Performance on agile teams: Relating iteration objectives and critical decisions to project management success factors

ContextWhile project management success factors have long been established via the golden triangle, little is known about how project iteration objectives and critical decisions relate to these success factors. It seems logical that teams’ iteration objectives would reflect project management success factors, but this may not always be the case. If not, how are teams’ objectives for iterations differing from the golden triangle of project management success factors?ObjectiveThis study identifies iteration objectives and the critical decisions that relate to the golden triangle of project management success factors in agile software development teams working in two-week iterations.MethodThe author conducted semi-structured interviews with members across three different agile software development teams using a hybrid of XP and Scrum agile methodologies. Iteration Planning and Retrospective meetings were also observed. Interview data was transcribed, coded and reviewed by the researcher and two independently trained research assistants. Data analysis involved organizing the data to identify iteration objectives and critical decisions to identify whether they relate to project management success factors.ResultsAgile teams discussed four categories of iteration objectives: Functionality, Schedule, Quality and Team Satisfaction. Two of these objectives map directly to two aspects of the golden triangle: schedule and quality. The agile teams’ critical decisions were also examined to understand the types of decisions the teams would have made differently to ensure success, which resulted in four categories of such decisions: Quality, Dividing Work, Iteration Amendments and Team Satisfaction.ConclusionThis research has contributed to the software development and project management literature by examining iteration objectives on agile teams and how they relate to the golden triangle of project management success factors to see whether these teams incorporate the golden triangle factors in their objectives and whether they include additional objectives in their iterations. What’s more, this research identified four critical decisions related to the golden triangle. These findings provide important insight to the continuing effort to better assess project management success, particularly for agile teams.     

O3/H2O2 Treatment of Methyl-terf-Butyl Ether in Contaminated Waters: Effect of Background COD on the O3-Dose

The destruction of methyl-tert-butyl ether (MTBE) in contaminated waters by O₃/H₂0₂ process was studied and the influence background COD, alkalinity, and hydrogen peroxide and MTBE concentrations on process treatment efficiency and ozone dosage was investigated. The treatment efficiency was evaluated by an Efficiency Index, which is based on electrical energy requirement for ozone production. It was found that the treatment efficiency decreases linearly with increasing concentrations of MTBE at constant background COD and with background COD at constant MTBE concentration. A simplified kinetic scheme was presented to account for these observations.     

利用南水北调工程改善济宁水生态环境的措施

通过对济宁市防治水污染技术研究, 提出水污染防治在政策措施上实施治污抓源头, 杜绝不达标排放; 在城市 建设规划上, 把河湖生态湿地建设、 改善居住生活环境与城市建设有机结合; 在河湖治理上, 坚持工程、 生物措施并 举; 在工程管护上, 坚持依法治水。利用南水北调东线工程建设, 实施水污染防治建设, 通过对济宁市水污染防治成 果的阐释, 为今后水污染治理提供成功的经验和做法。     

液态排渣锅炉高温受热面结焦及积灰问题的分析与对策

为提高四角喷燃液态排渣锅炉运行的安全性和经济性，从锅炉原理和实际运行情况对锅炉高温受热面的积灰与结焦问题进行了分析，并提出了解决办法，同时提出了一种基于热力学模型的受热面积灰状态实时监测方法。     

差异化教学在计算机课程教学中的应用

目前高等学校计算机专业部分课程教学中存在理论与实践脱节的问题,教学仍然采用传统的“一刀切”的统一教学模式,以教师、课本和课堂为中心的教学模式,无法适应社会对不同类型人才的需求。设计一种差异化教学体系,并将该体系应用于《软件开发项目》课程教学中。实践表明,应用差异化教学理论可以有效地促进各个层次的学生对学习内容的兴趣,提高学生的综合应用能力、创新能力以及协作精神。     

Groundwater as a source and pathway for road salt contamination of surface water in the Lake Ontario Basin: A review

