There is a broad consensus amongst law firms and in-house legal departments that next generation "Legal Tech" - particularly in the form of Blockchain-based technologies and Smart Contracts - will have a profound impact on the future operations of all legal service providers. Legal Tech startups are already revolutionizing the legal industry by increasing the speed and efficiency of traditional legal services or replacing them altogether with new technologies. This on-going process of disruption within the legal profession offers significant opportunities for all business. However, it also poses a number of challenges for practitioners, trade associations, technology vendors, and regulators who often struggle to keep up with the technologies, resulting in a widening regulatory "gap." Many uncertainties remain regarding the scope, direction, and effects of these new technologies and their integration with existing practices and legacy systems. Adding to the challenges is the growing need for easy-to-use contracting solutions, on the one hand, and for protecting the users of such solutions, on the other. To respond to the challenges and to provide better legal communications, systems, and services Legal Tech scholars and practitioners have found allies in the emerging field of Legal Design. This collection brings together leading scholars and practitioners working on these issues from diverse jurisdictions. The aim is to introduce Blockchain and Smart Contract technologies, and to examine their on-going impact on the legal profession, business and regulators.

Today's work is characterized by a high degree of innovation and thus demands a thorough overview of relevant knowledge in the world and in organizations. Semantic Work Environments support the work of the user by collecting knowledge about needs and providing processed and improved knowledge to be integrated into work. ""Emerging Technologies for Semantic Work Environments: Techniques, Methods, and Applications"" describes an overview of the emerging field of Semantic Work Environments by combining various research studies and underlining the similarities between different processes, issues and approaches in order to provide the reader with techniques, methods, and applications of the study.

Significant research and development advancement has been achieved in enterprise computing, integration, and management. The results of this advancement stimulate the creation of a new class of mission-critical infrastructures, a new category of integration methods and software tools, and a new group of business platforms for cost-effectively exploiting, integrating, and managing business operations across enterprises. ""Enterprise Service Computing: From Concept To Deployment"" presents the emerging service computing, or service-enabled computing, technologies currently preferably used in integrating enterprise-wide and cross-enterprise applications. The topics covered range from concept development, system design, modeling, and development technologies, to the final deployment, providing both theoretical research results and practical applications.

This book is a collection of conference proceedings mainly concerned with the problem class of nonlinear transport/diffusion/reaction systems, chief amongst these being the Navier-Stokes equations, porous-media flow problems and semiconductor-device equations. Of particular interest are unsolved problems which challenge open questions from applications and assess the various numerous methods used to treat them. A fundamental aim is to raise the overall awareness of a broad range of topical issues in scientific computing and numerical analysis, including multispecies/multiphysics problems, discretisation methods for nonlinear systems, mesh generation, adaptivity, linear algebraic solvers and preconditioners, and portable parallelisation.

This book collects and explains the many theorems concerning the existence of certificates of positivity for polynomials that are positive globally or on semialgebraic sets. A certificate of positivity for a real polynomial is an algebraic identity that gives an immediate proof of a positivity condition for the polynomial. Certificates of positivity have their roots in fundamental work of David Hilbert from the late 19th century on positive polynomials and sums of squares. Because of the numerous applications of certificates of positivity in mathematics, applied mathematics, engineering, and other fields, it is desirable to have methods for finding, describing, and characterizing them. For many of the topics covered in this book, appropriate algorithms, computational methods, and applications are discussed. This volume contains a comprehensive, accessible, up-to-date treatment of certificates of positivity, written by an expert in the field. It provides an overview of both the theory and computational aspects of the subject, and includes many of the recent and exciting developments in the area. Background information is given so that beginning graduate students and researchers who are not specialists can learn about this fascinating subject. Furthermore, researchers who work on certificates of positivity or use them in applications will find this a useful reference for their work.

