This book contains the best papers of the First International Conference on e-Business and Telecommunication Networks held in 2004. The book presents recent research on e-business and telecommunication networks. It includes analyses aspects of global communication information systems and services, and describes security and reliability problems and solutions in information systems and networks.

"Content Delivery Networks" enables the readers to understand the basics, to identify the underlying technology, to summarize their knowledge on concepts, ideas, principles and various paradigms which span on broad CDNs areas. Therefore, aspects of CDNs in terms of basics, design process, practice, techniques, performances, platforms, applications, and experimental results have been presented in a proper order. Fundamental methods, initiatives, significant research results, as well as references for further study have also been provided. Comparison of different design and development approaches are described at the appropriate places so that new researchers as well as advanced practitioners can use the CDNs evaluation as a research roadmap. All the contributions have been reviewed, edited, processed, and placed in the appropriate order to maintain consistency so that any reader irrespective of their level of knowledge and technological skills in CDNs would get the most out of it. The book is organized into three parts, namely, Part I: CDN Fundamentals; Part II: CDN Modeling and Performance; and Part III: Advanced CDN Platforms and Applications. The organization ensures the smooth flow of material as successive chapters build on prior ones.

Ontologies have been developed and investigated for some time in artificial intelligence to facilitate knowledge sharing and reuse. More recently, the notion of ontologies has attracted attention from fields such as databases, intelligent information integration, cooperative information systems, information retrieval, electronic commerce, enterprise application integration, and knowledge management. This broadened interest in ontologies is based on the feature that they provide a machine-processable semantics of information sources that can be communicated among agents as well as between software artifacts and humans. This feature makes ontologies the backbone technology of the next web generation, i.e., the Semantic Web. Ontologies are currently applied in areas such as knowledge management in large company-wide networks and call centers, and in B2C, B2G, and B2B electronic commerce. In a nutshell, ontologies enable effective and efficient access to heterogeneous and distributed information sources. Given the increasing amount of information available online, this kind of support is becoming more important day by day.

The author systematically introduces the notion of ontologies to the non-expert reader and demonstrates in detail how to apply this conceptual framework for improved intranet retrieval of corporate information and knowledge and for enhanced Internet-based electronic commerce. He also describes ontology languages (XML, RDF, and OWL) and ontology tools, and the application of ontologies.

In addition to structural improvements, the second edition covers recent developments relating to the Semantic Web, and emerging web-based standard languages.

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The World Wide Web has become a ubiquitous global tool, used for finding infor mation, communicating ideas, carrying out distributed computation and conducting business, learning and science. The Web is highly dynamic in both the content and quantity of the information that it encompasses. In order to fully exploit its enormous potential as a global repository of information, we need to understand how its size, topology and content are evolv ing. This then allows the development of new techniques for locating and retrieving information that are better able to adapt and scale to its change and growth. The Web's users are highly diverse and can access the Web from a variety of devices and interfaces, at different places and times, and for varying purposes. We thus also need techniques for personalising the presentation and content of Web based information depending on how it is being accessed and on the specific user's requirements. As well as being accessed by human users, the Web is also accessed by appli cations. New applications in areas such as e-business, sensor networks, and mobile and ubiquitous computing need to be able to detect and react quickly to events and changes in Web-based information. Traditional approaches using query-based 'pull' of information to find out if events or changes of interest have occurred may not be able to scale to the quantity and frequency of events and changes being generated, and new 'push' -based techniques are needed."

This edited book serves as a companion volume to the Seventh INFORMS Telecommunications Conference held in Boca Raton, Florida, March 7-10, 2004. The 18 papers in this book were carefully selected after a thorough re view process. The research presented within these articles focuses on the latest methodological developments in three key areas-pricing of telecommunica tions services, network design, and resource allocation-that are most relevant to current telecommunications planning. With the global deregulation of the telecommunications industry, effective pricing and revenue management, as well as an understanding of competi tive pressures are key factors that will improve revenue in telecommunica tions companies. Chapters 1-5 address these topics by focusing on pricing of telecommunications services. They present some novel ideas related to pricing (including auction-based pricing of network bandwidth) and modeling compe tition in the industry. The successful telecommunications companies of the future will likely be the ones that can minimize their costs while meeting customer expectations. In this context the optimal design/provisioning of telecommunication networks plays an important role. Chapters 6-12 address these topics by focusing on net work design for a wide range of technologies including SONET, SDH, WDM, and MPLS. They include the latest research developments related to the mod eling and solving of network design problems. Day-to-day management/control of telecommunications networks is depen dent upon the optimal allocation of resources. Chapters 13-18 provide insight ful solutions to several intriguing resource allocation problems."

