Spiritual Diversity Essay Example for Free

Spiritual Diversity Essay Abstract ]When meeting individuals and their families with various religious and spiritual backgrounds, it is important for nurses and health care providers to be comfortable and competent in providing religious and spiritual based care. To provide holistic care, understanding the religion or spiritual background of the patient and how it impacts their health care is an important factor for their health care planning. Three religions are studied within this paper; The Baha’i Faith, Buddhism, and Jehovahs Witness, and are compared with the Christian Faith. Key points were researched, which include getting a more in-depth understanding on the various perspectives on healing, the critical components of healing, and grasping a concept of the relationship between their beliefs and that of their health care provider. The Baha’i Faith includes prayer and meditation with the combination of modern medicine, in which can be lead to healing. A peaceful environment should be provided for patients and their families to promote prayer. Buddhism individuals also practice prayer and meditation, and follow a more restrictive diet. Keeping these key points in mind when caring for a patient of the Buddhist religion can ensure a more holistic approach. Jehovahs Witness can be known to refuse specific treatments. Offering alternatives can be possible. Jehovahs Witness patients wish to have a high level of respect, without being judged of their decisions. When comparing the four religions, it is found they all have the commonality of prayer, having a peaceful healing environment, and to be respected by their caregivers. Diversity in Health Care Health care providers meet and interact with many people of different ages, race, and religious and spiritual backgrounds. Being a provider to someone with a different background than his or her own can often be a difficult task. It is often thought that caring for an individual is solely based on the physical aspect, but to provide true, holistic care to an individual, all needs must be taken into consideration. Health care is typically defined as being multidimensional, and requires a degree of depth and balance between the elements of physical, emotional, intellectual, social, and spiritual health, and the dynamics between each and all of these influence that of another (Black, Furney, Graf, Nolte, 2010, p. 244). Spirituality plays a large role on the road of healing, and a health care provider must be able to understand and incorporate their individualized needs into their care. The religious and spiritual components of three different religions will be further discussed within this paper; grasping a more in-depth understanding of the spiritual perspective on healing, critical components on healing, and the relationship between their beliefs and that of their health care provider. The Baha’i Faith, Buddhism, and Jehovah’s Witness will be studied, and compared to the Christian Faith. Education and competence is a necessity when it comes to cultural and religious aspects in the health care field. To fully grasp and understand patients’ needs while they are in a hospital setting, can be challenging. Asking open-ended questions to an individual and their family can help the physicians and nurses further individualize patient centered care. For many cultures, religion plays a large role in their day-to-day lives, and when faced with illness, continuation of their practices needs to be incorporated to assist with the healing process. Another important aspect of spiritual diversity is to fully understand and be conscious of one’s own spiritual and cultural beliefs. This can allow for a lack of bias in the care that is provided, and to assure care is truly patient centered. For members of the Baha’i faith, there is only one God, and He is believed to be the Creator of the universe. The soul of human beings is essentially the identity of each individual, and the relationship between God grows and develops through prayer, moral self-discipline, and gives a meaning to life (The Baha’i Faith, 2012). Like many religions, life is seen as a joyous, eternal process that involves the discovery and growth of spirituality. Prayer and meditation are practiced to progress spiritually, and combined with medicine; it is believed that sickness can be healed. In the health care setting, prayer and meditation is a large part in the Baha’i faith, as well as symbols or pictures of the son of the Prophet Fou nder of the Baha’i Faith, ‘Abdu I-Baha’, which should all be treated with respect. No special prayer room is needed for an individual of this religion, but assisting in giving a peaceful environment will provide a suitable environment for the patient and their family. There are no dietary restrictions for a patient of the Baha’i faith, with an exception of the Fasting period, which is March 20-21st, when members aged 15-70 do not eat or drink between dawn and sunset (The Baha’i Faith, 2012). This fasting period can have an exception to those who are ill, but that is dependent on the individual. When providing care to an individual of the Baha’i faith, it is essential to understand and respect the views of the patient, and to allow time for prayer and meditation. Being the fourth largest religion in the world, Buddhism is a religion that many nurses and health care providers may come across more often. Like Christianity, Buddhism follows the principle of reciprocity, or the â€Å"‘Golden Rule’: To do onto others as you would wish them to do onto you† (Robinson, 2009). In the Buddhist religion, Buddha offered advice to members of the religion to assist them in healing quickly and thoroughly. His recommendatio ns consisted of eating selective foods, to consume foods at the proper intervals, keep an optimistic outlook, be kind, considerate, and cooperative to those who are taking care of them, and stay in touch with the physicians and nurses. Beliefs are, following these recommendations will yield the best results from treatments (â€Å"Buddhism, Medicine, and Health† n.d). Respect between the health care providers and the patient and their family is held very high with the Buddhist religion. Treatments recommended by the physician typically have no restrictions, including blood transfusions. Most Buddhists are vegetarian or vegan, so incorporating a special diet into their care will help build a level of confidence between the patient and the health care team. Prayer and meditation also is a part of the Buddhist practice, and Buddha figurines or pictures may be brought in by family members to help look over the patient. A Christian-based religious denomination that consists of approximately 6.9 million people makes up the religious movement, Jehovah’s Witness. Members of this religious group differ from the Christian religion in many ways, such as with the refusal of many health treatments or procedures such as blood transfusions (â€Å"Jehovah’s Witness†, 2009). When taking care of a patient who is a Jehovah’s Witness, the nurse needs to keep in mind the restrictions the patient may have regarding any blood transfusions or blood products. Having knowledge of and providing options for alternatives instead of a blood product will be necessary and useful for the patient when it comes to making decisions related to this issue. Jehovah’s Witnesses do not believe in faith healing, but will pray and reach out to their faith beliefs to guide them in the healing process. As a health care worker, having the Chaplain visit the patient and their family can help the patient feel more comfortable and gives them an additional outlet to pray and reconcile their religious beliefs during difficult times. When taking care of a patient who is a Jehovah’s Witness, the most important concept is respect and trust. Patients are trusting in modern medicine, the physicians, and nurses to help them heal, and deserve the right to refuse treatment without judgment of their decision. Receiving care from an individual who is of different religious or cultural background does not make a difference in the response of treatment, and a tr usting relationship should not be difficult to build as long as the caregiver acknowledges, respects, and does all they can to provide appropriate religious