How much is that data in the window? Advertising your research data with QUT Library

Queensland University of Technology (QUT) Library offers a range of resources and services to researchers as part of their research support portfolio. This poster will present key features of two of the data management services offered by research support staff at QUT Library. The first service is QUT Research Data Finder (RDF), a product of the Australian National Data Service (ANDS) funded Metadata Stores project. RDF is a data registry (metadata repository) that aims to publicise datasets that are research outputs arising from completed QUT research projects. The second is a software and code registry, which is currently under development with the sole purpose of improving discovery of source code and software as QUT research outputs. RESEARCH DATA FINDER As an integrated metadata repository, Research Data Finder aligns with institutional sources of truth, such as QUT’s research administration system, ResearchMaster, as well as QUT’s Academic Profiles system to provide high quality data descriptions that increase awareness of, and access to, shareable research data. The repository and its workflows are designed to foster better data management practices, enhance opportunities for collaboration and research, promote cross-disciplinary research and maximise the impact of existing research data sets. SOFTWARE AND CODE REGISTRY The QUT Library software and code registry project stems from concerns amongst researchers with regards to development activities, storage, accessibility, discoverability and impact, sharing, copyright and IP ownership of software and code. As a result, the Library is developing a registry for code and software research outputs, which will use existing Research Data Finder architecture. The underpinning software for both registries is VIVO, open source software developed by Cornell University. The registry will use the Research Data Finder service instance of VIVO and will include a searchable interface, links to code/software locations and metadata feeds to Research Data Australia. Key benefits of the project include:improving the discoverability and reuse of QUT researchers’ code and software amongst QUT and the QUT research community; increasing the profile of QUT research outputs on a national level by providing a metadata feed to Research Data Australia, and; improving the metrics for access and reuse of code and software in the repository.

Operationalizing Supply Chain vs. Supply Chain Competion

Competition is an immensely important area of study in economic theory, business and strategy. It is known to be vital in meeting consumers’ growing expectations, stimulating increase in the size of the market, pushing innovation, reducing cost and consequently generating better value for end users, among other things. Having said that, it is important to recognize that supply chains, as we know it, has changed the way companies deal with each other both in confrontational or conciliatory terms. As such, with the rise of global markets and outsourcing destinations, increased technological development in transportation, communication and telecommunications has meant that geographical barriers of distance with regards to competition are a thing of the past in an increasingly flat world. Even though the dominant articulation of competition within management and business literature rests mostly within economic competition theory, this thesis draws attention to the implicit shift in the recognition of other forms of competition in today’s business environment, especially those involving supply chain structures. Thus, there is popular agreement within a broad business arena that competition between companies is set to take place along their supply chains. Hence, management’s attention has been focused on how supply chains could become more aggressive making each firm in its supply chain more efficient. However, there is much disagreement on the mechanism through which such competition pitching supply chain against supply chain will take place. The purpose of this thesis therefore, is to develop and conceptualize the notion of supply chain vs. supply chain competition, within the discipline of supply chain management. The thesis proposes that competition between supply chains may be carried forward via the use of competition theories that emphasize interaction and dimensionality, hence, encountering friction from a number of sources in their search for critical resources and services. The thesis demonstrates how supply chain vs. supply chain competition may be carried out theoretically, using generated data for illustration, and practically using logistics centers as a way to provide a link between theory and corresponding practice of this evolving competition mode. The thesis concludes that supply chain vs. supply chain competition, no matter the conceptualization taken, is complex, novel and can be very easily distorted and abused. It therefore calls for the joint development of regulatory measures by practitioners and policymakers alike, to guide this developing mode of competition.

Helping ourselves: the role of self-help groups in poverty alleviation through aquaculture

Self-help groups (SHGs) are ways for farmers and fishers, especially those who are poor, to come together and work together. They can be a useful entry point for outsiders, promote a supportive local environment, strengthen voices in decision-making and in negotiations with more powerful forces, increase the effectiveness of local actions, and provide easier access to micro-credit and other resources and services. This case study describes a rural aquaculture development context, in India, the development of SHGs and the concept of a ‘one-stop aqua shop’, set up and run by a federation of self-help groups in Kaipara village, West Bengal (a pilot state along with Jharkhand and Orissa). It outlines testing new ways to share information, as part of a series of revised procedures and institutional arrangements for service delivery recommended by farmers and fishers and prioritized by government, with support from the Department of International Development, London (DFID) Natural Resources Support Programme (NRSP) and the Network of Aquaculture Centres in Asia-Pacific (NACA) to the Support to Regional Aquatic Resources Management (STREAM) Initiative (10 p.)

