Task complexity and different decision criteria for online service acceptance: A comparison of two e-government compliance service domains

Inspired by ever evolving information technologies and the myriad of successful business cases that reap the benefit of new technologies, many governments around the world have jumped on the bandwagon of electronic government (e-Gov). However, there has been little academic research regarding the types and conditions of e-Gov services that are acceptable to the public. This paper synthesizes a model of e-Gov compliance services acceptance by critically integrating prior research along with the distinctive characteristics of the online government services context. The study posits that different levels of task complexity involved in various e-Gov compliance processes can lead citizens to use different decision criteria and empirically examines the differing acceptance decision patterns of potential e-Government service users in two compliance service domains. The results reveal that citizens do adopt different decision criteria for different levels of task complexity, suggesting that functional usefulness of e-Gov services becomes a more important criterion for online services that involve difficult tasks. In contrast, the service provider's competence in online operations becomes a more important factor for simple tasks. Several other findings and future research directions are also discussed.     

基于WS-BPEL 的Web 服务组合技术

随着Web服务技术的不断发展,越来越多的Web服务已经发布在互联网上。然而独立的Web服务功能通常有限,不能满足用户或企业实际应用的需求。因此,Web服务的组合显得越来越重要。介绍了Web服务组合和WS-BPEL的相关知识,使用最新的业务流程执行语言WS-BPEL描述业务流程,在J2EE集成开发环境下设计并实现了基于业务流程思想的贷款审批应用实例,在Web服务执行引擎Active BPEL上进行部署,对Web服务进行了有效的组合。     

Failure analysis and tolerance strategies in web service ecosystems

Service‐oriented computing and cloud computing are playing critical roles in supporting business collaboration over the Internet. Thanks to the latest development in computing technologies, various large‐scale, evolving, and rapidly growing service ecosystems emerge. However, service failures greatly hamper the usability and reputation of service ecosystems. In the previous work, service failure is not adequately studied from an ecosystem's perspective. To address this gap, we propose a service failure analysis framework based on a complex network model of service ecosystem. This framework comprises a feature model of failed services and several service failure impact indicators. By applying the framework, empirical analysis of failed service features and failure impact assessment can be implemented more easily and precisely. Moreover, to provide failure tolerance strategies for service ecosystems, a novel composition‐based service substitution method is designed to replace the failed services with functional similar ones, such that the service systems are more robust when a failure occurs. As the new substitution method requires fewer structural data of services, it is more convenient to be applied in present RESTful Representational State Transfer (REST) service environment. Both the framework and the service substitution method are tested on real‐world data set, and their usability and efficiency are demonstrated. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Strategic context and patterns of IT infrastructure capability

The importance of a firm's information technology (IT) infrastructure capability is increasingly recognised as critical to firm competitiveness. Infrastructure is particularly important for firms in industries going through dynamic change, for firms reengineering their business processes and for those with multiple business units or extensive international or geographically dispersed operations. However, the notion of IT infrastructure is still evolving and there has been little empirically based research on the patterns of IT infrastructure capability across firms.We develop the concept of IT infrastructure capability through identification of IT infrastructure services and measurement of reach and range in large, multi-business unit firms. Using empirical case research, we examine the patterns of IT infrastructure capability in 26 firms with diverse strategic contexts, including different industry bases, level of marketplace volatility, extent of business unit synergies and the nature of firm strategy formation processes. Data collection was based on a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods with multiple participants.More extensive IT infrastructure capability is defined as a combination of more IT infrastructure services and more reach and range. More extensive IT infrastructure capability was found in firms where: (i) products changed quickly; (ii) attempts were made to identify and capture synergies across business units; (iii) there was greater integration of information and IT needs as part of planning processes; and (iv) there was greater emphasis on tracking the implementation of long term strategy. These findings have implications for both business and technology managers particularly in regard to how firms link strategy and IT infrastructure formation processes.     

