Cloud computing in higher education

Availability and accessibility of academic resource materials has evolved over time, from textbooks to currently being available online. Tuition or teaching has followed the same trend from classroom-based to online as well. This is in addition to not only the academic resources being provided by various entities but in different formats as well. These phenomena present challenges and opportunities. Cloud computing and Information Communication Technology (ICT) has contributed to this phenomenon. Availability and accessibility of academic resources by various entities and in varying formats has resulted in communication dynamics. This paper aims to review the dynamics due to availability and accessibility of academic resources and concludes that the opportunities presented far outweigh the challenges. Institutions and individuals should therefore leverage their operations on availability and accessibility of academic resources to offer a better service to their clients.

Physical laboratories for practical classrooms in computer networks can be prohibitively expensive, as well as requiring regular hardware/software upgrades. With Netkit and similar software, network laboratories can be set up in a computer lab, but the setup is complicated and each student still needs their own computer. Thanks to the Cloud-based infrastructure, Netkit is now available in pre-configured Amazon elastic compute Cloud (EC2) instances. This research reviews and introduces educational computer networks. Furthermore, a web interface is used to allow remote access to numerous lab scripts instantiated on the Cloud. This study also describes how to use the Cloud to set up and access Netkit, which is open-source and free, but only supports Linux computers. By hosting Netkit in the Cloud, where it can be accessed from any Internet-connected device regardless of the user's device or operating system (OS), we have made Netkit portable. It was shown how the Cloud architecture of Amazon web services (AWS) holds NetKit-capable virtual machines that instructors and students can create on demand. This eliminates the need to set up specialised labs and enables students to gain practical experience with the principles presented in seminars on computer networks from any Internet-connected computer. Two other Cloud selling advantages are scalability and on-demand pricing. The horizontal elasticity of the Cloud service allows the system to be replicated to serve a much greater demand from users, so we need not worry about its physical configuration/structure. In addition, there is no need to worry about being charged for time not used. Finally, this research provides perspectives, obstacles and open issues that could present useful information for researchers in future studies.

The rapid evolution of web technologies demands innovative educational methods that balance theoretical instruction with practical experience. This paper examines the integration of GrapesJS, an open source web builder, into educational platforms hosted on AWS (Amazon Web Services) to enhance web development training. By leveraging AWS's cloud infrastructure, educational institutions can provide scalable, secure, and interactive learning environments. The study presents case studies, performance evaluations, and student feedback to assess the impact of this approach on web development education. Results indicate significant improvements in student engagement and learning outcomes, demonstrating the potential of combining GrapesJS and AWS for modern web development training.

With the advancement of Information and Communication Technology ICT which favors increasingly fast, easy, and accessible communication for all and which can reach large groups of people, there have been changes, in recent years in our society that have modified the way we interact, communicate and transmit information. Access to this, it is possible, not only through computers situated in a fixed location, but new mobile devices make it available, wherever the user happens to be located. Now, information "travels" with the user. These forms of communication, transmission and access to information, have also affected the way to conceive and manage business. To these new forms of business that the Internet has brought, is now added the concept of companies in the Cloud Computing ClC. The ClC technology is based on the supply and consumption of services on demand and pay per use, and it gives a 180 degree turn to the business management concept. Small and large businesses may use the latest developments in ICT, to manage their organizations without the need for expensive investments in them. This will enable enterprises to focus more specifically within the scope of their business, leaving the ICT control to the experts. We believe that education can also and should benefit from these new philosophies. "Due to the global economic crisis in general and each country in particular, economic cutbacks have come to most universities. These are seen in the need to raise tuition rates, which makes increasingly fewer students have the opportunity to pursue higher education". In this paper we propose using ClC technologies in universities and we make a dissertation on the advantages that it can provide to both: universities and students. For the universities, we expose two focuses, one: "to reorganize university ICT structures with the ClC philosophy" and the other one, "to extend the offer of the university education with education on demand". Regarding the former we propose to use public or private Clouds, to reuse resources across the education community, to save costs on infrastructure investment, in upgrades and in maintenance of ICT, and paying only for what you use and with the ability to scale according to needs. Regarding the latter, we propose an educational model in the ClC, to increase the current university offerings, using educational units in the form of low-cost services and where students pay only for the units consumed on demand. For the students, they could study at any university in the world (virtually), from anywhere, without travel costs: money and time, and what is most important paying only for what they consume. We think that this proposal of education on demand may represent a great change in the current educational model, because strict registration deadlines disappear, and also the problem of economically disadvantaged students, who will not have to raise large amounts of money for an annual tuition. Also it will decrease the problem of loss of the money invested in an enrollment when the student dropout. In summary we think that this proposal is interesting for both, universities and students, we aim for "Higher education from anywhere, with access from any mobile device, at any time, without requiring large investments for students, and with reuse and optimization of resources by universities. Cost by consumption and consumption by service".

