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This master- thesis investigates the topic of intercultural web design. Two websites from different countries are exemplarily compared. On the basis of cultural dimensions, cultural differences are presented on each respective website. The analysis particularly focuses on how detailed the respective website-designer and -operator regards their users" cultural differences and the creation of a cross-cultural web design. The analysis illustrates which cultural - and particularly intercultural - aspects of countries were taken into consideration in the design of the web sites. The investigation led to the conclusion that their implementation was not consequently executed for all web sites. Hence, this thesis offers suggestions for the improvement of aspects which are most important in intercultural web design.
This bachelor thesis deals with the topic "user-friendly design of applications (apps)" on mobile devices, a subdomain of software-ergonomics. In the process, two applications are being analyzed with the aim of developing a solution on how support on a mobile device should be conducted. This study focuses primarily on appropriate gestures to coordinate the 'help function' on a mobile device. The study results show that the test persons request a customized help function, but reject an extensive help description, as this seems to be overwhelming for the user.
The aim of this work is to develop a simple concept for monitoring dogs that are alone at home for several hours. The prototypical implementation of such a "DogCam" can be considered as proof of concept. The basis for the prototype‘s implementation are the requirements identified within a conducted requirement analysis. Furthermore, the present work shows which improvements and extensions of the prototypical "DogCam" are possible and which similar projects already exist.
Statistical eco(-toxico)logy
(2017)
Freshwaters are of immense importance for human well-being.
Nevertheless, they are currently facing unprecedented levels of threat from habitat loss and degradation, overexploitation, invasive species and
pollution.
To prevent risks to aquatic ecosystems, chemical substances, like agricultural pesticides, have to pass environmental risk assessment (ERA) before entering the market.
Concurrently, large-scale environmental monitoring is used for surveillance of biological and chemical conditions in freshwaters.
This thesis examines statistical methods currently used in ERA.
Moreover, it presents a national-scale compilation of chemical monitoring data, an analysis of drivers and dynamics of chemical pollution in streams and, provides a large-scale risk assessment by combination with results from ERA.
Additionally, software tools have been developed to integrate different datasets used in ERA.
The thesis starts with a brief introduction to ERA and environmental monitoring and gives an overview of the objectives of the thesis.
Chapter 2 addresses experimental setups and their statistical analyses using simulations.
The results show that current designs exhibit unacceptably low statistical power, that statistical methods chosen to fit the type of data provide higher power and that statistical practices in ERA need to be revised.
In chapter 3 we compiled all available pesticide monitoring data from Germany.
Hereby, we focused on small streams, similar to those considered in ERA and used threshold concentrations derived during ERA for a large-scale assessment of threats to freshwaters from pesticides.
This compilation resulted in the most comprehensive dataset on pesticide exposure currently available for Germany.
Using state-of-the-art statistical techniques, that explicitly take the limits of quantification into account, we demonstrate that 25% of small streams are at threat from pesticides.
In particular neonicotinoid pesticides are responsible for these threats.
These are associated with agricultural intensity and can be detected even at low levels of agricultural use.
Moreover, our results indicated that current monitoring underestimates pesticide risks, because of a sampling decoupled from precipitation events.
Additionally, we provide a first large-scale study of annual pesticide exposure dynamics.
Chapters 4 and 5 describe software solutions to simplify and accelerate the integration of data from ERA, environmental monitoring and ecotoxicology that is indispensable for the development of landscape-level risk assessment.
Overall, this thesis contributes to the emerging discipline of statistical ecotoxicology and shows that pesticides pose a large-scale threat to small streams.
Environmental monitoring can provide a post-authorisation feedback to ERA.
However, to protect freshwater ecosystems ERA and environmental monitoring need to be further refined and we provide software solutions to utilise existing data for this purpose.
Die Arbeit beschäftigt sich mit der für Router und Kleingeräte entwickelten Linux-Distribution OpenWrt. Im ersten Teil der Arbeit wird die Erstellung von Softwarepaketen für OpenWrt erläutert und eine Anzeige- und Konfigurationskomponente für die Dateien des Quagga RIP-Daemons für die Benutzeroberfläche LuCI erstellt. Im zweiten Teil wird der Aufbau eines Testnetzwerkes mit OpenWrt Routern dokumentiert, sowie die Anbindung an VNUML-virtualisierte Netzwerke.
The output of eye tracking Web usability studies can be visualized to the analysts as screenshots of the Web pages with their gaze data. However, the screenshot visualizations are found to be corrupted whenever there are recorded fixations on fixed Web page elements on different scroll positions. The gaze data are not gathered on their fixated fixed elements; rather they are scattered on their recorded scroll positions. This problem has raised our attention to find an approach to link gaze data to their intended fixed elements and gather them in one position on the screenshot. The approach builds upon the concept of creating the screenshot during the recording session, where images of the viewport are captured on visited scroll positions and lastly stitched into one Web page screenshot. Additionally, the fixed elements in the Web page are identified and linked to their fixations. For the evaluation, we compared the interpretation of our enhanced screenshot against the video visualization, which overcomes the problem. The results revealed that both visualizations equally deliver accurate interpretations. However, interpreting the visualizations of eye tracking Web usability studies using the enhanced screenshots outperforms the video visualizations in terms of speed and it requires less temporal demands from the interpreters.
The global problematic issue of the olive oil industry is in its generation of large amounts of olive mill wastewater (OMW). The direct discharge of OMW to the soil is very common which presents environmental problems for olive oil producing countries. Both, positive as well as negative effects on soil have been found in earlier studies. Therefore, the current study hypothesized that whether beneficial effects or negative effects dominate depends on the prevailing conditions before and after OMW discharge to soil. As such, a better understanding of the OMW-soil interaction mechanisms becomes essential for sustainable safe disposal of OMW on soil and sustainable soil quality.
A field experiment was carried out in an olive orchard in Palestine, over a period of 24 months, in which the OMW was applied to the soil as a single application of 14 L m-2 under four different environmental conditions: in winter (WI), spring (SP), and summer with and without irrigation (SUmoist and SUdry). The current study investigated the effects of seasonal conditions on the olive mill wastewater (OMW) soil interaction in the short-term and the long-term. The degree and persistence of soil salinization, acidification, accumulation of phenolic compounds and soil water repellency were investigated as a function of soil depth and time elapsed after the OMW application. Moreover, the OMW impacts on soil organic matter SOM quality and quantity, total organic carbon (SOC), water-extractable soil organic carbon (DOC), as well as specific ultraviolet absorbance analysis (SUVA254) were also investigated for each seasonal application in order to assess the degree of OMW-OM decomposition or accumulation in soil, and therefore, the persisting effects of OMW disposal to soil.
The results of the current study demonstrate that the degree and persistence of relevant effects due to OMW application on soil varied significantly between the different seasonal OMW applications both in the short-term and the long-term. The negative effects of the potentially hazardous OMW residuals in the soil were highly dependent on the dominant transport mechanisms and transformation mechanisms, triggered by the ambient soil moisture and temperature which either intensified or diminished negative effects of OMW in the soil during and after the application season. The negative effects of OMW disposal to the soil decreased by increasing the retention time of OMW in soil under conditions favoring biological activity. The moderate conditions of soil moisture and temperature allowed for a considerable amount of applied OMW to be biologically degraded, while the prolonged application time under dry conditions and high temperature resulted in a less degradable organic fraction of the OMW, causing the OMW constituents to accumulate and polymerize without being degraded. Further, the rainfall during winter season diminished negative effects of OMW in the soil; therefore, the risk of groundwater contamination by non-degraded constituents of OMW can be highly probable during the winter season.
The aim of this work was to present the accident and traffic modeling of Oman (Muskat City) under theoretical assumptions by means of agent-based simulation. TRASS should be taken as the basis for the simulation environment. In addition, possible counter-measures should be proposed with regard to the high accident rate, which result from different simulation variants.
It was not part of this work whether the theoretical assumptions by the simulation should actually be applied and implemented in reality.
It was also necessary to check whether three different simulation variants could be represented differently by TRASS. The three variants were divided into simulation sequence with traffic light control, without traffic light control and finally with traffic light control, which however should be ignored with a probability of 70%. All three variants could produce different results. It has been shown that all three variants have advantages and disadvantages with respect to traffic flow and accident rate.
Not to be neglected is the fact that this work is modeled, analyzed and evaluated exclusively with TRASS framework. All potentials and deficits thus flow into the overall framework of this work. Therefore, after critical observation, this statement was viewed from a single angle only: the theoretical assumptions of Oman and the modeling limits of TRASS. In order to be able to make a promising statement about the actual implementation of the proposals, further comprehensive analyzes and simulations are necessary in a much wider range of variants of transport for Oman.
This master thesis is about the possibilities of supporting local corporate sales with the help of current mobile applications. The internet already has served in order to make the trading market more dynamic. The conditions for long-term local corporate sales have become more challenging. Because of smaller cost structures online-retailer offer prizes on which local point of sales can hardly keep up with. Another point is that more customers decide to order online because the service in e-shops enhanced; therefore, the digital transactions become more attractive for consumers. Today smartphones and tablets have brought the digitalization to a whole new level. With the possibility of Mobile Web the effects that the internet already showed us in the past have been intensified. The question that proposes here is: In which way do the conditions of competitions for local corporate sales change? This paper follows the outline of putting together various mobile services, their functions, and their practical usage, as well as the process of integrating them successfully into marketing. With that one should be able to find out if Mobile Web can be seen as an advantage for local corporates sales.
Agricultural pesticides, especially insecticides, are an integral part of modern farming. However, these may often leave their target ecosystems and cause adverse effects in non- target, especially freshwater ecosystems, leading to their deterioration. In this thesis, the focus will be on Insect Growth Regulators (IGRs) that can in many ways cause disruption of the endocrine system of invertebrates. Freshwater invertebrates play important ecological, economic and medical roles, and disruption of their endocrine systems may be crucial, considering the important role hormones play in the developmental and reproductive processes in organisms. Although Endocrine Disruption Chemicals (EDCs) can affect moulting, behaviour, morphology, sexual maturity, time to first brood, egg development time, brood size (fecundity), and sex determination in invertebrates, there is currently no agreement upon how to characterize and assess endocrine disruption (ED). Current traditional ecotoxicity tests for Ecological Risk Assessment (ERA) show limitations on generating data at the population level that may be relevant for the assessment of EDCs, which effects may be sublethal, latent and persist for several generations of species (transgenerational).
It is therefore the primary objective of this thesis to use a test method to investigate adverse effects of EDCs on endpoints concerning development and reproduction in freshwater invertebrates. The full life-cycle test over two generations that includes all sensitive life stages of C. riparius (a sexual reproductive organism) allows an assessment of its reproduction and should be suitable for the investigation of long-term toxicity of EDCs in freshwater invertebrates. C. riparius is appropriate for this purpose because of its short life cycle that enables the assessment of functional endpoints of the organism over several generations. Moreover, the chironomid life cycle consists of a complete metamorphosis controlled by a well-known endocrine mechanism and the endocrine system of insects has been most investigated in great detail among invertebrates. Hence, the full life-cycle test with C. riparius provides an approach to assess functional endpoints (e.g. reproduction, sex ratio) that are population-relevant as a useful amendment to the ERA of EDCs. In the laboratory, C. riparius was exposed to environmentally-relevant concentrations of the selected IGRs in either spiked water or spiked sediment scenario over two subsequent generations.
The results reported in this thesis revealed significant effects of the IGRs on the development and the reproduction of C. riparius with the second (F1) generation showing greater sensitivity. These findings indicated for the first time the suitability of multigenerational testing for various groups of EDCs and strongly suggested considering the full life-cycle of C. riparius as an appropriate test method for a better assessment of EDCs in the freshwater environment. In conclusion, this thesis helps to detect additional information that can be extrapolated at population level and, thus, might contribute to better protection of freshwater ecosystems against the risks of Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals (EDCs.) It may furthermore contribute to changes in the ERA process that are necessary for a real implementation of the new European chemical legislation, REACH (Registration, Evaluation Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals). Finally, significant interactions between temperature, chemical exposure and generation were reported for the first time and, may help predict impacts that may occur in the future, in the field, under predicted climate change scenarios.
Literaturanalyse und Darstellung aktueller Forschungsschwerpunkte zum Thema Entrepreneurial Strategy
(2019)
Entrepreneurial Strategy ist in der Literaturwelt weit verbreitet. Dieser Begriff fand schon im 20. Jahrhundert seine Anwendung und zieht sich bis ins heutige Zeitalter weiter. Diese Beständigkeit und Entwicklung des Entrepreneurs und dem Wunsch nach einem eigenen Unternehmen trieben die Diskussion dieses Themas voran. Die Wahl der passenden unternehmerischen Strategie ist eine der wichtigsten Entscheidungen, die ein Unternehmer treffen muss. Diese Problematik sorgte für eine Analyse und genaue Forschung der Entscheidungen und Einflussfaktoren. Resultate davon wurden festgehalten und interpretiert um die Branche der Entrepreneure zu fördern und somit die Wirtschaft anzutreiben. In der vorliegenden Arbeit wird zunächst ein Grundverständnis für die wichtigsten Begrifflichkeiten ausgearbeitet. Grundlage dieser Bachelorarbeit ist jedoch, anhand einer Literaturanalyse nach Webster und Watson (2002) einen Einblick in die Forschung der Entwicklung von Entrepreneurial Strategy zu geben und den aktuellen Stand herauszuarbeiten. Anahnd dieser Literaturanalyse werden Referenzen, Konzepte und die Notwendigkeit von Strategien verdeutlicht und die Rolle in einem Start-Up erklärt. Aus der Analyse und dem Vergleich zu älteren Veröffentlichungen geht hervor, das der Prozess der Strategiefindung eine Differenzierung in zwei Teile aufweist. Es wird unter dem Strategiesuch- und dem Strategieauswahlprozess uinterschieden. Merkmale, die früher als Allgemeine Einflussfaktoren für die Wahl der Strategie angenommen wurden, werden in der heutigen Literatur den genauen Prozessen und Phasen zugeteilt. Das Resultiert, das Merkmale, wie die persönlichen Eigenschaften, die Umgebung und das Humankapital eines Unternehmers mehr Einfluss während dem Suchprozess haben als während der darauffolgenden Auswahl. Zudem wurden für die Auwahl Methoden und Richtlinien entwickelt, die dem Unternehmer helfen sollen seine Alternativen zu sortieren und daraus zu wählen.
Estuaries are characterized by a longitudinal salinity gradient. This gradient is one of the main environmental factors responsible for the distribution of organisms. Distinguishing salinity zones is of crucial importance, e.g., for the development of tools for the assessment of ecological quality. The methods most often applied for classifying water according to salinity are the Venice System and the method of Bulger et al. (1993), both of which determine zone boundaries using species occurrences relative to mean salinity. However, although these methods were developed for homoiohaline waters, they have also been routinely applied to poikilohaline systems. I tested the applicability of both methods using salinity and macroinvertebrate data for the poikilohaline Elbe Estuary (Germany). My results showed that the mid-estuary distribution of macro-invertebrates is determined by variation in salinity rather than by mean salinity. Consequently, neither of the two methods is applicable for defining salinity zones in the Elbe Estuary. Cluster analysis combined with a significance test, by contrast, was a better tool for identifying the boundaries of salinity zones in poikilohaline systems.
In many estuaries, such as the Elbe Estuary, a maximum turbidity zone (MTZ) develops, where suspended matter accumulates owing to circulation processes. It is assumed that the MTZ is a stressful environment with an excess of organic matter, high deposition rates, large variations in salinity, and dredging activities. Under such harsh conditions, populations might remain below the carrying capacity, and it is assumed that competition is of little importance, as predicted by the stress gradient hypothesis. I tested whether competition for food is important in the MTZ of the Elbe Estuary using stable isotope analysis of the macroinvertebrate community. The isotopic niches of no two taxa within a feeding group overlapped, which indicated different resource use and the absence of competition. The main reasons for the lack of overlap of isotopic niches were differences in habitat, feeding behavior, and migration behavior.
The Elbe Estuary is nowadays highly industrialized and has long been subjected to a plethora of human-caused alterations. However, it is largely unknown what changes occurred in benthic communities in the last century. Hence, I considered taxonomic and functional aspects of macrobenthic invertebrates of the Elbe Estuary given in data from 1889 (most natural state), 1985 and 1986 (highly polluted state), and 2006 (recent state) to assess benthic community shifts. Beta-diversity analysis showed that taxonomic differences between the sampling dates were mainly due to species turnover, whereas functional differences were predominantly a result of functional nestedness. Species number (S), functional richness (FRic), and functional redundancy reached minimum values in 1985 and 1986 and were highest and rather similar in 1889 and 2006. The decline in FRic from 1889 to 1985/1986 was non-random, consistent with habitat filtering. FRic, functional beta diversity, and S data suggested that the state of the estuary from 1889 was almost re-established in 2006. However, the community in 1889 significantly differed from that in 2006 owing to species replacement. My results indicate that FRic and FR in 1889 could have promoted ecosystem resilience and stability.
Die Ukraine sieht seit dem Euromaidan im Jahr 2014 ihre Zukunft in einer stabilen Veran-kerung im westlichen Wertesystem. Für die EU ist die Ukraine ein priority partner und damit von besonderem Gewicht. Deshalb lag es folgerichtig im Interesse der EU, die Ukra-ine nach Kräften auf diesem Weg zu unterstützen.
Die wissenschaftliche Forschung zur EU-Demokratieförderung konzentrierte sich bis-her im Wesentlichen auf Staaten mit konkreter EU-Beitrittsperspektive. Sie kam zu dem Ergebnis, dass der Erfolg der Demokratieförderung maßgeblich von der Konditionierung eines EU-Beitritts getragen war. Damit konnte dieser Erfolg der EU als dominanter Träger der Demokratieförderung zugeordnet werden.
Mit dem Fokus auf Staaten ohne EU-Beitrittsperspektive entfällt diese Konditionie-rung. Auch weitere Akteure traten bei der Demokratieförderung hinzu, und die Wirksam-keit der Demokratieförderung kann nicht mehr der EU direkt zugeordnet werden. Es ent-stand also eine Forschungslücke, in welcher Weise jetzt die Wirksamkeit der EU-Demokratieförderung analysiert werden kann. Die vorliegende Studie greift diese For-schungslücke auf.
Zunächst wird analysiert, welcher Demokratiestatus der Ukraine und welche Defizite sich für den Untersuchungszeitraum ermitteln lassen. Im Anschluss erfolgt die Analyse der EU-Demokratieförderung auf der Grundlage einer eigens dafür entworfenen Definition von kohärenter Strategie, die eine statische und eine dynamische Dimension abbildet.
Die statische Dimension geht der Frage nach, ob die Zielsetzungen und Vorhaben der EU-Demokratieförderung auf die Demokratiedefizite zugeschnitten waren. Die dynami-sche Dimension des Transformationsprozesses beschäftigt sich mit der Frage, ob das jewei-lige Vorgehen den Prinzipien aus sozialkonstruktivistischer Perspektive folgte. Mit dieser sozialkonstruktivistischen Perspektive wird ein Weg aufgezeigt, wie man ohne eine EU-Beitritts-Konditionierung die Transformation demokratischer Werte und Normen erfolg-reich ausgestalten kann.
Das Ergebnis ist, dass die EU-Strategie der Demokratieförderung zwar mit ihren Ziel-setzungen und Vorhaben auf die Demokratiedefizite der Ukraine ausgerichtet war, aber auch, dass das Vorgehen in einem Fall nicht den Prinzipien aus sozialkonstruktivistischer Perspektive entsprach. Diesem Vorgehen lag keine kohärente EU-Strategie zugrunde.
Die Analyse auf der Ebene der Strategie lässt der EU-Demokratieförderung keine di-rekte Wirkung zuweisen, da auch andere Akteure eine Wirkung entfalten. Auf der Ebene eines konkreten Reformprojekts konnte dann der Nachweis geführt werden, dass die De-zen-tralisierungsreform direkt der EU zugeordnet werden kann, das Vorgehen den Prinzi-pien aus sozialkonstruktivistischer Perspektive folgt und eine positive Wirkung entfaltet.
Begünstigt wurde dieser Erfolg, da er sich auf demokratische Werte und Normen ab-stützen konnte, die in überdurchschnittlicher Ausprägung bereits vorhanden waren. Dar-über hinaus wurde aufgezeigt, dass dieses Projekt eine breit gefächerte potenzielle Wirkung auf den Reformprozess in Richtung Demokratie entfaltet.
Die Dissertation wurde am 14. Dezember 2021 abgeschlossen und an der Universität Koblenz-Landau eingereicht. Im Nachgang bietet ein „Postskript“ mit Datum September 2022 unter Berücksichtigung aktueller Entwicklungen eine Perspektive für weiterführende Forschungsfragen.
