Download or read book A Tale of Two Systems written by Michael K. Levine and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2009-06-24 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This business parable reviews two different systems development projects. One project was an abject, expensive failure, while the other succeeded in creating a major new revenue stream, bringing in new customers. By reviewing the tales of these two systems, readers will develop a better understanding of what works and what doesn‘t when it comes to

Download or read book A Tale of Two Systems written by Rene Reitsma and published by . This book was released on 2019-08 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text is meant as a case study and companion text to many Systems Analysis & Design textbooks used in undergraduate Management Information Systems (MIS), Business Information Systems (BIS) and Computer Information Systems (CIS) programs. The US counts about 1,300 (undergraduate + graduate) such programs (Mandiwalla et al., 2016). These texts typically contain short descriptions of technologies which give students some sense of what these technologies are used for, but do not provide much context or reflection on why these technologies might or might not be applied and what such applications actually amount to in real life. As a consequence, students, having worked their way through these textbooks and associated courses will have had little exposure to the reasoning which must take place when making choices between these technologies and to what goes into combining them into working and successful system architectures. It is our hope that this Tale of Two Systems (pun very much intended) will help mitigate this problem a little.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Transformations written by Michael K. Levine and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2011-12-05 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are many books that seek to explain Lean and Agile software that offer theory, techniques, and examples. Michael Levine’s first book, A Tale of Two Systems, is one of the best, synthesizing Lean manufacturing and product development with agile software concepts in an engaging business novel. However, there has been precious little practical guidance for those seeking to change existing organizations to become Lean and Agile, until now. Mr. Levine has followed the successful approach of A Tale of Two Systems, telling two simultaneous intertwined and contrasting stories, to bring organizational transformation to life. Mary O’Connell and James "Wes" Wesleyan, recently engaged to be married, share a commitment to Lean and Agile Software. They have recently become leaders in two very different companies – one, stuck in a slow-moving, unresponsive, process-driven quagmire of a software culture; the other, struggling through the chaos of a sales-driven, process-less swirl. Together with their wise mentor, Neville Roberts, they identify two approaches to making needed changes: Drive People (a top-down approach focused on processes and tools), and People Driven (an enablement approach focused on people and organizations). Mary and Wes evaluate their situations and choose approaches that best fit for them, and the transformations commence. A Tale of Two Transformations differs from many information technology books by grappling with all the complexities of our organizations: the people, the politics, the financials, the processes – in short, the culture from which our Lean and Agile journeys must begin. The change model presented in the flow of the stories is generally applicable, and can help anyone thinking about how to improve their organization.

Download or read book Social Policy Reform in Hong Kong and Shanghai A Tale of Two Cities written by Linda Wong and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-07-22 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As the richest cities in the world's most populous nation, Hong Kong and Shanghai have recently experienced dynamic growth spurred by more and better-managed capital. These cities also have social problems whose solutions will cost money. Their urban populations are aging. Health finance at the level these "First World" cities demand threatens to consume a large portion of the municipal budgets. Eldercare and social security are now less well covered by traditional Chinese families. Education has become more complex and public tuition, where it occurs, brings with it official plans for schools. Immigrants have flocked to Shanghai from inland China, and Hong Kong's border has become a protector of the former colony's high productivity jobs. Housing problems also have deeply affected both cities, albeit in somewhat different ways. This book provides a comprehensive overview of the similarities and differences between social policies in the two cities. Each chapter covers a different issue: health finance, housing, education, labor, poverty and social security, eldercare, and migration and competitiveness. The contributors explore pertinent developments in each city and analyze the similarities and differences between the two cities' approaches to social policies. They focus on policy reform and the interface between social policy and its environment. One main theme throughout the book is the extent to which spending for capital accumulation is in conflict with spending for social policies.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Plantations written by Richard S. Dunn and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2014-11-04 with total page 553 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Richard Dunn reconstructs the lives of three generations of slaves on a sugar estate in Jamaica and a plantation in Virginia, to understand the starkly different forms slavery took. Deadly work regimens and rampant disease among Jamaican slaves contrast with population expansion in Virginia leading to the selling of slaves and breakup of families.