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Major public cloud providers, such as AWS, Azure or Google, offer seamless experiences for infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS) and software as a service (SaaS). With the emergence of the public cloud's vast usage, administrators must be able to have a reliable method to provide the seamless experience that a public cloud offers on a smaller scale, such as a private cloud. When a smaller deployment or a private cloud is needed, OpenStack can meet the goals without increasing cost or sacrificing data control.

To demonstrate these enablement goals of resiliency and elasticity in IaaS and PaaS, the authors design a private distributed system cloud platform using OpenStack and its core services of Nova, Swift, Cinder, Neutron, Keystone, Horizon and Glance on a five-node deployment.

Through the demonstration of dynamically adding an IaaS node, pushing the deployment to its physical and logical limits, and eventually crashing the deployment, this paper shows how the PackStack utility facilitates the provisioning of an elastic and resilient OpenStack-based IaaS platform that can be used in production if the deployment is kept within designated boundaries.

The authors adopt the multinode-capable PackStack utility in favor of an all-in-one OpenStack build for a true demonstration of resiliency, elasticity and scalability in a small-scale IaaS. An all-in-one deployment is generally used for proof-of-concept deployments and is not easily scaled in production across multiple nodes. The authors demonstrate that combining PackStack with the multi-node design is suitable for smaller-scale production IaaS and PaaS deployments.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the antecedent factors influencing e-loyalty toward e-wallet payment apps in developing countries (e.g. Jordan). This study also investigates the mediating role of perceived usefulness (PU) and the moderating role of electronic word of mouth (e-WOM) toward these apps.

An online questionnaire was used for data collection from 251 actual users of e-wallet payment apps. To estimate and test the research-proposed model, the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was employed.

The results mainly confirm that perceived trust (PT), perceived financial cost (PFC) and perceived ease of use were found to be determinants of PU; perceived security (PS), PT, PFC, perceived ease of use and perceived enjoyment (PE) were found to be determinants of e-satisfaction, whereas e-satisfaction and e-WOM were found to be determinants of e-loyalty toward e-wallet payment apps. Likewise, the results support the significant effect of the moderating effect of e-WOM. Conversely, the direct and indirect impact of PU and perceived health benefits (PHB) on e-satisfaction is not supported; therefore, hypotheses H4, H5 and H9 were rejected.

This study contributes to the understanding of the critical success factors underlying e-wallet apps during and post-COVID-19 era, which can help policymakers in banks and other financial institutions (service providers) to increase the diffusion rate of financial inclusion by the usage of e-wallet apps.

The recent progress of digital accounting has significantly affected businesses’ sustainable production process. Businesses generally use digital accounting applications to automate their operational procedures and increase their corporate efficiencies through improved output quality and sustainability. Consequently, the purpose of this study is to look into the antecedent factors that directly and indirectly influence blockchain technology adoption in the context of digital accounting systems.

The data of the current study were obtained from 346 accountants working in information technology companies. Partial least squares structural equation modeling was used to test the research proposal model.

The empirical results confirmed that the adoption of blockchain technology is most considerably impacted by perceived usefulness, whereby it was also revealed that perceived ease of use has a direct and indirect effect on blockchain technology adoption.

According to the researchers’ knowledge, this study addresses a vital research gap in the literature by suggesting a comprehensive research model that can help garner enhanced usage of blockchain technology and its implications in digital accounting systems in the Jordanian context.

This study mainly aims to explore the causal nexus between big data-driven organizational capabilities (BDDOC) and supply chain innovation capabilities (SCIC) and innovation performance (IP), then explore the indirect effect of SCIC and also test the moderating effects for both internal supply chain integration (ISCI) and external supply chain integration (ESCI) into the relationship between BDDOC and SCIC.

In order to test the conceptual model and the hypothesized relationships between all the constructs, the data were collected using a self-reported questionnaire by workers in Jordanian small and medium manufacturing enterprises. Partial least squares-structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was employed to test the model.

