Personal computing and support services

This paper reports the results obtained from a field study of 173 US companies which have implemented personal computing in the past five years. The study establishes the relationship between (i) the support services provided by the MIS department and its control over the PC acquisition process and (ii) and degree of information system (IS) management concerns with personal computing problems such as user training and user experience and the existence of selected organizational programs and policies for personal computing. This study provides empirical evidence concerning the above relationships by formulating and testing three propositions.     

Selection and implementation of a PPC system

There are many computer-aided production planning and control (PPC) systems available on the market which can provide a solution to the complex task of production planning and control. However, the question remains, how can a company find an optimal system from the vast amount of available systems? This article proposes that a company, having decided to buy one of the available systems, starts a project for selection and implementation of the PPC system.     

Future trends in computing

This paper examines the important developments which are taking place within the technologies associated with computing and communications. The author claims that the future of computing in the U.K. depends upon four elements. The availability of the most up to date processing and storage components; the existence of a great variety of ‘end-user’ and other peripheral and terminal devices incorporating these components; a wide range of standards and software and supporting services making it easier to design, create, debug and operate micro-based systems; an awareness throughout industry and society of the new opportunities emerging and the impediments in the U.K. to reaping full benefits from them.

In this paper the author examines the problems which the U.K. require to overcome in developing an effective and profitable computer industry. Furthermore, through a historical evaluation of developments in Japan and other countries, in particular the role of government investment, the author examines four possible options which are open to the U.K. in relation to its development of the computer industry. Finally, the author emphasizes the importance of making the correct choices now since the lead times for developments, and the rapid rate for development, necessitates that the U.K. industry settles on the ‘right-lines’ as soon as possible.     

Exploiting logistic potentials with a simulation-aided test of PPC methods

In order to guarantee company competitiveness, the cost-effectiveness and efficiency of the production process must be continuously enhanced. In practice, PPC systems are implemented for this purpose, but frequently do not meet expectations. Reasons may be an inadequate selection of PPC methods as well as an unsuitable configuration of PPC parameters. By making use of a simulation-aided test bed it becomes possible to check and reconfigure a PPC system with regard to its specific application in a company. This gives access to logistic potentials which have remained unused so far. The paper introduces the concept of a simulation-based PPC tester and describes one application of the system in a medium-sized mechanical engineering company. An example taken from that investigation shows how to generate warehouse logistics operating curves with the help of simulation and how this knowledge could be used to select suppliers and to determine the 'appropriate' stock-on-hand level.     

A survey of simulation modeling techniques in production planning and control (PPC)

The manufacturing sector as a whole has undergone remarkable changes in terms of scale, complexity and technology over the past decades and this applies across most modern high-technology manufacturing such as electronics, semiconductor, aerospace and automotive industries. In order to remain competitive, manufacturers have to produce high-quality products at low cost, and at the same time retain sufficient flexibility and to meet rapidly changing customer demands. Production planning and control (PPC) is a key role which enables the manufacturer to gain visibility and control over all aspects of manufacturing activities. PPC in itself forms a subject of study, within which simulation techniques have proven themselves to be one of the most practical methodologies available to investigate and evaluate manufacturing issues. In this review paper, we focus on state-of-the art applications of simulation techniques in PPC to demonstrate their applicability to modern manufacturing issues. The review reports on academic publications on simulation applications in manufacturing from 2002 to 2014, incorporating surveys of peer-reviewed literature. The review covers three types of simulation techniques (system dynamic, discrete event simulation and agent-based simulation) and eight PPC issues (facility resource planning, capacity planning, job planning, process planning, scheduling, inventory management, production and process design, purchase and supply management). Literature survey is analysed on the basis of simulation application to PPC problems which can give a guideline for simulation technique selection and also can help for simulation modelling in PPC problemsWould you consider changing the term “modeling” to “modelling” in the title. Please check, and correct if necessary.     

