Parallel to new technological advancements, including the development of interactive recommender systems, digital music services on the Internet, such as Spotify, have in a short time span gradually replaced former physical media such as CDs and MP3-players and become pioneers on a market with an otherwise uncertain future. By subscribing to the service, users have access to a vast library of music and from any device with Internet access. In order to provide a satisfactory and useful musical experience, different ways of coping with the vastness is required - which is precisely what recommender systems are for. Improved filtering techniques and use of devices built in sensors, make way for new opportunities of more precise and contextually tailored suggestions for track selection, which in turn leads to potential privacy issues when using interactive music services. But where do we stand today? By compiling, exemplifying and discussing three different perspectives with relating to the development of interactive music recommender systems, the objective for this paper is to provide a for science, industry and user, objectively nuanced account of current potentials and expectations.

A reforming trend is captured showing that countries are shifting from defined benefit pension systems towards defined contribution systems. The reforms have been justified through predictions that the defined benefit systems will not manage to provide good enough pensions to members in the future. The newer defined contribution pension plans often include individual financial accounts where individuals have the possibility to choose how a part of their pension savings should be invested. Sweden was early to introduce such a system, which at the moment provides more than 800 funds to choose from. The aim of this thesis is to capture the market risk associated with these individual investments and does so by using Monte Carlo simulations for six selected pension funds.

In Uppsala, Sweden, Vattenfall has a combined heat and power plant. On the premises there is an engineering workshop with old fluorescent and mercury lamps that need to be replaced. This provides a great opportunity to save energy and money by installing more efficient lighting. The main purpose of this study was to present two functional and energy efficient lighting systems including control system. The lighting systems were designed by investigating the working environment, measuring illuminance and by simulations in the software DIALux.

This report is the result of a thesis conducted at the consulting firm Bjerking AB andis the final part of the Bachelor Programme in Construction Engineering at Universityof Uppsala. The work aims to investigate the costs and how the choice of ventilationsystem affects building projects during a long-term period. This report covers costssuch as investment, maintenance and energy but also how they affect residents andbuilders. Building regulations for energy consumption are expected to be tougher;therefore a comparison of two different heat recovery ventilation systems(HRV-system) was made. One system is based on a centrally placed unit that coversthe whole buildings ventilation through vertical shafts.

The aim of this thesis is to examine one part of Amazon.coms recommender systems: Similar Items. The purpose is also to show the difficulties with subject access, i. e. to find a similar book to the one you just read; problems with traditional systems versus the usefulness with recommender systems like Amazon.coms Similar Items. Similar Items presents a set, a cluster of related items to a given item based on customers co-purchase.

The aim with this thesis is to make a comparison between forcing tulips in a hydroponic system and the forcing off tulips that have been planted in soil. The results are mostly based on interviews with six Dutch and one Swedish tulip forcer and the managing director at the Horticultural Research Centre, Proeftuin Zwaagdijke, in the Netherlands. There are benefits and disadvantages with both methods. Tulip bulbs planted in soil seem to get a brighter colour after forcing, compared with those forced ?in water?.

While the call for regulations against greenhouse gas emissions are louder then ever before, demand for oil is also at an all time high. Oil companies face the dilemma of making sound business without being perceived as environmental villains. In this essay I will examine how BP, one of the largest companies in the world, broke rank with the industry and devoted itself to being an environmental friendly oil company. The actions and motives of this change will be evaluated through up-to-date theories about company motivation to environmental adaptation. We see that BP:s transformation can be well explained through Simone Pulvers theory about the socially embedded company.

The aim of this comparative study is to analyse the French and the Polish regional governance in order to see if there are any differences in their regional ruling systems. Further more I will study their different possibilities in taking part in the European Union regional political market. The shape of the regional systems will be explored both organisationally (study of the institutional entities of the regional construction) and functionally (study of the competencies of the regional body etcetera) to focus on its cause on the regional development. My over all focus will be to find out whether regional rule means differently in the countries France and Poland.Several questions are dealt with and the two main ones are as follows; How do the different structures of the form of government in France and Poland influence the governance on the regional level? Do Poland, as a new member state of the European Union, have what it takes to face the challenges of the new membership; or are there a complex of problems arising from the admittance that prevent its regions from fully taking part in the European regional political market?Some of my conclusions are as follows;There are major differences between the two countries when it comes to their regional ruling systems leading to different abilities in taking part in the European regional political market.

