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Traditionally computer applications in libraries and information units have been limited, both in scale and type, by the relatively high price of conventional computer equipment. Advances in micro‐electronics technology, and especially microprocessor‐based machines, such as microcomputers and word processors, have the potential for radically altering this situation. This paper is a report on a survey undertaken by Aslib to see how far this technology has ‘penetrated’ the library and information world. Systems in the various organisations visited are described, as well as the applications for which they are utilised.

Discusses an attempt by the British Library Document Supply Centre to exploit the capabilities of electronic mail linked to satellite transmission as a channel for large scale document delivery. Examines the background, transmission procedure, mode of operation, and future directions for electronic document delivery. Surmises that satellite transmission′s most serious competition comes from ISDN, although the likelihood is that the two will merge to carry a multitude of services.

With reference to the methodology of Prof Choudhry in his book “Tawhidi Epistemology and its Applications: Economics, Finance, Science, and Society” in 2014, in a different context, this study aims to present the conceptual fundamental of Islamic finance investment, where investment decisions are governed by Divine law and Islamic jurisprudence, followed by the empirical nature of real-world issues where investment decisions are governed by only financial indicators, using the Amman Stock Exchange as a case study.

As pointed out by Raderbauer (2011), research and industry initiatives mainly focus on environmental measures while ignoring the economic and socio-cultural dimension of sustainability. Recognizing the importance of a holistic understanding to define sustainable business practices for the accommodation industry. Financial markets are no exception; moral and values either coming from secular or religious understanding help to examine relationships between attitudes and actions, as well as differences in attitudes and actions related to the business’ characteristics. In business, ethical considerations apply to a broad list of virtues that companies, their managers and employees customarily seek to adopt. These include, but are not limited to, the encouragement of honesty, integrity and efficiency, as well as diversity and communication skills. One of the most common sources of ethical considerations is religion. In these cases, religious doctrine imparts a sense of applied ethics, where one considers what right conduct is, how to live a life pleasing to the Divine and how one should treat him/herself and others in accordance with those teachings. Again, as ethical considerations is a broad philosophical concept, it can apply to any situation where the person ponders the nature of right and wrong, how to recognize the difference and the meaning those conclusions carry for everyday life.

It can be concluded that the overall the quantitative and qualitative statistics showed that accommodation business manager’s decision has had a very little positive attitude toward sustainability and the implementation of sustainable business practices in ASE financial transaction, no matter what classification, type of business, ownership or size of business. Only rules and regulations govern the attitude and behavior when making financial transactions with profit is the main target. Moral indicators could not be seen throughout the analysis and test used to achieve objectives of the study at hand. One can imagine that the combined two factors together “Moral-Material” in implementing financial transactions will produce a more beneficial outcome. Achieving a material and holistic objective will produce an optimum situation, which can contribute positively to sustainable development.

Islamic alternatives to traditional investment tools have been driven by the fact that such tools do not conform to the Islamic general principles of the Shari’ah (Usmani, 2002). There has been a growing desire to have funds in which profits are not based on riba or interest, which is prohibited in Islam. Muslims deem that profit should come because of efforts; this is not the case in interest-dominated investments. In addition, there is a desire to have investment portfolios, which are morally purified. Thus, investments in companies that are not in compliance with the Shari’ah are not permitted and are eliminated from the portfolio. To ensure compliance with the forgoing condition, Shari’ah advisory boards whose role is mainly to give assurance that money is managed within the framework of Islamic laws govern Islamic mutual funds (Hassan, 2001; Hassan, 2002). On the other hand, dealing with the applied part, the paper will deal with a case study from Jordan (Amman Stock Exchange), where, code of ethics is issued by virtue of the provisions of Article 26 (e) of the Securities Law No. 23 of 1997. The Amman Stock Exchange operates as an exchange for the trading of securities. The company lists securities such as equities and bonds. Its activities include providing enterprises with a means of raising capital by listing on the exchange; encouraging an active market in listed securities based on the determination of prices and trading; providing facilities and equipment for trading the recoding of trades and publication of prices; monitoring and regulating market trading; and coordinating with the Jordan Securities Commission as necessary. The company’s activities also include ensuring compliance with the law, fair market and investor protection; setting out and enforcing a professional code of ethics.