care to the patient. People who are of the Christian religion are acceptable to most medical treatments, and while there are typically no restrictions per their religion, refusal of a treatment or procedure is most often due to personal preference. While in a hospital setting, offering to have a Chaplain visit the patient on a weekly or as needed basis can create a sense of connection with the Lord, and grant some ease and comfort to the patient. Christianity places a lot of their healing in the hands of God, and believes in the power of prayer. When comparing Buddhism, Jehovah’s Witness, and the Baha’i Faith to Christianity, there are some evident similarities between them all. Each share the appreciation for the health care provider to respect and incorporate their needs and beliefs, even when their provider has a different belief or background than the patients. All four of these religions share a commonality of a higher being in which they worship and put their faith in, and who they send their prayers in times of illness or hardship. Respect is the most prevalent common factor of these religions that individuals wish from their health care providers, and is also one of the simplest ways the provider can give back to their patient. If a health care provider is unfamiliar with a religion or the way they practice, a great way to show the patient you are truly interested in the patient centered care is to actively learn their rituals or beliefs, and accommodate it into their care. Taking care of patients of a different culture or religion can often create a feeling of distress between the nurse and patient, and â€Å"misunderstandings occur because of the difference in backgrounds, experiences, mannerisms, assumptions, and expectations† (McNutt, n.d, para. 2). It is important for the health care provider to ask questions to the patient or family members in regards to diet, spiritual needs, and any special accommodations that could be incorporated into patient care. Doing so can help the patient heal in a more comfortable environment, gain trust and respect of their providers, and yield better patient outcomes and compliance. References Black, J., Furney, S., Graf, H., Nolte, A. (2010). Philosophical foundations of health education. Retrieved from Google ebookstore http://books.google.com/books?hl=enlr=id=KL_pBVZftwICoi=fndpg=PA243dq=spiritual+and+holistic+careots=sIGdQb4TzTsig=fa0-Z1gaIuc1camBWlGw3UmRobQ#v=onepageq=spiritual%20and%20holistic%20caref=false â€Å"Buddhism, Medicine, and Health†. (n.d). Retrieved from http://www.blia.org/english/publications/booklet/pages/37.htm Jehovah’s Witness at a glance. (2009). Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/witnesses/ataglance/glance.shtml McNutt, B. (n.d). Patients from different cultures. Retrieved from http://www.streetdirectory.com/etoday/patients-from-different-cultures-pplejf.html Robinson, B. (2009). Buddhism’s core beliefs. Retrieved from http://www.religioustolerance.org/buddhism1.htm â€Å"The Baha’i Faith†. Prayer, Meditation, and Fasting. (2012). Retrieved from http://info.bahai.org/article-1-4-0-7.html

The Sustainable Event Management Environmental Sciences Essay

The Sustainable Event Management Environmental Sciences Essay This report will general introduce what is sustainability and to link all the concepts and theories to the Beijing Olympics. All the sustainability policies will link to the Triple-Bottom-Line theory and with suitable recommendations. The general idea of what International Olympic Committee IOC is about and the role of IOC play with the Olympic. All the economic, environmental and social impacts that did by Beijing during the Olympic Games. The environmental successful point and failures that the Beijing Olympic faced. How Beijing can improve or how the London Olympic can learn from Beijing Introduction The purpose of this report is to critically analyse concepts and theories of sustainability relevant to the events industry. All these sustainability policies will link to the Triple-Bottom-Line theory and suitable recommendations will be shown. Sustainability development means to protect the environment, but still meet the need of human, without compromising the future generations need and development. The term sustainability derives from a political and socially constructed terminology that supports the universal policy of sustainable development (Dresner, 2002; Rogers et al., 2008). In more recent times with a greater appreciation by nations of environmental matters and a move to a more sustainable society, the IOC requires the Olympic Games host country to implement strategies to protect the environment, observe concepts of equity and social justice and, where possible, minimise consumption of energy and water. The wastes minimise and to ensure that it is recycled as much as possible are the critical factors for selection when a country is bidding for the Game. The Beijing Olympic was the greenest Olympic ever, and will prove by articles, journals, etc. The aim and objectives To critically analysis the sustainability policy of the Olympics, create linkage to the Triple Bottom Line theory and provide sustainable recommendations for critical appraisal of the Olympics sustainability policy. International Olympic Committee IOC The Olympic were nearly ended in 1976 Montreal Olympics, Canada. Due to the large venues built and the investment was 10 times over from the original budget. Olympics not only need to carry a heavy debt burden but also damage the environment. Therefore, Olympics now focus on the sustainable development when the cities bid for the Olympics (Aim of Olympic 2008). One of IOC roles is to encourage and support a responsible concern for environmental issues, to promote sustainable development in sport and to require that the Olympic Games are held accordingly (IOC 2011) The Olympic Movement Agenda 21 was examined during the third IOC World Conference on Sport and the Environment in Rio in 1999, and approved by the IOC session in Seoul in June 1999. The goal of Agenda 21 is to increase the participation of local residents, to improve the social-economic and health benefits they derive from it, strengthen international cooperation projects for sustainable development, help combat social exclusion, encourage new consumer habits, promote a sports infrastructure which is even better adapted to social needs, and further improve the integration of development and environment concepts into sports policies (IOC 1999). The Beijing Olympic 2008 The idea of Green Olympic in Beijings bid was the strongest element to win the right to host the 2008 Games. The Beijing Organising Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad (BOCOG)s environmental programme was focused on improvement, protection and awareness-raising. The Olympic venues were constructed by environmentally friendly and energy-saving building materials. Beijing has put significant efforts to improve air quality, expand forestation, enhance public sewage and waste treatment systems.(IOC 2012) When Beijing was awarded the Games in 2001, the IOC Evaluation Committee noted: Beijing currently faces a number of environmental pressures and issues, particularly air pollution. However, it has an ambitious set of plans designed, which are comprehensive enough to greatly improve Beijings overall environmental condition. These plans and actions will require a significant effort and financial investment. The result would be a major legacy for Beijing from the Olympic Games, which include increased environmental awareness among the population. (IOC 2012) As the first developing country to host the Olympic Games, US$17 billion was invested on environment initiatives by China for the Games. China was not only to fulfil its original promises in the bid, but also to gain great achievement on environment sustainability (UNEP, 2009). Greenpeace has made a evaluation conducted that the BOCOG and the Beijing government had created a positive legacy in terms of environmental initiative for the city (Greenpeace, 2008). The Beijing Olympics made a great environmental achievements, therefore, the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau and BOCOG won the first-ever IOC Award for Sport and the Environment for Asia at the 8th World Conference on Sport and the Environment in