Today, individual indoor stalls and individual outdoor paddocks are the most common way to house horses in Sweden. The way that we manage, house and feed the horses are not optimal for the species natural basic behavioural needs. However, the awareness of this grows in the context of research and the emergence of alternative housing systems. One of the alternatives to the traditional format in individual boxes is called group housing. Group housing systems allow horses to live in herds and they can choose how they want to distribute the hours of the day between movement, resting and foraging. The purpose of this study is to examine how frequently the young horses in a group housing system use the indoor lying area.

The purpose of this qualitative study is to investigate how some teachers make use of the results of the national tests in mathematics to plan their teaching. The questions are how they plan their teaching in mathematics and if they use the results of the national tests to compare with their own teaching.   Five teachers in mathematics has been interviewed. I have used unstructured interviews with open-ended questions, and I have been able to ask follow-up questions based on their answers. The analysis of the survey is made from a systems theory approach.  The result of the survey shows that teachers make use of student performance to look at their own teaching of the current group of students. However, there is not enough time to rehearse and repair the deficiencies discovered in the national tests, which for some is perceived as a stress factor.

Active headsets have been on the market for years and now it is time for something else to enter the stage. The technology of active noise reduction can for exmple also be used in ventilation systems for reducing ventilation noise. An active control system principally consists of four important components, namely the downstream error microphone, the upstream detection or reference microphone, the digital signal processor (DSP) and a loudspeaker. The upstream reference microphone listen to the primary ventilation noise and sends it to the DSP which makes a phase shift to the signal and sends it to the loudspeaker. The loudspeaker sends out the opposite waveform of the incoming one and reduce the primary ventilation noise.

Syftet med denna studie var att beskriva äldre personers aktivitetsmönster samt deras skattning av bostadens tillgänglighet och användbarhet före och efter en bostadsanpassning. Undersökningsgruppen bestod av fem personer i ålder mellan 70 och 83 år. Studiens metod var fallstudie med en multipel ?embedded? design och datainsamling genom två frågeformulär, de tidigare utvecklade instrumenten ?Tillgängligheten i min bostad? och ?Kartläggning av aktivitet?. Datainsamlingen genomfördes vid tre olika tillfällen.

This study has been conducted on behalf of Vectura Consulting AB with the purpose to examine how different actors perceive the dimensions of sustainability and sustainable construction. The purpose is also to provide an understanding of existing barriers and opportunities for sustainable construction within the industry and exemplify with different directions for the actors in order to develop sustainability. The study has approach the research problem by using systems theory, developed by Checkland, to identify the relevant system. Other systems theories has been used as an theoretical framework in order to identify barriers and opportunities, which in this study are based on Hughes?s theory about reverse salients and salients.

ISO14001:2004 : A Human Ecological Tool?This is a study by means of litterature analysis and personal experience to find out wheather you could call ISO14001:2004 a Human Ecological tool. The ISO14001 is an environmental management system. I'm approaching the issue from a users' perspective and putting my experience of implementing the ISO 9001 at my work to good use. Though my personal experience is limited to the implementation of the ISO 9001, it is quite relevant to the task since the update of 2004 the ISO14001:2004 is brought closer to the ISO 9001 standard in many ways.

Electrolux Laundry Systems is the world leader in manufacturing professional laundry equipment.The machines are used in the hotel sector, elderly care, in multifamily houses, laundry bars, and incommercial and institutional laundries.If there is oil or grease left in the clothes after washing may the heat from the dryer cause a chemicalreaction. This reaction may, under certain circumstances cause a fire inside the drum. Competitors toElectrolux has developed its own systems that extinguishes fire inside a tumble dryer and customershave expressed desire to purchase a fire-extinguishing system. Therefore, the project team receivedthe task by Electrolux to develop a fire-extinguishing system that extinguishes a fire in a tumbledryer.The purpose of the project has been to develop a system that both detects and responds to fire in anindustrial tumble dryer to meet the competitors and to satisfy customers' requirements.The goal was to develop a fire-extinguishing system for Electrolux Laundry Systems and develop afully functioning prototype.The project began with information searches on a variety of methods to both detect and extinguish afire. Subsequently, a number of different methods were used to develop a final solution and make aprototype.The result of the project is a fire-extinguishing system that extinguishes a fire inside a dryer.