springer international publishing dez 2014 (794 risultati)

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This textbook is for the standard, one-semester, junior-senior course that often goes by the title 'Elementary Partial Differential Equations' or 'Boundary Value Problems'. The audience consists of students in mathematics, engineering, and the sciences. The topics include derivations of some of the standard models of mathematical physics and methods for solving those equations on unbounded and bounded domains, and applications of PDE's to biology. The text differs from other texts in its brevity; yet it provides coverage of the main topics usually studied in the standard course, as well as an introduction to using computer algebra packages to solve and understand partial differential equations.For the 3rd edition the section on numerical methods has been considerably expanded to reflecttheir central role in PDE's. A treatment of the finite element method has been included and the code for numerical calculations is now written for MATLAB. Nonetheless the brevity of the text has been maintained. To further aid the reader in mastering the material and using the book, the clarity of the exercises has been improved, more routine exercises have been included, and the entire text has been visually reformatted to improve readability.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -Smartphone users have come to expect high-quality apps. This has increased the importance of software testing in mobile software development. Unfortunately, testing apps¿particularly the GUI¿can be very time-consuming. Exercising every user interface element and verifying transitions between different views of the app under test quickly becomes problematic. For example, execution of iOS GUI test suites using Apple¿s UI Automation framework can take an hour or more if the app¿s interface is complicated. The longer it takes to run a test, the less frequently the test can be run, which in turn reduces software quality.This book describes how to accelerate the testing process for iOS apps using HadoopUnit, a distributed test execution environment that leverages the parallelism inherent in the Hadoop platform. HadoopUnit was previously used to run unit and system tests in the cloud. It has been modified to perform GUI testing of iOS apps on a small-scale cluster¿a modest computing infrastructure available to almost every developer.Experimental results have shown that distributed test execution with HadoopUnit can significantly outperform the test execution on a single machine, even if the size of the cluster used for the execution is as small as two nodes. This means that the approach described in this book could be adopted without a huge investment in IT resources. HadoopUnit is a cost-effective solution for reducing lengthy test execution times of system-level GUI testing of iOS apps.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 104 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -As Moore's Law and Dennard scaling trends have slowed, the challenges of building high-performance computer architectures while maintaining acceptable power efficiency levels have heightened. Over the past ten years, architecture techniques for power efficiency have shifted from primarily focusing on module-level efficiencies, toward more holistic design styles based on parallelism and heterogeneity. This work highlights and synthesizes recent techniques and trends in power-efficient computer architecture. Table of Contents: Introduction / Voltage and Frequency Management / Heterogeneity and Specialization / Communication and Memory Systems / Conclusions / Bibliography / Authors' BiographiesSpringer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 100 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -White dwarfs, each containing about as much mass as our Sun but packed into a volume about the size of Earth, are the endpoints of evolution for most stars. Thousands of these faint objects have now been discovered, though only a century ago only three were known. They are among the most common stars in the Milky Way Galaxy, and they have become important tools in understanding the universe. Yet a century ago only three white dwarfs were known.The existence of these stars completely baffled the scientists of the day, and solving the mysteries of these strange objects required revolutionary advances in science and technology, including the development of quantum physics, the construction and utilization of large telescopes, the invention of the digital computer, and the ability to make astronomical observations from space.This book tells the story of the growth in our understanding of white dwarf stars, set within the context of the relevant scientificand technological advances. Part popular science, part historical narrative, this book is authored by one of the astrophysicists who participated directly in uncovering some of the secrets of white dwarf stars.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 348 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -Current vision systems are designed to perform in normal weather condition. However, no one can escape from severe weather conditions. Bad weather reduces scene contrast and visibility, which results in degradation in the performance of various computer vision algorithms such as object tracking, segmentation and recognition. Thus, current vision systems must include some mechanisms that enable them to perform up to the mark in bad weather conditions such as rain and fog. Rain causes the spatial and temporal intensity variations in images or video frames. These intensity changes are due to the random distribution and high velocities of the raindrops. Fog causes low contrast and whiteness in the image and leads to a shift in the color. This book has studied rain and fog from the perspective of vision. The book has two main goals: 1) removal of rain from videos captured by a moving and static camera, 2) removal of the fog from images and videos captured by a moving single uncalibrated camera system. The book begins with a literature