Integrated Business Information Systems Research Articles

Dynamic Management of Occupational Health and Safety Processes in Integrated Business Information Systems

Abstract Currently operating enterprises are more and more willing to adopt a process approach in their structures. The process approach means the transition from traditionally understood management towards adapting to constantly changing environmental conditions. This change is accompanied by the possibility of using a wide range of tools of ICT technology, that allow modelling of any type of process occurring in the enterprise, including processes related to OHS. Thus, the objective of the paper is to indicate the opportunity for the integration of OHS processes with other processes (primary and auxiliary) of the organization using ERP systems. In the first part of the study, there will be indicated the determinants of the development of the process approach in modern enterprises. Subsequently, there will be characterized OHS processes against the background of other processes of the organization. In the third part, there will be indicated the most significant features of ERP systems. The last part will refer to the practical implementation of the process in the area of OHS in the Macrologic Merit system.

Integration of Business Game for Improving Literacy of Accounting Information Systems

The analysis of results of the exam session of students studying Business Administration in Kaunas University of Technology did show relatively low marks in accounting related modules. Thus, more attention should be given to use of accounting information systems. The analyses results of exams show difficulties integrated systemically understanding accounting, accounting information systems and relation with business basics. The main purpose of the paper is to create the tool for teaching integrated business information systems also improving teaching and learning of accounting information systems. A survey of the students has been performed, asking what improvements of business game (including further integration with other tools) they would consider useful. Integrated use of a system of tools (including business game, database management system, accounting information system and Geographical Information Systems) was proposed and tried out in the study process.

Integrated Business Information Systems Development: A Management Issue Not A Technological Solution

An overview of the role of enterprise issues in Business Information Systems Development is presented. The importance of information flow and data standards in the development of an enterprise view is discussed and the need of management control and coordination of information integration is emphasized. In addition, a tested phased approach to information architecture development and the components of this information architecture are presented.

A TEMPLATE-DRIVEN APPROACH FOR MAINTAINABLE SERVICE-ORIENTED INFORMATION SYSTEMS INTEGRATION

Service-oriented architecture (SOA) is currently the predominant software integration framework. Web services provide the predominant platform for SOA. SOA as an integration architecture solution supports a range of application scenarios. We present a solution for the integration of business information systems based on SOA and Web services. We discuss maintainability requirements in relation to information-specific integration and architecture aspects. A template-based approach based on modular and declarative transformation rules and architectural styles and patterns defines our solution to the maintainability problem of integration architectures.

Agile Integration Modeling Language (AIML): A conceptual modeling grammar for agile integrative business information systems

The proliferation of newer agile integrative business information systems (IBIS) environments that use the software agent and the multiagent systems paradigms has created the need for a common and well-accepted conceptual modeling grammar that can be used to efficiently, precisely, and unambiguously, model agile IBIS systems at the conceptual level. In this paper, we propose a conceptual modeling grammar termed Agile Integration Modeling Language (AIML) based on established ontological foundation for the multiagent-based integrative business information systems (MIBIS) universe. The AIML grammar provides adequate and precise constructs and semantics for modeling agile integration among participating work systems in terms of quickly building and dismantling dynamic collaboration relationships among them to respond to fast-changing market needs. The AIML grammar is defined as a formal model using Extended BNF and first order logic, and is elaborated using a running example in the paper. The grammar is also evaluated in terms of its syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic qualities and is found to exhibit a high degree of quality on all these three dimensions. In particular, the pragmatic quality of AIML measured in terms of grammar complexity evaluated using complexity metrics indicates that AIML is much easier to learn and use as compared to the Unified Modeling Language (UML) for modeling agile integration of work systems in organizations.

Transformative Capacity, Information Technology, and the Making of Business ‘Experts’

This paper explores the making of experts and the basis of claims to expertise in corporate organisational settings. The performance of expertise within organisations is increasingly associated with the implementation and use of integrated business information systems which purport to abstract the world into an informational form to make businesses run more efficiently. We argue that as these systems are put to work to replace the calculations of human experts, we are required to rethink how expertise is constituted as a political and performative process. We focus on the provisos and qualifications that surround the use of calculative techniques and the worries and scepticism over the correctness, accuracy and interpretation of numbers and figures derived from systems of calculation. Rather than identifying expertise as the capacity to make calculations and to abstract ‘representations’ from the ‘real world’, a job increasingly done by information systems, we find expertise being performed in the transformation of things of different orders which enables representations to be returned to the world through allusions to their transformative effect.

