This study uses a survey of U. S. state government information technology (IT) project management practitioners to investigate the utilization of IT project selection and evaluation methodologies-financial and qualitative-and to assess the empirical relationship between the chosen methods and several measures of perceived project success. The analysis presents evidence that financial project selection and evaluation methodologies appear to be important in obtaining better control over project costs.
Wu, Desheng Dash
Zhang, Yidong
Wu, Dexiang
Olson, David L.
Selection of supply chain partners is an important decision involving multiple criteria and risk factors. This paper proposes a fuzzy multi-objective programming model to decide on supplier selection taking risk factors into consideration. We model a supply chain consisting of three levels and use simulated historical quantitative and qualitative data. We propose a possibility approach to solve the fuzzy multi-objective programming model. Possibility multi-objective programming models are obtained by applying possibility measures of fuzzy events into fuzzy multi-objective programming models. Results indicate when qualitative criteria are considered in supplier selection, the probability of a certain supplier being selected is affected. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Olson, David L.
Shipley, Margaret
Johnson, Madeline
Yankov, Nikola
Eastern European countries have undergone a transition from centralized economic planning to more open economic systems. Hard data based upon past experience are inappropriate for decision making in this radically changed environment. A team of Bulgarian and U.S. researchers utilized system dynamics simulation to model the microeconomic environment of a Bulgarian winery expanding into regional and international markets. Expert opinion was provided for both micro- and macroeconomic factors. Given the uncertainty of the data and the ambiguity in the experts' opinions, fuzzy logic was used to model the transitional economic firm's decision making. (c) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Maroef, Iman
Park, Yeong-Do
Nam, Dae-Geun
Kim, Young-Seok
Cho, Yongjoon
Kang, Namhyun
Rhym, Young-Mok
Yu, Ji-Hun
Olson, David L.
Both theoretical and experimental studies have been performed in order to investigate the feasibility of thermite sparking and the impact of rusted steel on aluminum coated steel. For dry rust, the exothermic reaction occurred at 900 degrees C while the wet rust ignited an exothermic reaction at 1000 degrees C. This delayed ignition was attributed to the consumption of energy by the water while in wet rust for phase transformation. The experimental study used a compressed-gas-powered impact-testing apparatus that showed that the dry rusted steel ignited sparking upon colliding with un-coated steel. It was also found that the presence of an aluminum coat generated a higher susceptibility to sparking than colliding with un-coated steel.
This study compared the use of the REMBRANDT system to analytic hierarchy process (AHP) in a group multiple criteria selection problem. The decision was to select an operations management text, and the decision was the responsibility of a faculty group. The primary purpose of this study is to apply REMBRANDT to the same problem that was supported by AHP. There are no noticeable differences between the techniques from the perspective of the users, as the same input is used. Important technical differences between AHP and REMBRANDT are demonstrated, including (1) different ratio input scales, (2) alternative calculation of impact scores, and (3) a different aggregation procedure. REMBRANDT was found to recommend the same decision as AHP when the geometric mean was used for aggregation, but a different decision was given by conventional AHP using arithmetic mean aggregation.
AlAbbas, Faisal M.
Williamson, Charles
Bhola, Shaily M.
Spear, John R.
Olson, David L.
Mishra, Brajendra
Kakpovbia, Anthony E.
This work investigates microbiologically influenced corrosion of API 5L X52 linepipe steel by a sulfate-reducing bacteria (SRB) consortium. The SRB consortium used in this study was cultivated from a sour oil well in Louisiana, USA. 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis indicated that the mixed bacterial consortium contained three phylotypes: members of Proteobacteria (Desulfomicrobium sp.), Firmicutes (Clostridium sp.), and Bacteroidetes (Anaerophaga sp.). The biofilm and the pits that developed with time were characterized using field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM). In addition, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), linear polarization resistance (LPR) and open circuit potential (OCP) were used to analyze the corrosion behavior. Through circuit modeling, EIS results were used to interpret the physicoelectric interactions between the electrode, biofilm and solution interfaces. The results confirmed that extensive localized corrosion activity of SRB is due to a formed biofilm in conjunction with a porous iron sulfide layer on the metal surface. X-ray diffraction (XRD) revealed semiconductive corrosion products predominantly composed of a mixture of siderite (FeCO3), iron sulfide (Fe (x) S (y) ), and iron (III) oxide-hydroxide (FeOOH) constituents in the corrosion products for the system exposed to the SRB consortium.
There are many types of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, ranging from very large and very functional vendor products such as those provided by SAP and Oracle, through in-house systems, and smaller vendor products. Thus, there is a substantial range of enterprise computing support available for manufacturing organisations and their manufacturing planning and control. The Global Manufacturing Research Group (GMRG) has collected a systematic survey of manufacturing organisations around the world, providing a picture of manufacturing operations. We have taken GMRG data and organised it around seven levels of ERP functionality, and analysed these data to determine effectiveness in terms of how ERP systems are used in global manufacturing firms, their role in accomplishing manufacturing planning and control, the relationship between ERP forms and data-management practices, the satisfaction firms have across ERP forms, and finally, relative perceived benefits and costs across ERP forms.