Vancouver (Benjamin, 2009). According to Managing Business Ethics, Triple Bottom Line was defined as the impacts of economic, social and environmental (Trevino Nelson, 2011). The triple bottom lint of the sustainable development referred to the simultaneous pursuit of economic prosperity, environmental quality and social equity. Economic Impact The Olympics always help to improve not a city, but also a countrys economy. Such mega-event requires considerable investments in infrastructural developments, sports venues, and other types of industries. Therefore, these will bring both short term and long term effects on the chinas economy and publicity. Beijing reached its highest economic growth rate of 12.8 percent, a gross domestic product (GDP) per capita of USD 6,331, and the fixed assets investment of USD 3.527 million in 2007. Based on the criteria issued by the World Bank, Beijings socio-economic development is graded on a world ranking in the range of the upper-middle level, recognizable for example by the increase of the average annual wage of 109.4 percent from 2001 to 2007. For the Infrastructure Projects, according to the Beijing Olympic Action Plan, Beijings total investment in Olympic-related projects is expected to reach USD $180 billion and is divided into three different elements. The first part was used in the Olympic competition venues and the related facilities; the second was spent on citys infrastructural development; the third part was invested in projects, such as environmental protection and transportation. One of the largest projects was the enlargement of Beijings international airport, which became one of the worlds top five busiest airports during the Olympic season. In order to meet the high demand of air transportation a new terminal is being constructed amounting to a value of USD 2.1 billion, which will be the worlds largest terminal with a direct connection to the downtown area in 15 minute intervals. With the Number 3 Terminal being completed in February 2008, the three terminals of the airport will have a future total annual handling capacity of approximately 82 million passengers. Beijing has spent USD 700 million on upgrading its public transportation system, in order to avoid the traffic conjunctions during normal or rush hours. There are several projects helped to ensure the Olympic tourists enjoyed an easy, fast and safe travel from one sporting event to another. Six new expressways will link the downtown area and the airport as well as other cities of China. Six new subway and light railway lines will allow for better travel connection. Additionally, several bus lanes have been introduced whereby, during rush hour, all vehicles except for public buses must keep clear. All construction sites were using environmentally friendly technologies and measures. For example, all old buses replaced with new ones that possess updated catalytic converters. Recommendation Beijing should push the industrial technology to a cleaner production. Renewable energy technology as solar lighting, geothermal heating and solar PV systems should be promoted widely during the Game. Smart design and energy efficient technologies must be used as the building standards for new buildings. Although the BOCOG has introduced environmentally friendly policies guidelines for construction or purchasing materials, because it is not mandatory, companies may not follow the guidelines. Environmental Impact Improve infrastructure to both run the 2008 Green Olympics needs, the need for sustainable development to achieve the capital. For the environmental aspects, the BOCOG had set a comprehensive framework in order to coordinate all the sustainability projects. BOCOG started in early 2002 to design an Environmental Management System (EMS) complying with the international standard ISO 14001. (UNEP, 2009) The ISO 14001 standard is to establish an organized approach to reduce the impact of the environmental aspects which an organization has under its control. This standard helps the organizations to minimize their operational negative impacts on the environment (for example, air, waste, water), and continually to improve their environmental performance. The Committee passed the ISO 14001 certification audit in September 2005 and one year later was also certified according to the new 2004 release of the standard. Beijing has launched a new vehicle emission standard to EURO IV for the Olympics in order to improve the air quality. This emission standard is the strictest standard in the world. During the Games, 20% of the Olympic venue electricity was purchased from wind power station which supplies with clean wind sources. The first Beijing wind power generation station can generate 100 million KHz of electricity per which, that means this capacity can meet 100,000 families demand. 27 air quality sampling stations were set up, in order to monitor the index of sulfur dioxide (SO2), carbon monoxide (CO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and particulate matter (PM10). 18 temporary sampling stations were added during the Olympic Games. The Beijing air quality was improved by these measures. The air pollution was decreased by 50 percent in 2008, and SO2, CO, NO2 and PM10 were decreased respectively by 30%, 12%, 32% and 32% compared to1998. Beijing has built 14 sewage treatment plants and put in operation. The sewage treatment capacity rise from 320 million cubic metres in 2001 to 800 million cubic metres in 2008 and sewage treatment rate increased from 38 per cent to 90 per cent during the same period. By 2008, 57%of the citys waste water had been treated and reused. In addition, the citys forest coverage of more than 51.6%, the green coverage rate reached more than 43% of the urban centers, and the nature reserve area of à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ ¹8.18% of the total area of à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ ¹Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬ ¹the city. (United Nations Environment Programme, 2009) Recommendation Although the BOCOG has introduced the Olympic timber purchasing environment guidelines, they lose the opportunity to introduce the internationally recognizable timber purchasing policy, for example Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) standards for construction material. The landfill development and waste incineration were the failures, for Beijing to use as an opportunity of the Game to move towards a zero-waste policy. Although Beijing had launched many long term measures to improve the citys air quality, they used temporary measures, for example reduced the vehicle numbers and industrial production were shut down. To make sure that during the Game the air quality meets the standards. Beijing could launched more clean measures to other cities, in order to improve the air quality and the air quality will meet the standards in long term. Social Impact Education (United Nations Environment Programme, 2009) BOCOG focused its projects on raising awareness of the environment in both primary and secondary schools, thereby targeting the younger generation of Chinese. The major educational initiatives include: The Beijing 2008 Primary and Secondary School Olympic Education Programme This program was worked with the Ministry of Education, 0.4 billion students involved and the aim of this program is to establish the Olympic Model Schools (to teach, practice and promote the value of Olympic). This program encourages the students to live in an environmentally friendly way. 200 Beijing schools out of 556 were nominated as Olympic Model Schools. The Reserve a Barrel of Water this Summer Initiative This project carried out in the primary schools. The aim is to develop initiatives of water saving and to promote the importance of water saving. Communication (United Nations Environment Programme, 2009) BOCOG has developed several initiatives to spread the message of environmental values among the general public. Among the major projects, it is worth highlighting: The Green Community and Green Home Campaign The aim of this project is to raise the environmental awareness among Beijing families and communities, for example to reduce the using the water and energy saving, waste sorting and green consumption. The Campaign launched in Beijing and 886 communities were involved by the end of 2006. The One Day, No Engine Sounds Campaign This project aim to encourage Beijing citizens to use public transport more than private cars, and to raise their awareness about the air and noise pollution. 