survey. Pros and cons of the selected prior art algorithms are described, and a general framework for the development of an efficient rain removal algorithm is explored. Temporal and spatiotemporal properties of rain pixels are analyzed and using these properties, two rain removal algorithms for the videos captured by a static camera are developed. For the removal of rain, temporal and spatiotemporal algorithms require fewer numbers of consecutive frames which reduces buffer size and delay. These algorithms do not assume the shape, size and velocity of raindrops which make it robust to different rain conditions (i.e., heavy rain, light rain and moderate rain). In a practical situation, there is no ground truth available for rain video. Thus, no reference quality metric is very useful in measuring the efficacy of the rain removal algorithms. Temporal variance and spatiotemporal variance are presented in this book as no reference quality metrics. An efficient rain removal algorithm using meteorological properties of rain is developed. The relation among the orientation of the raindrops, wind velocity and terminal velocity is established. This relation is used in the estimation of shape-based features of the raindrop. Meteorological property-based features helped to discriminate the rain and non-rain pixels. Most of the prior art algorithms are designed for the videos captured by a static camera. The use of global motion compensation with all rain removal algorithms designed for videos captured by static camera results in better accuracy for videos captured by moving camera. Qualitative and quantitative results confirm that probabilistic temporal, spatiotemporal and meteorological algorithms outperformed other prior art algorithms in terms of the perceptual quality, buffer size, execution delay and system cost. The work presented in this book can find wide application in entertainment industries, transportation, tracking and consumer electronics. Table of Contents: Acknowledgments / Introduction / Analysis of Rain / Dataset and Performance Metrics / Important Rain Detection Algorithms / Probabilistic Approach for Detection and Removal of Rain / Impact of Camera Motion on Detection of Rain / Meteorological Approach for Detection and Removal of Rain from Videos / Conclusion and Scope of Future Work / Bibliography / Authors' BiographiesSpringer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 96 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -Conducting fieldwork for investigating technology use in healthcare is a challenging undertaking, and yet there is little in the way of community support and guidance for conducting these studies. There is a need for better knowledge sharing and resources to facilitate learning. This is the second of two volumes designed as a collective graduate guidebook for conducting fieldwork in healthcare. This volume brings together thematic chapters that draw out issues and lessons learned from practical experience. Researchers who have first-hand experience of conducting healthcare fieldwork collaborated to write these chapters. This volume contains insights, tips, and tricks from studies in clinical and non-clinical environments, from hospital to home. This volume starts with an introduction to the ethics and governance procedures a researcher might encounter when conducting fieldwork in this sensitive study area. Subsequent chapters address specific aspects of conducting situated healthcare research. Chapters on readying the researcher and relationships in the medical domain break down some of the complex social aspects of this type of research. They are followed by chapters on the practicalities of collecting data and implementing interventions, which focus on domain-specific issues that may arise. Finally, we close the volume by discussing the management of impact in healthcare fieldwork. The guidance contained in these chapters enables new researchers to form their project plans and also their contingency plans in this complex and challenging domain. For more experienced researchers, it offers advice and support through familiar stories and experiences. For supervisors and teachers, it offers a source of reference and debate. Together with the first volume, Fieldwork for Healthcare: Case Studies Investigating Human Factors in Computing systems, these books provide a substantive resource on how to conduct fieldwork in healthcare. Table of Contents: Preface / Acknowledgments / Ethics, Governance, and Patient and Public Involvement in Healthcare / Readying the Researcher for Fieldwork in Healthcare / Establishing and Maintaining Relationships in Healthcare Fields / Practicalities of Data Collection in Healthcare Fieldwork / Healthcare Intervention Studies ¿In the Wild¿ / Impact of Fieldwork in Healthcare: Understanding Impact on Researchers, Research, Practice, and Beyond / References / BiographiesSpringer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 148 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the First International Workshop on Computer Assisted and Robotic Endoscopy, CARE 2014, held in conjunction with MICCAI 2014, in Boston, MA, USA, in September 2014. The 12 papers presented focus on recent technical advances associated with computer vision; graphics; robotics and medical imaging; external tracking systems; medical device control systems; information processing techniques; endoscopy; planning and simulation.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 144 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the proceedings of the third International Workshop on Symbiotic Interaction, Symbiotic 2014, held in Helsinki, Finland, in October 2014.The 8 full papers and 5 short papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 16 submissions. They are organized in topical sections named: definitions of symbiotic interaction; reviews of implicit interaction; example applications; experimenting with users; and demos and posters.