a virtual environment for collaborative distance learning

A VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENT FOR COLLABORATIVE DISTANCE LEARNING Sittapong Settapat 1 and Michiko Ohkura 2 1 2

Graduate School of Engineering, Shibaura Institute of Technology, Japan

Department of Information Science and Engineering, Shibaura Institute of Technology, Japan

ABSTRACT In this work, we design and implement a 3D collaborative virtual environment (CVE) for distance learning (DL). After surveying current technologies and implementations supported by modern pedagogies, we noticed that current applications, particularly present web-based technologies or 2D-based technologies, do not adequately support our functional requirements of interaction, communication, and virtual community. We thus propose a new design for 3D CVEs, which are computer-enabled, virtual spaces where students can meet and interact with others, agents, virtual objects, and virtual environments to improve DLs. Our proposed system design is outlined by the current services used in online virtual communities. Its framework is designed with the major tools, including agents, virtual objects, and virtual environments to support 3D CVEs for DLs. The evaluation of the designed platform and its implementation will be performed in trials. We plan to evaluate the prototype of our designed platform under the Malaysia Project and Hybrid Twining Program. 1. INTRODUCTION 1.1 CVE and CSCL CVE and Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) have researched both computer supported collaborative work (CSCW) and collaborative learning [1]. CSCW is a computer-based network system that supports group work in a common task and provides a shared interface and environment for groups. Collaborative learning is defined as groups working together for a learning purpose. CSCL is used in educational settings, and its purpose is to scaffold or support students to effectively learn together. CSCL systems are typically tailored for use by multiple learners working at the same workstation or across networked machines in virtual environments. These systems can support the communication of ideas and information, access information and documents, and provide feedback on problem-solving activities. CSCL and CSCW research covers not only groupware techniques but also their social, psychological, organizational, and learning effects

1.2 Proposed Framework Nowadays, CSCL systems promote distance learning, and they have also been used to such develop Electrical Learning systems (E-Learning) as Learning Management System (LMS), Learning Content Management System (LCMS), Online Learning Centre (OLC), and Learning Platform (LP). The key advantages of the system include flexibility, convenience, and the ability to work any place where an internet connection is available. The difficulty of interacting with a 2D or a 2.5-D based system and the limitations of content presentation in web-based e-learning systems have motivated many researchers to address collaborative virtual environment systems in 3D geometry space [2]. The objective of our research is to develop a web-based framework with appropriate open architecture for effective collaborative virtual environments for distance learning. Following a brief overview of related works, this paper presents our idea and approach to build a web-based 3D collaborative virtual environment for distance learning using the latest technologies including X3D, RTMP, Flex, Groovy, and the Grails framework. This framework allows designers, engineers, and expert domains to share a common workspace with Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) that support not only present e-learning systems but also 3D collaborative virtual environments using X3D standards. 2. SYSTEM DESIGN 2.1 System Framework As new classes of collaborative applications emerge for Web environments, increasing pressure exists for full multimedia capabilities (audio, video, and 3D graphics) to become seamlessly integrated into the browser paradigm. Web 2.0, RIAs, and web services technology empower web-based e-learning frameworks. The Grails framework is not only an open source web framework for the Java platform but also a complete development framework based on Groovy language. Grails is a Java MVC framework that isolates business logic from user interfaces. Grails support scaffolding, Object Relational Mapping, Ajax Framework, and Web services, all of which require collaborative frameworks. The key advantage of the Java platform is the Java Virtual

― 167 ―

Machine (JVM), and the large libraries of Java Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) make Java more flexible and productive. Groovy is a dynamic language made specifically for JVM, unlike Ruby, Python, and JavaScript that run on JVM. In this work, we also deployed a Red5 Flash Server to support real-time video/audio streaming and flash-based collaborative e-learning RIAs.

Fig. 2 Collaborative Workspace for Distance Learning CONCLUSION We designed and implemented a 3D collaborative virtual environment (CVE) for distance learning (DL). Because X3D offers many potential benefits, our proposed framework, which enhances existing web-based CVEs for DLs with X3D technology, not only increases full multimedia capability support but also provides a 3D contents presentation in a common shared space and virtual scene simulation capability to support a new generation of web-based CVEs for DLs. Fig. 1 System Framework

REFERENCES

2.2 X3D In this paper, our system provides X3D browsers and integrated X3D contents to the system. X3D is a scene graph to model the many graphics nodes that comprise a virtual environment. X3D is built on VRML, which adds XML capabilities for integration with other WWW technologies. X3D uses X3D browsers to parse X3D scenes and then renders them, not only showing 3D objects from varying viewpoints as COLLADA does but also enabling object animation and user interaction. X3D browsers are often implemented as plug-ins that work as an integrated part of a regular HTML web browser.

[1] Redfern, S. and Naughton, N., Collaborative Virtual Environments to Support Communication and Community in Internet-Based Distance Education, Journal of Information Technology Education, vol. 1, no. 3, pp. 202-211, 2002. [2] Brenton, H., et al., Using multimedia and Web3D to enhance anatomy teaching, Computers & Education, vol. 49, no. 1, pp. 3-18, 2007.

3. WEB-BASED 3D-CVE FOR DL In accordance with our goal to enable web-based 3D interactive and collaborative learning in virtual environments, we tried to preserve as many web-based CVE features and uses as possible and to expand the use of 3D virtual environments for Distance Learning. We plan to evaluate the prototype of our designed platform under the Malaysia Project and Hybrid Twining Program and the value of web-based 3D collaborative workspaces for distance learning. An example of scene simulation will be selected to evaluate the effectiveness of web-based 3D collaborative workspaces. As shown in Fig. 2, such a virtual scene for disaster training will be implemented and simulated with the proposed framework through a web-based X3D browser. Collaborative learners can share real-time data and interact with others.

― 168 ―

Sittapong Settapat received B.E. (2004) and M.E. (2008) degrees in Computer Engineering from King 0RQJNXW¶V 8QLYHUVLW\ RI Technology Thonburi, Thailand, and an M.E. (2008) degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the Shibaura Institute of Technology, Japan. He is a PhD candidate at the Shibaura Institute of Technology.

MAGIC SURFACES: A SURFACE NETWORKING TECHNOLOGY FOR INDOOR UBIQUITOUS SENSOR NETWORKS Kenta Sakakura and Masateru Minami Laboratory for Information Systems and Applications, Shibaura Institute of Technology, 3-7-5 Toyosu, Koto-ku, Tokyo, Japan ABSTRACT This paper introduces a surface network system called Magic Surfaces 2 that enables easy construction of a smart space using a huge number of networked sensors. Networked sensors usually require power supply, localization and bi-directional communication functions. In particular, power supply is an important function for the long time use of a huge number of sensors. Magic Surface 2 provides these three basic functions to the sensors in a non-contact manner based on a near field communication (NFC) technology. This paper describes design and prototype implementation of Magic-surfaces 2. 1. INTRODUCTION In indoor environments, we can imagine various types of sensor/actuator network application such as elderly care, appliance control, office automation and factory automation. In such scenarios, it is necessary to develop a technology that is capable of installing various types of sensors everywhere in indoor environments. From this point of view, we are developing a platform technology called Smart Building Material. The goal of smart building material project is to develop a system that enables easy construction of indoor sensing infrastructures by simply filling an indoor space with the device just like installing wallpaper in a room. Towards this end, a surface-like networking device is necessary that integrates power supply, localization, and networking functions. So far, several surface-like devices have been developed. Networked Surfaces[1] provides electric power, wired connetion to objects and localization[2] through small metallic plates located on the surface. Pushpin computing[3] and Pin&Play[4] support bi-directional communication and power transmission using conductive sheets. Smart Table[4] detects the

Fig.1 System Architecture of Magic Surfaces 2

locations and orientations of objects on a table by recognizing the magnetic footprints of the objects. However, none of the above devices provides power supply, localization and communication functions in a non-contact manner. In contrast to these existing researches, we have implemented a proof-of-concept prototype of Magic Surfaces [6]. Although we have successfully implemented localization and communication functions, improving power transmission efficiency and reducing a system size were still desired. To tackle these problems, we are designing Magic Surfaces 2 (MS 2) based on a near field communication (NFC) technology. This paper describes hardware design and implementation of MS 2. 2. HARDWARE DESIGN 2.1 System Overview Fig.1 shows an overview of the system architecture of Magic Surfaces2. In MS 2, we utilize a NFC technology to a non-contact power transmission. The system consists of two devices; these are Surface Object (SO) and Movable Object (MO). A SO is a sheet-like device that consists of an array of planer coils on a printed circuit board (PCB), and these coils are controlled by a microcontroller. SOs are placed on various surfaces such as walls, floor and ceilings, and form a surface network system. A MO is assumed to be a device like a small sensor node, and is placed on the surface. It also has a planer coil and receives electric power transmitted from the coils on the surface in a non-contact manner. The received power is stored in a EDLC (Electric Double Layer Capacitor) equipped on the MO. A SO and a MO are able to communicate each other via modulated magnetic field and this communication medium is shared by each coil on the SO using a TDMA-like multiplex[6]. Localization of the MO is realized by using the position of a coil on the SO. In addition, SOs determines their relative position by running an auto-configuration protocol. The details of the protocol are described in [6]. 2.2 Detailed Hardware Design Fig.2 and Fig.3 show a prototype implementation of MS 2. A SO consists of four main components: there are a ASK modulator and demodulator, a coil selector circuit and a coil-array sheet. These components are controlled by a PSoC microcontroller (Cypress CY8C29466). This microcontroller is connected to a wireless module (Cypress CYRF6936), and is utilized to control each SOs by the host computer.

