A conceptual framework for product lifecycle modelling

Product lifecycle modelling is to define and represent product lifecycle data and to maintain data interdependencies. To build a complete, reusable and highly consistent product lifecycle information model, the product lifecycle is divided into five stages: requirement analysis, conceptual design, engineering design, manufacturing, and service and support. Accordingly, five stage product models (requirement analysis model, conceptual design model, engineering design model, manufacturing model, and service and support model) are discussed. To integrate all information of a product lifecycle and support networked manufacturing mode, the key elements of product lifecycle modelling are discussed and a framework of product lifecycle modelling is proposed. Further, the relationship and evolvement of product models at different stages are described. Finally, a Web-based integration framework is proposed to support interoperability of distributed product data sources.     

面向服务的动态电子商务模型研究

应用动态电子商务模式,设计并实现了一个灵活、可扩展的物流管理信息系统。以.NET平台为手段,利用WebServices技术实现了企业内部的应用集成和数据集成,在分析业务流程的基础上,引入了多层体系架构,为企业提供了完整的物流解决方案。     

Experimental comparison of Web, electronic and mail survey technologies in operations management

With the growing acceptance of the Web (Internet) and electronic mail, it is no surprise that researchers are using an increasingly diverse set of survey technologies to gather data from managers. However, the effectiveness of these electronic technologies has not been rigorously assessed, especially for gathering data from establishment-level surveys (i.e. firm- or plant-level). To that end, a stratified sample of large and small, service and manufacturing firms was constructed, followed by random assignment to one of four survey technologies: mail, fax, PC disk-by-mail and Web-page survey (combined with e-mail notification). For each treatment, managers are queried about their use of forecasting characteristics, yielding a sample of 118 firms. Unfortunately, only a low percentage (34%) of firms and managers assigned to the Web technology treatment both reported access to e-mail and were willing provide their e-mail addresses; they tended to be large firms and from the service sector. Moreover, those that did offer e-mail addresses were only about half as likely to respond to the Web-based survey as those targeted by other survey technologies. However, Web, fax and disk-by-mail technologies yielded higher item completion rates than mail. Limited statistical evidence indicated that respondents using computer-based survey technologies (i.e. Web or disk-by-mail) generally reported forecasting characteristics that are associated with firms exhibiting best practices. Thus, a multi-technology survey approach using the Web and fax can yield a strong combination of benefits over a traditional mail survey.     

面向SCM的物联网动态服务架构及协同应用

基于供应链集成化业务场景、持续分析了供应链以及增强上下游快速响应能力的需求,为了实现集成化供应链平台的业务协同合作与信息共享,并构建业务需求驱动的物联网关键技术融合体系,采用以动态服务为中心的物联网多层体系结构,通过物联网应用中间件技术以及多层关键技术融合与集成应用,实现由业务驱动的海量数据的采集、传输、处理与整合,采用面向服务的体系结构SOA技术及Web服务技术,支撑分布式SCM应用软件借助中间件技术实现物联网在异构环境下动态的服务架构及其协同应用。     

A PageRank-based reputation model for personalised manufacturing service recommendation

The number of manufacturing services for cross-enterprise business collaborations is increasing rapidly because of the explosive growth of Web service technologies. This trend demands intelligent and robust models to address information overload in order to enable efficient discovery of manufacturing services. In this paper, we present a personalised manufacturing service recommendation approach, which combines a PageRank-based reputation model and a collaborative filtering technique in a unified framework for recommending the right manufacturing services to an active service user for supply chain deployment. The novel aspect of this research is adapting the PageRank algorithm to a network of service-oriented multi-echelon supply chain in order to determine both user reputation and service reputation. In addition, it explores the use of these methods in alleviating data sparsity and cold start problems that hinder traditional collaborative filtering techniques. A case study is conducted to validate the practicality and effectiveness of the proposed approach in recommending the right manufacturing services to active service users.     

