No abstract

Issue trackers, such as Jira, have become the prevalent collaborative tools in software engineering for managing issues, such as requirements, development tasks, and software bugs. However, issue trackers inherently focus on the lifecycle of single issues, although issues have and express dependencies on other issues that constitute issue dependency networks in large complex collaborative projects. The objective of this study is to develop supportive solutions for the improved management of dependent issues in an issue tracker. This study follows the Design Science methodology, consisting of eliciting drawbacks and constructing and evaluating a solution and system. The study was carried out in the context of The Qt Company's Jira, which exemplifies an actively used, almost two-decade-old issue tracker with over 100,000 issues. The drawbacks capture how users operate with issue trackers to handle issue information in large, collaborative, and long-lived projects. The basis of the solution is to keep issues and dependencies as separate objects and automatically construct an issue graph. Dependency detections complement the issue graph by proposing missing dependencies, while consistency checks and diagnoses identify conflicting issue priorities and release assignments. Jira's plugin and service-based system architecture realize the functional and quality concerns of the system implementation. We show how to adopt the intelligent supporting techniques of an issue tracker in a complex use context and a large data-set. The solution considers an integrated and holistic system view, practical applicability and utility, and the practical characteristics of issue data, such as inherent incompleteness.

Climate change adaptation (CCA) policies require scientific input to focus on relevant risks and opportunities, to promote effective and efficient measures and ensure implementation. This calls for policy relevant research to formulate salient policy recommendations. This article examines how CCA research may contribute to policy recommendations in the light of idealized set of knowledge production attributes for policy development in Finland. Using general background information on the evolution of CCA research and a case study, we specifically examine how the set of attributes have been manifested in research serving CCA and discuss how they have affected the resulting policy recommendations. We conclude that research serving CCA can be improved by more explicit reflection on the attributes that pay attention to the context of application, the methods of teamwork and a variety of participating organizations, transdisciplinarity of the research, reflexivity based on the values and labour ethos of scientists and novel forms of extended peer review. Such attributes can provide a necessary, although not sufficient, condition for knowledge production that strives to bridge the gap between research and policy.

The working group on Sustainable Consumption and Production, under the Nordic Council of Ministers requested consultants from Gaia to identify, write out and publish this third report on Nordic best practice cases of sustainable consumption and production on the UNEP SCP Clearinghouse. Jointly the 50+ solutions presented in three different reports are directly linked to UNEP's 10-Year Framework Program and display a wide array of opportunities and actors of change for sustainability, covering sustainable lifestyles and education, sustainable public procurement, sustainable tourism and consumer information for SCP. The purpose of this report was more specifically to identify eight Nordic best practice examples of Sustainable Buildings and Construction and seven Nordic best practice examples of Sustainable Food Systems. These last 15 cases are all included in this report. The work was supervised by the following Nordic focal points to the UNEP 10 Year Framework Program (10YFP); Marianne Gjorv, Norwegian Ministry of Climate and Environment, Eva Ahlner, the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, Taina Nikula, Finnish Ministry of the Environment and Kaj Juhl Madsen, Ministry of Environment and Food of Denmark. The lead consultant at Gaia was Anna Kortesoja. The HKP group hereby wants to express its gratitude for their contribution to the project and the results we hope will be of inspiration for many others. Stockholm 12/01/2018, on behalf of the NCM SCP working group (HKP gruppen

No abstract