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 160 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes revised selected papers from the Third International Workshop on Clinical Image-Based Procedures, CLIP 2014, held in conjunction with MICCAI 2014 in Boston, MA, USA, in September 2014. The 19 papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 26 submissions. New strategies are essential to ensure a smooth and effective translation of computational image-based techniques into the clinic. For these reasons CLIP 2014¿s major focus is on translational research filling the gaps between basic science and clinical applications. A highlight of the workshop is the subject of strategies for personalized medicine to enhance diagnosis, treatment and interventions. Authors are encouraged to submit work centered on specific clinical applications, including techniques and procedures based on comprehensive clinical image data. Submissions related to applications already in use and evaluated by clinical users are particularly encouraged. The event will bring together world-class specialists to present ways to strengthen links between computer scientists and engineers, and clinicians.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 172 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-conference proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Activity Monitoring by Multiple Distributed Sensing, AMMDS 2014, held in Stockholm, Sweden, in August 2014, as a satellite event of ICPR 2014, the 22nd International Conference on Pattern Recognition. The 9 revised full papers included in the volume investigate the challenges that arise when distributed sensor networks are used to track, monitor, and understand the activity, intent, and motives of human beings. Application areas include human-computer interaction, user interface design, robot learning, and surveillance.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 128 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 6th International Workshop on Knowledge Representation for Health Care, KR4HC 2014, held as part of the Vienna Summer of Logic, VSL 2014, in Vienna, Austria, in July 2014. The workshop aimed at attracting the interest of novel research and advances contributing in the definition, representation and exploitation of health care knowledge in medical informatics. The 12 revised full research papers and 4 short papers presented in this book were carefully reviewed and selected from 26 submissions.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 188 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -Part I of this book is a practical introduction to working with the Isabelle proof assistant. It teaches you how to write functional programs and inductive definitions and how to prove properties about them in Isabelle's structured proof language. Part II is an introduction to the semantics of imperative languages with an emphasis on applications like compilers and program analysers. The distinguishing feature is that all the mathematics has been formalised in Isabelle and much of it is executable. Part I focusses on the details of proofs in Isabelle; Part II can be read even without familiarity with Isabelle's proof language, all proofs are described in detail but informally.The book teaches the reader the art of precise logical reasoning and the practical use of a proof assistant as a surgical tool for formal proofs about computer science artefacts. In this sense it represents a formal approach to computer science, not just semantics. The Isabelle formalisation, including the proofs and accompanying slides, are freely available online, and the book is suitable for graduate students, advanced undergraduate students, and researchers in theoretical computer science and logic. 312 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This textbook is for the standard, one-semester, junior-senior course that often goes by the title 'Elementary Partial Differential Equations' or 'Boundary Value Problems'. The audience consists of students in mathematics, engineering, and the sciences. The topics include derivations of some of the standard models of mathematical physics and methods for solving those equations on unbounded and bounded domains, and applications of PDE's to biology. The text differs from other texts in its brevity; yet it provides coverage of the main topics usually studied in the standard course, as well as an introduction to using computer algebra packages to solve and understand partial differential equations.For the 3rd edition the section on numerical methods has been considerably expanded to reflecttheir central role in PDE's. A treatment of the finite element method has been included and the code for numerical calculations is now written for MATLAB. Nonetheless the brevity of the text has been maintained. To further aid the reader in mastering the material and using the book, the clarity of the exercises has been improved, more routine exercises have been included, and the entire text has been visually reformatted to improve readability.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 304 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the proceedings of the First International Workshop on Biometric Authentication, BIOMET 2014, which was held in Sofia, Bulgaria, in June 2014. The 16 full papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 21 submissions. Additionally, this volume also contains 5 invited papers. The papers cover a range of topics in the field gait and behaviour analysis; iris analysis; speech recognition; 3D ear recognition; face and facial attributes analysis; handwriting and signature recognition; and multimodal and soft biometrics.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 276 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 20th EUNICE/IFIP WG 6.2, 6.6 Workshop on Advances in Communication Networking, EUNICE 2014, held in Rennes, France, in September 2014. The 21 papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions and present aspects in the field of information and communication technologies.