The paper reached a set of interesting results where it was confirmed that there is a positive and statistically significant relationship between BDDOC, SCIC and IP in addition to confirming the indirect effect of SCIC between BDDOC and IP. The results also showed that there is a moderating role for both ESCI and ISCI.

This study can be considered the first study in the current literature that investigates these constructs as shown in the research model. Therefore, the paper presents an interesting set of theoretical and managerial contributions that may contribute to covering part of the research gap in the literature.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of organisational socialisation tactics, namely, context-based, content-based and social-based tactics, on affective commitment by the mediating role of perceived organisational support.

A quantitative study was conducted using a judgmental sample of 119 newcomers with one-year experience or less in Jordanian small and medium-sized enterprises. The collected data were analysed using bootstrapped procedure by the partial least squares-structural equation modelling.

The empirical results show that perceived organisational support plays a crucial role in mediating the relationships between socialisation tactics and affective commitment. Specifically, both social-based tactics and content-based tactics have a significant indirect effect on affective commitment through perceived organisational support. However, context-based tactics do not directly or indirectly influence affective commitment or perceived organisational support significantly.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is among the first studies in the Jordanian context that investigate the relationship between organisational socialisation and affective commitment by the mediating role of perceived organisational support, thus adding originality to the existing literature. Furthermore, this study contributes to the scholarly debate on the relationship between socialisation and outcomes.

The digital transformation revolution has brought outstanding changes to business organizations, especially in the digital accounting transformation domain. Consequently, the purpose of this study is to explore the important role of digital accounting transformation in improving business performance in the context of the banking industry.

Data were collected through a questionnaire from the Jordanian bank sector with a sample of 190 respondents. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to analyze the collected data and test the hypotheses.

The results have shown that the adoption of digital accounting, adoption of FinTech innovation and technological competition are the major drivers for improving business performance. All direct paths leading to improving business performance were found to be significant in the hypothesized directions, while technological savvy was found to indirectly affect the relationship between (the adoption of digital accounting and FinTech innovation) and improving business performance.

The current study is differentiated from other studies by developing a theoretical research model to incorporate the adoption of digital accounting, adoption of FinTech innovation, technological competition, technological savvy and business performance in the Jordanian context under the digital transformation revolution. For practitioners, the findings provide policymakers with meaningful insight for organizations looking to adopt these digital technologies for improved business performance.

Most of the previous studies agree about the significance of user satisfaction in ensuring the endurance of information systems (ISs). Accordingly, it is crucial to investigate the effect of e-Government systems on individual end-user satisfaction as more and more countries adopt and deploy such Government Financial Management Information Systems (GFMIS) in the era of digital transformation. Because of this, the purpose of this study is to investigate the factors that contribute to the success of GFMIS in Jordan and ultimately the satisfaction of its users.

The IS success model developed by DeLone and McLean (2003) serves as the theoretical underpinning for the current research. Adding training quality as a new variable to the proposed model has been found to further increase the satisfaction of GFMIS users. A total of 104 GFMIS users in Jordan provided the data used to verify the model. The partial least squares-structural equation modelling was used to test the hypotheses.

The empirical findings indicated that GFMIS user satisfaction is significantly affected by information quality, service quality and perceived usefulness; meanwhile, system quality is only partially supported. The research also showed that the level of satisfaction among Jordanian GFMIS users was related to the quality of training they received.

This study fills a crucial literature gap by developing a research model that can help improve GFMIS usage towards attaining greater performance amongst government agencies in Jordan.

The purpose of the study is to investigate the factors that influence the adoption of new sustainability reporting (SDG) and external assurance (EXTA) practices. This study also examines the relationship between sustainability reporting activity and corporate economic performance for a sample of 99 companies in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries that addressed SDGs in their sustainability reports published in 2019.

