Slow down or race to halt: towards managing complexity of real-time energy management decisions

Existing work in the context of energy management for real-time systems often ignores the substantial cost of making DVFS and sleep state decisions in terms of time and energy and/or assume very simple models. Within this paper we attempt to explore the parameter space for such decisions and possible constraints faced.

Working in IT projects – Options and Limits of Work Design

Flexible forms of work like project work are gaining importance in industry and services. Looking at the research on project work, the vast majority of present literature is on project management, but increasingly, problems concerning the quality of work and the efficiency of project teams become visible. The question now is how project work can be structured in order to simultaneously provide efficient and flexible work and healthy working conditions ensuring the development of human resources for a long time. Selected results of publicly funded research into project work will be presented based on case studies in 7 software development /IT consulting project teams (N=34). A set of different methods was applied: interviews with management/project managers, group interviews on work constraints, a monthly diary about well-being and critical incidences in the course of the project, and a final evaluation questionnaire on project outcomes focusing on economic and health aspects. Findings reveal that different types of projects exist with varying degree of team members’ autonomy and influence on work structuring. An effect of self-regulation on mental strain could not be found. The results emphasize, that contradicting requirements and insufficient organizational resources with respect to the work requirements lead to an increased work intensity or work obstruction. These contradicting requirements are identified as main drivers for generating stress. Finally, employees with high values on stress for more than 2 months have significantly higher exhaustion rates than those with only one month peaks. Structuring project work and taking into account the dynamics of project work, there is a need for an active role of the project team in contract negotiation or the detailed definition of work – this is not only a question of individual autonomy but of negotiation the range of option for work structuring. Therefore, along with the sequential definition of the (software) product, the working conditions need to be re-defined.

Simultaneous decisions or leadership in an international competition

In this paper, we study an international market with demand uncertainty. The model has two stages. In the first stage, the home government chooses an import tariff to maximize the revenue. Then, the firms engage in a Cournot or in a Stackelberg competition. The uncertainty is resolved between the decisions made by the home government and by the firms. We compare the results obtained in the three different ways of moving on the decision make of the firms.

Um estudo sobre práticas colaborativas em Intervenção precoce no contexto jardim de Infância/pré-escolar

Dissertação em Ciências da Educação- Especialidade Educação Especial

Design and implementation of an autonomous, proactive, and reactive software infrastructure to help improving the management level of projects

Dissertação apresentada na Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa para obtenção do grau de Mestre em Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores

Environmental Decision Support: a Distributed Artificial Intelligence Approach

Decision making in any environmental domain is a complex and demanding activity, justifying the development of dedicated decision support systems. Every decision is confronted with a large variety and amount of constraints to satisfy as well as contradictory interests that must be sensibly accommodated. The first stage of a project evaluation is its submission to the relevant group of public (and private) agencies. The individual role of each agency is to verify, within its domain of competence, the fulfilment of the set of applicable regulations. The scope of the involved agencies is wide and ranges from evaluation abilities on the technical or economical domains to evaluation competences on the environmental or social areas. The second project evaluation stage involves the gathering of the recommendations of the individual agencies and their justified merge to produce the final conclusion. The incorporation and accommodation of the consulted agencies opinions is of extreme importance: opinions may not only differ, but can be interdependent, complementary, irreconcilable or, simply, independent. The definition of adequate methodologies to sensibly merge, whenever possible, the existing perspectives while preserving the overall legality of the system, will lead to the making of sound justified decisions. The proposed Environmental Decision Support System models the project evaluation activity and aims to assist developers in the selection of adequate locations for their projects, guaranteeing their compliance with the applicable regulations.

Development of web services to help risk management of construction projects

Dissertação apresentada na Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa para obtenção do grau de Mestre em Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores

Metodologia das opções reais na avaliação de investimentos produtivos: aplicação de um modelo de uma variável estocástica

Os critérios neoclássicos de investimento ignoram três características fundamentais, presentes na grande maioria dos projetos de investimento produtivos, sendo elas a Flexibilidade, a Incerteza e a Irreversibilidade. Face a essas características, a abordagem das Opções Reais parece ser a única abordagem competente quando comparada com critérios como Payback, Taxa Interna de Rendibilidade ou Valor Atual Líquido. Com vista a confirmar estas afirmações, aplica-se a uma situação simulada o modelo de uma variável estocástica, que segue um processo estocástico, mais concretamente um Geometric Brownian Motion com drift, apresentado por Dixit e Pindyck (1994), modelo este que a par dos modelos de duas variáveis estocásticas, como são exemplos os desenvolvidos por McDonald e Siegel (1986) e Adkins e Paxson (2011), constituem aquele que é, tanto quanto sabemos, o “estado da arte” da temática. Com base nesta aplicação recolhemos evidências de que, de facto, através da consideração de oportunidades de investimento perspetivadas em Opções Reais diminuímos a probabilidade de incorrer em decisões de investimento que não são, de acordo com este critério, ótimas para maximizar o valor do projeto em questão.