Maßnahmen der Führungskräfteentwicklung verfolgen das Ziel den Führungsnachwuchs des Unternehmens zu bilden und für einen reibungslosen Einstieg in die Füh-rungsaufgabe zu sorgen. In der Literatur gibt es zahlreiche Theorien und Modelle zu Führung und deren Entwicklung, doch offen bleibt meist, wie es um den praktischen Einsatz und die Effektivität steht. Das Ziel dieser Arbeit ist die Identifikation wesentlicher Bestandteile der Führungskräfteentwicklung, die effektiv Einfluss auf (Nachwuchs-)Führungskräfte nehmen. Drei Studien beschäftigen sich jeweils mit unter-schiedlichen Schwerpunkten mit der Gestaltung und Wirksamkeit von modularen Programmen der Führungskräfteentwicklung. Zur Beschreibung der Gestaltung wurde eine Expertenbefragung unter Verantwortlichen für Führungskräfteentwicklung in 4 Großunternehmen durchgeführt. Zur Prüfung der Wirksamkeit wurden zwei Prädiktoren erfolgreichen Führens, die praktische Führungsintelligenz und die Führungswirksamkeitserwartung (FWE), in zwei repräsentativen modularen Programmen gemessen. Dafür wurden zwei quasiexperimentelle Designs mit Prätest-Posttest durchgeführt: ein Design mit zusätzlicher Kontrollgruppe (Nexp = 14, Nkontr = 12), ein Design mit zusätzlicher Fremdeinschätzung (N = 11 bis N =57 je nach Messzeitpunkt und beteiligten Variablen). Die praktische Führungsintelligenz wurde anhand eines für die Untersuchung entwickelten Situational Judgment Tests (SJTs) gemessen. Neben der FWE (in Anlehnung an die Skala zur Erfassung der beruflichen Selbstwirksamkeitserwartung, BSW-Skala) wurden weitere Konstrukte wie Selbstregulation (Locomotion-Assessment-Fragebogen, L-A-F), Optimismus (Skala Optimismus-Pessimismus-2, SOP2) Selbstmanagement (Fragebogens zur Erfassung von Ressourcen und Selbstmanagementfähigkeiten, FERUS) erfasst, sowie explorativ entwicklungsförderliche Merkmale erhoben. Entsprechend der Annahme verdichten sich die Ergebnisse auf drei Merkmale wirksamer Trainingsgestaltung: Erfahrungssammlung, Feedback, Selbstreflexion. Es konnte nachgewiesen werden, dass Programme mit hohem erfahrungsorientiertem Trainingsanteil, die Erfolgserlebnisse und Modelllernen fördern sowie persönliche Gespräche und Feedback beinhalten, die FWE (ŋ2 = .24, ŋ2 = .50) und die praktische Führungsintelligenz (ŋ2 = .54). signifikant (p<.05) steigern. Deutlich wurde auch der enge Zusammenhang zwischen Merkmalen der Person (wie Ausprägung der FWE oder Selbstregulationsfähigkeiten) und der Wirksamkeit der Programme. Aus den Ergebnissen werden Empfehlungen zur praktischen Umsetzung in der Führungskräfteentwicklung abgeleitet und Anregungen für zukünftige Forschung diskutiert.
Community-Plattformen im Internet verwenden codebasierte Governance, um ihre hohe Anzahl an Nutzerbeiträgen zu verwalten. Dazu gehören alle Arten von Funktionalitäten, mit denen die Community Nutzerbeiträge in irgendeiner Form direkt oder indirekt beurteilen kann. Diese Arbeit erklärt zunächst die Bedeutung codebasierter Governance und der verschiedenen dafür nutzbaren Funktionalitäten. Anschließend werden die erfolgreichsten 50 Community-Plattformen auf codebasierte Governance untersucht. Das Ergebnis zeigt die Zusammenhänge zwischen dem Aufbau einer Plattform, der Beschaσffenheit der Nutzerbeiträge und der darauf ausübbaren codebasierten Governance auf.
Current political issues are often reflected in social media discussions, gathering politicians and voters on common platforms. As these can affect the public perception of politics, the inner dynamics and backgrounds of such debates are of great scientific interest. This thesis takes user generated messages from an up-to-date dataset of considerable relevance as Time Series, and applies a topic-based analysis of inspiration and agenda setting to it. The Institute for Web Science and Technologies of the University Koblenz-Landau has collected Twitter data generated beforehand by candidates of the European Parliament Election 2019. This work processes and analyzes the dataset for various properties, while focusing on the influence of politicians and media on online debates. An algorithm to cluster tweets into topical threads is introduced. Subsequently, Sequential Association Rules are mined, yielding wide array of potential influence relations between both actors and topics. The elaborated methodology can be configured with different parameters and is extensible in functionality and scope of application.
Globale Beleuchtung im Bildraum unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Sichtbarkeitsbestimmung
(2009)
Die Simulation einer globalen Beleuchtung im dreidimensionalen Objektraum ist sehr rechenintensiv und hängt von der Komplexität der Szene ab. Dabei ist besonders die Berechnung der Sichtbarkeit aufwändig, also der Test, ob sich zwei Punkte in der Szene gegenseitig sehen können. Verfahren, die die globale Beleuchtung vom Objektraum in den Bildraum verlagern (Screen-Space, Image-Space), umgehen das Problem der Szenenkomplexität und haben somit einen wesentlichen Geschwindigkeitsvorteil. Auf diese Weise erzeugte Effekte sind zwar naturgemäß nicht physikalisch korrekt, da die aus Sicht der Kamera verdeckte Geometrie ignoriert wird, dennoch können sie für die menschliche Wahrnehmung überzeugend sein und realistisch wirken. Schlagworte hierfür sind "Fake-"Global-Illumination oder auch "Quasi-"Global-Illumination. Ein bekanntes Beispiel für ein bildraum-basiertes Verfahren zur Annäherung einer globalen Beleuchtung mithilfe weicher Schatten ist Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO). In dieser Studienarbeit wird untersucht, inwieweit sich die Sichtbarkeitsbestimmung im Bildraum nicht nur für nah gelegene Geometrie wie beim Ambient Occlusion, sondern in Bezug auf die gesamte Szene realisieren lässt. Aktuelle Ansätze werden dahingehend untersucht und das geeignetste Verfahrend wird als Grundlage für die Implementierung eines Testszenarios für Screen-Space Global Illumination genutzt. Das umgesetzte Verfahren wird anhand verschiedener Testszenen bewertet.
Für die realistische Betrachtung einer virtuellen Szene spielt neben der direkten Beleuchtung auch die Ausbreitung des indirekten Lichtes eine wichtige Rolle. Die Berechnung der indirekten Beleuchtung benötigt grundsätzlich Informationen über die gesamte Szene, nicht nur über den für die Kamera sichtbaren Ausschnitt, der in bildraumbasierten Techniken zum Einsatz kommt. Mittels Voxelisierung kann die Szene in eine dreidimensionale, diskrete und GPU-freundliche Repräsentation überführt werden. In dieser Arbeit werden Voxelrepräsentationen hinsichtlich ihrer Eignung für den globalen Lichtaustausch in dynamischen und großen Szenen untersucht. Nach einer Einführung und einem Literaturüberblick über existierende Voxelisierungs- und Beleuchtungsverfahren, die Voxel als Grundlage nutzen, wird ein Voxelisierungsverfahren entwickelt, das sich für Szenen mit dynamischen Objekten eignet. Auf der Grundlage des Strahlenschnitt-Tests mit binärer Voxelhierarchie werden dann zwei Beleuchtungsalgorithmen umgesetzt, implementiert und evaluiert: Monte-Carlo-Integration der Hemisphäre eines Szenenpunktes und Beleuchtung der Szenenpunkte mit virtuellen Punktlichtquellen.
In Silico simulation of biological systems is an important sub area of computational biology (system biology), and becomes more and more an inherent part for research. Therefore, different kinds of software tools are required. At present, a multitude of tools for several areas exists, but the problem is that most of the tools are essentially application specific and cannot be combined. For instance, a software tool for the simulation of biochemical processes is not able to interact with tools for the morphology simulation and vice versa. In order to obtain realistic results with computer-aided simulations it is important to regard the biological system in its entirety. The objective is to develop a software framework, which provides an interface structure to combine existing simulation tools, and to offer an interaction between all affiliated systems. Consequently, it is possible to re-use existing models and simulation programs. Additionally, dependencies between those can be defined. The system is designed to interoperate as an extendable architecture for various tools. The thesis shows the usability and applicability of the software and discusses potential improvements.
Unterschiedliche Quellen (Print-Medien, Fernsehberichte u. Ä.) berichten immer wieder davon, dass es mit der Datenschutzkompetenz bei Kindern und Jugendlichen schlecht bestellt ist. Daher ist dem Thema Datenschutz im Informatikunterricht eine besondere Bedeutung zuzuschreiben.
Im Rahmen der Dissertation von Herrn Hug wird ein Datenschutzkompetenzmodell [Quelle INFOS17] entwickelt, anhand dessen die Datenschutzkompetenz von Schülerinnen und Schülern im Altern von 10 bis 13 Jahren gemessen werden kann.
Im Rahmen dieser Masterarbeit werden existierende Unterrichtsmaterialien zum Thema Datenschutz gesammelt und dazu eine Unterrichtsreihe entwickelt. Hierbei werden auch eigene Zugänge aufzeigt, um ein kohärentes und abgeschlossenes Projekt zu entwerfen, bei dem aktuelle Gefahren für Schülerinnen und Schüler aufgezeigt werden. Ziel ist es, dass die Schülerinnen und Schüler dazu befähigt werden, ihr Verhalten bezüglich Datenschutz besser einzuschätzen und verantwortungsvoller mit ihren persönlichen Daten umzugehen. Im Rahmen eines Feldversuches in einer 6. Klasse eines Gymnasiums wurde die Unterrichtsreihe erprobt.
Population genetic structure in European Hyalodaphnia species: Monopolization versus gene flow
(2012)
Cyclic parthenogens displays an alternation of asexual and sexual reproduction which has consequences for the genetic structure of these organisms. The clonal diversity of cyclic parthenogenetic zooplankton populations is influenced by the size of the dormant egg bank, i.e., the amount of sexually produced dormant eggs that assembled in the sediment, as these dormant eggs contribute new genetic variants to the populations. Further, the clonal diversity is impacted by clonal erosion over time, which reduces the number of different clones through stochastic and selective processes. Although freshwater invertebrates are good dispersers through their dormant stages, the influence of gene flow is assumed to be negligible, as the local population successfully monopolizes the available resources. As these populations reach carrying capacity fast due to the asexual reproduction, the first colonizing individuals are able to successfully establish in the habitat, resulting in a priority effect which hinders the invasion of new genotypes. Due to clonal selection and sexual reproduction a population will locally adapt over time and will establish a dormant egg bank which facilitates the fast re-colonization after a hostile period. This thesis evaluates the processes altering the population genetic structure of cyclic parthenogenetic zooplankton with a special focus on the concepts of monopolization as well as the counteracting effects of gene flow, using large-lake Daphnia species. Thirty-two variable microsatellite DNA markers were developed and a subset of twelve markers was evaluated regarding their suitability for species assignment and hybrid class detection. With this marker set and an additional mitochondrial DNA marker forty-four natural European populations of the species D. cucullata, D. galeata and D. longispina were studied. In D. galeata, most populations were characterized by low clonal diversities which suggest high influence from clonal erosion over the growing season and a low contribution from the dormant egg bank. Further, recent expansions as well as gene flow were detected, probably caused by the anthropogenic alteration of freshwater habitats, in particular eutrophication of many European lakes. D. longispina and D. cucullata revealed a different genetic structure compared to D. galeata, with high genetic differentiation among populations. This indicates low levels of effective gene flow which is in line with the predictions of monopolization. Further, high clonal diversities were found in populations of the two taxa, suggesting a high contribution from the dormant egg bank while clonal erosion was often not detectable. In D. longispina, mitochondrial data revealed an ancient expansion which was probably initiated by the formation of glacial lakes after the last ice age.
In addition, in D. longispina not only clonal diversity but also genetic diversity was high, indicating that during the build-up of the studied populations the influence from gene flow was probably high. To better understand the processes that act on early populations the population build-up in regard to the temporal advantage of clones during invasion succession was experimentally studied and revealed that priority effects shape population structure of Daphnia species. However, in certain cases the highly superior clones resulted in the extinction of inferior clones independent of the temporal advantage the single clones had.
This clearly shows that not only the time of succession is important but also the competitive strength. rnIn conclusion, the results obtained show that the population genetic structure in cyclic parthenogenetic zooplankton species is impacted by various processes. In addition to earlier studies, which mainly focus on local adaptation, clonal erosion and the size of the dormant egg bank to understand population genetic structure, this thesis could show that gene flow may be effective as well. During population build-up the advantage of early arriving individuals does not necessarily predict the outcome of population assembly, as additional genotypes may contribute to the population. Finally, the genetic structure of established populations may be severely impacted by effective gene flow, if severe environmental changes alter the habitat of the locally adapted population.
Die Analyse ortsbezogener Strukturdaten und Merkmale ist eine der wesentlichen Voraussetzungen für die Bewertung von Standorten und Räumen. Durch die Erfassung der lokalen Ausprägung ausgewählter Standortfaktoren und unter Zuhilfenahme eines Geographischen Informationssystems werden in der vorliegenden Dissertation die Städte und Gemeinden des hessischen Rheingau-Taunus-Kreises kategorisiert und miteinander verglichen. Hierbei erfolgt eine besondere Fokussierung auf die lokal bestehende technische und soziale Infrastruktur, um vorrangig das vorhandene Gewerbe- und Wohnumfeld sowie die darüber hinaus existierenden räumlichen Disparitäten eingehend veranschaulichen und beurteilen zu können.
Particle swarm optimization is an optimization technique based on simulation of the social behavior of swarms.
The goal of this thesis is to solve 6DOF local pose estimation using a modified particle swarm technique introduced by Khan et al. in 2010. Local pose estimation is achieved by using continuous depth and color data from a RGB-D sensor. Datasets are aquired from different camera poses and registered into a common model. Accuracy and computation time of the implementation is compared to state of the art algorithms and evaluated in different configurations.
Augmented reality is being present for many years. Through progress in technology smaller augmented reality glasses became possible. These new technologies allow many new ways of interaction and usage of augmented reality.
This thesis is about the Microsoft HoloLens and its possiblities for consumers and industry. In the context of this thesis a new interactive and augmented application to measure the possiblities and limitations of the Microsoft HoloLens has been developed. The scene is an assembly szenario with a step by step instruction of building with Lego bricks. The evaluation showed that the HoloLens can already be used to assist in assembling scenarios and offers some advantages over other methods, although the glasses still have some flaws.
This habilitation thesis collects works addressing several challenges on handling uncertainty and inconsistency in knowledge representation. In particular, this thesis contains works which introduce quantitative uncertainty based on probability theory into abstract argumentation frameworks. The formal semantics of this extension is investigated and its application for strategic argumentation in agent dialogues is discussed. Moreover, both the computational as well as the meaningfulness of approaches to analyze inconsistencies, both in classical logics as well as logics for uncertain reasoning is investigated. Finally, this thesis addresses the implementation challenges for various kinds of knowledge representation formalisms employing any notion of inconsistency tolerance or uncertainty.
This thesis connects the endeavors of the winemaker’s intention in perfect and profitable wine making with an innovative technological application to use Internet of Things. Thereby the winemaker’s work may be supported and enriched – and enables until recent years still unthinkable optimization of managing and planning of his business, including close state control of different areas of his vineyard, and more than that, not ending up with the single grapevine. It is exemplarily shown in this thesis how to measure, transmit, store and make data available, exemplarily demonstrated with “live” temperature, air and soil humidity values from the vineyard. A modular architecture was designed for the system presented, which allows the use of current sensors, and similar low-voltage sensors, which will be developed in the future.
By using IoT devices in the vineyard, the winemaker advances to a new quality of precision of forecasted data, starting from live data of his vineyard. Of more and more importance, the winemaker can start immediate action, when unforeseen heavy weather conditions occur. Immediate use of current data enabled by a Cloud Infrastructure. For this system, an open service infrastructure is employed. In contrast to other published commercial approaches, the described solution is based on open source.
As an alone-standing part of this work, a physical prototype for measuring relevant parameters in the vineyard was de-novo designed and developed until fulfilling the set of specifications. The outlined features and requirements for a functioning data collection and autonomously transmitting device was developed, described, and the fulfilment by the prototype device were demonstrated. Through literature research and supportive orientationally live interviews of winemakers, the theory and the practical application were synchronized and qualified.
For the development of the prototype the general principles of development of an electronic device were followed, in particular the Design Science Research development rules, and principles of Quality Function Deployment. As a characteristic of the prototype, some principles like re-use of approved construction and material price of the building blocks of the device were taken into consideration as well (e.g. housing; Arduino; PCB). Parts reduction principles, decomplexation and simplified assembly, testing and field service were integrated to the development process by the modular design of the functional vineyard device components, e.g. with partial reference to innovative electrical cabinet construction system Modular-3.
The software architectural concept is based on a three-layer architecture inclusive the TTN infrastructure. The front end is realized as a rich web client, using a WordPress plugin. WordPress was chosen due to the wide adoption through the whole internet, enabling fast and easy user familiarization. Relevant quality issues have been tested and discussed in the view of exemplary functionality, extensibility, requirements fulfilment, as usability and durability of the device and the software.
The prototype was characterized and tested with success in the laboratory and in field exposition under different conditions, in order to allow a measurement and analysis of the fulfilment of all requirements by the selected and realized electronic construction and layout.
The solution presented may serve as a basis for future development and application in this special showcase and within similar technologies. A prognosis of future work and applications concludes this work.
This bachelor thesis’s objective is to offer the reader insight into the discrete Fourier transform, the discrete cosine transform and the discrete Hadamard-Walsh transform in the context of image processing, and also to compare these transformations under various aspects. For this purpose the term of transformation, originated in linear algebra, will be explained and applied to image processing. Subsequently, the understanding of the Fourier transform will successively be built up and connected to the two remaining transforms. Finally, the transformations will be compared and their usefulness in relation to image processing will be explained.
Although most plastic pollution originates on land, current research largely remains focused on aquatic ecosystems. Studies pioneering terrestrial microplastic research have adapted analytical methods from aquatic research without acknowledging the complex nature of soil. Meanwhile, novel methods have been developed and further refined. However, methodical inconsistencies still challenge a comprehensive understanding of microplastic occurrence and fate in and on soil. This review aims to disentangle the variety of state-of-the-art sample preparation techniques for heterogeneous solid matrices to identify and discuss best-practice methods for soil-focused microplastic analyses. We show that soil sampling, homogenization, and aggregate dispersion are often neglected or incompletely documented. Microplastic preconcentration is typically performed by separating inorganic soil constituents with high-density salt solutions. Not yet standardized but currently most used separation setups involve overflowing beakers to retrieve supernatant plastics, although closed-design separation funnels probably reduce the risk of contamination. Fenton reagent may be particularly useful to digest soil organic matter if suspected to interfere with subsequent microplastic quantification. A promising new approach is extraction of target polymers with organic solvents. However, insufficiently characterized soils still impede an informed decision on optimal sample preparation. Further research and method development thus requires thorough validation and quality control with well-characterized matrices to enable robust routine analyses for terrestrial microplastics.
In an attempt to put pronunciation training back in the limelight and to engage in a fruitful discussion on pronunciation- equal importance with other language skills, the current research project focuses on pronunciation. Specifically, one area that causes problems for L1-German speakers is concentrated on, namely the central approximant. German learners should not despair too much as even many native-English children stumble with /r/. For some, acquiring this sound takes a long time and even some professional help (see Secord 2007: 7-8). One problem that these children have is the substitution of /r/ with /w/. "Children with developmental speech substitution," write Raphael et al., "often produce the more easily articulated (…) /w/ for /r/" (2011: 119). Most native-English children require a long time to acquire this sound. According to Bleile, /r/ belongs to the last stage (i.e. stage 4) of a child- language development (see Bleile 2004: 106). This final stage can range from five years of age to adolescence. One of the greatest difficulties, for instance, occurs with postvocalic /r/ (or "[r] colored schwa") and consonant clusters with /r/ (see Bleile 2004: 106).
It is important at this juncture to direct attention to the organization of the current research project and how it addresses the /r/-problem. At the start of the current study, an appropriate and concise definition of the /r/-sound is proposed. While it can be easily stated that the letter <r> is the 18th letter in the English alphabet, it is much more arduous to define what is meant by the /r/-sound. In chapter 2, a number of definitions of /r/ are explored. Section 2.1 presents an articulatory description and section 2.2 offers an acoustic description. A theoretical definition is provided in section 2.3. By exploring the distinguishing features of the /r/-sound, it can be distinguished from other sounds. From these three perspectives, a more encompassing view of the complicated English /r/-sound can be obtained.
In chapter 3, three hypotheses are presented. The first two are the main hypotheses for the current study. There is also a third (minor) hypothesis and it is an offshoot from some of the research findings from the first hypothesis. In section 3.1.1, hypothesis 1 (H1) investigates the frequency of the problem that L1-German speakers have when speaking the American English /r/-sound aloud when it is postvocalic and in a weakened syllable. Hypothesis 2 (H2) is put forward in section 3.1.2. It explores the frequency of /w/-substitution for /r/ when the latter sound is prevocalic in a stressed syllable. For the final and third hypothesis (H3), one specific occassion where L1 interference occurs (i.e. /ɐ/ for /ə/) is researched in section 3.1.3.
Some organizational details concerning the study are also included in the third chapter. The general set-up of the study is provided in section 3.2.1. Information pertaining to both the disqualified participants of the study as well as the 50 test subjects who were selected for the study is available in section 3.2.1.2. Details on technical equipment and software programs are disclosed in sections 3.2.1.1 and 3.2.1.3. The prescribed reading texts that the test subjects needed to read aloud are presented in the subsections of section 3.2.2.
For a better understanding of the acoustic properties of the prevocalic /r/-sound, five expressions from the reading text are selected. In section 3.3, the expressions are also articulated by the author (a native speaker of a variety of English from North America) in four different scenarios. The scenarios try to illustrate a limited number of possible articulatory variations. The author utters the expressions in four different ways: 1.) with lip spreading, 2.) in isolation, 3.) in connected speech and 4.) with /w/-substitution for /r/. These articulations serve as a template for understanding how the acoustic features of /r/ changes. Some of these changes are noticeable in the articulations of the test subjects (presented in chapter 4).
In chapter 4, the data collected for the three hypotheses are presented. For H1, section 4.1 and its subsections document the formant readings of a number of English expressions which contain the postvocalic /r/. In this analysis, it is important to detect where the central approximant is elided. In cases of elision, the samples have their schwa-like sounds plotted in a vowel quadrilateral, so that their locations can be detected. In section 4.2 and its subsections, data observations for H2 are discussed. From these data, the extent of /w/-substitution for /r/ when it is prevocalic in a stressed syllable can be observed. In section 4.3, an analysis of the /ɐ/-sound from three German expressions as they are spoken by the 50 test subjects is presented for H3. Together with pertinent data (i.e. formant readings) from H1, a comparison is made between the locations of /ə/ and /ɐ/. This section concludes with a plotting of all samples of these two vowels in a vowel chart.
