Professor Shah J Miah

This chapter reviews methods to develop a decision support system (DSS) for small business managers. The primary objective is to support managers, making strategic decisions for achieving competitive advantages in the business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce environment. Many researchers in the DSS domain utilized various methods to design information systems (IS) solution, mostly intended for large businesses. None of the researchers have considered the business environment as a knowledge source for DSS development of small business strategic decision support needs. User-centered design (UCD) and design science research (DSR) method were adopted for DSS development. DSR was appropriate because it addresses the real-world application environment where research problem or opportunity are defined. Multiple case studies and web content analysis were carried out for understanding business problems, needs, and system requirements. This study used the qualitative and descriptive data analysis methods. The findings suggested developing a DSS solution to meet the small business strategic needs.

This chapter reviews methods to develop a decision support system (DSS) for small business managers. The primary objective is to support managers, making strategic decisions for achieving competitive advantages in the business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce environment. Many researchers in the DSS domain utilized various methods to design information systems (IS) solution, mostly intended for large businesses. None of the researchers have considered the business environment as a knowledge source for DSS development of small business strategic decision support needs. User-centered design (UCD) and design science research (DSR) method were adopted for DSS development. DSR was appropriate because it addresses the real-world application environment where research problem or opportunity are defined. Multiple case studies and web content analysis were carried out for understanding business problems, needs, and system requirements. This study used the qualitative and descriptive data analysis methods. The findings suggested developing a DSS solution to meet the small business strategic needs.

Technology development for process enhancement has been a topic to many health organizations and researchers over the past decades. In particular, on decision support aids of healthcare professional, studies suggest paramount interests for developing technological intervention to provide better decisionsupport options. This chapter introduces a combined requirement of developing intelligent decisionsupport approach through the application of business intelligence and cloud-based functionalities. Both technological approaches demonstrate their usage to meet growing end users' demands through their innovative features in healthcare. As such, the main emphasis in the chapter goes after outlining a conceptual approach of demand-driven cloud-based business intelligence for meeting the decision-support needs in a hypothetical problem domain in the healthcare industry, focusing on the decision-support system development within a non-clinical context for individual end-users or patients who need decision support for their well-being and independent everyday living.

Computational Intelligence (CI) has become a well-established research field of computer science in which multi-disciplinary problems are studied to design an effective computing solution. As a known computer-based CI approach, decision support systems (DSS) has gained popularity as a computing solution to structured and unstructured problems in organizations' managerial improvement. DSS design needs to meet the domain-specific demands of emergency professionals on both an on-site and a real-time basis using the support of the most up-to-date technological provisioning platform. The advantages of cloud computing may offer promising support (e.g. Internet or web-based provisioning) for DSS services to meet the emergency professionals' decision needs. This chapter introduces requirements of a cloud-based CI approach for domain-specific decision support through the functionalities on an anywhere and anytime basis. The chapter highlights the context of intelligent DSS design in terms of support in determining the priorities of taking action, both for medical emergency professionals and natural disasters workers, as potential application areas identified in this study. © 2012, IGI Global.

Web 2.0 is a new way of using existing Web resources interactively, and has attracted growing interest from the Web community, and more recently from businesses. However, there are emerging issues associated with security with the use of Web 2.0. This chapter provides an overview of Web 2.0 and outlines the security issues with Mashups and other applications within the Web 2.0 environment. © 2011, IGI Global.

AI (Artificial intelligence) has the potential to improve strategies to talent management by implementing advanced automated systems for workforce management. AI can make this improvement a reality. The objective of this study is to discover the new requirements for generating a new AI-oriented artefact so that the issues pertaining to talent management are effectively addressed. The design artefact is an intelligent Human Resource Management (HRM) automation solution for talent career management primarily based on a talent intelligent module. Improving connections between professional assessment and planning features is the key goal of this initiative. Utilising a design science methodology we investigate the use of organised machine learning approaches. This technique is the key component of a complete AI solution framework that would be further informed through a suggested moderation of technology-organisation-environment (TOE) theory with the theory of diffusion of innovation (DOI). This framework was devised in order solve AI-related problems. Aside from the automated components available in talent management solutions, this study will make recommendations for practical approaches researchers may follow to fulfil a company¿s specific requirements for talent growth.

Applications of clinical decision support systems (CDSS) have become essential for physicians seeking to make appropriate decisions. The implementation of CDSS, however, is complicated if the factors affecting physician¿s acceptance are not recognised. This study aims to explore the various factors that may influence the acceptance of CDSS in Saudi Arabia. A qualitative method was used to collect data from interviews with 54 GPs, with interviews conducted in three stages. The study then integrated the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) and Task-Technology Fit (TTF) models to communicate the findings. It is suggested that all factors of both UTAUT and TTF influence acceptance of CDSS by GPs, with the sole exception of the social influence factor. Some additional factors were also discovered by means of in-depth interviews, including accessibility, patient satisfaction, informativeness (increased knowledge), connectedness (informing patients), communication and shared knowledge, privacy and security, and perceived risk (functional performance risk and time risk). The study thus offers a new insight of the factors influencing GPs¿ acceptance of CDSS.

The aim of this research is to assess the reliability of venue check-in data. We focus on resident mobility and assess how venue check-in¿data can provide valuable insights into residents¿ movement in tourist destinations. Understanding resident¿s mobility and related activities is necessary for strategic planning and decision making for destination managers. Venue-referenced social media data (VR-SMD) is a new type of data and can provide insights into resident¿s mobility and behavior. While VR-SMD is available on various social media platforms, their reliability to capture resident movement and activities has not been fully realized. We present an analytical approach to assess and demonstrate how VR-SMD, specifically venue check-in data, can be used to capture resident mobility and activities, with illustrative examples from the United States of America, United Kingdom, and Singapore. Results and analysis indicate that tourism managers and government organizations can exploit VR-SMD for domestic tourism development.

Given its multi-faceted nature, consumer research has evinced interest from scholars both within and outside the marketing domain, resulting in ongoing knowledge contributions from a diverse range of disciplines. We conduct a comprehensive review and comparison across both marketing (¿inside¿) and non-marketing (¿outside¿) disciplines to identify which topics are most and least focused on within each disciplinary domain and which are emerging as the most impactful. We also identify which of the marketing (FT50) journals are at the forefront of cutting-edge research and demonstrate their contributions to the progression of the most impactful topics in the field. Based on our findings, we identify key gaps and under-researched areas of substantive interest, highlight impactful emerging topics in non-marketing journals where marketing could offer unique perspectives, and provide concrete suggestions and directions to further progress and stimulate consumer research.

The hospitality and tourism sector has long played a significant role in Australia¿s economy, especially in regional areas. Due to the onslaught of COVID-19, numerous businesses have experienced lockdowns, restrictions, and closures due to the fact that people¿s activity in restaurants, shopping centers, and recreational destinations was restricted, and many other places went into hibernation. After about 2¿years since the outbreak, businesses in this sector are gradually starting to reopen and revitalize themselves, but in order to have better decision support about the future of this sector, thus being able to plan, businesses are suffering from an effective analytics solution due to the lack of broken data trends. Starting from fresh day-to-day real-time big data, the study aims to develop a new data analytics model, adopting the design science research methodology, which can provide invaluable options and techniques to make prediction easier from immediate past datasets. This study introduces an innovative design artifact as a big data solution for hospitality managers to utilize analytics for predictive strategic decision-making in post-COVID situation. The artifact can also be generalized for other sectors with tailoring aspects which are subject to further studies. The proposed artifact is then compared with other design artifacts related to big data solutions where it outperforms them in terms of comprehensiveness. The proposed artifact also shows promises for primarily available UGC in managers¿ decision support aids.

Designing effective methods of retrieving evidence-based clinical information for healthcare professionals¿ decision making have always been challenging tasks for researchers in this field. Relevant existing studies have indicated significant limitations of implementing context-sensitive information retrieval services in healthcare organizations, but attempts are yet at their emergent stage for designing research-based solutions. In this paper, we design a new information retrieval architecture as a solution artifact useful in healthcare organizations for improving their information retrieval practices. Under the design science research paradigm, we outline a combined methodology that comprises design science research, design thinking and systems thinking for operating an iterative guiding process for developing and evaluating the new information retrieval approach. A total of 13 requirements that are linked to user-oriented theory of information need and fitness-utility model are captured. The new architecture is evaluated for its usefulness and fitness-utility using multi-case in-depth interviews that satisfy formalizing prescriptive knowledge on information retrieval.