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 240 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -The Future Internet envisions a move toward widespread use of services as a way of networked interaction. However, while the technologies for developing and deploying services are well established, methods for ensuring trust and security are fewer and less mature. Lack of trust and confidence in composed services and in their constituent parts is reckoned to be one of the significant factors limiting widespread uptake of service-oriented computing.This state-of-the-art survey illustrates the results of the Aniketos ¿ Secure and Trustworthy Composite Services ¿ project (funded under the EU 7th Research Framework Programme). The papers included in the book describe the solutions developed during the 4-year project to establish and maintain trustworthiness and secure behavior in a constantly changing service environment. They provide service developers and providers with a secure service development framework that includes methods, tools, and security services supporting the design-time creation and run-time composition of secure dynamic services, where both the services and the threats are evolving. The 16 chapters are organized in the following thematic sections: state of the art of secure and trustworthy composite services; the Aniketos platform; design-time support framework; run-time support framework; and case studies and evaluation.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 260 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of three international workshops held in Rome, Italy, in conjunction with the 15th International Conference on Agile Software Development, XP 2014, in May 2014.The workshops comprised Principles of Large-Scale Agile Development, Refactoring & Testing (RefTest 2014), and Estimations in the 21st Century Software Engineering (EstSE21 2014). The 13 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 28 submissions. In addition, an introduction and a keynote paper are included.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 220 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Ad Hoc Networks, ADHOCNETS 2014, held in Rhodes, Greece, in August 2014. The 16 regular and invited papers presented were carefully selected and reviewed from numerous submissions and cover a wide range of applications, such as mobile ad hoc networks, sensor networks, vehicular networks, intelligent transportation systems, wireless sensor networks security.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 276 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-workshop proceedings of the International Workshop on Medical Computer Vision: Algorithms for Big Data, MCV 2014, held in Cambridge, MA, USA, in September 2019, in conjunction with the 17th International Conference on Medical Image Computing and Computer-Assisted Intervention, MICCAI 2014. The one-day workshop aimed at exploring the use of modern computer vision technology and 'big data' algorithms in tasks such as automatic segmentation and registration, localization of anatomical features and detection of anomalies emphasizing questions of harvesting, organizing and learning from large-scale medical imaging data sets and general-purpose automatic understanding of medical images. The 18 full and 1 short papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 30 submission.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 224 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the refereed conference proceedings of the Third International Conference on Big Data Analytics, BDA 2014, held in New Delhi, India, in December 2014. The 11 revised full papers and 6 short papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 35 submissions and cover topics on media analytics; geospatial big data; semantics and data models; search and retrieval; graphics and visualization; application-specific big data.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 208 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-conference proceedings of the 16th Japanese Conference on Discrete and computational Geometry and Graphs, JDCDGG 2013, held in Tokyo, Japan, in September 2013.The total of 16 papers included in this volume was carefully reviewed and selected from 58 submissions. The papers feature advances made in the field of computational geometry and focus on emerging technologies, new methodology and applications, graph theory and dynamics.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 200 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This volume focuses on the spotlight on Romania and Moldova, two distinct nations that share a common language, history and culture. Romania is a NATO member since 2004 and a fully integrated nation into the European Union since 2007, while The Republic of Moldova (a former Soviet republic) is attempting to join both international organizations for security and development reasons.Ever since the Iron Curtain fell on Europe at the end of World War II, the term ¿Eastern Europe¿ has been used without much regard for the diversity of the region. Given the geographical proximity, perhaps this is an understandable error. However, moving forward into the twenty-first century, and considering the highly sensitive geopolitical, security and development issues playing out in the region, we believe each nation should be treated with the unique distinction it deserves.Building a mosaic of the most current research, practical application, and policy, the authors, who represent unique, insider perspectives, cover a range of emerging and timely topics from Black Sea security to cultural analyses, organizational development and risk assessment shedding light on social, political and economic challenges of rapid transition in the region, while considering the implications for research, practice and policy in other front-line regions around the world.