In the final chapter of the current study, the main findings of the three hypotheses are summarized. Chapter 5 also provides some insights into a few of the gaps or limitations in the present research. Future research endeavors are proposed in order to suggest possible avenues to advance the findings reported on in the fourth chapter. In addition, several teaching suggestions and pronunciation exercises for implementing the /r/-sound in class are presented.
Lastly, there is an appendix section that consists of 14 smaller appendices (i.e Volume 2). The spectrograms and formant readings for each expression spoken by each of the 50 test subjects are documented in Appendix A to M. In Appendix N, some charts, tables, diagrams, etc. that are discussed throughout the following chapters are made available. Copies of the original questionnaire that were filled out by the test subjects are also in Appendix N.
Gefährdete Weltmacht USA
(2017)
Aims and findings of the dissertation
The completed research uses holistic, politological and historical approaches to present how, during the studied period of the administrations of Clinton to Obama, the liberal, rule-based world order system is gradually supplemented and replaced by a system of realist imposition of vital interests that have short-term effects, preferring military means combined with continuous military optimisation. This also explains a continuity between the leading-power policy of administrations in this study (1993-2017) and the subsequent period of the “transactional leadership of Trump”(1), with its recognizable, far-reaching effects of aiming to reduce idealistic Grand Strategy elements and measures of a benevolent order by passing on costs to and reducing the benefits of European NATO allies. The results of this dissertation, such as the increasingly evident dissolution of a multilateral fundamental order, therefore indicate that Trump’s foreign and security policy to date should be regarded as a clearly noticeable crisis symptom, rather than the cause of a decline in the world order established after 1945. This decline is synonymous with the erosion of the transatlantically initiated bipolar “American system”. Its implementation was the result of the “lesson of two world wars”, based on modern concepts of order introduced by the Enlightenment and the founding criteria of the United States: thus its dissolution is also an indicator of the failure of contemporary criteria of order that thrive in the “American way of life”.
The cause of the described development is shown to be a constantly exacerbating overall threat, from Clinton to Obama, which is connected to the consistent erosion of US supremacy. Among other aspects, this is based on climate change effects postulated in 1979, which multiply the threat while coinciding with American peak production of fossil fuels and increased demand on resources in the context of dwindling raw material resources. Furthermore, during the period of this study, the “US conservative revolution”, which began in the 1980s, increasingly affected foreign and security policy, combining with a consolidation in the influence of corporations and lobby groups in fields such as policy implementation and new underlying conditions. They include the onset of digitisation, entailing a high consumption of resources, and a growing world population faced with specific demographic indicators. Additionally, the maintenance of the armaments sector, originally a result of bipolar development, as the economic basis of military supremacy and the slow decline of the Dollar hegemony since around 1973, should also be taken into account. Complex interaction between Grand Strategy implementation according to the premise of expanding US-American dominance under neoconservative and Christian Right-wing influences, as well as asymmetrical and reactivated conventional security threats and threat multipliers clearly indicate the linear development of the overall threat in the period between 1993 and 2017: in the context of Grand Strategy statements, above all the understanding of defence against this threat, of the latter’s multiplying factors and the market economy explains the following with respect to the US far-right in a complex interaction with the growth of transnational corporations, lobby groups, individuals(2), informal networks and state actors with respect to objects of threat and threat multipliers(3) in connection with the post-bipolar, global anchoring of US economic and consumer patterns: US adaptation of its reaction to this threat – while consolidating imperial presidency(4) and weakening the system of checks and balances – including its implications of a bipolar liberal order. In this way, the necessary continued leadership within NATO through the US-proposed NATO reform can be seen as an appropriate implementation of transformed threat-reaction measures and the legitimisation of systemic adaptation. It equally becomes clear that the established threat reaction measures only provide a short-term defence: instead, they enhance the asymmetric and conventional threat, as well as threat multipliers – by introducing arms races and breaking down arms control – thereby heightening the overall threat. The consequence is the consistently growing likelihood of a conflict of hitherto unimaginable proportions. At the same time, the urgent need to mobilise transatlantic cooperation with respect to supporting global cooperation between state and non-government actors is illustrated with respect to the roots of the threat and its deteriorating underlying conditions: each increase in the overall threat, the adapted US security policy and its continuation in NATO is connected to an erosion of rule-based underlying criteria during the studied period. This continuously and consistently undermines the basis of the above-stated, ever-increasingly important cooperation, to prevent or at least limit the successive erosion of the bipolar “American system” under future dystopias. The research results completely overturn the state of research to date, since for instance it is possible to show that, by means of NATO transformation findings, no transatlantic sharing of burdens on an equal footing and no NATO reform in accordance with its founding principles can be achieved. The same also applies to European opposition to the actual anchoring of NATO transformation positions(5), which is based on the erosion of the bipolar liberal order system and the maintenance of US advantages as well as the consolidation of particular interests they facilitate. Furthermore, it is apparent that a line of continuity in the threat-reaction measures from Clinton to Obama exists with varying external effects, along with an underlying pattern of “Battleship America” – as opposed to a multilaterally orientated foreign and security policy under Clinton, which merged into a unilateral, radical swing under G. W. Bush 43 following 9/11, but was reverted by the Obama administration. A comprehensive wealth of literature was used of the doctoral thesis, as reflected by the extensive bibliography: they firstly include diverse American and European publications, monographs and relevant secondary literature, including biographies, publications of various kinds of important political planning and implementation, as well as collected volumes and research articles from specialist journals on all fields of research and politological methodology and theory. The same applies to publications by leading European and American institutions, research centres and think tanks. Furthermore, this author used publications and documents by governments, foreign ministries, defence ministries, other government bodies and Nato.
Dissertation structure
This dissertation is divided into two volumes and one Appendix: Volume 1 discusses Focus 1, namely a process-tracing in the context of offensive neorealist positioning. Volume 2 presents Focus 2, which is based on the preceding focus in making a structured, focussed comparison in the context of defensive neorealist positioning. The Appendix volume contains further discussion of Chapter 1, Volume 1 with respect to the state of research, literature and sources, theoretical positioning and the choice of the region of study and selected European NATO partners. Furthermore, a historical chapter provides underlying information for process-tracing in Chapter 2, Volume 1, an index of images and abbreviations, and a bibliography.
The entire dissertation uses qualitative methods to focus on these two mutually supporting, building on each other, themes to investigate the following from a US-perspective: firstly the overriding US security-policy reaction to a new overall threat and secondly, its continuation combined with the opportunity of for enabling and legitimising it within and through NATO during the studied period from Clinton to Obama.
Based on the first part of this hypothesis, Focus 1 (Volume 1) establishes a connection between, on the one hand, maintaining the bipolar Grand Strategy target of consolidating the USA as a leading, regulating power, bipolar foreign-policy Grand Strategy indicators and a new overall threat that is developing in a complex way, and, on the other, the necessity of its continued leadership within NATO and the required NATO transformation according to US-proposed NATO transformation positions.
Focus 2 (Volume 2) is based on the second part of the hypothesis, investigating the transatlantic negotiation process to establish these US-proposed NATO transformation positions: in this context, Volume 2 investigates whether the attempt to actually secure and consolidate such US supremacy was unsuccessful in the face of resistance from selected European NATO partners, namely France, Germany and the United Kingdom.
The overall result shows that due to a complex, developing, linear increase in the overall threat, the chance for the USA to consolidate its status as a leading power is steadily diminishing. This must be compensated by adapting US security policy. The resulting American security-policy realignment based on the initiated “revolution in military affairs” in turn modifies the indicators of bipolar collective security guarantees. Everything is enabled and legitimised by means of actually securing US NATO-transformation positions. The actual implementation of such NATO transformation – representing the consistent adaptation of US security policy – enables a mission-orientated, rapid response, flexible, global security projection. It also creates conditions for “alliances of choice” within NATO. Furthermore, the modification of a “bipolar NATO” exacerbates the erosion of key achievements of civilisation as a result of adapted US security policy, as well as undermining the tasks of bipolar collective security guarantees through diminished benefits to European NATO partners.
The actual anchoring of NATO transformation positions is achieved by reactivating the conventional threat in the context of the Ukraine crisis of 2014 and the extension of NATO partnership rings on a global level, without providing them with NATO membership status, thus avoiding globalisation in a mutual defence case. The German and French resistance is particularly intensive through the involvement of European founder states, while the formation of a European leadership triumvirate consisting of France, Germany and the United Kingdom does not take place.
Moreover, a relevant investigation of causes particularly shows that despite constant mutually supporting US security reaction measures with varying international effects and actual continued leadership within NATO, the overall threat is not receding: this leads to a constant increase in the overall threat, a loss of influence of state actors, the diffusion and concentration of power and the increased probability of reactive conventional, nuclear, cyber and ecological destruction scenarios. On this basis, the consequence is an increasingly comprehensive and rapidly responding precision defence combined with growing securitization to compensate for the ongoing containment of US supremacy. This developing process steadily diminishes the reach and power of a liberal, rule-based, bipolar “American system” and the establishment of “idealistic, liberal” elements of US-Grand Strategy. This entails a further reduction in benefits for European NATO allies and increasing US cost-cutting demands – based on the successive NATO transformation positions that build on each other and Obama’s “smart power”(6) during the period studied in this dissertation. Thus the chance is receding of developing the post-bipolar, globally adopted American way of life with individual national character, which is regarded as “non-negotiable”: for instance its articulation is expressed through increasing right-wing populism, the election of outsider-candidates, the dissolution of traditional party systems, isolationist tendencies combined with burgeoning ethnic, regional movements, the rejection of supranationalism, and religious fundamentalism. At the same time, the ongoing erosion of global public goods is apparent.
This all paves the way to limiting the benevolent American regulating power and state actors’ leverage – and therefore to a return to classic power politics in the context of a resulting diffusion and concentration of power. In view of the urgency of a long-term containment of asymmetrical or conventional threats to security, or aspects that exacerbate such threats or clusters thereof, as well as underlying global conditions, this undermines the ability to achieve the following: to achieve transatlantic cooperation by broadening the range of levels and actors in the spirit of proactive and expanded, networked security to achieve according global cooperation with respect to containing the root causes of threats.
Overall, this research work reveals how and why the anticipated “peace dividend” and the notion of an “age of hope”, as postulated by President Clinton, were hardly perceptible during the period of study between 1993 and 2017.
Notes
(1) Cf. Braml, Josef (2018), Trumps transaktionaler Transatlantizismus, in: Jäger, Thomas (Hrsg.), Zeitschrift für Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik, Oktober 2018, Volume 11, Ausgabe 4, S. 439-448, Wiesbaden.
(2) Cf. National Intelligence Council (Ed.) (2012), Global Trends 2013: Alternative Worlds (NIC 2012-001), https://publicintelligence.net/global-trends-2030/, last accessed: 12.04.19. See also the “international financial leadership, self-selected at Davos” cit. McCoy, Alfred W. (2017), In the Shadows of the American Century. The Rise and Decline of US Global Power, Chicago.
(3) In 1990, the threat-enhancing nature of climate change was already postulated with respect to asymmetric objects of threat as well as conventional and complex clusters: “Over the next half century, the global average temperature may increase by approximately 4 degrees C. (…) All nations will be affected. (…) How much time will there be to confirm the amount of change and then to act? (…) However, many believe that we will have waited too long to avoid major dislocation, hardship and conflict – on a scale not as yet seen by man“. Cf. Kelley, Terry P. (1990), Global Climate Change. Implications For The United States Navy (The United States Naval War College, Newport, RI), http://documents.theblackvault.com/documents/weather/climatechange/globalclimatechange-navy.pdf, last accessed: 30.03.19. Cf. Mazo, Jeffrey (2010), Climate Conflict. How global warming threatens security and what to do about it, London, Abingdon.
This supports the thesis of a developing, constant overall threat during the period between 1993 and 2017.
(4) Cf. Schlesinger, Arthur M., Jr. (1973), The Imperial Presidency, Boston.
(5) In this dissertation, the proposed US positions on NATO adaptation, the NATO Response Force and the Global Partnership Initiative are described as “NATO transformation positions”: Their actual establishment was connected to a NATO transformation with the consistent continuation of adapted US security policy.
(6) Cf. Nossel, Suzanne (2004), Smart Power. Reclaiming Liberal Internationalism, http://www.democracyarsenal.org/SmartPowerFA.pdf, last accessed: 26.08.17, Nye, Joseph S. Jr. (2011), The Future of Power, New York, Nye, Joseph S. Jr. (2011), Macht im 21sten Jahrhundert. Politische Strategien für ein neues Zeitalter, München, Rodham Clinton, Hillary (2010), Leading Through Civilan Power. Redefining American Diplomacy and Development, in: Foreign Affairs, November/December 2010, Vol. 89, No.6, S. 13-24.
Today you can find smartphones everywhere. This situation created a hype for Augmented Reality and AR Apps. The big question is: Do these applications provide a real added value? To make AR pratically it is important to add the computational power of a computer to the advantages of AR. An easy and fast way of interaction is essential.
A Poker-Assistance-Software is an ideal test area for an AR Application with real added value. The estimation of the winning probability and a fast automated tracking of the playing cards is the perfect field of investigation.
In this discussion it is interesting to evaluate the added value of AR Applications in common.
Betriebswirtschaftliche Trends wie der Wandel auf Käufermärkten, verkürzte Produktlebens- und Innovationszyklen, steigende Kundenanforderungen und immer leistungsfähiger werdende Informations- und Kommunikationstechnologien stellen für Unternehmen anspruchsvolle Herausforderungen dar. "Bis Anfang der 90er Jahre dominierten lokale Optimierungsbemühungen im Rahmen einer auf funktionale Spezialisierung ausgerichteten Aufbauorganisation entsprechend den Überlegungen zu Arbeitsteilung von beispielsweise Smith, Taylor und Ford. Aufgrund der vielfältigen Probleme dieses Ansatzes - insbesondere Schnittstellenbildung, demotivierte Mitarbeiter, mangelnde Kundenorientierung und erhöhter Aufwand zur Steuerung und Koordination der funktionalen Einheiten - vollzieht sich seit Beginn der 90er Jahre in den Wirtschaftswissenschaften und der unternehmerischen Praxis ein Paradigmenwechsel weg von der Funktions- hin zur Prozessorientierung." Die anspruchsvollen Probleme können aufgrund ihrer Kompliziertheit nicht mehr durch einfache, lokal anwendbare Maßnahmen gelöst werden. In Zeiten hoher Komplexität und Dynamik werden strategische Planungsaufgaben immer wichtiger für ein langfristig erfolgreiches Management. Entscheidungen mit großer Tragweite müssen im Vorfeld vollständig auf ihre kurz-und langfristigen Auswirkungen innerhalb und außerhalb des Unternehmens überprüft werden. Dabei sind die zeitverzögerten Rückkopplungen besonders wichtig. Es kann vorkommen, dass sich eine kurzfristig erfolgreiche Maßnahme zur Ergebnisverbesserung möglicherweise langfristig extrem negativ auf das Ergebnis auswirkt. System Dynamics, eine Methode zur Untersuchung komplexer, dynamischer Systeme, bietet die Möglichkeit, aus einer Analyse der Systemstruktur und des von ihr verursachten Verhaltens langfristig wirksame Entscheidungsregeln abzuleiten. Dabei werden Unternehmen als offene, äußerst vernetzte soziotechnische Systeme verstanden. System Dynamics, ursprünglich "Industrial Dynamics" genannt, wurde in den 50ern am MasMassachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT, entwickelt. Die Methode nimmt die Komplexität, Nichtlinearität und Rückkopplungsstrukturen, die sozialen und physikalischen Systemen enthalten, als Grundlage. Sie wird inzwischen an einer zunehmenden Zahl von Universitäten gelehrt. Unternehmen und Regierungen nutzen System Dynamics zur Simulation von Management- bzw. Politikentscheidungen. Mit der Hilfe der Methode wird es möglich, komplexe Systeme zu durchschauen, was für Entscheidungsträger eine zunehmende Herausforderung darstellt. Die "System Dynamics Society" ist bemüht, systematisches Denken einer breiten Masse von Anwendern zugänglich zu machen. Die Methode könnte die Menschen dabei unterstützen, die aktuellen Probleme und die langfristigen Auswirkungen des aktuellen Handelns zu verstehen. Die Intention dieser Arbeit ist es nun, zwei betriebswirtschaftliche Anwendungsgebiete der System Dynamics Modellierung mit jeweils einem konkreten Fallbeispiel vorzustellen. Dazu werden zunächst in Kapitel 2 die Grundlagen der Systemtheorie dargestellt. Dabei wird auf die Sichtweise von Forrester fokussiert. Darauf aufbauend wird in Kapitel 3 die die Methode detailliert vorgestellt. Nachdem die historische Entwicklung von System Dynamics aufgezeigt wird, werden die Anwendungsgebiete, die Grundlagen und die Grundsäulen der Modellierung und der Modellierungsprozess dargelegt. Im vierten Kapitel wird das erste Anwendungsgebiet untersucht, in der die System Dynamics Modellierung eingesetzt wird, die Balanced Scorecard, ein populäres Konzept für die Performancemessung in Unternehmen. Nachdem das Konzept vorgestellt wird, werden dessen Grenzen aufgezeigt, die mit der Verknüpfung des System Dynamics Ansatz überwunden werden können. Daraufhin werden die Möglichkeiten der System Dynamics Modellierung erläutert, womit die Schwächen der Balanced Scorecard reduziert werden, bevor anhand eines konkreten Fallbeispiels die Verknüpfung des System Dynamics Modellierung mit dem Balanced Scorecard Konzept vorgestellt wird. Eine abschließende Bewertung über die Anwendung wird dieses Kapitel abschließen. Im nächsten Kapitel wird die Anwendung der System Dynmaics Modellierung im Supply Chain Management untersucht. Zunächst werden die Grundlagen über das Supply Chain Management und Probleme, die damit verbunden sind, erläutert. Anhand des "Beer Game" werden die typischen Koordinationsprobleme mehrstufiger Lieferketten, der Bullwhip Effekt, verdeutlicht. Im nächsten Schritt wird die Anwendung der System Dynamics Modellierung im Supply Chain Management diskutiert, bevor die Umsetzung in einem konkreten Fallbeispiel aufgezeigt wird. Dieses Kapitel schließt mit einer Bewertung über die Anwendung von System Dynamics im Supply Chain Management ab. Mit dem abschließenden Kapitel Fazit wird die Arbeit abgerundet.
Initial goal of the current dissertation was the determination of image-based biomarkers sensitive for neurodegenerative processes in the human brain. One such process is the demyelination of neural cells characteristic for Multiple sclerosis (MS) - the most common neurological disease in young adults for which there is no cure yet. Conventional MRI techniques are very effective in localizing areas of brain tissue damage and are thus a reliable tool for the initial MS diagnosis. However, a mismatch between the clinical fndings and the visualized areas of damage is observed, which renders the use of the standard MRI diffcult for the objective disease monitoring and therapy evaluation. To address this problem, a novel algorithm for the fast mapping of myelin water content using standard multiecho gradient echo acquisitions of the human brain is developed in the current work. The method extents a previously published approach for the simultaneous measurement of brain T1, T∗ 2 and total water content. Employing the multiexponential T∗ 2 decay signal of myelinated tissue, myelin water content is measured based on the quantifcation of two water pools (myelin water and rest) with different relaxation times. Whole brain in vivo myelin water content maps are acquired in 10 healthy controls and one subject with MS. The in vivo results obtained are consistent with previous reports. The acquired quantitative data have a high potential in the context of MS. However, the parameters estimated in a multiparametric acquisition are correlated and constitute therefore an ill-posed, nontrivial data analysis problem. Motivated by this specific problem, a new data clustering approach is developed called Nuclear Potential Clustering, NPC. It is suitable for the explorative analysis of arbitrary dimensional and possibly correlated data without a priori assumptions about its structure. The developed algorithm is based on a concept adapted from nuclear physics. To partition the data, the dynamic behavior of electrically even charged nucleons interacting in a d-dimensional feature space is modeled. An adaptive nuclear potential, comprised of a short-range attractive (Strong interaction) and a long-range repulsive term (Coulomb potential), is assigned to each data point. Thus, nucleons that are densely distributed in space fuse to build nuclei (clusters), whereas single point clusters are repelled (noise). The algorithm is optimized and tested in an extensive study with a series of synthetic datasets as well as the Iris data. The results show that it can robustly identify clusters even when complex configurations and noise are present. Finally, to address the initial goal, quantitative MRI data of 42 patients are analyzed employing NPC. A series of experiments with different sets of image-based features show a consistent grouping tendency: younger patients with low disease grade are recognized as cohesive clusters, while those of higher age and impairment are recognized as outliers. This allows for the definition of a reference region in a feature space associated with phenotypic data. Tracking of the individual's positions therein can disclose patients at risk and be employed for therapy evaluation.
Für die Entwicklung sicherer Softwaresysteme erweitert UMLsec die UML durch die Definition von Sicherheitsanforderungen, die erfüllt sein müssen. In Klassendiagrammen können Attribute und Methoden von Klassen Sicherheitseigenschaften wie secrecy oder integrity haben, auf die nicht authorisierte Klassen keinen Zugriff haben sollten. Vererbungen zwischen Klassen erzeugen eine Komplexität und werfen die Frage auf, wie man mit der Vererbung von Sicherheitseigenschaften umgehen sollte. Neben der Option in sicherheitskritischen Fällen auf Vererbungen zu verzichten, gibt es im Gebiet der objektorientierten Datenbanken bereits viele allgemeine Recherchen über die Auswirkungen von Vererbung auf die Sicherheit. Das Ziel dieser Arbeit ist es, Ähnlichkeiten und Unterschiede von der Datenbankseite und den Klassendiagrammen zu identifizieren und diese Lösungsansätze zu übertragen und zu formalisieren. Eine Implementierung des Modells evaluiert, ob die Lösungen in der Praxis anwendbar sind.