504 institutions joined the Campaign after this has launched. The Beijing Green Map Initiative The project was developed by BOCOG and the Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau, encourages Beijing citizens to label the environmental and cultural facilities around the city. The Green Olympics, Green Action Team BOCOG was launched this team in 2004, and the Beijing Environmental Protection Bureau to promote Olympic environmental values, sustainable development principles, good energy saving and water saving practices and environmental awareness in general. Lectures and promotion activities were hold by this team in different places, for example, in schools, factories, universities, libraries and communities Olympic sponsorship maker Coca-Cola and Samsung are each given a commitment to the environment. The Coca-Cola Company has committed that natural refrigerant was used by all Olympic venues freezers and vending machines, excluding the climate change will increase greenhouse gases HFCs (HFCs). Samsungs commitment that all Olympic series phones SGH-F268 phone will not contain toxic material polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and brominates flame retardants (BFR). Recommendation All the Olympics sponsors who using the refrigeration equipments such as Coca-Cola, McDonalds, etc, failed to seize the opportunity not to use hydrogen fluorocarbons (HFCs) natural refrigeration equipment. Electronic equipment sponsors, such as Lenovo and Panasonic missed this opportunity, as they failed to provide products which contain without polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and brominates flame retardants (BFRs) and other toxic substances. Conclusion Beijing should continue the successful achievements on environment after the Olympic Games. Beijing had developed mass transportation and to implement the environmental policies and regulations are encouraging signs that the government understand the environment more. The Greenpeace urges that when the Chinese cities are devising economic development policies, they should consider environmental protection. As China is one of the fast growing economies country in the world and now China is facing serious environmental challenges, the environmental achievements of the Beijing Olympics, especially the long term infrastructural improvements, need to be spread to other cities in china.

Data Warehouse Characteristics And Definition Information Technology Essay

Data Warehouse Characteristics And Definition Information Technology Essay A data warehouse provides an integrated view of the customer and their relationship with the organisation by bringing together the data from a number of operational systems. A data warehouse provides a complete picture of the enterprise by focusing on its enterprise-wide components like profits, sales and customers by looking beyond the traditional information view structure. These components require information from various sources as they have both organisational and process boundaries. The data warehouses are made up of large databases. These databases store the integrated data of the enterprise. This data may be obtained from both, internal as well as external sources. Internal sources of data refer to the data that is obtained from the operational systems of the enterprise. External data sources are the government bodies, third party organisations, business partners, customers etc. These databases also store the metadata that gives a description of the content of data that is st ored in the data warehouse. The data warehouses are designed and constructed in a denormalized manner. This is done to replicate the dimensional view of the business by the user. This makes it possible to better analyze, examine and summarize the data. This can be done over different periods of time and at different levels of detail when the data structure is denormalized. The data warehouses have a time dimension where all the data is time stamped. This is done so that the data can support the reports that are used to compare the figures from the earlier months or years. It is helpful for the decision takers of the organisation to better understand the trends and patters of the market and customer behaviour over the period of time. The data warehouses contain both atomic as well as summarised data. The atomic data is the data that provides a great level of detail. This makes responding to queries a faster process when the tasks are at the highest level of detail. As the name sugges ts, the summarised data provides a quick summary of data and does not go much into detail. Thus only storing summarised data is not an option. However, the storage of atomic data requires much larger space. 2.2 Purpose Previously, the data was not easily accessible because it was stored in environments which were unfriendly and not easy to access. The data warehouses solve this problem by providing access to the integrated organisational data that was stored in such environments. The data warehouses provide security either by their front-end applications or from the database servers. As a result, the users can now have a secure connection to the warehouse from their personal computers. Because the data warehouses provide integrated data, the need for users to understand and access operational data is greatly reduced. The information provided by the data warehouses is consistent and is of high quality. They are the common source of information for the organisation. Due to this there is consistency in the data and the organisations decision making process becomes much easier. They are also used to store historical data. Actual historical data is not stored on operational systems but is simply loaded and integrated with the other data in the warehouse so that it can be accessed quickly. Data warehouses provide the ability to their users to view the data at different levels of detail and go through it as and how they require. Such freedom to view the data from different angles improves the analysis process by reducing the time and effort required to collect, format and present the information from the data. To make the information technology infrastructure of the organisation stronger, the data warehouses distinguish between analytical and operational processes. They provide additional system archite cture to execute the decisions. With the focus of the data warehouses on achieving the requirements for business decisions, they are the best suited systems for the redesigned decision-making business processes. 2.3 Trends in data warehousing Data warehousing is no longer just a concept or used for educational purposes only. It has become mainstream. Almost 90% of the multinational corporations either use data warehousing or are planning to implement it. Data warehousing has transformed the way business analysis and decision making takes place. The organisations that already use it have witnessed the enormous benefits that it has to offer. Web technologies have only added to the benefits provided by data warehousing and has paved the way for easy delivery of critical information. There have been many changing trends in the field of data warehousing since its evolution. Scientists have always felt that technology has been the driving force behind data warehousing. But now, the softwares being used have had a significant progress rate and in the years to come, we can expect data warehousing to take a major leap not only in software but also in optimising queries, indexing big tables, improved data compression and expanding dimensional modelling. Real-time warehousing Real -time data warehousing is increasingly becoming the focus of top executives in the organisations. As compared to conventional data warehousing, real-time data warehouses provide the most recent views of the business and are dynamic in nature. A conventional data warehouse is more passive in nature and provides historical trends. The tools of business intelligence along with the data warehouse have been mainly used to make strategic decisions. But now they are