Information Management Requirements Research Articles

Strategy for Design and Building Multimedia Data Type

This research work addresses a strategy for design and building of a comprehensive architecture to satisfy many information management requirements for Large and Distributed Multimedia Data. The paper proposes a unified model for designing multimedia data types which includes data representatives, content representatives. The proposed approach discusses several database architectures and user access mechanisms for data storage, efficient searching and fast retrieving of large and distributed multimedia data. The paper focused on the structure designing the data type which provides support for content based retrieval of multimedia data. The Query Language is an extension of a traditional query language which allows restrictions to be expressed on features, concepts of object of multimedia data

HAZard and OPerability (HAZOP) analysis for identification of information requirements for sewer asset management

Asset management is a prerequisite for maintaining the required level of serviceability of urban drainage systems. The required asset management effort to achieve a certain level of service is unclear due to limited knowledge on sewer systems process and structure complexity. Sewer failure mechanisms explain the structural/operational failures of sewer elements. This paper describes a method for assessing sewer failure mechanisms as a first step to identify information needed for sewer asset management. In order to be able to identify the main processes and defects responsible for the structural/operational failures of sewer elements, as well as the possibility of obtaining the information about them, a HAZard and OPerability (HAZOP) approach was applied. HAZOP results were, due to the nature of the analysis, rearranged in such a way that they can be applied in Failure-Tree Analysis (FTA) for the purpose of further risk estimation.

MISO: an open-source LIMS for small-to-large sequencing centres

Sequencing centres differ not only in terms of their scale and output, but also their requirements for information management. Sequencing platforms are becoming more accessible, and the efficient storage of genomic metadata is vital for large and small sequencing centres alike. Off-the-shelf solutions are often very expensive and not cost-effective for the smaller centre. Furthermore, support contracts are often required, and the extensibility of these systems is not in the hands of the metadata generators. In terms of implementation, as well as the desire to tailor an information system in-house, data formats can change and platforms can evolve rapidly. These are valid concerns for both large centres characterised by high-throughout data production and smaller scale laboratories with constrained expenditure for IT solutions, and potentially project specific metadata requirements. Hence, we are developing MISO, an open-source LIMS for recording sequencing metadata. We are using freely available tools that are industry standard, well documented, and easy to set up on minimal hardware. As a bare system, MISO can store relevant metadata based on the most common sequencing platforms (e.g. Illumina GA and HiSeq, Roche 454 and ABI SOLiD) and public repository data submission schemas (e.g. the Sequence Read Archive at the EBI), and has many features common to bespoke and proprietary LIMS, such as secure authentication, fine-grained access control, barcode tracking, and reporting. Features MISO accomplishes all of these elements: ● Authentication – user-centric access control to designated areas ● Laboratory tracking – project description, sample receipt, library preparation, run construction, and barcoding ● Printing – can directly connect to barcode printers and print barcodes for the relevant objects inside MISO ● Bioinformatics pipelines – monitoring and reporting of analytical processes, interacting directly with the computing cluster ● Reporting – accurate statistics from library preparation and sequencing processes (Figure 1) ● Data Visualisation – through “traffic light” indicators and treestructured status diagrams, MISO can easily show the status of each project and its elements (Figure 1) ● Submission – automated packaging of sequencing data and metadata, deployment of these data to remote public repositories ● Notification – automated import of run metadata and notification of change of run status ● SRA – MISO is heavily modelled upon the submission schemas specified by the SRA (http://www.ebi.ac.uk/ena/) and is therefore able to automatically generate and deploy the required XML and data files (Figure 2) We are working on new plugin features to enable MISO to be extendable, making it easier for the community to contribute more features.

Creating a process for incorporating epidemiological modelling into outbreak management decisions

Modern computational models of infectious diseases greatly enhance our ability to understand new infectious threats and assess the effects of different interventions. The recently-released CDC Framework for Preventing Infectious Diseases calls for increased use of predictive modelling of epidemic emergence for public health preparedness. Currently, the utility of these technologies in preparedness and response to outbreaks is limited by gaps between modelling output and information requirements for incident management. The authors propose an operational structure that will facilitate integration of modelling capabilities into action planning for outbreak management, using the Incident Command System (ICS) and Synchronization Matrix framework. It is designed to be adaptable and scalable for use by state and local planners under the National Response Framework (NRF) and Emergency Support Function #8 (ESF-8). Specific epidemiological modelling requirements are described, and integrated with the core processes for public health emergency decision support. These methods can be used in checklist format to align prospective or real-time modelling output with anticipated decision points, and guide strategic situational assessments at the community level. It is anticipated that formalising these processes will facilitate translation of the CDC’s policy guidance from theory to practice during public health emergencies involving infectious outbreaks.

