Natural disasters are becoming more common due to climate change and it is important to adapt the society and its infrastructure to withstand events such as extreme rainfall. Precipitation is an important climatic factor affecting the transport and annually generates the cost of millions in damages, over the past 40 years heavy rain has increased and will continue to increase in the future. The extreme rainfall that occurred in Kramfors municipality in September 2013 led to flooding and destroyed several roads, including highway 90, which recently both had been rebuilt and given a new stretch of road. Extreme rainfall had also occurred in the municipality earlier.  The aim of the thesis was to examine how the Swedish Transport Administration handles new knowledge gained after natural disasters and how this is used in the planning of new roads.

Today?s cell phones include more and more functionality, it is no longer uncommon to be able to connect to the Internet or take photos with the cell phone. In this thesis the question is if the cell phone users are interested in this new functionality. Are there people who are interested in a cell phone that in this thesis is called ?Basmobilen? (the entry level phone), which include the following functions; phone call, SMS, phone book, calling lists, clock and the possibility to change the call signal.

This thesis is an investigation of Iranian immigrants and their use of libraries in Sweden. It isbased on a combination of a qualitative and a·quantitative method.Using a qualitative method, I give an outline of the history of lran from ancient times up to the present, as well as the different ethnological groups in Iran and their cultures. The main objective of this part is to clarify the contrasts between Iranian and Swedish cultural, social, linguistic and family structures, and also the characteristics of the crisis that most immigrants go through on their arrival in the new country. The qualitative method also involves structured telephone interviews with eight highly educated Iranians.This method was supplemented by a quantitative study through questionnaires of the attitudes· of lranian immigrants to libraries and reading. Iranians in Sweden turned out to be frequent Iibrary users.

During 2006 an estimated number of 150 persons are supposed to have been killed in road accidents caused by speed limit violations. Through Automatic traffic security control (ATK) the Swedish road administration (Vägverket) is working towards lowering the number of speed related accidents. By placing the speed cameras on roads they've managed to lower the average speed at those places. The enlargement of the number of speed cameras is based upon knowledge about for example how high the risk is for speed related accidents on the roads. The speed cameras always measure the speed in which every vehicle passes, but aren't constantly activated to register speed violations.

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.

This thesis analyses the prerequisites, profitability and competitiveness of eucalyptus plantation on the Iberian Peninsula and in Brazil. The thesis has a macro perspective and analyses a typical hectare of eucalyptus in each studied region. A survey methodology was used as a strategy to cover a broad perspective using expert respondents. The regions studied on the Iberian Peninsula were the ones found suitable for eucalyptus plantations from an economic point of view. The studied regions were Huelva in the South West of Spain, Galicia in the North West of Spain and Portugal.

The low bearing capacity of roads during the spring thaw and periods in the autumn leads every year to increases costs for Holmen Skog. To reduce costs and increase accessibility Holmen Skog decided to install and test a CTI-system. Central tire inflation (CTI) is a system that makes it possible to monitor and vary a vehicle?s tire inflation pressures from the cabin, while the vehicle is in motion. When tire pressures are reduced, the area of the contact surface between the tire and the road increases, thus reducing the ground pressure. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the CTI-equipped vehicle and analyze if the CTI technology is economical defensible during the thaw 2005.

This is a master thesis from Uppsala University in collaboration with B Locket AB (more known as www.blocket.se). B Locket AB is a large ad-company from Sweden, located in Stockholm.Search engines on the market today are becoming more and more complex. When they were first introduced, they only had one function and that was to produce search results containing the string that the user had typed. Today, users want it to be able to spellcheck, produce more results and sort search results on specific fields as well. Preferably, all these features should not affect the performance as a whole.The reason to why these demands have come up is that users are getting more and more used to internet services as a whole and they want everything to be as easy as possible.The user ability has become a substantially more important area in the computer industry and this needs to be taken into account when it comes to B Locket AB and its search engine.