Self-Help Groups

“‘Self-Help Groups’ are … “... A way to start working that helps to build up the social connections which people find useful in support of their livelihoods objectives” “... Helping people to agree things and to speak together, giving people a stronger voice in decision-making and in negotiating with more powerful forces” “... A way of increasing the effectiveness of local actions” “... Providing easier access to micro-credit and other resources and services” (Pdf contains 4 pages).

Rompiendo la barrera de las 400 ppm: implicaciones físicas y sociales del reciente aumento de CO2

6 p.

400 ppm-ko langa hautsi da: CO2-kontzentrazioaren igoeraren ondorio fisiko eta sozialak

6 p.

九寨沟湖泊湿地植物群落与植物地理研究

九寨沟湖泊湿地在维持九寨沟的生态平衡中起着重要的作用，在旅游产业的发展下，湿地生态系统及生物多样性面临着较大的威胁。尽管九寨沟湿地具有重要的生态价值，但目前对其研究尚比较薄弱。湿地植物群落和植物地理研究可以为湿地资源的可持续利用和监测保护提供科学依据。作者从2004年8月到2007年11月对九寨沟湿地的植物物种组成、地理分布、优势植物群落的结构、生长动态、湿地土壤种子库进行了调查研究。主要结果如下： 1. 九寨沟湿地物种组成、地理分布特点及湿地植物群落特点 九寨沟湿地共有苔藓植物8科13属16种，维管植物为48科107属199种。九寨沟湿地植物的地理成份较为丰富，维管植物在科级水平上有7种地理分布型（变型），在属级水平上有13种地理分布型（变型）， 在种级水平上共有29种地理分布型（变型）。九寨沟湿地植物以温带成份和我国特有成份为主，同时兼有热带、亚热带成份和环极—高山成份。九寨沟湿地植物的分布表现出明显的垂直地带性和水平地带性。湿地植物群落可划分21个群落类型，不同植物群落类型的物种多样性及物种组成存在较大的差异。九寨沟湿地植物的物种多样性和群落多样性以及较高的生产力特征，是维持其湿地生态景观多样性和稳定性的基础。 2. 土壤、水环境、海拔等对湿地植物的分布及生物多样性的影响 九寨沟湿地土壤、水等环境因子存在较大的差异。帕米尔苔草和宽叶香蒲等群落的凋落物较多，土壤有机碳、土壤总磷较高，可能是九寨沟湿地的重要土壤碳库。 九寨沟湿地植物沿水环境梯度的分布规律表现为：沉水植物（轮藻—篦齿眼子菜，水苦荬，杉叶藻）——挺水植物（水木贼，芦苇，宽叶香蒲）——湿生草本（苔草、节节草、披散木贼）——湿生灌木（柳灌丛，小檗灌丛）等。海拔也影响湿地植物的物种组成。 水深对物种多样性有影响，水深与物种丰富度负相关。随着水深的增加，水木贼、芦苇、杉叶藻、宽叶香蒲等群落的物种多样性下降；在长期淹水和季节性淹水的地方，水木贼群落物种多样性存在显著差异。土壤总氮与水木贼群落物种丰富度正相关。 3. 土壤营养元素、水环境对植物生长的影响 水深影响湿地植物生物量的分配。芦苇无性系分株在47 cm水深的环境中单株平均生物量最大；在干滩地中（地面水深0 cm），叶生物量百分比最大，而茎生物量百分比最小，茎的生物量百分比和生长速率随水深的增加而增加；在较干的滩地生境中，开花率、花序的生物量百分比明显大于水较深的生境。 水深与水木贼地上生物量负相关，但水木贼地上生物量在长期淹水和季节性淹水的地方没有显著的差异。在水浅的地方，杉叶藻、水木贼、芦苇等植物群落中，其他伴生物种的生物量占样方总生物量的百分比较大。 土壤有机碳、土壤总氮、土壤总磷等对湿地植物生物量的影响比较大：宽叶香蒲地上生物量与土壤总磷正相关；水木贼地上生物量与土壤总氮正相关；杉叶藻地上生物量与土壤有机碳正相关。 水深、土壤营养成分对湿地植物高度、密度等有影响。水木贼的平均高度在季节性淹水的地方比长期淹水的地方低，平均密度在长期淹水的地方比季节性淹水的地方低；除了5月份，其他观察月份水木贼的密度都与水深负相关，同时与土壤有机碳正相关。另外，芦苇密度与土壤有机碳含量正相关，宽叶香蒲密度与水深负相关，帕米尔苔草高度与土壤有机碳负相关。 4. 优势植物群落的动态变化 在优势植物群落中，优势种的高度、密度、盖度、生物量等在群落中占绝对优势。除五花海，水木贼群落的物种组成、高度、生物量在两年间没有显著的变化。芦苇群落的物种丰富度在近两年有所增加。 湿地植物生长表现为明显的季节动态，生长的峰值大多在7月－8月。优势植物群落的物候与水文周期有关。湿地植物群落的物种组成和密度，可以作为对湿地监测和保护的生物指示。 5. 九寨沟湿地土壤种子库特征及其在湿地生物多样性恢复中的作用 水深和现存植被物种丰富度可以解释湿地土壤种子库的变化。水深可以解释表层物种丰富度45%的变化。现存植被物种丰富度可以分别解释10 cm土层、2－5 cm土层及5－10 cm土层土壤种子库45%、48%和25%的变化。 湿地土壤种子库的密度为0－15945粒m-2, 种子库中共发现23个物种。现存植被优势物种和种子库优势物种不同。各层土壤种子库密度和物种丰富度并不存在显著的差异，但第二层土壤种子库密度最大。海拔、现存植被优势种盖度、土壤总磷、土壤总氮、土壤有机碳对湿地土壤种子库的密度和垂直结构没有影响。土壤种子库物种丰富度小于地上植被物种丰富度。湿地土壤种子库与地上植被的相关性不大。在浅水区域，湿地土壤种子库在湿地植被恢复中有一定作用。但在深水区域，保护现存植被更重要。 The lakeshore wetlands are valuable ecological units of the Jiuzhaigou lakes. Pressure for travel industry development pose a continuing and severe threat to the biodiversity-support function of the wetland system. Despite the ecological importance of wetlands in Jiuzhaigou, they are so far poorly studied. Both general plant communties and biogeographical studies are needed in order to attain basis for sustainable use the wetland resources and adequate protection of these areas. The present study was undertaken to examine aquatic plants distribution and the species compositon, structure and growth dynamics of their communities with variations of environmental factors along altitudes, water depth and soil properities gradients in Jiuzhaigou. Analysis of field survey data collected during August 2004 and November 2007 in lakeshore wetlands in Jiuzhaigou National Nature Reserve, Sichuan, China. The results were as following: (i) Species composition and biogeography in wetland vegetation 8 families, 13 genus, 16 species of moss and 48 families, 107 genus and 199 species of vascular plants in Jiuzhaigou wetlands were found. The floristic compositions were abundunt. Ten geographical distribution types at family level, 13 geographical distributions types at generic level and 29 geographical distribution types at specific level in vascular plants were found. Most species in Jiuzhaigou wetlands are temperate elements and Chinese endemic elements, with a few of tropical and subtropical and some circumarctic elements. And the plant distributions show clear vertical and horizontal patterns. There were 21 major wetland plant community types. Species composition and species richness in different plant communities are different. The species diversity and plant community diversity and their high biomass are the basis for the diversity and stability of wetland landscapes in Jiuzhaigou. (ii) Water depth, soil nutrients and altitudes influence on the species diversity and plant