Request for Information Issues

Description/Abstract The PG&E WaveConnect project was intended to demonstrate the technical and economic viability of wave power in the open ocean adjacent to PG&E's service territory. WaveConnect was conceived as a multi-stage development process ...

The present study examines e-mail requests sent by Greek Cypriot university students (non-native speakers of English) to faculty at a major, English-medium university in Cyprus, over a period of several semesters. It examines forms of address (salutations), the degree of directness employed, and the degree and type of supportive moves and lexical/phrasal modifiers used by students in order to soften or aggravate their e-requests. Findings from the study have shown that the NNS students’ e-mails are characterized by significant directness (particularly in relation to requests for information), an absence of lexical/phrasal downgraders, an omission of greetings and closings and inappropriate or unacceptable forms of address. This paper argues that such e-mails can be perceived as impolite and discourteous and therefore capable of causing pragmatic failure. This is primarily due to the fact that they appear to give the faculty no choice in complying with the request and fail to acknowledge the imposition involved.

A key to the Web's success is the power of search. The elegant way in which search results are returned is usually remarkably effective. However, for exploratory search in which users need to learn, discover, and understand novel or complex topics, there is substantial room for improvement. Human computer interaction researchers and web browser designers have developed novel strategies to

This paper focuses on the use of a Virtual Collaborative Working and Visualisation Environment (VCWVE), i.e. using virtual collaborative desks (VCDs), for the development of shared situational awareness using a common operational picture to support collaborative military planning in joint command and control situations. Joint usability, critical task and situational awareness assessment methods were employed to determine the effectiveness of this VCWVE in supporting commanders' joint decision making. With reference to the British Army's seven questions (7Qs) estimate process and intelligence preparation of the battlefield along with a small military judgment panel (MJP) used for the simulation experiment, the research focused on how effectively networked VCDs highlighted commander's critical information requirements and their evolving requests for information during the planning process. The research also highlighted how collaborative technologies can not only help to improve joint decision making in a distributed HQ environment but also how an effective plan and its products can be delivered such as: the decision support overlay, the decision support matrix and the synchronisation matrix. As a result of this research a joint usability framework has been developed. This research has military significance in terms of enabling synchronised joint decision making in resilient agile distributed HQ groups and thereby reducing security risk of commander and staff.

Graduate medical education has undergone economic and structural changes-changes that have placed increasing pressure on medical students and programs to match effectively. This study documents the experiences, perceptions, and ethical dilemmas of medical students with the 1998 match process. Surveyed were 437 senior students from three medical schools. Students were questioned about: interviewing practices, communication with programs, commitments made, ethical dilemmas faced, and the match process itself. Data were analyzed using Student's t test, the chi-square test, and descriptive statistics. In all, 314 (72%) students responded. Programs expect postinterview communication from students (57%). Students perceive that programs are making "informal" commitments (43%), lying to them (33%), and encouraging their unethical behavior in order to match (21%). Ethical dilemmas are related to requests for informal commitments. The NRMP's ruling that denounces prematch commitments is being broken by students and programs alike, resulting in the promotion of unprofessional behavior and gamesmanship.

This study explores the phenomenon of the informal medical consultation, a communication event in which an individual asks for medical information, advice, or care from an off-duty health professional with whom the individual has no formal patient-provider relationship. Using surveys and interviews, the study describes these consultations from the perspective of the health care professional and the informal patient. The

Early socialization experiences have a long-term impact on newcomers’ satisfaction, performance, and intention to stay in a group. We know that newcomers proactively shape their own socialization, but we know little about the behavioral tactics they employ, or how the words they choose affect their acceptance by the group. The present article highlights three common conversational strategies of newcomers to online groups: (a) group-based membership claims, in which newcomers describe initial participation in the group; (b) identity-based membership claims, in which they describe their similarity to the group’s focal social category; and (c) information requests, in which they ask for help. Using machine learning to identify these conversational strategies automatically in 12,000 newcomers’ messages to approximately 100 online groups, we find that they are correlated with increased group responsiveness. We follow this analysis with two controlled field experiments to demonstrate that...

The Conclusion of an employment contract involves, as usually, the examination of certain preliminary stages: the request for information, negotiation, etc., but also the fulfillment of certain conditions as without it the fundamental legal act cannot be validated. In the Romanian legal doctrine, the conditions regarding the conclusion of the individual employment contract are classified in several categories and according

In this paper we describe an approach to respond to a request for information with the identification and location of the appropriate person as a source of information for answering the question. The expertise of a person is characterized using a weighted profile that has been derived from a series of documents describing the expert's activities. Having these profiles, requests for information can be matched with these profiles. The best matches correspond with the people that are experts for providing information on the request.

This submission is a response to the Object Management Group's request for information regarding version 2.0 of the Unified Modeling Language. The response is organised into four main sections, in line with the objectives of the RFI. These are:• strengths and weaknesses of UML 1.3• determination of major revision• comparison with roadmap recommendations• recommendations for revisions

It has been noted before in this book that patent retrieval is different from, and more complicated than “standard” information retrieval. Evaluation of patent retrieval engines has also been shown to require specific attention. In this chapter, we continue making this point, but emphasize the efforts undertaken in a specific domain, namely chemistry. We approached this issue from two different perspectives. First, there is the issue of scalability. Largely similar to the CLEF-IP efforts, it targets the problem of having to handle a large number of documents and, potentially, a large number of queries. Second, there are the issues generated by the specific characteristics of chemistry documents. We describe here how we manually created a set of topics to reflect the kind of requests for information that a patent searcher, or a general researcher, might have. The results of the first year’s track are presented as well, together with directions and desiderata for the next years.