Researching Complex Information Infrastructures

Thomas Ludwig reveals design characteristics when aiming at researching information infrastructures and their diverse information resources, types of users and systems as well as divergent practices. By conducting empirically-based design case studies in the domain of crisis management, the author uncovers methodological and design challenges in understanding new kinds of interconnected information infrastructures from a praxeological perspective. Based on implemented novel ICT tools, he derives design characteristics that focus on integrating objective and subjective queried insights into situated activities of people as well as emphasizing the subjective nature of information quality.

This book is open access under a CC BY-NC 2.5 license. The book aims to be a resource for those interested in planning and implementing large-scale information infrastructures for novel electronic services in health care. The focus of this book is on the pivotal role of the installed base (i.e. the already existing elements of an infrastructure) for ensuing infrastructural development. The book presents rich empirical cases on the design, development and implementation of core infrastructural components (e-prescription and public patient-oriented web platforms) in different national settings across Europe. Therefore, this is a book in which theoretical insights and practical experiences are tightly connected. Contributions have been sourced from a network of academics that have been working on the topic for years, and who have previously collaborated and shared a common understanding of the challenges entailed in expanding information infrastructures within healthcare. The book aims to become a reference for those seeking theoretical and empirical insights for conceptualizing and steering the evolution of information infrastructures in healthcare. The two types of systems (e-prescription and public patient-oriented web platforms) have been selected because they are widespread across Europe, because they invite comparisons, and because they are exemplary of two different types of aims. E-prescription initiatives are usually seen as opportunities to improve healthcare delivery by systematic and not dramatic change. Public patient-oriented web platforms are seen as opportunities to pursue wider and more radical innovation. This book targets researchers, practitioners and students who would benefit from a book providing a comprehensive view to contemporary approaches for the design and deployment of large-scale, inter-organizational systems within healthcare.

Within information societies, information availability is a key issue affecting society's well being. A geographic information infrastructure (GII) is the underlying foundation of such a society with regards to geographic information. Access to government information policies are important for the availability and successful use of the information and the success of the GII itself. Yet there have been only a few investigations into access policy oriented towards GII developments. This book adds this perspective. Through the creation of a GII maturity matrix describing the development in GIIs, it presents new insights in the role access policies may play in the development of GIIs. The book provides policy makers with strategy guidelines for GII development, as well as information about which access policy would best promote the use of geographic information. This should result in a GII that is able to perform its appropriate infrastructure function in an information society.

In the same way that infrastructures such as transportation, electricity, sewage, and water supply are widely assumed to be integrators of urban spaces, information infrastructures are assumed to be integrators of information spaces. With the advent of Web 2.0 and new types of information infrastructures such as online social networks and smart mobile platforms, a more in-depth understanding of the various rights to access, use, develop, and modify information infrastructure resources is necessary. Perspectives and Implications for the Development of Information Infrastructures aims at addressing this need by offering a fresh new perspective on information infrastructure development. It achieves this by drawing on and adapting theory that was initially developed to study natural resource commons arrangements such as inshore fisheries, forests, irrigation systems, and pastures, while placing great emphasis on the complex problems and social dilemmas that often arise in the negotiations.

Critical Infrastructures: State of the Art in Research and Application, comprising a selection of reviewed and edited contributions from all over the world, aims to shed light on the various aspects of critical infrastructures. The editors of this book have opted for a broad view on the various criticality aspects on infrastructures itself as well as contributions that discuss the institutional and technical environment of critical infrastructures which are crucial for their proper functioning. Critical Infrastructures brings to light a number of eye-opening critical issues that have been only marginally touched upon in research and practice. Hence, the book is an indispensable resource for infrastructure policy makers, managers, consultants and researchers alike. The book is divided into four sections: *Vulnerability and Risk; *System Development and Adaptation; *Institutional Change; *Capacity Management.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the 6th International ICST Conference, TridentCom 2010, held in Berlin, Germany, in May 2010. Out of more than 100 submitted contributions the Program Committee finally selected 15 full papers, 26 practices papers, and 22 posters. They focus on topics as Internet testbeds, future Internet research, wireless sensors, media and mobility, and monitoring in large scale testbeds.

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-conference proceedings of the Third International Workshop on Critical Information Infrastructures Security, CRITIS 2008, held in Rome, Italy, in October 2008. The 39 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from a total of 70 submissions. All the contributions highlight the current development in the field of Critical (Information) Infrastructures and their Protection. Specifically they emphasized that the efforts dedicated to this topic are beginning to provide some concrete results. Some papers illustrated interesting and innovative solutions devoted to understanding, analyzing and modeling a scenario composed by several heterogeneous and interdependent infrastructures. Furthermore, issues concerning crisis management scenarios for interdependent infrastructures have been illustrated. Encouraging preliminarily results have been presented about the development of new technological solutions addressing self-healing capabilities of infrastructures, that is regarded as one of the most promising research topics to improve the infrastructures' resilience.