Social entrepreneurship is a form of entrepreneurship that marries a social mission to a competitive value proposition. Notably, social entrepreneurship fosters a more equitable society by addressing social issues and trying to achieve an ongoing sustainable impact through a social mission rather than purely profit maximization. The topic of social entrepreneurship has appealed considerably to many different streams of research. The focus on understanding how and why entrepreneurs think and act is a significant justification for future research. Nevertheless, the theoretical examination of this phenomenon is in its infancy. Social entrepreneurship research is still largely phenomenon-driven. Specifically, Social Entrepreneurial Intention is in an early stage and lacks quantitative research. Therefore, this thesis proposes to address this need. The thesis’ objectives are twofold: (1) develop a formation model for Social Entrepreneurial Intentions in general and (2) test the model by conducting an empirical study. Based on these objectives, the two research questions guiding the thesis are (1) what factors influence the intention of a person to become a social entrepreneur and (2) what relationships exist among these factors.
In order to answer these two research questions, this thesis uses purposeful research design, which is a combination of literature review and empirical study. The literature review is based on a comprehensive range of books, articles, and research papers published in leading academic journals and conference proceedings in different disciplines such as entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship education, management, social psychology, and social economics. The empirical study is conducted via a survey of 600 last-year students from four universities in three regions in Vietnam: Hanoi, Da Nang, and Ho Chi Minh. The data are analyzed with SPSS-AMOS version 24, using screening data, scale development, exploratory factor analysis, and confirmation factor analysis. The thesis ascertains that Entrepreneurship Experience/Extra-curricular Activity, Role Model, Social Entrepreneurial Self-Efficacy, and Social Entrepreneurial Outcome Expectation directly and positively affect the intention of the Vietnamese students to be social entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship Education also influences the Social Entrepreneurial Intention, but not directly, otherwise indirectly via Social Entrepreneurial Self-Efficacy and Social Entrepreneurial Outcome Expectation. Similarly, Perceived Support has no direct relationship to Social Entrepreneurial Intention; however, it shows an indirect link via the mediator ‘Social Entrepreneurial Outcome Expectation’. Furthermore, the dissertation brings new insights to the social entrepreneurship literature and provides important implications for practice. Limitations and future directions are also provided in the thesis.
Ziel dieser Forschungsarbeit ist die Auswahl und Evaluierung von Open-Source ERPSystemen auf effiziente Anwendbarkeit in Unternehmen zum Zwecke des Aufbaus eines "ERP-Future-Labs", in welchem mittelständische Handelsunternehmen das/die installierte(n) System(e) testen können. Den Projektabschluss bildet hierbei die Installation eines lauffähigen Systems, auf welchem die vom Auftraggeber vorgegebenen Geschäftsprozesse abgewickelt werden können. Ferner sollen die Auftraggeber auf dem System geschult, eine Dokumentation der Software (Installation/Bedienung) und des Projekts erstellt werden.
From September 4 to 11, 1992, a fiirst meeting between Ukrainian and German scientists interested in mathematical and computer modeling of social processes was held at Vorzel' near Kiev. The meeting had been planned for nearly three years by Igor V. Chernenko and Mikhail V. Kuz'min, then members of the research group on mathematical modeling in sociology at the Institute of Sociology of the Academy of Science of the Ukrainian Republic, and had to be postponed twice due to the political development in the former Soviet Union, but thanks to the organizers' perseverance (and in spite of a strike of the airport personell at Kiev Borispol Airport on the eve of the conference) the conference could at last be realized.rnThe main purpose of the conference was to discuss a synergetic interpretation of large-scale destructive social processes as catastrophic phenomena in self-organized systems.
This paper originates from the FP6 project "Emergence in the Loop (EMIL)" which explores the emergence of norms in artificial societies. Part of work package 3 of this project is a simulator that allows for simulation experiments in different scenarios, one of which is collaborative writing. The agents in this still prototypical implementation are able to perform certain actions, such as writing short texts, submitting them to a central collection of texts (the "encyclopaedia") or adding their texts to texts formerly prepared by other agents. At the same time they are able to comment upon others' texts, for instance checking for correct spelling, for double entries in the encyclopaedia or for plagiarisms. Findings of this kind lead to reproaching the original authors of blamable texts. Under certain conditions blamable activities are no longer performed after some time.
The natural and the artificial environment of mankind is of enormous complexity, and our means of understanding this complex environment are restricted unless we make use of simplified (but not oversimplified) dynamical models with the help of which we can explicate and communicate what we have understood in order to discuss among ourselves how to re-shape reality according to what our simulation models make us believe to be possible. Being both a science and an art, modelling and simulation isrnstill one of the core tools of extended thought experiments, and its use is still spreading into new application areas, particularly as the increasing availability of massive computational resources allows for simulating more and more complex target systems.
In the early summer of 2012, the 26th European Conference on Modelling andrnSimulation (ECMS) once again brings together the best experts and scientists in the field to present their ideas and research, and to discuss new challenges and directions for the field.
The 2012 edition of ECMS includes three new tracks, namely Simulation-BasedrnBusiness Research, Policy Modelling and Social Dynamics and Collective Behaviour, and extended the classical Finance and Economics track with Social Science. It attracted more than 110 papers, 125 participants from 21 countries and backgrounds ranging from electrical engineering to sociology.
This book was inspired by the event, and it was prepared to compile the most recent concepts, advances, challenges and ideas associated with modelling and computer simulation. It contains all papers carefully selected from the large number of submissions by the programme committee for presentation during the conference and is organised according to the still growing number tracks which shaped the event. The book is complemented by two invited pieces from other experts that discussed an emerging approach to modelling and a specialised application. rnrnWe hope these proceedings will serve as a reference to researchers and practitioners in the ever growing field as well as an inspiration to newcomers to the area of modelling and computer simulation. The editors are honoured and proud to present you with this carefully compiled selection of topics and publications in the field.
The following work describes the prototypical conception and development of the stat-raising game "Adventurer's Guild" using the game engine Ren'Py. The game's narrative is influenced by player decisions and the planning of activities. The game is to be visually pleasing and enjoyable.
After giving an overview of stat-raising as a genre, the existing games "Dandelion - Wishes Brought to You", "Pastry Lovers", "Long Live the Queen" and "Magical Diary" are analysed to pinpoint various strengths and weaknesses of their different takes on the genre.
The resultant findings are used for the conception of a new stat-raising game.
The game mechanics and the design decisions made are then shown in screenshots and thoroughly explained.
In a final assessment, the game will be examined with regard to the given task. Further possibilities for potential improvements and expansions will be detailed at the end.
This dissertation is dedicated to a new concept for capturing renunciation-oriented attitudes and beliefs — sufficiency orientation. Sufficiency originates in the interdisciplinary sustain-ability debate. In contrast to efficiency and consistency, sufficiency considers human behaviour as the cause of socio-ecological crises and strives for a reduction in consumption respecting the planetary boundaries. The present work places sufficiency in a psychological research context and explores it qualitatively and quantitatively. On the basis of five manuscripts, the overarching question pursued is to what extent sufficiency orientation contributes to socio-ecological transformation. Based on one qualitative study and five further quantitative studies, sufficiency orientation is investigated in different behavioural contexts that are of particular importance with regard to CO2 emissions. In addition, sufficiency orientation is linked to a wider range of psychologically relevant theories that help gain an overview of correlates and possible causes for the development of a sufficiency orientation.
Manuscript 1 uses expert interviews (N = 21) to develop a heuristic framework on a transformation towards societal sufficiency orientation including barriers and enablers, as well as ambiguities on such a change. The derived elements are interpreted in the light of the leverage points approach. This framework can serve as a heuristic for future research and to develop measures concerning sufficiency orientation.
As part of an online study (N = 648), Manuscript 2 examines the extent to which sufficiency orientation can be embedded in classic models for explaining pro-environmental intentions and behaviour (Theory of Planned Behaviour, Norm Activation Model), and showed a significant contribution to the explanation of intentions and behaviour in the field of plastic consumption.
Manuscript 3 reports two framing experiments (Study 1, N = 123, Study 2, N = 330) to investigate how pro-social justice sensitivity contributes to making sufficiency orientation more salient and promoting it. While sufficiency orientation and pro-social facets of justice sensitivity were positively related to each other, there was no effect of the framing intervention in the hypothesised direction. The results indicate that justice-related information at least in the presented manner is more likely to generate reactance.
Manuscript 4 presents an online study (N = 317) and targets the importance of sufficiency orientation for predicting actual greenhouse gas emissions in relation to flight behav-iour and policy support for the decarbonisation of mobility. In addition, the connection between sufficiency orientation and global identity is examined. It turns out that sufficiency orientation is superior to global identity in predicting actual emissions and decarbonisation policies. Contrary to expectations, sufficiency orientation and the form of global identity operationalised in the presented study shows a positive correlation and are compatible.
Manuscript 5 reports a reflective diary intervention (N = 252) that should lead to a short- and long-term increase in sufficiency orientation by satisfying basic psychological needs through induced self-reflection. For both groups with or without the intervention, sufficiency orientation increased slightly but significantly. Although no specific effect of the manipulation was found, basic psychological need satisfaction turns out to be the largest predictor for sufficiency orientation. Subjective well-being is positively associated with sufficiency orientation, while time affluence shows no clear associations in the study.
Overall, the results highlight the relevance of sufficiency orientation in relation to socio-ecological transformation and actual behavioural change. Sufficiency orientation is related to low-emission behaviour and support for political measures to decarbonize infrastructures. These results contribute to the discussion on the intention-behaviour gap in regard to impact-relevant behaviour, i.e. behaviour producing high emissions. The present findings suggest, that sufficiency orientation could be related to a strong intention-behavioural consistency. However, further research is needed to validate these results and improve the measurement of sufficiency orientation. Furthermore, the studies provided insights on correlates of sufficiency orientation: justice sensitivity, global identity, subjective well-being and left-wing liberal political ideologies are all found to be positively related to sufficiency orien-tation. Moreover, basic psychological need satisfaction was identified as a potential mechanism that can support the emergence of sufficiency orientation, however, causality remains unclear. From these findings, the work derives practical implications how to possibly strengthen sufficiency orientation on the micro, meso and macro levels of society.
Taken together, the dissertation provides important insights into a new and still developing concept, and shows its connectivity to psychological theories. However, future research is required in order to grasp more precisely the complexity of sufficiency orientation and to understand origins and predictors of sufficiency orientation. This work contributes to the interdisciplinary debate on socio-ecological transformation and points out that sufficiency orientation can serve to a future worth living as being related to reduced consumption.
Im Rahmen des vorliegenden Promotionsprojekts wird untersucht, welche Körperideologien in den drei unterschiedlichen Sportfeldern Hochleistungs-, Gesundheits- sowie Erlebnis- bzw. Funsport gegeben sind und welchen gesellschaftswirksamen Einfluss diese Ideologien aufweisen. Im Rahmen der zentralen Forschungsfrage wird des Weiteren erforscht, welche diskursiven Mittel bei Körperideologien im Sportbereich eingesetzt werden, welche Formationen in Bezug auf den Gegenstand, welche Äußerungsmodalitäten, Begrifflichkeiten und Strategien dem Diskurs zugrundeliegen und wer als TrägerIn oder AdressatIn des Diskurses identifiziert werden kann. Außerdem steht die Fragestellung im Fokus, welche Bezüge zu anderen Diskursen bestehen und um welche Diskurse es sich dabei handelt. Körperideologien des Sports werden in diesem Zusammenhang als Vorstellungen von einem (idealen) Körper betrachtet, welche durch den Sport übertragen und in der Gesellschaft verbreitet werden. Dabei wird zunächst der Begriff der Ideologie theoretisch hergeleitet und definiert sowie im Hinblick auf die vorliegende Arbeit als Weltdeutung mit einem Anspruch auf Alleinvertretung aufgefasst. Des Weiteren wird die Gouvernementalitätstheorie von Foucault aufgegriffen und für die Identifizierung der Macht- und Herrschaftsstrukturen in Bezug auf die untersuchten Körperideologien herangezogen. Dabei geht es darum, inwieweit die durch den Sport übermittelten Körperideologien dazu geeignet sind, in einem gouvernementalitätstheoretischen Sinne Führung zur Selbstführung zu ermöglichen. In einer sportsoziologischen Hinsicht beinhaltet der Sport leistungsbezogene Eigenschaften, welche in auf Effektivität abzielenden wirtschaftlichen Prozessen eine grundlegende Voraussetzung darstellen. Im Rahmen der Studie werden für jeden der drei genannten Sportbereiche jeweils zwei Individualsportarten ausgewählt, bei welchen die fokussierten Körperideologien untersucht werden. Während im Bereich des Hochleistungssports Schwimmen und Biathlon und im Bereich des Gesundheitssports Nordic Walking sowie Pilates betrachtet werden, stellen Stand Up Paddling und Parkour die fokussierten Sportarten im Bereich des Fun- bzw. Erlebnissports dar. Für die vorliegende Untersuchung kommt das Verfahren der kritischen Diskursanalyse (KDA) von Jäger zur Anwendung, da dieses für die Rekonstruktion von ideologischen Diskursen geeignet erscheint. Hierfür werden aus den drei Sportbereichen sowohl Print- als auch Onlinepublikationen sondiert und anhand von Strukturanalysen hinsichtlich verschiedener formaler und inhaltlicher Charakteristika untersucht. Des Weiteren wird mit Hilfe der tiefergehenden Feinanalyse jeweils ein Artikel pro Sportart explorativ analysiert, um verschiedene Muster zu vorhandenen Körperideologien in den fokussierten Sportarten und Sportbereichen identifizieren und anhand ausgewählter Textstellen belegen zu können. Bei den Ergebnissen zeigt sich, dass der Körper in den Hochleistungssportarten Schwimmen und Biathlon als formbares Material bzw. als Instrument zur Erbringung sportlicher Höchstleistungen betrachtet und dargestellt wird. Auch im Gesundheitssport wird der Körper als form- bzw. trainierbar hervorgehoben, wobei hierbei die Gesundheit im Fokus steht und mit Schlankheit gleichgesetzt wird. Im Bereich des Fun- bzw. Erlebnissports zeigt sich bei der Sportart Stand Up Paddling der Körper ebenfalls als zu bearbeitendes Objekt. Dagegen wird bei der Sportart Parkour der angenommene Normalismus von Jugendlichkeit anhand der Ergebnisse widerlegt. Deutlich wird, dass als diskursives Mittel vor allem der Körper als formbares Material erscheint. Dabei stehen in Bezug auf die Äußerungsmodalitäten und Begrifflichkeiten der Diskurse vor allem das Leistungsmaximum, aber auch Schlankheit und Fitness im Fokus. Die identifizierten Diskurse sind an die gesamte Gesellschaft adressiert und werden zudem durch sich selbst getragen, wodurch sie nicht nur die Realität abbilden, sondern auch ein Eigenleben in der Form entwickeln, dass sie als Träger von Wissen fungieren.
The scientific interest in nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) has increased in the last two decades. High prevalence and comorbidity rates, low quality of life and increased risk of suicidality highlight the importance of this research field. The present thesis focuses on intra- and interpersonal factors associated with the development and maintenance of NSSI.
The aim of study 1 was the examination of personality traits of adolescents with NSSI without Borderline Personality Disorder (NSSI-BPD), adolescents with NSSI and BPD (NSSI+BPD), clinical controls (CC) and nonclinical controls (NC). Results showed that adolescents with NSSI disorder scored significantly higher on novelty seeking and harm avoidance and lower on persistence, self-directedness, and cooperativeness than CC. In adolescents with NSSI+BPD this personality pattern was even more pronounced than in adolescents with NSSI-BPD.
Adolescents´ NSSI leads to distress that affects the whole family system, often resulting in conflicts and disrupted family communication and functioning. Parents report feelings of distress, insecurity and helplessness. Adolescents with NSSI report more parental criticism and control and less support than adolescents without NSSI. Study 2 investigated the parenting behavior in families of adolescents with NSSI. Adolescents with NSSI reported less maternal warmth and support than NC adolescents. Mothers of adolescents with NSSI showed higher psychopathology scores than NC mothers and less parental satisfaction than CC and NC mothers.
Siblings are also reported to suffer from changes in family dynamics. The aim of study 3 was to examine the sibling relationship quality of adolescents with NSSI, CC and NC. Siblings reported a wide range of negative emotional and familial consequences as a result of their sister´s NSSI. Siblings of adolescents with NSSI experienced significantly more coercion in the relationship with their sister compared to CC and NC siblings. Adolescents with NSSI reported significantly less warmth and empathy in the sibling relationship and higher rivalry scores between their siblings and themselves than NC adolescents. For both, adolescents with NSSI and their siblings, associations were found between sibling relationship quality and internalizing problems.
Study 4 aimed to further explore the family emotional climate. Therefore, the level of expressed emotion (EE) was assessed in adolescents with NSSI, CC, NC and their mothers. Parental high EE (HEE) is linked to adolescent NSSI, especially parental criticism seems to be strongly associated with NSSI. Previous research into NSSI and EE has focused on parental EE, however, the conceptualization of EE as a unidirectional construct from parent to child may present an incomplete picture. Therefore, the current study included both, adolescent and maternal EE. Adolescents in the NSSI and CC group more often met criteria for HEE than NC. Adolescents with NSSI exhibited significantly more covert criticism and critical tone toward their mothers than CC and NC. HEE of adolescents with NSSI was associated with a range of difficulties in emotion regulation. For the total sample, moderate concordance was found between adolescents and mothers EE-status.
The research presented in this thesis has important clinical implications. The differences in personality traits of adolescents with NSSI with and without BPD underline the need for a dimensional personality assessment as well as specific treatment programs for adolescents with NSSI-BPD. Problems within the family are frequent triggers for NSSI. Therefore, interventions for adolescents with NSSI should include both, the improvement of emotion regulation and family interaction and communication. Along with the reduction of negative relationship aspects, psychotherapy should also focus on the enhancement of positive relationship quality. The emotional burden of family members stresses the need for emotional and practical support for parents and siblings.
Flowering habitats to enhance biodiversity and pest control services in agricultural landscapes
(2015)
Meeting growing demands for agricultural products requires management solutions that enhance food production, whilst minimizing negative environmental impacts. Conventional agricultural intensification jeopardizes farmland biodiversity and associated ecosystem services through excessive anthropogenic inputs and landscape simplification. Agri-environment schemes (AES) are commonly implemented to mitigate the adverse effects of conventional intensification on biodiversity. However the moderate success of such schemes thus far would strongly benefit from more explicit goals regarding ecosystem service provisioning. Providing key resources to beneficial organisms may improve their abundance, fitness, diversity and the ecosystem services they provide. With targeted habitat management, AES may synergistically enhance biodiversity and agricultural production and thus contribute to ecological intensification. We demonstrate that sown perennial wildflower strips, as implemented in current AES focusing on biodiversity conservation also benefit biological pest control in nearby crops (Chapter 2).
Comparing winter wheat fields adjacent to wildflower strips with fields without wildflower strips we found strongly reduced cereal leaf beetle (Oulema sp.) density and plant damage near wildflower strips. In addition, winter wheat yield was 10 % higher when fields adjoined wildflower strips. This confirms previous assumptions that wildflower strips, known for positive effects on farmland biodiversity, can also enhance ecosystem services such as pest control and the positive correlation of yield with flower abundance and diversity suggests that floral resources are key. Refining sown flower strips for enhanced service provision requires mechanistic understanding of how organisms benefit from floral resources. In climate chamber experiments investigating the impact of single and multiple flowering plant species on fitness components of three key arthropod natural enemies of aphids, we demonstrate that different natural enemies benefit differently from the offered resources (Chapter 3).
Some flower species were hereby more valuable to natural enemies than others overall. Additionally, the mixture with all flowers generally performed better than monocultures, yet with no transgressive overyielding. By explicitly tailoring flower strips to the requirements of key natural enemies of crop pests we aimed to maximise natural enemy mediated pest control in winter wheat (Chapter 4)and potato (Chapter 5) crops.
Respecting the manifold requirements of diverse natural enemies but not pests, in terms of temporal and spatial provisioning of floral, extra floral and structural resources, we designed targeted annual flower strips that can be included in crop rotation to support key arthropods at the place and time they are needed. Indeed, field experiments revealed that cereal leaf beetle density and plant damage in winter wheat can be reduced by 40 % to 61 % and aphid densities in potatoes even by 77 %, if a targeted flower strip is sown into the field. These effects were not restricted to the vicinity of flower strips and, in contrast to fields without flower strip, often prevented action thresholds from being reached. This suggests that targeted flower strips could replace insecticides. All adult natural enemies were enhanced inside targeted flower strips when compared to control strips. Yet, spillover to the field was restricted to key natural enemies such as ground beetles (winter wheat), hoverflies (potato) and lacewings (winter wheat and potato), suggesting their dominant role in biological control. In potatoes, targeted flower strips also enhanced hoverfly species richness in strips and crop, highlighting their additional benefits for diversity.
The present results provide more insights into the mechanisms underlying conservation biological control and highlight the potential of tailored habitat management for ecological intensification.
The Microsoft Kinect is currently polular in many application areas because ofrnthe cheap price and good precission. But controlling the cursor is unapplicablerndue to jitter in the skeletton data. My approach will try to stabilisize the cursor position with common techniques from image processing. The input therefore will be the Kinect color camera. A final position will be calculated using the different positions of the tracking techniques. For controlling the cursor the right hand should be tracked. A simple click gesture will also be developed. The evaluation will show if this approach was succesfull.
Die Forschungsarbeit beschäftigt sich mit der zentralen Frage, welche Erfolgsfaktoren einen Effekt auf eine erfolgreiche Crowdfunding Kampagne haben. Als Untersuchungsfeld stehen deutsche Startup-Unternehmen im Fokus, die bereits erfolgreiche CrowdfundingKampagnen durchgeführt haben.