Supply Chain Quality Information Management Methodology and Application System Research

Traceability is a new requirement of supply chain quality information management, but many companies have not got any effective measures yet. In response to this issue, this study firstly focuses on the management approach for traceability and discusses the quality information that need to be identified and its characteristics, then a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)-enabled method is proposed to record the quality information; after that, a BOM-based approach is used to organize the recorded quality information; linking of these quality information is made to achieve traceability. Finally a quality information management system is built on the proposed methodology and an application research in Auto parts manufacturing industry is used to demonstrate its effectiveness. Implementation result shows that the proposed methodology can achieve traceability effectively and supply chain product quality information management has indeed improved through ensured traceability.

Stand und Perspektiven des Europäischen Datenverkehrs- und Datenschutzrechts

<bold>Perspectives on EU Data Protection Law</bold> European law on information management and data protection is constantly changing. The Lisbon Treaty significantly modifies its “constitutional framework” with new fundamental rights and legislative competences. Unfortunately, this innovative framework entails several inconsistencies that cause problems for coherent interpretation. Since 2008, seven ECJ decisions on data protection have consolidated the Court's jurisprudence in some important aspects but have also given rise to continued or new legal discussions. Further change will be effected by the recent review of the data protection directive initiated by the European Commission in order to adjust the directive to alterations in its legal or factual environment since 1995. This article reflects the bipolar objectives of Art. 16 TFEU and tries to balance data protection interests with the requirements for an effective information management within the EU.

Study on 4PL Information Platform based on Web Services

The forth party logistics (4PL) information Platform is an information platform for comprehensive supply chain solutions for the customers in modern logistics environment. This paper put forward a web services based information platform for 4PL based on the analysis of information management requirements for regional logistics management and operation, and analysis the operation process of 4PL information platform. Furthermore, some key enable technologies supporting for 4PL information platform are studied, which including Web services encapsulation technology for logistics services and constructing technology for logistics services chain. The realization of the information platform provided an information operation platform for regional logistics operation and is validated in the 4PL information platform construction in Ningbo City.

Climate information requirements for community-level risk management and adaptation

Climate information can be of value when used in decisions involving risks posed by adverse weather or climate. Socio-economic factors such as increasing population in regions suscep- tible to climate extremes significantly increase the vulnerability of communities to climate. Climate information is an important pre-requisite for informed decision-making in risk management and adaptation that would help prevent climate extremes from becoming disasters and threats to liveli- hoods. Reliable weather, climate and water information generated by national meteorological and hydrological services (NMHSs) is the crucial first step in issuing early warnings of potential climate extremes. In order for climate information to inform risk management and adaptation effectively, it is helpful to have it embedded within an institutional system that starts with monitoring of weather and climate events and ends with a community level response. This institutional system contains a num- ber of components, of which perhaps the most important is the customization of information accord- ing to user requirements and its delivery to the community level. Policies and projects aimed at creating and facilitating systemic linkages between climate information producers and users can con- tribute significantly towards the 'community centeredness' of climate services. Experiences from implementing such community level activities in Asia are used to recommend actions required for evolving frameworks for developing community-centered climate services.

Information and food blogging as serious leisure

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to explore aspects of creating, seeking, sharing and management of information in food blogging as serious leisure.Design/methodology/approachParticipants' conceptualisation of food blogging and the role of information in it is interpreted through in‐depth interviews and analysis of activity on the UK Food Bloggers Association web site.FindingsFood blogging as a leisure pursuit resulted in the creation of new information sources, for which existing information is a source of inspiration. The content, and style of blogs, and so their nature as information sources, were influenced by the extent of involvement in a professional‐amateur‐public (PAP) system. Information about publics or audiences was of great concern and a focus of collegial information sharing. The management of content implies greater personal information management needs, but the data did not show great awareness of this, rather interviewees were concerned with access management. Pre‐professionals had an intensified concern with Intellectual Property Rights (IPR).Research limitations/implicationsFood blogs may be better understood by placing them in the context of the PAP system.Practical implicationsFood bloggers are sophisticated users of information and ICTs, but have unrecognised access management and information management requirements that have potentially significant design implications.Originality/valueThis paper adds to the growing literature on information aspects of serious leisure by examining activity within Stebbins' professional‐amateur‐public system.