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 132 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -Contrary to popular conceptions that ethical failures in leadership are correlated with economic downturns and other stressful market conditions, this book argues that such transgressions are an intrinsic element of leadership, as it is defined under the current prevailing paradigm.In recent years the crisis of failures in ethical leadership across organizations, particularly corporations, has been highlighted more than ever, both in academic discourse and the public sphere. Psychological maladies leading to higher number of sick leaves, general feelings of disillusionment among employees, loss of motivation and employee loyalty, even suicide (both in Western corporations and in other parts of the world) are just a few examples of how ethical failures in leadership are expressed.In order to gain original insight into the phenomenon of ethical leadership, the author explores the origins and effects of the current leadership paradigm along two dimensions: (1) a revisit of the leadership construct from a historical and philosophical perspective, with a focus on the relationship between theory and practice; and (2) the theoretical roots of the ethical component of leadership theories, identifying the reasoning behind the value system in our paradigm.Subsequently, by linking these constructs together, a meta-theory emerges suggesting that the three main ethical departure points of virtue ethics, teleology and deontology (all of which have emerged during the past three thousand years through a confluence of the Abrahamic religions¿ and Greek value-systems) are the basis for our reasoning about leadership, its construct and the practice of leadership itself.Challenging traditional views of ethical leadership, the author goes beyond theory and philosophy to consider practical implications, including alternative ways to improve executive recruitment, training, and involvement of followers in decision-making;experiments like rotating leadership; and a peek into other paradigms, such as the Zoroastrianism, hence making an original contribution to the field of leadership both for scholars and practitioners.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 156 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -Neoclassical growth theory is the dominant perspective for explaining economic growth. At its core are four implicit assumptions: 1) economic output can become decoupled from energy consumption; 2) economic distribution is unrelated to growth; 3) large institutions are not important for growth; and 4) labor force structure is not important for growth. Drawing on a wide range of data from the economic history of the United States, this book tests the validity of these assumptions and finds no empirical support. Instead, connections are found between the growth in energy consumption and such disparate phenomena as economic redistribution, corporate employment concentration, and changing labor force structure. The integration of energy into an economic growth model has the potential to offer insight into the future effects of fossil fuel depletion on key macroeconomic indicators, which is already manifested in stalled or diminished growth and escalating debt in many national economies. This book argues for an alternative, biophysical perspective to the study of growth, and presents a set of 'stylized facts' that such an approach must successfully explain. Aspects of biophysical analysis are combined with differential monetary analysis to arrive at a unique empirical methodology for investigating the elements and dependencies of the economic growth process.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 140 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This volume addresses the dynamics of sustainable development in the healthcare industry, covering all major aspects, including R&D, manufacturing, regulation, market access, commercialization, and general management. Healthcare markets are evolving under demographic and economic pressures. In mature markets, patients navigate complex systems with limited control on healthcare quality and outcomes, while in developing markets, patients have limited awareness, access, and ability to pay for healthcare. The industry needs to identify which business targets are genuinely attractive for major or new investments.At the same time, development of new products and services must be tackled within the context of environmental sustainability. Rather than focusing on the traditional issues of innovation, cost management, and commercial effectiveness associated with growth, the authors explore such emerging topics as:The mutations of innovation managementThe need to foster patient-centricity along the entire value chain of the healthcare industry and company-wideIssues related to improving healthcare access and disease managementThe allocation of educational resources focused on the patient to increase the effectiveness of disease managementThe preservation of natural resources and the environmental effect of pollution and hazards created by the handling of pharmaceutical productsIssues related to the size of medical need and/or market demandThe private-public partnerships necessary to address the full spectrum of public health issues, from basic patient access to care to managing global health crisesThe required organizational and governance evolutions for the healthcare industry to maintain profitability and sustainablegrowth.Featuring contributions from leading academics and industry insiders with emphasis on environmental, economically, and socially sustainable practices, the authors present a unique, multi-faceted set of perspectives on this vital and rapidly evolving field.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 164 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This textbook on network economics provides essential microeconomic instruments for the analysis of network sectors like telecommunications, transport or energy. Network-specific characteristics emerge both on the cost side and benefit side, requiring network providers to develop innovative entrepreneurial competition strategies for costing, pricing, and investment. From a competition policy perspective, a number of interesting questions arise: In which parts of networks is competition functional In contrast, where is an abuse of market power to be expected What is the division of labor between cartel authorities and regulatory agencies The book develops an analytical framework for all network industries which allows readers to study entrepreneurial strategies as well as regulation and competition policies for network industries.