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The paper aims to investigate how a tablet's design features, namely, its navigation design and visual appearance, influence users' enjoyment, concentration and control, when using tablets for problem-solving, and thereafter how their core flow experiences impact their perceived performance and efficiency with problem-solving.

This study uses a field survey approach to engage 87 participants in a decision sciences class to use eTextbooks and a few other associated educational apps including CourseSmart app for e-notes and highlighting, sketchbook app and a calculator app in tablets to resolve class problems at a large US university.

This study finds that the tablet's interface design features (navigation and visual appearance) make users engrossed in their problem-solving processes with perceived enjoyment, concentration and control. This, in turn, impacts their perceived performance and efficiency. Moreover, visual appearance plays the most significant role in arousing users' affective emotions (i.e. enjoyment), while interface navigation is crucial to engage users' deep concentration (i.e. cognition) and control for problem-solving.

Modern tablets are being used widely in various sectors. More in-depth user flow experience design associated with tablet use for problem-solving contexts should be further advocated in order to provide more engaging and meaningful flow experiences to users.

This study shows that the design of the tablet interface can engage users in problem-solving processes in both affective and cognitive ways. It provides valuable insights on tablet interface design for problem-solving.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the role that information systems (IS) artifacts (IS for automation and IS for analytics) and process standardization play in enhancing different dimensions of supply chain agility (SCA) (sensing, comprehending and responding).

Data collected through the survey approach was used to examine the research model. The results were analyzed based on regression analysis. Various tests were conducted to validate the results of the mediation hypotheses.

The results show that IS for analytics has a significant association with all dimensions of SCA and mediates the relationship between IS for automation and SCA’s sensing and comprehending dimensions. In addition, process standardization directly and uniquely influences the comprehending and responding dimensions of SCA.

The assessment of the relationship between different IS features in the context of SCA enhancement contributes to theory development in the area of IS-enabled supply chains. Furthermore, investing in both process and IS-related initiatives offers unique value in the context of supply chains. The data collection approach limited us to a cross-sectional analysis, whereas longitudinal data could have offered deeper insights.

IS artifacts and process-based initiatives can be leveraged for organizational capability enhancement. Organizations that are vigilant, analysis driven and take quick actions, invest in IS-based tools that support analytics. The highest impact of these tools is visible in the enhancement of the comprehending dimension of SCA.

Prior research does not explicitly examine the interplay among the different IS artifacts. Furthermore, process-centric initiatives can also be used in conjunction with or as an alternative to IS-based initiatives. The originality of this work stems from jointly evaluating the role of IS artifacts and process standardization in making the supply chain more agile.

The distribution function in a supply chain is an important internal service function for any firm, and has been increasingly recognized as playing a strategic role in achieving competitive advantage. This paper proposes improving the distribution function of the supply chain by employing hub‐and‐spoke network designs. Such designs have proven to be effective with third party logistics carriers such as Federal Express, UPS, Norfolk Southern, and Yellow Freight. Several models and heuristic solution techniques have been introduced in the literature in the past ten years. However, the performance of such heuristics, under different transportation environments, has not been examined. This paper acts as a first step in this direction. The performance of two heuristics to solve a hub‐and‐spoke network is compared against the performance of an optimal technique, for various configurations of data. With the results of this study, business managers can, by analyzing the structure of their data, assess the “risk” associated with applying one of the two heuristics. Heuristic developers can also exploit the results of this study to give them insight into areas where heuristics can be developed or strengthened in order to give rise to more robust heuristics.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how key users’ perceptions (capability, value, timing, and acceptance) toward an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system change from the pre-implementation to the post-implementation phase. The paper also examines how this change differs with varying levels of user involvement in the implementation process and users’ positions in the company.

The authors survey the employees of a major aircraft manufacturing company in the Midwest and analyze the data using repeated measures ANOVA. The authors use time as a within-subject independent variable, and involvement/position at the company as between-subject independent variables.

The results reveal a significant drop in users’ perceptions regarding the capability, value, and implementation timing of the ERP system. However, the perception of acceptance did not change significantly. Furthermore, there were more significant interactions of users’ perceptions with employee position than employee involvement in the implementation process.

The study offers a better theoretical understanding of how users’ perceptions regarding an ERP system evolve over time. The use of one company is a limitation of the study, so future research can focus on extending the study in different sectors.

Management can design interventions to minimize users’ negative perceptions about the ERP system and increase usage in the post-implementation phase. For example, management can design training customized toward users’ positions in the company.

Post-implementation research in the ERP field is rare. Conducting a survey of users’ perceptions allows the authors to take an in-depth look at attitudes toward an ERP system.

