电信运营企业物流信息化建设问题的探讨

在我国电信运营企业内部运作效率的自我提升和SOX法案内控机制要求的大背景下,如何在前端市场激烈竞争的环境下提供持续优质的后勤支持服务,并使这样的服务能实现高效率低成本?如何管理庞大而复杂的资产,尽快全面满足SOX法案严格的内控要求?问题集中在构建一个高效的电信企业供应链系统,通过物流信息化建设来实现集约化的电信企业物流运作。     

广西乐滩水库引水灌区工程取水口设计

概述了广西乐滩水库引水灌区工程进水口部分单项工程的基本情况,阐述了取水口设计的过程,并提出了该灌区引水工程取水口设计时应注意的问题。     

对中国城镇燃气行业发展问题的思考

城镇燃气供应直接影响经济竞争力和人民生活质量,而且已日益成为国民经济中具有先导性、全局性的基础产业。中国城镇燃气行业发展存在着供需矛盾突出、投资主体相对单一等问题。中国城镇燃气行业发展应通过实施合理制定燃气价格、打破垄断,实现有效竞争、构建多元化的投资主体格局、完善燃气行业法律法规等措施才能有效地推动中国城镇燃气行业的健康发展。     

Automation and artificial intelligence in business logistics systems: human reactions and collaboration requirements

Increasing application areas and depths of autonomous systems in logistics provide a new level of challenge for the analysis and design of human–machine interaction concepts. Due to scarce high-skilled personnel in several regions and the objectives of efficiency and sustainability improvement, logistics operators have to pursue technological progress like automation with all means. In order to distinguish between more or less performing human–artificial collaboration systems in logistics ex ante for investment decision purposes, a multi-dimensional conceptual framework is developed. A comprehensive case study regarding automated truck driving in logistics is provided in order to test the concept concerning practical implications. Results include the notion of four distinctive and increasing resistance levels before finally an efficient ‘trusted’ collaboration between human operators and artificial intelligence systems can be achieved. This is important for the design of many automated systems in logistics, among others for driving and piloting professions regarding autonomous driving supervision.     

Urban Operating Systems: Diagramming the City

A set of software/hardware packages developed by IT companies for the urban market is transforming the way in which cities are imagined and configured. These urban operating systems (Urban OS) embody important presumptions about what constitutes appropriate knowledge and forms of decision making, pointing to how novel forms of ‘smart' or ‘computational' urbanism may govern urban life. Arguing that an analysis of the interface between the urban and IT requires a broader historical and theoretical perspective, the article traces the ways in which the city has been diagrammed as a space of power since the nineteenth century and highlights the antecedents of Urban OS present across different domains of life—particularly in military and corporate enterprises. Relaying the urban as an efficient logistical enterprise, and operating as a piloting device (Deleuze and Guattari, 1987), the Urban OS appears as an emerging urban diagram introducing an informational diagrammatic of control. We focus on five archetypal framings of how Urban OS envision the city, illustrating how a new corporate rationality of control based on functional simplification and heterogeneous reintegration seeks to take hold in the city (via re‐engineering, agility, modularity, flexibility and configurability).     

The in-depth testing of survey questions: A critical appraisal of methods

It has become increasingly apparent that the conventional piloting, or pre-testing, of survey questions does not ensure that questions are understood by respondents as researchers intend them to be understood. This has led survey methodologists to advocate the use of indepth testing procedures. While some of the procedures used to identify comprehension problems appear to be reasonably effective, almost all of the procedures used to identify other kinds of problems have not proved to be very useful. Two reasons stand out as explanations for this general lack of success. First, the probes used are themselves not likely to be interpreted in the same way by different respondents. Second, the cognitive psychological assumptions that have suggested many of the procedures may not adequately reflect the processes that underlie the way questions are answered. A number of suggestions are made with the view to making the in-depth testing of survey questions a more profitable exercise.     

Classification and benchmark of City Logistics measures: an empirical analysis

Urban freight distribution accounts for a significant share of pollution and congestion in urban areas. To reduce these negative impacts, municipalities have implemented several City Logistics (CL) measures. This paper presents the empirical analysis of a dataset of 70 European cities that have been piloting or rolling out a CL measure, to provide an updated indication of the status of CL initiatives and analyse the diffusion of CL internationally. The research objective is also to help understand the contextual factors might explain their introduction. To this end, a set of City Logistics Indices (CLI) is used as indicators of the breadth and number of CL measures implemented in a city. A statistical correlation of these CLIs with respect to a set of independent variables, namely the contextual factors, is also performed. Results reveal that the level of pollution, the diffusion of e-commerce and GDP are important drivers of CL deployment.     