distribution. Total phosphorous and organic cabon in soil were higher in C. pamiernensis and T. latifolia communities, where are important cabon reservoirs in Jiuzhaigou wetlands. Along gradients of water depth, among populations of the dominant plant species present: submerged macrophytes (Chara vulgaris, Potagemonton pectinatus, Veronica anagalis-aquatica，Hippuris vulgaris), emergent macrophytes (Equisetum fluviatile, Phragamites australis, Typha latifolia), helophytes (Carex pamirensis )and shrubs (Salix sp., Berberis sp. ). Altitudes influence on the assemblage of plant communities. Water depth negatively correlated with species richness. Specie richness showed differences between permanently flooded sites and seasonally flooded sites in E. fluvatile communities. And total nitrogen in soil was negatively correlated with species richness in E. fluviatile communities. Altitudes show no significant influence on species richness, but in fact, through our analyses, they do have influence on the assemblage of wetland plants. (iii) Water depth, soil nutrients influence on the plant growth Water depth influences the biomass allocation in Phragmities australis. The average aboveground biomass of a single ramet (4.2 g) was the largest in the habitat with water level 47 cm above the soil surface. At the habitat with water level under soil surface 15 cm (－15 cm), the leaf biomass percentage (of the total ramet biomass) was the largest (46.1%), and the height and percentage of ramose ramets ( with branches on stem )(of the total ramets in a plot) were found obviously different. The deeper in water, the larger the biomass percentage and growth rate of stems were. The flowering rate and biomass of panicles were greater in shallow water than those in deep water. Water depth negatively correlated with aboveground biomass of E. fluviatile. However, above-ground biomass of E. fluviatile showed no significant difference between permanently flooded sites and seasonally flooded sites. But in shallow water, more biomasses of accompanying species were found in dominant plant communities such as H. vulgaris communities, E. fluviatile communities and P. australis communities. Water depth, soil nutrients influence on shoot density and shoot length of wetland plants. The shoot density of E. fluviatile was correlated to water depth in all growth months. Annual average density was significantly lower at permanently flooded sites than at seasonally flooded sites. But the annual average shoot length was significantly lower at seasonally flooded sites than at permanently flooded sites. (iv) Growth dynamics of dominant communities in Jiuzhaigou wetland The shoot length and shoot density, coverage and biomass of domiant species were dominated in plant communities. The species composition increased in P. australis communities in recent two years. The species richness in E. fluviatile communities showed no difference between 2005 and 2007. The above-ground biomass and shoot density in Five－flower Lake from July 2005 to July 2007 were significantly different, while in other sites, the differences were not significant. Shoot height, shoot density and above-ground biomass showed significant seasonal changes in all sites. Growth dynamics correlated with the cycle of water levels in lakes. Most plants growth parameters peaked at July or August. The biomass of T. latifolia peaked in August. But the shoot length of T. latifolia in deeper water peaked in July. The shoot length of E. fluviatile increased significantly from May to August except in seasonally flooded sites in Arrow-bamboo Lake. The species composition of communities and shoot density can be used as bioindicators in Jiuzhaigou wetland. (v) Soil seed bank in Jiuzhaigou wetland and its role in vegetation restoration Seed density in all soil layer samples was negatively correlated to water depth. Water depth can explain 45% variance of species richness in surface layer in sediment. Species richness in extant vegetation can explain 45%, 48%, 25% variance of species richness in total 10 cm and in 2－5 cm and 5－10 cm layer sediment respectively. Mean seed densities in wetlands ranged from 0 to 15945 m–2. A total of 23 species germinated in seed bank. The dominant species in seed bank and extant vegetation showed great difference. The total number of species and seedlings that germinated in different layers was not significantly different. But the second layer had the greatest seed density. In shallow water, seed bank can contribute to vegetation restoration, while in deeper water, protection of extant vegetation may be a better strategy.

