DSS implementation activities,problem domain characteristics and DSS success

This study examines the main and joint effects of DSS implementation activities (design, development, maintenance/use) and selected attributes (subjectivity, complexity, criticality) of the problem domain for which a DSS is being implemented. DSS success is assessed via four measures: relative use, perceived utility, output satisfaction and goal realisation (a new measure devised for this study). A sample of 155 DSS projects across 64 Finnish business organizations constituted the research database. The study's major findings are that (1) design activities have a positive influence on DSS success, (2) a negative relationship may exist between the development activities and DSS success and (3) interaction effects regarding problem domain complexity appear to exist.     

An empirical investigation of factors influencing object-oriented database querying

Object-oriented databases (OODBs) provide an effective means for capturing complex data and semantic relationships underlying many real-world database applications. Because users' interactions with databases have increased significantly in today's era of client–server computing, it is important to examine users' ability to interact with such databases. We investigated a number of factors that potentially affect performance in writing queries on an OODB. First, we evaluated the utility of graphical and textual schemas associated with emerging OODBs from the perspective of database querying. Second, we examined the use of two different strategies (navigation and join) that could be used in writing OODB queries. Third, we examined a number of factors that potentially contribute to the complexity of an OODB query.Our exploratory study examined the performance of 20 graduate students in an experiment in which each participant wrote queries for two problems, one using a graphical OODB schema and the other a textual OODB schema. The participants had no prior exposure to the object-oriented data model. We found that there was no difference in query writing performance (either accuracy or time) using the graphical and textual schemas. Examination of query strategy revealed that a significant number of participants used a join strategy, rather than the navigation strategy that matches the database structure. Use of the join strategy resulted in significantly less accurate and slower query writing than did the navigation strategy. From the viewpoint of complexity, the number of objects referenced in a query, the number of starting points in the from clause, and the presence of special operators influenced both the accuracy and time of query writing.     

An empirical investigation of competency factors affecting e-business success in European SMEs

In the last decade there was growing interest in strategic management literature about factors that influence a company's ability to use IT. There is general consensus that knowledge and competency are necessary in developing an IT capability, but there is very little understanding of what the necessary competencies are, and how they influence IS usage in different contexts. The small and medium-sized enterprise context is particularly interesting for two reasons: it constitutes a major part of the economy and it has been relatively unsuccessful in exploiting e-business.     

An empirical investigation of DSS usage and the user's perception of DSS training

Financial analysts, financed managers, and other finance specialists participated in a laboratory study to examine the perceived value of specific DSS training with DSS usage, the decision process, and task structure. Measures included the frequency of DSS features used, the number of syntax errors made, comfort with and the use of a computer terminal to improve decision effectiveness, and the use of a specific DSS to enhance decision making. Forty-nine participants received DSS training, were randomly assigned to a structured or semi-structured task, and conducted analyses. Results showed that DSS users see a strong positive correlation between their training and the use of a DSS to improve decision making. Significant relationships were also noted between perceptions of training and task structure differences.     

Critical success factors for ERP implementation in SMEs

ERP implementation is regarded as complex, cumbersome and costly, and, very often, it exceeds the initial estimated resources. The process involves a thorough examination of the business processes in the organisation; selection of the best available software solution that matches the requirements of the enterprise; configuration of the selected systems;, training of staff; and customisation of the selected software solutions including development of required interfaces. Finally, the existing MIS of the organisation is replaced totally or partially by the new system. All the implementation processes should be carried out without affecting the daily operations across the whole enterprise. This can only be achieved by having an understanding of the key elements forming the infrastructure of the organisation, an effective plan for the implementation and an effective procedure to measure and evaluate the project throughout the implementation process. This paper presents the results of a study to identify and analyse the interrelationships of the critical issues involved in the implementation of ERP in small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). Three basic research questions were addressed. First, what are the main critical success factors? Second, how do these factors interact throughout the implementation process? Third, which factors have their highest impact and in what stages? In order to answer these questions, over 50 relevant papers were critically reviewed to identify the main critical success factors (CSFs) for ERP implementation in large organisations. Then, the applicability of the identified CSFs to SMEs was investigated. Next, an industrial survey was also undertaken to identify which CSF has highest impact in what stages. The findings on relationships of the critical success factors have been utilised to develop a tool to monitor, and eventually improve, ERP implementations for SMEs. In the development of the tool, eight people from industry and academia with experience of ERP implementations were interviewed with the aim of validating the model being developed. The overall results provide useful pointers to the interplay of organisational and operational factors for the successful implementation of ERP.     