Recruiting outside board members in the small family business: an ideological challenge

The focus of this paper is to explore how contrasting ideologies influence the selection process of outside directors in the small family business. Small family businesses donot just represent smallscale economic activity but they are the outcome of entrepreneurial ambition and family involvement. This means that willpower and emotional commitment blend with calculative considerations. As emotional as well as cognitive constructs the family, management and entrepreneurship each represent an ideology: paternalism, managerialism and entrepreneurialism. The proposed ideological framework is positioned against alternative approaches to the study of board selection processes. Two sets of data are presented. A piloting survey of 12 family businesses is used to substantiate the theoretical assumption that entrepreneurial firms avoid having outside directors and managerial firms welcome outside directors, leaving paternalistically-run family businesses ambivalent. Repeated in-depth interviews in two family businesses, one founder-managed and entrepreneurial, the other established and traditional, reveal how the professionalization of the board enforces managerialism, challenging thus far dominating ideologies, entrepreneurialism and paternalism. The outcome of this ideological contest, if properly orchestrated, is an energized and more competitive family business.     

A note on reliability properties of k-record statistics

LetY _k,n denote the nth (upper) k-record value of an infinite sequence of independent, identically distributed random variables with common continuous distribution function F. We show that if the nth k-record valueY _k,n has an increasing failure rate (IFR), thenY _l,n (l<k) andY _k+1,n+1(n≤k+1) also have IFR distributions. On the other hand, ifY _k,n has a decreasing failure rate (DFR), thenY _l,n (1>k) has also a DFR distribution. We also present some results concerning log convexity and log concavity ofY _k,n .     

Zur Existenz der höheren Momente von Punktprozessen

Zusammenfassung Mit Hilfe der bedingten Wahrscheinlichkeiten für das Eintreten von genauk Ereignissen im Zeitpunktt _o unter der Bedingung, daß im Zeitpunktt _o mindestens ein Ereignis eintritt, wird eine Beziehung formuliert, die für die Existenz desk-ten Moments des die Ereignisse zählenden Punktprozesses notwendig ist. Hat dieser Punktprozeß unabhängige Zuwächse, so ist die angegebene Beziehung auch hinreichend für die Existenz desk-ten Moments.

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Summary Using the conditional probability thatk events occur at timet _o given that at least one event occurs att _o a condition is formulated which is necessary for the existence of the moment of orderk of the point process counting these events. This condition is sufficient, too, if the point process has independent increments.

     

Evaluation of P(Xt>Yt ) when both Xt and Yt are residual lifetimes of two systems

Let the random variables X and Y denote the lifetimes of two systems. In reliability theory to compare between the lifetimes of X and Y there are several approaches. Among the most popular methods of comparing the lifetimes are to compare the survival functions, the failure rates and the mean residual lifetime functions of X and Y. Assume that both systems are operating at time t > 0. Then the residual lifetimes of them are X_t=X?t | X>t and Y_t=Y?t | Y>t, respectively. In this paper, we introduce, by taking into account the age of systems, a time‐dependent criterion to compare the residual lifetimes of them. In other words, we concentrate on function R(t ):=P(X_t>Y_t) which enables one to obtain, at time t, the probability that the residual lifetime X_t is greater than the residual lifetime Y_t. It is mentioned, in Brown and Rutemiller (IEEE Transactions on Reliability, 22 , 1973) that the probability of type R(t) is important for designing as long‐lived a product as possible. Several properties of R(t) and its connection with well‐known reliability measures are investigated. The estimation of R(t) based on samples from X and Y is also discussed.     

Henry George and British Socialism

Abstract . Henrys George, the American social reformer and Single Tax advocate, had a decisive impact on native British socialism considered apart from the Marxist and revolutionary types imported from the continent. Karl Marx and Frederick Engels were hostile critics but the typically English Fabian Society was influenced by George's seminal ideas. The Fabians were especially attracted to two notions: the conception that George gave to the thought of his time, that poverty was an evil preventable by political intervention—by State action; and that the disparity in incomes could be explained by the theory of unearned increment. In turn Sydney Olivier, George Bernard Shaw, Sidney Webb, Annie Besant, H. G. Wells and E, R. Pease came under the influence of George. Soon to affect the Fabians, however, was the development of the economist, P. H. Wicksteed, beyond George to Jenons and Marginalism. Key figures in the Parliamentary and Independent Labour parties almost achieved land value taxation.     