LibQUAL+ Survey 2004 @ Queen's University Library : analysis of results

Queen's University Library was one of 202 libraries, including 57 members of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), to survey its users in spring 2004 using the LibQUAL+ survey instrument. LibQUAL+ was designed by ARL to assist libraries in assessing the quality of their services and identifying areas for improvement. # Overall: Queen's scored higher than the average for all ARL participants and 1st among the 2004 Canadian participants. This relatively high rating is due to very high scores in the dimensions of Library as Place and Affect of Service. However, there is considerable need for improvement in the area of Information Control where Queen's rated well below the ARL average. # Affect of Service: Queen's strong overall ratings are supported by the many respondent comments praising customer service throughout the system. The ratings and survey comments indicate greatest appreciation by faculty and more experienced students (e.g. graduate students) for the instruction and on-site services provided by the libraries. The ratings also indicate that undergraduates, growing up with the web, want and expected to be able to access library resources independently and do not value these services as highly. The comments also indicated some specific areas for improvement throughout the library system. # Library as Place : All Queen's libraries except for Law ranked well above the ARL and Canadian averages. Overall, Library as Place ranked lowest in importance among the service dimensions for all ARL participants including Queen's. Comparative analysis of LibQUAL results since the survey began shows a decline in “desired” ratings for Library as Place. However, undergraduates continue to give strong "desired" ratings to certain aspects of Library as Place and a relatively high rating for "minimum expected" service. The comments from Queen's survey respondents and ARL's analyses of focus groups indicate that undergraduates value the library much more as a place to study and work with peers rather than for its on-site resources and services. # Information Control: This is the area in greatest need of attention. While it ranked highest in importance for all user groups by a wide margin, Queen's performed poorly in this category. Overall, Queen's ranked far below both the ARL average and the top three Canadian scores. However, the major dissatisfaction was concentrated in the humanities/social sciences (Stauffer primary users) and the health sciences (Bracken primary users) where the overall rating of perceived service quality ranked below the minimum expected service rating. Primary users of the Education, Engineering/Science and Law libraries rated this service dimension higher than the ARL average. The great success of the Canadian National Site License Program (CNSLP) is reflected in the high overall rating generated by Engineering/Science Library users. The low ratings from the humanities and social sciences are supported by respondents' comments and are generally consistent with other ARL participants.