Lean Manufacturing has proved to be one of the most successful and most powerful production business systems over the last decades. Its application enabled many companies to make a big leap towards better utilization of resources and thus provide better service to the customers through faster response, higher quality and lowered costs. Lean is often described as "eyes for flow and eyes for muda" philosophy. It simply means that value is created only when all the resources flow through the system. If the flow is stopped no value but only costs and time are added, which is muda (Jap. waste). Since the philosophy was born at the Toyota many solutions were tailored for the high volume environment. But in turbulent, fast-changing market environment and progressing globalization, customers tend to require more customization, lower volumes and higher variety at much less cost and of better quality. This calls for adaptation of existing lean techniques and exploration of the new waste-free solutions that go far beyond manufacturing. This book brings together the opinions of a number of leading academics and researchers from around the world responding to those emerging needs. They tried to find answer to the question how to move forward from "Spaghetti World" of supply, production, distribution, sales, administration, product development, logistics, accounting, etc. Through individual chapters in this book authors present their views, approaches, concepts and developed tools. The reader will learn the key issues currently being addressed in production management research and practice throughout the world.

This book uses action research to conduct research activities in information technology and systems. It covers the methodological issues that arise when action research methods are conducted, provides examples of action research in practice, and summarizes the philosophical foundations of action research and its application as a methodology in Information Systems research and research programs.

This book goes beyond the discussion of global databases and presents a general Enterprise Resources Market model to facilitate the management and integration of enterprise information resources in a cooperating mode. It is the first book to analyze the problem from the perspective of information management and to present a solution for a key aspect of the cooperation problem on-demand information exchange.

This is the first comprehensive book about the emerging technology of Network-Centric Service-Oriented Enterprise (NCSOE). It establishes a system-of-systems (SoS) view of information technologies. The book discusses the practical capability of a competitive ecosystem in terms of how to achieve decision superiority from exploiting information and situation awareness as a key enabler in multiple sectors of the economy.

Intelligent Collaborative e-Learning Systems and Applications is a major research theme in CSCL and CSCW research community. It comprises a variety of research topics that focus on developing systems that are more powerful and flexible and also more adaptable to the learning process and thus provide better answers to the paradigmatic principles of on-line collaborative learning and work. The chapters collected in this book provide new insights, findings and approaches both on the analysis and the development of more powerful e-collaboration settings. Researchers will find in this book the latest trends in these research topics. On the other hand, academics will find practical insights on how to use conceptual and experimental approaches in their daily tasks. Finally, developers from CSCL community can be inspired and put in practice the proposed models and evaluate them for the specific purposes of their own work and context.

This book applies the concept of synchronization to security of global heterogeneous and hetero-standard systems by modeling the relationship of risk access spots (RAS) between advanced and developing economies network platforms. The proposed model is more effective in securing the electronic security gap between these economies with reference to real life applications, such as electronic fund transfer in electronic business. This process involves the identification of vulnerabilities on communication networks. This book also presents a model and simulation of an integrated approach to security and risk known as Service Server Transmission Model (SSTM).

Data Mining for Business Applications presents the state-of-the-art research and development outcomes on methodologies, techniques, approaches and successful applications in the area. The contributions mark a paradigm shift from "data-centered pattern mining" to "domain driven actionable knowledge discovery" for next-generation KDD research and applications. The contents identify how KDD techniques can better contribute to critical domain problems in theory and practice, and strengthen business intelligence in complex enterprise applications. The volume also explores challenges and directions for future research and development in the dialogue between academia and business.

