This paper surveys the development of current Information Systems (IS) research in Portugal, giving a broad overview of research activities in this field by analyzing the articles delivered at the Portuguese IS Conference (PISC). Based on such an analysis of all papers published by PISC, the paper presents the findings on key aspects such as keywords, key research topics and most cited articles...

The concept of architecture in relation to information systems research and practice is ambiguous and lacks a common agreed upon definition that combines the different areas of use. This paper investigates the origins of the concept and some of its common uses and conceptions. It is argued that the different conceptualizations of architecture are treated in an unreflectived manner and the effec...

Action research has for many years been promoted and practiced as one way to conduct empirical research within the Information Systems discipline. While the approach can lead to highly relevant contributions, researchers are warned against the many risks involved in action research. Based on successful cases of Information Systems action research we explore the role played by conventional resea...

Much attention has been paid recently to the need for information systems research in healthcare. Premiere IS journals have called for research addressing the interoperability, implementation, adoption, diffusion and clinical data standards needs of our ailing US health care system. Because of the IS community has much to offer the unique healthcare environment, collaborative research is a nece...

Although DeLone, McLean and others insist that system usage is a key variable in information systems research, the system usage construct has received little theoretical scrutiny, boasts no widely accepted definition, and has been operationalized by a diverse set of unsystematized measures. In this article, we present a systematic approach for reconceptualizing the system usage construct in par...

A considerable amount of research has already been conducted in the IT/IS evaluation arena, yet rewards remain elusive. This has been variously explained and in this paper we aim to realize two objectives: first, to examine some particular political and social aspects of evaluation processes in organizations and, second, to show the potential contribution of a social shaping approach to informa...

The boom in the application of information technologies to education and training, e-learning, underscores a fundamental need to understand how these technologies improve the learning process. Yet, very little Information Systems research is focusing on this issue. A review of education literature points out that learning strategies are shifting towards a more collaborative learning. In this pa...

Conceptual modelling deals with the process of building or interpreting a conceptual model. Stakeholders use the resulting model to reason and communicate about a domain in order to improve their common understanding of it. From this perspective, conceptual modelling and conceptual models are subjects for information systems research. In this paper, we argue that this engineering-driven view on...

This paper presents a modified method for approximating nonlinear systems by a sequence of linear time varying systems. The convergence proof is outlined and the potential of this methodology is discussed. Simulation results are used to show the effectiveness of the proposed method.