required more for making tactical decisions on a day to day basis. There is a lot of pressure in the companies as they are expected to come up with real-time information with everyone connected to important business processes. Providing real-time information has increased the productivity of the companies tremendously. However, there a number of challenges that the company has to face while trying to do so. Data types Previously the companies included mostly numeric structured data in their data warehouses. This divided the decision support systems in to two parts, one that worked with structured data and the other one that worked with knowledge management involving unstructured data. Most of the structured data is numeric and most of the unstructured data is in the form of images. Now, if we were to consider a situation where the decision maker of the company has to perform an analysis in order to find out about the top-selling products, where he/she would like to take a look at the images of the products for further decisions, then this wouldnt have been possible. This fact has been realised by the organisations and therefore the need is felt to integrate both the structured as well as the unstructured data in the data warehouses. In order to include the unstructured data in the data warehouses, the vendors are considering multimedia like images and texts as just another data type. They are stor ed as binary large objects and are considered to be a part of the relational data. They are defined as user-defined-types by the user-defined-functions. But it is not possible to simply consider all binary large objects as relational data type. That is because, if we were to consider video clips, there would be a need for a server that is able to support delivery of multiple video streams at a given rate along with audio synchronisation. After having included unstructured data in the data warehouses, there should also be a way to search for this data. Without proper ways to search for this data, the integration of unstructured data will prove rather useless. Vendors have now started providing search engines so that the user is able to search for all the information that he/she requires. The example of such a mechanism would be the query by images mechanism. Its purpose is to let the user search for pre-indexed images on the basis of their shape, size and colour. For text-data, the s earch engine retrieves the documents based on words, characters, phrases etc. The use of search mechanisms for audio and video data is still in the research stages. Another data-type would be the spatial data. Including the spatial data-type in the data warehouses adds a great deal of value to the data warehousing systems. Spatial data answers questions like average income of the people living near the store, average driving distance for the people coming to the store etc. Examples of spatial data include address, city, county, state etc. The database vendors do realise the importance of this type of data and some of them do add special SQL extensions to their products in order to include such data. Data visualisation Data visualization is necessary to improve the performance of the user in terms of analysis. The users expect to see the query results in the form of charts or graphics. If the query results are in the form of spread sheets, it affects the quickness and ease by which the users can carry out the analysis. It also means that the data warehouse is outdated. If we consider the last few years, there have been many trends in the way the data visualization softwares work. Now, the variety of charts to view different types of data has increased. For example, there are pie charts available to view the numerical results. Dynamic charts are available which allow the users to see the results, manipulate it and check for the new views online. The newer versions of the data visualization softwares make it possible to see a large number of results at once and complex data structures. Some of the more advanced visualization techniques available today are the chart manipulation technique, drill down technique and the advanced iteration technique. Companies have also started adopting scorecards and dashboards as a means to view the performance. Different types of users have different needs. The business users require bar charts, the scientific users require constellation graphs, and the analysts require three dimensional views and so on. The latest trends in the softwares have made it possible to fulfil the ever changing needs of the current users of the data warehousing systems. Parallel processing One of the most important aspects of data warehousing is delivering top-quality performance. The users of the data warehouses are constantly performing large complex queries. These queries read enormous amounts of data to give out the results. Again, to analyse these results, a large number of queries are executed one after the other by individual users. Some of the other functions involved are the loading of data and creating indexes for the data. Both the processes can be slow because of the huge amounts of data and large number of indexes. For the data warehouses to give out quality performance, it is necessary to speed up these processes like query processing, data loading and indexing. An efficient way to do this is to achieve parallel processing. This is done by utilising both hardware options as well as software techniques together. For parallel processing, the hardware options may include multiple CPUs, many server nodes, memory modules, high speed links between interconnecte d nodes etc. In the software implementation of parallel processing, the hardware configuration needs to be chosen properly. The reason for this is that if the hardware configuration is not proper, then the operating systems and the databases will be unable to use the hardwares parallel features. Parallel server and parallel query are the two options that the database vendors generally provide for parallel processing. The parallel server option makes it possible to have separate database instances for each of the hardware nodes. The database instances are also allowed to access a common set of database files. On the other hand, the parallel query option supports the important functions like query processing, data loading and index creation. Considering the current technology, executing the data warehouse without parallel processing is not at all an option to be considered. Tools for query processing The tools that are required for query processing are the most important set of tools in data warehousing. The success of a data warehouse is not possible without them. Because of this, the vendors have started coming out with new and improved query tools since the past few years. Some of the query tools that are of most importance and have undergone significant changes by the vendors are flexible representation, aggregate awareness, crossing subject areas, multiple heterogeneous sources, overcoming SQL limitations etc. Browser tools Here the term browser is not restricted to the use of web browsers alone. One of the major advantages of data warehousing is that the users are able to execute queries in the data warehouse that generate reports without any help or assistance from someone who is in the I.T. field. Here, the browser tools come in handy when the users want to go through the metadata and search for specific chunks of information. This allows the users to directly go to the data warehouse. Their need is also felt when a data warehouse for the company is being developed and the I.T. team has to go through all the data structures, data sources and business rules. Some of the major improvements that the browser tools have gone through in the past few years are: extensible tools that allow to define any type of data or information objects, open APIs, navigation through hierarchical groupings, web browsing and search techniques to go through information catalogues etc. Data Fusion In order to provide an integrated view of the enterprise, the data warehouse stores data collected from a number of sources. The data may be taken from different operational systems running on different platforms, each using a different DBMS. Data may also be taken from a number of external sources. Data