Blockchain hasbecome a widely used information system technology recently because of its effectiveness as an intermediary-free platform. While the use of blockchain in various fields, such as finance, supply chains, healthcare, education, and energy consumption, is increasingly enabling the development of Internet-enabled ¿distributed databases,¿ there are not many exploratory studies available to provide an understanding of how the field is progressing. Therefore, it is imperative to explore the status quo of blockchain technology in the finance sector, particularly highlighting how blockchain architectures can aid the finance sector to gain competitive advantage. This systematic literature review analyzes the content of the 50 most relevant articles and professional industry reports through peer-reviewed relevant academic literature in the finance sector from 2008 to 2022 to identify several possible features of blockchain research in the financial sector. This study highlighted the dimensions of blockchain technology, blockchain in finance, its competitive advantages, the current status of finance, and various challenges that keep the implementation of blockchain-based financial information systems at the initial stage. We identified three main areas that require research attention in order for blockchain technology to become the ¿next-generation networks¿ that will revolutionize the financial sector.

The study focuses on usability provisions of learning management systems (LMS) in a corrective service organization. Under the influence of goal-directed interaction design principles in design science, the study outlines a new innovative artifact as a conceptual LMS solution that addresses the employee-centric learning model. The collective artifact represents relevant design knowledge assistive to meeting stakeholders¿ contextual learning needs, for instance, demonstrating the potential significance of the developed mobile-based approach to support correctional officers in improving their learning on safety professional development. The paper concludes with a practical model that could be applied to assist correctional officers in their in-house training purposes.

Information governance (IG) embraces underlying necessities to organize information using consistent method for meeting organizational needs. This demand has proliferated over the past few years to any organization, including universities. However, due to the poor nature of information management systems in Nigerian universities, there is a significant need to explore the possibilities of IG implementation. Even though various factors affect IG success, these have not been investigated yet, particularly in the context of the Nigerian university system. The objective of this study is to identify key factors necessary for IG implementation in universities. A qualitative research using a case study approach was used with a semi-structured interview technique to elicit findings from the domain of information and record management in case universities. Findings were qualitatively analyzed using ATLAS-ti 7.0 software for developing meaningful interpretations. Research findings embraced key factors including user expertise, funding, technology; org. facilities, and security, which are the necessities of leading to successful IG implementation.

Contemporary industry practices must be appropriately reflected in designing modern-day teaching and learning programmes. Existing studies are limited to systematic methodologies for accumulating contemporary practice requirements and using that data to inform the design of educational programmes, even though various, local approaches for doing so often exist in higher education institutions. Going beyond this and adopting design-based research (DBR) principles, this paper introduces industry practitioner perspectives of contemporary- practice need for conceptualisation and design of a new business master¿s degree programme. Outlining industry-demand as a driving force in stimulating a new business data-analytics programme at a medium-sized Australian metropolitan university, the study utilises open-ended interviews with five senior data analytics professionals to find a new matrix of industry expectations. The emerged elements are open-sourced tools based general technical knowledge; specific industry certifications or special skills; technology integration knowledge; cross-industry knowledge such as marketing; project management/agility and decision-making utilising appropriate supporting knowledge. Based on these findings, key learning objectives, an initial structure of the programme and specialisation subjects is proposed for further evaluation through convergent interviewing. We anticipated that the entire design process could be reusable for other similar situations for designing new practical courses in higher education sector.

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a global platform of Internet-connected smart devices that strengthens the supply chain ICT infrastructure for greater integration within an organisation and externally with suppliers and customers. However, the IoT literature so far remains theoretical and excessively focused on its technology and potential applications, with a very limited revelation of its operational benefits. Therefore, the study explores the ground reality of IoT impact on supply chain integration and performance. Twelve semi-structured interviews with managers from the Australian retail industry were thematically analysed using NVivo. The findings reveal that multiple IoT forms provide additional capabilities in data auto-capture, visibility, intelligence, and information sharing for greater integration of retail supply chains. That, in turn, enhances supply chain performance in cost, quality, delivery, and flexibility dimensions to improve firm financial, social, and environmental sustainability. The study outlines the theoretical and practical contributions arising from the deployment of IoT.

In this research various concepts from network theory and topic modelling are combined, to provision a temporal network of associated topics. This solution is presented as a step-by-step process to facilitate the evaluation of latent topics from unstructured text, as well as the domain area that textual documents are sourced from. In addition to ensuring shifts and changes in the structural properties of a given corpus are visible, non-stationary classes of cooccurring topics are determined, and trends in topic prevalence, positioning, and association patterns are evaluated over time. The aforementioned capabilities extend the insights fostered from stand-alone topic modelling outputs, by ensuring latent topics are not only identified and summarized, but more systematically interpreted, analysed, and explained, in a transparent and reliable way.

Awareness and access to information on travel benefits may bear importance for tourist preference in selecting popular destination. Tourism businesses are continuously exploring to improve their competitive advantage and offering an effective method for assisting tourist in electing their preferred destinations. However, current studies are still at an emergent stage. This paper presents a tourists preferences dataset and introduces preference pattern mining (PPM) method as a solution framework for discovering tourist spots. Our PPM method finds and validates the most active tourist hot spots from tourist preferences dataset. The proposed framework facilitates an unbiased approach for optimal tourism destination management in tourism-friendly countries.

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a global network of smart devices that integrate physical and digital worlds. While the IoT is reported to be a foundation technology for the emerged Industry 4.0 era, empirical evidence related to IoT use in supply chain management is scant. This study, therefore, investigates the opportunities and challenges of IoT use in the supply chains using grounded theory based interviews with managers from the Australian retail industry. The thematic analysis using NVivo reveals that IoT deployment improves visibility of goods movement, data capture, partner communication, and business intelligence. However, retailers face challenges due to the lack of top management initiative, new technology acquisition cost, stakeholders' reluctance to accept change, unwillingness to share data, and inadequate interoperability between partner systems. The study offers a proof-of-concept of IoT benefits that strengthen the IoT-related investment decision, sheds light on adoption challenges and develops propositions for future research.

Background: Recent studies in information systems have predicted that applications of the Internet of Things (IoT) innovations will revolutionise various sectors including healthcare. Besides the issues and opportunities of IoT based innovations, existing studies have shown limitations to advance the adoption of IoT-understanding and relevant interventions to benefit researchers and healthcare practitioners. Method: In this context, a systematic literature review study was conducted to re-position a qualitative, phenomenological investigation that could offer useful insights into the factors affecting IoT-adoption in a developing country¿s healthcare service. In addition to it, five participants who worked in hospitals and clinics in Jazan, Saudi Arabia, took part in the semi-structured interviews developed based on the diffusion of innovation theory. Results: The study explored the relevant literature and evaluated how the outcome is used to identify the key delivers of IoT in healthcare. Conclusions: According to the findings, the capacity of the Saudi healthcare sector to accept and implement a new IT with IoT technologies is increasing and its integrations remains a debated issue.

Background: The purpose of this paper is to explore the underlying challenges in the telehealth environment in India and Pakistan that impede the delivery of high-quality images between a patient and health care professional. Method: An exploratory study was conducted among healthcare professionals in India and Pakistan to assess their perceptions regarding image quality, which is used for the diagnosis and treatment decision making. This cross-sectional qualitative study used semi-structured interviews with healthcare professionals in both India and Pakistan. Results: The interviews were analyzed using a thematic analysis, which revealed three major themes. These themes being: ICT infrastructure and connectivity, expertise of persons taking images, and multiple transmission degrading image quality. Conclusions: Findings indicate that in both countries, the main underlying challenge is the lack of consistency in the network infrastructure between urban, rural and remote areas. Additionally, training patients to use hand-held devices to take high-quality images could hold the key to improving the reliability and, consequently, the quality of images transmitted between patients and health care professionals.

Adopting modern methods for delivering teaching has been a great topic area of research in Higher education (HE). With the advancement of information and communication technologies towards accomplishing various contemporary demands such as Industry 4.0, online-based education has been explored to a greater extent, however, they are still limited. More recently, due to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, online teaching and assessment have become unprecedentedly mandatory in many HE settings. However, with online technologies, there arise new issues and concerns that impact educational quality. In this paper, we focus on the challenges associated with electronic examinations or online exams in HE and the strategies to address them. Using a design-based research approach we design, implement, and evaluate an innovative framework for online exams within a context of an Australian HE mixed-sector. We conduct an exploratory study on the quality of the process flow of the proposed Online Exam for Bachelor of Information Technology (OEBIT) framework. A triangulation of both qualitative data from focus groups and quantitative data from student outcomes provides the validity of data and confirms the completeness of the results. The successful deployment of our generalized framework with a smooth transition from pen-paper-based examination to online exam during the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrates its real-life application.

