Krzysztof Wroblewski, Using Artificial Intelligence for the Reduction of Emissions in Cities – Creating sustainable transportation with AI, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
This bachelor thesis investigates different use cases of using artificial intelligence to reduce city transport emissions with a focus on using machine learning to forecast passenger demand. We first conducted a literature review to gather the different uses of artificial intelligence in city transport emission reduction. Then we developed a prototype that uses artificial intelligence to predict the public transport passenger demand for the city of Zurich using the design science research method. Last we presented and evaluated the usability of the prototype in a workshop.
Our results highlight applications of artificial intelligence that can be used in city transport emission reduction. Our prototype shows how artificial intelligence can be used to predict public transport passenger demand in the city of Zurich. The findings from the evaluation show how transport decision makers can use our prototype to reduce city transport emissions,
We conclude that artificial intelligence methods can be used to support measures that reduce transport emissions in cities, by providing citiesí decision makers with information about traffic, passenger demand, mobility patterns, transport network design, electrification, and emissions. Passenger demand predictions made by artificial intelligence can be used by transport companies to reduce transport emissions through better public transport planning. |
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Maximilian Jonescu, Development of a Blockchain-Driven System for Optimizing Usage-Based Pricing Models in the Video Streaming Industry, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
Streaming providers’ subscription models lack ingenuity, and against the
background of new players emerging constantly, they impose inconveniences on customers. As such, they are looking for new ways to access their content. Following a modified design science research methodology, we first conduct interviews with consumers to concretize their problems, which can be abstracted to subscription fatigue and limited freedom of consumption. Although not broadly researched in the context of experience goods, such as streamed media, usage-based pricing models present themselves as promising solution to these problems, with prior research showing that they can benefit both sides. However, current implementations of such models suffer inefficiencies due to their post-paid nature, leading to secondary problems. They can be generalized to transaction costs on both sides of the trade. By
proposing a pay-per-minute system, as a subset of usage-based pricing models, with timely appropriate cash flows, transaction costs can be reduced. Nevertheless, implementing this through conventional payment systems is hardly possible due to the dependency on costly intermediaries. Moreover, these intermediaries can define certain transaction limits, thus further impairing design flexibility. Leveraging blockchain technology and smart contracts is a possible solution to overcome said issues. After abstracting design requirements from defined solution objectives, a fully functional artifact is developed. A subsequent technical and user-centric evaluation suggests that the artifact is perceived as exciting and beneficial, further stressing the need
for innovation. While the prototype generally supports the solutions to the problems and successfully implements the design requirements, the implications of using blockchain are manifold. High volatility of gas fees and arguably non-sufficient network externalities remain as challenges for feasibly realizing high-frequency transaction schemes, ultimately diminishing the artifact’s universal applicability. |
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Stefanie Krohmann, Design And Development of a Medical Supply Manager for a Community-based Health Care System in Lesotho, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
Nicht übertragbare Krankheiten (NCDs) breiten sich in Afrika südlich der Sahara rasch aus. Diese rasante Ausbreitung führt dazu, dass Gesundheitssysteme Mühe haben den damit anfallenden Behandlungsbedarf zu decken. In Lesotho zielt das Projekt Community Based Chronic Care Lesotho (ComBaCaL) darauf ab, die NCD-Epidemie zu bekämpfen. Mithilfe von Chronic Care Workers (CCWs) bietet ComBaCal Leistungen in der Prävention, dem Screening und der Diagnose an. Um die CCWs dabei in ihrem Arbeitsalltag effizient zu unterstützen, wurde ein mHealth-Tool eingeführt, mit welchem die CCWs all Ihre Patienten und Untersuchungen verwalten können. Jedoch fehlt dem Tool eine Unterstützung für die Verwaltung ihrer medizinischen Arbeitsmaterialien was dazu führt, dass die benötigten Materialien fehlen, worunter die Qualität der Arbeit leidet. Daraus resultiert eine erhöhte Belastung und Demotivation für die CCWs. Da die vorhandene Literatur zu mHealth das Lieferkettenmanagement für gemeindebasierte Interventionen nicht ausreichend berücksichtigt, zielt diese Arbeit darauf ab diese Lücke zu schließen, indem ein Medical Supply Manager entwickelt wird, welcher an den lokalen Kontext in Lesotho angepasst ist und der die CCWs bei der Verwaltung ihrer medizinischen Vorräte effektiv unterstützt. |
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Luca Huber, Supporting behavior change by digital health for people with non-communicable diseases: A literature review, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
Non-communicable diseases are the cause for 71% of global deaths. Cases of non-communicable diseases are rising. To fight non-communicable diseases, changing behavior that is causing the disease like tabaco use, physical inactivity, and unhealthy nutrition, is essential. One big problem is that adherence to interventions is bad at only around 50% in developed countries. This bad adherence leads to suboptimal benefit and increases health care costs by a factor of 3-4 times in direct costs.