Semantics of the MibML Conceptual Modeling Grammar

A conceptual modeling grammar should be based on the theory of ontology and possess clear ontological semantics to represent problem domain knowledge in a precise and consistent manner. In this paper, we follow the notion of ontological expressiveness and conduct an ontological analysis of a newly-developed conceptual modeling grammar termed MibML (Multiagent-based Integrative Business Modeling Language). The grammar is developed to respond to the emerging needs for a special-purpose conceptual modeling grammar for the MIBIS (multi-agent-based integrative business information systems) universe. We assign ontological semantics to the MibML constructs and their relationship using the BWW (Bunge Wand-Weber) model. This article provides a starting point to further develop ontological principles and step-by-step guidelines to ensure the straightforward mapping from domain knowledge into MibML modeling constructs.

Enterprise integration using the agent paradigm: foundations of multi-agent-based integrative business information systems

Enterprise integration through integrated business information systems (IBIS) is necessary to achieve agility in the current age of hyper-competition. Multi-agent systems (MAS) provide a new paradigm for IBIS development. In this paper, we review the IBIS modeling and MAS literatures and find that the MAS paradigm provides an excellent approach for modeling and implementing IBIS systems. We synthesize these two bodies of literature and propose a conceptual framework for multi-agent-based integrative business information systems (MIBIS) and a unified set of eight orthogonal ontological constructs that are minimally required for any conceptual modeling grammar for the MIBIS bounded universe of discourse.

Enterprise integration using the agent paradigm: foundations of multi-agent-based integrative business information systems

Enterprise integration through integrated business information systems (IBIS) is necessary to achieve agility in the current age of hyper-competition. Multi-agent systems (MAS) provide a new paradigm for IBIS development. In this paper, we review the IBIS modeling and MAS literatures and find that the MAS paradigm provides an excellent approach for modeling and implementing IBIS systems. We synthesize these two bodies of literature and propose a conceptual framework for multi-agent-based integrative business information systems (MIBIS) and a unified set of eight orthogonal ontological constructs that are minimally required for any conceptual modeling grammar for the MIBIS bounded universe of discourse.

Plastics for housings and functional components

Introduction The impact of silicon technology is now being seen in all aspects of the telecommunications industry from main exchanges to private systems and from telephones to transmission equipment. The advent of the digital exchange based on computer technology has produced customer installations with switching and computing power far greater than is needed to provide facilities equivalent to the older electromechanical systems. One important consequence has been the development of systems leading to the automated office and on a wider basis integrated business information systems. The system may be self contained or may involve a computer based private exchange which in addition to the traditional function will link and process information from many sources; the factory floor, office systems, data processing centres etc., and the hardware may involve dedicated work stations, specialised telephones, VDU's, telex and facsimile machines, data storage facilities, word processors and so on. The change in technology has been accompanied by a significant increase in the plastics content of the equipment. The hub of a business communication system is likely to be the business's P.A.B.X. and if the full potential is to be realised this will be a digital electronic system which will contain a much higher proportion of organic material than electromechanical equipment. If the usage of plastics is compared in Strowger, Crossbar and Electronic equipment a general increase is found in the order of 20 : 40 : 60% of the total material content, by volume of the system; this includes plastic mouldings, wire and cable insulation and printed circuit board and component materials. The explosion in the capacity for processing information has been accompanied by remarkable reduction in equipment size and the trend for miniaturisation is continuing. The total material content of new systems is therefore significantly reduced. For example, the Strowger equipment providing 200 lines would occupy a room, equivalent Crossbar equipment would be half that size, reedelectronics would occupy one cabinet, digital equipment one shelf and the ultimate development in large scale integration would be contained on one chip.