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Capitalisms written by Supritha Rajan and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2023-11-29 with total page 363 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: No questions are more pressing today than the ethical dimensions of global capitalism in relation to an unevenly secularized modernity. A Tale of Two Capitalisms offers a timely response to these questions by reexamining the intellectual history of capitalist economics during the nineteenth century. Rajan’s ambitious book traces the neglected relationships between nineteenth-century political economy, anthropology, and literature in order to demonstrate how these discourses buttress a dominant narrative of self-interested capitalism that obscures a submerged narrative within political economy. This submerged narrative discloses political economy’s role in burgeoning theories of religion, as well as its underlying ethos of reciprocity, communality, and just distribution. Drawing on an impressive range of literary, anthropological, and economic writings from the eighteenth through the twenty-first century, Rajan offers an inventive, interdisciplinary account of why this second narrative of capitalism has so long escaped our notice. The book presents an unprecedented genealogy of key anthropological and economic concepts, demonstrating how notions of sacrifice, the sacred, ritual, totemism, and magic remained conceptually intertwined with capitalist theories of value and exchange in both sociological and literary discourses. Rajan supplies an original framework for discussing the ethical ideals that continue to inform contemporary global capitalism and its fraught relationship to the secular. Its revisionary argument brings new insight into the history of capitalist thought and modernity that will engage scholars across a variety of disciplines.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Bridges written by Stephen Mikesell and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2017-04-03 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Tale of Two Bridges is a history of two versions of the San Francisco—Oakland Bay Bridge: the original bridge built in 1936 and a replacement for the eastern half of the bridge finished in 2013. The 1936 bridge revolutionized transportation in the Bay Area and profoundly influenced settlement patterns in the region. It was also a remarkable feat of engineering. In the 1950s the American Society of Civil Engineers adopted a list of the “Seven Engineering Wonders” of the United States. The 1936 structure was the only bridge on the list, besting even the more famous Golden Gate Bridge. One of its greatest achievements was that it was built on time (in less than three years) and came in under budget. Mikesell explores in fascinating detail how the bridge was designed by a collection of the best-known engineers in the country as well as the heroic story of its construction by largely unskilled laborers from California, joined by highly skilled steel workers. By contrast, the East Span replacement, which was planned between 1989 and 1998, and built between 1998 and 2013, fell victim to cost overruns in the billions of dollars, was a decade behind schedule, and suffered from structural problems that has made it a perpetual maintenance nightmare. This is narrative history in its purest form. Mikesell excels at explaining highly technical engineering issues in language that can be understood and appreciated by general readers. Here is the story of two very important bridges, which provides a fair but uncompromising analysis of why one bridge succeeded and the other did not.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Biddies written by Vicki Kuyper and published by BroadStreet Publishing Group LLC. This book was released on 2015-08-01 with total page 131 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Aging is a gift—a privilege best enjoyed with open arms and a grateful heart. Meet Kitty and Mardel, also affectionately known as St. Katherine and the Dragon Lady. Through a good dose of humor and some hard-earned insight, A Tale of Two Biddies tells the entertaining story of the two women who inspired this book. One was kind, tender-hearted, and humble; the other was critical, pessimistic, self-centered, and sharp-tongued. As these women aged and their inhibitions fell away, the true character of their hearts became increasingly evident to those around them. For better and for worse. In this book Vicki Kuyper explores the issues women face as they age and encourages them to make the most of the latter seasons of their lives. We can’t control the aging process, but we can choose how we’ll face each day, ultimately shaping our hearts and who we become. We grow old in the blink of an eye. Growing up takes considerably longer. That means there’s no better time than right now to reevaluate our habits, our faith, and our future. We can choose what draws us closer to God and closer to being the amazing women God created us to be. That’s life at its finest.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Navies written by Anthony R Wells and published by Naval Institute Press. This book was released on 2017-01-15 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Tale of Two Navies is an analysis of the unique relationship between the United States Navy and the Royal Navy from 1960 to present. This loosely chronological study examines the histories, strategies, operations, technology, and intelligence activities of both navies. The special intelligence relationship is highlighted by unique knowledge and insights into the workings of U.S. and British intelligence. Bringing his extensive experience in both navies to bear, Anthony Wells provides a revealing look at the importance of naval thinking — how it impacts not only every level of naval activity, but also national defense as a whole. A Tale of Two Navies probes selective key themes and offers a discourse between the author and readers. Throughout, Wells challenges his reader to consider how the U.S. and the U.K. can best collaborate to advance their common strategic interests. This insightful look at the “special relationship” is especially relevant given emerging and increasing threats from China, Russia, and radical Islamist terror organizations.