In this literature review our goal was to find how behavior change can be supported with digital health for people with non-communicable diseases. To do so we searched Scopus for relevant literature using a predefined search query. We systematically reduced the literature and ended up reviewing 65 papers.
By reviewing meta-analyses prior to our analysis, we found many strategies used to support behavior change using digital health for people with non-communicable diseases. This was the basis for our coding schema to support our analysis. We synthesized design principles from the reviewed literature for the different strategies. Further we categorize the strategies by assigning them to elements of the Fogg Behavior Model and to a phase of the plan-do-study-act cycle. This step allowed us to see the focus and potential gaps of recent literature.
We conclude that many areas are covered well but find some gaps, most importantly in the area or prompts. Further, a shortcoming of literature found were missing long-term studies. We also present what practitioners and developers can do to implement a digital agent. |
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Nicolas Peyer, Development of a Task Manager Prototype to Improve Time Management for Chronic Care Workers in Lesotho, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
Community-based healthcare (CBHC) and chronic care workers (CCWs) are often used in low- and middle-income countries to relieve the overburdened health system and to address pressing health challenges. As a result, CCWs are often confronted with high workloads, leading to their attrition over time. Health information systems (HISs) are increasingly being used to support CCWs in their work, but the design of these systems, particularly their task management functionalities, is often inadequate. This thesis, therefore, developed design principles to serve as guidelines for HISs and to help reduce attrition rates in CBHC programs. An exemplary task manager prototype was created to test the effect of the design principles on the CCWs' efficiency and empowerment. The prototype creation took place in two steps: In the first step, an initial version of the prototype was created and evaluated with a focus group. Based on these results, the second version was developed and tested in an experimental setting with the CCWs. The results of the final evaluation suggest that the proper design of task management features can increase efficiency and user empowerment. Thus, the design principles increase two empowerment dimensions that reduce the CCW attrition rate: users feel more self-determined and perceive their ability have an impact as more significant. |
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Nitharsan Yoganathan, Deriving design requirements for a blockchain-based marketplace for NFTs to support athletes, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Master's Thesis)
Through the recent NIL changes, student-athletes could benefit from their NIL (name, image and likeness) to earn money. Therefore, a blockchain-based marketplace for NFTs was created to leverage said changes by exploring the platform’s value. What design requirements could maximize the utility of the prototype for the student-athletes by incorporating literature review, researching existing NFT solutions on the market and eliciting insights from semi-structured interviews? The study could determine monetary value and gains in fan engagement and personal branding for the athletes by implementing the proper design requirements of the platform. Essential requirements can be categorized into critical functionalities for an open, global marketplace complemented with tools such that the user has more information to make better trade decisions. We conclude that the design requirements are consistent with existing literature, and the value of a blockchain-based marketplace is significant for student-athletes as long as there is a sufficient user base on the platform. |
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Rafael Dubach, Effekte der KI-Unterstützung im Online-Kundenfeedback-Management; Veränderungen der Beantwortungspraktiken, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
This work aims to answer how the efficiency, as well as working practices of authors in the field of online customer feedback management, are changed by Artificial intelligence (AI). For this purpose, data from the ReAdvisor-Project of the Institute of Computer Science at the University of Zurich was used. As part of this analysis, the working methods of 13 different authors were observed when responding to online reviews. The authors worked in three different settings, each of which differed in terms of the tools available for responding to reviews. Depending on the setting, the tools were supported by AI or not. For this purpose, 108 hours of video material were coded, resulting in 1583 answered customer reviews. On this basis, the working methods of the authors and the effect of AI on their work were analysed. The analysis shows that the efficiency of the work can be significantly increased through AI support. This was particularly the case in the setting where all available AI tools were used. In this setting, the authors are 118 seconds faster in answering a review than in the setting without AI support. In addition to efficiency, authors' working practices also changed. The AI support made quality checking more excessive. Also, certain activities of the authors shifted or became partly obsolete. In addition, it was observed that especially for untrained authors, the AI took on the role of a cooperation partner. |
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Aleksandar Ristic, Finanzberatung mit Conversational Agent: Fehler des CA und deren Auswirkungen auf das Vertrauen, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