― 169 ―

Fig.2. Prototype Implementation of MS 2

Fig.3. Block Diagram of MS 2

The ASK modulator and demodulator performs power transmission and communication functions for each MO on the SO. The communication speed between MO and SO is up to 20kbps. The modulator produces 13.56MHz carrier waves and modulates it into On-Off shift Keying (OOK) signals. The demodulator utilizes a normal diode detector circuit to simplify the circuit. The coil selector circuit is utilized to connect the coil-array sheet and the modulator-demodulator. This circuit utilizes mechanical relay switches to select each coil. Mechanical relay switches are unreliable in terms of the durability. Since our goal is to implement Magic Surfaces 2 for proof-of-concept, we utilized mechanical relay switches this time. We are planning to use RF MEMS switch for the next version of the system. The coil-array sheet is composed of 64 (8 x 8) square coils (20mm in diameter, 10 turns) on a 18cm x 18cm FPC (Flexible Printed Circuit).

nodes. On the other hand, the output power decreased to 65mW at 5mm away from the center of the sender coil. The output power was less than 10mW in outer of the sender coil. This indicates that square-gridded coil alley does not produce uniform power density on the sheet. We are trying to improve it by re-designing the layout and the shape of the coil in our future work.

3. EXPERIMENTAL RESULT In the implementation of MS 2, one key function is the power transmission function because it affects not only communication and localization capabilities but also variety of applications. For this reason, we measured power transmission performance of the system in our initial experiment. Fig.4 shows an experimental setup of power transmission test. We placed a receiver coil (20mm in diameter, 10 turns) on the center of a surface object coil (x=3, y=3). The SO coil produces 13.56MHz 15Vp-p carrier waves through the modulator. The receiver coil is attached to a resonance circuit, and a 1 kilo-ohms resistor was connected to the output of the circuit. We moved the receiver coil within a range of 30mm from the sender coil as intervals of 1mm and measured the transmitted power density at the height z=0mm. The result shows that maximum 130mW of electric power can be obtained from the system. The amount of the transmitted power is enough to drive small devices such as sensor network

4. SUMMARY We presented hardware design and prototype implementation of Magic Surfaces 2 in this paper. The result shows that MS 2 can transmit sufficient amount of power to MOs in a contact-less manner. Our future work will be completing prototype implementation including both hardware-level and system-level implementations. Optimizing coil design and layout is also important to improve performance of the system. Building a large-scale indoor sensing testbed and implementing attractive applications will be quite important in our long-term challenges. REFERENCES [1] J. Scott et al., Networked Surfaces: A New Concept in Mobile Networking, ACM Mobile Networks and Applications, Vol. 7, No. 5, pp. 353–364, Oct. 2002. [2] F. Hoffman et al., Location of Mobile Devices using Networked Surfaces, Proc. the 4th International Conference on Ubiquitous Computing (UbiComp 2002), Sept. 2002. [3] J. Lifton et al., Pushpin Computing System Overview: A Platform for Distributed, Embedded, Ubiquitous Sensor Networks, Proc. the 1st International Conference on Pervasive Computing (Pervasive 2002), Aug. 2002. [4] K. Van Laerhoven et al., Pin&Play: The Surface as Network Medium, IEEE Communications Magazine, Vol. 41, No. 4, pp.90–96, April 2003. [5] P. Steurer et al., System Design of Smart Table, Proc. IEEE International Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications (PerCom 2003), Mar. 2003. [6] R. Kurakake, et al., “Magic Surfaces: A Smart Building Material for Indoor Sensing Infrastructures”, Proc. 4th International Conference on Networked Sensing Systems (INSS2007), June 2007

Fig.4. Experimental Setup and Result of Power Transmission

― 170 ―

KNOWLEDGE DISSEMINATION TOOLS

Noorabsya Mohamed, Azizah Abdul Rahman, and Wardah Zainal Abidin Department of Computer Science and Information Systems, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia

ABSTRACT This paper reviews several types of knowledge dissemination tools. Initially, the definitions of knowledge and knowledge dissemination are explained in detail. This paper highlights the importance of knowledge dissemination in developing knowledge community. Secondly, the suggested ICT tools for knowledge dissemination will be presented. The suggested ICT tools for knowledge dissemination are RSS feeds, phone text messaging (SMS), internet telephone, and intelligent agents. These tools are then analyzed into categories according to its technology strategy and mobility aspects. These will help in understanding the usage and the purpose of the tools. These ICT tools were compared in order to demonstrate their suitability with the respect to the context. In conclusion, this paper shows that ICT has high potential to support knowledge expansion process effectively. 1. INTRODUCTION Knowledge is information that is organized, synthesized, or summarized to enhance comprehension, awareness, or understanding (Bergeron 2003). To differentiate knowledge from information, knowledge is also known as actionable information (Tiwana 2003). Therefore information needs to be disseminated in order to make them actionable. There are three types of knowledge. They are tacit (know how), implicit and explicit (know what) knowledge. Below are the definitions from different authors. Table 1 Tacit, Implicit and Explicit Knowledge Definitions. Authors

Tacit Knowledge (Bergeron Knowledge 2003) that is

Implicit Knowledge Like tacit knowledge,

Explicit Knowledge Knowledge that easily

ingrained at typically is a subcontrolled by conscious expert. level and However, it therefore can be difficult to extracted from explain to the expert others. through a process termed knowledge engineering. (Rao 2005) Likely the The property of knowledge firm such that is implicit as in transaction communities data, work and products, relationships is research often notes, accessible only e-mails and in a social others context

conveyed from someone proficient at a task to someone else through written or verbal communica -tions. Knowledge that cannot be codified and remains the property of the knowledge workers such as experience, expertise, reputation and others.

2. KNOWLEDGE DISSEMINATION To disseminate information or knowledge means to distribute it so that it reaches the masses or organizations (2003). Dissemination is generally seen as a measure through which the results are brought into the awareness of certain target groups (Suurla, Markkula et al. 1999). According to both of these definitions, it is obvious that dissemination is to distribute or diffuse any information or knowledge to other party for their usage. In knowledge management, knowledge dissemination process supports the knowledge sharing process. Knowledge in the form of topics can be discussed in knowledge sharing platforms and disseminated using

― 171 ―

dissemination tools. These tools will create awareness of knowledge to the target users. This process will enhance the knowledge sharing processes. Users who are interested in the topics will be attracted to share their knowledge and visit the knowledge sharing platform. After sharing the knowledge, new knowledge will be produced. This knowledge then once again will go back to the knowledge dissemination tools in order to distribute updates to the target users. And this cycle will be repeated many times. This action shows that knowledge dissemination and knowledge sharing processes need and support each other. Figure 1 (a) visualized the process how knowledge dissemination work together within knowledge sharing process.

Fig. 1 (a) How knowledge dissemination work together within knowledge sharing process. Knowledge dissemination is a process where knowledge or actionable information is distributed to others for some attentions. There are several reasons that explain the benefit of knowledge dissemination whether in the society or in the organization surrounding. For example: x Product advertisements (Shelly and Vermaat 2008). x To enlighten the society due to some issues x To acknowledge community in new ideas x To inform updates of news or websites x Event announcements (Shelly and Vermaat 2008). x Job vacancies (Shelly and Vermaat 2008). Knowledge need to be disseminated in order to build knowledge society. Knowledge society is about creating, sharing, and using knowledge to bring prosperity and sense of well-being to its people (Al-Hawamdeh and Hart 2002). Government who need to acknowledge the citizen about new economic strategy needs to find the way to disseminate the knowledge to them effectively. Knowledge dissemination encourages knowledge sharing processes while knowledge sharing processes occurred in knowledge society. Therefore knowledge dissemination processes are needed in building knowledge society.