Zur Beantwortung dieser Frage wird zunächst eine systematische Literaturanalyse durchgeführt, durch die relevante Erfolgsfaktoren für eine Crowdfunding-Kampagne ermittelt werden. Diese Faktoren werden anschließend einem Mixed-Method-Ansatz unterzogen, bei dem qualitative Ergebnisse, basierend auf einer Fallstudienforschung, mit den statistisch ausgewerteten quantitativen Ergebnissen aus der Fragebogenforschung verglichen und überprüft werden. Dabei liegt der Fokus insbesondere auf der Identifikation von signifikanten Wirkungszusammenhängen zwischen den Erfolgsfaktoren und einer erfolgreichen Crowdfunding-Kampagne.
Im Ergebnis konnten diesbezüglich Wirkungszusammenhänge innerhalb dieser Thesis nachgewiesen werden. Sechs der festgestellten Zusammenhänge aus der qualitativen Analyse werden durch die quantitative Analyse bestätigt. Es konnte jedoch keine Signifikanz der Korrelationen festgestellt werden. Auch die Hypothese, dass sich die Erfolgsaussichten einer Kampagne durch eine höhere Anzahl jeweils kombinierter Erfolgsfaktoren erhöhen, wurde sowohl in der qualitativen als auch in der quantitativen Betrachtung widerlegt. Demnach galt es für den Autor der vorliegenden Thesis künftige Forschungsfelder zu definieren, die die ermittelten Ergebnisse erweitern und konkretisieren. Es bleibt beispielsweise einer weiterführenden Forschung überlassen, zu klären, ob bestimmte Kombinationen der Erfolgsfaktoren zu signifikanten Wirkungszusammenhängen führen. Darüber hinaus bietet sich eine weiterführende statistische Regressionsanalyse an, um die kausalen Effekte zu untersuchen und Prognosen für erfolgreiche Crowdfunding-Kampagnen zu formulieren.
Student misbehavior and its treatment is a major challenge for teachers and a threat to their well-being. Indeed, teachers are obliged to punish student misbehavior on a regular basis. Additionally, teachers’ punishment decisions are among the most frequently reported situations when it comes to students’ experiences of injustice in school. By implication, it is crucial to understand teachers’ treatment of student misbehavior vis-à-vis students’ perceptions. One key dimension of punishment behavior reflects its underlying motivation and goals. People generally intend to achieve three goals when punishing misbehavior, namely, retribution (i.e., evening out the harm caused), special prevention (i.e., preventing recidivism of the offender), and general prevention (i.e., preventing imitation of others). Importantly, people’s support of these punishment goals is subject to hierarchy and power, implying that teachers’ and students’ punishment goal preferences differ. In this dissertation, I present three research projects that shed first light on teachers’ punishment and its goals along with the students’ perception of classroom intervention strategies pursuing these goals. More specifically, I first examined students’ (i.e., children’s) general support of each of the three punishment goals sketched above. Furthermore, I applied an attributional approach to understand and study the goals teachers intend to achieve when punishing student misbehavior. Finally, I investigated teachers’ and students’ support of the punishment goals regarding the same student misbehavior to directly compare their views on these goals and reactions pursuing them. In sum, the findings show that students generally prefer retribution and special prevention to general prevention, whereas teachers prefer general prevention and special prevention to retribution. This ultimately translates into a "mismatch" of teachers and students in their preferences for specific punishment goals, and the findings suggest that this may indeed enhance students’ perception of injustice. Overall, the results of the present research program may be valuable for the development of classroom intervention strategies that may reduce rather than enhance conflicts in student-teacher-interactions.
The European landscape is dominated by intensive agriculture which leads to widespread impact on the environment. The frequent use of agricultural pesticides is one of the major causes of an ongoing decline in flower-visiting insects (FVIs). The conservation of this ecologically diverse assemblage of mobile, flying insect species is required by international and European policy. To counteract the decrease in species numbers and their abundances, FVIs need to be protected from anthropogenic stressors. European pesticide risk assessment was devised to prevent unacceptable adverse consequences of pesticide use on FVIs. However, there is an ongoing discussion by scientists and policy-makers if the current risk assessment actually provides adequate protection for FVI species.
The first main objective of this thesis was to investigate pesticide impact on FVI species. The scientific literature was reviewed to identify groups of FVIs, summarize their ecology, and determine their habitat. This was followed by a synthesis of studies about the exposure of FVIs in their habitat and subsequent effects. In addition, the acute sensitivity of one FVI group, bee species, to pesticides was studied in laboratory experiments.
The second main objective was to evaluate the European risk assessment for possible deficits and propose improvements to the current framework. Regulatory documents were screened to assess the adequacy of the guidance in place in light of the scientific evidence. The suitability of the honey bee Apis mellifera as the currently only regulatory surrogate species for FVIs was discussed in detail.
The available scientific data show that there are far more groups of FVIs than the usually mentioned bees and butterflies. FVIs include many groups of ecologically different species that live in the entire agricultural landscape. Their habitats in crops and adjacent semi-natural areas can be contaminated by pesticides through multiple pathways. Environmentally realistic exposure of these habitats can lead to severe effects on FVI population parameters. The laboratory studies of acute sensitivity in bee species showed that pesticide effects on FVIs can vary greatly between species and pesticides.
The follow-up critical evaluation of the European FVI risk assessment revealed major shortcomings in exposure and effect assessment. The honey bee proved to be a sufficient surrogate for bee species in lower tier risk assessment. Additional test species may be chosen for higher tier risk assessment to account for ecological differences. This thesis shows that the ecology of FVIs should generally be considered to a greater extent to improve the regulatory process. Data-driven computational approaches could be used as alternative methods to incorporate ecological trait data in spatio-temporal scenarios. Many open questions need to be answered by further research to better understand FVI species and promote necessary changes to risk assessment. In general, other FVI groups than bees need to be investigated. Furthermore, comprehensive data on FVI groups and their ecology need to be collected. Contamination of FVI habitat needs to be linked to exposure of FVI individuals and ecologically complex effects on FVI populations should receive increased attention. In the long term, European FVI risk assessment would benefit from shifting its general principles towards more scientifically informed regulatory decisions. This would require a paradigm shift from arbitrary assumptions and unnecessarily complicated schemes to a substantiated holistic framework.
Smart Building Solutions - Generischer Ansatz für die Identifikation von Raumsteuerungsfunktionen
(2018)
40 percent of current housing and real estate companies plan to integrate intelligent control systems into their properties during new construction and modernization. At the same time, Internet companies are pushing their devices into homes and apartments, promising intelligent services for their users. The term "Smart Home" is used for both types of new technologies. The first group of systems has its origins in the field of "Building Automation", the second group developed from the concept of the "Internet of Things".
In order to discover what the differences are and what common foundations exist, both the areas of Building Automation and Internet of Things are analyzed and compared.
The central contribution of this thesis is the realization that both domains are based on similar concepts and an integration is possible, without compromising the integrity of the systems themselves. In addition, the work provides an approach to designing Building Automation Systems with the integration of the Internet of Things.
Despite the inception of new technologies at a breakneck pace, many analytics projects fail mainly due to the use of incompatible development methodologies. As big data analytics projects are different from software development projects, the methodologies used in software development projects could not be applied in the same fashion to analytics projects. The traditional agile project management approaches to the projects do not consider the complexities involved in the analytics. In this thesis, the challenges involved in generalizing the application of agile methodologies will be evaluated, and some suitable agile frameworks which are more compatible with the analytics project will be explored and recommended. The standard practices and approaches which are currently applied in the industry for analytics projects will be discussed concerning enablers and success factors for agile adaption. In the end, after the comprehensive discussion and analysis of the problem and complexities, a framework will be recommended that copes best with the discussed challenges and complexities and is generally well suited for the most data-intensive analytics projects.
Zahlreiche Untersuchungen weisen darauf hin, dass die Kombination von Texten und Bildern beim Wissenserwerb zu besseren Lern- und Behaltensleistungen führt, als wenn nur mit Texten gearbeitet wird. Dieser Multimediaeffekt ist häufig auch dann zu beobachten, wenn beispielsweise Schüler oder Studierende Bild und Text sequenziert lernen. Einige Arbeiten haben dabei gezeigt, dass die Reihenfolge, in der die beiden Formate verarbeitet werden, großen Einfluss auf den Wissenserwerb hat. Erfolgt die Präsentation des Bildes vor dem Text, gelingt es den Lernenden in der Regel mehr Fakten zu erinnern. Das Phänomen des picture-text-sequencing-Effekts wurde von zwei Forschern aufgegriffen und anhand alternativer Theoriemodelle auf unterschiedliche Weise erklärt. Während einer der Autoren kapazitätsspezifische Merkmale der mentalen Repräsentation des Bildes als Ursache ansieht, macht der andere Autor Interferenzen für den Einfluss der Verarbeitungsreihenfolge verantwortlich. Das Ziel der Arbeit war es daher, zu untersuchen, welcher der beiden Ansätze der Wahrheit am ehesten entspricht. Zu diesem Zweck wurde eine Studie durchgeführt, bei der Verarbeitungsreihenfolge und Informationverhältnis beim Lernen mit multiplen Repräsentationen experimentell variierte. Das Stimulusmaterial bestand aus Texten und Bildern zur Geodynamik, die in einer komplementären und einer kongruenten Version vorlagen. Anders als erwartet, zeigte sich jedoch kein eindeutiges Ergebnis, obwohl die Analyse der Lernzeiten letztlich gegen die Annahme eines besonderen Kapäzitätsvorteils sprach. Eine Anschlussuntersuchung erbrachte die Möglichkeit, Personen, die Texte und Bilder erhalten hatten, mit Teilnehmern zu vergleichen, die nur auf ein Format zurückgreifen konnten. Die Auswertungen ergab Unterschiede hinsichtlich der mentalen Belastung bei äquivalenten Leistungen im Wissenstest. Interpretiert wurden diese Resultate als Hinweis für das Auftreten von Interferenzen, die immer dann entstanden, wenn die Versuchspersonen das Bild nach dem Text lernten. In diesem Zusammenhang hatte die dritte und letzte Untersuchung den Zweck, weitere Belege für die Interferenzannahme zu finden. Anhand von Blickbewegungsparametern, die während des sequenzierten Lernens mit den Texten und Bildern erhoben worden waren, konnten jedoch keine Unterschiede festgestellt werden. Insgesamt ließ sich die Schlussfolgerung ziehen, dass hinsichtlich des sequenzierten Lernens mit Texten und Bildern weiterhin ein großer Spielraum für zusätzliche Forschungsarbeiten besteht.
Since the invention of U-net architecture in 2015, convolutional networks based on its encoder-decoder approach significantly improved results in image analysis challenges. It has been proven that such architectures can also be successfully applied in different domains by winning numerous championships in recent years. Also, the transfer learning technique created an opportunity to push state-of-the-art benchmarks to a higher level. Using this approach is beneficial for the medical domain, as collecting datasets is generally a difficult and expensive process.
In this thesis, we address the task of semantic segmentation with Deep Learning and make three main contributions and release experimental results that have practical value for medical imaging.
First, we evaluate the performance of four neural network architectures on the dataset of the cervical spine MRI scans. Second, we use transfer learning from models trained on the Imagenet dataset and compare it to randomly initialized networks. Third, we evaluate models trained on the bias field corrected and raw MRI data. All code to reproduce results is publicly available online.
This study was conducted in Nyungwe National Park (NNP); a biodiversity hotspot Mountain rainforest of high conservation importance in Central Africa, but with little knowledge of its insect communities including butterflies, good indicators of climate change, and forest ecosystem health. The study aimed at availing baseline data on butterfly species diversity and distribution in NNP, for future use in monitoring climate change-driven shifts and the effects of forest fragmentation on the biodiversity of Nyungwe. Butterflies were collected seasonally using fruit-baited traps and hand nets along elevational transects spanning from 1700 m up to 2950 m of altitude. Two hundred forty-two species including 28 endemics to the Albertine Rift and 18 potential local climate change indicators were documented. Species richness and abundance declined with increasing elevation and higher seasonal occurrence was observed during the dry season. This was the first study on the spatial and temporal distribution of butterflies in NNP and further studies could be conducted to add more species and allow a depth understanding of the ecology of Nyungwe butterflies.
Opinion Mining : Using Twitter as a source of opinion for the prediction of stock market prices
(2012)
Neben den theoretischen Grundkonzepten der automatisierten Fließtextanalyse, die das Fundament dieser Arbeit bilden, soll ein Überblick in den derzeitigen Forschungsstand bei der Analyse von Twitter-Nachrichten gegeben werden. Hierzu werden verschiedene Forschungsergebnisse der, derzeit verfügbaren wissenschaftlichen Literatur erläutert, miteinander verglichen und kritisch hinterfragt. Deren Ergebnisse und Vorgehensweisen sollen in unsere eigene Forschung mit eingehen, soweit sie sinnvoll erscheinen. Ziel ist es hierbei, den derzeitigen Forschungsstand möglichst gut zu nutzen.
Ein weiteres Ziel ist es, dem Leser einen Überblick über verschiedene maschinelle Datenanalysemethoden zur Erkennung von Meinungen zu geben. Dies ist notwendig, um die Bedeutung der im späteren Verlauf der Arbeit eingesetzten Analysemethoden in ihrem wissenschaftlichen Kontext besser verstehen zu können. Da diese Methoden auf verschiedene Arten durchgeführt werden können, werden verschiedene Analysemethoden vorgestellt und miteinander verglichen. Hierdurch soll die Machbarkeit der folgenden Meinungsauswertung bewiesen werden. Um eine hinreichende Genauigkeit bei der folgenden Untersuchung zu gewährleisten, wird auf ein bereits bestehendes und evaluiertes Framework zurückgegriffen. Dieses ist als API 1 verfügbar und wird daher zusätzlich behandelt. Der Kern Inhalt dieser Arbeit wird sich der Analyse von Twitternachrichten mit den Methoden des Opinion Mining widmen.
Es soll untersucht werden, ob sich Korrelationen zwischen der Meinungsausprägung von Twitternachrichten und dem Börsenkurs eines Unternehmens finden lassen. Es soll dabei die Stimmungslage der Firma Google Inc. über einen Zeitraum von einem Monat untersucht und die dadurch gefunden Erkenntnisse mit dem Börsenkurs des Unternehmens verglichen werden. Ziel ist es, die Erkenntnisse von (Sprenger & Welpe, 2010) und (Taytal & Komaragiri, 2009) auf diesem Gebiet zu überprüfen und weitere Fragestellungen zu beantworten.
While the existing literature on cooperative R&D projects between firms and public research institutes (PRI) has made valuable contributions by examining various factors and their influence on different outcome measures, there has been no investigation of cooperative R&D project success between firms and PRI from a product competitive advantage perspective. However, insights into the development of a meaningful and superior product (i.e., product competitive advantage) are particularly important in the context of cooperative R&D projects between PRI and (mainly small and medium-sized) firms in the biotechnology industry in response to increasing competition to raise capital funds necessary for survival.
The objectives of this thesis are: (1) to elaborate the theoretical foundations which explain the achievement of a product competitive advantage in cooperative R&D projects between biotechnology firms and PRI, (2) to identify and empirically evaluate the determining factors for achieving a product competitive advantage in cooperative R&D projects between biotechnology firms and PRI, and (3) to show how cooperative R&D projects between biotechnology firms and PRI should be designed and executed to support the achievement of a product competitive advantage.
To accomplish these objectives, a model of determinants of product competitive advantage in cooperative R&D projects between biotechnology firms and PRI is developed by drawing from the theoretical foundations of resource-based theory and information-processing theory. The model is evaluated using data from 517 questionnaires on cooperative R&D projects between at least one biotechnology firm and one PRI. The data are analyzed using variance-based structural equation modeling (i.e., PLS-SEM) in order to conduct hypotheses testing. The evaluation of the empirical data includes an additional mediation analysis and the comparison of effects in subsamples.
The results demonstrate the importance of available resources and skills, as well as the proficient execution of marketing-related and technical activities for the achievement of a product competitive advantage in cooperative R&D projects between biotechnology firms and PRI. By identifying project-related and process-related factors affecting product competitive advantage and empirically testing their relationships, the research findings should be valuable for both researchers and practitioners. After discussing contributions and implications for research and practice, the present thesis concludes with limitations and avenues for future research.
The term “Software Chrestomaty” is defined as a collection of software systems meant to be useful in learning about or gaining insight into software languages, software technologies, software concepts, programming, and software engineering. 101companies software chrestomathy is a community project with the attributes of a Research 2.0 infrastructure for various stakeholders in software languages and technology communities. The core of 101companies combines a semantic wiki and confederated open source repositories. We designed and developed an integrated ontology-based knowledge base about software languages and technologies. The knowledge is created by the community of contributors and supported with a running example and structured documentation. The complete ecosystem is exposed by using Linked Data principles and equipped with the additional metadata about individual artifacts. Within the context of software chrestomathy we explored a new type of software architecture – linguistic architecture that is targeted on the language and technology relationships within a software product and based on the megamodels. Our approach to documentation of the software systems is highly structured and makes use of the concepts of the newly developed megamodeling language MegaL. We “connect” an emerging ontology with the megamodeling artifacts to raise the cognitive value of the linguistic architecture.
The content aggregator platform Reddit has established itself as one of the most popular websites in the world. However, scientific research on Reddit is hindered as Reddit allows (and even encourages) user anonymity, i.e., user profiles do not contain personal information such as the gender. Inferring the gender of users in large-scale could enable the analysis of gender-specific areas of interest, reactions to events, and behavioral patterns. In this direction, this thesis suggests a machine learning approach of estimating the gender of Reddit users. By exploiting specific conventions in parts of the website, we obtain a ground truth for more than 190 million comments of labeled users. This data is then used to train machine learning classifiers to use them to gain insights about the gender balance of particular subreddits and the platform in general. By comparing a variety of different approaches for classification algorithm, we find that character-level convolutional neural network achieves performance with an 82.3% F1 score on a task of predicting a gender of a user based on his/her comments. The score surpasses 85% mark for frequent users with more than 50 comments. Furthermore, we discover that female users are less active on Reddit platform, they write fewer comments and post in fewer subreddits on average, when compared to male users.
La tesis doctoral examina los tres manuscritos conocidos hasta hoy de la Explicación de la Guitarra, primer método para guitarra de seis órdenes conocido hasta escrito por Juan Antonio de Vargas y Guzmán. Fue escrito primeramente cuando Vargas y Guzmán era vecino de la ciudad de Cádiz, en 1773; y copiado en dos ocasiones cuando el autor era maestro de este instrumento en la Ciudad de Veracruz, en 1776. Después de 200 años, específicamente en 1974, se dio la primera referencia de un manuscrito de este método, fechado en Veracruz en 1776, que se resguardaba en la Biblioteca Newberry de Chicago. Años más tarde, ya en 1980, la doctora María Fernanda García de los Arcos encontró en el Archivo General de la Nación (AGN) la segunda copia manuscrita, con la misma información de lugar y fecha que la anterior, pero que contenía una diferencia sustancial con el primero: 13 Sonatas para guitarra y bajo continuo. El tercero de ellos, fechado en Cádiz en 1773, fue adquirido por el investigador Ángel Medina Álvarez en una librería anticuaria a fines de los años 70; pero no fue sino hasta 1989, que decidió dar noticias de él y publicarlo posteriormente. A su vez, este manuscrito contiene una diferencia sustancial: un Tratado de Rasgueado. Además de esas diferencias sustanciales, la Explicación de la Guitarra, en su conjunto contiene, un Tratado de Punteado y un Tratado de Bajo continuo para guitarra.
El estudio establece la relación entre cada uno de los manuscritos; define sus contenidos y analiza los principios y fundamentos que sustentan las innovaciones de ellos sobre los ya conocidos por el autor; establece la relación entre los contenidos teóricos y prácticos; compara su evolución; los sitúa en un contexto histórico; establece su relación con otros métodos de la misma índole, así como con métodos de características similares; compila sus fuentes y determina la influencia que tuvieron éstas sobre la Explicación de la Guitarra y ésta sobre aquellas; y determina su importancia histórica y teórica en la música para este instrumento.
Autonomous systems such as robots already are part of our daily life. In contrast to these machines, humans an react appropriately to their counterparts. People can hear and interpret human speech, and interpret facial expressions of other people.
This thesis presents a system for automatic facial expression recognition with emotion mapping. The system is image-based and employs feature-based feature extraction. This thesis analyzes the common steps of an emotion recognition system and presents state-of-the-art methods. The approach presented is based on 2D features. These features are detected in the face. No neutral face is needed as reference. The system extracts two types of facial parameters. The first type consists of distances between the feature points. The second type comprises angles between lines connecting the feature points. Both types of parameters are implemented and tested. The parameters which provide the best results for expression recognition are used to compare the system with state-of-the-art approaches. A multiclass Support Vector Machine classifies the parameters.
The results are codes of Action Units of the Facial Action Coding System. These codes are mapped to a facial emotion. This thesis addresses the six basic emotions (happy, surprised, sad, fearful, angry, and disgusted) plus the neutral facial expression. The system presented is implemented in C++ and is provided with an interface to the Robot Operating System (ROS).
The thesis "E-Partizipation Virtual Ressourcen Portal" describes the conception and implementation of the Virtual Resource Centre (VRC), an international resource and knowledge portal for multidisciplinary research and application areas in the domain of eParticipation. The need for such a portal was developed in the context of the European DEMO_net project, the eParticipation network of excellence. The aim of this portal is to improve the spreading of the actual knowledge of the connected researchers and practitioner in the domain of eParticipation. For this, the collaboration and discussion with each other in different distributed projects will be improved and the results of the works will be published and saved. A well structured and an easy to handle portal is necessary therefore, as many connected institutions are not familiar with technological businesses. Further aims of the VRC are avoiding redundant developments to report excellent research facilities for the different subjects and to dynamically list the running projects in selectable categories. The technical base for the portal is a web content management system (WCMS), provided with many increments. To detect a suitable WCMS, the systems Plone, TYPO3 and Xoops are compared by a value benefit analyses. The special requirements for the VCR are fulfilled by the development and integration of increments, which include and provide the administration of publications, the overview of projects and research areas, etc. using an actual Web 2.0 functionality. This thesis is based on two different research methods, where the basic method design research is. Design research describes a compendium of how a portal can be modeled and realized in five phases. Another used method is the hypertext design model, which is used to build a model of the VRC. In the description of the implementation the changes in the WCMS, the user administration and the access control are explained as a guideline. In the conclusion of the thesis, an overview over the challenges and a recommendation for further developments and potential work is shown.