The use of artificial intelligence as a conversational agent in financial consulting can support the financial advisor and automate processes. As a result, the conversational agent assumes responsibility and the human must have confidence that the conversational agent will perform its tasks correctly. Thus, this work investigates to what extent different artificial intelligence errors influence the trust of the users (advisor and client) in the artificial intelligence. For this purpose, videos of the conducted experiments, interviews and a workshop were analyzed. For each error, it was summarized to what extent it influenced users' trust, and the results showed that depending on the error, users' trust was influenced differently. The results of this work can be used as a basis for further research to find out which errors made by an artificial intelligence in a financial advisory service could be harmful to trust. |
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Max Zehnder, Blockchain-based Loyalty Programs in the Travel Industry, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
The motivation of the thesis is to find an incentive for customers to directly book with a destination instead of going through intermediaries, such as Booking.com, which demands high commissions. Loyalty programs can be such an incentive. However, they face numerous problems, such as having low customer engagement and not acquiring enough customers to increase sales, the main goal of a loyalty program. A decentralized loyalty program is a solution to that problem. Such a program has one application provider, includes multiple partners from which customers receive rewards, and is based on Blockchain Technology. The main question that is answered during the thesis is if such a decentralized loyalty program increases customer acquisitions and engagement such that it can lead to more sales and solve the mentioned problem. To answer that question, a prototype was implemented and evaluated in the context of a specific use case. Two semi-structured interviews with experts were conducted. The evaluation met the expectation, that a decentralized loyalty program (1) acquires more customers and (2) increases customer engagement in the context of the use case. Different aspects and advantages were identified, among other things, a more efficient on-boarding, valuable rewards, and transparent conditions which bring value to all participating parties in the use case. By inducing this design knowledge, a design theory is created. Six requirements define the context in which Blockchain Technology should be utilized for a loyalty program, to increase sales by increasing acquisitions and engagement. At this point, it has to be emphasized, that the theory considers the partner's profitability but neglects the application provider's, as the theory assumes a provider to be present. Nonetheless, the thesis proves, that a decentralized loyalty program acquires more customers, leads to more customer engagement, and is, therefore, more profitable for a partner to join when comparing it to ordinary loyalty programs. |
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Damaris Schmid, Empowerment and Practices of Community Care Workers in Lesotho, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Master's Thesis)
Low- and middle income countries (LMIC) struggle with tackling the rise in cases of non-communicable diseases (NCD) such as diabetes and a shortage of community health workers (CHW). One way to address this is to implement HIS in order to more effectively allocate resources. Another approach is the lens of empowerment as a driver for lower turnover. Although the idea of using laypeople to provide health services in underserved communities is not new, the impact of mHealth applications on the empowerment of CHW has not yet been examined in detail. This work is motivated by the question of what happens to lay people who participate in medical, technical, and counseling training and are then released into the field to provide basic health services. The second focus is on how application affects empowerment in this setting. The findings illustrate the importance of context integration into the training concept. It has an impact on the slight downward trend of empowerment among CHW measured before and after the in-field experience. According to our expectations, health information systems (HIS) influence empowerment negatively and beneficially. Therefore, more important than the mere use of HIS is their design, their introduction, and the organizational structures in which they are embedded. Our results are considered interesting for product managers and developers of HIS, as well as non-technical managers of community-based health projects. |
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Silvan Kübler, Remote E-Learning ─ Development of a tablet solution to support learning for community health workers in Lesotho, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
This thesis comes up with a solution for e-learning in a community-based healthcare project conducted by ComBaCaL (Community Based Chronic Care) in Lesotho. Community-based healthcare is common in low- and middle-income countries due to the lack of physicians and often far distances to cover. Hence, health care is provided by CHWs (Community Health Workers) which most of the time only receive their initial training and are afterwards sent to the field. In place, physical training is expensive and requires a lot of effort and time from all stakeholders. This lack of continuous training leads to lower efficiency, safety and quality of the services provided by the CHWs. With the help of e-learning, new approaches are possible. During this thesis, e-learning requirements in the specific context of ComBaCaL are determined and multiple potential solutions are evaluated. The chosen solution is implemented and tested in a field experiment. Data is collected in the form of questionnaires and usage statistics. The participants show a high level of interest in the solution and agree that it provides great added value for them personally considering their ability to learn apart from the physical training sessions. As a result, there are suggestions for improvement within the application and challenges considering its further integration into ComBaCaL, which must be considered with the future scaling of the project. |