The success of knowledge dissemination depends on the level of previous knowledge held by the audience and the effectiveness of the channels available to share the knowledge (Debowski 2006). Information and communication technologies (ICT) are one set of major forces that has moved knowledge management front and centre. These technologies have made it possible for people to share enormous amounts of information unconstrained by the boundaries of geography and time (Bukowitz and Williams 1999). Internet is one of the medium for communication. It is a tool that may be used as knowledge disseminator. People use the internet as knowledge disseminator because internet is: x Fast and efficient x Readily available x Easy to update x Cater for wide audience groups x Easily accessible for users anytime anywhere x Lower cost compared to conventional dissemination process. This paper analyzed the knowledge dissemination tools 2 aspects; technology strategy, and mobility. In technology strategy, there are two strategy catered for knowledge dissemination. They are push and pull technology. Push technology automatically delivers data to the user based on pre-defined information profiles or filters(Shelly and Vermaat 2008). Push technology is a process of a web server sending content to a computer at regular intervals, such as current sport scores or weather reports (Shelly and Vermaat 2008). Users of push technology may obtain leads from the information received and then search for more in-depth information (Powis-Dow 2006). This shows that using push technologies, user will take an action due to the disseminated information. In simple words, push technologies will disseminate knowledge or action information straight to the target users. This action will cause target users who are interested in the knowledge to do some action in order to know more about the knowledge. Pull technology is a process where the target users request information from the web server (Shelly and Vermaat 2008). This shows that the users are interested in the information or knowledge available at certain sites. The target users may notice the knowledge in the specific sites before visiting them. For example, most of the book lovers know that Amazon.com sells book. Therefore they will go straight to Amazon.com to know more about the products available. Mobility comes from the word mobile which means to describe something large that can be moved easily from place to place(2003). This paper will discuss some of the relavant dissemination ICT tools. They are RSS feeds, phone text messaging (SMS), internet telephone, and intelligent agents.

3. ICT TOOLS 3.1 RSS Feeds

― 172 ―

Rather than conventional mails, electronic mails (e-mails) are now more popular among the internet users. It is not just because they are fast but they also free. This is one of the suitable ways to disseminate knowledge through the internet. E-mail is the transmission of messages and files via a computer network (Shelly and Vermaat 2008). Several knowledge dissemination tools using e-mails as their medium to pass the knowledge to the end users such as RSS feeds. RSS feeds stands for really simple syndication. RSS is a specification that content aggregators use to distribute content to subscribers (Shelly and Vermaat 2008). A content aggregator is a business that gathers and organizes web content and then distributes, or feeds, the content including news, music videos and pictures to subscribers for free or fee (Shelly and Vermaat 2008). RSS is obviously using push technology to distribute the information and knowledge to the target users. RSS is considered static because this tool did not move from one place to another. Figure 1 (b) shows the suggested knowledge dissemination mechanism using RSS feeds. Knowledge contributors will adapt RSS feeds machine to their websites, blogs or portals. This machine then will disseminate the updates of these sites to all the target audience. Therefore an RSS feed is suitable for knowledge content dissemination in any website, blogs or portals.

Knowledge Contributors

1999): x The world wide availability and popularity of an inexpensive SMS x The evolution of Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) in phone into a standardized and secure application platform for the next-generation networks. x The demand for applications that let people uses their mobile phones for more than just talking.

Fig. 1 (c) Statistic of cellular phones in Malaysia (Malaysia 2008). Figure 1 (d) shows the suggested mechanism of SMS for knowledge dissemination purpose. Initially knowledge contributors such as the government or any other service provider, send their knowledge to SMS server. Then SMS will be posted to GSM modem in order to submit them to the users. From GSM modem, SMS is submitted to SMS Center (SMS-C) so that the SMS will be delivered to the target user’s mobile. Therefore, knowledge dissemination processes are able to be done using SMS technology.

RSS Feeds Knowledge Contributors Target Audience 1 Target Audience 4

Target Audience 2

Knowledge

Target Audience 3

SMS Server Post SMS

Target Audience N

SMS-C Fig. 1 (b) RSS feed mechanism for knowledge dissemination process. 3.2 Phone Text Messaging (SMS) Other than the internet, mobile application such as phone text messaging or short message services (SMS) are also had been a trend in disseminating information and knowledge. Information or knowledge passed within this medium may be formal or informal. In Malaysia itself, total subscriptions for cellular phones draws a very large numbers within the year 2007 and 2008 (Malaysia 2008). Figure 1 (c) shows the statistics of cellular phones subscribers in Malaysia. The reasons why SMS is one of the suitable tools for knowledge dissemination are (Guthery; and Cronin

SMS Deliver

SMS Submit

GSM Modem

Target user’s mobile

Fig. 1 (d) Suggested mechanism of SMS for knowledge dissemination purpose. Although the mechanism to send SMS seems to be static, users will received their message anywhere they are. Therefore SMS is considered mobile. The technology strategy for SMS is pull technology. Message sent

― 173 ―

through SMS is considered using pull technology. 3.3 Internet Telephone The most common way of the telephone system is analog. The inexpensive analog technology has many advantages such as it is simple and keeps the end-to-end delay of voice transmission very low because the signal propagates along the wire almost at the speed of light (Hersent;, Petit; et al. 2005). Conversation may be the fastest way to spread out knowledge. Although analog phone have many advantages, there are still many drawbacks such as(Hersent;, Petit; et al. 2005): x Unless you use manual switchboards, analog switches require a lot of electromechanical gear, which is expensive to buy and maintain x Parasitic noise adds up at all stages of the transmission because is no way to differentiate the signal from the noise and the signal cannot be cleaned Internet telephone not only allows the users to talk more, but it also let users to get connected throughout the word without any geographical barriers. Since knowledge is better to be explained by the knowledge contributors, internet telephone is one of the solutions. Internet telephone is mobile if users who access them are using wireless internet connection. But it may be static if users only access them through local area network. This tool is using both pull and push technology. It allows service provider to call the target users and push the knowledge to them and the target users also may get interested and started to dig more about the disseminated knowledge from the net. 3.4 Intelligent Agents Intelligent agent is defined as an object or entity that understands their position in an environment through sensor and reacts to the environment through effectors(Russel and Norvig 2003). In computer science, intelligent agent may be in form of software, system or other object that are applicable to the computer or internet environment. In order to make any applications to be intelligent or expert, there must be some knowledge features added in them. The characteristic of intelligent agents makes them suitable for knowledge dissemination tools. As listed in table 2. are the characteristic of intelligent agents (Kasabov and Kozma 1998) and the reasons why they are suitable for knowledge dissemination processes. Table 2 Characteristic of intelligent agents and the reasons why they are suitable for knowledge dissemination processes. Characteristic of Intelligent Agents (Kasabov and Kozma 1998) Learn and improve

Reasons why it Suits Knowledge Dissemination Processes Knowledge dissemination

through interaction processes required an with the environment interaction between one site to another in order to do knowledge or information collecting or to disseminate the knowledge and information. Adapt online and in In order to crawl in the web, real time adaption of online and real time is important for knowledge dissemination tools in terms of distributing knowledge to all target users at the right so that it may escape from online traffic. Learn quickly from As a knowledge large amounts of data dissemination tools, an agent shall know whether the knowledge that they pick is suitable for the target users or not. Accommodate If the knowledge that the real-time problem agent found are new, they solving rules shall know whether it is incrementally suitable for them to cater or not. To show the mechanism of knowledge dissemination in intelligent agent, figure 1 (e) are the modified models of intelligent agent mechanism adopted from the models of goal-based intelligent agents by Russels and Norvig. First the sensors of the agent sense the knowledge in the environment. The agent then has to know what environment are they in by referring to the state of the environment. Agent has to suit themselves in the environment. To know the consequences if any action is taken in the environment, agent have to know how the world evolves. Knowledge dissemination agents shall know that the knowledge is created or updated in the website that they visited. The agent has to know what they should do when they visit a website. In dissemination, the agent has to collect the information or knowledge in websites. To gather the knowledge or information in certain website, the agent shall not destroy nor change the contents. After gathering the knowledge and information, the agent shall know the goal for their actions. In this case, the goal for the agent is to disseminate knowledge gathered to target users. Then the agent will send the message to their reactors to react according to the goal. Reactors will get back to the environment and disseminate the knowledge. Intelligent agents are suitable for knowledge dissemination processes since it may perform these processes in the internet environment. Intelligent agent may be used for many purposes. In knowledge dissemination, it may be used as a tool to crawl in the web to collect and distribute them to the target users. The intelligent agent may also be used as a tool to pick which knowledge available that the target

― 174 ―

users prefer the most before they disseminate it to them. In this case, intelligent agent is using both pull and push technology. First, user need to initiate the knowledge area in the intelligent agent interface (pull technology). Then the intelligent agent passed back knowledge retrieval for the target user.

