In the kingdom of the blind: successfully implementing institutional repositories in the UK and the SHERPA Partnership experience

This paper takes an overview of the work of SHERPA team and the SHERPA Partnership institutions in the area of developing, populating and maintaining institutional open access repositories. Crucial to this work has been the development of mutually supporting and enabling Partnership community, something which has been now recognised as needed by institutions who lie outside of it. To this end SHERPA is involved in efforts to support the individuals and institutions across the UK and Europe whom are engaging with the open access agenda on a practical level; through setting up community networks and disseminating experience. Key in the experience of the Partnership has been the role of advocacy of open access and repositories to the institutional research community. Whilst this experience has been unique to each institution, there are many shared lessons and best practice that the Partnership has recently reflected on, and that are articulated within this paper. Finally brief coverage on some of the vital community tools developed and maintained by SHERPA, and reflections on the evolving direction of open access in the UK are made.

SAP-Related Education - Status-Quo and Experience

Integrating Enterprise Systems solutions in the curriculum of not only universities but all types of institutes of higher learning has been a major challenge for nearly ten years. Enterprise Systems education is surprisingly well documented in a number of papers on Information Systems education. However, most publications in this area report on the individual experiences of an institution or an academic. This paper focuses on the most popular Enterprise System - SAP - and summarizes the outcomes of a global survey on the status quo of SAP-related education. Based on feedback of 305 lecturers and more than 700 students, it reports on the main factors of Enterprise Systems education including, critical success factors, alternative hosting models, and students’ perceptions. The results show among others an overall increasing interest in advanced SAP solutions and international collaboration, and a high satisfaction with the concept of using Application Hosting Centers.

Best after rain : waterfall discharges and the tourist experience

Waterfalls attract tourists because they are aesthetically appealing landscape features that are not part of everyday experience. It is generally understood that falls are usually seen at their best when there is a copious flow of water, especially after heavy rain. Guidebooks often contain this observation when referring to waterfalls, sometimes warning readers that the flow may be severely reduced during dry periods. Indeed, many visitors are disappointed when they see falls at such times. Some are saddened when the discharge of a waterfall has been depleted by the abstraction of water upstream for power generation or other purposes. While, for those in search of the Sublime or merely the superlative, size is often important, small waterfalls can give great pleasure to lovers of landscape beauty. According to guidebooks, however, even these falls are usually best seen after rain. Drawing on tourist and travel literature and personal journals from the eighteenth century to the present, and with reference to examples from different parts of the world, this paper discusses the importance of discharge in the tourist experience of waterfalls.