Purpose: Student attritions in tertiary educational institutes may play a significant role to achieve core values leading towards strategic mission and financial well-being. Analysis of data generated from student interaction with learning management systems (LMSs) in blended learning (BL) environments may assist with the identification of students at risk of failing, but to what extent this may be possible is unknown. However, existing studies are limited to address the issues at a significant scale. Design/methodology/approach: This study develops a new approach harnessing applications of machine learning (ML) models on a dataset, that is publicly available, relevant to student attrition to identify potential students at risk. The dataset consists of the data generated by the interaction of students with LMS for their BL environment. Findings: Identifying students at risk through an innovative approach will promote timely intervention in the learning process, such as for improving student academic progress. To evaluate the performance of the proposed approach, the accuracy is compared with other representational ML methods. Originality/value: The best ML algorithm random forest with 85% is selected to support educators in implementing various pedagogical practices to improve students¿ learning.

The blood donation process is usually very safe, and blood donors are comfortable during the blood donation procedure; however, blood donors occasionally experience various types of adverse reactions during or at the end of blood donation. Some of these reactions are very minor while blood donors sometimes experience serious reactions as well. This study aims to analyze the various types of adverse reactions experienced by the blood donors. The study conducts detailed analysis on a significant amount of real data collected through a blood organization in the southern part of the United States and provides the results regarding the frequency and types of adverse reactions based on multiple attributes such as age, gender, and donation type.

Purpose: Technologies continue to disrupt logistics and freight transport (known as smart logistics), but their impacts on smart city sustainability is underinvestigated. Drawing on technology, organisation and environment (TOE) perspective, the objective of this study is to empirically investigate the hierarchical effects of smart logistics on smart city sustainable dimensions (i.e. environmental, social and economic). Design/methodology/approach: The study used cross-sectional survey to collect data from urban transporters, warehouse managers, retailers and information technology (IT) managers in Australia. Data were analysed using structural equation modeling (SEM) to test the hypothesised relationship between constructs of smart logistics and smart city sustainable performance. Findings: The findings reveal that information and communications technologies (ICTs) use and IT capability (ITC) have positive and significant effects on smart logistics. Technology-enabled smart logistics have an immediate positive effect on smart city environment, which in turn has positive impacts on social and economic performance. Practical implications: The study informs managers that smart logistics equipped with freight transport telematics can improve smart city environment through enhanced tracking and tracing of goods movement. The improved environmental stewardship is likely to support social and economic performance. Originality/value: Smart city research remains primarily theoretical and focussed on concerns surrounding sustainable growth amid urbanisation and digitalisation. City logistics and urban freights play key role in smart city economic growth, but vehicular pollution pose social and environmental challenges. Technology-assisted smart logistics are likely to improve smart city sustainable performance but yet to find how they affect each other.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the possible content of IG (Information Governance) framework for implementation in Nigerian universities so that emphases should be on the areas discovered by the study when planning for the framework for better information management in the universities. A qualitative research using case study approach on two Nigerian public universities using semi-structured interview technique was used to elicit data from stakeholders in records and information management systems (RIMS) regarding the research topic in the case study universities. Qualitative research analysis software ATLAS-ti 7.0 was used to aid the data analysis. Finding of the study suggests that IG implementation could alleviate enormous challenges of records and information management in the universities. Similarly, all issues regarding RIMS, personnel, technology, increase in the university population should be spelt out explicitly in the IG framework. The study offered recommendation for records management professionals and IG researchers to consider this research and articulate the views and experiences of stakeholders in RIMS regarding the four IG components explored.

Smart education research has been rapidly developed for transforming education systems leading to engage and empower students, educators and administrators more effectively. Despite decades of the adoption of new technologies in improving education systems, approaches are frequently criticized for lacking appropriate theoretical and technological basis. The aim of this paper is to describe the current state of smart education research as a theoretical substance for introducing an initial innovative approach called Students Career Assistance System (SCAS). We conduct systematic literature review for capturing necessary insights to establish the initial solution design understanding. A total of 40 selected sample articles were qualified through a selection criterion developed to identify the most relevant existing studies in the smart education domain. Content analysis technique was used for processing the meta-details as key findings. The key findings suggest that smart education is a rapidly evolving research field that complements applications of a range of latest technologies. Combining them, a new innovative framework of smart education artefact is introduced as a case demonstration, which is mainly a mobile-based SCAS enabling student to manage both their learning and career development for a better future.

Universities in Nigeria aim to be on global map with better international rankings. Unfortunately, they are plagued with inefficient administration and management due to poor management of records and information. Universities, most of the cases are failed to comply with the National Universities Commission, which resulted higher possibilities of revoking their licenses. The need for effective records and information management is imperative. Information Governance deals with managing records and information for providing a meaningful solution to present situation. The essence of this study is to explore the critical factors (CFs) for implementing Information Governance (IG) framework in Nigerian universities. A qualitative research using case study approach with semi-structured interview technique was used to elicit data from 11 stakeholders in records and information management regarding the research topic in the case study university. Software for qualitative research analysis ATLAS-ti 7.0 was used to aid the data analysis. The research found that CFs such as funding, stakeholder involvement, policy, enabling environment, personnel and, information and communication technologies (ICT) are vital in implementing IG for universities.

The study develops an artifact for decision support in capital raising campaigns that employs the power of social media analytics (SMA) to allow a better matching between investors and companies. The paper uses the design science approach to propose an artifact which pioneers the investment landscape by providing a method to focus investors¿ attention on a selected set of companies and identifying investors groups for targeted capital raising. The artifact is based on SMA that employs machine learning techniques to provide insights from unstructured social media data and textual data from capital raising campaigns. The study demonstrated the application of the artifact using data from CrowdCube to assist with decision-making during capital raising campaigns. The application of the artifact is further validated through the focus group evaluation. Unlike existing approaches, the proposed artifact views investors as heterogeneous groups with different preferences and needs identified through social media.

Background: Patient participation in the health care domain has surged dramatically through the availability of digital health platforms and online health communities (OHCs). Such patient-driven service innovation has both potential and challenges for health care organizations. Over the last 5 years, articles have surfaced that focus on value cocreation in health care services and the importance of engaging patients and other actors in service delivery. However, a theoretical understanding of how to use OHCs for this purpose is still underdeveloped within the health care service ecosystem. Objective: This paper aimed to introduce a theoretical discussion for better understanding of the potential of OHCs for health care organizations, in particular, for patient empowerment. Methods: This literature review study involved a comprehensive search using 12 electronic databases (EMBASE, PsycINFO, Web of Science, Scopus, ScienceDirect, Medical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System Online, PubMed, Elton B Stephens Co [academic], Cumulative Index of Nursing and Allied Health Literature, Accelerated Information Sharing for Law Enforcement, Association for Computing Machinery, and Google Scholar) from 2013 to 2019. A total of 1388 studies were identified from the database search. After removing duplicates and applying inclusion criteria, we thematically analyzed 56 articles using the Braun and Clarke thematic analysis approach. Results: We identified a list of 5 salient themes: Communication extension, improved health literacy for patients and health care organizations, communication transparency with patients, informational and social support for patients, and patient empowerment in self-management. The most frequent theme was communication extension, which covers 39% (22/56) of the literature. This theme reported that an extension of communication between patients, caregivers, and physicians and organizations led to new opportunities to create value with minimal time and cost restrictions. Improved health literacy and communication transparency with patients were the second and third most frequent themes, respectively, covering 26% (15/56) and 25% (14/56) of the literature, respectively. The frequency of these themes indicated that the use of OHCs to generate new knowledge from patients' interactions helped health care organizations to customize treatment plans and establish transparent and effective communication between health care organizations and patients. Furthermore, of the 56 studies, 13 (23%) and 10 (17%) studies contended the opportunity of using OHCs in terms of informational and emotional support and empowering patients in their self-management of diseases. Conclusions: This review enables better understanding of the current state of the art of the online value cocreation and its potential for health care organizations. This study found that the opportunities for health care organizations through enhancement of patient participation and their cocreation of value in digital health platforms have been rapidly increasing. The identified gaps and opportunities in this study would identify avenues for future directions in modernized and more effective value-oriented health care informatics research.

Although existing data science educational programmes develop talent and produce graduates, business-focused data science curricula comprising essential skills oriented to business and managerial data with associated analysis, remain underserved. Current pedagogy has focused either on data science or on purely analytic technical aspects. There is therefore, an opportunity to rethink how institutions can develop innovative data-focussed education programmes, addressing both modern industry and community demands. As both academia and industry strive to integrate applied learning, transferable and enterprise skills into business and sciences, this paper proposes a design based research approach (DBR) for designing such a new interdisciplinary data science teaching curriculum as a foundation to deliver business undergraduate degrees in Business Data Science. Adopting a design science method our proposed DBR illustrates effective utilities for conceptualising and evaluating a fully functional new degree programme - Bachelor of Business Data Science. Ten senior business information systems academics and five analytics industry practitioners in Victoria, Australia were interviewed in three iterative prototyping phases followed by a final focus group session with business information systems students that evaluated the proposed structure. The findings suggest that proposed DBR ensures the design of an innovative data science degree that may meet growing industry and interdisciplinary demands. The paper concludes by discussing overall feasibility of the proposal in the Australian higher education sector, particularly for the case context of an Australian University.