Integration of hybrid wireless networks in cloud services oriented enterprise information systems

This article presents a hybrid wireless network integration scheme in cloud services-based enterprise information systems (EISs). With the emerging hybrid wireless networks and cloud computing technologies, it is necessary to develop a scheme that can seamlessly integrate these new technologies into existing EISs. By combining the hybrid wireless networks and computing in EIS, a new framework is proposed, which includes frontend layer, middle layer and backend layers connected to IP EISs. Based on a collaborative architecture, cloud services management framework and process diagram are presented. As a key feature, the proposed approach integrates access control functionalities within the hybrid framework that provide users with filtered views on available cloud services based on cloud service access requirements and user security credentials. In future work, we will implement the proposed framework over SwanMesh platform by integrating the UPnP standard into an enterprise information system.     

Identifying and evaluating strategic partners for collaborative R&D: Index-based approach using patents and publications

Identifying and selecting appropriate strategic partners have been the subject of many previous studies: but most have dealt with partner selection that has relied heavily on experts' judgements: the value of a literature-based quantitative approach as a source of technology intelligence has seldom been addressed. This paper therefore aims to develop a systematic framework to guide strategic partner selection, taking a literature-based approach. Reviewing the factors that can lead to successful R&D partnerships to develop partner selection criteria, we designed 14 indexes – grouped into four major categories – to reflect desirable partner characteristics, and used the literature data to suggest a framework for prioritising potential partners. As data sources, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and the ISI Web of Science databases are adopted for patent analysis and publication analysis, respectively. This research applied the framework to identify strategic R&D partners for Korean firms and found that the use of literature data enabled a wide ranging search for potential partners and the quick analysis of their characteristics, with results that provided objective evidence for selection decisions. It also investigated the relative importance of literature databases and that of the four decision criteria by industry, and examined the relationships between the indexes to improve the application of the framework. The suggested framework is expected to be valuable as a complementary tool for decision-making about R&D collaboration.     

基于WEB的服务组合系统设计与实现

服务组合是通过重用已有的Web服务满足用户高质量的应用需求的一种技术手段,是面向服务架构研究领域的热点问题。本文采用基于业务流的服务组合方式,设计并实现基于Web的服务组合系统,并结合校园用户需求给出并讨论了服务组合的实际案例。     

Design and implementation of embedded un-interruptible power supply system (EUPSS) for web-based mobile application

With the growth of the amount of information manipulated by embedded application systems, which are embedded into devices and offer access to the devices on the internet, the requirements of saving the information systemically is necessary so as to fulfil access from the client and the local processing more efficiently. For supporting mobile applications, a design and implementation solution of embedded un-interruptible power supply (UPS) system (in brief, EUPSS) is brought forward for long-distance monitoring and controlling of UPS based on Web. The implementation of system is based on ATmega161, RTL8019AS and Arm chips with TCP/IP protocol suite for communication. In the embedded UPS system, an embedded file system is designed and implemented which saves the data and index information on a serial EEPROM chip in a structured way and communicates with a microcontroller unit through I²C bus. By embedding the file system into UPS system or other information appliances, users can access and manipulate local data on the web client side. Embedded file system on chips will play a major role in the growth of IP networking. Based on our experiment tests, the mobile users can easily monitor and control UPS in different places of long-distance. The performance of EUPSS has satisfied the requirements of all kinds of Web-based mobile applications.     

Reasoning under uncertainty and multi-criteria decision making in data privacy

By means of an integration of decision theory and probabilistic models, we explore and develop methods for improving data privacy. Our work encompasses disclosure control tools in statistical databases and privacy requirements prioritization; in particular we propose a Bayesian approach for the on-line auditing in Statistical Databases and Pairwise Comparison Matrices for privacy requirements prioritization. The first approach is illustrated by means of examples in the context of statistical analysis on the census and medical data, where no salary (resp. no medical information), that could be related to a specific employee (resp. patient), must be released; the second approach is illustrated by means of examples, such as an e-voting system and an e-banking service that have to satisfy privacy requirements in addition to functional and security ones. Several fields in the social sciences, economics and engineering will benefit from the advances in this research area: e-voting, e-government, e-commerce, e-banking, e-health, cloud computing and risk management are a few examples of applications for the findings of this research.     