基于CIMISS的海南气象信息服务网设计与实现

随着海南省气象业务的快速发展和社会公众对气象预报、预警服务的日益关注,建设海南气象信息服务网,形成海南气象系统内部统一的省级气象信息服务平台,是海南省气象现代化建设的重要任务之一;基于全国综合气象信息共享平台（CIMISS,china integrated meteorological information service system）的基础气象数据,整合相关业务单位的数据资源,利用统一的数据收集、处理及存储方式,采用Model+View+Controller (MVC)开发模式,使用J2EE应用架构Struts+Spring+Hibernate (SSH)研发一个集预报预警、气象监测和决策服务等功能于一体的信息服务平台,实现省级气象观测数据和预报产品的集约共享服务;目前,平台已投入业务试运行,运行稳定,具有高可用性和高可靠性,为社会公众提供及时、有效的基础气象数据服务产品。     

Emerging online educational models and the transformation of traditional universities

The information and communications technology (ICT) led revolution in the last two decades has transformed a large number of traditional businesses. The impact has been more significant in industries dominated by information goods such as music, software, and newspapers. Higher education sector is information-centric and its digitization is inevitable. The new generation of the Internet-based educational business models have emerged and they have already started evolving to make electronic learning (eLeraning) as effective and efficient as electronic commerce (eCommerce) has become in retailing. Drawing on information goods theory in economics, online retailers and marketplaces literature in information systems, and contemporary research on eLearning, this paper classifies and analyses the emerging educational business models into online education marketplaces (OEM), online education providers (OEP), and online education services (OES) and also provides a roadmap for the transformation of traditional universities.     

Research on dynamic business composition based on web service proxies

Web services-based business composition brings a number of advantages to the enterprise application development. How to select and compose the web services based on their functionality and QoS (Quality of Service) dynamically prove to be more and more important. In this paper we develop a proxy-based framework to compose Web services dynamically. The framework is featured with a QoS model, an effective service discovery and selection algorithms to facilitate the dynamic integration of Web services and management of abnormalities. Furthermore, a business process constructing method based on service slice is put forward to satisfy the users’ personalized requirements more effectively and flexibly. Our study concerns both functionality and QoS characteristics of Web services to identify the optimal business process solutions. A Complete case study is also included in this paper and the performance demonstrated that the framework and algorithms can provide a tangible and reliable solution to dynamic Web service composition and adaptation.     

一种共性服务接入与集成方法

随着互联网的高速发展,各领域企业的信息化程度越来越高,快速开发高质量、易维护的企业业务信息系统是必然的趋势.由于不同企业在搭建业务信息系统时存在一些十分相似的功能需求,为了高效而有保障地满足信息化系统的建设,信息系统的开发人员选择使用第三方企业开发的服务并以松耦合的方式整合其共性服务的开发.开发人员从而可以将更多的精力投入于其核心商业逻辑的构建.然而,众多的基于第三方提供的各种服务给系统开发人员带来了适配难、质量无保障等困难,极大地阻碍了业务信息系统的建设.针对上述问题,提出了一种业务信息系统共性服务接入与集成方法.该方法集成了搭建业务信息系统所共性需求的各种第三方共性服务,为各领域、各行业的业务信息系统提供具有统一接口格式的、可互联互通的,且支持服务保障和服务运营支撑功能的可定制集成服务的共性服务基础设施.详细阐述了该方法的功能、结构与特点,提出了一种共性服务组合流程抽象描述语言以系统地描述与开发,并举例深入阐述系统的特点.     

Automating identification of services and their variability for product lines using NSGA-II

Architecture-level business services are identified based on business processes; and likewise, in service-oriented product lines, identifying the domain architecture-level business services and their variability is preferred to be based on business processes and their variability. Identification of business services for a product line satisfying a set of given design metrics (such as cohesion and coupling) is extremely difficult for a domain architect, since there are many product configurations for which the services must be proper at the same time. This means that the identified services must have proper values for n metrics in m different configurations at the same time. The problem becomes more serious when there are high degrees of variability and complexity embedded in the business processes that are the basis for service identification.We contribute to solve the multi-objective optimization problem of identifying business services for a product line by partitioning the graph of a business process variability model utilizing Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm-II. The service specification is achieved based on the results of the partitioning. The variability of the services is then determined in terms of mandatory and optional services as well as variability relationships, which are all represented in a Service Variability Model. The method was empirically evaluated through experimentation, and showed proper levels of reusability and variability. Furthermore, the resulting models were fully consistent.     