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Joel Weber, Third World UX Design – Optimisation of a tablet interface for chronic care workers in Lesotho, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
Over the past decade, the smartphone became an essential part of many life aspects all over the world. However, an application succeeding in a western country such as Switzerland does not necessarily work as seamlessly in low- and middle-income countries. This fact is due to cultural differences, which are also reflected in required changes in the design of such products. This thesis tried to understand the essential cultural adaptations concerning UX design and usability in the context of the CHT ComBaCaL application in Lesotho. Based on design principles and heuristics, a new prototype was created, which optimised the new design and workflows from CHT (an open-source mHealth community care application). With the help of an interactive survey and a focus group, the prototypes were tested. The resulting feedback showed significant cultural differences between the results from Switzerland and those from Lesotho, such as preferences in colours, a shifting focus from design to feature complexity, and the need for more guidance in Lesotho. It was concluded that almost all design principles and heuristics could be upheld, however, the interpretation indicated a diverging implementation. |
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Maximilian Achakri, Digitale Agenten in der Finanzberatung - Anforderungen an eine automatisierte Protokollierung von Finanzberatungsgesprächen, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
The objective of this work is to analyze criteria of a financial advice protocol in the financial industry, to divide them into building blocks and to define them in a standard catalog. The objective is also to standardize the protocol process.
The artefact, the standard catalog, will is developed by using the Design Science Research (DSR) method which splits up the process into three cycles. In the first cycle, the initial version of the standard catalog is created using the analysis of the literature. In the second cycle, interviews and protocols are analyzed to further develop the standard catalog. In the third cycle, the standard catalog developed after the first two cycles is analyzed in a workshop, and the final standard catalog is created. The artefact is tested by creating initial protocols.
The standard catalog developed in this work contains, on the one hand, the points that are required by law to be documented and, on the other hand, points that generate added value in the customer relationship. The standard catalog is divided into categories: Grundsätzliches (Basics), Persönliches (personal information), finanzielles (financial information), Informationstechnische Punkte (informational inputs) and Actions.
It is shown that protocols can be standardized with the help of the standard catalog. In the future, this standard catalog can be used to develop a technical solution that automates the standardized process with the effect of making investment discussions more rational and efficient. |
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Mateusz Dolata, Stefan Feuerriegel, Gerhard Schwabe, A sociotechnical view of algorithmic fairness, Information Systems Journal, Vol. 32 (4), 2022. (Journal Article)
Algorithmic fairness (AF) has been framed as a newly emerging technology that mitigates systemic discrimination in automated decision-making, providing opportunities to improve fairness in information systems (IS). However, based on a state-of-the-art literature review, we argue that fairness is an inherently social concept and that technologies for AF should therefore be approached through a sociotechnical lens. We advance the discourse on AF as a sociotechnical phenomenon. Our research objective is to embed AF in the sociotechnical view of IS. Specifically, we elaborate on why outcomes of a system that uses algorithmic means to assure fairness depend on mutual influences between technical and social structures. This perspective can generate new insights that integrate knowledge from both technical fields and social studies. Further, it spurs new directions for IS debates. We contribute as follows: First, we problematize fundamental assumptions in the current discourse on AF based on a systematic analysis of 310 articles. Second, we respond to these assumptions by theorizing AF as a sociotechnical construct. Third, we propose directions for IS researchers to enhance their impacts by pursuing a unique understanding of sociotechnical AF. We call for and undertake a holistic approach to AF. A sociotechnical perspective on AF can yield holistic solutions to systemic biases and discrimination. |
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Andreas Bucher, Dario Staehelin, Mateusz Dolata, Gerhard Schwabe, Form Follows Function: Designing For Tensions Of Conversational Agents In Service Encounters, In: 30th European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS), AISeL, AIS Electronic Library (AISeL), 2022-06-18. (Conference or Workshop Paper published in Proceedings)
The proliferation of conversational agents (CAs) promises efficiency and quality improvements while enabling a more seamless integration of technology into service encounters. However, it remains un- clear how CAs should be designed to provide the optimal experience for the key users: clients and frontline employees. Based on qualitative research with those key users, this study delivers a vision of an adaptable CA. It proposes a differentiated approach toward the design of CA: there is no "one-size- fits-all" design regarding the level of social presence, autonomy, or agency. The analysis reveals three tensions in user expectations leading to inconsistent design requirements for CAs. To resolve those ten- sions, CAs should be adapted to the changing context of a service encounter considering the appropriate level of autonomy, task complexity, interpersonal intimacy, and social role of the CA. The study con- tributes three design principles emphasizing the importance of the context for which a CA is designed. |