Regret avoidance as a measure of DSS success: An exploratory study

Assessing the value of decision support systems (DSS) is an important line of research. Traditionally, researchers adopt user satisfaction and decision performance to measure DSS success. In some cases, however, the use of DSS is not benefit driven. Instead, DSS adoption may be motivated by avoiding decision errors or reducing decision cost, indicating that regret avoidance may be a useful measure of DSS success. Regret is a post-decision feeling regarding not having chosen a better alternative. Recent behavioral research has indicated that, in addition to pursuing higher performance and user satisfaction, reducing decision regret is another important consideration for many decision-makers. This exploratory study extends prior research on DSS evaluation by proposing regret avoidance as an additional measure of DSS success. Experimental results regarding the use of DSS for stock investment demonstrate DSS use significantly reduces regret in situations involving low user satisfaction. Consequently, besides decision performance and user satisfaction, regret reduction is also important in measuring the effectiveness of DSS.     

A critical success factors model for ERP implementation

An effective IT infrastructure can support a business vision and strategy; a poor, decentralized one can break a company. More and more companies are turning to off-the-shelf ERP (enterprise resource planning) solutions for IT planning and legacy systems management. The authors have developed a framework to help managers successfully plan and implement an ERP project     

An empirical investigation of employee portal success

Employee portals are utilized by many companies to improve companies’ information exchange, communication, and employee collaboration, as well as to better support their business processes. Owing to limited IT budgets and the need to justify investments in employee portals, assessing the benefits of these is an important field in research and practice. Thus, the purpose of this study is to gain a better understanding of employee portal success. We introduce a theoretical model for this that is based on the DeLone and McLean IS Success Model. Furthermore, we develop hypotheses regarding the associations between different models’ success dimensions and test them using more than 10,000 employees’ responses collected in a survey of 22 companies. Our results indicate that besides the factors contributing to IS success in general, other success dimensions – like the quality of the collaboration and process support – have to be considered when aiming for a successful employee portal. The study’s findings make it possible for practitioners to understand the levers with which to improve their employee portals. By empirically validating a comprehensive success model for employee portals, the study’s results advance theoretical development in the area of collaboration-centered systems and present a basis for further research in this field.     

The role of the champion in DSS implementation

Adoption of a DSS usually involves changes or innovation in an organization's way of doing things. The process of innovation has been the subject of study in other contexts, and research has indicated that the efforts of various champions can be critical to successful innovation. Observations of DSS implementations in several organizations suggest that a system champion can likewise be a key factor in implementation success. Such persons play a variety of roles, including that of reference leader, of missionary or change agent, or of top management surrogate. Implementation strategies can be designed which capitalize on the presence of a champion.     

An investigation into the factors influencing the adoption of B2B trading exchanges in small businesses

Small businesses, in general, play dominant roles in terms of employment generation and share in total business activities. However, studies have shown that small businesses are also slow in their uptake of modern technologies including electronic commerce. This paper presents the result of an empirical study that investigates the adoption behaviour of small businesses in relation to business-to-business (B2B) trading exchanges in the context of Western Australia. Following extensive literature review on innovation adoption–diffusion theories and qualitative field study, a research model was developed which treated six sets of antecedents of small business's attitude towards B2B trading exchanges. The findings revealed that external influences raise the small business's awareness of an innovation. This awareness leads to the evaluation of the perceived direct and indirect benefits and a positive evaluation leads to a positive attitude towards the innovation. The results confirmed that a positive attitude towards B2B trading exchanges leads to the intention to adopt B2B trading exchanges in small businesses. The findings also confirm that external, belief, contextual and control factors drive the attitude towards B2B trading exchanges. Implications of the results are highlighted.     

An experimental investigation of formality in UML-based development

The object constraint language (OCL) was introduced as part of the Unified Modeling Language (UML). Its main purpose is to make UML models more precise and unambiguous by providing a constraint language describing constraints that the UML diagrams alone do not convey, including class invariants, operation contracts, and statechart guard conditions. There is an ongoing debate regarding the usefulness of using OCL in UML-based development, questioning whether the additional effort and formality is worth the benefit. It is argued that natural language may be sufficient, and using OCL may not bring any tangible benefits. This debate is in fact similar to the discussion about the effectiveness of formal methods in software engineering, but in a much more specific context. This paper presents the results of two controlled experiments that investigate the impact of using OCL on three software engineering activities using UML analysis models: detection of model defects through inspections, comprehension of the system logic and functionality, and impact analysis of changes. The results show that, once past an initial learning curve, significant benefits can be obtained by using OCL in combination with UML analysis diagrams to form a precise UML analysis model. But, this result is however conditioned on providing substantial, thorough training to the experiment participants.     