The racial and ethnic representation of individuals in the workforce is not comparable to that in the general population. In 2010, African Americans constituted 12.6% of the US population. However, African Americans represented less than 5% of PhD recipients in 2010; African American women comprised less than 1% of the degrees awarded in that same year. These disappointing statistics have sparked conversations regarding the retention of underrepresented groups with a focus on what helps to ensure these individuals will transition through the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) pipeline. This chapter provides insight into the elements of the Spelman College learning environment that empower women of African descent to become agents of their success while facilitating their movement through the STEM pipeline. The chapter focuses on interventions and resources developed in the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department to foster student-centered learning. Described herein are cocurricular strategies and course-based interventions are used synergistically to enhance student outcomes. The approach to curricular innovation is framed by theories related to community of inquiry (CoI), metacognition, agency, and self-regulated learning. Strategic institutional investments have underpinned these efforts. In addition to providing a snapshot of student outcomes, the authors discuss lessons learned along with the realities of engaging in this type of intellectual work to elucidate the feasibility of adopting similar strategies at other institutions.

Tobacco sponsorship of sports has increasingly been cast as a public issue on the grounds that it supports pediatric smoking by circumventing advertising restrictions and communicating positive brand information to children(28,31,32). Research on tobacco sponsorship effects on children is as yet inconclusive, but growing evidence suggests that sponsorship is an effective medium for building cigarette brand awareness and image among under‐aged youth. Research in this area has been inconclusive in part because it lacks a unified framework in which the various contributions of sponsorship to brand knowledge and use can be analysed holistically. This paper proposes that the brand equity concept(1,2,18) provides such a framework. The paper reviews previous research on tobacco sponsorship and children, and presents findings from a study that assessed the relative contribution of sponsorship to brand awareness among fourteen year‐olds (n=366) in Dunedin, New Zealand. The value of sponsorship‐derived cigarette brand knowledge among youth is expressed in terms of Keller's(18) concept of customer‐based brand equity. The study found that children's awareness of tobacco brands and tobacco sponsorships varied according to their smoking experience, sports interests and gender. Cigarette brands with the strongest event associations were those that sponsored events that had a high appeal for the youth in the study. The brands with the highest unaided recall levels were those that were prominently shown in point of purchase displays in stores frequented by the youth, and included those with the highest sponsorship profiles. The research demonstrates that tobacco companies can achieve significant brand recall among children through sport sponsorship, as well as interest‐based (lifestyle) segmentation and targeting benefits, and brand positioning (personality) benefits. The findings have implications for public policy and industry practice. In policy terms, if the goal of tobacco advertising prohibitions is to denormalise smoking by restricting the positive promotional imagery of cigarettes, then sport sponsorship and point of purchase displays need to be incorporated into advertising legislation. In terms of industry practice, the fact that tobacco sponsorship reaches and influences under‐aged youth stands to be a matter of concern for any entity that does not want this social burden. It is recommended that corporations considering involvement in a tobacco‐sponsored event should evaluate the reach of the event and the potential effects of its promotions on youth. Where a youth‐interest connection has been demonstrated for the event, corporations should weigh the social risks and costs of the sponsorship. For non‐tobacco related entities these costs include the potential negative impacts of tobacco‐linked event cross‐promotions on their own brands and corporate image.

Smart card-based E-payment systems are receiving increasing attention as the number of implementations is witnessed on the rise globally. Understanding of user adoption behavior of E-payment systems that employ smart card technology becomes a research area that is of particular value and interest to both IS researchers and professionals. However, research interest focuses mostly on why a smart card-based E-payment system results in a failure or how the system could have grown into a success. This signals the fact that researchers have not had much opportunity to critically review a smart card-based E-payment system that has gained wide support and overcome the hurdle of critical mass adoption. The Octopus in Hong Kong has provided a rare opportunity for investigating smart card-based E-payment system because of its unprecedented success. This research seeks to thoroughly analyze the Octopus from technology adoption behavior perspectives.

