In search for a widely applicable and accepted software quality model for software quality engineering

Software Quality Engineering is an emerging discipline that is concerned with improving the approach to software quality. It is important that this discipline be firmly rooted in a quality model satisfying its needs. In order to define the needs of this discipline, the meaning of quality is broadly defined by reviewing the literature on the subject. Software Quality Engineering needs a quality model that is usable throughout the software lifecycle and that it embraces all the perspectives of quality. The goal of this paper is to propose the characteristics of a quality model suitable for such a purpose, through the comparative evaluation of existing quality models and their respective support for Software Quality Engineering.     

Theoretical and experimental analysis of the thermal behaviour of a green roof system installed in two residential buildings in Athens,Greece

Measurements of the thermal behaviour of two residential buildings equipped with a green roof system have been performed in Athens, Greece. Experimental data have been used to calibrate detailed simulation tools and the specific energy and environmental performance of the planted roofs system has been estimated in detail. Simulations have been performed for free‐floating and thermostatically controlled conditions. The expected energy benefits as well as the possible improvements of the indoor thermal comfort have been assessed. It is found that green roofs have a limited contribution to the heating demand of insulated buildings operating under the Mediterranean climate. On the contrary, the green roof system is found to contribute highly to reduce the cooling load of thermostatically controlled buildings. For the considered residential buildings, a cooling load decrease of about 11% has been calculated. In parallel, it is found that green roofs contribute to improve thermal comfort in free‐floating buildings during the summer period. The expected maximum decrease of the indoor air and roof surface temperatures is close to 0.6°C. Such a decrease contributes to reduce by 0.1 the summer absolute Predicted Mean Vote Comfort Index levels in the building. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A randomized trial of deflazacort versus 6-methylprednisolone in renal transplantation--immunosuppressive activity and side effects

Blue-flowering genotypes of Campanula were classified into four phenotypes on the basis of the anthocyanin composition of their flowers. The flowers contained one, two, three or four of the following anthocyanins: bisdeacylplatyconin (7-O-(beta-D-glucopyranosyl)-3-O-(6-O-alpha-L-rhamnopyranosyl-beta-D- glucopyranosyl)delphinidin), violdelphin (7-O-(6-O-(4-O-(6-O-(4-hydroxybenzoyl)-beta-D-glucopyranosyl)-oxybenz oyl)-beta- D-glucopyranosyl)-3-O-(6-O-alpha-L-rhamnopyranosyl-beta-D-glucopyranosyl ) delphinidin), an unknown anthocyanin and campanin (7-O-(6-O-(4-O-(6-O-(4-O-(6-O-p-hydroxybenzoyl-beta-D-glucopyranosyl) oxybenzoyl)-beta-D-glucopyranosyl)oxybenzoyl)-beta-D-glucopy ranosyl)-3-O-(6-O- (alpha-L-rhamnopyranosyl)-beta-D-glucopyranosyl)delphinidin). The structure of the unknown anthocyanin has been determined as 7-O-(6-O-(4-O-(6-O-(4-O-(beta-D-glucopyranosyl)oxybenzoyl)-beta-D- glucopyranosyl)oxybenzoyl)-beta-D-glucopyranosyl)-3-O-(6-O-(alpha- L- rhamnopyranosyl)-beta-D-glucopyranosyl)-delphinidin, i.e. monodeacylcampanin. The genetic evidence is consistent with a biosynthetic pathway in which bisdeacylplatyconin, violdelphin and monodeacylcampanin are intermediates in the biosynthesis of campanin.     

Requirements Engineering and Process Modelling in Software Quality Management— Towards a Generic Process Metamodel

This paper examines the concept of Quality in Software Engineering, its different contexts and its different meanings to various people. It begins with a commentary on quality issues for systems development and various stakeholders' involvement. It revisits aspects and concepts of systems development methods and highlights the relevance of quality issues to the choice of a process model. A summarised review of some families of methods is presented, where their application domain, lifecycle coverage, strengths and weaknesses are considered. Under the new development era the requirements of software development change; the role of methods and stakeholders change, too. The paper refers to the latest developments in the area of software engineering and emphasises the shift from traditional conceptual modelling to requirements engineering and process metamodelling principles. We provide support for an emerging discipline in the form of a software process metamodel to cover new issues for software quality and process improvement. The widening of the horizons of software engineering both as a communication tool and as a scientific discipline (and not as a craft) is needed in order to support both communicative and scientific quality systems properties. In general, we can consider such a discipline as a thinking tool for understanding the generic process and as the origin of combining intuition and quality engineering to transform requirements to adequate human-centred information systems. We conclude with a schematic representation of a Generic Process Metamodel (GPM) indicating facets contributed by Software Engineering, Computer Science, Information Systems, Mathematics, Linguistics, Sociology and Anthropology. Ongoing research and development issues have provided evidence for influence from even more diverse disciplines.     