State

Sensors

E N

How the world evolves? Knowledge A will be created or updated from website X, Y, Z.

What my actions do? Collect Knowledge A from the web

Goal: Disseminate Knowledge A to target users

Know the environment

V I

Know the consequences if action A is taken

R O N

X

Yes Yes (using wireless internet) Intelligent X Yes (may agents crawl throughout the internet) Knowledge communities have many choice of knowledge source. Therefore the knowledge providers have to choose the suitable tools to disseminate the knowledge effctively. In the future, intelligent agent tools shall have better capability to directly involve the target users so that the knowledge will be disseminated to the targeted person in a timely manner. REFERENCES (10pt.)

E

(2003). Collins COBUILD Advance Learner’s English Dictionary, HarperCollins Publishers. Al-Hawamdeh, S. and T. L. Hart ( 2002). Information and Knowledge Society, McGraw-Hill Education (Asia). Bergeron, B. (2003). Essentials of Knowledge Management. New Jersey, John Wiley & Sons. Bukowitz, W. R. and R. L. Williams (1999). The Knowledge Management Fieldbook, Pearson Education Limited, Britain. Debowski, S. (2006). Knowledge Management, John Wiley & Sons, Australia Ltd. Guthery;, S. B. and M. J. Cronin (1999). Mobile Application Development: with SMS and the SIM Toolkit, McGraww-Hill Companies, Inc., United States of America. Hersent;, O., J.-P. Petit;, et al. (2005). IP Telephony: Deploying Voice-over-Internet Protocols. West Sussex, Egland, John Willey & Sons Ltd. Kasabov, N. and R. Kozma (1998). "Introduction: Hybrid Intelligent Adaptive System." International Journal of Intelligent Systems 13: 2. Malaysia, D. o. S. (2008). "Cellular phones in Malaysia." from http://www,statistics.gov.my/eng. Powis-Dow, D. W. (2006). "Reconciling Push vs. Pull Technologies." Dialog. Rao, M. (2005). Knowledge Management Tools and Techniques, Elsevier Butterworth Heinemann. Russel, S. and P. Norvig (2003). Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach, Prentice Hall. Shelly, G. B. and M. E. Vermaat (2008). Discovering Computers 2009, Course Technology. United States of America. Suurla, R., M. Markkula, et al. (1999). Methods and Tools for Effective Dissemination: A Guide to the Dissemination of the Result of International Educational Projects, International Association for Continuing Engineering Education, IACEE.

Disseminate the knowledge to users

N

Reactors

T

CONCLUSION There are varieties of ways to perform knowledge dissemination processes using ICT. However each of the ICT tools may have their strengths and weaknesses. It depends on the contents and structures of the knowledge that need to be disseminated. The service provider shall know what are the contents and structures of knowledge that they want to disseminate. Then they may choose the most appropriate tool in order to disseminate their information or knowledge. Therefore, this paper provides a comparison between tools by looking at four categories; pull technology, push technology, mobility, and level of collaboration. Table 3 Comparison between tools by looking at four categories; pull technology, push technology, mobility, and level of collaboration.

RSS

X X

M

Fig. 1 (e) Suggested mechanism of SMS for knowledge dissemination purpose. Just like internet telephone, intelligent agent is mobile if users who access them are using wireless internet connection. But it may be static if users only access them through local area network.

Tools

SMS Internet telephone

Pull Push Mobility technology technology X Yes (using wireless internet)

― 175 ―

Tiwana, A. (2003). The Knowledge Management Toolkit, Perantice Hall, United Kingdom, London.

Noorabsya Mohamed received the Bachelor Degree (2008) in Information Science from the National University of Malaysia (UKM). She is a master student in Department of Information System, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. Her current interests include knowledge management and intelligent agents. E-mail address: [email protected] Azizah Abdul Rahman received the Bachelor Degree (1986) in Computer Science at the University of Sauthwesten Lousiana; master in computer science (1988) at Western Michigan University and her PhD (2003) at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. She is a lecturer in Department of Information System, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. Her current interests include knowledge management and information architecture. E-mail address: [email protected] Wardah Zainal Abidin received the Bachelor Degree in Pharmacology at National University of Malaysia (UKM). She completed her master in computer science at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. She is a lecturer in Department of Information System, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. Her current interests include knowledge management and special children. E-mail address: wardah@utm,my

― 176 ―

FACTORS OF INTERNET FINANCIAL REPORTING: THE CASE OF MALAYSIA

Mohd Noor Azli Ali Khan, Department of Management, Faculty of Management & Human Resources Development, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia Assoc. Prof. Dr. Noor Azizi Ismail, Universiti Utara Malaysia ABSTRACT This paper examines the factors that influence companies in Malaysia to engage in Internet Financial Reporting (IFR). Perceptions of advantages and problems in using this new technology for financial reporting were also examined. The perceptions of preparers of financial information were solicited using a survey mailed questionnaire. Preliminary findings suggested three factors that are perceived as important by responding firms to engage in IFR: (1) enhance corporate image, (2) company teller with the technology development, and (3) competitors in the industry. The findings also revealed three factors that inhibit firms from engaging in IFR: (1) need to keep information updated to be of use, (2) required expertise from the company, and (3) concern over security of information. The findings also suggested that ‘global reach and mass communication’ and ‘timeliness and up-date ability’ as the most important advantages from financial reporting on the Internet. On the other hand, ‘security problems’ and ‘cost and expertise’ are the disadvantages of placing financial information on the Internet. Finally, plausible implications of the findings of the study are then presented and areas for future research are also proposed. Keywords: factor, advantage, disadvantage and internet financial reporting Field: Information technology 1. INTRODUCTION The development of the Internet as a distribution channel of financial information creates a new communication medium and reporting environment in the corporate world (Ashbaugh et al., 1999; Chan & Wickramasinghe, 2006). The practice of disseminating business information in a digital format is spreading around the world (Bonson et al., 2006) and becoming a very important part of business information services (Liu, 2000). The Internet is a technology with the power to revolutionize external reporting and increasingly important for financial reporting (Jones & Xiao, 2004). It is a unique information disclosure tool that encourages

flexible forms of presentation and allows immediate, broad, and inexpensive communication to investors (Kelton & Yang, 2008). The Internet also provides a unique form of corporate voluntary disclosure that enables companies to provide information instantaneously to global audience (Abdelsalam et al., 2007). A comprehensive review of existing literature on Internet Financial Reporting (hereinafter referred to as IFR) indicates a significant evolution of IFR research. The evolution of IFR research can be categorized into four research themes; classification of IFR, descriptive studies, association studies and dimension of IFR (Ali Khan & Ismail, 2008a). While researchers have given considerable attentions to IFR research over the last decade, only a limited number of studies have emerged to explain the relationship between corporate behaviour and the attitudes and preferences of preparers of IFR, especially in the context of Malaysia. Therefore, this study attempts to fill the gap by investigating the perceptions of preparers of financial information and to solicit their views about the factors, advantages and disadvantages of IFR. The rest of this paper is arranged as follows. The next section provides an overview of IFR. Section three discusses about the research methodology, followed by research findings. The paper ends with a conclusion and suggestions for future research. 2. PRIOR RESEARCH ON IFR There have been a growing number of empirical studies on IFR since 1995 reflecting the growth in this form of information dissemination (Davey & Homkajohn, 2004). IFR is an attractive and fast growing research topic (Oyelere et al., 2003; Xiao et al., 2005). A lots of IFR researches have emerged over the last decade. The earliest studies were produced during 1996 and 1997, only a year after the global, corporate interest in the Internet as an advertising media had commenced (Allam & Lymer, 2003). In general, the IFR literature can be classified into two themes; (1) the practices of companies

