Australia : LIS education

The topic of library and information science (LIS) education has been under the spotlight in the professional literature in Australia and New Zealand for a number of years. Critical issues of discussion encompass the apparent lack of a core curriculum for the discipline, the perceived gulf between LIS education and LIS practice, and the pressing need for career-long learning and development. One of the central points of debate that emerges repeatedly is the long-standing question about the positioning of the profession: Is LIS a graduate profession of highly skilled individuals valued for their expertise and professionalism or is it a profession of anyone who works in a library, regardless of their qualifications (LIANZA, 2005)? While Australia and New Zealand do not stand alone in this debate – similar issues are echoed in many other countries – there are inevitably some local characteristics which warrant exploration. The discussion presented here highlights the historical background to professional training, the specific professional policies and standards that guide LIS education and some of the challenges facing professional and paraprofessional education, given the changing environment of education in Australia as a whole, with some comparisons made with the New Zealand situation. While all too often library practitioners point the finger at the library educators to ‘right the wrongs’, the authors wish to reinforce the idea that the future of effective and relevant LIS education is a matter for all stakeholders in the profession: practitioners and educators, students and staff, employers and employees, with cohesion potentially offered by the professional body.

Towards an acoustic environmental observatory

The need for large scale environmental monitoring to manage environmental change is well established. Ecologists have long used acoustics as a means of monitoring the environment in their field work, and so the value of an acoustic environmental observatory is evident. However, the volume of data generated by such an observatory would quickly overwhelm even the most fervent scientist using traditional methods. In this paper we present our steps towards realising a complete acoustic environmental observatory - i.e. a cohesive set of hardware sensors, management utilities, and analytical tools required for large scale environmental monitoring. Concrete examples of these elements, which are in active use by ecological scientists, are also presented

Mining trading partners’ preferences for efficient multi-issue bargaining in E‑business

Classical negotiation models are weak in supporting real-world business negotiations because these models often assume that the preference information of each negotiator is made public. Although parametric learning methods have been proposed for acquiring the preference information of negotiation opponents, these methods suffer from the strong assumptions about the specific utility function and negotiation mechanism employed by the opponents. Consequently, it is difficult to apply these learning methods to the heterogeneous negotiation agents participating in e‑marketplaces. This paper illustrates the design, development, and evaluation of a nonparametric negotiation knowledge discovery method which is underpinned by the well-known Bayesian learning paradigm. According to our empirical testing, the novel knowledge discovery method can speed up the negotiation processes while maintaining negotiation effectiveness. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first nonparametric negotiation knowledge discovery method developed and evaluated in the context of multi-issue bargaining over e‑marketplaces.

Modeling web search : preliminary results

This paper reports preliminary results from a study modeling the interplay between multitasking, cognitive coordination, and cognitive shifts during Web search. Study participants conducted three Web searches on personal information problems. Data collection techniques included pre- and post-search questionnaires; think-aloud protocols, Web search logs, observation, and post-search interviews. Key findings include: (1) users Web searches included multitasking, cognitive shifting and cognitive coordination processes, (2) cognitive coordination is the hinge linking multitasking and cognitive shifting that enables Web search construction, (3) cognitive shift levels determine the process of cognitive coordination, and (4) cognitive coordination is interplay of task, mechanism and strategy levels that underpin multitasking and task switching. An initial model depicts the interplay between multitasking, cognitive coordination, and cognitive shifts during Web search. Implications of the findings and further research are also discussed.

YAWL : power through patterns

Workflow Management Systems (WfMSs) enable the development and maintenance of workflow specifications at design time and their execution and monitoring at runtime. The open source WfMS YAWL supports the YAWL language – a formally defined language based on Petri nets which offers comprehensive support for control-flow and resource patterns. In addition, the YAWL system provides extensive support for process flexibility, in particular for process configuration, exception handling, dynamic workflow and declarative workflow. Due to its formal foundation, sophisticated verification support can also be achieved. This paper presents the YAWL system and its main applications.

Towards automatic tree crown detection and delineation in spectral feature space using PCNN and morphological reconstruction

The application of object-based approaches to the problem of extracting vegetation information from images requires accurate delineation of individual tree crowns. This paper presents an automated method for individual tree crown detection and delineation by applying a simplified PCNN model in spectral feature space followed by post-processing using morphological reconstruction. The algorithm was tested on high resolution multi-spectral aerial images and the results are compared with two existing image segmentation algorithms. The results demonstrate that our algorithm outperforms the other two solutions with the average accuracy of 81.8%.

Managing Process Model Complexity - Part I: Concrete Syntax

While Business Process Management (BPM) is an established discipline, the increased adoption of BPM technology in recent years has introduced new challenges. One challenge concerns dealing with process model complexity in order to improve the understanding of a process model by stakeholders and process analysts. Features for dealing with this complexity can be classified in two categories: 1) those that are solely concerned with the appearance of the model, and 2) those that in essence change the structure of the model. In this paper we focus on the former category and present a collection of patterns that generalize and conceptualize various existing features. The paper concludes with a detailed analysis of the degree of support of a number of state-of-the-art languages and language implementations for these patterns.