Healthcare analytics has been a rapidly emerging research domain in recent years. In general, healthcare solution design studies focus on developing analytic solutions that enhance product, process and practice values for clinical and non-clinical decision support. The objective of this study is to explore the scope of healthcare analytics research and in particular its utilisation of design and development methodologies. Using six prominent electronic databases, qualifying articles between 2010 and mid-2018 were sourced and categorised. A total of 52 articles on healthcare analytics solutions were selected for relevant content on public healthcare. The research team scrutinised the articles, using established content analysis protocols. Analysis identified that various methodologies have been used for developing analytics solutions, such as prototyping, traditional software engineering, agile approaches and others, but despite its clear advantages, few show the use of design science. Key topic areas are also identified throughout the content analysis suggesting topical research priorities in the field.

Research in Smart City development has proliferated over the past few years, focussing heavily on various supporting service sectors, such as healthcare. However, little effort has been made to design health surveillance support systems, which are also important for the advancement of public healthcare monitoring as an essential aspect of smart city initiatives. From an information system (IS) design perspective, this paper introduces a social mediabased health surveillance supporting method, which can automatically extract relevant online posts for health symptom prediction and management. We describe and demonstrate an IS design approach in this paper for hay-fever prediction solution concept based on Twitter posts. This concept could be developed into a fully functional solution design by practitioners in this field.

This paper presents a contemporary literature review to provide insights into the current health informatics literature. The objective of this study is to identify emerging directions of current health informatics research from the latest and existing studies in the health informatics domain. We analyse existing health informatics studies using a thematic analysis, so that justified sets of research agenda can be outlined on the basis of these findings. We selected articles that are published in the Science Direct online database. The selected 73 sample articles (published from 2016 to 2018 in premier health informatics journals) are considered as representative samples of health informatics studies. The analysis revealed ten topic areas and themes that would be of paramount importance for researchers and practitioners to follow. The findings provide an important foundational understanding for new health informatics studies.

Blockchain is treated as a ledger system that manages data and their transactions using time-stamped blocks through cryptography and works in a decentralised manner over the computing network. Although blockchain is originally used as a backbone for the cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, its capabilities and applications have yet to be extended far beyond cryptocurrencies. In this paper, through conducting a latest systematic literature review aiming to produce new source of evidence, we identify potential applications of the blockchain technologies in healthcare. The comprehensive review looks at the professional and academic open-sourced journals published between 2008 to 2019 to recognise the potential of blockchain based approaches in the purpose of healthcare information disseminations, as well as to segregate issues for the implementation and development of blockchain applications. We identify several major application domains that present research opportunities and challenges for the future advancements and directions for the benefits of IS researchers and professionals.

Mental health is an important determinant of communities¿ well-being, influenced not only by individual attributes, but also by social and organisational environments in which people work and live. Despite studies examining mental health status among specific populations, few attempts are evident that focus on solution designs for detecting and measuring impact of mental health conditions. In this study, we develop a construct utilising design science research principles for outlining common vocabulary around the problem, and solution design relevant to a mental health management system. For the case of IT professionals, the developed construct is informed through a social-media based dataset containing more than 65,000 cells and 100 attributes potentially identifying influencing factors. Machine learning techniques are applied to the dataset to discover new findings for this specific group. It is anticipated that the analysis reported in this study would contribute in developing other electronic health management systems both for communities and healthcare professionals.

Location analytics offers statistical analysis of any geo-or spatial data concerning user location. Such analytics can produce useful insights into the attractions of interest to travellers or visitation patterns of a demographic group. Based on these insights, strategic decision-making by travel marketing agents, such as travel package design, may be improved. In this paper, we develop and evaluate an original method of location analytics to analyse travellers' social media data for improving managerial decision support. The method proposes an architectural framework that combines emerging pattern data mining techniques with image processing to identify and process appropriate data content. The design artefact is evaluated through a focus group and a detailed case study of Australian outbound travellers. The proposed method is generic, and can be applied to other specific locations or demographics to provide analytical outcomes useful for strategic decision support.

Mobile technologies have created enormous opportunities for improving information delivery and dissemination processes among individuals. While studies of the mobile-based technologies in health and businesses have been proliferated, research on mobile applications for education are still at its emergent stage, however, for developing user-centric support to enhance individual¿s involvements in learning and teaching purposes. Moreover, formal methods of learning management systems (LMS) for supporting students and academics to achieve industry demands are still yet to be developed for higher education institutes. This study develops and evaluates an innovative mobile-based technology for enhancing current approaches of LMS by linking relevant industry into learning and teaching procedure in a case context of an Australian University. The solution artefact as a model can be viewed as an industry-enabled LMS that captures and processes data from students¿ teaching materials, exercises and participation contents in order to develop assistive information which is directly related to the employers¿ requirements. Design science method is adopted for designing and evaluating the solution artefact that meets the key requirements of the stakeholders. It is anticipated that the developed artefact would be applicable across Australian higher education sectors for enhancing industry uptake into improving pedagogy of learning.

Despite years of decision support systems (DSS) research, DSS artifacts are frequently criticized for lacking practitioner relevance and for neglecting configurability and contextual dynamism. Tailoring in end-user contexts can produce relevant emergent DSS artifacts, but design theory for this is lacking. Design science research (DSR) has important implications for improving DSS uptake, but generally this has not been promoted in the form of metadesigns with design principles applicable to other DSS developments. This paper describes a metadesign theory for tailorable DSS, generated through action design research studies in different primary industries. Design knowledge from a DSS developed in an agricultural domain was distilled and generalized into a design theory comprising: (1) a general solution concept (metadesign), and (2) five hypothesized design principles. These were then instantiated via a second development in which the metadesign and design principles were applied in a different domain (forestry) to produce a successful DSS, thus testing the metadesign and validating the design principles. In addition to contributing to DSR and illustrating innovation in tailorable technology, the paper demonstrates the utility of action design research to support theory development in DSS design.

The study investigates critical factors which are important to evaluate enterprise resource planning (ERP) in the post-implementation stage. A conceptual framework is proposed with a set of relevant hypotheses and a structural equation modeling is used to analyze the survey data using Smart-PLS package program. The results illustrate that post-implementation success factors are significant for assessing an overall impact of ERP post-implementation. Likewise, the possibility of business process performance is higher in a condition of when the systems are employed in a coordinated way. The findings may assist ERP professionals and developers in other countries for ERP implementation in future.

Objectives: Mobile health (m-Health) technologies may provide an appropriate follow-up support service for patient groups with post-treatment conditions. While previous studies have introduced m-Health methods for patient care, a smart system that may provide follow-up communication and decision support remains limited to the management of a few specific types of diseases. This paper introduces an m-Health solution in the current climate of increased demand for electronic information exchange. Methods: Adopting a novel design science research approach, we developed an innovative solution model for post-treatment follow-up decision support interaction for use by patients and physicians and then evaluated it by using convergent interviewing and focus group methods. Results: The cloud-based solution was positively evaluated as supporting physicians and service providers in providing post-treatment follow-up services. Our framework provides a model as an artifact for extending care service systems to inform better follow-up interaction and decision-making. Conclusions: The study confirmed the perceived value and utility of the proposed Clinical Decision Support artifact indicating that it is promising and has potential to contribute and facilitate appropriate interactions and support for healthcare professionals for future follow-up operationalization. While the prototype was developed and tested in a developing country context, where the availability of doctors is limited for public healthcare, it was anticipated that the prototype would be user-friendly, easy to use, and suitable for post-treatment follow-up through mobility in remote locations.

Background: Practicing evidence-based health care is challenging because of overwhelming results presented to practitioners by Google-like Web-scale discovery (WSD) services that index millions of resources while retrieving information based on relevancy algorithms with limited consideration for user information need. Objective: On the basis of the user-oriented theory of information need and following design science principles, this study aimed to develop and evaluate an innovative contextual model for information retrieval from WSD services to improve evidence-based practice (EBP) by health care practitioners. Methods: We identified problems from literature to support real-world requirements for this study. We used design science research methodology to guide artefact design. We iteratively improved prototype of the context model using artificial formative evaluation. We performed naturalistic summative evaluation using convergent interviewing of health care practitioners and content analysis from a confirmatory focus group consisting of health researchers to evaluate the model's validity and utility. Results: The study iteratively designed and applied the context model to a WSD service to meet 5 identified requirements. All 5 health care practitioners interviewed found the artefact satisfied the 5 requirements to successfully evaluate the model as having validity and utility. Content analysis results from the confirmatory focus group mapped top 5 descriptors per requirement to support a true hypothesis that there is significant discussion among participants to justify concluding that the artefact had validity and utility. Conclusions: The context model for WSD satisfied all requirements and was evaluated successfully for information retrieval to improve EBP. Outcomes from this study justify further research into the model.