Usability is a well-known term in system development. Today both consumers and organizations aim to increase usability. The purpose of the study is to gain knowledge about inexperienced users? interactions with websites and concretize that knowledge for future studies.Interviews have been conducted within two areas where experienced web developers with extensive programming knowledge brought know-how while inexperienced users without any programming knowledge have given their views. A number of existing tools for web publishing have been analyzed.

The aim of this thesis is to study the views of public librarians on the subject of controversial video games and how they work with them at the library. The purpose of the study is to answer these questions: What content is controversial in video games according to the librarians? How do the librarians handle the controversial games at the library? Does it exist a conflict between the users and the librarians about the controversial video games? Is it possible to see any underlying reasons or tendencies in the librarians answers? Five qualitative interviews were performed to answer these questions and the collected data was analyzed using the terms, value rationality and instrumental rationality which were collected from a theory by Geir Vestheim. The results showed that the librarians see violence, sexism and racism as controversial content in video games. They handle the games at the library by limiting the access for children with age limits and by not buying the most controversial games in some cases.

This master thesis is about Augmented Reality (AR), a phenomenon that has existed since the mid-fifties but only recently has become available for the general public. This report is a knowledge compilation about AR, focusing on AR in cell phones and the use of the technology in traffic related situations.AR is usually described as adding a digital layer of information onto the real world. There are different technologies to make virtual images; in cell phones sensor-based and camera-based technologies are the most common ones.In this report, the market of AR applications for cell phones has been investigated. Three use cases have also been investigated in order to get more knowledge about the designers' thoughts and visions.In order to analyze the technology and the applications in a broader and more scientific perspective, two theories has been used: Situation Awareness (SA) and the Service Dominant Logic (SDL). These theories seem useful when reflecting on the Swedish road administrations vision, and to investigate what the applications and the AR technology can contribute to the traffic domain.The conclusions of this thesis are that:- AR can be applied on most of the human senses, but augmenting by visualization is most common.- The market for cell phone applications is growing rapidly: AR applications are relatively new but on the rise.

Profit in first commercial thinnings of today is hard to achieve. This is because of prevailing pulpwood prices and because of high costs of logging and transport. To reduce these costs higher productivity is advocated. One way to increase the productivity is the use of multi-tree handling harvester heads. The aim of this study was to calculate logging and transport costs in first thinnings, where multi-tree handling has been used.

Over 80% of Sweden's population lives in urban areas, and half of the country's forest visits will thus be in urban woodlands. Social values ??- how the individual experiences the forest, and the impact of the forest visits on individual health and well-being, are pointing to the importance of managing the urban woodlands.When there comes to the cultivation of the urban woodlands there are usually many opinions to consider.This study aims to investigate the various opinions on the use and forestry in an urban recreation area in ??the City of Trollhättan. The study addresses both general and in four cases specific suggestions on management methods.Data was obtained from both quantitative and qualitative study through survey, interviews and discussions with the users of the recreation area.Trollhättan's goal with the recreation area is to make it accessible to local residents. The users are mainly influenced by the accessibility therefore clearings and thinnings are appreciated.

This thesis is an investigation of Iranian immigrants and their use of libraries in Sweden. It isbased on a combination of a qualitative and a·quantitative method.Using a qualitative method, I give an outline of the history of lran from ancient times up to the present, as well as the different ethnological groups in Iran and their cultures. The main objective of this part is to clarify the contrasts between Iranian and Swedish cultural, social, linguistic and family structures, and also the characteristics of the crisis that most immigrants go through on their arrival in the new country. The qualitative method also involves structured telephone interviews with eight highly educated Iranians.This method was supplemented by a quantitative study through questionnaires of the attitudes· of lranian immigrants to libraries and reading. Iranians in Sweden turned out to be frequent Iibrary users.

The purpose of this Master's thesis is to examine the decision-process concerning public art in Borås municipality. My questions have been from where the initiatives come, who the decision-makers are, how the decisions are taken and which questions are discussed. I have examined this through partly interviews with the members of the deciding organ in Borås municipality, partly through literary studies. I have also analysed texts such as debates and protocols from the Swedish parliament. I have also been present at two of the committees meetings.