This thesis evaluates automated techniques to remove objects from an image and proposed several modifications for the specific application of removing a colour checker from structure dominated images. The selection of approaches covers the main research field of image inpainting as well as an approach used in medical image processing. Their results are investigated to disclose their applicability to removing objects from structure-intense images. The advantages and disadvantages discovered in the process are then used to propose several modifications for an adapted inpainting approach suitable for removing the colour checker.
Im Rahmen dieser Diplomarbeit wird eine Datenbank-Persistenzlösung für die TGraphenbibliothek JGraLab entwickelt. Diese erlaubt das Persistieren von TGraphen in Datenbanken ausgewählter Technologien und sorgt gleichzeitig dafür, dass die Datenbankpersistenz eines TGraphen für den Benutzer transparent bleibt. Nach der Anforderungserhebung und der Recherche zur Bewertung der Tauglichkeit von bereits bestehenden Werkzeugen für dieses Projekt, wird die Anwendungsdomäne erläutert. Anschließend wird dargelegt wie die Persistierung von TGraphen mit allen ihren Eigenschaften in Datenbanken ermöglicht werden kann. Dem schließt sich der konzeptuelle Entwurf an, in dem die Details der Lösung beschrieben werden. Als nächstes wird der objektorientierte Feinentwurf zur Integration der Lösung in die TGraphenbibliothek JGraLab entwickelt, der die Grundlage der programmatischen Umsetzung bildet. Eine Anleitung zur Verwendung der Lösung und eine Bewertung des Laufzeitverhaltens der umgesetzten Implementation schließen die Arbeit ab.
Die normative Selbstorganisation von sozialen Online-Systemen am Beispiel der Enzyklopädie Wikipedia
(2010)
Als Teil des Projektes "EMergence In the Loop: simulating the two way dynamics of norm innovation" geht die vorliegende Arbeit der Frage nach, welche Mechanismen die systematische Selbst-Organisation auf Diskussionsseiten der Online-Enzyklopädie Wi-kipedia beeinflussen. Sie setzt dabei an der Studie "Explaining Normative Behavior in Wikipedia" von Chris GOLDSPINK an. Untersuchungsgegenstand dieser Arbeit sind zwei Diskussionsthemen ebenso aus der freien Online-Enzyklopädie Wikipedia, die im Vergleich zu dem Untersuchungsmaterial GOLDSPINKS jedoch nach modifizierten Merkmalen ausgewählt wurden. Die Untersuchung der Diskussionsthemen erfolgt mittels computergestützter qualitativer und quantitativer Datenanalyse unter Nutzung der von GOLDSPINK erweiterten Verbal-Response-Mode. Als zentrales Resultat der vorliegenden Studie des Verfassers lässt sich festhalten, dass die mit dieser Untersuchung gewonnen Erkenntnisse die Ergebnisse der Studie GOLDSPINK grundsätzlich untermauern. Darüber hinaus bietet diese Studie aber auch drei neue Anhaltspunkte für weitere Analysen: Erstens ist hervorzuheben, dass die Reaktionsart von Benutzern auf negativen Kommunikationsstil in kontrovers geführten Diskussionen überwiegend negativ ist. Zweitens ist eine signifikante Häufigkeit von Gegennormzitierung (Antinormzitierung) als Reaktion auf eine Normzitierung erkennbar. Drittens sei auf das Phänomen verwiesen, dass ein Akteur als eine Art Diskussionsführer hervortritt.
Eine systematische Literaturstudie zu beaconless Algorithmen für drahtlose Ad-hoc- und Sensornetze
(2014)
Wireless sensor networks (WSN) are computer networks consisting of sensor nodes.In position-based protocols nodes broadcast messages containing their position information periodically. These messages are called beacons. The use of beacons however has downsides, which led to the emerging of beaconless algorithms. Despite their importance in the research area of computer networks and to the best of our knowledge, beaconless algorithms have not been systematically surveyed.
The aim of this work is a comprehensive, systematic review of beaconless algorithms since the turn of the millennium. Relevant articles are categorized based on their similarities and their differences are compared. Thus, this work serves as a reference to the current state of research of beaconless algorithms and as a basis for finding research gaps.
Für die Netzwerkprogrammierung hat sich auf breiter Front das Socket API nach Vorbild der Berkley Sockets durchgesetzt. Die "normalen" Sockets in Form von Stream- oder Datagram-Sockets erleichtern zwar die Programmierarbeit, verschleiern jedoch auch zahlreiche Details der Netzwerkkommunikation vor dem Programmierer. So ist man beispielsweise auf die Nutzung der Protokolle TCP oder UDP eingeschränkt und agiert zwangsläufig bereits auf dem Application-Layer des TCP/IP Referenzmodells. Für den Zugriff auf tiefer gelegene Netzwerkschichten, d.h. für den Zugriff auf die Headerdaten eines Netzwerkpaketes, hält das Socket API die sogenannten RAW Sockets bereit. Mit ihnen ist es möglich, alle IP Pakete inklusive Headerdaten zu lesen oder von Grund auf neu zu generieren. Hiermit ist es nun auch möglich, Protokolle zu verwenden, die dem Anwendungsprogrammierer bislang nicht zugänglich waren (z.B. ICMP oder OSPF) oder sogar eigene IP basierte Protokolle zu entwickeln. RAW Sockets stoßen an ihre Grenzen, wenn es darum geht auf den Data-Link-Layer der Netzwerkkommunikation zuzugreifen. Unter Linux gibt es hierfür einen weiteren Socket-Typ: Den PACKET Socket. Die Studienarbeit möchte einen Einstieg in die Programmierung mit den eher unbekannten RAW und PACKET Sockets schaffen. Dabei werden einige Beispielprogramme vorgestellt und mögliche Anwendungsgebiete aufgezeigt.
In this bachelor thesis, the question of whether or not a jump'n run game with sensor control for android devices is useful, is handled. To this end, a game was developed, which is once controlled with and without sensors at different levels. In a second version, the game is completely controlled by means of sensors, so that the controls can later be compared. It is explained how the game was planned, designed and investigated. In addition, it is checked whether games with sensor control already exist. The engine, which was used to developed the game, is also introduced. Finally, the evaluation is carried out for an elaborated user test on the playability of the game in terms of control.
World’s ecosystems are under great pressure satisfying anthropogenic demands, with freshwaters being of central importance. The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment has identified anthropogenic land use and associated stressors as main drivers in jeopardizing stream ecosystem functions and the
biodiversity supported by freshwaters. Adverse effects on the biodiversity of freshwater organisms, such as macroinvertebrates, may propagate to fundamental ecosystem functions, such as organic matter breakdown (OMB) with potentially severe consequences for ecosystem services. In order to adequately protect and preserve freshwater ecosystems, investigations regarding potential and observed as well as direct and indirect effects of anthropogenic land use and associated stressors (e.g. nutrients, pesticides or heavy metals) on ecosystem functioning and stream biodiversity are needed. While greater species diversity most likely benefits ecosystem functions, the direction and magnitude of changes in ecosystem functioning depends primarily on species functional traits. In this context, the functional diversity of stream organisms has been suggested to be a more suitable predictor of changes in ecosystem functions than taxonomic diversity.
The thesis aims at investigating effects of anthropogenic land use on (i) three ecosystem functions by anthropogenic toxicants to identify effect thresholds (chapter 2), (ii) the organic matter breakdown by three land use categories to identify effects on the functional level (chapter 3) and (iii)on the stream community along an established land-use gradient to identify effects on the community level.
In chapter 2, I reviewed the literature regarding pesticide and heavy metal effects on OMB, primary production and community respiration. From each reviewed study that met inclusion criteria, the toxicant concentration resulting in a reduction of at least 20% in an ecosystem function was standardized based on laboratory toxicity data. Effect thresholds were based on the relationship between ecosystem functions and standardized concentration-effect relationships. The analysis revealed that more than one third of pesticide observations indicated reductions in ecosystem functions at concentrations that are assumed being protective in regulation. However, high variation within and between studies hampered the derivation of a concentration-effect relationship and thus effect thresholds.
In chapter 3, I conducted a field study to determine the microbial and invertebrate-mediated OMB by deploying fine and coarse mesh leaf bags in streams with forested, agricultural, vinicultural
and urban riparian land use. Additionally, physicochemical, geographical and habitat parameters were monitored to explain potential differences in OMB among land use types and sites. Regarding results, only microbial OMB differed between land use types. The microbial OMB showed a negative relationship with pH while the invertebrate-mediated OMB was positively related to tree cover. OMB responded to stressor gradients rather than directly to land use.
In chapter 4, macroinvertebrates were sampled in concert with leaf bag deployment and after species identification (i) the taxonomic diversity in terms of Simpson diversity and total taxonomic
richness (TTR) and (ii) the functional diversity in terms of bio-ecological traits and Rao’s quadratic entropy was determined for each community. Additionally, a land-use gradient was established and the response of the taxonomic and functional diversity of invertebrate communities along this gradient was investigated to examine whether these two metrics of biodiversity are predictive for the rate of OMB. Neither bio-ecological traits nor the functional diversity showed a significant relationship with
OMB. Although, TTR decreased with increasing anthropogenic stress and also the community structure and 26 % of bio-ecological traits were significantly related to the stress gradient, any of these shifts propagated to OMB.
Our results show that the complexity of real-world situations in freshwater ecosystems impedes the effect assessment of chemicals and land use for functional endpoints, and consequently our potential to predict changes. We conclude that current safety factors used in chemical risk assessment may not be sufficient for pesticides to protect functional endpoints. Furthermore, simplifying real-world stressor gradients into few land use categories was unsuitable to predict and quantify losses in OMB. Thus, the monitoring of specific stressors may be more relevant than crude land use categories to detect effects on ecosystem functions. This may, however, limit the large scale assessment of the status of OMB. Finally, despite several functional changes in the communities the functional diversity over several trait modalities remained similar. Neither taxonomic nor functional diversity were suitable predictors of OMB. Thus, when understanding anthropogenic impacts on the linkage between biodiversity and ecosystem functioning is of main interest, focusing on diversity metrics that are clearly linked to the stressor in question (Jackson et al. 2016) or integrating taxonomic and functional metrics (Mondy et al., 2012) might enhance our predictive capacity.
Implementierung eines Subsurface Scattering Shader Plugins für die Augenblick Raytracing Engine
(2009)
In dieser Ausarbeitung werden drei Beleuchtungsverfahren und mögliche Implementierungen zur Realisierung eines Subsurface Scattering Shaders vorgestellt und diskutiert. Subsurface Scattering bezeichnet allgemein den Lichttransport in die Oberfläche von Objekten hinein und durch sie hindurch. Die korrekte Darstellung dieses Phänomens ist sehr komplex und ist nicht mittels einer einfachen BRDF und gängiger Beleuchtungsverfahren darstellbar. Die drei Verfahren sind: Physikalisch korrektes Subsurface Scattering durch das Monte Carlo Pathtracing, vereinfachtes Subsurface Scattering durch Nutzung eines Licht-Lots, stark vereinfachtes Subsurface Scattering durch ein normalenabhängiges Aufhellen der Kanten. Durch die Nutzung des Monte Carlo Pathtracers können zudem Beleuchtungseffekte wie das sogennante Colorbleeding, dass heißt Lichttransport von einer farbigen Fläche auf eine andere mittels indirekter Beleuchtung, ermöglicht werden. Jedes Verfahren beinhaltet eine andere Kombination der bekanntlich gegenläufigen Eigenschaften Performanz und Korrektheit, je nachdem in welchem Rahmen und Aufgabenbereich Subsurface Scattering benötigt wird.Am Schluss der Arbeit werden Ergebnisse präsentiert, diskutiert und ein Ausblick auf weiterführende Arbeiten gegeben. Alle drei Verfahren wurden als Plugin für den Raytracer Augenblick von Oliver Abert realisiert.
Das Lernen und Verstehen dynamischer Sachverhalte kann sowohl anhand von statischen Bildern als auch von Animationen erfolgen. Da die bisher vorliegenden Befunde keine eindeutige Überlegenheit der einen oder der anderen Repräsentationsform erkennen lassen, sind differenziertere Wirkungsanalysen erforderlich. Grundannahme der vorliegenden Dissertation war, dass beide Darstellungsformen unterschiedlich gut für den Aufbau dynamischer mentaler Modelle einerseits und den Aufbau dynamischer perzeptueller Repräsentationen andererseits geeignet sind. Es wurde erstens angenommen, dass dynamische mentale Modelle keine kontinuierlichen mentalen Simulationen ermöglichen, sondern aus einer Sequenz von diskreten prototypischen Prozess-Zuständen (sog. "key states") bestehen und deshalb besser anhand statischer Bilder dieser "key states" als anhand einer Animation konstruiert werden können. Zweitens wurde angenommen, dass perzeptuelle Repräsentationen dynamischer Sachverhalte aus dynamischen Schemata bestehen, die besser anhand einer Animation als anhand von statischen Bildern gebildet werden können. Als Indikator für die Qualität mentaler Modelle wurden Inferenzaufgaben verwendet, bei denen durch Manipulation dieser Modelle neue Informationen zu erschließen sind. Als Indikator für die Qualität dynamischer perzeptueller Repräsentationen wurden Leistungen bei der Kategorisierung von Bewegungsabläufen verwendet. Die erste Annahme wurde am Beispiel der synaptischen Informationsübertragung (nach einer Vorpilot- und Pilotstudie) in einer ersten Hauptstudie mit 61 Probanden überprüft.
Die Ergebnisse weisen darauf hin, dass die Hypothese eher bei Probanden mit höherem Vorwissen als bei solchen mit niedrigerem Vorwissen zutrifft. Die zweite Annahme wurde am Beispiel des Erkennens der Gangart von Pferden (nach einer Pilotstudie) in einer zweiten Hauptstudie mit 52 Probanden überprüft. Die Ergebnisse zeigten durchwegs Unterschiede in der erwarteten Richtung, die jedoch nicht oder nur marginal signifikant sind. Allerdings führten die Animationen zu einer hochsignifikant geringeren kognitiven Belastung als statische Bilder. Darüber hinaus zeigten sich signifikante Interaktionen mit den räumlichen Fähigkeiten: Probanden mit geringeren Fähigkeiten profitieren bei der Kategorisierung von Bewegungsabläufen bedeutsam mehr von Animationen als von statischen Bildern.
Traditional Driver Assistance Systems (DAS) like for example Lane Departure Warning Systems or the well-known Electronic Stability Program have in common that their system and software architecture is static. This means that neither the number and topology of Electronic Control Units (ECUs) nor the presence and functionality of software modules changes after the vehicles leave the factory.
However, some future DAS do face changes at runtime. This is true for example for truck and trailer DAS as their hardware components and software entities are spread over both parts of the combination. These new requirements cannot be faced by state-of-the-art approaches of automotive software systems. Instead, a different technique of designing such Distributed Driver Assistance Systems (DDAS) needs to be developed. The main contribution of this thesis is the development of a novel software and system architecture for dynamically changing DAS using the example of driving assistance for truck and trailer. This architecture has to be able to autonomously detect and handle changes within the topology. In order to do so, the system decides which degree of assistance and which types of HMI can be offered every time a trailer is connected or disconnected. Therefore an analysis of the available software and hardware components as well as a determination of possible assistance functionality and a re-configuration of the system take place. Such adaptation can be granted by the principles of Service-oriented Architecture (SOA). In this architectural style all functionality is encapsulated in self-contained units, so-called Services. These Services offer the functionality through well-defined interfaces whose behavior is described in contracts. Using these Services, large-scale applications can be built and adapted at runtime. This thesis describes the research conducted in achieving the goals described by introducing Service-oriented Architectures into the automotive domain. SOA deals with the high degree of distribution, the demand for re-usability and the heterogeneity of the needed components.
It also applies automatic re-configuration in the event of a system change. Instead of adapting one of the frameworks available to this scenario, the main principles of Service-orientation are picked up and tailored. This leads to the development of the Service-oriented Driver Assistance (SODA) framework, which implements the benefits of Service-orientation while ensuring compatibility and compliance to automotive requirements, best-practices and standards. Within this thesis several state-of-the-art Service-oriented frameworks are analyzed and compared. Furthermore, the SODA framework as well as all its different aspects regarding the automotive software domain are described in detail. These aspects include a well-defined reference model that introduces and relates terms and concepts and defines an architectural blueprint. Furthermore, some of the modules of this blueprint such as the re-configuration module and the Communication Model are presented in full detail. In order to prove the compliance of the framework regarding state-of-the-art automotive software systems, a development process respecting today's best practices in automotive design procedures as well as the integration of SODA into the AUTOSAR standard are discussed. Finally, the SODA framework is used to build a full-scale demonstrator in order to evaluate its performance and efficiency.
This dissertation provides an interdisciplinary contribution to the project ReGLaN-Health & Logistics. ReGLaN-Health & Logistics, is an international cooperation deriving benefits from the capabilities of scientists working on different fields. The aim of the project is the development of a socalled SDSS that supports decision makers working within health systems with a special focus on rural areas. In this dissertation, one important component for the development of the DSS named EWARS is proposed and described in detail. This component called SPATTB is developed with the intention of dealing with spatial data, i.e. data with additional geocoded information with regard to the special requirements of the EWARS.rnrnAn important component in the process of developing the EWARS is the concept of GIS. Classically, geocoded information with a vectorial character numerically describing spatial phenomena is managed and processed in a GIS. For the development of the EWARS, the manageability of the type of data exemplarily given by (x,y,o) with coordinates x,y ) and Ozon-concentration o is not sufficient. It is described, that the manageable data has to be extended to data of type (x,y,f ), where (x,y) are the geocoded information, but where f is not only a numerical value but a functional description of a certain phenomenom. An example for the existence and appearance of that type of data is the geocoded information about the variation of the Ozon-concentration in time or depending on temperature. A knowledge-base as important subsystem of DSS containing expert knowledge is mentioned. This expert-knowledge can be made manageable when using methods from the field of fuzzy logic. Thereby mappings, socalled fuzzy-sets, are generated. Within the EWARS, these mappings will be used with respect to additional geocoded data. The knowledge about the geocoded mapping information only at a finite set of locations (x,y) associated with mapping information f is not sufficient in applications that need continuous statements in a certain geographical area. To provide a contribution towards solving this problem, methods from the field of computer geometry and CAD, so-called Bezier-methods, are used for interpolating this geocoded mapping information. Classically, these methods operates on vectors a the multidimensional vector-space whose elements contain real-valued components but in terms of dealing with mapping information, there has to be an extension on topological vector spaces since mapping spaces can be defined as such spaces. This builds a new perspective and possibility in the application of these methods. Therefore, the according algorithms have to be extended; this work is presented. The field of Artificial Neural Networks plays an important role for the processing and management of the data within the EWARS, where features of biological processes and structures are modeled and implemented as algorithms. Generally, the developed methods can be divided as usable in terms of interpolation or approximation functional coherences and in such being applicable to classification problems. In this dissertation one method from each type is regarded in more detailed. Thereby, the classical algorithms of the so-called Backpropagation-Networks for approximation and the Kohonen-Networks for classification are described. Within the thesis, an extension of these algorithms is then proposed using coherences from mathematical measure-theory and approximation theory. The mentioned extension of these algorithms is based on a preprocessing of the mapping data using integration methods from measure theory.
In der vorliegenden Untersuchung geht es um methodische Fragen der Unterrichtswahrnehmung aus Schülersicht. Dabei werden theoretische Ansätze zur Urteilsbildung aus der Klassenklima- und der kognitiv fundierten Survey-Forschung sowie der Forschung zur Interpersonalen Wahrnehmung diskutiert. Weiterhin werden Modelle zur inhaltlichen Interpretation von Aggregatmerkmalen (sogenannte Kompositionsmodelle) und zum Einfluss sogenannter "Halo"-Effekte berücksichtigt. Die relevanten Aspekte aus den genannten Theorien sowie empirische Befunde zum Einfluss von Fachleistung, Schulnote und Geschlecht auf die Beurteilung des Unterrichts werden in einem Modell zur Unterrichtswahrnehmung aus Schülersicht zusammengeführt. Daneben werden in der vorliegenden Untersuchung Möglichkeiten und Grenzen verschiedener statistischer Verfahren zur Analyse von Daten zur Wahrnehmung des Unterrichts aus Schülersicht aufgezeigt und diskutiert. Dabei geht es um Fragen der absoluten Übereinstimmung von Urteilern vs. der Interrater-Reliabilität. Weiterhin werden Grundlagen und Effekte von Verletzungen der Annahmen mehrebenenanalytischer konfirmatorischer Faktorenanalysen dargestellt, die im Rahmen einer Monte-Carlo-Studie überprüft werden. Datengrundlage der vorliegenden Untersuchung sind im Rahmen des Projekts DESI (Deutsch Englisch Schülerleistungen International) erhobene Fragebogendaten aus 330 Klassen bzw. Kursen der neunten Jahrgangsstufe, sowie im Längsschnitt erhobene Testleistungen in den Bereichen Deutsch und Englisch. Die Ergebnisse der Analysen bestätigen in großen Teilen das zugrunde gelegte theoretische Modell: Es zeigen sich hohe relative Übereinstimmungen der unterrichtsbezogenen Urteile von Schülerinnen und Schülern. Der Einfluss der Kommunikation mit Mitschülern auf die Urteilsbildung zeigt sich v.a. in der Gruppe der Mädchen. Die theoretischen Unterrichtsmerkmale lassen sich als Faktoren auf beiden Analyseebenen (innerhalb von Klassen und zwischen Klassen) nachweisen, wobei diese " bis auf wenige Ausnahmen " ebenen- sowie fachübergreifend nur im Sinne analoger und nicht "isomorpher" Konstrukte interpretierbar sind. Daneben finden sich deutliche Hinweise auf eine eher Lehrkraft- statt Unterrichtsfach-bezogene Wahrnehmung auf beiden Ebenen. Der Itemformulierung (Ich vs. Klassen-Bezug) kommt insgesamt betrachtet eine eher geringe Bedeutung zu. Bezüglich der Unterrichtswahrnehmungen finden sich Einflüsse der oben genannten Prädiktoren insbesondere auf der Ebene innerhalb von Klassen. Auf Klassenebene zeigt sich ein möglicher Einfluss einer "milden" Benotung auf die geteilte Unterrichtswahrnehmung. Die auf beiden Ebenen deutlichsten Effekte auf die Unterrichtswahrnehmung finden sich bei den Globalurteilen bezüglich der jeweiligen Lehrkraft. Zusammengenommen mit den extrem hohen Interkorrelationen der Faktoren innerhalb eines Fachs (die sich jeweils auf dieselbe Lehrkraft beziehen) und den " aufgrund von Effekten auf Schulebene etc. erwartungswidrigen " niedrigen bis nicht vorhandenen fachübergreifenden Interkorrelationen spricht dies in hohem Maße für eine Verzerrung der Unterrichtswahrnehmung im Sinne einer globalen Wahrnehmungstendenz. Die globale Wahrnehmung muss allerdings gleichzeitig überwiegend als Ergebnis von Unterrichtswahrnehmungen betrachtet werden: Hier zeigen sich die auf der Basis empirischer Untersuchungen theoretisch postulierten unterschiedlichen Gewichtungen der einzelnen Unterrichtsmerkmale über verschiedene Klassen hinweg.