With the advancement of Information and Communication Technology ICT which favors increasingly fast, easy, and accessible communication for all and which can reach large groups of people, there have been changes, in recent years in our society that have modified the way we interact, communicate and transmit information. Access to this, it is possible, not only through computers situated in a fixed location, but new mobile devices make it available, wherever the user happens to be located. Now, information "travels" with the user. These forms of communication, transmission and access to information, have also affected the way to conceive and manage business. To these new forms of business that the Internet has brought, is now added the concept of companies in the Cloud Computing ClC. The ClC technology is based on the supply and consumption of services on demand and pay per use, and it gives a 180 degree turn to the business management concept. Small and large businesses ma...

The cost of higher education (HE) is constantly increasing with less public funding and yet the demand is increasing causing institutions to search for ways of reducing costs while improving delivery as well as competitiveness in the global market. Cloud Computing (CC) is a potential solution because it has the capability for end users to seamlessly access data and applications from multiple devices and platforms. However, research findings indicate that the rate of adoption and subsequent deployment within higher educational institutions (HEIs) compared to other sectors is low. This study is therefore investigating the responsible factors and their dynamics. As universities readjust to demands due to globalization and internationalization, it is expected that the findings of this research will aid HEIs to make informed strategic decisions about adoption of CC technology.

is a researcher focused on removing barriers to effective use of Robotics and Cloud Computing in our homes, schools, and training centers. Dr. Remy is currently an Assistant Professor in Human-Centered Computing, and comes to Clemson from the University of Notre Dame where he was a Moreau Postdoctoral Fellow. He also had the pleasure of serving as a part-time instructor in Computer Science at Spelman College. A graduate of the Georgia Institute of Technology (ECE) and Morehouse College (CS), Remy leverages education in both engineering and liberal arts to enable change.

In the past few decades various industries have adopted new information systems and supply chain management techniques. Unfortunately, although many industries saw significant gains, the health care industry—both large hospitals and small private practices—are slow to consider new technologies. According to the Health Care Information Technology Model (HCIT) and the Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) Model, a necessary aspect in planning and applying new IT and supply chain techniques is the ability to compare and benchmark the organization. Whereas some research is available for hospitals (Malin, 2006), little work has been done for private medical practices. In this paper, the authors benchmark IT practices in terms of staffing efficiency and importance of usage to compare medical practices in the United States and Taiwan. The authors develop a set of efficiency measures for private medical practices that they correlate with types of IT usage, barriers to IT usage and extent...

Context-awareness is a quintessential feature of ubiquitous computing. Contextual information not only facilitates improved applications, but can also become significant security parameters-which in turn can potentially ensure service delivery not to anyone anytime anywhere, but to the right person at the right time and place. Specially, in determining access control to resources, contextual information can play an important role. Access control models, as studied in traditional computing security, however, have no notion of context-awareness; and the recent works in the nascent field of context-aware access control predominantly focus on spatio-temporal contexts, disregarding a host of other pertinent contexts. In this paper, with a view to exploring the relationship of access control and context-awareness in ubiquitous computing, the authors propose a comprehensive context-aware access control model for ubiquitous healthcare services. They explain the design, implementation and evaluation of the proposed model in detail. They chose healthcare as a representative application domain because healthcare systems pose an array of non-trivial context-sensitive access control requirements, many of which are directly or indirectly applicable to other context-aware ubiquitous computing applications.

Even though there is a rich and extensive literature on the individual adoption of technologies, limited attention has been placed on the choice of one among competing alternatives, which the authors posit as an essential antecedent to the individual acceptance decision that has been considered in the past. In this chapter, they compare two levels at which the choice can be made-expectations and intentions-and then review and contrast four different comparison mechanisms that can integrate the evaluations made at each level as predictive of actual choice. These were investigated by asking business professionals to assess and evaluate technologies for potential adoption within their domain of expertise, and then a second study was conducted to further validate the results thus obtained. The authors also extensively discuss the implications of this research for future work on the processes leading to adoption of information technologies.