一种基于来电平台的新型提醒类业务

随着电信技术以及互联网应用的飞速发展,越来越多的新兴业务出现,给传统电信业务,尤其是各类手机业务带来了巨大挑战,同时,也对传统运营商的创新能力以及满足用户各类需求的能力提出了更高要求。本文介绍的换号提醒业务就是从用户需求的角度出发,对用户进行各种细节的关心,提升手机用户的业务体验。     

Adaptive integration activity management for on demand business process collaboration

Today businesses are interacting and collaborating more often in the context of a business value chain involving a variety of partners to deliver products and services. Business to business (B2B) connectivity, Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) and general business collaboration processes are becoming more critical in operating and managing efficient enterprises. The required level of inter and intra enterprise integration is generally a large undertaking and involves substantial development and customization efforts. In this paper, we propose an adaptive integration activity management approach based on web services technologies to reduce code changes associated with business process integration in a distributed collaboration environment. Specifically, we present a concept of activity chain to capture non-deterministic process flows as well as deterministic process flows in a uniform manner. Then an Activity Ontology is introduced to capture the integration requirements that include adaptation behaviors, action properties, business rules, and access control policy references. The unique ontology representation and management of the integration activities provides a uniform way to integrate additional internal and external business applications to reduce the need for pre-defined and hard-wired integration methods and to minimize code changes to existing components in an existing business collaboration and integration (B2B/EAI) infrastructure. In addition, a Petri-Net modeling exercise of the proposed integration activity management is performed to help better understand the actual system and improve the system design beforehand.     

Nutzungsmanagement von Unternehmensportalen mithilfe von Empfehlungssystemen

Corporate portals are supposed to support a company’s business model and to increase productivity of the employees. However, the productivity gain that can be achieved by corporate portals is often undermined because the users of the portal are not sufficiently informed about the portal’s capabilities. This is of particular concern for large corporate portals whose service portfolio is constantly evolving and to which new users are added frequently. In the article, we propose a recommender system for corporate portals in order to increase service awareness and usage. Following the design science methodology, a suitable recommender concept is developed and several implementation options are evaluated in a field experiment at one of Germany’s largest companies. It is found that the recommender system increases the number of newly visited services as well as the number of newly used services in the corporate portal by about 20 %.     

Derivation of trust federation for collaborative business processes

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is considered to be an important enabler of Internet of Services. By adopting SOA in development, business services can be offered, mediated, and traded as web services, so as to support agile and dynamic business collaborations on the Internet. Business collaboration is often implemented as cross-enterprise processes and involves more than one business entity which agrees to join the collaboration. To enable trustworthy and secure provision of services and service composition across enterprise boundaries, trust between business participants must be established, that is, user identities and access rights must be federated, to support business functions defined in the business processes. This paper proposes an approach which derives trust federation from formally described business process models, such as BPMN and WS-CDL processes, to automate security configuration of business collaborations. The result of the derivation is trust policies which identify trust relationships between business participants and can be enforced in enterprises’ service runtimes with support of a policy deployment infrastructure.     

基于面向服务架构的港口智慧气象服务系统

随着海洋气象业务不断发展,海洋气象服务也逐渐向专业化、可视化及智慧化方向发展,综合性海洋气象服务已不能满足港口气象服务实际业务需求.为保障港口安全生产,提升港口气象服务效能,本文提出了一种基于面向服务架构(service-oriented architecture, SOA)的港口智慧气象服务系统建设方案.通过对气象、港口、地理信息等多源异构业务数据进行动态集成,结合XML(extensive markup language)、Web service、数据仓库、中间件模式、WebGIS、消息队列等计算机相关技术,实现了港区气象业务数据实时监测,港口专业预报预警,应急预案制作发布、专业用户及气象要素阈值管理等功能.系统业务应用结果表明,该系统满足港口专业气象服务需求,有效减少了海洋气象灾害对港区生产活动的不利影响,同时系统可扩展性强,具有较高应用推广价值.     