Download or read book Tale Of Two Twins A The Langevin Experiment Of A Traveler To A Star written by Lucien Gilles Benguigui and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2020-10-02 with total page 174 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The thought experiment proposed by Langevin in 1911, known under the popular names, 'Clock Paradox' or 'Twin Paradox', is the most surprising result of the theory of Relativity: A twin who travels to a star at nearly the velocity of light comes back to Earth and finds his twin brother much older. In over a century, several thousands of published articles debated both in favor of and against this result. Unique to the physics of Relativity, this baffling phenomenon is analyzed as a main goal of this book.Among an incredible number of solutions, is there one of simplicity and clarity which may be accepted unanimously by all of the physics community? The answer is yes and this solution, which has its origin in Einstein himself, is developed in the framework of the Special Theory of Relativity. In detailing this solution, it is shown that the essential ingredient to understand the theory is the acceleration of the twins. All the models which do not include acceleration are incompatible with the original idea of Langevin. If one considers this phenomenon, several questions come to mind. Why did physicists debate excessively on the paradox and struggle to reach an agreement? Why was there resistance to integrate acceleration into their studies? Why is the solution developed in this book known only by a minority of scientists?Written for physicists, historians and philosophers of science, this book seeks to answer these questions based on (1) the psychological difficulty to accept the theoretical results, and (2) the fact that scientific knowledge is not uniformly distributed among scientists.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Brothers written by Eveline Hasler and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2022-05-03 with total page 38 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this version of the Swiss folktale, two humpback brothers, one good and friendly, the other bad-tempered and lazy, have their lives changed by a trip to their old hut in the mountains.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Melons written by Sarah Schneewind and published by Hackett Publishing. This book was released on 2006-09-14 with total page 167 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A commoner's presentation to the emperor of a lucky omen from his garden, the repercussions for his family, and several retellings of the incident provide the background for an engaging introduction to Ming society, culture, and politics, including discussions of the founding of the Ming dynasty; the character of the first emperor; the role of omens in court politics; how the central and local governments were structured, including the civil service examination system; the power of local elite families; the roles of women; filial piety; and the concept of ling or efficacy in Chinese religion.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Narratives written by Grace Wermenbol and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-05-27 with total page 411 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Holocaust and the Nakba are foundational traumas in Israeli-Jewish and Palestinian societies and form key parts of each respective collective identity. This book offers a parallel analysis of the transmission of these foundational pasts in Israeli-Jewish and Palestinian societies by exploring how the Holocaust and the Nakba have been narrated since the signing of the 1993 Oslo Accords. The work exposes the existence and perpetuation of ethnocentric victimhood narratives that serve as the theoretical foundations for an ensuing minimization – or even denial – of the other's past. Three established realms of societal memory transmission provide the analytical framework for this study: official state education, commemorative acts, and mass mediation. Through this analysis, the work demonstrates the interrelated nature of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the contextualization of the primary historical events, while also highlighting the universal malleability of mnemonic practices.