Cloud computing popularity has continued to be on the increase side, and it has been significant contributory factor to the of 24/7 365 days business culture of the digital 21st century where data and data centers are accessed via the internet through any connected device, anytime and from anywhere. Higher Education Institutions (HEI) or Tertiary Education Institution (TEI) are also among organisations, medium and large, that are tapping into this trend by gradually adopting this technology to reduce their high budgets in the prevailing face of financial shortage. This has particularly made the technology attractive to TEI in developing countries, and more of them are adopting the services being offered by cloud computing. The adoption of this technology however, affects the way and manner by which IT services are being delivered traditionally by the TEI IT or ICT departments. The objective of this study therefore, is to explore the adoption of this phenomenal technology and its impact on the role of traditional IT department in one of the tertiary education institution in the South Western part of Nigeria. The TOE framework adoption model was used to explore the adoption factors, and interviews conducted within the ICT department of the institution as part of the empirical findings process. In contrary to popular belief, no member of the IT staff has lost his or her job yet based on the adoption despite the impact on the skills and culture in service delivery of the department. IT staffs were encouraged to adapt to the change as quickly as possible with trainings given, and the ICT, thus the HEI have value added as most of the services are now available on a 24-hour basis to users, even while off campus and far remote, a dream very difficult and near impossible in the days of full traditional IT services delivery.

This chapter discusses innovation in the Romanian healthcare sector, from the point of view of organizational learning, which is influenced by the components of organizational culture. Starting from the premise that hospital organizational culture differs from other types of organizations, we investigated the perceptions of a mixed sample of doctors and nurses from an internal medicine clinic of a large teaching and research hospital. The Dimensions of the Learning Organization Questionnaire and items selected from a questionnaire developed by the authors were used in order to study how the two groups perceived organizational culture and, subsequently, innovation, as both a component and a result of it. The results of the study show differences in perception between physicians and nurses, consistent with the ones presented in literature, and account for which facets of hospital organizational culture affect learning easiness versus which factors are negatively correlated with it.

Information strategy is often relegated to an information technology element of corporate strategy, or worse, ignored in favour of IT operational planning. This research, conducted over a five-year period, stresses the correct framing of an information strategy and its implementation. The authors propose a framework that assists in the evaluation of such strategies, primarily those at higher education institutions, but also in a wider range of organisations seeking to improve the understanding and implementation of their information strategy.

The authors critically review the history of information technology innovations, from a national competitive advantage perspective. Definitions of key terms are grounded in a thorough literature review, to inform a future meta-analysis. The authors identify the most significant US-based innovations, which in turn are driving future IT development. Propositions are generated for future IT-related studies.

Cloud Computing has emerged as the prime IT computing model for an on-demand access using a pool of shared resources with least IT support. Cloud computing is starting to replace the legacy office IT infrastructure and helpdesk support system. Corporate and home users alike are turning into cloud service consumers in a huge way and moving their data and work to the cloud. Therefore, the CSA between the cloud service consumers and cloud service providers has critical significance that can guarantee the highest-level service quality and delivery. The current CSA fall short on the service delivery commitments with no common terminology or standard followed industry wide by the cloud service providers. Comparing agreements from multiple cloud service providers continues to be an issue. This paper provides a pragmatic approach for Cloud Service Agreements, comparing the current process with the proposed parameters and the new framework for CSA to determine the role of various elements an...

Recent trends in researching Information Behaviour in organisations show that the initial focus on technology has shifted to cognitive methods that take the individual into account, but more recently there has been a move to the social sciences approach. Literature shows that this approach has been informative but rather theoretic as there has been limited work using this approach to handle information problems in organisations. There is a need to develop and test theories to help understand Information Behaviour in organisations in a social science context that gives direct benefits to the organisation. It is useful to view organisations as complex social networks of interactions, where importance is put on the relationships between people in the organisations, as well as on the individual actor. A need exists to evaluate and connect insights from social sciences communities of practice, and complexity theory. This paper explores insights from these theories and develops a conceptual framework for understanding Information Behaviour in organisations. Data collection is in a preliminary stage, reflections and observations, of the researcher and a few participants. The intention is to provoke thoughts along the lines of seeking to use a synergy between theories that can offer different and useful platforms to help better understand the impact of information behaviour on organizational culture.