Bioinformatics is an integrative field of computer science, genetics, genomics, proteomics, and statistics, which has undoubtedly revolutionized the study of biology and medicine in past decades. It mainly assists in modeling, predicting and interpreting large multidimensional biological data by utilizing advanced computational methods. Despite its enormous potential, bioinformatics is not widely integrated into the academic curriculum as most life science students and researchers are still not equipped with the necessary knowledge to take advantage of this powerful tool. Hence, the primary purpose of our book is to supplement this unmet need by providing an easily accessible platform for students and researchers starting their career in life sciences. This book aims to avoid sophisticated computational algorithms and programming. Instead, it focuses on simple DIY analysis and interpretation of biological data with personal computers. Our belief is that once the beginners acquire these basic skillsets, they will be able to handle most of the bioinformatics tools for their research work and to better understand their experimental outcomes. Our second title of this volume set In Silico Life Sciences: Medicine provides hands-on experience in analyzing high throughput molecular data for the diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment of monogenic or polygenic human diseases. The key concepts in this volume include risk factor assessment, genetic tests and result interpretation, personalized medicine, and drug discovery. This volume is expected to train readers in both single and multi-dimensional biological analysis using open data sets, and provides a unique learning experience through clinical scenarios and case studies.

This textbook intends to be a comprehensive and substantially self-contained two-volume book covering performance, reliability, and availability evaluation subjects. The volumes focus on computing systems, although the methods may also be applied to other systems. The first volume covers Chapter 1 to Chapter 14, whose subtitle is ``Performance Modeling and Background". The second volume encompasses Chapter 15 to Chapter 25 and has the subtitle ``Reliability and Availability Modeling, Measuring and Workload, and Lifetime Data Analysis". This text is helpful for computer performance professionals for supporting planning, design, configuring, and tuning the performance, reliability, and availability of computing systems. Such professionals may use these volumes to get acquainted with specific subjects by looking at the particular chapters. Many examples in the textbook on computing systems will help them understand the concepts covered in each chapter. The text may also be helpful for the instructor who teaches performance, reliability, and availability evaluation subjects. Many possible threads could be configured according to the interest of the audience and the duration of the course. Chapter 1 presents a good number of possible courses programs that could be organized using this text.

Recently, educators have begun to consider what is required in literacy curricula and best teaching practices given the demands placed on the educator sector and on literacy in general. ""Multiliteracies and Technology Enhanced Education: Social Practice and the Global Classroom"" features theoretical reflections and approaches on the use of multiliteracies and technologies in the improvement of education and social practices. Assisting educators at different teaching levels and fostering professional development and progress in this growing field, this innovative publication supports practitioners concerned with teaching at both a local and global level.

The modeling of healthcare components and systems in order to develop a complete understanding of component interactions is one of the more challenging simulation and modeling problems for software agent systems. ""Multi-Agent Systems for Healthcare Simulation and Modeling: Applications for System Improvement"" provides relevant theoretical frameworks and the latest empirical research findings used by medical professionals in the implementation of multi-agent systems. This ""Premier Reference Source"" disseminates understanding on the strategic role of systems modeling in healthcare, a valuable resource to academicians, researchers, and field practitioners.

This book examines application and methods to incorporating stochastic parameter variations into the optimization process to decrease expense in corrective measures. Basic types of deterministic substitute problems occurring mostly in practice involve i) minimization of the expected primary costs subject to expected recourse cost constraints (reliability constraints) and remaining deterministic constraints, e.g. box constraints, as well as ii) minimization of the expected total costs (costs of construction, design, recourse costs, etc.) subject to the remaining deterministic constraints. After an introduction into the theory of dynamic control systems with random parameters, the major control laws are described, as open-loop control, closed-loop, feedback control and open-loop feedback control, used for iterative construction of feedback controls. For approximate solution of optimization and control problems with random parameters and involving expected cost/loss-type objective, constraint functions, Taylor expansion procedures, and Homotopy methods are considered, Examples and applications to stochastic optimization of regulators are given. Moreover, for reliability-based analysis and optimal design problems, corresponding optimization-based limit state functions are constructed. Because of the complexity of concrete optimization/control problems and their lack of the mathematical regularity as required of Mathematical Programming (MP) techniques, other optimization techniques, like random search methods (RSM) became increasingly important. Basic results on the convergence and convergence rates of random search methods are presented. Moreover, for the improvement of the - sometimes very low - convergence rate of RSM, search methods based on optimal stochastic decision processes are presented. In order to improve the convergence behavior of RSM, the random search procedure is embedded into a stochastic decision process for an optimal control of the probability distributions of the search variates (mutation random variables).

