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The purpose of this paper is to compare the accuracy of tracking the amplitude and frequency changes of non‐stationary electric signals.

Short‐time fourier transform (STFT) and S‐transform algorithms were applied to analyze non‐stationary signals originating from switching of capacitor banks in a power system.

The S‐transform showed possibilities of sharp localization of the basic component, and allowed improvement of tracking dynamism the transient components in comparison to STFT.

S‐transform is a better tool for the analysis of non‐stationary waveforms in power systems and its properties can be used for diagnostic and power quality applications.

The dynamic tracking of the changes in time and frequency of real‐like signals originating from a power system are investigated in this paper.

By using the central limit theorem, it is possible to consider the Fourier’s transform of a stochastic process with independent increments as a Gaussian random variable of which the mathematical expectation and the variance are respectively integrals of the mean and the variance of this process. One can then use this result to analyze the statistical properties of linear feedback systems in the frequency domain, that is to say in terms of transfer functions. The advantage of this approach is that one can deal with linear systems subject to squared white noises, in a very simple manner.

Noise abatement is one of the key techniques for Partial Discharge (PD) on-line measurement and monitoring. However, how to enhance the efficiency of PD signal noise suppression is a challenging work. Hence, this study aims to improve the efficiency of PD signal noise abatement.

In this approach, the time–frequency characteristics of PD signal had been obtained based on fast kurtogram and S-transform time–frequency spectrum, and these characteristics were used to optimize the parameters for the signal matching over-complete dictionary. Subsequently, a self-adaptive selection of matching atoms was realized when using Matching Pursuit (MP) to analyze PD signals, which leading to seldom noise signal element was represented in sparse decomposition.

The de-noising of PD signals was achieved efficiently. Simulation and experimental results show that the proposed method has good adaptability and significant noise abatement effect compared with Empirical Mode Decomposition, Wavelet Threshold and global signal sparse decomposition of MP.

A self-adaptive noise abatement method was proposed to improve the efficiency of PD signal noise suppression based on the signal sparse representation and its MP algorithm, which is significant to on-line PD measurement.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a new fault feature extraction scheme for the rolling element bearing.

The generalized Stockwell transform (GST) and the singular value ratio spectrum (SVRS) methods are combined. A time-frequency distribution measurement criterion named the energy concentration measurement (ECM) is initially used to determine the parameter of the optimal GST method. Then, the optimal GST is applied to conduct a time-frequency transformation for a raw signal. Subsequently, the two-dimensional time-frequency matrix is obtained. Finally, the improved singular value decomposition (SVD) analysis is used to conduct a noise reduction of the time-frequency matrix. The SVRS is proposed to select the effective singular values. Furthermore, the time-domain feature of the impact signal is obtained by taking the inverse GST transform.

The simulated and experimental signals are used to verify the superiority of the proposed method over conventional methods. The obtained results show that the proposed method can effectively extract fault features of the rolling element bearing.

This paper mainly discusses the application of GST and SVRS methods to analyze the weak fault feature extraction problem. The next research direction is to explore the application of the Hilbert Huang transform (HHT) and variational modal decomposition (VMD) in the impact feature extraction of rolling bearing.

In the present study, a new SVRS method is proposed to select the number of effective singular values. This paper proposed an effective way to obtain the fault feature in monitoring of rotating machinery.

The purpose of this paper is to measure the flexibility of business process models. The authors give the notions of flexible process distance, which corresponds to the number of change operations needed for transforming one process model into another, considering the different perspectives (functional, operational, behavioral, informational, and organizational).

The proposed approach is a quantitative-based approach to measure the flexibility of business process models. In this context, the authors presented a method to compute the distance between two process models. The authors measured the distance between a process model and a process variant in terms of the number of high-level change operations (e.g. to insert or delete actors) needed to transform the process model into the respective variant when a change occurred, considering the different perspectives and the flexible features.

To evaluate the flexibility-measurement approach, the authors performed a comprehensive simulation using an emergency care (EC) business process model and its variants. The authors used a real-world EC process and illustrated the possible changes faced in the emergency department (possible variants). Simulation results were promising because they fit the flexibility needs of the EC process users. This was validated using the authors’ previous work which consists in a guidance approach for business process flexibility.