In Ontario, there is limited comprehensive research regarding the contribution of chloride in groundwater to surface water systems. The delivery of chloride via groundwater can contribute to the degradation of the Great Lakes and their tributaries. Thus, this review intends to fill or identify knowledge gaps regarding assessing groundwater as a potential source of road salt, the single largest use of salt in urban cold region environments, contamination to surface water by synthesizing existing groundwater chloride research in the Lake Ontario Basin. Knowledge regarding source characterization, properties, pathways, and impacts of chloride in the environment is essential to evaluate the contribution of chloride via groundwater. Past groundwater chloride research in the basin is primarily concentrated in highly urbanized areas and has identified localized trends of increasing groundwater chloride concentrations in these regions; however, few investigations have been conducted in varying land uses (e.g., rural or less urbanized watersheds) or at sufficient temporal and/or spatial scales. Significant chloride accumulation is occurring in watersheds and aquifers within the basin. Concentrations are expected to increase until equilibrium is obtained, thus resulting in sustained yearlong elevated concentrations in tributaries. Recently, chloride loading to Lake Ontario has increased significantly, with groundwater inputs having the potential to support long-term increases in chloride concentrations in the lake. However, few studies have evaluated the explicit contribution via groundwater to Lake Ontario, and therefore a knowledge gap continues to exist. We provide a synthesis of additional research priorities to better understand the magnitude of groundwater chloride issues in the basin.     

南水北调中线总干渠水质变化趋势及污染源分析

为了解和掌握南水北调中线总干渠水质状况,依据总干渠26个常规水质断面监测数据,分析了总干渠沿程水质变化趋势。结果表明,主要污染指标(CODMn、氨氮、总氮和总磷)呈现出沿程增加趋势。根据影响总干渠水质的潜在影响因素,分析了7类污染源(直接水污染、大气粉尘沉降、桥面雨水污染、底泥污染、周边垃圾场淋溶液污染、雨洪污染、受污染地下水)及其可能对干渠水质产生的影响程度,并针对不同污染源提出了防控对策,供管理部门决策参考。     

Diets,population structure,and seasonal activity patterns of mudpuppies (Necturus maculosus) in an urban,Great Lakes coastal habitat

Freshwater species native to the Laurentian Great Lakes region face numerous environmental stressors, and the conservation status and ecological relationships of many remain poorly understood. One such species, the mudpuppy (Necturus maculosus), is declining, but better information on their natural history and development of more effective population monitoring techniques is needed. We assessed seasonal variation in capture success, biases in capture techniques, and feeding ecology of mudpuppies in Wolf Lake, a highly perturbed and urban former estuarine wetland complex to Lake Michigan. Trapping periods of ≥ 3 consecutive nights occurred from January to May 2015, and October 2015 to March 2016. Overall trapping success differed among trapping periods (p = 0.01) and declined precipitously at water temperatures above 14.1 °C (p < 0.001). Mudpuppies in traps (mean 26.9 ± 0.5 cm) were larger than those caught with hand nets (mean 14.7 ± 0.8 cm, p < 0.0001), suggesting that multiple methods may be needed to accurately assess demographics. Stomach contents obtained through gastric lavage included mollusks, leeches, insects, isopods, amphipods, crayfish, fish, a frog, and a juvenile conspecific. Invasive species, including rusty crayfish (Orconectes rusticus), round gobies (Neogobius melanostomus), and zebra/quagga mussels (Dreissena spp.) were present in guts, suggesting mudpuppy foraging has changed along with aquatic communities in the region. Prey community analyses revealed differences in overall diet among size classes of mudpuppies (p = 0.001), but relatively weak similarity within size classes. Results suggest that mudpuppies in lake ecosystems occupy a broad niche that changes as they grow.     

工程造价管理改革刍议

工程造价管理改革就是改革现行的定额、费率和价格，定额从指令性变为参考性，费率自主确定，价格市场化；推行监理制，采用FIDIC的合同管理方法和工程量表的做法。     

MoNoC: A monitored network on chip with path adaptation mechanism

Complex systems on chip containing dozens of processing resources with critical communication requirements usually rely on the use of networks on chip (NoCs) as communication infrastructure. NoCs provide significant advantages over simpler infrastructures such as shared busses or point to point communication, including higher scalability, more efficient energy management, higher bandwidth and lower average latency. Applications running on NoCs with more than 10% of bandwidth usage attest that the most significant portion of message latencies refers to buffered packets waiting to enter the NoC, whereas the latency portion that depends on the packet traversing the NoC is sometimes negligible. This work presents an adaptive routing architecture, named Monitored NoC (MoNoC), which is based on a traffic monitoring mechanism and the exchange of high priority control packets. This method enables to adapt paths by choosing less congested routes. Practical experiments show that the proposed path adaptation is a fast process, enabling to transmit packets with smaller latencies, up to 9 times smaller, by using non-congested NoC regions.