Using a two-stage analysis, this study examines how firms’ characteristics and corporate governance variables affect SDG and economic performance, as well as the firm’s decision to adopt EXTA statements for a sample of companies in that addressed SDGs in their sustainability reports published in 2019. The authors collected data from the Global Reporting Initiative’s (GRI) Sustainability Disclosure database and the Bureau van Dijk for Orbis database.

The results show that the variables firm size, profitability, big 4 auditors and government ownership significantly affect SDG and economic performance. The results also reveal that firms operating in the manufacturing sector are positively correlated with SDG and the firm’s decision to adopt EXTA statements. Furthermore, the results indicate that board independence positively affects SDGs and EXTA.

The results can be particularly relevant and timely in helping large GCC companies promote their engagement to sustainable development practices by adopting more sustainable long-term strategies and policies. The findings could also guide managers in the strategic direction to identify firms’ characteristics and corporate governance features essential to promote sustainability reporting, an increasingly important performance indicator for investors and to enhance their confidence in the capital market. The results may also have practical implications to policymakers and other regulators in GCC countries to define effective frameworks that promote sustainable development reports and the use of EXTA.

The results make significant contributions by providing new insights to the existing literature on sustainability reporting in emerging markets by examining a unique perspective on the influence of firms’ characteristics and corporate governance features on the adoption of new sustainability reporting practices. The authors further add to the previous literature on the relationship between a firm’s economic performance and sustainable reporting by providing evidence from large companies in GCC countries, which might benefit from the adoption of multiple conceptual lenses, in this case, legitimacy and stakeholder theories. Lastly, through the empirical findings, this study provides economic validity to the 2018 joint initiative of the GRI and the United Nations Global Compact to strengthen corporate actions to achieve the United Nations SDGs.

The purpose of this study is to discuss the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) favorable attitude toward the financial sector’s digital transformation and the development of FinTech due to the rise of financial technology. FinTech blends innovation and technology to provide financial inclusion to stakeholders through various new products and services such metaverse and artificial intelligence.

A quantitative research approach was used to empirically validate the suggested research model by using 260 Emirates-based banking authorities and administrators’ data.

The findings indicate that FinTech adoption had a substantial impact on the competitiveness and performance of the UAE banking industry during COVID-19 times. The research indicates that adequate FinTech implementation and alignment with technology management directly influence the performance of the UAE’s banking sector in difficult times.

This study is critical because the UAE banking sector serves diverse nationalities, and its success is contingent on FinTech and its competitive edge.

The agricultural sector is a critical component of global economic development, and its significance has grown significantly in recent years. The risks associated with agriculture and the behaviors of farmers in handling these risks are becoming increasingly important, given the sector’s increasing dependence worldwide. Various activities related to agriculture are vulnerable to multiple risks, which can have severe consequences for farmers’ livelihoods. The purpose of this systematic review is to present a comprehensive analysis of the sources of risk faced by farmers and their choices in adopting risk management strategies worldwide.

The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses protocol was utilized to select relevant literature, and a total of 102 studies were analyzed. Through the use of Venn diagrams and graphical methods, the authors provide a transparent overview of the risks faced by farmers and the adoption of risk management strategies in developed and developing countries.

From the analysis, the authors found that, in terms of risk management strategies, diversification, reserve credit and accumulated assets are frequently used in developing countries, while developed countries tend to rely on future/forward contracts, crop insurance and hedging. Diversification is the most widely used risk management strategy across both developed and developing countries. Our study also highlights the different perceptions of weather-related risks among growers in developed and developing countries.

This systematic review provides valuable insights into the risks associated with agriculture and farmers' strategies in managing these risks, which could inform policy decisions and promote sustainable agricultural practices. For instance, understanding the individualistic nature of farmers' risk perception and the varying risk sources and management strategies depending on the locality and provide assistance to the farmers accordingly.

The paper explains how farmers behave during uncertainty in terms of risk perception and their decision to adopt risk management strategies in developed and developing countries.