Cloud computing is becoming popular technology due to its functional properties and variety of customer-oriented services over the Internet. The design of reliable and high-quality cloud applications requires a strong Quality of Service QoS parameter metric. In a hyperconverged cloud ecosystem environment, building high-reliability cloud applications is a challenging job. The selection of cloud services is based on the QoS parameters that play essential roles in optimizing and improving cloud rankings. The emergence of cloud computing is significantly reshaping the digital ecosystem, and the numerous services offered by cloud service providers are playing a vital role in this transformation. Hyperconverged software-based unified utilities combine storage virtualization, compute virtualization, and network virtualization. The availability of the latter has also raised the demand for QoS. Due to the diversity of services, the respective quality parameters are also in abundance and need a carefully designed mechanism to compare and identify the critical, common, and impactful parameters. It is also necessary to reconsider the market needs in terms of service requirements and the QoS provided by various CSPs. This research provides a machine learning-based mechanism to monitor the QoS in a hyperconverged environment with three core service parameters: service quality, downtime of servers, and outage of cloud services.

The adoption of cloud enterprise resource planning (CERP) systems deserves serious attention from both the practitioner and academic communities. This study empirically investigated the relationships for organizations that adopted CERP systems and for average organizations which are interested in CERP system adoption based on three technological and one benefit factors: The study identified the relevant technological factors as relative advantage, compatibility and security concern over the system adoption. This study indicated that the three technological and one perceived benefit factors are significant predictors of CERP systems adoption. The findings of the study provide evidence that organizations with CERP systems have a higher level of the three technological factors and perceived benefits than the mean of each relevant factor for all organizations that are merely interested in adopting the systems. The study discusses practical and theoretical implications of the results, and provides a guide for CERP systems adoption and a basis for further research.

The Indian education sector is constrained by cost but demand has been rising for cost-effective, robust software applications to deliver services for learning and administration. Existing systems are not scalable and require huge capex (Capital Expenditure) and IT staff to maintain the system, which has shifted the focus from the core education business to managing the overheads of IT operations. The Cloud Computing paradigm has emerged as the optimal solution to meet the requirements of cost effective, scalable, and secure systems. In this paper, the author examines how the deployment of cloud computing in the education sector in India can meet these challenges.

This study examines the structural relationship between attitudes towards environmental activities, subjective norms, and perceived behavioural control, and students' intention to engage in environmental activities and green initiatives on campus and the moderating effects of actual engagement with environmental activities such as using recycle bins in the campus. Results of the covariance structural equation modelling based (CB-SEM) approach divulged that perceived behavioural control positively affects students' intention to engage in environmental activities and green initiatives on campus was significantly proven. Next, results also found significant differences between light and heavy categories of actual engagement with environmental activities such as using recycle bins which successfully moderated these links. The research makes a significant contribution to a solid understanding of the students' intention to engage in environmental and green initiatives on campus, which is marginally touched on in the literature in the Asia context. Direction for future research is also provided.

The new market trends include globalization and service orientation as important drivers that are changing the way in which businesses operate. Companies are requesting flexible applications that can be acquired and executed seamlessly and independently of the location. This situation is progressively pushing businesses from a proprietary system orientation to a service one. Accordingly, more and more traditional software vendors are noticing the need to transform their current business and technology model in order to remain competitive in the market. Software as a Service (SaaS) has been set by these companies as a mandatory way to keep their existing customers while at the same time seizing the chance of acquiring new customers in unexplored markets. However, this transition from Software off-the-shelf to Software as a Service is not trivial as many issues (business, application, and technical) come into play. The real hands-on experience in implementing end-to-end SaaS migration strategies considering both business and technological dimensions of the problem are hardly covered. Hence, there exists a real demand for proven methods to perform the transition from traditional software products to the services concept. Based on this premise, this chapter presents a stepwise procedure and a method to migrate non-SaaS applications to SaaS taking into account not only technical and technological issues and constraints but also those issues related to business models and the monetization of the final solution. These methods are currently being supported by real-life experiments carried out in different companies based on successful SaaS implementation experiences, a deep understanding of the details, and a proven approach to making SaaS transformation happen in an accurate, secure, and sustainable way.