fusion is the technology that fuses together all this different types of data from multiple sources and stores it in the data warehouse. It provides a wider scope and the real-time integration of data from the monitoring systems. A vast amount of research is being carried on in order to improve this technology as it has a direct application in the field of data warehousing. Apart from the integration of data from multiple sources, the data fusion technology is also expected to address the problem of finding the right information at the right time as it can be a difficult task due to the vast amounts of data that is stored. The data fusion technology as for now is still in its researc h phase and therefore the vendors are not hurrying to develop the tools for data fusion. Integrating ERP and Data Warehouses Enterprise resource planning was introduced in the markets in the 1990s. The goal of ERP was to help in the decision making as well as the taking of necessary actions from one integrated environment. It was also supposed to provide the companies with the integrated corporate data repositories. For this, the data was cleansed, transformed and integrated in one place. But soon, the companies that implemented these systems realised that the relational databases that were designed and normalised to carry out the business operations were not able to provide the necessary strategic information. Also the data from the external sources and the operational systems was not included in the ERP data repositories. As a result, the companies that were planning to acquire the ERP systems started to consider the integration of ERP systems with data warehousing. There are three major options that are available that allow the companies to do so. They are the ERP data warehouse, the custom developed data warehouse and the hybrid ERP data warehouse enhanced with third party tools. The ERP data warehouse option allows the companies to implement data warehousing with the current available functionality and wait for further enhancements. But the only negative about this option is that the enhancements may take a long time to come. The 2nd option that is the custom-developed data warehouse allows the companies to have a customized data warehouse along with the use of 3rd party tools to get the data from the ERP datasets. Although reclaiming and loading the data from the ERP datasets is not an easy task. The 3rd option that is the hybrid ERP data warehouse enhanced with 3rd party tools allows the combination of the functionalities of the existing data warehouse with the additional functionalities from the third party tools. The companies need to sel ect the option that will be most suitable for their corporation. Data Warehousing and CRM The benefits of having a CRM-ready data warehouse are substantial. Now-a-days, there is an increasing competition among the companies and also, there is a need to retain the existing customers and attract new ones. The companies have now started targeting individual customers and fulfilling their needs instead of having a mass focus group. To achieve this, the companies have adopted customer relationship management. To build a data warehouse that is customer ready, there is a need to develop CRM-ready data warehouses. But, doing so is by no means an easy task. The data warehouses need to have all the information of every transaction with every individual customer. What this means is that each unit of each sale of every product to each customer must be recorded in the data warehouse. Not only the sales data, but also, information regarding every other type of interaction with the customer needs to be recorded. The CRM-ready data warehouse becomes flexible with such detailed recording of data. There is a huge amount of increase in the volumes of data. These large amounts of data can be stored across multiple storage management devices. They are accessed by using common data warehouse tools. Also, there is a need to improve functions like cleansing and transformation functions that are more complex in nature. These are some of the major efforts to achieve a CRM-ready data warehouse. Although, the previous tools of data warehousing are not quite capable of adopting the specialized requirements of customer-focused applications. The Web and Data warehouse The introduction of internet has deeply affected the way in which computing and communication has been taking place previously. From its start in 1969 with only four host computers, it has come a long way with a huge amount of increase in the host computers, almost up to 95 million hosts by 2000. And it still continues to grow with exponential speeds. In the year 2000, there were almost 26 million web-sites and 150 million users using the available web technologies for one reason or the other. Now, the companies have come up with intranets (private networks) and extranets (public networks) in order to properly communicate with their employees, customers and business partners. The web has transformed itself in to a universal information delivery system. Today, there is no business that can survive without making use of the available web technologies. E-commerce has now become the main focus of the businesses and there is an annual investment of 300 billion dollars which is soon expected to cross the 1 trillion mark. Therefore, it has become extremely important for the companies to transform their data warehouses to make them web-enabled in order to make use of the tremendous potential that the web technologies have to offer. But while doing so, the companies need to bring the data warehouses to the web and also bring the web to the data warehouses. Bringing the warehouse to the web: During the early times of the evolution of data warehousing, the data warehouses were developed only for the top-level management such as the managers, analysts and a few others to help them with critical analysis and decision making. The necessary information was delivered to this user group by making use of the client/server environment. But today, the needs of the businesses have increased tremendously. The warehousing technology has been made available to all the members included in the corporations value chain. It is not just confined to a select group of people. Important information is not only provided to employees alone but also to the customers, business partners and the suppliers. In todays highly competitive times, these changes are necessary to increase the productivity of all the members of the company. This can only be possible with the help of internet along with web technology. The way the users of the data warehouse retrieve, analyse and share the information is changed drastically with the help of the new information delivery mechanism that is the web technology. The information delivery will be a little different having new components and the internet interface will provide a browser, search engine, a homepage, hypertext links, downloadable Java etc. The important requirements of the users while bringing the data warehouse to the web are strict security, self data access, unified metadata, high performance etc. Bringing the web to the warehouse: In order to bring the web to the warehouse, the company needs to collect the number of clicks the company website gets from all the visitors and then perform the traditional data warehousing functions. This must be accomplished in real-time and involves extraction, transformation and loading of the number of clicks to the data warehouse. Dimensional schemas are then developed from this data and the information delivery systems are launched. The click data helps in analysing how exactly the visitors went about through the company web-site. Also important information like what made the visitors purchase the company product, how they were attracted and what made the visitors come back to the web-site can also be recorded. The web-house as it is known has become an extremely important tool for retaining, identifying and prioritising the e-commerce customers. The combination of data warehousing and web technology has become very important to all the businesses in the 21st century. Using web technologies for information delivery and integrating the click data from the company web-sites for analysis has become the need of the day.

