S Moslehpour, K Jenab, N. Namburi,
Volume 22, Issue 4 (12-2011)
Abstract
Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is used to identify the characteristics of an object wirelessly using radio waves. The purpose of this technology in this study is mainly focused on healthcare for inventory management and theft control replacing the manual logs. The storage and tracking of high-cost inventory items is developed. Automatic reordering and billing interfaces are designed for the inventory falling below the par levels. iRISupply and iRIScope are the two RFID systems developed to reduce the inventory costs, expired item costs and to improve the inventory management with easy reporting system .
Sam Khoury,
Volume 22, Issue 4 (12-2011)
Abstract
Community college computer instructors provide a valuable service by preparing students for challenging careers. At the same time, they face many challenges to stay current in their field and to maintain industry certifications. Therefore, community college administrators need to determine what perceptions are held by computer instructors, address any negative perceptions, and determine if instructors are satisfied with their job. To address this need, a study of North Carolina community college computer instructors’ job satisfaction was conducted using the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire (MSQ) Short Form. The MSQ Short Form is a 20 question survey developed by researchers at the University of Minnesota to study job satisfaction among workers. Although, the majority of the 182 respondents reported they were satisfied with their job and hold positive perceptions of their supervisors, only slightly over half of the respondents reported being either satisfied or very satisfied with the way policies are implemented within their organization, indicating for the first time that a significant percentage of computer instructors in North Carolina perceive a problem exists within this area. The results of this study should encourage academic institutions to find better ways to implement policies in ways that don’t negatively affect job satisfaction and worker productivity .
Mahdi Karbasian, Saeed Abedi ,
Volume 22, Issue 4 (12-2011)
Abstract
One of the main principles of the passive defense is the principle of site selection. In this paper, we propose a multiple objective nonlinear programming model that considers the principle of the site selection in terms of two qualitative and quantitative aspects. The purpose of the proposed model is selection of the place of facilities of a system in which not only it observes the dispersion principle but also reduces the system transportation costs. Moreover, the proposed model tries to select the sites that can fulfill other elements of site selection as well as dispersion in a way that it increases the trustworthiness of the selected network .
Kamyar Sabri Laghaie, Mohammad Saidi Mehrabad, Arash Motaghedi Larijani,
Volume 22, Issue 4 (12-2011)
Abstract
In this paper a single server queuing production system is considered which is subject to gradual deterioration. The system is discussed under two different deteriorating conditions. A planning horizon is considered and server which is a D/M/1 queuing system is gradually deteriorates through time periods. A maintenance policy is taken into account whereby the server is restored to its initial condition before some distinct periods. This system is modeled to obtain optimal values of arrival rates and also optimal maintenance policy which minimizes production, holding and maintenance costs and tries to satisfy demands through time periods. The model is also considered to control customers’ sojourn times. For each deteriorating condition a model is developed. Models are solved by GA based algorithms and results for a sample are represented .
Mostafa Setak, Samaneh Sharifi,
Volume 22, Issue 4 (12-2011)
Abstract
In recent years, Supplier evaluation and selection, an important element in supply chain management, has been gaining attention in both academic literature and industrial practice. The Mixed integer multi-Objective non-Linear programming model (MIMONLP) presented in this paper aimed to evaluate and select the appropriate set of suppliers considering quantitative and qualitative criteria and in addition to selecting the first layer's suppliers which relate directly to the organization, analyses the characteristics of second-layers suppliers, and design a network to determine the flow rate of products and materials between buyers and best suppliers in both layers. Another important feature of this model is considering holding costs of different products over the planning horizon and quantity discounts for the first layer's suppliers at the same time. Finally, the model is solved by using goal programming approach and numerical examples are presented to test the performance of proposed model.
Mostafa Shirinfar, Hassan Haleh,
Volume 22, Issue 4 (12-2011)
Abstract
In this study, an outsourcer evaluation and management system is developed for a manufacturing company by use of Fuzzy goal programming (FGP). A first phase of the methodology evaluation criteria for outsources and the objectives of the company are determined. Considering the fuzziness in the decision data, linguistic variables that can be expressed in generalized fuzzy number are used. The propose approach is utilized from fuzzy sets, Analytic Network Process (ANP), fuzzy TOPSIS and Preference Ranking Organization method for enrichment evaluations (PROMETHEE) approaches. Evaluation criteria for this problem are weighted by Fuzzy ANP approach then in the Fuzzy TOPSIS and Fuzzy PROMETHEE approaches. At the second phase the FGP model developed selects the most appropriate outsourcers suitable to be strategic partners with the company and simultaneously allocates the quantities to be ordered to them. At the end, gives the computational results .
P.k Shahabadkar, J.s Sujit Kumar , K.s Prashant ,
Volume 22, Issue 4 (12-2011)
Abstract
There has been a recent development and explosion of interest among academicians across a wide range of disciplines in the use of virtual Class room. Utilization of the virtual class room as a laboratory experimentation for teaching and learning has increased significantly in recent years as development tools for web based applications have become easier to use and computers have become more capable and less expensive. But, does the virtual class-room improve students learning? Herein we describe the results of two experiments conducted on sections of a Manufacturing and Operation Management course [MIME - 3240] at one of the Colleges of Technology in the Sultanate of Oman during fall semester. Two experiments were designed to determine if student learning of Manufacturing and Operation Management course was significantly affected by two treatments: 1) Virtual class room environment for the students of section S2 and 2) Real Class-room environment for students of section S1. The actual final scores of students of section S1 and S2 were compared in order to determine the effectiveness of virtual class room on student learning for the Manufacturing and Operation Management course.