Exploring knowledge and information needs in engineering from the past and for the future – results from a survey

This paper presents the results from a UK survey about the knowledge and information requirements of managers and engineers in design and service. The survey aimed to gather requirements regarding the needs for retrieval of previous designs and the needs to capture knowledge and information from current designs to support future engineering tasks. The survey nature, method and instruments are described with the information and knowledge categories identified. The findings are analysed and contrasted with the results of other empirical studies. Notable results include the variety of information needs, unexpected absences and low frequency categories, the expectation of practitioners that tomorrow’s needs will be similar to today’s, the apparent failure to satisfy those needs, and suggestions from respondents for improvements.

Policy-based Data Integration for e-Health Monitoring Processes in a B2B Environment: Experiences from Canada

eHealth processes are data-focused, event-driven, and dynamic. They are systematically monitored for compliance with legislation, organizational guidelines and quality of care protocols. Community care, especially at home care, frequently requires the cooperation and integration of care processes across several providers and organizations. Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) through Web services and business process automation through Business Process Execution Language (BPEL) is emerging as a framework for business process integration over the Internet, but does not address all information management requirements of eHealth monitoring processes particularly with respect to policy compliance and event-based data integration. In this paper, we extend the traditional SOA framework to define a flexible policy-based approach for defining and monitoring streaming event data based on a general publish/subscribe model in a business-to-business (B2B) healthcare network. The work described here is design-oriented research where the purpose is to show the utility of the proposed framework. The approach is evaluated based on information management requirements drawn from a case study of palliative care and a prototype implementation.

Neon

Modern organizations face increasingly complex information management requirements. A combination of commercial needs, legal liability and regulatory imperatives has created a patchwork of mandated policies. Among these, personally identifying customer records must be carefully access-controlled, sensitive files must be encrypted on mobile computers to guard against physical theft, and intellectual property must be protected from both exposure and "poisoning." However, enforcing such policies can be quite difficult in practice since users routinely share data over networks and derive new files from these inputs--incidentally laundering any policy restrictions. In this paper, we describe a virtual machine monitor system called Neon that transparently labels derived data using byte-level "tints" and tracks these labels end to end across commodity applications, operating systems and networks. Our goal with Neon is to explore the viability and utility of transparent information flow tracking within conventional networked systems when used in the manner in which they were intended. We demonstrate that this mechanism allows the enforcement of a variety of data management policies, including data-dependent confinement, mandatory I/O encryption, and intellectual property management.

Getting the Right Balance: Information Security and Information Access

AbstractThis article by former law librarian, Jennifer Smith, highlights access and security issues to consider when handling sensitive information. Jennifer is a Director of the Information Management and IT consultancy, OneIS, which specialises in working with smaller organisations with complex information management requirements. The article provides practical advice and is particularly aimed at readers working in organisations without dedicated information security professionals.

IEEE Standards for Prognostics and Health Management

Recently operators of complex systems such as aircraft, power plants, and networks have been emphasizing the need for on-line health monitoring for purposes of maximizing operational availability and safety. The discipline of prognostics and health management (PHM) is being formalized to address the information management and prediction requirements for addressing these needs. Herein, we will explore how standards currently under development within the IEEE can be used to support PHM applications. Particular emphasis will be placed on the role of PHM and PHM-related standards with Department of Defense (DOD) automatic test systems-related research.

Design of a model of publication sharing and harvesting

PurposeThis study aims to discuss a system constructed to satisfy scholars' personal information management requirements when collecting e‐documents, and to include generation of a citation format that can aid paper writing. The system compiles records and personal publications of specific domains collected by individual scholars to form a knowledge set for other scholars to use as a reference. It not only simplifies the data collection process, but also increases the visibility of scholars themselves, along with their papers.Design/methodology/approachThis study analyzes the mechanism of increasing cited frequency of scholars' publications and aggregating relevant documents. It then enables the design of feasible system structures based on this mechanism to form a knowledge set by combining scholars' publications within specific academic domains. In addition, it expedites the gathering of relevant documents by scholars in order to create an accessible archive for subsequent researchers.FindingsBy way of an effective system for publication sharing, and not merely offering a reference for scholars in other relevant fields, this system can also improve the visibility of scholars' publications and further enhance the cited frequency of publications.Originality/valueCombining collected documents and personal publications and sharing those with other scholars for reference can establish a highly effective personal research domain. It not only simplifies the data collection process, but also increases the visibility of personal academic works.