On domain modelling of the service system with its application to enterprise information systems

Information systems are a kind of service systems and they are throughout every element of a modern industrial and business system, much like blood in our body. Types of information systems are heterogeneous because of extreme uncertainty in changes in modern industrial and business systems. To effectively manage information systems, modelling of the work domain (or domain) of information systems is necessary. In this paper, a domain modelling framework for the service system is proposed and its application to the enterprise information system is outlined. The framework is defined based on application of a general domain modelling tool called function-context-behaviour-principle-state-structure (FCBPSS). The FCBPSS is based on a set of core concepts, namely: function, context, behaviour, principle, state and structure and system decomposition. Different from many other applications of FCBPSS in systems engineering, the FCBPSS is applied to both infrastructure and substance systems, which is novel and effective to modelling of service systems including enterprise information systems. It is to be noted that domain modelling of systems (e.g. enterprise information systems) is a key to integration of heterogeneous systems and to coping with unanticipated situations facing to systems.     

Reusing process fragments for fast service composition: a clustering-based approach

With the proliferation of Web services over the Internet and due to the increasing complexity of users’ needs, Web service composition has emerged as a powerful method of software reuse, allowing to deliver complete business processes as a set of interacting services. To guarantee a rapid and secure service composition, fragments of available business processes at different granularities may be considered as a composition unit and recombined to deliver effective compositions. Despite the benefits of this method, most of the existing works do not take into consideration the reuse of service process fragments (SPF). Reusing SPFs allows, not only to minimize the composition time, but also to improve the reliability of the composition process. In this paper, we propose a Web service composition approach that aims to combine service process fragments rather that atomic services. We adopt a powerful mathematical model called Formal Concept Analysis (FCA) to define the relationships between services and fragments. Moreover, we exploit the regrouping capabilities of FCA by proposing algorithms for the extraction of candidate fragments’ combinations. A scoring function is also defined to determine the quality level of each SPF and its ability to participate in a composition. The experimental studies proved the effectiveness of our FCA-based approach compared to existing state-of-the-art solutions.     

湖南省生猪产业科技信息服务平台的设计与运行

湖南省生猪产业科技信息服务平台是一套充分整合科技资源,为湖南生猪产业发展提供科技信息支持与服务的基础平台。文章着重阐述了平台的总体框架、模块设计、服务运行等关键问题。     

供应链质量管理中一种面向目标的建模方法

现今的商业环境使得企业间的竞争由个体与个体之间的竞争转变为所处的供应链之间的竞争。由于供应链的企业来自不同的地理位置,属于不同利益的组织,如何协调和整合所有这些企业的业务流程来改进供应链上的产品和服务一直存在三个困难:(1)供应链成员的自利性;(2)生产过程的信息不对称;(3)质量难以准确测量及没有完美的质量检测手段。针对这些困难,文章提出了一种面向目标的方法来支持供应链质量管理的建模。在详细介绍建模过程之后,通过探讨几个供应链质量管理中的实例,证明了所述方法的可行性和有效性。     

高校计算机实验室设备及实验教学网络化管理的研究

计算机是培养学生信息技术实践能力的工具,而计算机实验课程是培养学生信息技术实践能力及创新精神的策略手段,因此,高校计算机实验室设备及实验教学实现网络化管理,提高管理效率及质量是当前教育改革、素质教育的需要。通过对高校计算机实验室设备及实验教学网络化管理现状、意义的分析,探讨网络化管理系统模块功能的设计,以便总结出一套基于网络技术高效的、科学的管理方法。     

A web-based system architecture for ontology-based data integration in the domain of IT benchmarking