通用FPGA实验系统的设计与应用

阐述了一种FPGA实验系统的设计思想并较为详细地介绍了PCI接口的开发。实验系统以FPGA为核心,可通过PCI、USB、串行以及网络接口和计算机交换数据。可作为逻辑分析仪、密码协处理器使用,也可用于信息安全、IC设计、嵌入式操作系统等有关的研究、开发和实验。     

An investigation into the factors influencing the detectability of oil spills using spectral indices in an oil-polluted environment

The aim of this article is to investigate and test the influence of oil spill volume and time gap (number of days between oil spill events and image acquisition date) on normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and normalized difference water index (NDWI). This was carried out to determine the effect of these factors on vegetation condition affected by the oil spill. Based on regression analysis, it was shown that increase in the volume of oil spill resulted in increased deterioration of vegetation condition (estimated using NDVI and NDWI) in the study site. The study also tested how the length of time gap between the oil spill and image acquisition date influences the detectability of impacts of oil spill on vegetation. The results showed that the length of time between image acquisition and oil spill influenced the detectability of impacts of oil spill on vegetation condition. The longer the time between the date of image acquisition and the oil spill event, the lower the detectability of impacts of oil spill on vegetation condition. The NDVI seemed to produce better results than the NDWI. In conclusion, time and volume of oil spill can be important factors influencing the detection of pollution using vegetation indices (VIs) in an oil-polluted environment.     

The critical success factors for ERP implementation: an organizational fit perspective

Since early 1990s, many firms around the world have shifted their information technology (IT) strategy from developing information systems in-house to purchasing application software such as enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. IT managers responsible for managing their organization’s ERP implementation view their ERP systems as their organizations’ most strategic computing platform. However, despite such strategic importance, ERP projects report an unusually high failure rate, sometimes jeopardizing the core operations of the implementing organization. This study explores the root of such high failure rate from an “organizational fit of ERP” perspective. Based on the relevant literature, we define the concept of organizational fit of ERP and examine its impact on ERP implementation, together with ERP implementation contingencies. The results from our field survey of 34 organizations show that ERP implementation success significantly depends on the organizational fit of ERP and certain implementation contingencies.     

Research on factors influencing intention to use DMB using extended IS success model

The commercialization of DMB (Digital Multimedia Broadcasting), a portable multimedia broadcasting technology, has begun. Although DMB has been introduced internationally, the distribution has been limited to a few countries, such as Korea and Japan. Moreover, the DMB industries have not yet obtained large share of broadcasting market. Hence, it is necessary to further understand DMB users’ usage intentions in order to make substantial profits. This study examines the factors which affect DMB usage intention in order to induce and sustain its continuous usage. Adopting the extended DeLone and McLean’s IS success model, we include new factors derived from unique features of DMB. The research model was empirically tested, based on a questionnaire survey of 350 DMB users, by structural equation modeling. Results show that content quality and enjoyment directly influence intention to use and that system quality, content quality, enjoyment, ubiquitousness, and time pressure indirectly influence intention to use through user satisfaction. This study provides theoretical and practical implications to generate sustainable DMB usage.     

An experimental investigation of distributed matrix multiplication techniques

This paper discusses the development and refinement of several distributed matrix multiplication algorithms. Our goal in this research has been to determine if successful distribution of this problem is possible within a loosely-coupled environment. Our criteria for success are fast execution speed and, to a lesser extent, memory efficiency. Our results indicate that, perhaps counter-intuitively, it is possible to use distribution to improve the performance of dense matrix multiplication. The speed increase obtained ranges up to a factor of four, depending upon the algorithm and the process configuration used. Among the factors affecting performance are computational complexity, number and size of interprocess messages, and bookkeeping overhead. We conclude that this approach to matrix multiplication has potential. Furthermore, some of the principles discussed here may be usefully employed in the distribution of other algorithms of the same O(n³) computational complexity, such as LU decomposition (linear system solvers) and Cholesky factorization.     

Strategic alignment of ERP implementation stages: An empirical investigation

We applied the notion of strategic alignment to ERP system implementation and used a balanced scorecard approach to analyze business performance. The PLS analysis showed a positive association between realized strategic alignment, shorter and more cost efficient ERP projects, faster reaction times to business events, and the benefits of ERP systems. While each stage of ERP implementation has its inherent intricacies, we concluded that there was a substantial interdependency between the stages of ERP implementation and the success factors in one stage influencing the success of another.     

An AHP model of DSS effectiveness

Empirical studies have reported equivocal, or even dysfunctional, results from the use of decision support systems (DSS). Recent examples are the Davis, Kottemann, and Remus production planning experiments. According to the researchers, these experiments demonstrate that DSS what-if analysis creates an ‘illusion of control’ that causes users to overestimate its effectiveness. Such experimental findings are contrary to case-supported DSS theory. This paper examines the discrepancy. It first overviews the decision-making process, presents a generic DSS, identifies the theoretical role of the DSS in improving decision making, develops a multiple criteria model of DSS effectiveness, and gives a DSS for delivering the model to users. Illustrating with recent empirical investigations and the Davis, Kottemann, and Remus studies, the DSS-delivered model is used to reconcile the incongruity between the experimental findings and the case-supported theory. The paper concludes with a discussion of the article's implications for information systems research and practice.