The ability to communicate with anyone at anytime, anywhere, necessitates a need to provide reliable, resilient, and sustainable applications to support the evolving uses of mobile technologies. Movement-Aware Applications for Sustainable Mobility: Technologies and Approaches focuses on the use of location sensing technology and its wider applicability in supporting sustainable mobility, and presents current research on developing innovative approaches for gathering, representing, storing and analyzing movement data sets being generated from location sensing technology. Offering a unique opportunity for learning about how different techniques are being used to develop new movement-aware applications, this reference work gives students, researchers and practitioners the opportunity to acquire new concepts in the production, awareness and use of sensors, data, and information products for supporting sustainable mobility.

Today's enterprises are increasingly going global by becoming more distributed, leveraging resource bases in all parts of the world. Whether through offshore relationships, global support or application development programs, or linking disparate parts of organizations, enterprises are reducing costs by managing applications centrally, boosting security, and assuring network uptime. The Handbook of Research on Global Information Technology Management in the Digital Economy provides comprehensive coverage and definitions of the most important issues, concepts, trends and technologies in the field of the emerging sub-discipline of global information technology management, covering topics such as the technical platform for global IS applications, information systems projects spanning cultures, managing information technology in multidomestic/ international/global/transnational corporations, and global information technology systems and socioeconomic development in developing countries. With 25 authoratative contributions from 34 of the world's leading experts, this publication is a must-have for academic and research libraries.

This book presents a collection of papers on recent advances in problems concerning dynamics, optimal control and optimization. In many chapters, computational techniques play a central role. Set-oriented techniques feature prominently throughout the book, yielding state-of-the-art algorithms for computing general invariant sets, constructing globally optimal controllers and solving multi-objective optimization problems.

This is an examination of the various technical and organisational elements that impact services management, business management, risk management, and customer relationship management.

Advances in Computers, Volume 108, the latest volume in a series published since 1960, presents detailed coverage of innovations in computer hardware, software, theory, design and applications. This book provides contributors with a medium in which they can explore subjects in greater depth and breadth than similar topics in journal articles allow.

A new set of major changes is reshaping the economy and creating challenges that are testing the mettle and talents of organizations and their employees. Unless organizations and their employees develop the requisite skills they need to cope with these challenges, many will become casualties of their own deficiencies. "Keys to Employee Success in Coming Decades" seeks to prepare employees for future success in an increasingly demanding and competitive global environment. Sims, Veres, and their contributors are careful to focus on what employees at different levels in the organization will need to do to be successful in the twenty-first century.

Mastery of the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behaviors discussed by the contributors in this book will lead to enhanced employee performance as the new decade approaches. The requirements for new employees or the redesigned employees is quickly changing. The organizations of tomorrow will expect employees who understand the importance of success; who welcome change and accept it, master it, and deliberately cause it. They are also employees who are proactive innovators, who confront constraints and the limitations on actions that they impose, who take risks and who continue to develop themselves professionally, technically, and personally. Written clearly, concisely, and with a minimum of academic jargon, the book will be important reading for specialists in human resource management, training and development, and others with critical responsibilities throughout the organization.

This book explores the emerging concept of cultural DNA, considering its application across different fields and examining commonalities in approach. It approaches the subject from four different perspectives, in which the topics include theories, analysis and synthesis of cultural DNA artefacts. After an opening section which reviews theoretical work on cultural DNA research, the second section discusses analysis & synthesis of cultural DNA at the urban scale. Section three covers analysis & synthesis of cultural DNA artefacts, and the final section offers approaches to grammar-based cultural DNA research. The book places emphasis on two specific axes: one is the scale of the object under discussion, which ranges from the small (handheld artefacts) to the very large (cities); and the other is the methodology used from analysis to synthesis. This diverse approach with detailed information about grammar-based methodologies toward cultural DNA makes the book unique. This book will serve as a source of inspiration for designers and researchers trying to find the essence, archetype, and the building blocks of our environment for the incorporation of social and cultural factors into their designs.