The availability of digital cameras and the possibility to take photos at no cost lead to an increasing amount of digital photos online and on private computers. The pure amount of data makes approaches that support users in the administration of the photo necessary. As the automatic understanding of photo content is still an unsolved task, metadata is needed for supporting administrative tasks like search or photo work such as the generation of photo books. Meta-information textually describes the depicted scene or consists of information on how good or interesting a photo is.
In this thesis, an approach for creating meta-information without additional effort for the user is investigated. Eye tracking data is used to measure the human visual attention. This attention is analyzed with the objective of information creation in the form of metadata. The gaze paths of users working with photos are recorded, for example, while they are searching for photos or while they are just viewing photo collections.
Eye tracking hardware is developing fast within the last years. Because of falling prices for sensor hardware such as cameras and more competition on the eye tracker market, the prices are falling, and the usability is increasing. It can be assumed that eye tracking technology can soon be used in everyday devices such as laptops or mobile phones. The exploitation of data, recorded in the background while the user is performing daily tasks with photos, has great potential to generate information without additional effort for the users.
The first part of this work deals with the labeling of image region by means of gaze data for describing the depicted scenes in detail. Labeling takes place by assigning object names to specific photo regions. In total, three experiments were conducted for investigating the quality of these assignments in different contexts. In the first experiment, users decided whether a given object can be seen on a photo by pressing a button. In the second study, participants searched for specific photos in an image search application. In the third experiment, gaze data was collected from users playing a game with the task to classify photos regarding given categories. The results of the experiments showed that gaze-based region labeling outperforms baseline approaches in various contexts. In the second part, most important photos in a collection of photos are identified by means of visual attention for the creation of individual photo selections. Users freely viewed photos of a collection without any specific instruction on what to fixate, while their gaze paths were recorded. By comparing gaze-based and baseline photo selections to manually created selections, the worth of eye tracking data in the identification of important photos is shown. In the analysis of the data, the characteristics of gaze data has to be considered, for example, inaccurate and ambiguous data. The aggregation of gaze data, collected from several users, is one suggested approach for dealing with this kind of data.
The results of the performed experiments show the value of gaze data as source of information. It allows to benefit from human abilities where algorithms still have problems to perform satisfyingly.
Towards Improving the Understanding of Image Semantics by Gaze-based Tag-to-Region Assignments
(2011)
Eye-trackers have been used in the past to identify visual foci in images, find task-related image regions, or localize affective regions in images. However, they have not been used for identifying specific objects in images. In this paper, we investigate whether it is possible to assign image regions showing specific objects with tags describing these objects by analyzing the users' gaze paths. To this end, we have conducted an experiment with 20 subjects viewing 50 image-tag-pairs each. We have compared the tag-to-region assignments for nine existing and four new fixation measures. In addition, we have investigated the impact of extending region boundaries, weighting small image regions, and the number of subjects viewing the images. The paper shows that a tag-to-region assignment with an accuracy of 67% can be achieved by using gaze information. In addition, we show that multiple regions on the same image can be differentiated with an accuracy of 38%.
This work represents a quantitative analysis and visualisation of scar tissue of the left ventricular myocard. The scar information is shown in the late enhancement data, that highlights the avitale tissue with the help of a contrast agent. Through automatic methods, the scar is extracted from the image data and quantifies the size, location and transmurality. The transmurality shows a local measurement between the heart wall und the width of the scar. The developed methods help the cardiologist to analyse the measurement, the reason and the degree of the heart failure in a short time period. He can further control the results by several visual presentations. The deformation of the scar tissue over the heart cycle is implemented in another scientific work. A visual improvement of the deformation result which extracts the scar out of the data is aspired. The avital tissue is shown in a more comfortable way by eliminating the unnecessary image information and therefore improves the visual analysis of the pumping heart. Both methods show a detailed analysis of the scar tissue. This supports the clinic practical throughout the manual analysis.
Abstract zum Print-Buch: Walden, R. (2008). Architekturpsychologie: Schule, Hochschule und Bürogebäude der Zukunft. Lengerich: Pabst Science Publishers. Menschen wünschen sich im Allgemeinen „Kontrolle“ über ihre Umweltbedingungen (vgl. Flammer, 1990; Burger, 1992). Dieses Bedürfnis kommt in Form von Selbstgestaltungen von Architektur und Selbstregulierungen von Stressoren zum Ausdruck. Aus diesem Grund wird das Konzept der Umweltkontrolle als zentrales Kriterium für gebaute Umwelten in allen drei Fall-Studien zu Schule, Hochschule und Büro angewendet. Die Erhebung smethoden Programming (nutzerorientierte Programmentwicklung), User-Needs Analysis (Nutzer-Bedarfs-Analyse) und Post-Occupancy Evaluation werden im Hinblick auf ihren Stellenwert für die Building Performance Evaluation (Gebäudeleistungsevaluation) (Preiser & Schramm, 1997; 2005) erläutert. Der „Koblenzer Architekturfragebogen“ wird als Instrument zur Beurteilung von gebauten Umwelten in drei Varianten vorgestellt. Es werden zu den drei Studien jeweils ausgewählte Ergebnisse zu zwei verschiedenen Umweltbereichen berichtet.
Auswirkungen von Architektur auf Performance von Nutzern (vgl. BOSTI-Studien, 1984, 2001) werden im empirischen Teil in drei Studien zu innovativen Gebäuden (Waldorfschule in Köln, Universität in Koblenz, Post Tower in Bonn) ermittelt. Performance wird gemessen anhand von 1) Lern- und Arbeitsleistungen, 2) Wohlbefinden und 3) Umweltkontrolle sowie 4) Sozialverhalten im Fall der Schulstudie und mit der Hilfe von 16 (Bürogebäude) bzw. 21 (Universität) psychologischen Kriterien für den Erfolg von Organisationen. Ziel aller drei Studien ist unter anderem, das theoretische Konzept „Umweltkontrolle“ zu überprüfen und Empfehlungen für Verbesserungen von Um- bzw. Neubauten benennen zu können. Zwei zentrale Frages tellungen lauten daher: Unterscheidet sich in einer User-Needs Analysis eine Einschätzung des Gebäudes „zur Zeit“ von der Beurteilung der „Wichtigkeit in Zukunft“? Haben Merkmale der Architektur Auswirkungen auf die Performance-Kriterien?
Zu den Studien wurden drei Abbildungssätze nach dem Facettenansatz (Borg, 1996) und zwei Schemata zur Beurteilung der Qualität von Schul- und Bürogebäuden entwickelt. Aus den Schemata wurden zur Schule 139 Fragen für 26 Lehrer und 86 Fragen für 122 Schüler gewonnen, zur Hochschule 203 Fragen für 147 Studierende und 28 Dozenten sowie zu dem Bürogebäude 254 Fragen für 56 studentische Beurteiler. Einzelne Merkmale von Gebäuden wurden anhand einer Skala von +2 ☺☺ („zur Zeit“ sehr gut bzw. sehr wichtig „in Zukunft“) bis –2 // („zur Zeit“ sehr schlecht bzw. sehr unwichtig „in Zukunft“) bewertet. Die drei Performance-Hauptkriterien, insbesondere zu der Einschätzung der „Wichtigkeit in Zukunft“, korrelieren in der Regel in allen drei Studien substanziell und hoch signifikant miteinander, so dass erwartet werden kann, dass eine höhere Ei nschätzung von Umweltkontrolle durch die Nutzer
zu mehr Wohlbefinden führt und über beide Va riablen auch die Beurteilungen von Lern- und Arbeitsleistungen „in Zukunft“ gesteigert werden können. Nach den Ergebnissen der drei Studien wünschen si ch die Nutzer bzw. Beurteiler beispielsweise in allen drei Umwelten Rückzugsmöglichkeiten, in der Schule in Form von Schülerbüros, Nischen und Sitzgruppen im Klassenzimmer, in der Universität in Form von geschützten Bänken im Außenbereich und Arbeitstischen zum Beispiel in der Cafeteria und im Bürogebäude durch weniger Transparenz im Kombibüro und damit weniger Einsicht aller Tätigkeiten durch Vorgesetzte und Kollegen. Die in den drei Studien ermittelten Zusammenhänge der zentralen Perfor mance-Kriterien lassen begründet annehmen, dass durch gezielte Verbesserungen wichtiger Umweltaspekte, insbesondere solcher, die Umweltkontrolle ermöglichen, das Wohlbefinden und somit die Leistung von Nutzern positiv beeinflusst werden kann.
Resumen del libro impreso : Walden, R. (2008). Psicología arquitectónica: Escuela, escuela superior y edificios de oficinas del futuro. Lengerich: Pabst Science Publishers. Las personas desean, por lo general, un “contr ol“ sobre las condiciones de su entorno (comp. Flammer, 1990; Burger, 1992). Esta necesidad queda de manifiesto en forma de autoorganizaciones de la arquitectura y la autorregulación de los factores de estrés. Por esta razón, el concepto de control del medio ambiente se aplica como criterio central para los entornos construidos en los tres estudios de caso: de la escuela, de la universidad y de la s oficinas. Los métodos de encuesta "Programming" (desarrollo del programa orientado al usuario), "U ser-Needs Analysis" (análisis de necesidades del usuario) y "Post-Occupancy Evaluation" (análisis post-ocupacional) se explican con vistas a su importancia para la "Building Performance Evaluation" (evaluación del rendimiento del edificio) (Preiser & Araña, 1997; 2005). La “evaluación arquitectónica de Koblenz“ se presenta como instrumento para evaluar los entornos construidos en tres variantes. Los resultados elegidos de dichos tres estudios se relacionan, a su vez, con dos entornos diferentes. Los efectos de la arquitectura sobre el rendimiento de los usuarios (comp. Estudios BOSTI, 1984 y 2001) se establecen en la parte empírica en tres estudios de edificios innovadores (Escuela Waldorf en Köln, Universidad de Koblenz, Post Tower en Bonn). La eficacia se mide a través de: 1) el rendimiento de aprendizaje y laboral, 2) el bienestar y 3) el control del medio ambiente, así como 4) el comportamiento social en el caso del estudio escola r y con la ayuda de 16 (edificios de oficina) y 21 (universidades) criterios psicológicos para el éxito de las organizaciones. La meta de los tres estudios es, entre otras cosas, revisar el concepto teórico de "control del medio ambiente" y poder dar nuevas recomendaciones para mejorar en las reformas y ta mbién en las nuevas construcciones. Por eso, dos planteamientos centrales son: en el análisis de necesidades del usuario, la opinión del edificio "en la actualidad", ¿se diferencia de la evaluación de la “importancia en el futuro”?; las características de la arquitectura ¿tienen repercusión en los criterios de rendimiento?. Con los estudios se desarrollaron tres teoremas según el enfoque de facetas (Borg, 1996) y dos esquemas para la evaluación de calidad de los edificios escolares y de oficinas. De los esquemas se obtuvieron: para la escuela, 139 preguntas para 26 profesores y 86 preguntas para 122 alumnos; para la escuela superior, 203 preguntas para 147 estudian tes y 28 docentes, así como para el edificio de oficinas 254 preguntas para 56 censores estudiantiles. Las características particulares de los edificios se calificaron mediante una escala de +2 ☺☺ ("en la actualidad" muy buenas y “en el futuro” muy importantes respectivamente) a –2 // ("en la actualidad" muy malas y “en el futuro“ muy insignificantes respectivamente). Los tres criterios principales de rendimiento, especialmente para la evaluación de la “importancia en el futuro“, están correlacionados uno con el otro en los tres estudios, por lo general, de manera sustancial y muy significativa, de manera que se puede esperar que una evaluación superior del control del medio ambiente llevada a cabo por los usuarios conduzca a más bienestar y que, sobre ambas variables, también puedan ser aumentadas las evaluaciones de rendimientos de aprendizaje y laboral “en el futuro“. Según los resultados de los tres estudios, los usuarios y los censores desean por ejemplo, en los tres entornos, la posibilidad de retiro: en la escuela, en forma de oficinas de alumnos, nichos y tresillos en el aula; en la universidad, en forma de bancos protegidos en el área exterior y mesas de trabajo, por ejemplo, en la cafetería; y en el edificio de ofic inas a través de menos transparencia en las oficinas compartidas y con eso menos visión de todas las actividades entre jefes y compañeros. Las relaciones de los criterios de rendimiento centrales establecidas en los tres estudios dejan suponer de modo justificado que, mediante mejoras concretas de aspectos importantes del entorno -sobre todo de aquellos que permiten el control del mismo-, se puede influir de manera positiva sobre el bienestar y, con esto, sobre el rendimiento de los usuarios. Palabras claves: necesidades del usuario, análisis; evaluación del rendimiento del edificio; control del medio ambiente (autoorganización, regulación de los factores de estrés, control social), bienestar, rendimientos de aprendizaje y laboral, comportamiento social; criterios del éxito de las Resumen 5 organizaciones; teoría de las facetas; esquema para la evaluación de la calidad de los edificios; recomendaciones para la construcción de edificios con visión de futuro.
Abstract for the print-book: Walden, R. (2008). Architectural Psychology: School, University Campus, and Office Building of the Future. Lengerich: Pabst Science Publishers (in German). The need for display of self in architecture and for users' self-regulation of stress factors, which demonstrate that users crave individual control of their environment (cf. Flammer, 1990; Burger, 1992) motivated this study to use the concept of environmental control as a central criterion for the evaluation of built environment. It was applied to three case studies: a school, a university campus, and an office building. Advantages and disadvantages of the data- gathering methods of architectural Programming, User-Needs Analysis, and Post-Occupancy Evaluation were analyzed to highlight their significance in terms of Building Performance Evaluation as described by Preiser and Sc hramm (1997, 2005). The “Koblenz Architecture Questionnaire” was used as an instrument for assessing the built environment of the three case studies, and the study reports selected findings from these questionnaires. The investigation seeks to determine the effect of architecture - especially buildings' provisions for user control of environmental conditions - on user performance (cf. BOSTI studies, 1984, 2001) in three innovative buildings: the Waldorf School in Cologne, the new campus for the University in Koblenz, and the Office Tower of the Deutsche Post World Net AG in Bonn. Performance is measured in terms of (1) Lear ning and Work Efficiency, (2) Well-being, (3) Environmental Control, (4) Social Behavior (the latter just for the school project), and by means of 21 and 16 additional psychological criteria for success of the organization in the cases of the university and the office building, respectively. The study aims, among other things, at reassessing the theoretical concept of 'environmental control' and at making recommendations for both improvement of existing buildings and the design of new projects. Two central questions are: In User-Needs Analysis, what is the difference between the assessment of a building for its current use and its estimated performance in future? Do certain architectural features influence user assessments on the given performance criteria? In the studies, three mapping sentences were developed according to the 'facet approach' (Borg, 1996) as well as two systems to judge the quality of school and office buildings. Using these systems, information was obtained in all three studies to construct questionnaires. In the school study, teachers were asked 139 questions, pupils 86 questions. Responses were obtained from 26 teachers and 122 pupils. For the university, 147 students and 28 faculty members responded to 203 questions. For the office building, 56 student-experts were asked 254 questions. Characteristics of the built environment were rated using the following scale: +2 ☺☺ (very good “at present”, and accordingly very important “in the future”) down to –2 // (very bad “at present”, and very unimportant “in the future”). A general finding was a high and significant co rrelation between the responses for the three main performance criteria in all three case studies, especially for the 'importance for the future' aspect. This supports the conclusion that a perception of higher degree of environmental control by users will lead to an increased sense of well-being and consequently, there will also be a higher expectation of improved work or learning efficiency 'in the future'. The three studies further show for example that users in all three environments desire 'retreat opportunities' which may take the form of student offices in schools, niches and small group seating in classrooms, and sheltered seating in outdoor areas and work tables in the cafeteria for the university. For the offices, users wanted more visual privacy (less transparent office partitions in Combi Offices) for less visual control of their activities by supervisors and co-workers. The relationships found by the studies between the responses on the central performance criteria and the spatial characteristics of the three buildings support the contention that focused improvements in the built environment, especially with respect to features that enhance user control of environmental conditions, will influence users’ well-being as well as work performance and work or learning efficiency in a positive way.
Menschen wünschen sich im Allgemeinen "Kontrolle" über ihre Umweltbedingungen. Dieses Bedürfnis kommt in Form von Selbstgestaltungen von Architektur und Selbstregulierungen von Stressoren zum Ausdruck. Aus diesem Grund wird das Konzept der Umweltkontrolle als zentrales Kriterium für gebaute Umwelten in allen drei Fall-Studien zu Schule (Waldorfschule Köln), Hochschule (Universität Koblenz) und Bürogebäude (Post Tower Bonn) angewendet. Im deutschen Sprachraum werden damit erstmalig in einer Monographie psychologische Untersuchungen von innovativen Gebäuden in Anlehnung an die International Building Performance Evaluation (Gebäudeleistungsevaluation) beschrieben. Der "Koblenzer Architekturfragebogen" wird als Instrument zur Beurteilung von gebauten Umwelten in drei Varianten vorgestellt. Bis zu 21 psychologische Kriterien für den Erfolg von Organisationen werden pro Studie angewandt. Ziel aller drei Studien ist unter anderem, Empfehlungen für Verbesserungen von Um- und Neubauten benennen zu können. Zwei zentrale Fragestellungen lauten daher: Unterscheidet sich in einer User-Needs Analysis eine Einschätzung des Gebäudes "zur Zeit" von der Beurteilung der "Wichtigkeit in Zukunft"? Haben Merkmale der Architektur Auswirkungen auf die Performance-Kriterien? Zu den Studien wurden drei Abbildungssätze nach dem Facettenansatz und zwei Schemata zur Beurteilung der Qualität von Schul- und Bürogebäuden entwickelt. Die in den drei Studien ermittelten Zusammenhänge der zentralen Performance-Kriterien lassen begründet annehmen, dass durch gezielte Verbesserungen wichtiger Umweltaspekte, insbesondere solcher, die Umweltkontrolle ermöglichen, das Wohlbefinden und somit die Leistung von Nutzern positiv beeinflusst werden können.
In der Masterthesis von Benjamin Waldmann mit dem Titel „Flusskrebse in Deutschland – Aktueller Stand der Verbreitung heimischer und invasiver gebietsfremder Flusskrebse in Deutschland; Überblick über die erfolgten Schutzmaßnahmen und den damit verbundenen Erfahrungen; Vernetzung der Akteure im Flusskrebsschutz“ wurden erstmals für alle heimischen wie gebietsfremden Flusskrebsarten (Zehnfußkrebse) Verbreitungskarten für Deutschland vorgelegt. Grundlage der Arbeit waren umfangreiche Recherchen und Abfragen zur Verbreitung der Arten in den Bundesländern bei den zuständigen Behörden, Institutionen, Artexperten und Privatpersonen. Die Rohdaten wurden qualitätsgesichert und in einem Geoinformationssystem aufbereitet und dargestellt, so dass daraus bundesweite Verbreitungskarten für jede Art in einem zehn Kilometerraster (UTM-Gitter im Bezugssystem ETRS89) erstellt werden konnten. Darüber hinaus wurden, ebenfalls auf Basis umfangreicher Recherchen und Abfragen, die unterschiedlichen Möglichkeiten für Schutzmaßnahmen für heimische Flusskrebspopulationen aufgezeigt, bewertet und daraus Empfehlungen abgeleitet. Besonderes Augenmerk wurde dabei auf das Management invasiver gebietsfremder Flusskrebsarten sowie der Umgang mit der Tierseuche Krebspest (Aphanomyces astaci) gelegt. Abschließend wurden Empfehlungen zur Vernetzung der Akteure im Flusskrebsschutz gegeben sowie die Ansprechpartner:innen in den einzelnen Bundesländern aufgeführt.
Model-Driven Engineering (MDE) aims to raise the level of abstraction in software system specifications and increase automation in software development. Modelware technological spaces contain the languages and tools for MDE that software developers take into consideration to model systems and domains. Ontoware technological spaces contain ontology languages and technologies to design, query, and reason on knowledge. With the advent of the Semantic Web, ontologies are now being used within the field of software development, as well. In this thesis, bridging technologies are developed to combine two technological spaces in general. Transformation bridges translate models between spaces, mapping bridges relate different models between two spaces, and, integration bridges merge spaces to new all-embracing technological spaces. API bridges establish interoperability between the tools used in the space. In particular, this thesis focuses on the combination of modelware and ontoware technological spaces. Subsequent to a sound comparison of languages and tools in both spaces, the integration bridge is used to build a common technological space, which allows for the hybrid use of languages and the interoperable use of tools. The new space allows for language and domain engineering. Ontology-based software languages may be designed in the new space where syntax and formal semantics are defined with the support of ontology languages, and the correctness of language models is ensured by the use of ontology reasoning technologies. These languages represent a core means for exploiting expressive ontology reasoning in the software modeling domain, while remaining flexible enough to accommodate varying needs of software modelers. Application domains are conceptually described by languages that allow for defining domain instances and types within one domain model. Integrated ontology languages may provide formal semantics for domain-specific languages and ontology technologies allow for reasoning over types and instances in domain models. A scenario in which configurations for network device families are modeled illustrates the approaches discussed in this thesis. Furthermore, the implementation of all bridging technologies for the combination of technological spaces and all tools for ontology-based language engineering and use is illustrated.