The IEEE International Conference on Intelligence and Security Informatics (ISI) and Pacific Asia Workshop on Intelligence and Security Informatics (PAISI) conference series (http: //www. isiconference. org) have drawn significant attention in the recent years. Intelligence and Security Informatics is concerned with the study of the dev- opment and use of advanced information technologies and systems for national, int- national, and societal security-related applications. The ISI conference series have brought together academic researchers, law enforcement and intelligence experts, - formation technology consultant and practitioners to discuss their research and pr- tice related to various ISI topics including ISI data management, data and text mining for ISI applications, terrorism informatics, deception and intent detection, terrorist and criminal social network analysis, public health and bio-security, crime analysis, - ber-infrastructure protection, transportation infrastructure security, policy studies and evaluation, information assurance, among others. In this book, we collect the work of the most active researchers in the area. Topics include data and text mining in terr- ism, information sharing, social network analysis, Web-based intelligence monitoring and analysis, crime data analysis, infrastructure protection, deception and intent det- tion and more. Scope and Organization The book is organized in four major areas. The first unit focuses on the terrorism - formatics and data mining. The second unit discusses the intelligence and crime analysis. The third unit covers access control, infrastructure protection, and privacy. The forth unit presents surveillance and emergency response

Business-to-business (B2B) integration is a buzzword which has been used a lot in recent years, with a variety of meanings. Starting with a clear technical definition of this term and its relation to topics like A2A (Application-to-Application), ASP (Application Service Provider), A2A, and B2C (Business-to-Consumer), Christoph Bussler outlines a complete and consistent B2B integration architecture based on a coherent conceptual model. He shows that B2B integration not only requires the exchange of business events between distributed trading partners across networks like the Internet, but also demands back-end application integration within business processes, and thus goes far beyond traditional approaches to enterprise application integration approaches.

His detailed presentation describes how B2B integration standards like RosettaNet or SWIFT, the application integration standard J2EE Connector Architecture and basic standards like XML act together in order to enable business process integration.

The book is the first of its kind that discusses B2B concepts and architectures independent of specific and short-term industrial or academic approaches and thus provides solid and long-lasting knowledge for researchers, students, and professionals interested in the field of B2B integration.

Designing and Evaluating E-Managemnet Decision Tools presents the most relevant concepts for designing intelligent decision tools in an Internet-based multimedia environment and assessing the tools using concepts of statistical design of experiments. The design principle is based on the visual interactive decision modeling (VIDEMO) paradigm. Several case studies are discussed in detail, referring to online preference elicitation, collaborative decision making, negotiation and conflict resolution, and marketing decision optimization.

(See www.beroggi.net for more info on the book and Visual Interactive Decision Modeling)

This textbook focuses on the members of the digital value chain for eBusiness and eCommerce and dedicates a separate chapter to each of them: eProducts and eServices, eProcurement, eMarketing, eContracting, eDistribution, ePayment, as well as eCustomer relationship management. In addition to business models and business webs, digital procurement and marketing processes such as electronic negotiation processes, security questions with digital signatures, as well as electronic supplier relationship management and customer relationship management are also addressed. The topics are described using explicit procedures and descriptive examples of their application. A case study describing the gradual creation of an electronic webshop for DVDs is developed over the course of the book.

The book is intended for students of economics at universities and technical colleges; it is also suitable for executives, project leaders, and company experts who deal with the digital value chain.

The material collected in this book covers a broad range of applications of computer science methods and algorithms in business practice. It presents cutting edge research in development, implementation, and improvement of computer systems. The computer science and information systems topics covered include data warehouses, ERP, XML, ontologies, rule languages, software engineering and Business Process Management.

