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Schule und Zivilreligion: die Diskussion über den schulischen Religionsunterricht im Kanton Zürich 1872 und 2004
Full text linkThe Medium of Visualization for Software Comprehension
Full text linkAlthough abundant studies have shown how visualization can help software developers to understand software systems, visualization is still not a common practice since developers (i) have little support to find a proper visualization for their needs, and once they find a suitable visualization tool, they (ii) are unsure of its effectiveness. We aim to offer support for identifying proper visualizations, and to increase the effectiveness of visualization techniques.
In this dissertation, we characterize proposed software visualizations. To fill the gap between proposed visualizations and their practical application, we encapsulate such characteristics in an ontology, and propose a meta-visualization approach to find suitable visualizations. Amongst others characteristics of software visualizations, we identify that the medium used to display them can be a means to increase the effectiveness of visualization techniques for particular comprehension tasks.We implement visualization prototypes and validate our thesis via experiments.
We found that even though developers using a physical 3D model medium required the least time to deal with tasks that involve identifying outliers, they perceived the least difficulty when visualizing systems based on the standard computer screen medium. Moreover, developers using immersive virtual reality obtained the highest recollection.
We conclude that the effectiveness of software visualizations that use the city metaphor to support comprehension tasks can be increased when city visualizations are rendered in an appropriate medium. Furthermore, that visualization of software visualizations can be a suitable means for exploring their multiple characteristics that can be properly encapsulated in an ontology
Citizens’ support for the energy transition. The influence of policy and politics on citizens’ opinions towards renewable energy promotion
Full text linkAs a result of climate change and several countries’ decisions to phase out nuclear power, several countries are currently facing the question of how to take effective action to secure energy provision for the future. However, reducing CO2 and replacing non-renewable energies with renewables to provide electricity faces a barrier of ‘social acceptance’, i.e., support for targets and measures from both the political elite and the public. This dissertation focuses on the role of citizens. It answers the questions of why citizens matter in energy policy, how they form opinions on different policies, and how their opinions can be influenced and manipulated. It provides insights into how the political elite can design energy policy proposals in order to ensure public support, and also discusses the degree to which citizens participate in this conversation. Furthermore, this work shows which political processes are behind these energy policies, argues for a multidimensional approach to decision-making, and analyses which policy elements are relevant for citizens.Viele Länder stehen aufgrund des Klimawandels und der Entscheidung, aus der Kernenergie auszusteigen vor der Herausforderung, wirksame Massnahmen zur Sicherung der Energieversorgung der Zukunft umzusetzen. Die Reduktion des CO2-Ausstosses sowie der Ersatz von nicht-erneuerbaren Energien mit sauberen Energiequellen steht allerdings vor der Herausforderung der ‘sozialen Akzeptanz’. Dies bedeutet, dass die Unterstützung der Ziele und Massnahmen durch die politische Elite und der Bevölkerung ein zentraler Faktor für den Erfolg einer Energiewende darstellt. In dieser Dissertation wird die Rolle der Bevölkerung näher betrachtet. Die Dissertation bietet Antworten auf die Fragen, wieso die Stimmberechtigten in der Energiepolitik relevant sind, wie sie ihre Meinung zu den verschiedenen Vorlagen bilden, und welche Faktoren diese Meinung beeinflussen können. Daraus ergeben sich Einblicke, wie zukünftige Vorlagen im Bereich der Energiepolitik ausgestaltet werden können, um nicht an der Hürde der Zustimmung der Bevölkerung zu scheitern. Zudem wird der Grad diskutiert, zu welchem die Stimmberechtigten in den Prozess einbezogen werde sollten. Weiter zeigt