In this study Web-based virtual Class room (WVC) is developed to communicate, to share and to disseminate knowledge from the teacher to student. Further, in this study web based tools are also used to create, store, and manage contents of class room instructions and course material .
Kouroush Jenab, Samir Khoury, Ahmad Sarfaraz,
Volume 23, Issue 1 (3-2012)
Abstract
Evaluative and comparative analysis among educational projects remains an issue for administration, program directors, instructors, and educational institutes. This study reports a fuzzy complexity model for educational projects, which has two primary aspects (technical aspects and transparency aspects). These aspects may not be measured precisely due to uncertain situations. Therefore, a fuzzy graph-based model to measure the relative complexity of educational projects is presented that uses an aggregation operator to resolve conflict among experts with respect to a complexity relation. The model maps the fuzzy graph into a scaled Cartesian diagram that depicts the relative degree of complexity among projects. An illustrative example for several educational projects is demonstrated to present the application of the model.
M Shofoluwe, A. Ofori-Boadu, L. Waller, C Bock-Hyeng,
Volume 23, Issue 1 (3-2012)
Abstract
New home buyers in United States are becoming more discriminating in their home buying decision. They are demanding quality construction at reasonable prices. The current state of construction market also gives construction buyers more ammunition to be more discriminate when they choose to purchase homes. To be competitive and remain in business, housing contractors and developers must meet the growing quality demands of the customers. Thus, the competition to meet the buyers’ quality demand has forced many of them to rethink the ways they build their homes. The improved designs, and construction methods and practices have resulted into award-winning quality-built homes for many of these contractors. This study was conducted to examine the quality improvement characteristics of selected award-winning residential builders and housing developers in selected counties in North Carolina, U.S.A. Through a structured questionnaire, the researchers collected information relative to their common quality characteristics, organizational culture and overall business practices. Data analysis was performed using basic descriptive statistics. The results show that regular inspection of work in progress, feedback from customers, and immediate attention to punch list items, were highly ranked among the quality characteristics evaluated.
Saeid Moslehpour, Kouroush Jenab, Srikar Valiveti,
Volume 23, Issue 1 (3-2012)
Abstract
As functional integration has increased in hand-held consumer devices features such as Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers have been embedded in increasingly more devices in recent years. For example, the train positioning system based on GPS provides an integrated positioning solution which can be used in many rail applications without a cost intensive infrastructure. The network built in the GPS receiver has the advantage of determining the exact location and time of the train. The objective of this research was to develop a system which accepts the location from the GPS receiver mounted on the train and extracts its local time. This is implemented using Altera SOPC builder in the NIOS – II environment. Nios II is a 32 bit soft-core embedded-processor architecture designed specifically for the Altera family of FPGAs. The signal received using the GPS receiver is given to the DE2 board through the UART port and converted it in to local time and displayed on the NIOS II console. A working system was developed, which accepts the location from the GPS receiver and extracted its local time.
Yahia Zare Mehrjerdi,
Volume 23, Issue 1 (3-2012)
Abstract
An interactive heuristic approach can offer a practical solution to the problem of linear integer programming (LIP) by combining an optimization technique with the Decision Maker’s (DM) judgment and technical supervision. This is made possible using the concept of bicriterion linear programming (BLP) problem in an integer environment. This model proposes two bicriterion linear programs for identifying a feasible solution point when an initial infeasible solution point is provided by the decision maker or when the searching process leaves the region of feasibility seeking for a better pattern to improve the objective function. Instructions regarding the structure of such BLP problems are broadly discussed. This added property offers a great degree of flexibility to the decision making problem solving process.
The heuristic engine is comprised of four algorithms: Improve, Feasible, Leave, and Backtrack. In each iteration, when a selected algorithm has been terminated, the DM is presented with the results and asked to reevaluate the solution process by choosing an appropriate algorithm to follow. It is shown that the method converges to the optimal solution for most of the time. A solution technique for solving such a problem is introduced with sufficient details.
Mahdi Karbasian, Saeed Abedi,
Volume 23, Issue 1 (3-2012)
Abstract
One of the main principles of the passive defense is the principle of site selection. In this paper, we propose a multiple objective nonlinear programming model that considers the principle of the site selection in terms of two qualitative and quantitative aspects. The purpose of the proposed model is selection of the place of key production facilities of a system in which not only it observes the dispersion principle but also reduces the system transportation costs. Moreover, the proposed model tries to select the sites that can fulfill other elements of site selection as well as dispersion in a way that it increases the trustworthiness of the selected network. For solving the proposed model we used the Genetic Algorithm integrated with TOPSIS method.
B. Moradi, H. Shakeri, S. Namdarzangeneh,
Volume 23, Issue 1 (3-2012)
Abstract
Until now single values of IRR are traditionally used to estimate the time value of cash flows. Since uncertainty exists in estimating cost data, the resulting decision may not be reliable. The most commonly cited drawbacks to using the internal rate of return in evaluatton of deterministic cash flow streams is the possibility of multiple conflicting internal rates of return. In this paper we present a fuzzy methodology for solving problems of multiple IRR in any type of streams. Utilization of fuzzy cash flow allows modeling of uncertainty in estimating cost data. The approach of