When I set out to write this book, I was often surprised by the comments I received from friends and colleagues. Many asked me if some other platform, such as Android or the iPhone, would render Java Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME) obsolete (and non- existent, some posited) by the time the book is published. Still others pointed to the growing convergence between different lines of Java as re…
Hibernate is an amazing piece of software. With a little experience and the power of annotations, you can build a complex, database-backed system with disturbing ease. Once you have built a system using Hibernate, you will never want to go back to the traditional approaches. While Hibernate is incredibly powerful, it presents a steep learning curve when you first encounter it—steep learning c…
Airport personnel must have a clear, consistent understanding of the term hazard. Many air- ports in the early stages of SRM implementation use hazard synonymously with the term risk; however, these are different although related terms. A hazard must exist for the airport to be at risk. A hazard is defined as any existing or potential condition that can lead to injury, illness, or death to peop…
Knowledge of the harmful effects of tobacco use has prompted sustained efforts to regulate the industry that produces and markets tobacco products. The last decade has been encouraging with the development of the first global treaty negotiated under the auspices of the World Health Organization (WHO). The Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), adopted by the World Health Assembly …
Why are established lean enterprises so durably successful while so many at- tempts to become lean fail? The answer lies in the Anna Karenina principle, an extension of Tolstoy’s observation: “Happy families are all alike; every un- happy family is unhappy in its own way.” In general, this means that a defi- ciency in any one of a number of factors critical to overall system function doom…
The second edition of Just-in-Time Accounting demonstrates for the controller or chief financial officer how to streamline an accounting system so that transac- tions can be processed with minimal errors and staff time, resulting in high lev- els of efficiency that result in more time for other activities. Part One of the book uses a multistep approach to improving accounting sys- tems. The fir…
This book is dedicated to Mirjaliisa Charles. Its content is related to the research fields she has been involved in over the years, but in particular, the book focuses on the field in which she has done pioneering work over the past ten years: International Business Communication (IBC). The authors of the book are Mirjaliisa’s research fellows, colleagues and doctoral students from all over …
The world is experiencing significant transformations in its geo-political and economic constitution. The processes of transformation have accelerated over the last decades. A signifi cant part of the growth potential of the world economy nowadays and for the coming decades resides in some fast-developing countries. Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (BRICS) have displayed such…
First and foremost, this is a book about economic growth and long-run economic development. The process of economic growth and the sources of differences in economic performance across nations are some of the most interesting, important and challenging areas in modern social science. The primary purpose of this book is to introduce graduate students to these major questions and to the theo…
You are just beginning your study of economics, but let us fast-forward to the end of your first economics course. How will your study of economics affect the way you see the world? The final exam is over. You are sitting at a restaurant table, waiting for your friends to arrive. The place is busy and loud as usual. Looking around, you see small groups of people sitting and talking animated…
When, on 7 April, people around the world commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Rwanda genocide, that observance should be fi lled not only with remorse, but with resolve. We must remember the victims – the hundreds of thousands of men, women and children abandoned to systematic slaughter while the world, which had the capacity to save most of them, failed to save more than a handful, …
The mobile development community is at a tipping point.Mobile users demand more choice,more opportunities to customize their phones,and more functionality.Mobile operators want to provide value-added content to their subscribers in a manageable and lucrative way.Mobile developers want the freedom to develop the powerful mobile appli- cations users demand with minimal roadblocks to success.Final…
During the months we were writing this book, a lot of people asked us what would make this book special and why someone should care to read it. The most powerful argument that I heard all this time was, "Hey, Google official supports only Gradle to build Android applications and the latest release of Android Studio makes extensive use of Gradle. Ant was already replaced and Maven is nowhere. Wh…
Open source development is well understood in our community. But we shouldn’t take it for granted. I (Stray) was working on some of the diagrams for the book on a flight back from the first ever Robotlegs team meet-up, and the man next to me started asking questions about what I was doing. When I told him I was working on a book about a project that was the collective effort of strangers from…