This book represents the compilation of papers presented at the IFIP Working Group 8. 2 conference entitled "Information Technology in the Service Economy: Challenges st and Possibilities for the 21 Century. " The conference took place at Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada, on August 10 13, 2008. Par ticipation in the conference spanned the continents from Asia to Europe with paper submissions global in focus as well. Conference submissions included complete d research papers and research in progress reports. Papers submitted to the conference went through a double blind review process in which the program co chairs, an associate editor, and reviewers provided assessments and recommendations. The editor ial efforts of the associate editors and reviewers in this process were outstanding. To foster high quality research publications in this field of study, authors of accepted pape rs were then invited to revise and resubmit their work. Through this rigorous review and revision process, 12 completed research papers and 11 research in progress reports were accepted for presentation and publica tion. Paper workshop sessions were also esta blished to provide authors of emergent work an opportunity to receive feedback fromthe IF IP 8. 2 community. Abstracts of these new projects are included in this volume. Four panels were presented at the conference to provide discussion forums for the varied aspect s of IT, service, and globalization. Panel abstracts are also included here.

Computer-based infectious disease surveillance systems are capable of real-time or near real-time detection of serious illnesses and potential bioterrorism agent exposures and represent a major step forward in disease surveillance. Infectious Disease Informatics: Syndromic Surveillance for Public Health and Bio-Defense is an in-depth monograph that analyzes and evaluates the outbreak modeling and detection capabilities of existing surveillance systems under a unified framework, and presents the first book-length coverage of the subject from an informatics-driven perspective. Individual chapters consider the state of the art, including the facilitation of data collection, sharing and transmission; a focus on various outbreak detection methods; data visualization and information dissemination issues; and system assessment and other policy issues. Eight chapters then report on several real-world case studies, summarizing and comparing eight syndromic surveillance systems, including those that have been adopted by many public health agencies (e.g., RODS and BioSense). The book concludes with a discussion of critical issues and challenges, with a look to future directions. This book is an excellent source of current information for researchers in public health and IT. Government public health officials and private-sector practitioners in both public health and IT will find the most up-to-date information available, and students from a variety of disciplines, including public health, biostatistics, information systems, computer science, and public administration and policy will get a comprehensive look at the concepts, techniques, and practices of syndromic surveillance.

This book details metagraph theory and its applications. It begins by defining a metagraph and its uses, which allow for the representation and analysis of more complex systems. The first part of the book develops the theoretical results with an emphasis on the development of a metagraph algebra. In the second part, four promising applications of metagraphs are examined.

Business organizations and governments are nowadays developing and providing internet based electronic services (e-services) featuring various intelligent functions. This book offers a thorough introduction and systematic overview of the new field e-service intelligence. It covers the state-of-the-art of e-service intelligence including both theorems and applications, and a broad range of topics are discussed.

At last, a right up-to-the-minute volume on a topic of huge national and international importance. As governments around the world battle voter apathy, the need for new and modernized methods of involvement in the polity is becoming acute. This work provides information on advanced research and case studies that survey the field of digital government. Successful applications in a variety of government settings are delineated, while the authors also analyse the implications for current and future policy-making. Each chapter has been prepared and carefully edited within a structured format by a known expert on the individual topic.

Advances in wireless technologies promise to reshape the way we conduct business. Yet to make wireless e-business work effectively, a variety of enabling technologies are needed.

Kou and Yesha and their contributors provide comprehensive information on these technologies, including, for example, wireless security, mobile payment, location-based services, mobile data management, and RFID technologies. The presentation is targeted at students, lecturers, e-business developers, consultants, and business managers, and this book is an ideal introduction for both self-study and taught e-business classes or commercial training courses.

"I believe this is an excellent book to acquire comprehensive knowledge on enabling technologies for the blooming wireless e-business. I highly recommend this book!" Robert Mayberry, Vice President, Sensors and Actuators, IBM Software Group

One of the great challenges in flexible production and supply chains is the availability of necessary information at any time and place. Autonomous logistics processes can bring about fast and flexible adaptations to change. This book identifies autonomous logistics processes and details how they differ from conventionally managed processes. Coverage also describes the changes that autonomy will cause in order processing.

Collaborative Networks is a fast developing area, as shown by the already large number of diverse real-world implemented cases and the dynamism of its related involved research community. Being recognized as the most focused scientific and technical conference on Collaborative Networks, PRO-VE continues to offer the opportunity for presentation and discussion of both the latest research developments as well as the practical application case studies.