Locating hub facilities is important in different types of transportation and communication networks. The p‐Hub Median Problem (p‐HMP) addresses a class of hub location problems in which all hubs are interconnected and each non‐hub node is assigned to a single hub. The hubs are uncapacitated, and their number p is initially determined. Introduces an Artificial Intelligence (AI) heuristic called simulated annealing to solve the p‐HMP. The results are compared against another AI heuristic, namely Tabu Search, and against two other non‐AI heuristics. A real world data set of airline passenger flow in the USA, and randomly generated data sets are used for computational testing. The results confirm that AI heuristic approaches to the p‐HMP outperform non‐AI heuristic approaches on solution quality.

The purpose of this paper is to present and test a model that seeks to answer Robey et al.'s challenge that “ERP's critical success factors offer few insights beyond conventional wisdom.” The model proposes that many so‐called critical success factors (CSFs) affect organizational benefits from enterprise systems use (OBESU) through their impact on three outcomes of an enterprise systems (ES) implementation process, namely functional fit, overcoming organizational inertia, and delivering a working system.

The model is tested using content analysis of 133 customer presentations at SAP's April 2007 Sapphire USA Conference.

The benefit‐driver approach appears to provide at least one good answer to Robey et al.'s challenge.

It seems likely that the model is valid for most large Western organizations implementing ES.

The model provides new insights into how and why the CSFs affect benefits from ES.

No prior study to the best of one's knowledge has sought to explain in such depth how ES project CSFs affect OBESU.

This study aims to examine what factors shape Muslim business operators’ attitudes towards pre- and post-value-added tax (VAT) implementation in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

A longitudinal approach is employed to collect data from a total of 200 respondents, during both the pre-VAT implementation period and the post-VAT implementation period. A partial least squares structural equation modelling approach was performed to analyse the research.

Empirical findings revealed that challenges in implementing the VAT system were the primary predictors of Muslim business operators’ attitudes regarding the pre-VAT implementation period in the UAE because they were aware that the penalties associated with non-compliance would outweigh the costs incurred in preparing for the VAT. During the post-VAT implementation period, awareness was the strongest influence on Muslim business operators’ attitude because there are no income taxes imposed on businesses and individuals in the UAE.

The introduction of VAT in the UAE ignited great controversy on the part of Muslim business operators, who viewed the new tax system as a significant challenge or risk to their careers, especially when they realised that they would have to play a significant role in tax collection. VAT registration should be required for all businesses regardless of size since they are going to be the tax agents for the government. Indeed, the government should finalize policies and procedures on the penalties for non-compliance since such legalities could greatly contribute towards the acceptance of VAT.

Challenges prompted Muslim business operators to become more knowledgeable about VAT, whereas also developing a greater awareness and sense of preparedness regarding the implications of the system on their businesses. This discovery has advanced the theoretical understanding of the topic and its managerial implications.

The purpose of this paper is to further build up the knowledge about reasons for small and mid‐sized enterprises (SMEs) to adopt open source enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems.

The paper presents and analyses findings in articles about proprietary ERPs and open source ERPs. In addition, a limited investigation of the distribution channel SourceForge for open source is made.

The cost perspective seems to receive a high attention regarding adoption of open source ERPs. This can be questioned and the main conclusion is that costs seem to have a secondary role in adoption or non adoption of open source ERPs.

The paper is mainly a conceptual paper written from a literature review. The ambition is to search support for the findings by doing more research in the area.

The findings presented are of interest both for developers of proprietary ERPs as well as SMEs since it is shown that there are definitely reasons other than costs involved when deciding on proprietary ERPs or open source ERPs.

It can be argued that there is a lack of research conducted and published about why SMEs choose open source ERPs instead of proprietary ERPs. This paper identifies the gap and suggests future research directions about this subject.

This paper aims to examine the impact of enterprise resource planning (ERP) on organizations and discusses critical issues that should be considered by managers and decision makers who are considering implementing an ERP/ERP II system.

Extensive literature review and the author's professional experience on the topic provide the foundation for this article.

ERP/ERP II are designed to improve competitiveness by upgrading an organization's ability to generate timely and accurate information throughout the enterprise and its supply chain. The goal of an ERP/ERP II is to integrate all business units of an organization and to create a system that is capable of providing up‐to‐date and relevant information for the corporation's decision makers and employees as well as business partners. The investment that is required is significant, sometimes running into the hundreds of millions of dollars and the decision to purchase and implement an ERP system is one of the most important decisions a manager will have to make.

Implementing ERP systems often requires organizational change and commitment by top managers. Participation by decision makers and executives from the acquisition phase to the end is essential to the success of ERP/ERP II. Factors that managers should consider are outlined in the study.

This paper provides useful information to both academicians and practitioners who are interested in ERP.