In the domain of IT benchmarking (ITBM), a variety of data and information are collected. Although these data serve as the basis for business analyses, no unified semantic representation of such data yet exists. Consequently, data analysis across different distributed data sets and different benchmarks is almost impossible. This paper presents a system architecture and prototypical implementation for an integrated data management of distributed databases based on a domain-specific ontology. To preserve the semantic meaning of the data, the ITBM ontology is linked to data sources and functions as the central concept for database access. Thus, additional databases can be integrated by linking them to this domain-specific ontology and are directly available for further business analyses. Moreover, the web-based system supports the process of mapping ontology concepts to external databases by introducing a semi-automatic mapping recommender and by visualizing possible mapping candidates. The system also provides a natural language interface to easily query linked databases. The expected result of this ontology-based approach of knowledge representation and data access is an increase in knowledge and data sharing in this domain, which will enhance existing business analysis methods.     

Design of a terminal solution for integration of in-home health care devices and services towards the Internet-of-Things

In-home health care services based on the Internet-of-Things are promising to resolve the challenges caused by the ageing of population. But the existing research is rather scattered and shows lack of interoperability. In this article, a business-technology co-design methodology is proposed for cross-boundary integration of in-home health care devices and services. In this framework, three key elements of a solution (business model, device and service integration architecture and information system integration architecture) are organically integrated and aligned. In particular, a cooperative Health-IoT ecosystem is formulated, and information systems of all stakeholders are integrated in a cooperative health cloud as well as extended to patients’ home through the in-home health care station (IHHS). Design principles of the IHHS includes the reuse of 3C platform, certification of the Health Extension, interoperability and extendibility, convenient and trusted software distribution, standardised and secured electrical health care record handling, effective service composition and efficient data fusion. These principles are applied to the design of an IHHS solution called iMedBox. Detailed device and service integration architecture and hardware and software architecture are presented and verified by an implemented prototype. The quantitative performance analysis and field trials have confirmed the feasibility of the proposed design methodology and solution.     

A framework for service enterprise workflow simulation with multi-agents cooperation

Process dynamic modelling for service business is the key technique for Service-Oriented information systems and service business management, and the workflow model of business processes is the core part of service systems. Service business workflow simulation is the prevalent approach to be used for analysis of service business process dynamically. Generic method for service business workflow simulation is based on the discrete event queuing theory, which is lack of flexibility and scalability. In this paper, we propose a service workflow-oriented framework for the process simulation of service businesses using multi-agent cooperation to address the above issues. Social rationality of agent is introduced into the proposed framework. Adopting rationality as one social factor for decision-making strategies, a flexible scheduling for activity instances has been implemented. A system prototype has been developed to validate the proposed simulation framework through a business case study.     

Applications integration in a hybrid cloud computing environment: modelling and platform

With the development of application services providers and cloud computing, more and more small- and medium-sized business enterprises use software services and even infrastructure services provided by professional information service companies to replace all or part of their information systems (ISs). These information service companies provide applications, such as data storage, computing processes, document sharing and even management information system services as public resources to support the business process management of their customers. However, no cloud computing service vendor can satisfy the full functional IS requirements of an enterprise. As a result, enterprises often have to simultaneously use systems distributed in different clouds and their intra enterprise ISs. Thus, this article presents a framework to integrate applications deployed in public clouds and intra ISs. A run-time platform is developed and a cross-computing environment process modelling technique is also developed to improve the feasibility of ISs under hybrid cloud computing environments.     

Macro‐integration with inequality constraints: an application to the integration of transport and trade statistics

Macro‐integration is the process of combining data from several sources at an aggregate level. We review a Bayesian approach to macro‐integration with special emphasis on the inclusion of inequality constraints. In particular, an approximate method of dealing with inequality constraints within the linear macro‐integration framework is proposed. This method is based on a normal approximation to the truncated multivariate normal distribution. The framework is then applied to the integration of international trade statistics and transport statistics. By combining these data sources, transit flows can be derived as differences between specific transport and trade flows. Two methods of imposing the inequality restrictions that transit flows must be non‐negative are compared. Moreover, the figures are improved by imposing the equality constraints that aggregates of incoming and outgoing transit flows must be equal.