Intelligent decision support systems for collaboration in industrial plants

Dissertação apresentada para obtenção do Grau de Doutor em Sistemas de Informação Industriais, Engenharia Electrotécnica, pela Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia

CDIO and the European Project Semester: a match for capstone projects?

The CDIO Initiative is an open innovative educational framework for engineering graduation degrees set in the context of Conceiving – Designing – Implementing – Operating real-world systems and products, which is embraced by a network of worldwide universities, the CDIO collaborators. A CDIO compliant engineering degree programme typically includes a capstone module on the final semester. Its purpose is to expose students to problems of a greater dimension and complexity than those faced throughout the degree programme as well as to put them in contact with the so-called real world, in opposition to the academic world. However, even in the CDIO context, there are barriers that separate engineering capstone students from the real world context of an engineering professional: (i) limited interaction with experts from diverse scientific areas; (ii) reduced cultural and scientific diversity within the teams; and (iii) lack of a project supportive framework to foster the complementary technical and non-technical skills required in an engineering professional. To address these shortcomings, we propose the adoption of the European Project Semester (EPS) framework, a one semester student centred international capstone programme offered by a group of European engineering schools (the EPS Providers) as part of their student exchange programme portfolio. The EPS package is organised around a central module – the EPS project – and a set of complementary supportive modules. Project proposals refer to open multidisciplinary real world problems and supervision becomes coaching. The students are organised in teams, grouping individuals from diverse academic backgrounds and nationalities, and each team is fully responsible for conducting its project. EPS complies with the CDIO directives on Design-Implement experiences and provides an integrated framework for undertaking capstone projects, which is focussed on multicultural and multidisciplinary teamwork, problem-solving, communication, creativity, leadership, entrepreneurship, ethical reasoning and global contextual analysis. As a result, we recommend the adoption of the EPS within CDIO capstone modules for the benefit of engineering students.

Aperfeiçoamento dos Métodos Utilizados, para a Orçamentação e Planeamento de Obras Rodoviárias

Este relatório foi realizado no âmbito da unidade curricular de DIPRE (Dissertação/Projecto/Estágio) lecionada no Mestrado em Engenharia Civil – Infraestruturas, no Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto. O estágio foi realizado na Divisão Municipal de Obras e Iluminação Pública, na Câmara Municipal do Porto. Neste relatório procurou-se descrever e caracterizar todos os tipos de pavimentos, desenvolver e estudar novas técnicas de orçamentação e planeamento, e ainda analisar vários casos para mostrar a validade do que se realizou. Este relatório inicia-se com uma primeira parte de âmbito teórico, em que se faz referência aos diferentes tipos de pavimentos, analisando-se o seu comportamento, execução, patologias e métodos de dimensionamento. Para além disso faz-se a interpretação do Decreto-Lei nº 163/2006 e das questões de mobilidade urbana. Para o estágio foram necessárias diversas ferramentas de trabalho, não só fornecidas pela Divisão Municipal de Obras e Iluminação Pública, mas também propostas e exploradas pelo aluno. Com estas ferramentas conseguiu-se desenvolver um novo método de orçamentação, estudando os Rendimentos dos operários para um maior rigor nas estimativas de custo efetuadas. As soluções que se apresentam para mostrar o trabalho desenvolvido foram escolhidas de acordo com a sua importância e abrangência para demonstrar tudo o que foi acompanhado e realizado durante o estágio. Começando pela Rua do Dr. Magalhães Lemos, que foi selecionada porque houve a oportunidade de acompanhar e fiscalizar uma obra que contempla a execução de dois pavimentos distintos, o pavimento flexível e o rígido, em Betão Armado Contínuo. Optou-se também por selecionar dois casos de melhoria da acessibilidade no centro da cidade, porque foram dois projetos desenvolvidos pelo aluno em que se conseguiu explorar as diferentes decisões que teve de se tomar. Por fim, apresenta-se o estudo do dimensionamento da Rua de Santo Ildefonso de acordo com as diretrizes da Câmara Municipal do Porto no percurso académico.