Purpose: Theorising from the intersection of supply chain and information systems (IS) literature, this study aims to investigate supply chain integration (SCI) as a multidimensional construct in the context of cloud-based technology and explores the effect of cloud-enabled SCI on supply chain performance, which will eventually improve firm sustainability from a resource-based view (RBV). In addition, the moderating effect of top management is explored. Design/methodology/approach: Using cross-sectional survey data collected from a sample of 105 Australian retail firms, this study used structural equation modelling to test the hypothesised relationship of cloud-enabled SCI with performance in a theoretical model. Findings: Results show that cloud-based technology has positive effect on SCI, and the cloud-enabled SCI is positively related to supply chain performance which eventually influenced firm sustainability. Further, top management intervention moderates the relationship between supplier and internal integration with supply chain performance. But it is found to have no moderating effect on the relationship between customer integration and supply chain performance. Practical implications: Recognising the potential benefits of emerging cloud-based technologies reported in this study, retail managers need to understand that higher order SCI requires the support of cloud-based technology to improve supply chain performance and firm sustainability. Originality/value: This research extends prior research of information and communication technologies-enabled SCI and its effect on supply chain performance which overly remains inconsistent. In addition, IS literature abounds with discussion on cloud computing technology per se, and its adoption in supply chain is overly rhetoric. This study fills this gap by conceptualising the multiple dimensions of SCI enabled by cloud-based technology and the way it affects supply chain and firm sustainable performance. Investigating SCI in context of cloud-based technology is a unique contribution in this study. The moderating effect of top management in this decision also adds to the current body of literature.

The Internet of things (IoT) is a next generation of Internet connected embedded ICT systems in a digital environment to seamlessly integrate supply chain and logistics processes. Integrating emerging IoT into the current ICT systems can be unique because of its intelligence, autonomous and pervasive applications. However, research on the IoT adoption in supply chain domain is scarce and acceptance of the IoT into the retail services in specific has been overly rhetoric. This study is drawn upon the organisational capability theory for developing an empirical model considering the effect of IoT capabilities on multiple dimensions of supply chain process integration, and in turn improves supply chain performance as well as organisational performance. Cross-sectional survey data from 227 Australian retail firms was analysed using structural equation modelling (SEM). The results indicate that IoT capability has a positive and significant effect on internal, customer-, and supplier-related process integration that in turn positively affects supply chain performance and organisational performance. Theoretically, the study contributes to a body of knowledge that integrates information systems research into supply chain integration by establishing an empirical evidence of how IoT-enabled process integration can enhance the performance at both supply chain and organisational level. Practically, the results inform the managers of the likely investment on IoT that can lead to chain's performance outcome.

Business intelligence (BI) has proliferated due to its growing application for business decision support. Research on organizational factors may offer significant use in BI implementation. However, a limited number of studies focus on organizational factors for revealing adverse impacts on effective decision support. The aim of this theoretical study is to conduct a literature analysis to identify organizational factors relevant to BI implementation. Through a systematic literature review, a qualitative content analysis on 49 relevant sample articles for generating themes inductively is adopted to reveal organizational factors. Findings suggest two contexts: Information management that integrates factors such as technological capability and personnel capability and organizational context that integrates factors such as organizational capability, managerial decision, and organizational culture for facilitating embedding information management capability for BI implementation in businesses. It is hoped that these contextual understanding can be useful for further BI implementations.

This article reviews methods to the development of a decision support system (DSS) solution for small business owners/managers. The main objective of designing the DSS artefact is to support the strategic decision-making for achieving competitive advantages in the business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce environment. Many researchers in the DSS domain utilised various methods to design of information systems (IS) artefact, mostly intended for large businesses. Researchers have paid much attention to the business environment as a knowledge source for DSS design and development for the small business strategic decision support needs. User-centred design (UCD) principles were adopted for DSS development. Prior a novel DSS development, multiple case studies were carried out for understanding the user needs and system requirements. Also, knowledge was sourced from the external business environment via the analysis of small business website features against their overseas competitors. The findings suggested developing a DSS solution for small business needs.

Emerging digital technologies for healthcare information support have already contributed to reducing the digital divide among rural communities. Although mobile health (m-health) applications facilitate provision of support for treatment consultation in real-time, their substantial potential has not yet been operationalised for decision support to meet citizen demand in developing nations. Modern healthcare information access, especially in rural areas of developing countries, is critical to effective healthcare, since both information and expert opinions are limited. Mobile phone and social media penetration, however, is often extensive. In this paper, we design and evaluate an innovative mobile decision support system (MDSS) solution for rural citizens healthcare decision support and information dissemination. Developed using a design science approach, the instantiated artifact connects underserved rural patients in Bangladesh to general practitioners (GPs) ¿ allowing GPs, based on queries and information support provided, to evaluate patient conditions virtually and provide answers for further diagnosis or treatment. A cloud platform using social media embodies health record information and is used with a rating technique that matches queries to profiled remote experts, participating asynchronously. A comprehensive evaluation of the MDSS artifact ensures its utility, efficacy, and reliability.

Whilst researchers and professionals recognise that mobile health (M-health) systems offer unprecedented opportunities, most existing work has comprised individual project-based developments in specialised areas. Existing review articles generally utilise medical literature and categories: none investigates M-health from an information systems (IS) design point of view. Identifying application areas, design issues and IS research techniques will demonstrate models, issues, approaches and gaps to inform future research. A comprehensive analysis of the literature from this viewpoint is thus valuable, both for theoretical progression and for guiding real-world innovative system developments. Drawing from key IS and healthcare multidisciplinary journals we analyse recent (2010¿2016) articles concerning M-health application developments and their associated design or development issues, with particular focus on the use of contemporary research methods. Our analysis suggests that M-health is an emerging field to which, although underused, contemporary approaches such as design science research are particularly appropriate. We identify eight application categories, eleven design issues (security, privacy, literacy, accessibility, acceptability, reliability, usability, confidentiality, integrity, knowledge sharing and flexibility) as well as the stakeholders and development techniques involved. This goes beyond previous frameworks, and theoretically integrates the central role of IS design within the sub-field.

Big data generated across social media sites have created numerous opportunities for bringing more insights to decision-makers. Few studies on big data analytics, however, have demonstrated the support for strategic decision-making. Moreover, a formal method for analysing social media-generated big data for decision support is yet to be developed, particularly in the tourism sector. Using a design science research approach, this study aims to design and evaluate a ¿big data analytics¿ method to support strategic decision-making in tourism destination management. Using geotagged photos uploaded by tourists to the photo-sharing social media site, Flickr, the applicability of the method in assisting destination management organisations to analyse and predict tourist behavioural patterns at specific destinations is shown, using Melbourne, Australia, as a representative case. Utility was confirmed using both another destination and directly with stakeholder audiences. The developed artefact demonstrates a method for analysing unstructured big data to enhance strategic decision making within a real problem domain. The proposed method is generic, and its applicability to other big data streams is discussed.

Advances in telecommunication and online service solutions help to bridge the digital divide between rural and urban healthcare services, enabling provision of suitable medical diagnosis and treatment consultations. Although applying e-health solutions has brought some positive impact full potential has not yet been realised, especially in regions where expertise is scarce. In this study we develop and evaluate an e-health consultancy system utilizing cloud computing (we so called "On-Cloud Healthcare Clinic") that enables doctors and healthcare workers to identify and treat non-communicable diseases in rural and remote communities in Bangladesh, a developing nation. Adopting a design science research approach we developed the solution based around stakeholders' collaborative participation in prototyping and then evaluated the design using focus groups. The cloud-based solution supports doctors in evaluating and diagnosing patients' data and medical history through intermediary health care workers or community clinics. The design also knowledgeably allows informed decisions on a course of treatment with follow up for remote or underserved communities. Previously unavailable clinical work is thus practically achieved through utilization of the cloud based e-health system, and generalisation of this approach in healthcare management is discussed.

Higher education institutes such as universities suffer from a range of issues in managing their academic records and relevant digital contents. Many universities nowadays use specific software applications for their effective mechanism in records management. The effective provision of enterprises records management (ERM) software for managing records especially for maintaining research activities are of paramount importance to meet complex criteria outlined by the university. The purpose of this study is to describe the design of a locally-innovated Electronic Document and Records Management Systems (EDRMS) implementation for managing academic records in the context of a Malaysian University. The lessons learned from the design study can be applicable for improving relevant technologies for record keepings in other similar enterprises.