The growth in cloud computing adoption is phenomenal in organizations worldwide due mainly to its potential to increase productivity and enhance efficiency in business operations. However, cloud adoption is very low in many organizations in the developing countries. To gain insights into organizations' behavioral intention and usage behavior of cloud computing, based on the Extended Unified Technology Acceptance and Use Theory, the current study investigated the effects of technological, organizational, and environmental factors on cloud adoption in organizations. Using samples from five industry sectors and by employing the Structural Equation Model, the study found that facilitating conditions, habit, performance expectancy, and price value had positive and significant effect on behavioral intention to use cloud computing. But, effort expectancy, social influence, lack of motivation, and inadequate security were found to be barriers to cloud adoption. These findings could cont...

Innovation literature long has advocated that an innovation may be compatible or incompatible with an organization's existing systems or resources. Compatibility of an innovation traditionally has meant that the innovation is compatible with the existing values, skills, and work practices of potential adopters. However, Tornatzky and Klein (1982) criticized this definition as too broad, noting that compatibility may refer to compatibility with the adopters' values (value compatibility) or that it may represent congruence with the adopters' existing practices (practical compatibility). Anecdotal evidence suggests both types influence telecommuting. Therefore, this study investigates compatibility and its relationship to IS personnel's telecommuting. The organization's ability to secure telecommuting (a dimension of practical compatibility) was found to be a major facilitator of the adoption and diffusion of telecommuting. Group values were found to be a major facilitator of diffusion and success, and practical compatibility was found to be a facilitator of success. Implications are discussed.

This chapter adopts a micro approach towards assessing the e-readiness of small and medium enterprises in the textile industry in Egypt. The analysis focuses on evaluating firms' level of connectivity, awareness and usage of ICTs and identifies barriers to ereadiness. The chapter adds to the literature on e-readiness assessment, which is mostly macro in nature. The micro approach focuses on ICT awareness and usage patterns, and has the advantage of capturing variations at the firm level. Based on connectivity alone, neither small nor medium firms under study were found close to being e-ready. However, extending e-readiness to include the use and awareness of ICTs, one may conclude that e-readiness is in general directly proportional to size. Medium-sized firms, therefore, are potentially e-ready. The chapter argues that raising SME ereadiness would require heavy investment in human capital and raising awareness in addition to upgrading levels and types of connectivity.

In the knowledge based economy era, the success of an organization lies more in its intellectual capital and system capabilities than its physical assets and financial capital. Therefore, professional intellects such as lawyers, doctors, systems analysts, accountants are an important source of intelligence for most organizations. Knowledge Management (KM) in a public sector organization can take advantage the transfer and sharing process of experiences, ideas and expertise of the organization’s professional intellects for the organization’s knowledge assets with the support of information technology. Therefore, this chapter presents the knowledge sharing model that interconnects KM enablers and knowledge sharing process for KM implementation success in the public sector accounting organization in Malaysia. Survey questionnaires were used as the main instrument to collect data from all public sector accountants working in the Accountant General’s Department (AGD) which is an accounti...

E-Government has gained an enormous amount of attention by researchers and practitioners interested in digitizing the public sector through enacting policies and regulations. Compliance of regulatory requirements from these policies and regulations is an important requirement in e-Government service development projects. However, the concepts of regulatory requirements compliance are still scattered around in developing e-Government services. This article presents an e-Government regulatory requirement compliance (eGRRC) ontology framework that describes the interrelated concepts of regulatory requirements compliance in e-Government service development. The proposed eGRRC ontology is then applied on the recently introduced general data protection regulation (GDPR) for personal data processing across European Union (EU) countries, in order to indicate how the concepts can be mapped to the defined entities. The contribution of this article is on introducing a framework for researchers...

E-Learning is still relatively uncommon in developing countries, but there is growing interest. This case study explores the factors influencing readiness to launch e-learning of a Library and Information Science (LIS) program in a developing country, with a focus on understanding attitudes toward e-learning and the viability of transitioning to an online delivery model in Vietnam. A technology infrastructure assessment was performed to understand whether changes were needed at Vietnam National University to support e-learning, and 5 key informant interviews and 4 focus group sessions with 39 participants were performed with faculty, graduate and undergraduate students, members of the professional community, and administrators to understand their usage of technology and their perceptions and attitudes toward e-learning. Study findings suggest the importance of understanding the cultural context and the need for further e-learning research, as well as the steps needed for e-learning readiness and integration.