― 177 ―

using the Internet for financial reporting purposes and as an investor relations communication strategy, and (2) the determinants of web-based disclosure policy choice (Joshi & Al-Modhahki, 2003). Furthermore, IFR research can be divided into several themes: descriptive research, comparative research and explanatory research (Pervan, 2006; Abdelsalam et al., 2007). It has now becoming increasingly common for large corporations to communicate information to their stakeholders by using a voluntary disclosure medium like the Internet. Many companies provide websites which include large amounts of information on a rich range of financial matters. Compared to the traditional printed reports, the Internet offers many more opportunities to communicate financial information, and its importance in this regard is rapidly increasing (Pirchegger & Wagenhofer, 1999). Corporate websites are designed for multiple reasons, including advertising the firms’ products, facilitating electronic commerce, promoting brand identification, attracting potential employees, and enhancing the corporate image (Lybaert, 2002). The advantages of the Internet for financial reporting are its cheapness, speed, dynamism, and flexibility (Lymer, 1999). IFR can be cost effective, fast, flexible in format, and accessible to all users within and beyond national boundaries (Mohamed Hisham & Hafiz-Majdi, 2004). The last five years witness a growth in the number of companies adopting IFR. Indeed, IFR is one of the fast growing phenomenon (Ashbaugh et al., 1999; Oyelere et al., 2003). The development of IFR practice has been rapid, largely mirroring, and motivated by, the development of the world wide web since 1994, being the primary Internet medium for IFR (Allam & Lymer, 2003). Several professional studies in the US, UK and Canada have also examined the status of IFR. These include the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) (Spaul, 1997), the International Accounting Standard Committee (IASC), now the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) (Lymer et al., 1999), Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants (CICA) (Trites, 1999), and the U.S. Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) (FASB 2000, 2001). IFR practices have been surveyed by a number of academic studies in many countries, for example US (Petravick & Gillett, 1996; Ashbaugh et al., 1999; Ettredge et al., 2001), UK (Lymer, 1997; Marston & Leow, 1998; Craven & Marston, 1999), Japan (Marston, 2003), New Zealand (McDonald & Lont, 2001; Oyelere et al., 2003) and Ireland (Brennan & Hourigan, 1998). Several studies have also examined the relationship between firm specific characteristics and IFR (see, for example, Ashbaugh et al., 1999; Craven & Marston, 1999; Hassan et al., 1999; Pirchegger & Wagenhofer, 1999; Bonson & Escobar, 2002; Debreceny et al., 2002; Allam & Lymer, 2003; Joshi & Al-Modhahki, 2003; Oyelere et al., 2003; Marston & Polei, 2004; Xiao et al., 2004; Chan & Wickramasinghe, 2006). While numerous studies have examined the status and

determinants of IFR, only few studies have focused on the timeliness issue which is an important part of IFR (Pirchegger & Wagenhofer, 1999; Ettredge et al., 2002; Abdelsalam & Street, 2007). Timeliness is crucial as users are demanding for more timely information (Fisher et al., 2004). It is even more important as shorter delays are often associated with greater profitability (reference). Unfortunately, many companies are found to focus more on the user support and information content than timeliness and technology (Davey and Homkajohn, 2004). Studies on the perceptions of IFR from the preparers’ and users’ perspectives are very limited compared to those of traditional reporting. One exception is a study by Joshi and Al-Modhahki (2003). They found ‘global reach and mass communication’, ‘timeliness and updateability’ and ‘interaction and feedback’ as important advantages of IFR, while ‘security problems’ and ‘authentication, attestation and legal impediments’ as important disadvantages of IFR. In summary, the wealth of recent research in this area also confirms the importance of the IFR issues. However, perception studies on the factors, advantages and disadvantages of IFR are still lacking in developing countries, especially Asian countries. In additions, to the best of our knowledge, no studies have asked the interested parties, and especially preparers about their perception and attitude in relation to IFR. 3. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY The main objective of this study is to investigate the perception of preparers toward the advantages and disadvantages of IFR. For this purpose, data were collected by a mean of survey questionnaire. In designing the questionnaire, comments and feedback from post graduate students and academics were elicited in an endeavour to ensure that questions were clear and precise. Early draft on the questionnaire was pre-tested by two PhD accounting students, three accounting lecturers at Faculty of Management and Human Resource Management, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, and three accounting lecturers at College of Business, Universiti Utara Malaysia. Based on their feedbacks, several modifications were made to the wording of some questions and some less important questions were deleted to reduce the length of the questionnaire. The target prepares of IFR are chief financial officer (CFO), finance manager and accountants. CFO, finance managers or accountants of the public companies listed on the main board represented the preparers. CFOs were chosen because they are the senior executives who are responsible for both accounting and financial operations (Jiambalvo, 2004). CFO is a member of the management team that would typically be associated with the development of the corporate annual report and be in a position to comment on what influence the decision to disclose (Wilmshurst & Frost, 2000). These individuals also have the necessary knowledge and competency regarding IFR matters (Ho & Wong, 2003; Mohd Isa,

― 178 ―

2006). The respondents were asked to indicate their opinions on a five-point scale in terms of strongly disagree to strongly agree. Since this paper is exploratory in nature. A exploratory study is conducted to preliminary determine to get the respondent perceptions. A sample of this study consists of 450 respondents (preparers of public listed companies in Bursa Malaysia). The sample size satisfies the rule of thumb proposed by Roscoe (1975) as noted by Sekaran (2003). Sekaran noted Roscoe as suggesting that, among others, a sample size larger than 30 and less than 500 is appropriate for most research, with a minimum number of sub-sample sizes of 30 for each category is necessary. The data were collected during the month of July to September 2008. Each respondent received a marked questionnaire (for tracking purposes) together with a letter outlining the objective of the research, respondent confidentiality, and availability of survey result upon request, as well as a stamped addressed enveloped. We sent questionnaire to solicit their opinion on factors, advantages and disadvantages of reporting financial information on the Internet. A total of 68 respondents responded to the questionnaire, representing 15.11% response rate. CFOs and accountants are busy people and are generally unwilling to participate in survey studies (see, Ho & Wong, 2001), the low response rates (between 10 to 20 percent) were in line with the expectation of this study. PricewaterhouseCoopers (2002) reported that the average response rate for postal surveys in Malaysia is around 16 percent. The questionnaire consists of two parts. Part one relates to the general aspects, which are the background of the respondent such as gender, age, education level and position. Part two, consists of respondent perceptions toward factors, advantages and disadvantages of IFR.

Accountants

11

16.2

The following sections report the results of the preparers’ perceptions toward the factors that influenced them to adopt IFR. The results in Table 2 and Table 3 show ‘enhance corporate image’, ‘company teller with the technology development’ and ‘competitors in the industry’ as the three main factors that influence most influenced company to adopt IFR, while ‘need to keep information updated to be of use’, ‘required expertise from the company’ and ‘concern over security of information’ as the three main factors that most inhibited companies from adopting IFR. The respondent perceptions show that all the items are the factor influence company to engage or not to engage with IFR (mean > 3.00). Table 2. Factors influencing company engage IFR Item Enhance corporate image Company teller with the technology development Competitors in the industry Directors desire to engage IFR Obligations to community Obtain funds from wider sources Media attention Receive government support Stability and improvement in share prices Pressures from stakeholders Win awards

N = 68 Mean 4.18 3.88

Standard deviation 0.690 0.838

Rank

3.66 3.62 3.60 3.54 3.40 3.26 3.24

0.924 0.811 0.866 0.921 0.849 0.908 0.900

3 4 5 6 7 8 9

3.16 3.15

1.016 0.950

10 11

1 2

Table 3. Factors influencing company not engage IFR 4. RESULTS Table 1 shows the profile of the respondents. The results show that about 53 percent of the respondents are CFO while the remaining are finance manager and accountants. Two-third of the respondents are male. Eighty-seven percent of the respondents are 40 years old or below and almost all respondents have at least a degree or a professional qualification. Table 1. Profile of Respondent Demographic

Item

Gender

Male Female < 30 years 31 to 40 years 41 to 50 years > 51 years Diploma Degree / Professional Masters/Ph.D CFO Finance manager

Age

Academic certification Occupation

Frequency 46 22 6 27 26 9 3 49

Percentage (%) 67.6 32.4 8.8 39.7 38.2 13.2 4.4 72.1

16 36 21

23.5 52.9 30.9

Item Need to keep information updated to be of use Required expertise from the company Concern over security of information Concern over disclosure of proprietary information Cost incurred outweigh benefits to company Potential legal liability There are alternative forms of obtaining information Too costly to setup and maintain Do not want to be too transparent No legal requirement Fear of losing competitive advantage

― 179 ―

N = 68 Mean 3.90

Standard deviation 0.866

Rank

3.74

0.785

2

3.72

0.990

3

3.63

0.913

4

3.50

0.985

5

3.47 3.43

0.954 0.834

6 7

3.43 3.40

0.935 1.067

7 9

3.37 3.06

1.021 0.976

10 11

1

A further analysis was carried out to investigate the perceptions of preparers and users toward the advantages and disadvantages of IFR. These items were extracted from the literature ( Wallman, 1995; Green & Spaul, 1997; Lymer & Tallberg, 1997; Joshi & Al-Modhahki, 2003; Ali Khan & Ismail, 2008b). The perceptions were elicited using a Likert scale ranging from 1 (Strongly disagreed) to 5 (Strongly agreed). The results in Table 4 show that respondents perceived ‘global reach and mass communication’, ‘timeliness and updateability’ and ‘increased information’ as the three most important advantages of IFR (mean > 4.00). Table 4. Advantages of IFR Item Global reach and mass communication Timeliness and up-date ability Increased information (downloadable) and analysis Navigational ease Interaction and feedback Cost beneficial Presentation flexibility and visibility