Sources of personal computing problems

The rapid growth of personal computing in organizations has given rise to numerous problems of information management. Broadly these problems encompass the categories of evolvability and integration of systems, cost of computing, data integrity and security, and MIS department-user department relationships. A framework is proposed linking these problem categories and three organizational factors, viz., level of use of personal computing, extent of control over personal computing, and degree of support for personal computing. Correlational, regression, and moderated regression analysis techniques are employed to test a number of hypotheses relating the organizational factors and problems categories. Results indicate that control over personal computing is the strongest predictor of the extent of personal computing problems encountered and that, while various commonly used support measures are helpful in mitigating MIS-user relationship problems, they do not seem to be effective in dealing with other types of personal computing problems. Control is found to exert both a direct and an interactive effect on problem intensity. Implications of these findings for managing personal computing in organizations are noted.     

股权激励中的个人股票期权收入纳税问题探析

随着股改的实施与推进,许多上市公司纷纷对内部管理人员和技术人员予以股票期权的激励,因此这些人员的大部分收入来源于其股票期权的收入,这部分收入如何缴纳个人所得税,成为一个大家关心的问题.本文就个人股票期权所取得的收入应如何计算并缴纳所得税进行详细的探讨.     

Personal trainer, personal coach

The increasing number of fresh faces in the management ranks, many of them with highly polished credentials but little in the way of practical experience in the work-a-day management world, has increased the need for a new consulting professional--the personal coach. There simply aren't enough volunteer mentors to accommodate the growing medical management profession. Whatever the conditions under which this new professional's services are sought, both the individual to be coached and the organization for which the individual works should approach the arrangement with care and planning. The author offers some guidance for making the arrangement pay off.     

Marketplace Competition in the Personal Computer Industry*

A decision regarding development and introduction of a potential new product depends, in part, on the intensity of compeitition anticipated in the marketplace. In the case of a technology-based product such as a personal computer (PC), the number of competing products may be very dynamic and consequently uncertain. We address this problem by modeling growth in the number of new PCs as a stochastic counting process, incorporating product entries and exits. We demonstrate how to use the resulting model to forecast competition five years in advance.     

用人也要追求效益最大化

干部是否用在当用之时,是检验干部工作效益高低的一个标准。针对这个问题,我们不妨先分析一下干部工作中时常出现的两种现象。现象之一,个别干部面对组织提拔使用前的谈话,没有任何的责任驱动意识,也没有任何被组织和群众信任的感动,没有荣誉感,没有任何的感恩心理。他一脸无所谓地告诉别人,这是他早该得到的,是组织对他的"补偿"。     

On computing a minimum secure dominating set in block graphs

In a graph \(G=(V,E)\), a set \(D \subseteq V\) is said to be a dominating set of G if for every vertex \(u\in V{\setminus }D\), there exists a vertex \(v\in D\) such that \(uv\in E\). A secure dominating set of the graph G is a dominating set D of G such that for every \(u\in V{\setminus }D\), there exists a vertex \(v\in D\) such that \(uv\in E\) and \((D{\setminus }\{v\})\cup \{u\}\) is a dominating set of G. Given a graph G and a positive integer k, the secure domination problem is to decide whether G has a secure dominating set of cardinality at most k. The secure domination problem has been shown to be NP-complete for chordal graphs via split graphs and for bipartite graphs. In Liu et al. (in: Proceedings of 27th workshop on combinatorial mathematics and computation theory, 2010), it is asked to find a polynomial time algorithm for computing a minimum secure dominating set in a block graph. In this paper, we answer this by presenting a linear time algorithm to compute a minimum secure dominating set in block graphs. We then strengthen the known NP-completeness of the secure domination problem by showing that the secure domination problem is NP-complete for undirected path graphs and chordal bipartite graphs.     

Personal computers in business education: An experimental assessment

The growing importance of personal computers in business and the difficulties that business schools have had in effectively employing PCs in business education motivated an experimental study of the use of PCs in an educational context. The study confirms the merits of the strategy of off-loading basic computer instruction from mainframes to PCs. The results of the study also illustrated some important methodological points regarding the assessment of the effectiveness of computer systems.