The knowledge of design science research (DSR) can have applications for improving expert systems (ES) development research. Although significant progress of utilising DSR has been observed in particular information systems design ¿ such as decision support systems (DSS) studies ¿ only rare attempts can be found in the ES design literature. Therefore, the aim of this study is to investigate the use of DSR for ES design. First, we explore the ES development literature to reveal the presence of DSR as a research methodology. For this, we select relevant literature criteria and apply a qualitative content analysis in order to generate themes inductively to match the DSR components. Second, utilising the findings of the comparison, we determine a new DSR approach for designing a specific ES that is guided by another result ¿ the findings of a content analysis of examination scripts in Mathematics. The specific ES artefact for a case demonstration is designed for addressing the requirement of a ¿wicked¿ problem in that the key purpose is to assist human assessors when evaluating multi-step question (MSQ) solutions. It is anticipated that the proposed design knowledge, in terms of both problem class and functions of ES artefacts, will help ES designers and researchers to address similar issues for designing information system solutions.

This paper presents a contemporary literature review of design science research (DSR) studies in the domain of decision support systems (DSS) development. The latest studies in the DSS design domain claim that DSR methodologies are the most popular design approach, but many details are still yet to be revealed for supporting this claim. In particular, it is important to thoroughly investigate the trends in either the form or deeper insights in use of DSR in this field. The aim of this study is to analyse the existing DSS design science studies to reveal insights into the use of DSR, so that we can outline research agenda for a special issue, based on findings of analysis. We selected articles (from 2005 to 2014) that were published in seven selected premier IS journals (ranked as A* in the ABDC journal ranking). The selected 57 sample articles are representative of DSS design studies that used DSR in theorising, designing, implementing, and evaluating DSS solutions. We discuss the theoretical positions of DSR for DSS development through six categories: DSS artefacts, DSR methods, DSR views, user involvement, DSS design innovations and problem domains. The findings indicate that new studies are needed to fill the knowledge gap in DSS design science, for more solid theoretical basis in near future

Assessment has been defined as an authentic method that plays an important role in evaluating students¿ learning attitude in acquiring lifelong knowledge. Traditional methods of assessment including the Computer-Aided Assessment (CAA) for mathematics show limited ability to assess students¿ full work unless multi-step questions are sub-divided into sub questions. This issue persisted significant drawback especially within the notion of method marking approach. To address this issue, the aim of the study is to develop a methodological framework that will create an information and communications technology (ICT) artefact prototype. The prototype (termed as method marking assessment (MMA) artefact) implements a method-marking assessment concept to assess through multi-step questions. Extensive literature reviews have revealed that there are features in common between complex-problem solution characteristics and multi-steps questions assessment using ICT; therefore complex problems paradigm is used in the study for developing the MMA prototype.

This article proposes the simplified trust-reputation model that relates attributional trust and issue resolution to corporate reputation. In effect, individuals on a project are very forgiving of supply chain members with regard to issues because of concern for their company's reputation. Hence, while trust may vary, there was no breakdown in trust because this would affect their company's reputation as a good partner. Furthermore, although there was a reported variance in trust by the project managers, it did not affect the project's outcome, but it did affect the ease of doing business.

Purpose ¿ This study aims to describe an assessment methodology of e-Government readiness through an empirical study that investigates collaborative needs in operating effective governance at root-level public service delivery in a developing country context. Broader methodology that accommodates collective functions of the government should be used while assessing the readiness of e-Government implementation. Design/methodology/approach ¿ The study is based on interview data collected from a total of 13 government officials, 21 elected representatives and 106 targeted citizens in the local government of Bangladesh. Findings ¿ Through a qualitative case study, this paper empirically investigated a proposition of e-Government readiness within local government cases. The findings of the study may help rectify existing assessment methodologies in e-Government implementation. Research limitations/implications ¿ The data analysis used a collaborative perspective subjectively rather than focusing on the objective manner to capture technological aspects. Practical implications ¿ This finding could benefit various e-Government initiatives in developing countries, especially for addressing critical collaborative needs of e-Government implementation. Social implications ¿ The findings of the paper represent social perspectives of new e-Government system implementation. Originality/value ¿ The study proposed a holistic methodology of e-Government readiness assessment that can broaden existing assessment methodologies.

Purpose-The knowledge of artefact design in design science research can have an important application in the improvement of decision support systems (DSS) development research. Recent DSS literature has identified a significant need to develop user-centric DSS method for greater relevance with respect to context of use. The purpose of this paper is to develop a collective DSS design artefact as method in a practical industry context. Design/methodology/approach-Under the influence of goal-directed interaction design principles the study outlines the innovative DSS artefact based on design science methodology to deliver a cutting-edge decision support solution, which provides user-centric provisions through the use of design environment and ontology techniques. Findings-The DSS artefact as collective information technology applications through the application of design science knowledge can effectively be designed to meet decision makers¿ contextual needs in an agricultural industry context. Research limitations/implications-The study has limitations in that it was developed in a case study context and remains to be fully tested in a real business context. It is also assumed that the domain decisions can be parameterised and represented using a constraint programming language. Practical implications-The paper concludes that the DSS artefact design and this development successfully overcomes some of the limitations of traditional DSS such as low-user uptake, system obsolescence, low returns on investment and a requirement for continual re-engineering effort. Social implications-The design artefact has the potential of increasing user uptake in an industry that has had relevancy problems with past DSS implementation and has experienced associated poor uptake. Originality/value-The design science paradigm provides structural guidance throughout the defined process, helping ensure fidelity both to best industry knowledge and to changing user contexts.

Although an improvement of design knowledge is an essential goal of design research, current design research predominantly focuses on knowledge concerning the IT artifact (tool) design process, rather than a more holistic understanding encompassing the dynamic usage contexts of a technological artifact. Conceptualising a design in context as an "ensemble artifact" (Sein et al., 2011) provides the basis for a more rigorous treatment. This paper describes an IS artifact design framework that has been generated from the development of several practitioner-oriented decision support systems (DSS) in which contextual aspects relevant to practitioners' decision making are considered as integral design themes. We describe five key dimensions of an ensemble artifact design and show their value in designing practitioner-oriented DSS. The features are user centredness, knowledge sharing, situation-specific customisation, reduced model orientation, and practice based secondary design abilities. It is argued that this understanding can contribute to design research knowledge more effectively both to develop dynamic DSS, and by its extensibility to other artifact designs.

Electronic Government (e-Government) has been considered as an essential strategy for many governments in their efforts to ensure qualities of participatory good governance. Various e-Government applications have been recognised as effective methods of enhancing governance qualities, such as accountability, transparency, collaboration and trust. However, previous studies that focused on participatory good governance are so far limited, especially in bringing an e-Government solution strategy using a bottom-up approach. Using a qualitative case study1 this paper identifies a participation gap in achieving participatory good governance and aims to address this gap through an e-Government approach in rural sector of a developing country. The outcomes of the study demonstrate that e-Government strategy can play a significant role to address the participation-gap in implementing qualities of good governance. Copyright © 2013, IGI Global.

This paper presents findings of an attitudinal readiness assessment to establish electronic participatory governance (EPG) in a developing country context. It explores major components of barriers to electronic governance through a case study analysis and proposes an initial framework. The main findings reveal that the readiness of relevant actors (e.g., government officials, elected representatives, citizens, civil society groups, private sector groups) are the key issues in establishing EPG. It is argued that the findings of this study will assist both government and donor organisations to identify potential barriers to implement the new governance in developing nations. © 2013 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

As a subset of the Information systems (IS) discipline, Decision Support Systems (DSS) development research needs a broader conceptual lens in order to evaluate design qualities specific to DSS. This paper presents a development-oriented approach for evaluating DSS applications. Based on a design science mental model proposed by Peffers, Tuunanen, Rothenberger and Chatterjeea (2008), our study outlines a new application area of this conceptual approach through a case demonstration of DSS development through various design checkpoints. To assess the proposed development-oriented evaluation strategy the paper also describes a qualitative investigation that has been undertaken to assess the conceptual approach with target industry DSS users and developers. The findings suggest that this strategy is of use for improving the overall design qualities in every phase of DSS development, and could be useful for evaluating DSS design with target users and DSS designers within a socio-technical design context.

This paper describes a new conceptual approach of e-government application development in which end users such as government managers, responsible officials and citizens at different levels can engage in effective service delivery, particularly in the agricultural sector. This approach provides end-user specific customizable provisions in which responsible government officials can design public services for the target end-user groups/local citizens such as primary producers. In the G2C (Government to Citizen) dimension, the author focuses on a hypothetical case of an e-government solution that provides various agricultural extension services such as training, awareness, consultation services, and knowledge sharing services provision, according to individual or farming requirements. This initiative reinforces a shift from the traditional information portal process to a new provision where citizens/primary producers can actively contribute in designing their useful services from the relevant government agencies. This paper presents a generic process model and identifies the critical interplaying roles between the end-user groups. The study argues that the process model may be operationalized in various other government service sectors. Copyright © 2012, IGI Global.

