1,720,954 research outputs found
Cloud computing in a South African Bank
Get PDFDissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2013.This research looked at cloud computing in a South African bank. Interviews were
conducted in the information technology sector of a major bank in South Arica, as part
of a deductive research method, to establish how cloud computing should be
understood, what are specific benefits, obstacles, risks and if the benefits outweigh the
obstacles and risks.
The research demonstrated that cloud computing is a fairly new concept in South
African banks especially when it comes to the public cloud. Private clouds are currently
in existence, especially in the form of data centres and virtualised services. The
research also indicated that benefits outweigh obstacles and risks, with cost seen as the
most important benefit in contrast to privacy and security as the most important obstacle
to consider.
It would be difficult for a bank in South Africa to move into the public cloud and the focus
would be to move no-core services into a public cloud and to keep the core services
within the bank.
It should be noted that the research sample was limited to only one of the major banks
in South African and that it would be inaccurate to present the results as a complete
view of banks in South Africa.pagibs2014Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS)MBAUnrestricte
Developing zero-waste baselines to identify compressed air system inefficiencies in deep-level mines.
Get PDFThesis (MEng)--Stellenbosch University, 2023.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: As one of the main exporting industries of South Africa, the gold mining industry has seen a decrease in gold exports in past years. A weakening economy and rolling blackouts prompt Eskom to increase it’s tariff to battle the lack of supply and ever-increasing demand. As the price of electricity increases, the operating costs of mines increase, due to the high reliance on electricity by the mines. The largest electricity consumer on deep-level mines are the compressors and compressed air system. Not only is compressed air the largest consumer of electricity, it was determined to be a very ineffective and inefficient system due to numerous losses and improper use of the resources. Between 30 and 40 % of savings can be realized if the compressed air system inefficiencies are repaired. This highlights the need to identify, localise and quantify the inefficiencies in the compressed air system, with the goal to reduce the overall operating costs of the compressed air system. The compressed air system consists of the supply side, which are the compressors, the distribution network, which is the network of pipes, valves and meters, and lastly, the demand side, which is all the equipment which consumes the compressed air to function. Some unavoidable losses found in the compressed air network are friction losses, however, these losses only reduce pressure and not mass flow. The phenomenon auto compression can also increase pressures in lower levels, due to the weight of the air. Optimal operation of a system can be described as the best achievable performance of the system in question. Optimal performance can be compared to a system performing with zero waste. Zerowaste on the other hand, is a concept and paradigm which challenges operation design to limit and minimise wastages in any given system, either by recycling or optimizing the system. With these concepts in mind, the zero-waste baseline concept was derived as a comparative performance indicator of any given system. Using the zero-waste baseline, a method was developed to identify, localise and quantify compressed air system inefficiencies, by comparing the actual performance of the system with the developed zero-waste baselines. These baselines are developed based on the demand side equipment and the time of use of the specified equipment. With the principle of mass conservation, the difference between actual performance and the zerowaste baseline can be calculated and is then defined as the wastages and inefficiencies in the compressed air system. The zero-waste baseline method was tested on a deep-level gold mine. The major consuming equipment were determined to be refuge bays, pneumatic drills, pneumatic cylinders and pneumatic loaders. It was found that this mine wasted 229 MWh every day, which is equal to R300 622 per day. After physical audits of the major underground levels, the error of the waste calculation was calculated to be 4 %. Therefore, this method can be implemented to determine where the largest wastages are and assist in fixing these wastagesAFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Goud is een van die grootste produkte wat in Suid Africa uitgevoer word, maar die bedryf is besig om laer gehalte en verlaagde hoeveelhede goud uit te voer. ’n Verswakende ekonomie, krag onderbrekings en ’n verhoogde elektrisiteit tarief is verdere nagevolge van Eskom wat nie genoeg elektrisiteit kan opwek om by die aanoudende groeiende vraag na elektrisiteit te bevredig. Soos wat die elektrisieit tarief toeneem, neem die bedryfskostes van die goud-myn-bedryf toe, as gevolg van die afhanklikheid wat die myn-bedryf of elektrisiteit het. Daar was bevind dat die saamgepersde lug-sisteem baie oneffektief en ondoeltreffend is, as gevolg van verskeie ondoeltreffendhede en misbruik van die lug in die sisteem. Tussen 30 % en 40 % van die elektrisiteits kostes kan gespaar word as al die ondoeltreffendhede verwyder word. Hierdie verhoogde eletrisiteitskostes beklemtoon die belangrikheid om die ondoeltreffendhede to identifiseer, lokaliseer en te kwantifiseer. Die saamgepersde lug-sisteem bestaan uit beide ’n verskaffings-kant, wat die kompressors is, ’n verspreidings-netwerk, wat die pype, kleppe en sensors is, en ’n vraag-kant, wat al die toerusting insluit wat die saamgepersde lug gebruik. Van die onvermydelike ondoeltreffendhede in die saamgepersde lug-sisteem is as gevolg van wrywing in die pyp netwerk. Let wel, dat wrywing slegs die druk in die sisteem verminder en nie die massa vloei in die sisteem nie. Verder is daar autokompressie in die sisteem wat bydra tot die verhoogde druk in die sisteem, as gevolg van die saamgepersde lug se eie gewig. Optimale operasie van ’n sisteem kan beskryf word as die beste behaalbare toestand van die sisteem. Optimale operasie kan vergelyk word met ’n sisteem wat geen vermorsings produseer. Nul-vermorsing is ’n paradigma en konsep wat die traditionele ontwerp van operasies uitdaag om eerder te streef na produksie van geen vermorsings, deur die vermorsings te herwin of om die sisteem te optimaliseer. Met hierdie definisies in gedagte, was die nul-vermorsing basislyn konsep afgelei as ’n vergelykende toestand indikator van enige toepasbare sisteem. Deur van die nul-vermosring basislyn gebruik te maak, was daar ’n metode ontwerp wat die ondoeltreffendhede in die sisteem identifiseer, lokaliseer en kwantifiseer. Hierdie basislyne word ontwikkel deur die toerusting wat die saamgepersde lug gebruik te identifiseer en die hoeveelheid lug wat die toerusting deur die dag gebruik, saam te tel. Die verskil tussen die nul-vermorsing basislyn en die werklike toestand van die sisteem kan gedefinieer word as die vermorsings en ondoeltreffendhede in die sisteem. Die nul-vermorsing basislyn metode was getoets op ’n diep-vlak myn. Die grootste lug-verbruikende toerusting was geidentifiseer as veiligheids kamers, pneumatiese bore, pneumatiese silinders en pneumatiese laaiers. Daar was bevind dat die myn 229 MWh elke dag vermors, wat gelykstaande is aan R300 622 per dag. Nadat fisiese ondergrondse audits gedoen is, was daar bevind dat die metode afwyk met 4 % van die werkilike toestand. Daarom kan die metode gebruik word om die ondoeltreffendhede to lokaliseer.Master
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Get PDFWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
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