This book analyzes the fundamental issues faced when blockchain technology is applied to real-life applications. These concerns, not only in the realm of computer science, are caused by the nature of technological design. Blockchain is considered the foundation of a wide range of flexible ecosystems; its technology is an excellent mixture of mathematics, cryptography, incentive mechanisms, economics, and pertinent regulations. The book provides an essential understanding of why such fundamental issues arise, by revising the underlying theories. Blockchain theory is thus presented in an easy-to-understand, useful manner. Also explained is the reason why blockchain is hard to adopt for real-life problems but is valuable as a foundation for flexible ecosystems. Included are directions for solving those problems and finding suitable areas for blockchain applications in the future. The authors of this work are experts from a wide range of backgrounds such as cryptography, distributed computing, computer science, trust, identity, regulation, and standardization. Their contributions collected here will appeal to all who are interested in blockchain and the elements surrounding it.

Now fully revised and updated, "VSAT Networks" continues to cover all of the essential issues involved with the installation and operation of networks of small earth stations called 'Very Small Aperture Terminal'. VSATs are typically one to two meters in antenna reflector diameter and communicate with one another, or with a central earth station called a 'hub', via a relay satellite in space. This informative volume enables the reader to understand how services, economics and regulatory aspects condition the success of such networks.

Key features include: configuration and practical applications of VSAT networks radio frequency (RF) link analysis, focusing on basic formulae and the evaluation of the RF link performance protocols used, with emphasis on the necessary adaptation of protocols used in terrestrial networks procedures for the dimensioning of the network according to the type and volume of generated traffic and to the expected quality of service

Written by a well-known, highly respected academic, this authoritative volume will appeal to students of telecommunications, electronics and computer science. Practising telecommunications engineers and technical managers involved in the planning, design and operation of networks and service provision will all find this book a valuable reference source.

This "Second Edition" has taken full advantage of the author's experience gained from the success of the first edition. The theoretical background has been expanded and the operational contents have been updated in view of recent developments in the field.

This book of conference proceedings contains papers presented at the Art and Design International Conference (AnDIC 2016). It examines the impact of Cyberology, also known as Internet Science, on the world of art and design. It looks at how the rapid growth of Cyberology and the creation of various applications and devices have influenced human relationships. The book discusses the impact of Cyberology on the behaviour, attitudes and perceptions of users, including the way they work and communicate. With a strong focus on how the Cyberology world influences and changes the methods and works of artists, this book features topics that are relevant to four key players - artists, intermediaries, policy makers, and the audience - in a cultural system, especially in the world of art and design. It examines the development, problems and issues of traditional cultural values, identity and new trends in contemporary art. Most importantly, the book attempts to discuss the past, present and future of art and design whilst looking at some underlying issues that need to be addressed collectively.

E-Business covers a broad spectrum of businesses based on the Internet, including e-commerce, e-healthcare, e-government and e tailing. While substantial attention is being given to the planning and development of e-business applications, the efficiency and effectiveness of e-business systems will largely depend on management solutions. These management solutions demand a good grasp of both the technical and business perspectives of an e-business service. There have been many books on the Internet based on e-commerce, Internet protocols, distributed components etc. However, none of these books address the problem of managing e business as a set of networked services. They do not link enterprise management with network and systems management. This book provides an overview of the emerging techniques for IT service management from a business perspective with case studies from telecommunication and healthcare sectors. It integrates the business perspective with relevant technical standards, such as SNMP, WBEM and DMI. This book presents some concepts and methodologies that enable the development of effective and efficient management systems for networked services. The book is intended to familiarize practicing managers, engineers, and graduate level students with networked service management concepts, architectures and methodologies with reference to evolving standards. It should be useful in a number of disciplines, such as business management, information systems, computers and networking, and telecommunications.

Appendix 2 is based on TeleManagement (TM) Forum's documents on TOM (GB921, GB910 and GB908). While this appendix has explained the basic management concept of an e-telco, TMForum now recommends the use of eTOM as explained in www.tmforum.com. An overview of eTOM is available in the report The TeleManagement Forum's enhanced Telecom Operations Map (eTOM) by Michael Kelly appearing in the Journal of Network and Systems Management in March 2003.

Business processes are becoming increasingly complex and dynamic as they seek to cope with a wide range of internal and external interactions and changes. ""The Handbook of Research on Complex Dynamic Process Management: Techniques for Adaptability in Turbulent Environments"" investigates the nature and history of dynamic processes essential to understanding the need for flexibility and adaptability as well as the requirements to improve solutions. This innovative collection covers the development of various strategies, architectures, and techniques for achieving adaptive processes in environments.