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 200 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book provides a unique comparative and global analysis of the regulation of disclosure in financial (securities) markets. It is written by two authors who represent both the new world (Australia) and the old world (Germany). The authors present their research in the global business context, with legal and regulatory perspectives including some references from Africa, Asia, the Middle East and South America.After every ¿boom¿ and ¿bust¿, legislators pass new disclosure legislation, often in a heated environment fuelled by politics and the media. Little regard is paid to existing regulation or the lessons learned from earlier regulation. The result is the continuing enactment of redundant and overlapping disclosure laws. Since financial markets are often described as markets for information, the failure to ensure disclosure is at the heart of financial services regulation. This book argues that the solution to the failure of disclosure is a brief, easily understood, principles-based, plain English safety-net amendment to statute law such as ¿you must keep the financial market fully informed¿, a measure that would support effective mandatory continuous disclosure of information to financial markets.This book examines the reasons for disclosure regulation, and how the efficient operation of financial markets is dependent on disclosure. It examines the adequacy of common law and civil law concerning broker/client disclosure, and concludes that industry licensing in itself fails to keep the market informed. While recognizing the failures of securities commissions to achieve good disclosure in financial markets, it confirms the effectiveness of coregulation of disclosure by a commission with the support of the financial markets (such as the stock exchange). Coregulation builds on financial market self-regulation, and is best described in the words of one-time SEC Chairman William O. Douglas, who, in the 1930s, described it as ashotgun behind the door.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 256 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book takes an in-depth look at the software industry as a major factor in future global economic performance. It explores how software-based companies are a significant factor behind economic growth and serve as important bridge builders between industries. Countries with a weak and underdeveloped software industry risk being left behind in the 21st century.The book examines the case of Germany as one of the world's major industrial nations, which is facing loss of competitiveness due to its underdeveloped software sector. It shows how the German software market is characterized by a multiplicity of small and medium sized companies and exhibits a shortage of globally dominating companies. This is presented and examined in the light of Germany being a powerhouse for technologies in sectors other than the software industry.The book analyzes the current situation and future potential of the German software industry. Using empirical analysis and international case studies, it presents the status quo and offers recommendations for policy makers. It shows effective management strategies for the sustainable international growth of software-based companies. The recommendations in this book are intended to secure Germany's front seat on the express train bound for the second half of the 21st century.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 92 pp. Englisch.

Taschenbuch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book presents recent advancements of research, new methods and techniques, applications and projects in decision making and decision support systems. It explores expert systems and neural networks, knowledge engineering and management, fuzzy sets and systems and computational methods for optimization, data analysis and decision making. It presents applications in Economics, Finance, Management and Engineering. The book undertakes to stimulate scientific exchange, ideas and experiences in the field of decision making in Economy and Management. Researchers and practitioners alike will benefit from this book, when they are dealing with imprecision, vagueness and uncertainty in the context of decision making.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 236 pp. Englisch.

Buch. Condizione: Neu. Neuware -This book provides a portrait of the family in France today, revealing many of the deep-seated, demographic changes that have affected French society in recent decades. It first focuses on conjugal and family trajectories, examining union formation, types of union, entry into parenthood, influence of religion, and separation. Next, the book explores domestic organization within the couple. It looks at gender differences in attitudes to task-sharing, division of household and parenting tasks, influence of past partnership history, and changes after a birth.The book presents a series of studies based on the French version of the international Generations and Gender Survey, a major comparative research project conducted in 20 countries to collect information from individuals aged 18-79 about relationships and processes in the life course. Inside, readers will find insightful analysis of the survey results by sociologists, demographers, and economists, and come to better understand recent demographic and social developments in France as well as the factors influencing them.The book will appeal to a broad audience of students and researchers interested in family, gender, and intergenerational relations. In addition, as the survey data are comparable across countries, the book will provide researchers with ideas for further research opportunities in Europe and beyond.Springer Verlag GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 17, 69121 Heidelberg 284 pp. Englisch.