A Vision Based Target Detection System for Docking of an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle

This paper describes the development and preliminary experimental evaluation of a visionbased docking system to allow an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) to identify and attach itself to a set of uniquely identifiable targets. These targets, docking poles, are detected using Haar rectangular features and rotation of integral images. A non-holonomic controller allows the Starbug AUV to orient itself with respect to the target whilst maintaining visual contact during the manoeuvre. Experimental results show the proposed vision system is capable of robustly identifying a pair of docking poles simultaneously in a variety of orientations and lighting conditions. Experiments in an outdoor pool show that this vision system enables the AUV to dock autonomously from a distance of up to 4m with relatively low visibility.

The susceptibility of digital signatures to fraud in the National Electronic Conveyancing System : an analysis

Public key cryptography, and with it,the ability to compute digital signatures, have made it possible for electronic commerce to flourish. It is thus unsurprising that the proposed Australian NECS will also utilise digital signatures in its system so as to provide a fully automated process from the creation of electronic land title instrument to the digital signing, and electronic lodgment of these instruments. This necessitates an analysis of the fraud risks raised by the usage of digital signatures because a compromise of the integrity of digital signatures will lead to a compromise of the Torrens system itself. This article will show that digital signatures may in fact offer greater security against fraud than handwritten signatures; but to achieve this, digital signatures require an infrastructure whereby each component is properly implemented and managed.

Efficient one-round key exchange in the standard model

We consider one-round key exchange protocols secure in the standard model. The security analysis uses the powerful security model of Canetti and Krawczyk and a natural extension of it to the ID-based setting. It is shown how KEMs can be used in a generic way to obtain two different protocol designs with progressively stronger security guarantees. A detailed analysis of the performance of the protocols is included; surprisingly, when instantiated with specific KEM constructions, the resulting protocols are competitive with the best previous schemes that have proofs only in the random oracle model.

Efficient one-round key exchange in the efficient one-round key exchange in the standard model

We consider one-round key exchange protocols secure in the standard model. The security analysis uses the powerful security model of Canetti and Krawczyk and a natural extension of it to the ID-based setting. It is shown how KEMs can be used in a generic way to obtain two different protocol designs with progressively stronger security guarantees. A detailed analysis of the performance of the protocols is included; surprisingly, when instantiated with specific KEM constructions, the resulting protocols are competitive with the best previous schemes that have proofs only in the random oracle model.

Efficient one-round key exchange in the standard model

We consider one-round key exchange protocols secure in the standard model. The security analysis uses the powerful security model of Canetti and Krawczyk and a natural extension of it to the ID-based setting. It is shown how KEMs can be used in a generic way to obtain two different protocol designs with progressively stronger security guarantees. A detailed analysis of the performance of the protocols is included; surprisingly, when instantiated with specific KEM constructions, the resulting protocols are competitive with the best previous schemes that have proofs only in the random oracle model.

Improving the Traversal of Large Hierarchical Process Repositories

Business Process Management (BPM) has increased in popularity and maturity in recent years. Large enterprises engage use process management approaches to model, manage and refine repositories of process models that detail the whole enterprise. These process models can run to the thousands in number, and may contain large hierarchies of tasks and control structures that become cumbersome to maintain. Tools are therefore needed to effectively traverse this process model space in an efficient manner, otherwise the repositories remain hard to use, and thus are lowered in their effectiveness. In this paper we analyse a range of BPM tools for their effectiveness in handling large process models. We establish that the present set of commercial tools is lacking in key areas regarding visualisation of, and interaction with, large process models. We then present six tool functionalities for the development of advanced business process visualisation and interaction, presenting a design for a tool that will exploit the latest advances in 2D and 3D computer graphics to enable fast and efficient search, traversal and modification of process models.

State-of-the-Art Review on Opinion Mining from Online Customers’ Feedback

Dealing with the ever-growing information overload in the Internet, Recommender Systems are widely used online to suggest potential customers item they may like or find useful. Collaborative Filtering is the most popular techniques for Recommender Systems which collects opinions from customers in the form of ratings on items, services or service providers. In addition to the customer rating about a service provider, there is also a good number of online customer feedback information available over the Internet as customer reviews, comments, newsgroups post, discussion forums or blogs which is collectively called user generated contents. This information can be used to generate the public reputation of the service providers’. To do this, data mining techniques, specially recently emerged opinion mining could be a useful tool. In this paper we present a state of the art review of Opinion Mining from online customer feedback. We critically evaluate the existing work and expose cutting edge area of interest in opinion mining. We also classify the approaches taken by different researchers into several categories and sub-categories. Each of those steps is analyzed with their strength and limitations in this paper.