Definição de uma política de água sustentável em Portugal: proposta de modelo financeiro

O presente trabalho aborda de que forma a Análise Económica pode contribuir para a definição de uma Política Pública da Água sustentável para Portugal. Analisam-se, inicialmente, as particularidades do recurso e o seu enquadramento legislativo, institucional, bem como as respectivas implicações no processo de gestão da água. Esta análise conduz à definição daquilo a que se chamará ―Novo Modelo de Gestão da Água‖. Tendo por enquadramento a Directiva-Quadro da Água (DQA) — Directiva 2000/60/CE de 23 de Outubro de 2000, publicada no Jornal Oficial das Comunidades Europeias, em 22 de Dezembro do mesmo ano — é ilustrada a aplicação dos conceitos e a abordagem desenvolvida na definição de uma estratégia política de actuação para Portugal, de modo a assegurar o seu cumprimento de forma eficaz, eficiente e sustentável. São discutidos os aspectos económicos e a justificação teórica para a intervenção nos mercados, nomeadamente através do desenvolvimento de sistemas de tarifas. As formas de financiamento do sector, à luz do princípio da recuperação de custos, são analisados propondo-se a chamada visão dos 4T. Dado o contexto de análise do sector da água, enquanto política pública, são referenciados os vários de tipos de regulação e as várias reformas propostas pelos principais investigadores e organizações internacionais. Neste contexto de análise é abordada a governação (governance) e os seus atributos. São enunciados os principais entraves a uma governação eficiente. As várias formas de participação do capital privado, bem como a descrição de algumas das suas potencialidades são postas em evidência. A partir de um modelo analítico procede-se ao estudo dos efeitos do uso de vários instrumentos económicos, nomeadamente a nível do bem-estar. Analisa-se o modelo institucional português, nas suas vertentes, legislativa e institucional. O estado dos recursos hídricos e dos serviços de água em Portugal é avaliado a partir de dados oficiais. Com base na identificação das restrições do actual modelo institucional, é proposto um novo modelo que responda de forma flexível e atempada às solicitações postas pela Directiva. Propõe se a criação de uma instituição financeira — o ―Banco da Água‖ — que, em condições de mercado, possa financiar os investimentos estruturais necessários à melhoria da qualidade dos recursos hídricos, bem como dos serviços associados à água. Pretende demonstrar-se que, face às restrições orçamentais, à esperada conclusão do Quadro de Referência Estratégico Nacional (QREN) e às limitações dos chamados project finance esta solução será necessária para o sucesso da Política Pública da Água. A criação de condições para um maior papel da iniciativa privada, uma legislação protectora do consumidor, a aplicação de instrumentos de política da água — nomeadamente sistemas de tarifas e a criação de um Fundo de Equilíbrio Tarifário —, e o uso da metodologia Oikomatrix, nas políticas sectoriais, são outras das sugestões que completam as propostas avançadas tendentes a que o Sector da Água mimize algumas das ineficiências detectadas e almeje à desejável sustentabilidade.