N = 68 Mean 4.26

Standard Rank deviation 0.683 1

4.10 4.01

0.694 0.723

2 3

3.94 3.87 3.72 3.65

0.689 0.751 0.789 0.768

4 5 6 7

On the hand, the results in Table 5 show that respondents perceived ‘security problems’, ‘cost and expertise’ and ‘poor website design and advertising’ as the three most important disadvantages of IFR (mean > 3.50). Otherwise, the respondent perceptions show that all the items are the advantages and disadvantages of IFR (mean > 3.00). Table 5. Disadvantages of IFR Item Security problems Cost and expertise Poor website design and advertising Authentication, attestation and legal impediments Information overload Developed and developing country digital divide

N = 68 Mean 3.94 3.84 3.53

Standard deviation 0.896 0.874 0.954

Rank

3.50

0.889

4

3.44 3.34

0.920 0.874

1 2 3

5 6

5. CONCLUSION On this paper, we examine the perceptions of preparers on the factors, advantages and disadvantages of IFR. There are two important findings emerged from this study that can be used as a basis for future research. First, the respondents ranked ‘enhance corporate image’, ‘company teller with the technology development’ and ‘competitors in the industry’ as the most important factors that influence companies to adopt IFR. On the other hand, ‘global reach and mass communication’, ‘timeliness and

updateability’, ‘increased information’ and ‘navigational ease’ were ranked as the most important disadvantages. Second, respondents perceived ‘global reach and mass communication’ as the most important advantage of IFR, while ‘security problems’ as the most important disadvantage. In a nutshell, this paper provides important insights into the factors, advantages and disadvantages of IFR from the perspectives of preparers and users which are neglected by prior research. However, there are several limitations of our study, and future research ca refine and broaden our analyses in several aspects. The first is the small sample size. As the Internet continues to evolve, we expect more companies to create websites and adopt IFR within the next few years. Therefore, it would be interesting for researchers to further investigate this issue with a larger sample size. Second, the subject being surveyed can be described as a top management issue and it may be that not all respondents can reveal all the confidential information. Third, questionnaire may not be the best way of collecting data about IFR. Further research could try other approaches, such as interviewing companies, prepares and user. Fourth, this study only focuses on Malaysia. Future research may investigate and compare the issue between countries, especially between developed and developing countries. Finally, the Malaysian environment may be unique and, therefore, our findings may not be generalized in other capital markets. Replications of IFR practice in other national settings warrant potential research extensions of this paper. REFERENCES Abdelsalam, O.H., Bryant, S.M. & Street, D.L., An Examination of Comprehensiveness of Corporate Internet Reporting Provided by London-Listed Companies, Journal of International Accounting Research, vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 1-33, 2007. Abdelsalam, O.H. & Street, D.L., Corporate governance and the timeliness of corporate internet reporting by U.K. listed companies, Journal of International Accounting, Auditing and Taxation, vol. 16, pp. 111-130, 2007. Ali Khan, M.N.A. & Ismail, N.A., An Evolution of Internet Financial Reporting Research, Paper presented at

International Accounting and Business Conference (IABC) 2008, Puteri Pan Pacific, Johor Bahru, Johor, August 18-19, 2008a. Ali Khan, M.N.A. & Ismail, N.A., Faktor, Kelebihan dan Kekurangan Pelaporan Kewangan Menerusi Internet: Satu Kajian Awal, Paper presented at National Management Conference (NaMac) 2008, Primula Beach Resort, Kuala Terengganu, Terengganu, December 13-14, 2008b. Allam, A. & Lymer, A., Development in Internet Financial Reporting: Review and Analysis Across Five Developed Countries, The International Journal of Digital Accounting Research, vol. 3, no. 6, pp. 165-199, 2003. Ashbaugh, H., Johnstone, K.M. & Warfield, T.D., Corporate Reporting on the Internet, Accounting

― 180 ―

Horizons, vol. 13, no. 3, pp. 241-257, 1999. Bonson, E. & Escobar, T., A Survey on Voluntary Disclosure on the Internet: Empirical Evidence from 300 European Union Companies, The International Journal of Digital Accounting Research, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 27-51, 2002. Bonson, E., Escobar, T. & Flores, F., Online transparency of banking sector. Online Information Review, vol. 30, no. 6, pp. 714-730, 2006. Brennan, N. & Hourigan, D., Corporate Reporting on the Internet by Irish Companies, Accountancy Ireland, vol. 30, no. 6, pp. 18-21, 1998. Chan, W.K. & Wickramasinghe, N., Using the internet for financial disclosure: the Australian experience, International Journal Electronic Finance, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 118-150, 2006. Craven, B.M. & Marston, C.L., Financial reporting on the Internet by leading UK companies, The European Accounting Review, vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 321-333, 1999. Davey, H. & Hamkajohn, K., Corporate Internet Reporting: An Asian Example, Problems and Perspectives in Management, vol. 2, 211-227, 2004. Debreceny, R., Gray, G.L. & Rahman, A., The determinants of internet financial reporting, Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, vol. 21, no. 4-5, pp. 371-394, 2002. Deller, D., Stubenrath, M. & Weber, C., A Survey on the Use of the Internet for Investor Relations in the USA, the UK and Germany, The European Accounting Review, vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 351-364, 1999. Ettredge, M., Richardson, V.J. & Scholz, S., The presentation of financial information at corporate Web sites, International Journal of Accounting Information Systems, vol. 2, pp. 149-168, 2001. Ettredge, M., Richardson, V.J. & Scholz, S., Dissemination of information for investors at corporate Web sites, Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, vol. 21, pp. 357-369, 2002. FASB, Business reporting research project: Electronic distribution of business reporting information, Steering Committee Report Series, Financial Accounting Standards Board, 2000. FASB, Improving business reporting: Insights into enhancing voluntary disclosures, Financial Accounting Standards Board, 2001. Fisher, R., Oyelere, P. & Laswad, F., Corporate reporting on the Internet Audit issues and content analysis of practices, Managerial Auditing Journal, vol. 19, no. 3, pp. 412-439, 2004. Green, G. & Spaul, B., Digital Accountability, Accountancy, International Edition, pp. 49-50, 1997, May. Haniffa, M.H. & Ab. Rashid, H., The determinants of voluntary disclosures in Malaysia: The case of internet financial reporting, Paper presented at International Business Management Conference 2004, Kuantan, Pahang, December 6-7, 2004. Hassan, S, Jaaffar, N., Johl, S.K. & Mat Zain, M./N., Financial reporting on the internet by Malaysian

companies: Perceptions and practices, Asia-Pacific Journal of Accounting, vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 299-319, 1999. Healy, P. M. & Palepu, K. G., Information asymmetry, corporate disclosure, and the capital market: A review of the empirical disclosure literature, Journal of Accounting and Economics, vol. 31, pp. 405-440, 2001. Ho, S.S.M. & Wong, K.S., A study of the relationship between corporate governance structures and the extent of voluntary disclosure, Journal of International Accounting, Auditing & Taxation, vol. 10, pp. 139-156, 2001. Ho, S.S.M. & Wong, K.S., Preparers’ perceptions of corporate reporting and disclosure, International Journal of Disclosure and Governance, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 71-81, 2003. ICAEW, Digital reporting: a progress report, London: The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, 2004. IFAC, Financial reporting on the internet, International Federation of Accountants, 2002. Jiambalvo, J., Managerial Accounting (2nd ed.), USA: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2004. Jones, M.J. & Xiao, J.Z., Financial reporting on the Internet by 2010: a consensus view, Accounting Forum, vol. 28, no. 3, pp. 237-263, 2004. Joshi, P.L. & Al-Modhahki, J., Financial reporting on the internet: Empirical evidence from Bahrain and Kuwait, Asia-Pacific Journal of Accounting, vol. 11, no. 1, pp. 88-101, 2003. Kelton, A.S. & Yang, Y., The impact of corporate governance on Internet financial reporting, Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, vol. 27, no. 1, pp. 62-87, 2008. Liu, L.G., The emergence of business information resources and services on the Internet and its impact on business librarianship, Online Information Review, vol. 24, no. 3, pp. 234-255, 2000. Lybaert, N., On-Line Financial Reporting: An Analysis of the Dutch Listed Firms, The International Journal of Digital Accounting Research, vol. 2, no. 4, pp. 195-234, 2002. Lymer, A., The Use of the Internet in Company

Reporting: A Survey and Commentary on the Use WWW in Corporate Reporting in UK, Paper presented at the British Accounting Association Annual Conference, Birmingham, 1997. Lymer, A., The Internet and the future of corporate reporting in Europe, European Accounting Review, vol. 2, no. 2, pp. 289-301, 1999. Lymer, A & Tallberg, A., Corporate Reporting and the Internet - a survey and commentary on the use of the WWW in corporate reporting in the UK and Finland, Paper presented at the Annual Congress of the European Accounting Congress, Graz, Austria, 1997, April. Lymer, A., Debreceny, R., Gray, G. L. & Rahman, A., Business Reporting on the Internet, IASC Research Report, 1999. Marston, C., Financial reporting on the internet by leading Japanese companies, Corporate Communication:

― 181 ―

An International Journal, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 23-34, 2003. Marston, C. & Leow, C.Y., Financial reporting on the Internet by leading UK companies, Paper presented at the

by listed Chinese companies, Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, vol. 23, pp. 191-225, 2004.