The authors defined six different distances between business process models, which are summarized in the definition of total process distance. However, changes in one perspective may lead to changes in other perspectives. For instance, adding a new activity may lead to adding a new actor.

The results of this study would help companies to obtain important information about their processes and to compare the desired level of flexibility with their actual process flexibility.

This study is probably the first flexibility-measurement approach which incorporates features for capturing changes affecting the functional, operational, informational, organizational, and behavioral perspectives as well as elements related to approaches enhancing flexibility.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the roles of perceived certainty, manipulated risk and knowledge in the satisfaction‐purchase intention relationship in the context of a new product evaluation.

This study uses a 2×2 factorial design with 120 participants and a combination of methods to test hypotheses.

The respondents of low‐risk as well as high‐knowledge groups report a higher purchase intention. Interestingly, the movement from satisfaction to purchase intention is higher among respondents with higher certainty, and among respondents in low‐risk as well as high‐knowledge groups. In particular, this study finds a positive interaction effect between manipulated knowledge and manipulated risk on the satisfaction‐purchase intention relationship.

As with most experiments, this study has low external validity. Thus, future studies should use different products/brands tested among a wider range of consumers and in more realistic user situations. Both product risk and consumer knowledge are multidimensional constructs, thus, it will be interesting for future studies to manipulate different facets of those constructs (e.g. financial risk, procedural knowledge).

The authors' findings suggest that managers should be aware of satisfaction strength (e.g. confidence and knowledge) and risk in their estimations of purchase intention based on satisfaction measurement. Marketing strategies that reduce consumers' risks, consolidate their confidence and educate them with relevant knowledge may be effective strategies to increase their purchase intentions, especially towards new products.

This study contributes to the literature by simultaneously examining the roles of perceived certainty, manipulated risk and knowledge within a satisfaction‐purchase intention relationship. It also contributes by providing empirical evidence supporting an interaction between knowledge and risk affecting the satisfaction‐purchase intention relationship. Finally, it uses a controlled experiment in the context of a new product evaluation to confirm the causal effects.

This paper develops a plausible software availability model for operational use. In particular, we consider two kinds of restoration scenarios; one involves the debugging activity and the other does not involve the debugging activity. The time‐dependent behavior of the software system during the operation phase is described by a Markov process. Several stochastic quantities for software availability measurement are derived from this model. Finally, numerical examples are shown to illustrate software availability analyses.

Torbay Care Trust has been widely promoted as an effective model of integrated health and social care, and yet the impact of reforms introduced by the previous and current governments has been to destabilise its partnership coherence and its organisational form. This paper seeks to explain why this is the case, highlighting the potentially damaging consequences for the local, currently productive, system of care; and to indicate the local adaptations necessary to maintain progress, which are seen as under continuing threat in the current financial environment.

This is a personal reflection by the chief executive of Torbay Care Trust, reviewing the documented progress made since 2005.

The model of partnership, collaboration and risk sharing carefully nurtured over 15 years in Torbay has been proven to be beneficial not only for local people, but for NHS financial and clinical performance generally, and for social care performance. This is now paradoxically being undermined by the more commercially‐minded policy approaches of Labour's Transforming Community Services programme and by the current NHS reforms. New tensions have arisen across the “health and social care divide”.

The current government is unequivocally committed to integrated care, and specifically to integrated health and social care. The Torbay experience gives insight firstly into the care and attention which may be needed by government to secure this over forthcoming years; and secondly to the way in which integrated commissioning will have to be conceived and organised in the new system, and how integrated services will have, in turn, to be commissioned, and operated.

How society, its institutions and organizations relate to place and space is largely defined by advances in information, and communications and transportation technology. Advances in information technology transform society’s relationships to and involvement in economic and social activity, and therefore the real estate processes, systems, procedures and relationships that characterize the real estate that support society’s space‐using economic and social activity. Information technology advances simultaneously introduce complexity and simplicity to the real estate sector. Now, we are seeing a convergence of functions, as a particular space assumes multiple purposes, similar to the earliest phases of economic history. The resources and purposes of activities that occur in traditional work environments will increasingly reflect those that have been thought of as occurring in residential environments, and homes will have all the resources and electronic capabilities of places of business and merchandising. Ultimately, the implications of information technology for the real estate discipline challenge all involved to craft strategies reflecting an understanding of the direction and pace of society’s transforming relationship to place and space.