The paper presents a new re ective model, called Channel Rei cation, which can be used to implement communication abstractions. After a brief review of existing re ective models and how re ections can be used in distributed systems, channel rei cation is presented and compared to the widely used meta-object model. An application to protocol implementation, and hints on other channel application...

RDF, and notations based on it such as OWL, are not very good at representing arbitrary propositions, which are necessary for many applications, including the representation of processes and plans. There are various official (“OWL rules”) and semiofficial (“RuleML”) efforts to solve this problem. DRS is similar in spirit to the OWL Rules system, but different in detail. (For further remarks, se...

The Resource Description Framework (RDF) format is being used by a large number of scientific applications to store and disseminate their datasets. The provenance information, describing the source or lineage of the datasets, is playing an increasingly significant role in ensuring data quality, computing trust value of the datasets, and ranking query results. Current provenance tracking approac...

Context-aware systems must be interoperable and work across different platforms at any time and in any place. Context data collected from wireless body area networks (WBAN) may be heterogeneous and imperfect, which makes their design and implementation difficult. In this research, we introduce a model which takes the dynamic nature of a context-aware system into consideration. This model is con...

The phenomenon of Inverse Linking has proven challenging for theories of the syntax-semantics interface; a noun phrase within another behaves with respect to binding as though it were structurally independent. In this paper I show that, using an LF-movement style approach to the syntax-semantics interface, we can derive all and only the appropriate meanings for such constructions using no seman...

The science and professional practices of vocational psychology and career development are brought into question via a critical polemic informed by the work of Foucault, with a particular focus on the application of theory and techniques of objective assessment and psychometrics. It is asserted that the scientific and professional discourse and constructs of traditional approaches to career dev...

This paper examines an organizational pathology that we label “escalating indecision”—where people find themselves driven to invest time and energy in activities and decision processes aimed at resolving an issue of common concern, but where closure appears elusive. The phenomenon is illustrated through a case history in which a strategic orientation decision involving the configuration of a gr...

Contrary to some predictions, it appears religion is coming back. We are constantly being reminded that religion is becoming more important again in late modernity. Despite this, religion is still “banished to the sidelines in the contemporary field of theoretical struggle” (Beckford 2003: 12). Moreover, when religion is studied, it is often a concept of ‘religion’ so reified and generalised as...