On a study of the exponential and Poisson characteristics of the Poisson process

Based on the exponential and Poisson characteristics of the Poisson process, in this work we present some characterizations of the Poisson process as a renewal process. More precisely, let γ_t be the residual life at time t of the renewal process A={A(t),t≥0 }, under suitable condition, we prove that if Var(γ_t)=E ² (γ_t),∀t≥0, then A is a Poisson process. Secondly, we show that if Var (A(t)) is proportional to E (A(t)), then A is a Poisson process also, and Var (A(t))=E (A(t)). Received: August 1999     

On maximum likelihood prediction based on Type II doubly censored exponential data

In this paper, the maximum likelihood predictor (MLP) of the kth ordered observation, t _k, in a sample of size n from a two-parameter exponential distribution as well as the predictive maximum likelihood estimators (PMLE's) of the location and scale parameters, θ and β, based on the observed values t _r, …, t _s (1≤r≤s<k≤n), are obtained in closed forms, contrary to the belief they cannot be so expressed. When θ is known, however, the PMLE of β and MLP of t _k do not admit explicit expressions. It is shown here that they exist and are unique; sharp lower and upper bounds are also provided. The derived predictors and estimators are reasonable and also have good asymptotic properties. As applications, the total duration time in a life test and the failure time of a k-out-of-n system may be predicted. Finally, an illustrative example is included. Received: August 1999     

Inequalities for the Gini coefficient of composite populations

Unlike other popular measures of income inequality, the Gini coefficient is not decomposable, i.e., the coefficient G($\text{X}$) of a composite population $\text{X}\text{=}\text{X}{}_1\text{∪…∪}\text{X}{}_{\mathrm{r}}$ cannot be computed in terms of the sizes, mean incomes and Gini coefficients of the components $\text{X}$_i. In this paper upper and lower bounds (best possible for r=2) for G($\text{X}$) in terms of these data are given. For example, $\text{G(}\text{X}{}_1\text{∪…∪}\text{X}{}_{\mathrm{r}}\text{)≧Σα}{}_{\mathrm{i}}\text{G(}\text{X}{}_{\mathrm{i}}\text{)}$, where α_i is the proportion of the pop ulation in $\text{X}$_i. One of the tools used, which may be of interest for other applications, is a lower bound for ∫^∞₀f(x)g(x)dx (converse to Cauchy's inequality) for monotone decreasing functions f and g.     

Semiparametric estimation of a censored regression model with an unknown transformation of the dependent variable

This paper presents a method for estimating the model Λ(Y)=min(β′X+U, C), where Y is a scalar, Λ is an unknown increasing function, X is a vector of explanatory variables, β is a vector of unknown parameters, U has unknown cumulative distribution function F, and C is a censoring threshold. It is not assumed that Λ and F belong to known parametric families; they are estimated nonparametrically. This model includes many widely used models as special cases, including the proportional hazards model with unobserved heterogeneity. The paper develops n^1/2-consistent, asymptotically normal estimators of Λ and F. Estimators of β that are n^1/2-consistent and asymptotically normal already exist. The results of Monte Carlo experiments illustrate the finite-sample behavior of the estimators.     

Cointegration and distance between differenced processes

In this note, it is argued that cointegration augments the distance between the differenced series. If two series, x _t and y _t , are integrated of order one and cointegrated and v _t and w _t are integrated of order one but not cointegrated then, under certain conditions, the distance between ??x _t and ??y _t is more than the distance between ??v _t and ??w _t .     

Restricted houseswapping games

Restricted houseswapping games (RHGs) are a generalization of ‘one-sided matching games’, in which we specify a class II* of ‘allowable’ simple trading cycles. The cores of such games may be empty. Given II*, all possible closed RHGs have non-empty cores of II* is ‘strongly balanced’. Examples include the one-sided matching markets (^{Shapley and Scarf. Journal of Mathematical Economics 1974. 1. 23–37}. ^{Tijs et al., OR Spektrum 1984, 6, 119–123}; ^{Quinzii, International Journal of Game Theory 1984, 13, 41–60}) and the two-sided matching markets (^{Gale and Shapley. American Mathematical Monthly 1962. 69, 9–16}; ^{Shapley and Shubik, International Journal of Game Theory 1972, 1, 111–130}: and ^{Demange and Gale Econometrica 1985, 53, 873–888}).We then consider the subclass of RHGs in which there is no transferable resource. In this case, a weaker condition on II*, called ‘weak balancedness’, is sufficient to guarantee core non-emptiness. In addition, if II* is not weakly balanced, then there exists a preference profile such that the strict core of the resultant game is empty.Several other examples are given of II* that are (a) strongly balanced: (b) weakly balanced but not strongly balanced: and (c) not even weakly balanced.Finally, we discuss the issues of equilibrium definition, existence, and core-equilibrium allocation equivalence in RHGs.