die Dissertation auf, welche politischen Prozesse hinter politischen Vorlagen im Energiebereich stehen, argumentiert für eine multidimensionale Betrachtung von Entscheidungssituationen und analysiert welche Elemente einer Vorlage die Bevölkerung als wichtig erachtet.Chaschunà da la midada dal clima e la decisiun da renunziar a l’energia nucleara èn plirs pajais al mument confruntads cun la sfida da chattar soluziuns effectivas che segireschan la provisiun d’energia dal futur. Ma la reducziun da CO2 ed il remplazzament d’energias betg regenerablas cun energias regenerablas dovra ‘l’acceptanza sociala’; q.v.d. l’elita politica e la populaziun ston sustegnair las finamiras e las mesiras per producir tala electricitad. En questa dissertaziun è la rolla da la populaziun en il focus. La lavur dat respostas a las dumondas, pertge ch’ils votants e las votantas èn relevants en la politica d’energia, co ch’els furman in’opiniun tar las differentas propostas, e co che quest’opiniun po vegnir influenzada e manipulada. Tras quai èsi pussaivel per l’elita politica d’avair invistas, co che propostas futuras en la tematica da la politica d’energia pon vegnir concepidas per betg far naufragi causa l’approvaziun da la populaziun mancanta, e tge inclusiun da votantas e votants ch’è necessaria. Plinavant mussa la dissertaziun tge process politics ch’èn davos questas propostas, argumentescha per ina perspectiva multidimensiunala da situaziuns da decisiun, ed analisescha tge elements d’ina proposta ch’èn relevants per la populaziun
Causes, forms and consequences of professionalization in Swiss national sport federations
Full text linkThis thesis explores causes, forms and consequences of professionalization in Swiss national sport federations (NSF) – a phenomenon that has been observed in the last number of decades as NSFs face new societal challenges. The community with its diverse stakeholders – from members to financial backers to political institutions – expect more from NSFs than their former organizational structures and activities can facilitate. Following organizational adaptations, NSFs are transforming from traditional amateur pastime form of organization toward more businesslike entities.
The first aim of the thesis was to propose a framework for analysing professionalization in NSFs by exploring practitioners’ perceptions of professionalization and synthetizing those with the analytical concepts used by scholars. Despite attributes that – similar to previous literature – describe businesslike organizations, the practitioners primarily perceived professionalization to be a matter of “professional” attitude that transforms into federation culture. The conceptual framework that we developed may be used for studying various forms of professionalization in NSFs.
To study causes for professionalization in Swiss NSFs, a multiple-case study was conducted with seven Swiss NSFs. Causes for professionalization were similar across the NSFs. Prominent triggers were conflicts in the board, ambiguous decision-making competences and initiatives taken by key persons, e.g. CEOs. Our analysis revealed NSF-specific factors, such as popularity and attitudes of individuals toward professionalization, that have an impact on the continuity of professionalization process once it has been initiated. We propose that uncertainty and competing for financial resources have led some NSFs to mimic NSFs, which they deem successful. Reciprocity of NSF-endogenous and external causes for professionalization deserve further consideration in future studies.
Intended and unintended consequences of professionalization in Swiss NSFs were explored by means of a case study of a Swiss NSF. The autonomy, that Swiss sport policy allows to the NSFs, makes Swiss NSFs interesting for studying consequences of professionalization. Autonomous federations may have several options to avoid negative consequences of their professionalization strategies. Beside positive and intended consequences of professionalization in terms of, for example, transparency and increased publicity, the case in our study faced new challenges that emerged from the adaptations. Especially, the needs and goals of its member clubs have been disregarded as the NSF has focused on marketing and other professionalization strategies. Also, emphasis on the entertainment impact have exceeded clubs’ capacities.