Metaphors from biological ecosystems emerge in a wide range of leading computing areas and applications of digital ecosystems. The diversified use of these metaphors in different application domains of digital ecosystems varies between computing areas and shapes their interventions. This paper reviews these application interventions of various computing areas as a qualitative approach to outline a roadmap of digital ecosystems from a metaphor towards a mature scientific paradigm. This roadmap is illustrated through five propositions to current practice. The proposed roadmap envisions digital ecosystems as a collaborative coordination environment and platform for computing interventions. © 2012 IEEE.

In supply chain management, how to determine appropriate suppliers has been a key challenge in strategic decision making. Supply chain managers need to explore options in selecting suitable suppliers that best fulfil the requirements in a competitive environment. This article focuses on how the supplier selection process can be delegated to different organisational levels and to different functional or divisional units within a company. We demonstrate how this de-centrally executed selection process can be supported by a new type of decision support system (DSS) platform, in which cross functional decision making on different managerial levels can be supported. We demonstrate the effectiveness of this type of DSS for supplier selection using a widely used multi-attribute utility approach. The applicability of such an approach will be demonstrated using a subset of sample data from a real-world project. Copyright © 2011 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

Expert systems (ES) development technology has been used to build rural business applications in the past but these have usually been developed using traditional expert systems shells. This paper introduces a new architecture for the development of a design environment where the domain experts can build a knowledge base for target-specific ES for rural business operators. The system allows rural business operators to use their own knowledge in building their own, target-specific ES for tailored development to their own specific requirements. At this stage, this reusable design environment caters for the Australian dairy industry but in the long run we claim it will be useful for the other livestock based rural industries such as beef cattle and sheep. This approach of developing target-specific ES contributes new knowledge in that it provides a new way of developing decision support by allowing human domain experts to develop relevant ES for different livestock farming business. An evolutionary prototyping approach was employed for initial development of a proof of concept example and as a method of outlining the solution environment. Multiple qualitative data collection methods were engaged to facilitate knowledge acquisition in the domain of milk protein enhancement for dairy operations. This paper also describes the generic development procedure used in this project. © 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

This paper describes a new knowledge acquisition method using a generic design environment where context-sensitive knowledge is used to build specific DSS for rural business. Although standard knowledge acquisition methods have been applied in rural business applications, uptake remains low and familiar weaknesses such as obsolescence and brittleness apply. We describe a decision support system (DSS) building environment where contextual factors relevant to the end users are directly taken into consideration. This "end user enabled design environment" (EUEDE) engages both domain experts in creating an expert knowledge base and business operators/end users (such as farmers) in using this knowledge for building their specific DSS. We document the knowledge organisation for the problem domain, namely a dairy industry application. This development involved a case-study research approach used to explore dairy operational knowledge. In this system end users can tailor their decision-making requirements using their own judgement to build specific DSSs. In a specific end user's farming context, each specific DSS provides expert suggestions to assist farmers in improving their farming practice. The paper also shows the environment's generic capability. © 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Internet of things (IoT) has significantly altered the traditional lifestyle to a highly technologically advanced society. Some of the significant transformations that have been achieved through IoT are smart homes, smart transportation, smart city, and control of pollution. A considerable number of studies have been conducted and continues to be done to increase the use of technology through IoT. Furthermore, the research about IoT has not been done fully in improving the application of technology through IoT. Besides, IoT experiences several problems that need to be considered in order to get the full capability of IoT in changing society. This research paper addresses the key applications of IoT, the architecture of IoT, and the key issues affecting IoT. In addition, the paper highlights how big data analytics is essential in improving the effectiveness of IoT in various applications within society.

The implications of intergovernmental agencies may forever change the way in which governments provide common services within a federated Australia. As governments seek to reduce duplication and inconsistencies across state and territory borders, intergovernmental agencies are faced with the challenge of managing health related records under differing laws and with lack of clarity on ownership of each record. As records and cost of records increases within these entities we examine if an intergovernmental agencies can ever dispose of a record or does the legal frameworks for these agencies mean that the information systems need to evolve to support these new and emerging entities? This paper will examine the introduction of intergovernmental agencies and the challenges of managing health related records and relevant information systems within these agencies, to explorer how recent legal precedents or the concept of information citizenship may provide guidance on how to manage transient records and cloud services, while also mitigating the impacts of data sovereignty.

Information and communication technology (ICT) tools are ineffective when assessing solutions of questions with more than one step in Mathematics. ICT tools assessing these types of questions are paralleled to solving complex problems. This conceptual paper describes a new combined approach to develop a rule based expert system (ES) prototype, implementing method marking concept (MMC) in assessing multi-step question (MSQ) solutions. Pragmatist views and mixed methods are jointly employed to conduct document analysis using undergraduate students' solutions to past examination papers and related findings from previous research. Design science research (DSR) paradigm and ES development phases will be used to design, construct and evaluate the artifact based on ES. The expected functioning ES artifact will enhance the authenticity of assessment, because evaluation of solution strategies in MSQ solution reveals the scope in the comprehension of the assessed domain knowledge. The artifact and the conceptual framework can be applied to a similar domain with modifications or as it is.

Managers are heavily engaged in strategic decision-making for businesses, particularly in a changing environment. One of the most important decisions for online small businesses, as part of their strategic planning, is selecting relevant features on their websites, both to attract and interact with consumers. However, only a few Australian small businesses use strategic tools for selecting their website features. As a result, businesses lose potential domestic sales in the business-to-consumer (B2C) sector. The aim of this study is to determine the relationship between factors that influence consumers' online purchasing, and owner/manager strategic decisions in selecting relevant features for websites. Results from employing qualitative case studies with small business owner/managers, and a content analysis of website features, inform the design of a Decision Support Systems (DSS) framework. This may assist owner/managers' strategic decisions to implement competitive features on B2C websites that ultimately attract more consumers.

Technologies for record management systems have not been sufficient in meeting industry's demands, especially for providing appropriate search options that are context-sensitive. Ontology has been a tool for providing useful vocabulary and meaning that enable decision-makers to find the relevant information quickly. This paper discusses an ontology development approach that is used to improve search-ability of an existing electronic record management system (EDRMS). The discussion in the paper focuses on various options of an appropriate ontology specification for the structural composition of the EDRMS. The adapted approach helps define technical components that are interrelated within the system. The approach can be reused in other projects in that an ontology development would be a vital part of solution design process. Application-based evaluation strategy was used to evaluate the developed proof of concept prototype. Result has indicated positive outcome in relation to improved search-ability.

Within the field of information systems development, enterprise record management (ERM) technologies have largely failed to meet industry's demands specially for context-sensitive records management and document preservation. Electronic record management systems (EDRMS), as ERM tool, have become wellrecognized applications to academic users in higher educational institutes. The system often shows limited decision support options that result lack of coordination and duplication of academic efforts. There is no common domain ontology developed yet so far for effective management of record and oral history. Using structured methodology this study develops and evaluates a semantic domain ontology to provide contextspecific systematic record management approach. The lessons learnt from this project could be beneficial in general to the theory and practice of knowledge management decision support development in complex problem domains.

This study examines the application of digital ecosystems concepts to a biological ecosystem simulation problem. The problem involves the use of a digital ecosystem agent to optimize the accuracy of a second digital ecosystem agent, the biological ecosystem simulation. The study also incorporates social ecosystems, with a technological solution design subsystem communicating with a science subsystem and simulation software developer subsystem to determine key characteristics of the biological ecosystem simulation. The findings show similarities between the issues involved in digital ecosystem collaboration and those occurring when digital ecosystems interact with biological ecosystems. The results also suggest that even precise semantic descriptions and comprehensive ontologies may be insufficient to describe agents in enough detail for use within digital ecosystems, and a number of solutions to this problem are proposed.

The interplaying roles among the user groups must be adequately-mapped to fulfil the design needs of Egovernment applications. In previous studies, the design of citizen-centric e-government and its theoretical understanding is still limited in relation to the requirement of engaging malleable features for supporting all relevant users' roles in governing bodies. Operationalising IS theories to improve the design of e-government application has been a much sought-after objective. Yet, there is a lack of actionable guidance on how to develop e-government application that exhibits high levels of users' engagement through malleable features. Under a participatory good governance perspective, the paper reports a qualitative study and identifies requirement of malleable provisions to support the interplaying roles among users in a case demonstration of extensional service delivery in government. While service content describes the features available on an e-government application for assisting user groups in completing their support services. Miah & Waheduzzaman © 2012.