21st Annual Congress of the European Accounting Association, Antwerp, Belgium, 1998. Marston, C. & Polei, A., Corporate reporting on the Internet by German companies, International Journal of Accounting Information System, vol. 5, pp. 285-311, 2004. McDonald, R. & Lont, D., Financial Reporting on the Web – A 2001 Review, Chartered Accountants Journal. pp. 64-68, 2001. Mohd Isa, R., Graphical Information in Corporate Annual Report: A Survey of Users and Preparers Journal of Financial Reporting & Perception, Accounting, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 39-60, 2006. Petravick, S. & Gillett, J., Financial reporting on the World Wide Web, Management Accounting, pp. 26-29, 1996, July. PricewaterhouseCoopers, Market Readiness for

Disclosure-Based Regulation, Highlights from the survey on the readiness of the Malaysian Capital Market participants for DBR, Kuala Lumpur: Securities Commission, 2002. Oyelere, P., Laswad, F. & Fisher, R., Determinants of Internet Financial Reporting by New Zealand Companies,

Journal of International Financial Management and Accounting, vol. 14, no. 1, pp. 26-61, 2003. Pervan, I., Voluntary Financial Reporting on the Internet- Analysis of the Practice of Stock-Market listed Croatian and Slovene Joint Stock Companies, Financial Theory and Practice, vol. 30, no. 1, pp. 1-27, 2006. Pirchegger, B. & Wagenhofer, A., Financial information on the Internet: a survey of the homepages of Austrian companies, The European Accounting Review, vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 383-395, 1999. Sekaran, U., Research Methods For Business A Skill Building Approach (4th ed.), USA: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2003. Spaul, B., Corporate dialogue in the digital age, London. The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, 1997. Trites, G., The impact of technology on financial and business reporting, Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants, 1999. Wallman, S., The Future of Accounting and Disclosure in Evolving World: The Need for Dramatic Change, Accounting Horizon, vol. 9, no. 3, pp. 81-91, 1995. Wilmshurst, T.D. & Frost, G.R., Corporate environmental reporting A test of legitimacy theory, Accounting, Auditing Accountability Journal, vol. 13, no. 1, pp. 10-25, 2000. Xiao, J.Z., Jones, M.J. & Lymer, A., A Conceptual Framework for Investigating the Impact of the Internet on Corporate Financial Reporting, The International Journal of Digital Accounting Research, vol. 5, no. 10, pp. 131-169, 2005. Xiao, J.Z., Yang, H. & Chow, C.W., The determinants and characteristics of voluntary Internet-based disclosures

― 182 ―

Mohd Noor Azli Ali Khan received the Bachelor of Accounting (Hons) (1998) and Master of Accounting (2001) from Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. Currently, pursuing his PhD in Accounting at College of Business, Universiti Utara Malaysia. He is a lecturer, Department of Management, Faculty of Management & Human Resources Development, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. His current research interests include financial disclosures and Internet financial reporting. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Noor Azizi Ismail received holds a bachelor degree (Accounting) from Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (1992); a Master degree (Accounting Systems) from University of Memphis, United States (1995); and a Doctorate degree (PhD) from Loughborough University, United Kingdom (Accounting and Information Systems) (2004). He is a associate professor at College of Business (Accounting), Universiti Utara Malaysia. His current research interests include accounting and information systems in small businesses, the interaction between organisational issues and technical factors in information systems development. Recently, his

work has concentrated on the IT governance issues and management accounting systems such as activity-based management and performance measurement. He has published articles in both local and international journals in the domains of accounting, management, and information systems such as International Journal of Accounting Information Systems, Journal of Global Information Technology Management, Campus Wide Information Systems, Malaysian Management Journal, International Journal of Management Studies, Journal of Muamalat & Islamic Finance Research, Jurnal Teknologi, Jurnal Penyelidikan Pendidikan, Jurnal Kemanusiaan, PROSPECT and Accountants Today. He is also the former editor for Malaysian Management Journal.

― 183 ―

ANALYSIS ON THE MODEL CHECKING AGENT FOR SMS MANAGEMENT SYSTEM VERIFICATION USING TEMPORAL LOGIC Siti Dianah Abdul Bujang, Ali Selamat and Radziah Mohamad Intelligent Software System Research Laboratory Faculty of Computer Science & Information System Universiti Teknologi Malaysia 81310 UTM Skudai,Johor, Malaysia. [email protected], [email protected] and [email protected]

ABSTRACT Nowadays, Short Message Service (SMS) is an emerging software mobile technology that support mobile-driven for business and telecommunication industry. The use of SMS has become an essential to most enterprises because the technology is known excellent. However, once SMS has been applied in distributed computing, the performance shows not given satisfied results. Extensive usage of SMS transaction has lead to the unseen faulty and errors. Also, the system is not able to support secure service to the users. This problem occurred because tremendous amount of SMS consume high bandwidth which could limit the network resources. Therefore, verification is needed to ensure the reliability of the system. This paper proposed the use of model checking agent approach for the verification of SMS Management System. The analysis of modeling shows the model checking agent is a basis approach to handle the SMS verification at the early stage of the software development. Keywords: Short Message Service (SMS), Model Checking Agent, Verification. 1.

INTRODUCTION

As an internet and mobile technology growth fast, it is one of potential technology to increase the market value for organizations. When we use the internet as a medium for managing commercial transactions, it can enhance the accessibility to a wide variety of information and services, and greatly facilitates remote payments. In fact, towards the evolution of the mobile technology, Short Message Service (SMS) is one of the notorious services that are capable to increase the performance of the conventional system. Thus, many companies are eager to convert the conventional system for mobile SMS application in order to have a better performance and service (Valentino, 2007), (Mee & Selamat, 2007) and (Shengguang, et al., 2008). Moreover,

in the telecommunication industry especially, we always need a system that can reduce the time, cost and give high priority in security because they want the users to have satisfaction in services and performance. Therefore, the SMS become one of the technologies which support the requirement so far. However, there are several cases of mobile systems have faced the unprecedented risk in operations especially involving on computing processes which resulting non trustworthiness for user point of view. They found out some problems occurred when many online ventures have been a victim to the operational processes because of poor security, poor data integrity control and inadequate management control once using the SMS. Others, Chaki et al. has claimed that now in information society, the correctness of computer software becomes one of the critical issues (Chaki, et al., 2008). The errors in complex software systems have caused large-scale economic losses in the past. Furthermore, Chaki et al. added that it is difficult to detect and fix the software bug in multi-threaded systems. Therefore, for a distributed application such as SMS Management System, we assume that the system will encounter risk during a heavy workload of SMS transaction. Problems occur when tremendous amount of SMS need to share the network bandwidth which could limit the network resources. Then, the bandwidth and network traffic became congested (Timothy & Scott, 2000). Consequently, the system will be unstable and prone to errors. Therefore, verification is needed to ensure the reliability of the system. We propose the use of model checking agent approach for the verification of system that based on the integration of agent based system and model checking method. This approach is one of potential idea in order to ensure the SMS Management System can support robustness and verifiable to satisfy user.

― 184 ―

In this research, we show the analysis of our model checking agent in a temporal logic approach. We have designed the SMS agent architecture and we test it using a model checker approach. The remainder of this paper is organized as follows: We present the related works in Section 2. Sections 3 showed the previous and propose architecture of the system. Section 4 and 5 respectively, showed the formal verification of SMS properties and experimental of result. Then, we conclude our paper in Section 6. 2.