This thesis is a first step towards understanding professionalization processes in Swiss NSFs. Apart from the empirical knowledge, the studies contribute to approaches of reciprocal relations between social action and structure, as well as to institutional theories in the field of sport. We encourage similar approaches in other countries for understanding the meaning of autonomy for professionalization that is given to Swiss NSFs
Quality-Aware Tooling
Full text linkProgramming is a fascinating activity that can yield results capable of changing people lives by automating daily tasks or even completely reimagining how we perform certain activities. Such a great power comes with a handful of challenges, with software maintainability being one of them. Maintainability cannot be validated by executing the program but has to be assessed by analyzing the codebase. This tedious task can be also automated by the means of software development. Programs called static analyzers can process source code and try to detect suspicious patterns. While these programs were proven to be useful, there is also an evidence that they are not used in practice. In this dissertation we discuss the concept of quality-aware tooling —- an approach that seeks a promotion of static analysis by seamlessly integrating it into development tools. We describe our experience of applying quality-aware tooling on a core distribution of a development environment. Our main focus is to provide live quality feedback in the code editor, but we also integrate static analysis into other tools based on our code quality model. We analyzed the attitude of the developers towards the integrated static analysis and assessed the impact of the integration on the development ecosystem. As a result 90% of software developers find the live feedback useful, quality rules received an overhaul to better match the contemporary development practices, and some developers even experimented with a custom analysis implementations. We discovered that live feedback helped developers to avoid dangerous mistakes, saved time, and taught valuable concepts. But most importantly we changed the developers' attitude towards static analysis from viewing it as just another tool to seeing it as an integral part of their toolset
The influence of attention on the relationship between temporal resolution power and general intelligence
Full text linkPrevious research showed repeatedly that individual differences in the temporal resolution power (TRP) of the central nervous system are related to individual differences in general intelligence. This relationship became to be known as the TRP hypothesis. However, the TRP hypothesis was challenged by the fact that temporal as well as non-temporal neural information processing afford considerable attentional resources and, hence, the relationship between TRP and general intelligence might be explained alternatively by attention as common source of variance. Therefore, the present study aimed to arrive at a better understanding of the interplay among TRP, attention, and general intelligence. For this purpose, a latent variable approach was used to dissociate attention-paced speed variance in latency-based measures of attention from all residual-based, non-experimental speed variance. That way, two potential mediators were derived, one representing a pure measure of perceptual attention and the other representing a conglomerate of the non-experimental processes not associated with the experimental manipulation of attention. A bootstrapped mediation analysis revealed that both mediators were not capable of mediating the relationship between TRP and general intelligence, hence, the present finding confirmed that TRP is a reliable and substantial determinant of individual differences in general intelligence. Future studies have to clarify the potential mediating role of more executive aspects of attention in order to elucidate the role of attention as an integral phenomena in the context of the TRP hypothesis
An Extraction System for Radiocarbon Microanalysis of Dissolved Organic Carbon in Glacier Ice
Full text linkAlpine glaciers situated in mid- and low latitudes are valuable archives for paleoclimatology. They offer a continuous record of recent local climatic conditions in regions where the majority of humankind lived and still lives. For meaningful interpretation of an ice core from such an archive, accurate dating is essential. Usually, several complementary approaches are used to establish a depth-age relationship. The oldest part of the ice at the bottom of the ice core suffers annual layer thinning and is influenced by small-scale bedrock geometry, which limits the use of annual layer counting or the assignment of reference horizons for dating. Nuclear dating techniques overcome this restriction since they do not rely on the preservation of a resolvable stratigraphy by using the continuous record of the respective radioisotope.
Radiocarbon is especially powerful for dating alpine glaciers because its half-life of 5730 years suitably allows it to cover the typical age range of these archives. Most important, glacier ice does contain minute amounts of carbon. While macrofossils can only be found by coincidence, organic aerosols deposited on the glacier offer the best source of contemporary carbon in glacier ice. Despite a large part of its chemical composition being unknown, organic carbon found in an ice sample can be operationally classified into a particulate fraction (POC) and a dissolved fraction (DOC). Radiocarbon dating of POC has proven to be very successful and is a routine application by now. The major limitation of this technique is the low POC concentration found especially in pre-industrial and polar ice samples.
Therefore, the DOC fraction promises even better suitability for dating thanks to its by a factor of 5 to 10 higher concentrations. Nevertheless, a straightforward analysis of DOC is hampered by its vulnerability to contamination. DOC consists in large part of mono- and dicarboxylic acids - compounds that can easily be taken up from the surrounding gas phase during sample preparation or which are dissolved from surfaces in contact with the liquid sample. Hence it is vital to ensure ultra-clean sample preparation with a low and stable procedural blank for reliable radiocarbon analysis of DOC from glacier ice.
In this work, we developed an extraction system for DOC from glacier ice samples. To meet the requirements of ultra-clean and effcient carbon extraction, the complete sample treatment is performed in inert gas conditions and only dedicated materials are chosen for the individual components of the setup.