Establishment of stackable community networks

Uma das áreas de investigação em Telecomunicações de interesse crescente prende-se com os futuros sistemas de comunicações móveis de 4a geração e além destes. Nos últimos anos tem sido desenvolvido o conceito de redes comunitárias, no qual os utilizadores se agregam de acordo com interesses comuns. Estes conceitos têm sido explorados de uma forma horizontal em diferentes camadas da comunicação, desde as redes comunitárias de comunicação (Seattle Wireless ou Personal Telco, p.ex.) até às redes de interesses peer-to-peer. No entanto, estas redes são usualmente vistas como redes de overlay, ou simplesmente redes de associação livre. Na prática, a noção de uma rede auto-organizada, completamente orientada ao serviço/comunidade, integralmente suportada em termos de arquitetura, não existe. Assim este trabalho apresenta uma realização original nesta área de criação de redes comunitárias, com uma arquitetura subjacente orientada a serviço, e que suporta integralmente múltiplas redes comunitárias no mesmo dispositivo, com todas as características de segurança, confiança e disponibilização de serviço necessárias neste tipo de cenários (um nó pode pertencer simultaneamente a mais do que uma rede comunitária). Devido à sua importância para os sistemas de redes comunitárias, foi dado particular atenção a aspetos de gestão de recursos e controlo de acessos. Ambos realizados de uma forma descentralizada e considerando mecanismos dotados de grande escalabilidade. Para isso, é apresentada uma linguagem de políticas que suporta a criação de comunidades virtuais. Esta linguagem não é apenas utilizada para o mapeamento da estrutura social dos membros da comunidade, como para, gerir dispositivos, recursos e serviços detidos pelos membros, de uma forma controlada e distribuída.

Promoção da acessibilidade em televisão interativa (iTV) : proposta de um serviço adaptado a utilizadores com défice visual

As infraestruturas de televisão interativa atualmente existentes possibilitam a integração de uma grande variedade de recursos e serviços, possibilitando aos utilizadores novas experiências de interação e participação. Para a maioria dos telespetadores, o uso de serviços interativos não acarreta grandes dificuldades; no entanto, para públicos com necessidades especiais, por exemplo para pessoas com défice visual, essa tarefa torna-se complexa, dificultando, ou mesmo impedindo, que estes utilizadores possam beneficiar deste tipo de serviços. Portugal não é uma exceção neste contexto, existindo um número significativo de utilizadores com défice visual (UDV) que não beneficiam totalmente das potencialidades do paradigma televisivo atual. Neste âmbito, o projeto de investigação que suporta esta tese explora a problemática do Design Universal aplicado à Televisão Interativa (iTV) e tem como objetivos a conceptualização, prototipagem e validação de um serviço de iTV adaptado especificamente a UDV, visando promover a sua inclusão digital. Para cumprir estes objetivos, a investigação dividiu-se em três etapas distintas. Na primeira etapa, a partir da Teoria Fundamentada nos Dados, foram identificadas as dificuldades e necessidades dos UDV enquanto consumidores de conteúdos televisivos e serviços de audiodescrição; foi selecionada a plataforma tecnológica mais adequada para o suporte do serviço prototipado; e foi definido um conjunto de princípios orientadores de design (POD’s) de interfaces de televisão interativa específico para este público-alvo. Inicialmente foram efetuadas duas entrevistas a 20 participantes com défice visual, para determinar as suas dificuldades e necessidades enquanto consumidores de conteúdos televisivos e serviços de audiodescrição. De seguida, foi realizada uma entrevista a um perito responsável pelo processo de transição para a TDT em Portugal (inicialmente considerou-se que a TDT seria uma plataforma promissora e poderia suportar o protótipo) e efetuada a revisão da literatura sobre POD’s para o desenvolvimento de interfaces para serviços iTV dirigidos a pessoas com défice visual. A partir dos resultados obtidos nesta etapa foi possível definir os requisitos funcionais e técnicos do sistema, bem como os seus PODs, tanto ao nível da componente gráfica, como de interação. Na segunda etapa foi concetualizado e desenvolvido o protótipo iTV adaptado a UDV ‘meo ad+’, com recurso à plataforma tecnológica IPTV da Portugal Telecom, seguindo os requisitos e os princípios de design definidos. Relativamente à terceira etapa, esta contemplou a avaliação do serviço prototipado, por parte de um grupo de participantes com défice visual. Esta fase do trabalho foi conduzida através do método de Estudo Avaliativo, possibilitando, através de testes de usabilidade e acessibilidade, complementados com entrevistas, compreender se o serviço prototipado ia efetivamente ao encontro das necessidades deste tipo de utilizadores, tendo-se observado que os participantes que estiveram envolvidos nos testes ao protótipo mostraram-se satisfeitos com as funcionalidades oferecidas pelo sistema, bem como com o design da sua interface.