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Linda Weigl, Alexandre Amard, Hanna Marxen, Tamara Roth, Liudmila Zavolokina, User-centricity and Public Values in eGovernment: Friend or Foe?, In: Thirtieth European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS 2022), ECIS, Thirtieth European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS 2022), 2022. (Conference or Workshop Paper published in Proceedings)
In their delivery of services, public administrations seek to develop a ‘citizen-centric’ approach. Concomitantly, user-centricity is emerging as a widely accepted construct for Web 3.0 applications supporting the digital interaction between service providers and recipients. The digitalization of public services can positively impact important public values, such as efficiency and transparency. However, the digital divide highlights that information and communication technologies can simultaneously neglect public needs. This begs the question of whether user-centricity reflects or conflicts with public values. To answer this question, we present a systematic review of existing literature on user-centricity and public values. The contribution of this paper is an extended taxonomy of public values for user- centricity, as well as recommendations for public policy to address conflicts between public values and user-centricity. |
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Pascal Marty, The Faces of Agile Organizations; A Configurational Approach to Identifying Types of Agile Organizations, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
Organizational agility as a means to survive in highly volatile and uncertain markets has become more and more popular in the last years. Despite this rise in popularity, barely any efforts were made to identify different pathways leading to an agile organization. This thesis aims to close the gap in research by utilizing a configuration approach, fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis, on data gathered from a survey conducted as a part of this thesis. Additionally, in-depth interviews were conducted with fifteen industry experts working with agility daily in order to further illustrate the findings of the configurational analysis with qualitative insights. As a result, four distinct configurations of organizations with high maturity in organizational agility were identified: Agile Technology Innovators, Heterogeneous Agile Organizations, Low-Tech Agile Organizations and Limited Agile Organizations. |
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Kiram Ben Aleya, Fair Algorithmic Team Formation, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
We built a prototype application enabling fair group formation in educational settings and tested our prototype in a real university setting. We determined the most important requirements of our main stakeholder, the students. In a careful examination of the requirements we determined that they can be grouped along the following four dimensions: 1) Collaborative Decision-making, 2) Agency, 3) Auditability and 4) Transparency. We designed and developed a prototype over the course of three iterations. Our main contributions are introducing a new agency related feature, allowing students to chose a preferential teammate, and designing for and evaluating for perceived fairness. Further we examined satisfaction among students using both qualitative and quantitative data. |
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Martin Jud, Automatic generation of contact reports in financial advisory, University of Zurich, Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, 2022. (Bachelor's Thesis)
In financial advisory, it is common practice that a summary is prepared after the interview. Past research has proposed a digital agent that assists the advisory session and transcripts the whole dialog. The goal of this thesis was to automatically generate a summary by training a pretrained Machine Learning model on the specific downstream task of summarizing dialogs. It did not prove to be practical to train the model with German dialogues, which is why it was decided to first translate the dialogues into English and then create the summary, followed by translating them back into German. This approach led to grammatically correct summaries for the most part which, however, sometimes have errors in the contextual meaning. |
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Mateusz Dolata, Kiram Ben Aleya, Morphological analysis for design science research: The case of human-drone collaboration in emergencies, In: The Transdisciplinary Reach of Design Science Research. DESRIST 2022, Springer, Cham, p. 17 - 29, 2022-05-25. (Book Chapter)
Drones are becoming pervasive in private and professional settings. The engineering of human-drone collaboration poses unique challenges. Specifically, drones’ distinctive capabilities yield a vast design space. Yet, the relevant guidance is scattered across literature such that an overview of various design dimensions is missing. This paper synthesizes adequate research and provides an overview of essential design dimensions in the form of a morphological box (MB) to support designers of drones for emergencies. Using this MB, practitioners and researchers become aware of design decisions they will have to make when designing drones or collaboration between drones and humans. It prevents fragmented or partial perspectives on drones design and provides a basis for structured, holistic design explorations. Using the case of drones, we discuss the potential of morphological analysis for design science research (DSR). New types of sociotechnical systems involve a vast, multidimensional design space, and singular studies frequently address domain or discipline-specific subsections of this space. We claim that morphological analysis supports a systematic exploration of the design space across disciplinary boundaries and might contribute towards a more transparent and traceable design of DSR artifacts. |
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