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Small Programmable Object Technology devices from Sun Microsystems (Sun SPOTs) are small wireless devices that can run Java programs. In the on-going research project described in this paper, Sun SPOTs have been used in conjunction with model-driven software development techniques to develop a tool that can be used to introduce new software developers to object-oriented programming in general and Java in particular in a new and interesting way. The tool, a graphical user interface application, allows users to quickly design, build, and deploy Java applications to the Sun SPOTs without using a conventional integrated development environment or low level commands. In this way new developers aren’t so overwhelmed by the wealth of technologies, commands, and possibilities offered by the current sophisticated Java development tools. However, the generated Java source code will be available as either an Eclipse or NetBeans project for those who would like to study it.

The sociology of software project management is an often under-represented component in the education and professional development of software engineers even though factors such as team formation, role assignment, motivation, training, hiring, and many other peopleware18 practices have been identified many times as at least equally important to the success of software projects as the technical14,16,18,42,44,45,46. The reasons for this may be two-fold: the seeming arbitrariness of the sociological factors in software development is at odds with the formal and familiar technical aspects; and the lack of suitable tools with which to model and understand human dynamics...

Systems thinking is a way of thinking that focuses on the relationships between the parts forming a purposeful whole. System dynamics is concerned with building computer models of complex problem situations and then experimenting with and studying the behaviour of these models over time. This paper is a review of systems thinking that considers its unique history and influences, paradigms and methodologies, and presents a case for the system dynamics methodology as the best tool for the most diverse range of problem situations

Artificial intelligence and data mining techniques have been used in many domains to solve classification, segmentation, association, diagnosis, and prediction problems. The overall aim of this special issue is to open a discussion among researchers actively working on algorithms and applications. The issue covers a wide variety of problems for computational intelligence, machine learning, time series analysis, remote sensing image mining, and pattern recognition. After a rigorous peer review process, 20 papers have been selected from 38 submissions. The accepted papers in this issue addressed the following topics: (i) advanced artificial intelligence and data mining techniques; (ii) computational intelligence in dynamic and uncertain environments; (iii) machine learning on massive datasets; (iv) time series data analysis; (v) Spatial data mining: algorithms and applications.

In response to real and perceived short-comings in the quality and productivity of software engineering practices and projects, professionally-endorsed graduate and post-graduate curriculum guides have been developed to meet technical developments and evolving industry demands. Each of these curriculum guidelines identifies better software project management skills as critical for all graduating students, but they provide little guidance on how to achieve this. One possible way is to use a serious game - a game designed to teach and educate players about some of the dynamic complexities of the field in a safe and inexpensive environment. This paper presents the results of a qualitative research project that used a simple game of a software project to see if and how games could contribute to better software project management education. Initial results suggest that suitably-designed games are able to teach software engineering and project management concepts at higher-order Bloom taxonomy levels.

In response to real and perceived short-comings in the quality and productivity of software engineering practices and projects, professionally-endorsed graduate and post-graduate curriculum guides have been developed to meet evolving technical developments and industry demands. Each of these curriculum guidelines identifies better software engineering management skills and soft, peopleware skills as critical for all graduating students, but they provide little guidance on how to achieve this. One possible way is to use a serious game — a game designed to educate players about some of the dynamic complexities of the field in a safe and inexpensive environment. This thesis presents the results of a qualitative research project that used a simple game of a software project to see if and how games could contribute to better software project management education; and if they could, then what features and attributes made them most efficacious. That is, shall we— should we— play games in software engineering management? The primary research tool for this project was a game called Simsoft. Physically, Simsoft comes in two pieces. There is an A0-sized printed game board around which the players gather to discuss the current state of their project and to consider their next move. The board shows the flow of the game while plastic counters are used to represent the staff of the project. Poker chips represent the team’s budget, with which they can purchase more staff, and from which certain game events may draw or reimburse amounts depending on decisions made during the course of the game. There is also a simple Java-based dashboard, through which the players can see the current and historical state of the project in a series of reports and messages; and they can adjust the project’s settings. The engine behind Simsoft is a system dynamics model which embodies the fundamental causal relationships of simple software development projects. In Simsoft game sessions, teams of studen

This paper proposes a new modeling technique called B-Nodes. B-Nodes represent a new, high-level abstraction that allows technical detail to be controlled using top-down recursive decomposition. This abstraction. is independent of architectural detail and can therefore accommodate rapid changes in technology. The use of recursive decomposition allows B-Nodes to be used not only for entire e-commerce system but also sub-modules within this system. The use of fundamental units allows the performance of heterogeneous technologies to be compared and other units to be derived. Results to date indicate no comparable model exists. Should further work validate this technique the authors recommend its use as a standard technique in information systems analysis and design

AlKahtani, S. J. H., Xia, J. C., Veenendaaland, B., Caulfield, C., & Hughes, M. (2015). Building a conceptual framework for determining individual differences of accessibility to tourist attractions. Tourism Management Perspectives, 16, 28-42. Available here

Xia J., Caulfield C., Ferns S. (2015). Work-integrated learning: linking research and teaching for a win-win situation. Studies in Higher Education. Available here