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On many levels, “follow‐the‐sun” management makes a glorious kind of sense. The idea goes something like this: Start a process in the East, say Japan or Hong Kong, where the sun rises. When those workers leave their offices at the end of the day, a new team further west in, say, London, arrives fresh to continue the job. Later in that same 24‐hour period, a bunch of New Yorkers can complete the task. Three hours later, those in Silicon Valley can arrive to find the finished project on their desks. Everyone works on their own turf in a standard 9‐to‐5 day, but four times the amount of work is done.

The paper aims to address the combined attitude control and Sun tracking problem in a flexible spacecraft in the presence of external and internal disturbances. The attitude stabilization of a flexible satellite is generally a challenging control problem, because of the facts that satellite kinematic and dynamic equations are inherently nonlinear, the rigid–flexible coupling dynamical effect, as well as the uncertainty that arises from the effect of actuator anomalies.

To deal with these issues in the combined attitude and Sun tracking system, a novel control scheme is proposed based on the adaptive fuzzy Jacobian approach. The augmented spacecraft model is then analyzed and the Lyapunov-based backstepping method is applied to develop a nonlinear three-axis attitude pointing control law and the adaptation law.

Numerical results show the effectiveness of the proposed adaptive control scheme in simultaneously tracking the desired attitude and the Sun.

Reaction wheels are commonly used in many spacecraft systems for the three-axis attitude control by delivering precise torques. If a reaction wheel suffers from an irreversible mechanical breakdown, then it is likely going to interrupt the mission, or even leading to a catastrophic loss. The pitch-axis mounted solar array drive assemblies (SADAs) can be exploited to anticipate such situation to generate a differential torque. As the solar panels are rotated by the SADAs to be orientated relative to the Sun, the pitch-axis wheel control torque demand can be compensated by the differential torque.

The proposed Jacobian control scheme is inspired by the knowledge of Jacobian matrix in the trajectory tracking of robotic manipulators.

The purpose of this paper is to answer the question asked by Buelen “What do we still need to learn about outsourcing across time zones?”.

This paper serves as a response to the commentary by Erik Beulen in SOIJ Vol. 5 No. 1 titled “I'm working while they're sleeping: time zone separation challenges and solutions”.

The paper finds that we are still very much at the beginning of the “era of time zone dependent work.”

This futures analysis leads to the projection that many more individuals will be entering time zone dependent work. While technology may elevate some of the hardships of temporal separation, it will exacerbate others.

There's never a dull day in the life of a director of a testing station — at least there have not been many in my twenty‐four years as Director of Desert Sunshine Exposure Tests in Arizona. (Perhaps it would be more accurate to say, ‘in my nineteen years’, because for the first five years there was no other employee to direct.)

The purpose of this paper is to review current research and developments with particular reference to the next‐generation technologies.

A general review and survey of selected research and development topics is given, and some of the new challenges and applications of future technologies are considered.

The paper illustrates the multi‐ and trans‐disciplinary natures of studies in cybernetics, systems and management science, with a view to further research and development activity.

The choice of reviews provides an awareness of current trends in these areas of endeavour.

The reviews are selected from a global database and give a studied assessment of current research and development initiatives.

This paper reviews energy alternatives for groundwater pumping in remote, rural areas which are not grid connected or where grid extension costs are prohibitively high. The applicability of photovoltaic (PV) pumping under certain conditions is discussed, using examples of in‐service fieldwork results, and experimental results of a laboratory PV pumping rig with remote monitoring capabilities using telemetry. The outcome of the survey and analysis shows that PV pumping can be competitive with other technologies under specific head and flow conditions, although the socio‐institutional implementation strategies are crucial to the techno‐economic success of actual pumping schemes.

The purpose of this paper is to share the experiences and reflections of one woman’s journey towards well-being.

A narrative approach has been taken to structure reflections based on lived experience.

Reflections are offered based on a personal journey towards well-being.

This paper adds to the accounts of the lived experience of the journey towards well-being and, as such, contributes to the understanding of the process of rebuilding a life.

The purpose of this paper is to present a model of the 24‐h software development process to help software project managers assess the profitability of a 24‐h development configuration and to select the optimal partnering sites. The model also helps the customer‐support divisions of software firms to decide which customer requests need to be performed using the 24‐h development mode.

This paper presents a graphical representation of the 24‐h software development process. Highlighting the importance of interaction times between two sites and the role of product‐, process‐, and site‐related factors that influence its value, the paper adopts the method of pair‐wise comparison of factors as done in the case of analytical hierarchy process and proposes a multiplicative model for its estimation. The software development time and cost are thereafter estimated by using site‐specific values of work hours, compensation package, and productivity. The approach is used to determine the economic viability of 24‐h development and make optimum site selection for a number of decision‐making situations.

The results obtained from applying the models to hypothetical, but realistic problems, with different values for site‐ and personnel‐specific factors to prove the ability of the model to be used in real‐life situations.

The proposed model does not consider effects of factors like multiple interactions, reworks, and errors in communication.

A circular representation of the 24‐h software development process, the multiplicative model for estimating the length of interaction time, and the time and cost of development in such a process are the main contributions of the paper.