The article describes the importance of motivational factors through an analysis of the core TAM constructs in the context of marketing IS evaluation. We argue that our findings compliment current IS evaluation strategy, specially for measuring motivational elements for online IS. The study consequently provides an empirical validation of the importance of motivational and behavioural factors. Through an experimental analysis we evaluated the relative importance of perceived enjoyment with perceived usefulness of using an online website for shopping purposes and found that enjoyment was by far the dominant predictor of attitude towards online shopping. The result illustrates that in terms of IS evaluation online environments have moved from being functional online applications to being functional, engaging and interactive online IS (e.g. websites). Islam and Miah © 2012.

Mathematical models are becoming popular to represent biological systems. A mathematical model can be based upon existing knowledge from scientific literature, expert opinion, and field and laboratory studies. However, there are significant issues in model development including robustness. This study therefore examines how model quality can be improved automatically using optimization approaches. Specifically, we examine how a recently developed robust model of a forest pest species, with potential application in areas such as risk prediction [3], may have its robustness further increased using optimization. Digital eco-systems provide a powerful and broader methodological foundation and support for the implementation of optimization through application of the design science method1. © 2011 IEEE.

Knowledge sharing within a large entity such as government organizations, is critical to successful e-government implementations. Semantic technologies offer promise in this regard, however, many studies in the past have suggested that the semantic technologies for knowledge sharing suffer from potential weaknesses such as dynamicity, scalability, flexibility and offer limited options for specific business applications. In most cases the need for knowledge integration in business interactions in government systems are overlooked or loosely addressed due to rapidly changing situations and complex business networking. Significant challenges remain in developing e-government solution that can address the need for growing knowledge integration and sharing to enhance business interactions. This paper outlines a knowledge sharing framework to solve these issues with respect to citizen's participation in egovernment system, by encouraging user driven activities through the use of emerging technology and ontology based design. © 2010 IEEE.

There is a need to engage in a broader evaluation strategy when considering information system (IS) design. This paper describes an approach that addresses this need particularly for decision support systems (DSS). The conceptual approach is based on a mental model within the design science research paradigm that enables evaluation of DSS development at various design checkpoints from the problem identification stage to the outcomes and communication stages. This paper also describes a qualitative research plan to investigate the applicability of the conceptual approach under a socio-technical design context. The applicability of the approach is shown through a comparison with a known DSS evaluation method.

The article discusses a new decision support process for forestry pest management. Over the past few years, DSS have been introduced for forestry pest management, providing forest growers with advice in areas such as selecting the most suitable pesticide and relevant treatment. Most of the initiatives process knowledge from various domains for providing support for specific decision making problems. However, very few studies have identified the requirements of developing a combined process model in which all relevant practitioners can contribute and share knowledge for effective decision making; such an approach would need to include the decision makers' perspective along with other relevant attributes such as the problem context and relevant policies. We outline a decision support process for forestry pest management, based on the design science research paradigm, in which a focus group technique has application to acquire both expert and practical knowledge in order to construct the DSS solution. © 2010 Miah, Debuse, Kerr and Debuse.

Issues around climate change are being examined globally across various disciplines and informed decisions at community levels are required within wider national responses. Research addressing decision support for managing the possible impacts on human communities has to date been limited. As climate science knowledge and government policy changes, information must be updated for dissemination to regional implementers. Traditional knowledge repositories for decision support however work on static models, expensive to update in dynamic fields. This paper describes a process for developing a sustainable knowledge repository for decision support that can assist local policy development in climate change applications. An ontology guaranteeing the semantic integrity of the repository is a central feature. Using a semantic wiki approach the semantic integrity of the knowledge base is combined with the update of emergent findings from multiple stakeholders. Both methodological and practical aspects for developing an information framework to support climate change decision makers are addressed. © 2009 IEEE.

Mashup refers to an integrated Application Programming Interface (API) that combines data from different data destination or third party sources for web services. This web service provides a combined API that is technologically valid and compatible with other web applications. In recent years, web Mashups have been implemented for solving many issues in existing web applications, such as e-library. In this paper, we demonstrate a Mashup prototype by analysing a real service problem in an existing virtual organization to show current limitations of using a distributed architecture. This paper also presents an analysis of web service orientated architectures using the Mashup concept. Based on the case issues in classical web portals, we outline a generic architecture that offers a dynamic solution for providing services to better meet users' needs. ©2009 IEEE.

The ability of citizens to participate in the government system is a key issue for governments in developing countries as these countries have limited arid inflexible infrastructural information arid communication technology (ICT) facilities. ICT can support the establishment of electronic interaction between citizens and government bodies just as ecommerce systems facilitate customers' services in traditional online businesses. e-Democracy or e-participation initiatives imply electronic-based government services for enhancing electronic interaction between citizens and government bodies. The services of e-participation require use of Internet infrastructure and web based applications as well as end user devices such as personal computers, laptops or PDAs. This paper proposes an infrastructure for user centric e-participation services in a developing country context. ©2009 IEEE.

This paper discusses a new generation end-user centred information service view, for developing decision support applications. The tailorable solution allows specific applications to be designed by end-users, where integrity is assured by the architecture's control in knowledge-based systems. In the development approach, the end-users at different level engage in interaction for secondary application creation. This initiative reinforces a shift from the traditional IS development process to a new provision where end-users can actively participate for a secondary application design. A secondary application design can be seen as a secondary activity for tailoring applications by the end users so that it fits within their context. However, the achievable boundaries of the architecture and the interplaying roles of end-users for the secondary design are still emergent and increasingly of interest to researchers. This paper describes a process by which 'end-users-as-designers' engage in the secondary design or redesign processes of decision support applications in a rural industry context.

Application design driven by user needs is an increasing trend: such applications may not be anticipatable using traditional requirement and build approaches. Mashup refers to an integrated Application Programming Interface (API) that combines data from different data destination or third party sources for web services. This web service provides a combined API that is technologically valid and compatible with other web applications. In recent years, web mash ups have been tested for solving many issues in existing web applications, such as e-science. In this paper, we analyzed a real service problem in a current virtual organization to show current limitations of using a distributed architecture, and to describe a web service orientated architecture using the mashup concept. We provide a schematic solution for a paradigmatic user application problem, illustrated by a specific map usage need based on geographical information system data. Specifically, our illustrative application is finding the closest hotel within walking range of a meeting venue. Based on the case issues, we outline a generic architecture that offers a dynamic solution for web portals providing services for dynamic user needs. © 2008 IEEE.

Semantics have become acceptable techniques for data integration, data interoperability and data visualization in many software engineering domains and web developments over the past few years. This paper describes a software development where semantic ontology techniques have been used for developing a generic knowledge model applicable across rural industries. This technique enables us to outline a single access point for building end-user specific knowledge based systems. We have called the new solution prototype an End-User Enabled Design Environment (EUEDE) where the knowledge components from the problem ontology is used in building specific decision systems that are context-sensitive to end-user factors. Illustrating with an application from the dairy industry, we describe the design architecture and theory, and argue its generic capability to application in other problem domains. © 2007 IEEE.

Decision support systems (DSS) developed by end users have had limited success in rural operations. This paper will discuss the development stages of a new tool for improving the DSS development process in the rural industries. The object of this project is to develop an end user enabled design environment (EUEDE) which will allow a non-technical computer user to build target-relevant decision support tools. The resultant design environment aims to allow the end user to re-use and share their knowledge within a specific business context. This approach will facilitate flexibility to build relevant DSS's for an end user's specific decision requirements. The proposed design architecture will be transferable to other rural industries such as beef cattle and cotton. Theoretically, this approach anticipates extending development technologies of decision support tools to overcome traditional difficulties, by improving the context and relevance of development strategies and encourage end users to develop their own solutions. A qualitative field study using focus group approach will be adopted to acquire expert knowledge with an evolutionary prototyping approach being employed at this stage in order to construct a knowledge base for an expert system (ES). Utilising the decision making knowledge from the ES knowledge base, a generic design environment will be subsequently developed that will allow end user development of their own systems. The involvement of key industry stakeholders will be vital throughout both stages of EUEDE development. [S. Miah, D. Kerr and J. Gammack] © 2006.

A significant number of decision support systems (DSS) are available for rural applications. However, many of these have low adoption rates because they have been developed with little end-user engagement, limited ease of use by farmers, and the identified gap in understanding significant problems between the DSS developers and the potential end-users in the development process. A useable development environment that prioritises end-user engagement can be expected to reduce the known DSS development difficulties and to improve the development of appropriate decision support tools. To date however few significant attempts have been made to outline sophisticated models for a design environment that offers an adaptable and effective solution for end-user DSS development. This paper describes ongoing work in ontology construction and knowledge elicitation part of the development of an end-user enabled design environment (EUEDE). In general the EUEDE will assist rural business stakeholders to build their own target-relevant decision making tools. We describe in the first instance, the ontology for EUEDE that will allow dairy stakeholders to outline domain-specific decision making scenarios that will lead to the building of relevant DSS. © 2006 Miah, Kerr and Gammack.