Ice samples are pre-cleaned and melted in a melting vessel. POC is separated from the liquid sample by filtration during the transfer to the photo-reactor. The sample is acidified and inorganic carbon is degassed from the solution. A minimal invasive photo-oxidation method is applied by means of external UV irradiation of the sample. This converts the DOC to CO2, which is degassed, cleaned and captured in cryogenic traps. The CO2 is quantified to determine the initial DOC concentration and is sampled to glass vials. With state-of-the-art accelerator mass spectrometry, the gaseous CO2 sample is directly analysed for its radiocarbon content to yield the age of the ice sample.
Following a detailed description of the extraction system hardware and its operation protocol, we show the results of its extensive characterisation. The setup can process ice samples of up to 400 g mass. Within 45 min of irradiation time, oxalic acid was oxidised and recovered as CO2 with an efficiency of (85 ± 7)%. Most important, thanks to the stringent working conditions we achieved a low overall procedural blank of mblank = (3.5±0.6) µg C with F14Cblank = 0.65±0.04. This allows for the reliable measurement of ice samples with carbon concentrations as low as 33 µg C/kg ice, if we require the minimal sample mass to be larger than three times the blank mass.
Thus by now, the method provides the anticipated effciency and accuracy to analyse DO14C of ice samples from alpine glaciers.
As a side product of the method, also POC is extracted. We found that the procedural blank for this method is similar to the standard method for PO14C analysis. Therefore, this setup can be used to analyse both organic carbon fractions from only one ice sample.
We validated this new method with well-dated ice samples from Juvfonne ice patch in Norway. Six samples from three different ice blocks were analysed for DO14C and PO14C. Within the uncertainties and the sample-to-sample variability most F14C results from both organic carbon fractions agree with each other and with the reference samples from the same ice blocks. In contrast to previous studies that proposed a possible in-situ DO14C production in glacier ice, we did not find such a bias. Thus, we conclude that radiocarbon microanalysis with DOC from glacier ice is both technically feasible and physically meaningful and can now contribute to future cryospheric science
Das Personen- und Familienrecht des ZGB von 1912: eine inhaltliche Untersuchung der Gesetzeskommentare des August Egger (1875-1954)
Full text linkMit dem Inkrafttreten des Schweizerischen Zivilgesetzbuches (ZGB) im Jahr 1912 gelangte die Schweiz erstmals in ihrer Geschichte zu einer landesweit einheitlichen Zivilrechtskodifikation. Als einer der ersten Juristen kommentierte der Zürcher Rechtsprofessor August Egger (1875-1954) das Personen- und Familienrecht des ZGB; dies in zwei Auflagen: Die Kommentare zum Personenrecht erschienen in den Jahren 1911 (also noch vor Inkrafttreten des ZGB) bzw. 1930; jene zum Familienrecht in den Jahren 1914 bzw., nunmehr in drei Bänden, 1936 (Eherecht), 1943 (Verwandtschaft) und 1948 (Vormundschaft).
Diese Gesetzeskommentare – Eggers Lebenswerk – werden von Philipp Stehlin in seiner Dissertation in nahezu umfassender Weise untersucht. Dabei wird der Fokus auf den Inhalt von Eggers Darlegungen zu den einzelnen Gesetzesnormen gerichtet. Freigelegt werden sowohl Eggers Interpretation dieser Normen als auch Eggers konzeptionelle und systematische Einordnung derselben ins ZGB. Überdies werden Eggers Positionen, wo möglich, mit den Vorstellungen des Gesetzesredaktors, Eugen Huber (1849-1923), verglichen. Letzteres ermöglicht dem Leser nicht nur einen bequemen Nachvollzug von Hubers Vorstellungen, sondern verschafft ihm insbesondere auch Klarheit über die Frage, inwiefern der Huber-Schüler Egger von den Ideen seines Lehrers geprägt war. Damit der Leser auf den Beizug einer alten Gesetzesausgabe verzichten kann, wird jede einzelne der im vorliegenden Werk besprochenen Normen zitiert
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