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The paper aims to explore whether topic analysis (identification of the core contents, trends and topic distribution in the target field) can be performed using a more low-cost and easily applicable method that relies on a small dataset, and how we can obtain this small dataset based on the features of the publications.

The paper proposes a topic analysis method based on prolific and authoritative researchers (PARs). First, the authors identify PARs in a specific discipline by considering the number of publications and citations of authors. Based on the research publications of PARs (small dataset), the authors then construct a keyword co-occurrence network and perform a topic analysis. Finally, the authors compare the method with the traditional method.

The authors found that using a small dataset (only 6.47% of the complete dataset in our experiment) for topic analysis yields relatively high-quality and reliable results. The comparison analysis reveals that the proposed method is quite similar to the results of traditional large dataset analysis in terms of publication time distribution, research areas, core keywords and keyword network density.

Expert opinions are needed in determining the parameters of PARs identification algorithm. The proposed method may neglect the publications of junior researchers and its biases should be discussed.

This paper gives a practical way on how to implement disciplinary analysis based on a small dataset, and how to identify this dataset by proposing a PARs-based topic analysis method. The proposed method presents a useful view of the data based on PARs that can produce results comparable to traditional method, and thus will improve the effectiveness and cost of interdisciplinary topic analysis.

This paper proposes a PARs-based topic analysis method and verifies that topic analysis can be performed using a small dataset.

A project was devised to develop a number of user interfaces to an experimental online public access catalogue which could then be evaluated in a series of user tests. BRS/Search commercial software, mounted on a large 16‐bit microcomputer, was used to create the interfaces; this saved time and effort in producing the software. The database was small, consisting of only a few thousand records obtained from the education section of a real library catalogue. Particular attention was paid to the average person's understanding of Boolean logic and terms when searching an online catalogue. It is hoped to investigate the design and format of browse screens in online catalogues. The software and hardware used in this project are described at some length. The problems and advantages of using commercial software for this research are discussed.

Literature shows that university spin‐offs (USOs) have idiosyncratic strengths in comparison to other new firms; however, evidence also shows that Chinese USOs have a low survival rate, and only a small percent of them can grow into sustainable businesses. The purpose of this paper is to conduct an empirical study to inquire about the variable growth barriers to Chinese USOs, in order to address two major research questions of this paper: what are the major growth barriers, and how significant they are; and what supports should university and government provide to eliminate those barriers?

In the first place, this paper attempts to explore the research questions through literature review and pilot interviews, based on which, a questionnaire for a survey was developed. Then, this study then attempts to address the research questions through a nation‐wide survey in 2009 across 69 national university science parks.

This paper finds that corporate governance issues, managerial concerns, and lack of infrastructure support are three major categories of barriers that thwart the growth of USOs in China. In addition, this paper also identified the support that is expected from universities and government agencies in order to cope with the barriers.

This paper contributes to theory in three ways. First, it tests and validates some existing conceptual frameworks concerned with the growth barriers to USOs. Second, it sheds light on the specific growth concerns of Chinese USOs and identifies three kinds of barriers. Further, this study provides evidence for future policy making regarding USOs and university technology transfer activities in China. This research will be of interest to policy makers, academic entrepreneurs, and university administrators.

Customized product development is facing the challenges of maintaining mass producibility and exploring customer perception on target products. This paper reports an approach by combining virtual prototyping (VP) with design by manufacturing simulation techniques. By constructing virtual prototypes, accurate assessments of mass producibility and customer acceptance will enable better informed design of customized products. The primary goal of VP for customized product development is to provide a multidisciplinary design definition and rapid prototyping environment for concept development and a tailored, scenario‐based simulation environment for concept evaluation within a single facility. This design environment facilitates the capture and utilization of information generated during the design phase, and the simultaneous generation, at design time, of manufacturing, materials, costing, and scheduling data, together with visual evaluation of customer perception on target products, hence supporting the implementation of concurrent engineering.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the effecting mechanism of relational embeddedness on technological innovation performance in the context of China.

By probing into the related theories and five exploratory case studies of Chinese manufacturing firms, this paper establishes a conceptual model about the effects of relational embeddedness on technological innovation performance and proposes nine hypotheses. The authors then investigate 228 Chinese manufacturing firms by questionnaires, and testify the hypotheses and conceptual model by structural equation modeling.

Chinese firm's relational embeddedness in the international manufacturing network has a positive effect on its technological innovation performance through explorative learning. Specifically, trust, information sharing and joint problem solving are beneficial to new knowledge acquisition and application, and then to the improvement of technological innovation performance.

This paper mainly focuses on bilateral relations among firms, regardless of the influence of network structure. Future research can extend to multilateral relations as well.

The paper builds up linkages among theories of network resources, organizational learning and technological innovation to open the black‐box of how relational embeddedness acts on technological innovation. It is a supplement to the existing research on inter‐firm network theories in developing countries.