The technology acceptance model (TAM) stipulates that both perceived ease of use (PEOU) and perceived usefulness (PU) directly influence the end user's behavioral intention (BI) to accept a technology. Studies have found that selfefficacy is an important determinant of PEOU. However, there has been no research examining the relationship between self-efficacy and BI. The studies on the effect of self-efficacy on PU are also rare, and findings are inconsistent. In this study, we incorporate Internet self-efficacy (ISE) into the TAM as an antecedent to PU, PEOU, and BI. We conducted a controlled experiment involving a Web-based medical record system and 86 health care participants. We analyzed both direct and indirect effects of ISE on PEOU, PU, and BI using hierarchical regressions. We found that ISE explained 48% of the variation in PEOU. We also found that ISE and PEOU together explained 50% of the variation in PU, and the full model explained 80% of the variance in BI.

Increasingly, more software is developed locally, to address the needs of the developer's immediate community and yet little research has been done regarding their acceptance. The technology acceptance model (TAM), which has greatly been used in literature, failed to consider some cultural particularities of such software. Furthermore, most research has focused on the acceptance of foreign technologies in Africa. The primary objective of this article, is to investigate the validity of TAM for locally developed software within a community. The article utilizes quantitative methodology based on data gathered using a modified version of a published survey instrument; as well as Short Message Service for the collection of qualitative data. The findings concur with previous studies on technology acceptance and the raises interests on the use of qualitative data for understanding the context of technology acceptance.

is a doctoral scholar who has an emerging profile in the areas of Cloud Computing, Enterprise Resource Planning, and Virtual learning systems. He recently, published in the journal of Small Business Innovation, and the British Academy of Management Proceedings. He is currently investigating the area of cloud education, including different technical, organizational, and political issues associated with its adoption.

It has been argued that simple conceptualizations of usage are inadequate for understanding and studying the use of complex information technologies. In this article, we contend that quality of use, instead of the dichotomy of use vs. nonuse, is appropriate for understanding the extent to which a complex information technology is being used. An inductive case study of the implementation of a complex information technology was conducted, which led to the development of a learningbased model of quality of use. This model suggests the inclusion of factors relating to training (either formal or informal), learning, and beliefs, their impact on quality of use, and their change over time. Moreover, it describes how quality of use evolves over time as learning increases and perceptions of the system change. Evidence from the case study along with relationships from the literature are provided to support the model. Implications for future research are also discussed.

The use of e-training in healthcare has experienced considerable growth. The results of this study provide insights regarding the importance of technology compatibility attributes to behavioral intentions to continue the use of e-training by healthcare professionals. A model based on the technology acceptance literature has been used. The model adds the construct of healthcare practice compatibility to the Technology Acceptance Model as a predictor of behavioral intention to continued use of e-training by healthcare professionals. Using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM), findings suggest that perceived practice compatibility, perceived workflow compatibility, and perceived task compatibility in e-training are essential to healthcare professionals' intent to continue use of e-training. The parsimonious model in this study is a more predictive model than the basic TAM model in explaining users' intentions to continue use of e-training.

In this chapter, the authors introduce the key ideas related to strategic alignment and ICT in SMEs. They present the ERP strategic alignment in SMEs as an important investment but more problematic, discussing the challenges of ERP systems implementation in Arab SMEs by introducing the main studies conducted in the area. This literature review helps to understand the main enablers of ERP strategic alignment in this context. The intent of the chapter is to provide readers with a theoretical framework linking business managers' skills and interaction between business managers and IS managers to ERP strategic alignment as main chosen variables. This framework was tested in previous research conducted in Tunisian context and retested for this study in a Saudi context. Within this context, the authors hope the chapter can be helpful for researchers in ERP strategic alignment, mainly for students and professors in their academic activities.

Cloud computing is an emerging platform for e-learning in current and future learning management system. Many e-learning cloud computing models have been proposed to support e-Learning. However using e-Learning environment for teaching computer programming requires a platform equipped with special applications such as programming workbook, program automatic marking and plagiarism detection, centralised logbook for monitoring students' work and performance, online development environment, etc. Furthermore there are issues of education management rules in e-learning cloud that needs to be addressed such as teaching content management, course management, examination, performance management, student management, instructors' workload management. These elements are taken into consideration in designing the proposed architecture for Programming Education Environment as Cloud Computing Services.