Agent negotiation based ontology refinement process and mechanisms for service applications

Nowadays organisations are willing to outsource their business processes as services and make them accessible via the Web. In doing so, they can dynamically combine individual services to their service applications. However, unless the data on the Web can be meaningfully shared and is interpretable, this objective cannot be realised. In this paper, a new agent-based approach for managing ontology evolution in a Web services environment is exploited. The proposed approach has several key characteristics such as flexibility and extensibility that differentiate this research from others. The refinement mechanisms which cope with an evolving ontology are carefully examined. The novelty of our work is that inter-processes between different ontologies are studied from the agent’s perspective. Based on this perspective, an agent negotiation model is applied to reach an agreement regarding ontology discrepancy in an application. The efficiency and effectiveness of reaching an agreement over an ontology dispute is leveraged by the private negotiation strategy applied in the argumentation approach. An extended negotiation strategy is discussed to enable sufficient information in decision making at each negotiation round. A case study is presented to demonstrate ontology refinement in a Web services environment.     

无线局域网（WLAN）在气象系统中的应用

随着通信技术、网络技术和气象现代化的飞速发展,气象通信方式也有了很大的变化,利用GPRS获取自动站信息,通过手机短信提供气象服务信息和预警服务,而且随着办公条件的变化,单位笔记本电脑也越来越多。现有的有线网络模式已经不能满足现代化业务的需求,而无线网络以其的高度的空间自由性和灵活性为现有的有线网络的扩充提供了可能。主要介绍无线局域网技术、特点、安全以及在现有的局域网中如何组建无线局域网。     

面向服务集成的工作流模型及其实现方法

针对现有工作流系统集成已有软件服务时存在的两个问题:1)对于业务流程中所集成服务的描述信息不足,无法满足服务集成需要;2)流程定制时可选择节点类型少,节点不具有业务含义,导致其定制过程复杂;提出一种新的工作流模型。首先,通过分析服务集成环境下的实际业务流程确定了模型的三部分信息:结构信息、服务信息和人员信息;其次,将模型中各部分信息与JPDL作了对应说明,表明了模型的完备性;最后,详细介绍了三部分信息的关键要素。实验结果表明,基于35种服务可以快速搭建出满足实际业务需求的48种业务流程。模型中丰富的服务信息为流程运行提供了保障,流程运行正确率100%;流程定制更加简便快捷,流程从定制到运行平均时间小于2 min。通过该模型可以快速地基于已有服务构建新的业务流程,降低了为新需求开发软件的成本。     

一种将业务规则与BPEL有效集成的方法

业务规则是定义和约束企业业务结构与业务行为的规定或规范，是企业业务运作和管理决策所依赖的重要资源。当前，面向服务的计算变得越来越流行，Web services已经成为集成互联网上分布和异构应用程序的通用技术。使用Web服务合成语言BPEL可以将不同服务提供者提供的服务整合成新的服务。然而，这种基于流程的合成语言缺乏在合成过程中使用由不同的业务规则引擎管理的业务规则的能力。因此提出了一种将业务规则与BPEL集成的方法。     

Exploring vendor capabilities in the cloud environment: A case study of Alibaba Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is being viewed as an effective enabler for enhanced operational efficiency and flexibility in competitive business environments. Despite the increased knowledge on cloud computing, very few studies have been conducted to explore vendors' capabilities for service development and delivery. This gap prevents us from developing a full understanding of the service provision process and the actions through which vendors develop cloud services and create value for clients. In this paper, we present an in-depth qualitative case study of Alibaba Cloud Computing, China’s biggest Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) vendor, and identify five important capabilities, namely, cloud platform development, cloud platform deployment, IaaS imitation, IaaS commercialization, and IaaS improvement. We suggest that these capabilities and the associated actions are central to vendors’ adoption of cloud computing, acquisition of knowledge, and delivery and improvement of their cloud service provision. This paper contributes incrementally to the evolving scholarship on cloud computing and also offers useful guidelines for current and aspiring vendors.     

Web服务中一种基于时间衰减和反馈的信任管理机制研究

Web服务是在商业社会中兴起的一种新的Web应用。伴随着Web服务的发展,服务和服务请求者的数量变得越来越多,如何保障服务的利益和如何在海量的服务请求者中选择诚实的服务请求者将变得十分重要和困难,而现有的基于反馈的信任管理惩罚机制对于恶意的服务请求者缺乏有效的识别方法和惩罚机制。针对Web服务中缺乏对恶意服务请求者实施有效处罚机制的问题,本文在基于反馈的信任管理机制基础上,提出了一种反馈与时间衰减结合的信任管理机制,激励服务请求者提供诚实的访问行为,有效避免其对服务造成伤害,增强了Web服务的访问控制安全。