Enabling Scientific Workflow Sharing through Coarse-Grained Interoperability

E-scientists want to run their scientific experiments on Distributed Computing Infrastructures (DCI) to be able to access large pools of resources and services. To run experiments on these infrastructures requires specific expertise that e-scientists may not have. Workflows can hide resources and services as a virtualization layer providing a user interface that e-scientists can use. There are many workflow systems used by research communities but they are not interoperable. To learn a workflow system and create workflows in this workflow system may require significant efforts from e-scientists. Considering these efforts it is not reasonable to expect that research communities will learn new workflow systems if they want to run workflows developed in other workflow systems. The solution is to create workflow interoperability solutions to allow workflow sharing. The FP7 Sharing Interoperable Workflow for Large-Scale Scientific Simulation on Available DCIs (SHIWA) project developed two interoperability solutions to support workflow sharing: Coarse-Grained Interoperability (CGI) and Fine-Grained Interoperability (FGI). The project created the SHIWA Simulation Platform (SSP) to implement the Coarse-Grained Interoperability approach as a production-level service for research communities. The paper describes the CGI approach and how it enables sharing and combining existing workflows into complex applications and run them on Distributed Computing Infrastructures. The paper also outlines the architecture, components and usage scenarios of the simulation platform.

m-SportGIS

Information technologies (ITs), and sports resources and services aid the potential to transform governmental organizations, and play an important role in contributing to sustainable communities development, respectively. Spatial data is a crucial source to support sports planning and management. Low-cost mobile geospatial tools bring productive and accurate data collection, and their use combining a handy and customized graphical user interface (GUI) (forms, mapping, media support) is still in an early stage. Recognizing the benefits — efficiency, effectiveness, proximity to citizens — that Mozambican Minister of Youth and Sports (MJD) can achieve with information resulted from the employment of a low-cost data collection platform, this project presents the development of a mobile mapping application (app) — m-SportGIS — under Open Source (OS) technologies and a customized evolutionary software methodology. The app development embraced the combination of mobile web technologies and Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) (e.g. Sencha Touch (ST), Apache Cordova, OpenLayers) to deploy a native-to-the-device (Android operating system) product, taking advantage of device’s capabilities (e.g. File system, Geolocation, Camera). In addition to an integrated Web Map Service (WMS), was created a local and customized Tile Map Service (TMS) to serve up cached data, regarding the IT infrastructures limitations in several Mozambican regions. m-SportGIS is currently being exploited by Mozambican Government staff to inventory all kind of sports facilities, which resulted and stored data feeds a WebGIS platform to manage Mozambican sports resources.

Resource Sharing Among Engineering College Libraries Affiliated To Mahatma Gandhi University, Kerala: A Proposed Model

There are around 150 engineering colleges (ECs) in Kerala under the government, aided and self financing (S.F.) sectors. While the college libraries in the government and aided sectors receive several grants, the libraries of S.F. colleges are solely run by their own funds. The rising costs of scholarly publications and strict AICTE stipulations regarding libraries and their collection, pose great difficulties to the libraries in all sectors in finding adequate budgets to provide quality services. Library cooperation/resource sharing helps to overcome this problem to a considerable extent. The present study analysed the facilities and services of the ECs affiliated to M.G.University, Kerala to identify whether there is a need for resource sharing (RS) among these libraries. The satisfaction of the users with their library resources and services were also ascertained. The study put forward a model for RS and the opinion of the librarians and users regarding the same were collected. Structured questionnaires were used to collect the required data. The study revealed that a wide gap exist between the libraries with respect to their facilities and services and many of the S.F. libraries have better infrastructure when compared to the government and aided college libraries. Majority of the respondents opined that RS is necessary to satisfy their information needs. The model of RS proposed by the study was widely accepted by the librarians and users. Based on the opinions and suggestions of the respondents, the study developed the potential model for resource sharing- the Virtual Resource Sharing Centre (VRSC).

e-Research Methods Theme 3: Literature Review

This theme helps you to develop search strategies, select search terms and appraise references you retrieve in order to differentiate between helpful and irrelevant literature sources. In addition, it looks at ways in which you can manage your references and develop understanding and skills to become an effective and efficient user of Library resources and services.