Download or read book A TALE OF TWO CITIES Illustrated written by Charles Dickens and published by e-artnow. This book was released on 2017-02-27 with total page 1787 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness…” A Tale of Two Cities is a novel set in London and Paris before and during the French Revolution. The novel depicts the plight of the French peasantry demoralized by the French aristocracy in the years leading up to the revolution, the corresponding brutality demonstrated by the revolutionaries toward the former aristocrats in the early years of the revolution, and many unflattering social parallels with life in London during the same period. Charles Dickens (1812-1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era. His works enjoyed unprecedented popularity during his lifetime, and by the twentieth century critics and scholars had recognized him as a literary genius. His novels and short stories enjoy lasting popularity.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Theologians written by Ambrose Mong and published by James Clarke & Company. This book was released on 2017-03-31 with total page 219 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In A Tale of Two Theologians, Ambrose Mong's observant new work, he examines the writings of the Peruvian theologian Gustavo Gutierrez and the Indian theologian Michael Amaladoss, and gives fresh attention to their main concerns regarding evangelisation and the poor. Why, he asks, is Gutierrez's liberation theology now accepted and celebrated by the Roman Catholic Church while Amaladoss's Asian theology with a liberation thrust is threatened with censorship? Mong argues that the dwindling threat of Communism has made the Marxist overtones of Latin American liberation theology more palatable to the Catholic hierarchy, while the challenge of religious pluralism in Asia is as complex and emotive as ever.How can the Church learn to balance the need for dialogue between religions with their duty to proclaim the Gospel? How can the Church inculturate itself in Asia while maintaining its identity? Ambrose Mong tackles these questions with the shrewd, clear-eyed view of an active priest and scholar, exploring the long, troubled relationship the Church has with liberation theology and offering guidance for the future.

Download or read book A Tale of Two Cities Thrift Study Edition written by Charles Dickens and published by Courier Corporation. This book was released on 2013-12-10 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Includes the unabridged text of Dicken's classic novel plus a complete study guide that features chapter-by-chapter summaries, explanations and discussions of the plot, question-and-answer sections, author biography, historical background, and more.

Download or read book Thinking in Systems written by Donella Meadows and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2008-12-03 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The classic book on systems thinking—with more than half a million copies sold worldwide! "This is a fabulous book... This book opened my mind and reshaped the way I think about investing."—Forbes "Thinking in Systems is required reading for anyone hoping to run a successful company, community, or country. Learning how to think in systems is now part of change-agent literacy. And this is the best book of its kind."—Hunter Lovins In the years following her role as the lead author of the international bestseller, Limits to Growth—the first book to show the consequences of unchecked growth on a finite planet—Donella Meadows remained a pioneer of environmental and social analysis until her untimely death in 2001. Thinking in Systems is a concise and crucial book offering insight for problem solving on scales ranging from the personal to the global. Edited by the Sustainability Institute’s Diana Wright, this essential primer brings systems thinking out of the realm of computers and equations and into the tangible world, showing readers how to develop the systems-thinking skills that thought leaders across the globe consider critical for 21st-century life. Some of the biggest problems facing the world—war, hunger, poverty, and environmental degradation—are essentially system failures. They cannot be solved by fixing one piece in isolation from the others, because even seemingly minor details have enormous power to undermine the best efforts of too-narrow thinking. While readers will learn the conceptual tools and methods of systems thinking, the heart of the book is grander than methodology. Donella Meadows was known as much for nurturing positive outcomes as she was for delving into the science behind global dilemmas. She reminds readers to pay attention to what is important, not just what is quantifiable, to stay humble, and to stay a learner. In a world growing ever more complicated, crowded, and interdependent, Thinking in Systems helps readers avoid confusion and helplessness, the first step toward finding proactive and effective solutions.