The growing importance of the service sector in almost every economy in the world has created a significant amount of interest in service operations. In practice, many service sectors have sought and made use of various enhancement programs to improve their operations and performance in an attempt to hold competitive success. As most researchers recognize, service operations link with customers. The customers as participants act in the service operations system driven by the goal of sufficing his/her added values. This is one of the distinctive features of service production and consumption. In the paper, first, we propose the idea of service operations improvement by mapping objectively the service experience of customers from the view of customer journey. Second, a portraying scheme of service experience of customers based on the IDEF3 technique is proposed, and last, some implications on service operations improvement are given.

The purpose of this paper is to test the effect of informal finance and trade credit on the performance of private firms.

Based on a survey to private firms in 19 cities, the paper empirically tests the promoting effects of informal finance and trade credit on the performance of private firms in China.

It was found that informal finance and trade credit have positive effects on private firms' performance measured by ROA. The net income reinvestment rate of private firms is positively related to whether or not the firm adopts informal financing or trade credit financing. A private firm having limited access to formal finance is more inclined to rely on self‐funds and is more limited by financing choices. Informal financing and trade credit can relieve the tension of cash flow chain but cannot solve the financing constraints. The empirical results also show that bank credit is still not the main financing choice for private firms and has not yet played a promoting role in private firms' performance and growth. Informal finance is more important to promote performance in manufacturing industry, while trade credit is more effective in wholesale and trading industry. The results show the coexistence viability of informal financing channels and formal financial institutions in China.

The policy implication is the Chinese Government should take careful steps to regulate informal financing sources.

After some theoretical literature, such as Lin and Sun, this paper explores for the first time the effect of informal financing channels on the performance of private firms.

In September 1990, the U.S. Department of Education's Library Technology and Cooperation Grants Program awarded a three‐year grant to the Florida Center for Library Automation (FCLA), an agency of the Florida State University System, to develop software adhering to the ANSI Z39.50 Information Retrieval protocol standard. The Z39.50 software was to operate over the Open Systems Interconnect (OSI) communications protocols and be integrated with FCLA's NOTIS system, which is shared by all nine state universities in Florida. In order to test the correctness of its Z39.50 software, FCLA sought out other library software developers who would be willing to develop Z39.50 systems of their own. As part of this process, FCLA helped to found the Z39.50 Implementors' Group (ZIG), which has since gone on to improve the standard and promote Z39.50 implementations throughout much of the North American library systems marketplace. Early on in the project, it became apparent that TCP/IP would be a more heavily used communications vehicle for Z39.50 messages than OSI. FCLA expanded its design to include TCP/IP and, by the end of the grant in September 1993, will have a working Z39.50 system that can communicate over both OSI and TCP/IP networks.

Science and technology policy plays an important role in promoting the development of economic and social development in China. At present, the research on science and technology policy is mainly focused on the basic theories and some quantitative research. The analyses for contents of massive science and technology policies are relatively less. This paper makes use of semantic technologies to extract and analyze the relatively important information from massive science and technology policies. The purpose of this paper is to facilitate users to quickly and effectively obtain valuable information from the massive science and technology policies. The key methods and study results are presented in the paper. The study results can provide references for further study and application in China.

The paper presented the analysis model and method for science and technology policy in China. The terms and sentences are the important information in the science and technology policy. The study adopted the technology of natural language processing to analyze the linguistics characteristics of terms and combined with statistical analyses to extract the terms from Chinese science and technology policy. Then, the authors designed an algorithm, calculated and analyzed the important sentences in Chinese science and technology policies. The experiments were run on the Java test platform.

This paper put forward the analysis model and method for science and technology policy in China. The study obtained the following conclusions: term extraction of science and technology policy: the paper analyzed characteristic of terms in Chinese science and technology policy and designed a method of extracting a term that was suitable for the science and technology policy. The calculation of important sentences for science and technology policy: the paper designed an algorithm and calculated the importance of the sentences to obtain valuable information from the massive science and technology policies.

In our methods, there are some defects to be improved or solved in the future. For example, the precision of algorithm needs to be improved. The significance of this paper is to propose and use the analysis model to process Chinese science and technology policy; we can provide an auxiliary tool to help policy beneficiaries. Enterprises and individuals can be more effective to extraction and mining information from massive science and technology policy and find the target policy.

To verify the effectiveness of the method, the paper selected the real policies about the new energy vehicles as experimental data; at the same time, the paper added uncorrelated policies. It used the proposed analysis model of science and technology policy to calculate and find out the relatively important sentences. The results of study showed that the proposed method can obtain better performance. It verified the validity of this method. The model and method have been applied to actual retrieval system.

The proposed model and method in the paper have been applied to actual retrieval system for users.

The paper proposed the new analysis model and method to analyze science and technology policies in China. The presented model and method are a new attempt. According to the experimental results, this exploration and study are valuable. In addition, the idea and method will give a good start for improving information services of massive science and technology policies in China.