The widespread usage of social media has attracted a new group of researchers seeking information on who, what and, where the users are. Some of the information retrieval researchers are interested in identifying the gender, age group, and the educational level of the users. The objective of this work is to identify the gender in the Arabic posts in the social media. Most of the works related to gender classification has been for English based content in the social media. Work for other languages, such as Arabic, is almost next to none. Typically people express themselves in the social media using colloquial, so this study is geared towards the identification of genders using the Saudi dialect of the Arabic language. To solve the gender identification problem the authors, a novel method called k-Top Vector (k-TV), which is based on the k-top words based on the words occurrences and the frequency of the stems, was introduced. Part of this work required compiling a dataset of Saudi dialect words. For this, a well-known widely used social site was relied on. To test the system, we compiled 1200 samples equally split between both genders. The authors trained Support Vector Machine (SVM) and k-NN classifiers using different number of samples for training and testing. SVM did a better job and achieved an accuracy of 95% for gender classification.

Benchmarking by higher education institutions (HEIs) has been evolving for some time in Australia and New Zealand. Earlier efforts were focused on improving reputation, but now benchmarking has become a required component of higher education quality assurance, or regulatory compliance schemes. ACODE's benchmarking framework and the ACODE Benchmarks provide Australasian HEIs with the ability to review their technology enhanced learning (TEL) practices and decision-making against what is considered “good” practice. The ACODE benchmarking framework and its benchmarks also allow HEIs to inform quality audit, or regulatory compliance reporting by HEIs to maintain institutional recognition and demonstrate performance against threshold or other specific performance standards. ACODE's benchmarking framework and benchmarks are recognized as influencers in benchmarking practice. However, there is a need to generate empirical data to demonstrate its leadership role and review the bench...

Tourism is one of the largest growing industry worldwide. A tourist will naturally keep on travelling to different countries and sub-continents. Several researchers have addressed and proposed Mobile applications to facilitate Tourist and Tourismin different areas. A Mobile application to assist nightblind tourist is still one of the unaddressed issues by the researchers. This paper proposes a Mobile application model for the Tourist who facesdifficulty in vision during dark times, referred to as night blindness. The proposed application model is based on the difference of current time with sunset time. The application module uses mobile technology and difference of time function to proactively alert the night blind tourist to reach its safe place or destination before sunset. This model also provides an alternate path and distance with respect to time and user location. This proposed mobile application is very useful for the apprehensive night blind tourist who feels fear in travel...

Cloud computing represents a paradigm shift in information technology outsourcing. The technology renders numerous benefits such as flexibility, cost reduction and scalability. Also, it presents organisations with the opportunity to conform to environmental management system. Several studies have applied different theories to investigate the factors that affect cloud computing adoption by organisations. However, the results are inconclusive. Therefore, this study systematically reviews factors influencing adoption the adoption of cloud computing by organisations. A total of 174 papers were reviewed from different databases such as Science direct, Emerald and IEEE Xplore. Consequently, 37 of these articles have been considered to come up with the most salient factors based on their frequency. The findings indicated that technology readiness, top management support, relative advantage, competitive pressure, compatibility, complexity and data security are the significant factors that affect cloud computing adoption in organisations. This review consolidates literature and can benefit decision makers in organisations who intend to adopt cloud computing technology. Furthermore, it has laid a foundation for a future part of this work which is conceptualising a model for cloud computing adoption in the upstream oil and gas sector.

Currently, institutions are increasingly dependent on ICTs to provide their clients with educational services. In most industries, cloud services have been able to offer scalable online infrastructure on a broad scale; it means that users can access, transfer and save data to internet sites from everywhere and from every device, so IT moves from the company to the software. cause of its cost-effectiveness, the motive to use Cloud Computing" (CC) is increased, but the development of CC is not far behind in education. The study highlights using CC in Higher Education (HE), and its influence on both learners and educators, and addressing the difficulties of CC in HE. Also, explores the use of this technology in different fields. As a result, the researcher found CC has many benefits in that learners can access online courses, learning reports, and other cloud-based tools. Many applications can run in the cloud computing environment, so HE institutions can take the lead in these features. Literature review was followed in this study, data was collected qualitatively. In conclusion, preferred applications used with CC in higher education such as (LMS), Amazon, IBM, and Microsoft Azure. While found some drawbacks such as lack of network and access usability choices, Privacy and Individual Mistakes. As well as many challenges facing the use of cloud computing technology in universities, and the study recommend a set of essential recommendations related to the use of fog computing technology in educational institutions. Keywords: Cloud Computing, Cloud Computing in Education, Cloud Computing in Higher Education

The implementation of Enterprise Recourse Planning (ERP) systems has grown rapidly, but limited research has been conducted to investigate the utilization of ERP systems. By extending the Technology Acceptance Model, this paper provides a research model for examining the impact of computer self-efficacy and ERP systems design features on the utilization of ERP systems. To test the proposed research model, data are collected through a questionnaire survey distributed among employees in different organizations that have implemented an ERP system in the United Arab Emirates. Structural equation modeling techniques are used in this study to verify the causal relationships between the variables. The results strongly support the extended TAM in understanding employees’ utilization of ERP systems. The implications of this study and further research opportunities are also discussed.