Eine zutreffende Diagnose über den aktuellen Kenntnisstand der jeweiligen Schülerinnen und Schüler ist notwendig, um adäquat in Gruppenarbeitsprozesse intervenieren zu können. Von diesem Zusammenhang wird in der Literatur weit-gehend ausgegangen, jedoch gibt es bisher kaum empirische Studien, die diesen belegen. Die vorliegende Arbeit widmet sich schwerpunktmäßig dem Interventi-onsverhalten von Studierenden. Dabei wird die prozessdiagnostische Fähigkeit „Deuten“ zugrundegelegt, um unterschiedliches Interventionsverhalten auf diese Fähigkeit zurückführen zu können. Sowohl beim Aufbau diagnostischer Fähig-keiten als auch bei der (Weiter-)Entwicklung des eigenen Lehrerhandelns gilt Reflexion als hilfreich. Entsprechend wird auch das Zusammenspiel von Pro-zessdiagnose und Reflexionsverhalten sowie von Interventionsverhalten und Reflexionsverhalten untersucht.
Für die Erhebung der prozessdiagnostischen Fähigkeit „Deuten“ wurden drei Videovignetten erstellt und in das Videodiagnosetool ViviAn eingebunden. Die Videovignetten zeigen jeweils vier Schülerinnen, die sich mit dem Thema „Ter-me“ beschäftigen. Im Rahmen eines Lehr-Lern-Labores wurden über vier Se-mester hinweg alle teilnehmenden Studierenden dazu angehalten, die Videovig-netten zu bearbeiten. Ebenso konzipierten sie jeweils zu dritt eine Laborstation im Mathematik-Labor „Mathe ist mehr“ und erprobten diese mit einer Schul-klasse. Dabei wurden die Interventionen der Studierenden in die Gruppenarbeits-prozesse der Schülerinnen und Schüler videographiert. Anschließend reflektierten die Studierenden in Kleingruppen über die Erprobungen und über die getätigten Interventionen. Die Reflexionsgespräche wurden ebenfalls videographiert.
Es zeigt sich, dass die Studierenden, die sich zum Zeitpunkt der Erhebung im Masterstudium befanden, noch Entwicklungsspielraum in Bezug auf ihre pro-zessdiagnostische Fähigkeit „Deuten“ besitzen. Im Hinblick auf die Interventio-nen waren responsive Interventionen häufiger angemessen als invasive Interven-tionen, wobei responsive Internvetionen auch vergleichsweise häufiger dazu führten, dass mehr Schülerinnen und Schüler nach der Intervention aktiv waren. Studierende mit höherer prozessdiagnostischer Fähigkeit „Deuten“ intervenierten jedoch häufiger invasiv und tätigten dabei trotzdem angemessenere und aktivie-rendere Interventionen als ihre Kommilitoninnen und Kommilitonen. Entspre-chend scheint sich die prozessdiagnostische Fähigkeit „Deuten“ positiv auf die Interventionen der Studierenden auszuwirken und sollte daher bereits im Rah-men des (Lehramts-)Studiums verstärkt geschult werden.
Retrospektive Analyse der Ausbreitung und dynamische Erkennung von Web-Tracking durch Sandboxing
(2018)
Aktuelle quantitative Analysen von Web-Tracking bieten keinen umfassenden Überblick über dessen Entstehung, Ausbreitung und Entwicklung. Diese Arbeit ermöglicht durch Auswertung archivierter Webseiten eine rückblickende Erfassung der Entstehungsgeschichte des Web-Trackings zwischen den Jahren 2000 und 2015. Zu diesem Zweck wurde ein geeignetes Werkzeug entworfen, implementiert, evaluiert und zur Analyse von 10000 Webseiten eingesetzt. Während im Jahr 2005 durchschnittlich 1,17 Ressourcen von Drittparteien eingebettet wurden, zeigt sich ein Anstieg auf 6,61 in den darauffolgenden 10 Jahren. Netzwerkdiagramme visualisieren den Trend zu einer monopolisierten Netzstruktur, in der bereits ein einzelnes Unternehmen 80 % der Internetnutzung überwachen kann.
Trotz vielfältiger Versuche, dieser Entwicklung durch technische Maßnahmen entgegenzuwirken, erweisen sich nur wenige Selbst- und Systemschutzmaßnahmen als wirkungsvoll. Diese gehen häufig mit einem Verlust der Funktionsfähigkeit einer Webseite oder mit einer Einschränkung der Nutzbarkeit des Browsers einher. Mit der vorgestellten Studie wird belegt, dass rechtliche Vorschriften ebenfalls keinen hinreichenden Schutz bieten. An Webauftritten von Bildungseinrichtungen werden Mängel bei Erfüllung der datenschutzrechtlichen Pflichten festgestellt. Diese zeigen sich durch fehlende, fehlerhafte oder unvollständige Datenschutzerklärungen, deren Bereitstellung zu den Informationspflichten eines Diensteanbieters gehören.
Die alleinige Berücksichtigung klassischer Tracker ist nicht ausreichend, wie mit einer weiteren Studie nachgewiesen wird. Durch die offene Bereitstellung funktionaler Webseitenbestandteile kann ein Tracking-Unternehmen die Abdeckung von 38 % auf 61 % erhöhen. Diese Situation wird durch Messungen von Webseiten aus dem Gesundheitswesen belegt und aus technischer sowie rechtlicher Perspektive bewertet.
Bestehende systemische Werkzeuge zum Erfassen von Web-Tracking verwenden für ihre Messung die Schnittstellen der Browser. In der vorliegenden Arbeit wird mit DisTrack ein Framework zur Web-Tracking-Analyse vorgestellt, welches eine Sandbox-basierte Messmethodik verfolgt. Dies ist eine Vorgehensweise, die in der dynamischen Schadsoftwareanalyse erfolgreich eingesetzt wird und sich auf das Erkennen von Seiteneffekten auf das umliegende System spezialisiert. Durch diese Verhaltensanalyse, die unabhängig von den Schnittstellen des Browsers operiert, wird eine ganzheitliche Untersuchung des Browsers ermöglicht. Auf diese Weise können systemische Schwachstellen im Browser aufgezeigt werden, die für speicherbasierte Web-Tracking-Verfahren nutzbar sind.
In der vorliegenden Arbeit wird die Integration einer Business Intelligence-Lösung in eine bestehende Social Software beschrieben. Dafür wird zunächst der Begriff Business Intelligence und Social Software, der Aufbau sowie deren Bestandteile näher erläutert. Danach erfolgt eine Analyse der IST-Situation der Zielgruppe durch Interviews, deren Auswertungen in der SOLL-Konzeptionierung in eine Anforderungsliste transformiert werden. Abschließend werden die herausgearbeiteten Anforderungen an der finalen Installation geprüft und getestet, um festzustellen ob die Erwartungen der Zielgruppe und ihre Vorstellungen von Business Intelligence realisierbar sind.
Das Ergebnis dieser Arbeit soll eine installierte Business Intelligence-Lösung in einer Social Software sein. Diese soll einen Überblick darüber geben, was mit der aktuellsten Version der Software bereits möglich ist und kritisch aufzeigen, wo es Stärken und Schwächen gibt, die bei zukünftigen Versionenrnbedacht werden sollten.
German politicians have identified a need for greater citizen involvement in decision-making than in the past, as confirmed by a recent German parliamentarians study ("DEUPAS"). As in other forms of social interactions, the Internet provides significant potential to serve as the digital interface between citizens and decision-makers: in the recent past, dedicated electronic participation ("e-participation") platforms (e.g. dedicated websites) have been provided by politicians and governments in an attempt to gather citizens" feedback and comment on a particular issue or subject. Some of these have been successful, but a large proportion of them are grossly under-used " often only small numbers of citizens use them. Over the same time period, enthusiasm of Society for social networks has increased and is now commonplace. Many citizens use social networks such as Facebook and Twitter for all kinds of purposes, and in some cases to discuss political issues.
Social networks are therefore obviously attractive to politicians " from local government to federal agencies, politicians have integrated social media into their daily work. However, there is a significant challenge regarding the usefulness of social networks. The problem is the continuous increase in digital information: social networks contain vast amounts of information, and it is impossible for a human to manually filter the relevant information from the irrelevant (so-called "information overload"). Even using the search tools provided by social networks, it is still a huge task for a human to determine meanings and themes from the multitude of search results. New technologies and concepts have been proposed to provide summaries of masses of information through lexical analysis of social media messages, and therefore they promise an easy and quick overview of the information.
This thesis examines the relevance of these analyses" results, for the use in everyday political life, with the emphasis on the social networks Facebook and Twitter as data sources. Here we make use of the WeGov Toolbox and its analysis components that were developed during the EU project WeGov. The assessment has been performed in consultation with actual policy-makers from different levels of German government: policy-makers from the German Federal Parliament, the State Parliament North Rhine-Westphalia, the State Chancellery of the Saarland and the cities of Cologne and Kempten all took part in the study. Our method was to execute the analyses on data collected from Facebook and Twitter, and present the results to the policy-makers, who would then evaluate them using a mixture of qualitative methods.
The responses of the participants have provided us with some useful conclusions:
1) None of the participants believe that e-participation is possible in this way. But participants confirm that "citizen-friendliness" can be supported by this approach.
2) The most likely users for the summarisation tools are those who have experience with social networks, but are not "power users". The reason being is that "power users" already knew the relevant information provided by analysis tools. But without any experiences for social networks it is hard to interpret the analysis results the right way.
3) The evaluation has considered geographical aspects, and related this to e.g. a politician- constituency as a local area of social networks. Comparing the rural to the urban areas, it is shown that the amount of relevant political information in the rural areas is low. While the proportion of publicly available information in urban areas is relatively high, the proportion in the rural areas is much lower.
The findings that result from the engagement with policy-makers will be systematically surveyed and validated within this thesis.
Deformable Snow Rendering
(2019)
Accurate snow simulation is key to capture snow's iconic visuals. Intricate
methods exist that attempt to grasp snow behaviour in a holistic manner. Computational complexity prevents them from reaching real-time performance. This thesis presents three techniques making use of the GPU that focus on the deformation of a snow surface in real-time. The approaches are examined by their ability to scale with an increasing number of deformation actors and their visual portrayal of snow deformation. The findings indicate that the approaches maintain real-time performance well into several hundred individual deformation actors. However, these approaches each have their individual restrictions handicapping the visual results. An experimental approach is to combine the techniques at reduced deformation actor count to benefit from the detailed, merged deformation pattern.
Previous research concerned with early science education revealed that guided play can support young children’s knowledge acquisition. However, the questions whether guided play maintains other important prerequisites such as children’s science self-concept and how guided play should be implemented remain unanswered. The present dissertation encompasses three research articles that investigated 5- to 6-year-old children’s science knowledge, science theories, and science self-concept in the stability domain and their relation to interindividual prerequisites. Moreover, the articles examined whether children’s science knowledge, science theories, and science self-concept can be supported by different play forms, i.e., guided play with material and verbal scaffolds, guided play with material scaffolds, and free play. The general introduction of the present dissertation first highlights children’s cognitive development, their science self-concept, and interindividual prerequisites, i.e., fluid and crystallised intelligence, mental rotation ability, and interest in block play. These prerequisites are applied to possible ways of supporting children during play. The first article focused on the measurement of 5-to-6-year-old children’s stability knowledge and its relation to interindividual prerequisites. Results suggested that children’s stability knowledge could be measured reliably and validly, and was related to their fluid and crystallised intelligence. The second article was concerned with the development of children’s intuitive stability theories over three points of measurement and the effects of guided and free play, children’s prior theories as well as their intelligence on these intuitive theories. Results implied that guided play with material and verbal scaffolds supported children’s stability theories more than the other two play forms, i.e., guided play with material scaffolds and free play. Moreover, consistency of children’s prior theories, their fluid and crystallised intelligence were related to children’s theory adaptation after the intervention. The third article focused on the effect of the playful interventions on children’s stability knowledge and science self-concept over three points of measurement. Furthermore, the reciprocal effects between knowledge acquisition and science self-concept were investigated. Results implied that guided play supported knowledge acquisition and maintained children’s science self-concept. Free play did not support children’s stability knowledge and decreased children’s science self-concept. No evidence for reciprocal effects between children’s stability knowledge and their science self-concept was found. Last, in a general discussion, the findings of the three articles are combined and reflected amidst children’s cognitive development. Summarising, the present dissertation shows that children’s science knowledge, science theories, and science self-concept can be supported through guided play that considers children’s cognitive development.
This thesis deals with quality assurance of model-based SRS, in particular SRS-Models and SRS-Diagrams. The interesting thing about model-based SRS is that they are generated by a documentation generator based on the following input data: SRS-Model, SRS-Diagrams and texts external to the model. Therefore to assure the quality of the documentation the quality of their four factors must be assured, which are the SRS-Model, SRS-Diagrams, external texts and the documentation generator. The thesis" goal is to define a quality connotation for SRS-Models and -Diagrams and to show an approach for realizing automatically quality testing, measurement and assessment for the modelling tool Innovator.
Fresh water resources like rivers and reservoirs are exposed to a drastically changing world. In order to safeguard these lentic ecosystems, they need stronger protection in times of global change and population growth. In the last years, the exploitation pressure on drinking water reservoirs has increased steadily worldwide. Besides securing the demands of safe drinking water supply, international laws especially in Europe (EU Water Framework Directive) stipulate to minimize the impact of dams on downstream rivers. In this study we investigate the potential of a smart withdrawal strategy at Grosse Dhuenn Reservoir to improve the temperature and discharge regime downstream without jeopardizing drinking water production. Our aim is to improve the existing withdrawal strategy for operating the reservoir in a sustainable way in terms of water quality and quantity. First, we set-up and calibrated a 1D numerical model for Grosse Dhuenn Reservoir with the open-source community model “General Lake Model” (GLM) together with its water quality module “Aquatic Ecodynamics” library (AED2). The reservoir model reproduced water temperatures and hypolimnetic dissolved oxygen concentrations accurately over a 5 year period. Second, we extended the model source code with a selective withdrawal functionality (adaptive offtake) and added operational rules for a realistic reservoir management. Now the model is able to autonomously determine the best withdrawal height according to the temperature and flow requirements of the downstream river and the raw water quality objectives. Criteria for the determination of the withdrawal regime are selective withdrawal, development of stratification and oxygen content in the deep hypolimnion. This functionality is not available in current reservoir models, where withdrawal heights are generally provided a priori to the model and kept fixed during the simulation. Third, we ran scenario simulations identifying an improved reservoir withdrawal strategy to balance the demands for downstream river and raw water supply. Therefore we aimed at finding an optimal parallel withdrawal ratio between cold hypolimnetic water and warm epilimnetic or metalimnetic water in order to provide a pre-defined temperature in the downstream river. The reservoir model and the proposed withdrawal strategy provide a simple and efficient tool to optimize reservoir management in a multi-objective view for mastering future reservoir management challenges.
This thesis addresses the implementation of a particle simulation of an explosion. The simulation will be displayed via ray tracing in near real time. The implementation makes use of the openCL standard. The focus of research in this thesis is to analyse the performance of this combination of components.
Pelagic oxyclines, the transition zone between oxygen rich surface waters and oxygen depleted deep waters, are a common characteristic of eutrophic lakes during summer stratification. They can have tremendous effects on the biodiversity and the ecosystem functioning of lakes and, to add insult to injury, are expected to become more frequent and more pronounced as climate warming progresses. On these grounds, this thesis endeavors to advance the understanding of formation, persistence, and consequences of pelagic oxyclines: We test, whether the formation of metalimnetic oxygen minima is intrinsically tied to a locally enhanced oxygen consuming process, investigate the relative importance of vertical physical oxygen transport and biochemical oxygen consumption for the persistence of pelagic oxyclines, and finally assess their potential consequences for whole lake cycling. To pursue these objectives, the present thesis nearly exclusively resorts to in situ measurements. Field campaigns were conducted at three lakes in Germany featuring different types of oxyclines and resolved either a short (hours to days) or a long (weeks to months) time scale. Measurements comprised temperature, current velocity, and concentrations of oxygen and reduced substances in high temporal and vertical resolution. Additionally, vertical transport was estimated by applying the eddy correlation technique within the pelagic region for the first time. The thesis revealed, that the formation of metalimnetic oxygen minima does not necessarily depend on locally enhanced oxygen depletion, but can solely result from gradients and curvatures of oxygen concentration and depletion and their relative position to each other. Physical oxygen transport was found to be relevant for oxycline persistence when it considerably postponed anoxia on a long time scale. However, its influence on oxygen dynamics was minor on short time scales, although mixing and transport were highly variable. Biochemical consumption always dominated the fate of oxygen in pelagic oxyclines. It was primarily determined by the oxidative breakdown of organic matter originating from the epilimnion, whereas in meromictic lakes, the oxidation of reduced substances dominated. Beyond that, the results of the thesis emphasize that pelagic oxyclines can be a hotspot of mineralization and, hence, short-circuit carbon and nutrient cycling in the upper part of the water column. Overall, the present thesis highlights the importance of considering physical transport as well as biochemical cycling in future studies.
This Master Thesis is an exploratory research to determine whether it is feasible to construct a subjectivity lexicon using Wikipedia. The key hypothesis is that that all quotes in Wikipedia are subjective and all regular text are objective. The degree of subjectivity of a word, also known as ''Quote Score'' is determined based on the ratio of word frequency in quotations to its frequency outside quotations. The proportion of words in the English Wikipedia which are within quotations is found to be much smaller as compared to those which are not in quotes, resulting in a right-skewed distribution and low mean value of Quote Scores.
The methodology used to generate the subjectivity lexicon from text corpus in English Wikipedia is designed in such a way that it can be scaled and reused to produce similar subjectivity lexica of other languages. This is achieved by abstaining from domain and language-specific methods, apart from using only readily-available English dictionary packages to detect and exclude stopwords and non-English words in the Wikipedia text corpus.
The subjectivity lexicon generated from English Wikipedia is compared against other lexica; namely MPQA and SentiWordNet. It is found that words which are strongly subjective tend to have high Quote Scores in the subjectivity lexicon generated from English Wikipedia. There is a large observable difference between distribution of Quote Scores for words classified as strongly subjective versus distribution of Quote Scores for words classified as weakly subjective and objective. However, weakly subjective and objective words cannot be differentiated clearly based on Quote Score. In addition to that, a questionnaire is commissioned as an exploratory approach to investigate whether subjectivity lexicon generated from Wikipedia could be used to extend the coverage of words of existing lexica.
Problems in the analysis of requirements often lead to failures when developing software systems. This problem is nowadays being faced by requirements engineering. The early involvement of all kinds of stakeholders in the development of such a system and a structured process to elicitate and analyse requirements have made it a crucial factor as a first step in software development. The increasing complexity of modern softwaresystems though leads to a rising amount of information which has to be dealt with during analysis. Without the support of appropriate tools this would be almost impossible to do. Especially in bigger projects, which tend to be spatially distributed, an effective requirements engineering could not be implemented without this kind of support. Today there is a wide range of tools dealing with this matter. They have been in use since some time now and, in their most recent versions, realize the most important aspects of requirements engineering. Within the scope of this thesis some of these tools will be analysed, focussing on both the major functionalities concerning the management of requirements and the repository of these tools. The results of this analyis will be integrated into a reference model.
Digitalisation and further media development are core processes of the current digital age. In order for companies to benefit from technical progress, their employees must have or are expected to acquire the relevant skills. Companies therefore are faced with the task of not being overwhelmed with the mass of innovations and opportunities and, in the best-case scenario, of being able to use them to improve their own performance.
Small and medium-sized enterprises represent 99% of all enterprises in Germany. Though, it has not been further established, how the majority of small enterprises and their employees participate in this development. The research question therefore consists of two parts. On the one hand: "Is the promotion of employees' skills taken care of in micro-enterprises?" and on the other hand: "Where are the opportunities and challenges for companies of this size?”
In order to answer the research question, a qualitative research method was used, the guideline-based interview. The interviewed companies were all in the media and IT sector. Thus, the recorded and transcribed data provided a real insight into the current situation in micro-enterprises.
The responses to the interviews showed that companies with very small numbers of employees are more dependent on their employees than others. So, the commitment of the employees is decisive for the success of the company itself. It is the management's task to promote this and ensure employee satisfaction.
Companies that pay more attention to employee development are therefore more recommendable for career starters who need and/or want to develop themselves and their entire horizon of experience.
Ziel dieser Arbeit war es, den in [Rhe06] dargestellten operationalen Ansatz zur Modelltransformation mit Hilfe der am Institut für Softwaretechnik der Universität Koblenz-Landau vorhandenen Bibliotheken "JGraLab" und "GReQL" in Java zu implementieren. Die Implementierung sollte beweisen, dass der aufgezeigte Transformationsansatz in der Praxis umsetzbar ist. Dies wurde durch verschiedene Beispiele bewiesen. Die geplante Verwendung in weiteren Projekten des IST wird für die Zukunft zeigen, ob sich weitere Transformationen umsetzten lassen oder wo die Grenzen des Ansatzes sind. Des weiteren ist denkbar, die Transformationen nicht mehr in zwei Schritten (Schematransformation vor Graphtransformation), sondern beide Schritte auf einmal ablaufen zu lassen. Dieser Schritt setzt jedoch voraus, dass JGraLab dies ebenfalls unterstützt.