Masterbation - Men vs Women :: Sociology Essays Research Papers

Masterbation - Men vs Women 55 vs 38 percent of men vs women (aged 18-59) said they masturbated on a regular basis. The percentage above is basically an indicative quantitative value for what society believes is the norm for both men and women. Two stereotypes come into play, that of a man being an overly sexual being, constantly craving sex and consuming every waking moment and every ounce of energy in pursuit of it. Secondly, there is the stereotype of woman being a passive, sexually unresponsive being. Many combinations of factors come together to produce the common misconceptions shown in the above statistics. The lower percentage of women in this statistic is most likely indicative of a social pressure. Women who don’t express their sexuality and who don’t give in to many of their sexual needs are deemed as â€Å"good† in our society. Many people consider women who masturbate as â€Å"loose† and intimidating, a role not considered to be lady like. In addition there are many cultural factors associated with the lowered percentage. A woman learns from an early age that her genitals are inferior to that of a man. We all can recall the â€Å"mine fell off† story; this implies that a woman is lacking something that a man has. In many cultures both outside and inside the U.S., women are taught to repress their sexual urges, and that sex for them is merely a means to procreate and keep their husbands happy. Furthermore, a partner who masturbates, because it implies they are lacking in their performance, intimidates many men. As the social ideal of a woman being a dependent and passive creature has deteriorated in our time, the taboo of female masturbation is beginning to show signs of decrease. However, for the most part the taboo still exists. For men masturbation is seen as a necessity, a means of controlling intense hormonal imbalances, a release valve. There is no study indicating that females don’t have the same desires and need to explore themselves. In fact masturbation is a healthy and natural thing for both males and females.

Relationship of Dreams to Thought, Memory, and Smell :: Sleep Dream

Dreams involve a fundamental integration and spreading of being and experience at the mid-range of feeling between thought and sense. Since dreams [already] involve a fundamental integration and spreading of being and experience at what is the mid-range of feeling between thought and sense, the sense of smell very rarely occurs while dreaming, and the lighting and sound levels are fairly constant (and proper) therein. Memory integrates experience. There is less memory in the dream because experience is already better integrated, and also because experience is less extensive. Dreams improve upon memory and understanding by increasing (or adding to) the integrated extensiveness of being and experience (including thought) in and with time. The sense of relative familiarity involving dream experience is associated with the improvement of understanding and memory therein. Dreams and memory integrate experience, and both add to the extensiveness of experience (including thought) as well, w hile involving a [relative] reduction in the totality of experience. Since the self has extensiveness of being and experience (in and with time) in conjunction with the integrated and natural extensiveness of sensory experience, we spend less time dreaming (and sleeping) than waking. The integrated extensiveness of being and experience go hand in hand. Emotion that is comprehensive and balanced advances consciousness. Dreams are an emotional experience. The comprehensiveness and consistency of both intention and concern are central to our consciousness, life, and growth. (Desire consists of both intention and concern, thereby including interest as well.) The comprehensiveness and consistency of both intention and concern in relation to experience in general is ultimately dependent upon the natural and integrated extensiveness of sensory experience. In keeping with this, consciousness and language involve the ability to represent, form, and experience comprehensive approximations of experience in general, and this includes art and music as well. If the self did not represent, form, and experience a comprehensive approximation of experience in general, we would be incapable of growth and of becoming other than we are. Thought involves a relative reduction in the range and extensiveness of feeling. In keeping with this, dreams make thought more like sensory experience in general. Accordingly, both thought and also the range and extensiveness of feeling are proportionately reduced in the dream. (This reduction in the range and extensiveness of feeling during dreams is consistent with the fact that the experience of smell very rarely occurs therein.