RELATED WORKS

2.1

SMS issues

properties such as deadlock, invalid end state and nonprogress cycle (Bang Ki, et al., (2005). Generally, to specify the property of a system in model checking, we use Computational Tree Logic (CTL) or Linear Temporal Logic (LTL). The logics specify the behaviors of a system based on time structure. In the case of our research, we use the LTL because the time sequence is assumes as linear. The model of the system is represent in Kripke structure as we proposed in (Selamat, A. & Bujang, A.S.D., 2008). 3.

Today’s everyone used Short Message Service (SMS) to send and receive messages to retrieve the information in a fast way. It became one of popular communication technology that offers services to mobile devices including PDAs, all type of mobile phones, computers and any other terminals. It is an easy technology that been created in Europe by Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) (http://www.etsi.org, 2004). Lately, there are billions of messages has been sent worldwide and the number is getting increase every year (Schusteritsch R., et al., 2005). However, when the SMS is applied in the application of business industry, we have anticipated several issues in the design challenges which are the limitation of the network bandwidth and network resources for communication between the mobile phones users and the system. Although, the SMS is a low cost consume money with high speed services, but somehow the undesirable congestion can probably effect the system management (http://cramsession.brainbuzz.com, 2004). 2.2

SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE

SMS Management System is one of e-business system that integrates with SMS for multi level marketing (MLM) services (Mee & Selamat, 2007). There are four main modules in this system; registration module, selling product, bonus calculation and group SMS for activities sharing. However, this architecture has been enhanced for greater performance by using our proposed architecture in Fig 1.

Formal Method and Model Checking

Nowadays, formal methods have an important role to represent the specification of software for complex system. It is rapidly becoming a promising automated method to enhance the accuracy and correctness of the software systems. The verification is based on the static analysis that able to analyze systematically and exhaustively (Eugenio D. S., et al., 2003). The known formal method model checking is a current evolving technology to evaluate the ebusiness process. Model checking provides an effective and efficient evaluation with counter-example to verify the correctness of complex software system (Bonnie B. A., et al., 2005). This method can effectively represent a systematically exhaustive mathematical models and infinite models to trace the errors. In verification using model checking, there are several model checkers can be used for testing our model. SPIN (Simple Promela Intepreter) can be written using Promela language and is representative of LTL model checker for communication protocol or concurrent software. SPIN provides safety and liveness

Fig. 1: The SMS Management System and the propose architecture The propose architecture is the enhancement from the SMS Management System into agent- based system with the model checking agent as the manager to control the SMS system. We identified that the problems occurred in SMS Management System is when they are dealing thousands of user sending the messages to a system. The services

― 185 ―

The flow chart of the agents’ role can be showed as in Fig 2.

became slow and the probability of system to receive an invalid data is greater. As a result, the collision between the messages will increase the system errors. Therefore, the proposed of our model checking agent will be suggested to enhance the quality of services to check the correctness of the system design. 3.1

Modeling of Agent

In dealing with the problems in SMS Management System, we proposed a Model Checking Agent (MCa) with other supporting agents includes Input Agent (Ia), Output Agent (Oa) and Refine Agent (Ra). The MCa plays as a manager that will verify the incoming message. The message is verify based on three properties; format and syntax checking, byte transmission checking and timing checking. However, in this paper we only showed the verification of format and syntax checking as the experiment is still on going. The verification design of our MCa will then be tested using model checker SPIN. Based on Fig. 1, we enhance the architecture into agentbased system with the role of all agents as the following below: i.

Input Agent (Ia) Input Agent is a user interface in mobile phone has used as a medium for a users to interact with the SMS management system. The Ia will receive the request from user and assist the MCa to get the input from the user.

ii. Model Checking Agent (MCa) The Model Checking Agent role as a manager of the whole system that will check and verify the SMS request whether does it satisfies the system requirement or could be otherwise. The requirement is verify based on the properties that we mentioned before. This process is done in order to ensure the system get a correct and valid message. iii. Output Agent (Oa) Output Agent will be reacted if the messages successfully verified from the MCa. Then the Oa will accept the messages and sent it to the system server. The status of the user request will automatically send in back propagation to the user for acknowledgment. iv. Refine Agent (Ra) However, if the messages are identified as failure, the refine agent or Ra will handle to do the refinement of any errors in the user request by sending ’failure status’. It means that the user has to send back their request again for new process. Otherwise, the message will be considered as violated and terminate automatically.

Fig. 2: The flow chart of the verification 4.

FORMAL VERIFICATION OF SMS PROPERTIES

In model checking, we use linear temporal logic (LTL) to encode the formulae about the future path with modalities referring to time. It has two main types of properties that can be expressed using LTL which are safety and liveness. Safety properties is usually state that something bad never happens, while liveness properties is something good keeps happening. Therefore, we defined two properties in this paper: "no messages redundant" (safety) and "all messages send and receive eventually get through the system in valid format" (liveness). Then, we verified the correctness of the SMS property based on format and syntax checking using SPIN. There are two paths for the issues of format and syntax checking which are:

― 186 ―

1.

Ia MCa Oa : Process checking and verifying is success. 2. Ia MCa Ra Ia : Process checking and verifying is fail.

― 187 ―

As in the future works, we will enhance the results with two properties that we defined for SMS quality checking. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This work is supported by the Ministry of Science & Technology and Innovation (MOSTI), Malaysia and Research Management Center, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) under the Vot 79200. REFERENCES Bang Ki S., Jin Hyun W., Yoo C. and Choi Jin Y., System Resource Utilization Analysis based on Model Checking Method, An International Journal of Computing and Informatics (Informatica), 2005. Bonnie B. A., James. V. H., Paul B. L. and Scott L. S., Model Checking for E-Business Control and Assurance,

IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man and Cybernetics-Part C: Applications and Reviews, vol. 35, No. 3, August 2005.

Chaki S., Clarke E., Sharygina N. and Sinha N., Verification of Evolving Software via Component, Substitutability Analysis, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2008. Configuring SMS WAN Bandwidth http://cramsession.brainbuzz.com/articles/getarticles.asp?aid=805 , 2004. Eugenio D. S., Francesco M. D., Marina M., Giacomo P., Web applications design and maintenance using Symbolic Model Checking, Proceedings of the Seventh

European Conference on Software Maintenance and Reeingineering (CSMR'03) IEEE, 2003.

European Telecommunications Standards Institute, http://www.etsi.org, 2004. Mee V. N. and Selamat A., SMS Management System for Direct Sales and Network Marketing. Fifth International Conference on Information Technology in Asia (CITA’07), 2007. Selamat A. and Bujang A., The design of model checking agent for SMS Management System. 2nd KES In Symposium (KES AMSTA), Incheon, Korea, SpringerVerlag Berlin Heidelberg 2008, LNAI 4953, pp. 813-821, 2008. Shengguang M., Wei C., Gang L. Shitong W. and Liu W., An Asset management System based on RFID, WebGIS and SMS, 2nd International Conference on

Ubiquitous Information Management & Communication

(ICUIMC’08), 2008. Schusteritsch R., Rao S. and Rodden K., Mobile search with text messages:designing the user experience for

google SMS. In ACM Special Interest Group on ComputerHuman Interaction (SIGCHI), (2005). Timothy L., Scott A.D, Automatic Verification of Multiagent Conversations, The Midwest Artificial Intelligent & Cognitive Science Conference, (MAICS2000), 2000. Valentino C.A, Progress Monitoring for the Field Operations of the 2007 Philipine Cencus of Population, National Statistics Office, Philipines, 10-12 December 2007.

Siti Dianah A. Bujang has received a B.Sc (Hons) in Computer Science from the Universiti Teknologi Malaysia and currently is pursuing her M.Sc. Computer Science by research under a supervision of Assoc. Prof. Dr Ali Selamat at the same university since 2007 until now. She has published papers in several international and local conference including the IEEE and Springer. Her research interests include formal method, software agent, software engineering process and application, software modeling and specification and ebusiness. Ali Selamat has received a B.Sc. (Hons.) in IT from Teesside University, U.K. and M.Sc. in Distributed Multimedia Interactive Systems from Lancaster University, U.K. in 1997 and 1998, respectively. He has received a Ph.D. degree from Osaka Prefecture University, Japan in 2003. Currently, he is an associate professor and IT manager at the School of Postgraduate Studies, UTM. His research interests include software engineering, software agents, web engineering, information retrievals, genetic algorithms, neural networks and soft computing. Radziah Mohamad has received a B. Sc. in Software Engineering from Sheffield Hallam University, UK. She pursued her study for M.Sc. in Computer Science and Ph.D. degree from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM). Currently, she is a lecturer at the Department of Software Engineering, Faculty of Computer Science & Information System (FSKSM), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) from 2000-now. Her research interests include software agent, formal method, and software engineering and embedded real time system.

― 188 ―