Managers’ perception of information management and the role of information and knowledge managers: The Malaysian perspectives

This paper reports a study conducted to investigate the progression of information and knowledge management (KM) within the business organizations in Malaysia from the managers’ point of view. Among the objectives set are to identify the information requirements of managers, to identify the need for effective information management (IM) and information managers, and to identify the role and skill requirements of information and knowledge managers in the organizations. Using survey questionnaires and interviews, the findings provided rich and meaningful information about information requirements of managers and their overall perception of information and KM. The findings also revealed the important roles of information and knowledge managers and their desired competencies as perceived by the managers. Positive perception towards the establishment of a one-stop resource center or library was also reported. Overall, the findings may assist in the initial stage of effective IM and KM strategy by organizations, and in the development of curriculum for the IM program and the related management fields.

Information and its management for differentiation of agricultural products: The example of specialty coffee

Prices of most of agricultural commodities show a long-term declining trend. Increasingly markets are signaling demand for differentiated products and in order to increase their incomes farmers and traders are looking to higher value options, including differentiated products. Product differentiation occurs when a product offering is perceived by the consumer to differ from its competition on any physical or non-physical characteristic including price. The differentiation can be based both on perceptual differences and also on actual product differences, based on measurable characteristics. The information requirements for supply chain management of differentiated high value products are much more stringent than for traditional agricultural commodities requiring a two-way information flow from the producer to the customer. The conceptual base for information systems to support supply chain management of differentiated products is described in this paper. An Internet-based coffee information system (CINFO), illustrates how these principles can be applied to the case of specialty coffee. CINFO provides farmers information on where and how to produce coffee with particular features, whilst at the same time providing traders with information on the availability of products with particular traits. Furthermore, CINFO traces individual product batches indicating where and how they were produced, processed and distributed to the end consumer so as to facilitate identity preservation, which is the key to obtaining added value from differentiation.

Supporting collaboration in the development and management of lean supply networks

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how the appropriate information and communication technology can act as a catalyst in the development and operations management of lean supply networks; not by automating tasks and procedures, but by providing the enabling infrastructure required for structuring difficult problems and issues arising at inter-organisational boundaries and for taming the social complexity of their resolution processes. Towards this end, we present the design rationale and the functionalities of Co-LEAN, which is an integrated suite of software tools developed by the authors for the design and management of lean supply networks. In addition to providing full operational support in the planning and execution of the lean supply network, Co-LEAN supports internet-based collaboration in the specification of value, the identification and optimisation of value-streams, the alignment of supply-chain strategy with the overall operations strategy, and the supply-chain improvement tasks. The paper discusses the knowledge and information management requirements of lean supply networks, and presents the main components and functionalities of Co-LEAN in the context of a use case in a supply network formed around a stainless steel tanks’ manufacturer.

Streamlining Workflow Using Existing Technology

Processing rehabilitation admissions and case management records in a three-person office in a major academic medical center had become cumbersome and redundant due to multiple information management approaches and requirements from various sources. Simple questionnaires and brief, casual meetings with pertinent personnel defined what was working well and what was problematic and helped establish a foundation for change management. Analysis of the existing paper system revealed more than 300 data items used more than once throughout the departmental processes. A simple timing trial, based on selected segments of a workflow diagram, revealed the potential to save 3 to 3(1/2) hours per case by revising a departmental database, decreasing work redundancy, and creating an electronic case file. Because the work environment utilized Microsoft Office and Access databases, a plan was developed to utilize these resources to streamline the workflow and eliminate duplication of effort in the admission/case management documentation processes.

Natural language interface for information management on mobile devices

A natural language interface (NLI) enables the ease-of-use of information systems in performing sophisticated human – computer interaction. To address the challenges of mobile devices to user interaction in information management, we propose an NLI as a promising solution. In this paper, we review state-of-the-art NLI technologies and analyse user requirements for managing notable information on mobile devices. To minimize any technical difficulties arising from developing and improving the usability of NLI systems we develop general principles for NLI design, which fills in a gap in the literature. In order to satisfy user requirements for information management on mobile devices, we innovatively design NLI-enabled information management architecture. It is shown from two usage scenarios that the architecture could lead to reduced effort in user navigation and improved efficiency and effectiveness of managing information on mobile devices. We conclude the article with the implications of this study and suggestions for future direction.