Internal and External Constraints Facing Venetian Ices Ltd Essay

Constraints are laws, which the company must abide by. There are two different types of constraints; these are internal and external constraints. Internal constraints are those that the company controls their selves such as: * Availability of finance * Existing company policy * Peoples behaviour External constraints are decisions that are made outside the company’s control such as: * Government and EC legislation * Competitors behaviour * Lack of technology * The economic environment The internal constraints facing Venetian ices include: 1.Equipment Venetian Ices need equipment in order to produce their goods and also keep the ice cream frozen. So obviously they will need equipment such as freezers (to store the ice cream), new ice cream making machines in order to produce the ice cream for the customers. They will also need a mobile van, so that customers could get ice cream in different areas. Another equipment that Venetian Ices could have is packaging, this will be for customers who would want to buy a whole tub of ice cream from them. There are some problems, which may occur when replacement or extra equipment is needed. Venetian ices could in fact find themselves in a position where they are unable to afford the equipment that they would want available to them. In the case of additional equipment there may not be enough room on the sight of enough employees to operate all the machinery. 2. Financing the development of a Franchisee operation Venetian Ices must provide finance to their franchisees in order to get them started and set up in the business world. Venetian Ices can get their finance from a number of places and ways. The first is retained profit, but that can possible prove difficult for them, as small companies such as themselves only tend to make a small profit. They can also get their finance from selling as much ice cream as they possibly can. Venetian ices would have to buy all the equipment and premised that they would require when they are setting up a business up and also paying all of the workers in their franchisee. This means that when a new franchisee joins at first Venetian Ices have to spend a lot of capital and get little back in return. 3. Staffing for Increased Production Output By increasing the number of staff it would increase the output of the company, but this will mean having to pay out more money in order to pay their new employees. Also they may have a problem with the size of the premises. There could be a problem with the amount of people allowed to work in the building, if there isn’t enough room for everyone they would have to employ less people then they would like. Some External constraints that may affect Venetian Ices include: 1.Raising finance How much finance Venetian Ices can raise depends a lot on the public who purchase ice cream from them and also investors who decide to invest money in the company. This could cause a problem though because in winter ice cream is less popular and a whole lot less people would come and purchase ice cream during the cold period. This could therefore mean investors will not want to invest in an ice cream company, which for part of the reason will not raise much finance. 2. Planning Permission If Venetian Ices decided they wanted to expand their premises or decide to build new premises for their company, they would require planning permission from the local council or the government. If Venetian Ices did decide to go ahead with an extension or the building of a new building without a contract from the authorities then they could be taken to court and forced to abandon work on their new premises completely. 3. Franchising Venetian Ices do not have complete control over its franchisees, as the franchiser does not always check them on. This can mean that franchisees may run the business against the company policy and use different and methods. For example if the franchisee trains the staff in how to recruit then the staff must do exactly as they are told to, if they recruit people in a different way or people who Venetian Ices don’t want. This could lead to the company having a bad reputation. 4. Law Venetian Ices must follow and work by all the laws. There has being laws set about methods of employment, training, European regulations and also food which would defiantly apply to Venetian Ices. These laws can be checked often by government inspectors. 5. Tourism Tourism is a big market for Venetian Ices as they make up a large percentage of customers in some areas where there are mobile and ice cream parlours. Tourist also often purchases goods on impulse. However, Venetian Ices cannot insure that the number of tourists in a certain area will remain the same all the time. 6. Foot and Mouth Disease Another outbreak of foot and mouth can cause serious problems for Venetian Ices. Foot and Mouth affect cows, which Venetian ices, depends on for its main ingredient, which is milk. Another foot and mouth epidemic breaking out would make it hard obtaining the milk and also getting it transported as certain areas of the countryside would be shut off, therefore making transportation hard. Foot and mouth can also cause tourism to drop in certain areas and possibly even close. This would lead Venetian Ices in an awful position in them areas affected by foot and mouth. There could possibly be people who would want to stay away from the ice cream due to foot and mouth.

Readers of Huck Finn

The ending of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain is indeed puzzling. On the surface, the story looks a perfect happy end – more or less, everybody seems satisfied with the new order of things: Jim is now a free man, Tom is fully recovered, and Huck gets rid of his father and receives a chance to move West to start an independent life free of â€Å"civilizing† efforts of well-meaning adult women. This looks like a perfect American ‘happy end’ which so often ends Hollywood movies even if the previous course of events had seemed unlikely to bring about such a happy combination of circumstances. Perhaps the sympathetic treatment of the runaway slave on the part of Huck seemed idealized to many of Clemens’ contemporaries and later critics. At the same time, the ending contains one very important message that makes it less ideal than it may seem on the surface. This is the whole behaviour of Tom Sawyer who had known all the way that Jim was in fact a free man, yet had chosen to withhold this information from his friends simply to have a spectacular liberation. In doing so, he had subjected Huck and Tom to many trials and dangers that are surely exciting to read about, but overall so difficult that few of us would like to repeat it on their own. This callous and insensitive action on the part of Tom, although he tries to justify it with a lame excuse that he had meant to repay Jim with money for his troubles, vividly demonstrates that his treatment of Afro-Americans is less idealistic. In showing Tom’s lack of sensitivity for the feelings of another human being simply because this human being happens to be a black slave brings home to the readers of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn the real situation of the relationship between slave-owners and slaves. To a great degree, such attitude puts Huck’s heroic deeds in context and reveals that many people would probably choose to imitate Tom’s behaviour rather than Huck’s especially if this promised them an opportunity to have fun. True, the readers realize that Tom is not a typical white male as there is probably no such thing as a purely stereotypical person who simply follows all the norms of his class without showing any individuality. Tom does have a very bright and outstanding individuality, and he is notable for his love of a good prank. Thus, he is going to take liberties with the lives and need of other people, including those of his own class, as he had shown during his school jokes. However, would he be willing to make a white person from a respectable background undergo such hardship as Jim did? The question remains unanswered, and the readers can very well suspect that Tom can be doing many things to have fun with things that are life and death to other people, less empowered than himself. Therefore, the ending of the book does reveal the inhuman attitudes of white slave-owners toward their black slaves. The author does show that the life of a black person is no bed of roses even after the basic question of personal freedom is solved. This freed person finds oneself in the setting in which the white majority are taught to see their black fellow citizens as worthless individuals in contrast to themselves – as people whose human value is at least slightly less than that of their own. As to Huck’s kind treatment of the runaway slave, this does not seem so improbably even one considers the wide scale of the abolitionist movement in the nation. Huck is shown to experience pangs of conscience when he conceals a runaway slave, feeling affinity with his own class and race. Yet, like many people in theory born to be slave-owners, he oversteps the prejudice the society imposes upon him and manages to become a moral person by helping a human being. Summing it up, the ending of Huck Finn does not seem to contain any improbable elements that would confirm that Twain cheated. The closure of the book does show that white people often tended to see slaves as inferior, and that many were able to rise above prejudices to help slaves. Twain, Mark. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. 13 Jan. 06 .