Cultural impacts on adoption behavior are one of the key areas that this research posits to investigate. Since the present research is conducted in Hong Kong where a majority of population is Chinese ethnicity and yet is westernized in a number of aspects, assuming that users in Hong Kong are characterized by eastern or western culture is less useful. Explicit cultural characteristics at individual level are tapped into here instead of applying generalization of cultural beliefs to users to more accurately reflect cultural bias. In this vein, the technology acceptance model (TAM) is adapted, extended, and tested for its applicability cross-culturally in Hong Kong on the Octopus. Four cultural dimensions developed by Hofstede are included in this study, namely uncertainty avoidance, masculinity, individualism, and Confucian Dynamism (long-term orientation), to explore their influence on usage behavior through the mediation of perceived usefulness.

TAM is also integrated with the innovation diffusion theory (IDT) to borrow two constructs in relation to innovative characteristics, namely relative advantage and compatibility, in order to enhance the explanatory power of the proposed research model. Besides, the normative accountability of the research model is strengthened by embracing two social influences, namely subjective norm and image. As the last antecedent to perceived usefulness, prior experience serves to bring in the time variation factor to allow level of prior experience to exert both direct and moderating effects on perceived usefulness.

The resulting research model is analyzed by partial least squares (PLS)-based Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) approach. The research findings reveal that all cultural dimensions demonstrate direct effect on perceived usefulness though the influence of uncertainty avoidance is found marginally significant. Other constructs on innovative characteristics and social influences are validated to be significant as hypothesized. Prior experience does indeed significantly moderate the two influences that perceived usefulness receives from relative advantage and compatibility, respectively. The research model has demonstrated convincing explanatory power and so may be employed for further studies in other contexts. In particular, cultural effects play a key role in contributing to the uniqueness of the model, enabling it to be an effective tool to help critically understand increasingly internationalized IS system development and implementation efforts. This research also suggests several practical implications in view of the findings that could better inform managerial decisions for designing, implementing, or promoting smart card-based E-payment system.

This purpose of the paper is to examine the multi-channel cyclone created at the Vilnius Gediminas Technical University (VGTU) Research Institute of Environmental Protection. The paper aims to predict the possible trajectories of solid particle motion in the cyclone with reference to the mechanical forces only.

The numerical calculations were performed on the basis of experimental results. The system of differential equations describing particle motion in the cyclone is analysed and numerically solved using Runge–Kutta–Fehlberg method. Research consists of three examples that illustrate the impact of particle density and velocity on collection and analyses the particle motion trajectories in the first and second channels of the cyclone.

Numerical calculations were performed according to the data from Vilnius Gediminas Technical University Research Institute of Environmental Protection. The particulate matter of wood ash and granite were used. The collection of solid particles of different size was examined when the air inflow velocity varies from 10 to 20 m/s. The possible motion trajectories of the solid particles are defined and the parameters of collected particles have been discussed.

The obtained results can be used for the analysis of air cleaning efficiency and particulate matter removal from air in a multi-channel cyclone.

The results lead us to improve the structure of the cyclone so as to effectively collect the solid particles of different size.

This paper presents the results obtained for the multi-channel cyclone created at the Vilnius Gediminas Technical University Research Institute of Environmental Protection.

In light of the dramatic social transformations occurring in the nature of family and worker demands, nearly all employees today need to make decisions on how to manage work and family roles. Drawing on role theory, we provide a summary framework for understanding individual, family, and organizational influences on the self‐management of work and family roles. Work‐family role synthesis is defined as the strategies an individual uses to manage the enactment of work and caregiving roles. It involves decision‐making choices governing boundary management and role embracement of multiple roles. We present hypotheses and a research agenda for examining antecedents and consequences of employee strategies for managing work and family roles.

The topic of whistleblowing is achieving prominence as a question of social policy. Some influential voices are suggesting that far from whistleblowing — informing on organisations —, being socially undesirable, it may in certain circumstances be an activity deserving high praise. Inevitably it entails huge risks to the activist, and these risks need to be personally and carefully considered. John Banham, Director General of the Confederation of British Industry, wrote in support of the Social Audit report on the subject (Winfield 1990), and a committee established by the Speaker of the House of Commons has suggested the possibility of honouring whistleblowers in the British Honours system for their good corporate citizenship. There have also been landmark reports in America, Australia and Canada (Leahy 1978, Electoral and Administrative Review Commission 1990, Ontario Law Reform Commission 1986).