Massive Open Online Course management: learning science and engineering through peer-reviewed projects

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) are gaining prominence in transversal teaching-learning strategies. However, there are many issues still debated, namely assessment, recognized largely as a cornerstone in Education. The large number of students involved requires a redefinition of strategies that often use approaches based on tasks or challenging projects. In these conditions and due to this approach, assessment is made through peer-reviewed assignments and quizzes online. The peer-reviewed assignments are often based upon sample answers or topics, which guide the student in the task of evaluating peers. This chapter analyzes the grading and evaluation in MOOCs, especially in science and engineering courses, within the context of education and grading methodologies and discusses possible perspectives to pursue grading quality in massive e-learning courses.

Interpretative research in information systems: two qualitative research design projects

In a scientific research project is important to define the underlying philosophical orientation of the project, because this will influence the choices made in respect of scientific methods used, as well as the way they will be applied. It is crucial, therefore, that the philosophy and research design strategy are consistent with each other. These questions become even more relevant in qualitative research. Historically, the interpretive research philosophy is more associated to the scientific areas of social sciences and humanities where the subjectivity inherent to human intervention is more explicitly defined. Information systems field are, primarily, trapped in computer science field, though it also integrates issues related with management and organizations field. This shift from a purely technological guidance for the consideration of the problems of management and organizations has fostered the rise of research projects according to the interpretive philosophy and using qualitative methods. This paper explores the importance of alignment between the epistemological orientation and research design strategy, in qualitative research projects. As a result, it is presented two PhD projects, with different research design strategies, that are being developed in the technology and information systems field, in the light of the interpretive paradigm.

The development and implementation of math projects in a HEI: expectations, objectives, experiences and analysis

An overwhelming problem in Math Curriculums in Higher Education Institutions (HEI), we are daily facing in the last decade, is the substantial differences in Math background of our students. When you try to transmit, engage and teach subjects/contents that your “audience” is unable to respond to and/or even understand what we are trying to convey, it is somehow frustrating. In this sense, the Math projects and other didactic strategies, developed through Learning Management System Moodle, which include an array of activities that combine higher order thinking skills with math subjects and technology, for students of HE, appear as remedial but important, proactive and innovative measures in order to face and try to overcome these considerable problems. In this paper we will present some of these strategies, developed in some organic units of the Polytechnic Institute of Porto (IPP). But, how “fruitful” are the endless number of hours teachers spent in developing and implementing these platforms? Do students react to them as we would expect? Do they embrace this opportunity to overcome their difficulties? How do they use/interact individually with LMS platforms? Can this environment that provides the teacher with many interesting tools to improve the teaching – learning process, encourages students to reinforce their abilities and knowledge? In what way do they use each available material – videos, interactive tasks, texts, among others? What is the best way to assess student’s performance in these online learning environments? Learning Analytics tools provides us a huge amount of data, but how can we extract “good” and helpful information from them? These and many other questions still remain unanswered but we look forward to get some help in, at least, “get some drafts” for them because we feel that this “learning analysis”, that tackles the path from the objectives to the actual results, is perhaps the only way we have to move forward in the “best” learning and teaching direction.

Crescer com os desafios. Uma intervenção psicossocial em acolhimento institucional

O acolhimento institucional é concebido como uma medida com vista à promoção e proteção de crianças e jovens em risco. Esta resposta concretiza-se na capacidade de resposta dos Lares de Infância e Juventude e da especialização dos profissionais, tendo em conta as diferentes necessidades e caraterísticas dos educandos. A necessidade de compreender os jovens institucionalizados, como sujeitos participativos e com voz nas decisões que afectam as suas vidas, assume um especial significado para estes sujeitos se considerarmos que o impacte da institucionalização nas suas vidas influencia o seu desenvolvimento e a relação com os diferentes contextos nos quais se inserem. O presente Relatório reflete o desenvolvimento de um Projeto de investigação posicionado metodologicamente na Investigação-Acção Participativa, intitulado “Crescer com os desafios”, desenvolvido com jovens e educadores do LIJ. Este projeto teve como grande finalidade “Potenciar o “empowerment” dos jovens do LIJ no contexto institucional e escolar, favorecendo uma aprendizagem centrada nas suas necessidades e valorização do seu próprio processo educativo, através de uma intervenção psicossocial”. A finalidade deste Projeto e todos os objetivos propostos foram ao encontro dos problemas e necessidades priorizados pelos participantes, propondo-se, a partir de um conjunto de ações e atividades, alcançar a mudança. Os resultados deste Projeto revelam-se significativos, uma vez que promoveram um processo de reflexão e de partilha acerca dos desafios do acolhimento institucional, apontando para a necessidade de traçar linhas de intervenção adequadas às necessidades e ao percurso escolar de cada jovem.