Degradation of methylparathion in aqueous solution by electrochemical oxidation

The electrochemical degradation of methylparathion has been investigated by using Ti/Pt as anode, Stainless Steel 304 as cathode, and sodium chloride as electrolyte. The pesticide is rapidly degraded, but full mineralization is not observed. Degradation products have been monitored through gas chromatography and mass spectrometry, and the overall degradation process has been monitored through dissolved and particulate organic carbon, sulfur, and phosphorus measurements. Several intermediates have been identified, and oxalic, formic, and acetic acids as well as tetraphosphorus trisulfide have been recognized as final products of the degradation process. A proposed mechanism of the process is presented.     

Empirical Measurement of the Effects of Cultural Diversity on Software Quality Management

The difficulties of achieving social acceptance for Software Quality Management systems have been underestimated in the past, and they will be exacerbated in the future by the globalization of the software market and the increasing use of cross-cultural development teams within multinational companies. Management that can take account of the cultural context of their endeavours will improve understanding, minimize risk and ensure a higher degree of success in improvement programs within the software industry.This paper addresses cross-cultural issues in Software Quality Management. Qualitative and quantitative research was carried out in five European countries by using a postal questionnaire. Empirical measures of organizational culture, national culture and their interdependence, are presented together with interim instruments developed for the purpose of classifying organizations. Verification of the statistical results from the survey was carried out by triangulation, which included qualitative research methods in the form of interviews and observation. Cultural factors, which may have bearing on successful adoption and implementation of Software Quality Management were identified, and an assessment model, has been developed for use by organizations developing software in different parts of the world. The intention is that the recommendations following from the assessment will lead to greater cultural awareness in addressing quality, and will provide stimulus for improvement. The model's aims is to predict to what degree there is a fit between the organizational and the national culture, and to give recommendations and guidelines for software process improvement.     

Fault tolerant scheduling of tasks of two sizes under resource augmentation

Guaranteeing the eventual execution of tasks in machines that are prone to unpredictable crashes and restarts may be challenging, but is also of high importance. Things become even more complicated when tasks arrive dynamically and have different computational demands, i.e., processing time (or sizes). In this paper, we focus on the online task scheduling in such systems, considering one machine and at least two different task sizes. More specifically, algorithms are designed for two different task sizes while the complementary bounds hold for any number of task sizes bigger than one. We look at the latency and 1-completed load competitiveness properties of deterministic scheduling algorithms under worst-case scenarios. For this, we assume an adversary, that controls the machine crashes and restarts as well as the task arrivals of the system, including their computational demands. More precisely, we investigate the effect of resource augmentation—in the form of processor speedup—in the machine’s performance, by looking at the two efficiency measures for different speedups. We first identify the threshold of the speedup under which competitiveness cannot be achieved by any deterministic algorithm, and above which there exists some deterministic algorithm that is competitive. We then propose an online algorithm, named \(\gamma \text{-Burst } \), that achieves both latency and 1-completed-load competitiveness when the speedup is over the threshold. This also proves that the threshold identified is also sufficient for competitiveness.     

Nanoporous structure of a GdF(3) thin film evaluated by variable angle spectroscopic ellipsometry

As excimer lasers extend to deep-ultraviolet and vacuum-ultraviolet wavelengths at 193 and 157 nm, optical coatings experience the challenge of eliminating possible environmental contamination, reducing scattering loss, and increasing laser irradiation durability. Wide bandgap metal fluorides become the materials of choice for the laser optics applications. To understand the optical properties of nanostructure fluoride films, thin GdF(3) films grown on CaF(2) (111) substrates were evaluated by variable angle spectroscopic ellipsometry. An effective medium approximation model was used to determine both the film porosity and the surface roughness. Structural evolution of the GdF(3) film was revealed with improved ellipsometric modeling, suggesting the existence of multilayer structure, a densified bottom layer, middle layers with increasing porosity, and a rough surface. The nanostructure of the film and the surface roughness were confirmed by atomic force microscopy. The attraction of the nanostructure to environmental contamination was experimentally demonstrated.