As the successful establishment of technology supported educational systems requires wide investment in terms of finances and faculty time, this study explores the influencing factors in the adoption of Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) and the main barriers encountered during the use of TEL in Punjab, Pakistan. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with medical educators and thematic analysis was carried out using Nvivo-10. The study participants were well aware of educational technologies and stated that the influencing factors for adoption of TEL were self-effort, motivation, a personal positive approach and departmental policy. The institutions were well equipped with resources but the main problem was the lack of faculty training and institutional support. The study concludes that pedagogy is the main driver for the use of educational technologies. At the national level, it is suggested that governing bodies can provide definite polices and guidelines for the implementatio...

Information security is a growing part of the information technology function in an organization. Higher learning institutions generally do not provide much “hands-on” exposure to information security concepts due to costs, internal information security concerns, and a lack of worthwhile exercises that cater to students. We have created a collaborative virtual computer laboratory (CVCLAB) that seeks to leverage a large group of virtual computers together with specialized designed laboratory exercises in order to ...

Previous research shows that selecting an appropriate theory or model has always remained a critical task for IS researchers. To the best of the authors' knowledge, there are few papers that review and compare the acceptance theories and models at the individual level. Hence, this article aims to overcome this problem by providing a critical review of eight of the most influential theories that have been used to predict and explain human behaviour towards adoption of various technologies at the individual level. This article also summarizes their evolution; highlight the key constructs, extensions, strengths, and criticisms from a selective list of published articles appeared in the literature related to IS. This review provides a holistic picture for future researchers in selecting appropriate single/multiple theoretical models/constructs based on their strengths and weaknesses and in terms of predictive power and path significance. It is concluded that a well-established theor...

Every year, thousands of new technological ideas are conceived. An ability to innovate these ideas continues to be critical in surviving the current business world. This study identifies and empirically assesses the characteristics of technological innovativeness. A research model based on the existing literature on consumer innovativeness is thus presented. The model is tested via a survey instrument from a population of earlier adopters of mobile money services in Ghana and analyzed using ANOVA and independent sample t-test techniques in SPSS. The results showed that early adopters of technology are younger, novelty seekers, and more likely to have good employment and opinion leadership than late adopters. The study contributes to diffusion literature by providing further empirical evidence on the distinctive characteristics of early and late adopters of technology and posits that contrary to past research, independent judgment making of an individual does not affect innovativeness.

This chapter is undertaken in a Philippine research context that has been described as mired in wicked problems. In the age of the Anthropocene and faced with increasing pressure to become research productive, this chapter contends that the state of research in a Philippine context is highly-complex. Using a cross sectional design, a questionnaire on educators' attitudes toward educational research was used to determine its underlying dimensions and correlate them with educators' demographic characteristics. A total of 286 volunteered respondents from selected universities/colleges in selected regions in the Philippines participated in the study. T-test, Anova, Pearson correlation, Factor Analysis, and Structural Equation Model was used for data analysis. Findings of the study determined that research training is very important to improve educators' research skill and have better understanding of research output. Prioritizing it requires time, effort and resources to lea...

Information Technology industry is growing with very high speed and has become an integral part of the curriculum of all the universities/educational institutes. Teaching or using advanced technology in university is a costly affair with highly configurable systems. Cloud Computing has emerged as a cost effective solution to provide the latest and highly configurable resources/systems with less investment. Cloud Computing technology enhances traditional e-learning system by including usage of the latest hardware and software. Virtual classroom and labs are also provided simultaneously to improve e-learning systems and enhance collaboration among remote users. Focus on Cloud Computing is to serve users of different types of requirements and allocates resources to them in a cost effective manner. Users need not to worry for licensed software, hardware configuration, storage, maintenance, up-gradation of resources and big working space. If you just have a PC and internet connection, yo...