OBJECTIVES The aim was to study whether a workplace-registered frequent short-term sick leave spell pattern was an early indicator of future disability pension or future long-term sick leave among municipal eldercare workers. SETTING The municipal healthcare sector in the city of Aarhus, which is the second largest city in Denmark. PARTICIPANTS All elder care employees who worked the entire...

Although ‘Halcyon’ means serene environment which pervasive computing aims at, we have tried to present a different interpretation of this word. Through our approach, we look at it in context of achieving future ‘calm technology’. The paper gives a general overview of the state of pervasive computing today, proposes the ‘HALCYON Model’ and outlines the ‘social’ challenges faced by system design...

In 1998, police in the southern Australian state of Victoria raided hotels property of a local bar owner, Gary Glazner, and seized his computer. What they found confirmed what a Thai woman had told them – Glazner was a trafficker. He was involved in bringingThai women to Australia on ‘contracts’. The women were compelled to pay off fabricated ‘debts’ of up to US$40,000 and were regularly prosti...

Isolates of Bipolaris maydis race T, mating types A and a, and Bipolaris maydis race O, mating types A and a, were compared for ammonium production at two or 10 g/l glucose on a L-asparagine-mineral salts medium in relation to mycelium dry weight, sporulation and pH of the culture medium at six, 10 and 14 d of incubation. Ammonium was detected in all media for all isolates at six days and level...

We study the interdomain traffic as seen by a non-transit ISP, based on a six days trace covering all the interdomain links of this ISP. Our analysis considers the relationships between the interdomain traffic and the interdomain topology. We first discuss the day-to-day stability of the interdomain traffic matrix to evaluate the feasibility of interdomain traffic engineering. Then, we study th...

Strawberry packaging based on four different chitosan–poly(vinylalcohol) blend films with chitosan contents of 0 wt %, 20 wt %, 25 wt %, and 30 wt % was tested. The samples were stored at 18 ± 2 ◦C and 60% ± 5% relative humidity for six days. Strawberry quality was evaluated during and after storage. Strawberries packaged using these films showed significant differences in weight loss and firmn...

Since 2004 the virtual agent Max is living at the Heinz Nixdorf MuseumsForum – a computer science museum. He is welcoming and entertaining visitors ten hours a day, six days a week, for seven years. This article brings together the experiences made by the staff of the museum, the scientists who created and maintained the installation, the visitors and the agent himself. It provides insights abo...