Foreword

Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) are having an increasing impact in almost every scientific discipline and are facilitating the creation of integrative systems and processes, which are in turn supporting the creation of effective relationships among different academic activities and potentiating effective collaboration in research, design, and education. On the other hand the conceptual infrastructures of Systemics, Informatics, and Cybernetics (Communication and control) are increasingly being related to each other and are providing an effective intellectual platform for inter-disciplinary communication. Accordingly, the main purpose of the organizing committees of the collocated events organized by the International Institute of Informatics and Systemics (IIIS) on 11/29-12/2, 2011, in Orlando Florida is to bring together researchers, developers, practitioners, consultants and users of Information and Communication Technologies, for intra- and inter-disciplinary communication,

Consequently, three kinds of activities have been planned:

1. Regular traditional presentations in breakout sessions to support intra-disciplinary communication,
2. Plenary sessions where Keynote Speakers will address the multi-disciplinary audience, mostly with inter- or trans-disciplinary topics, and;
3. Conversational sessions on inter- or trans-disciplinary topics in order to support inter-disciplinary communications and to foster the analogical thinking that might emerge in a multi-disciplinary forum based on trans-disciplinary concepts and/or multi-disciplinary tools, technologies, and methodologies. Ideas generated by analogical thinking might be a) applied to a diversity of areas and practical domains, and b) support a synergic combination of analytical and synthetic thinking.

The disciplinary variety, required for inter-disciplinary communications, analogical learning, and synergic analytical/synthetic thinking, is one of the motivation for organizing the following related events:

• International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Applications ICTA 2011
• Design and Modeling in Science, Education, and Technology: DeMset 2011
• International Symposium on Integrating Research, Education, and Problem Solving: IREPS 2011
• International Conference on Education, Informatics, and Cybernetics: icEIC 2011

The articles accepted for presentation that also have an author registered in the conference for the respective presentation, have been grouped in two volumes for their publications in the hard copy proceedings of the collocated events. Their grouping is based on the similarities of the respective topics. Consequently, papers of ICTA 2011 and DeMset 2011 have been grouped in one volume, and papers of IREPS 2011 and ICEIC 2011 have been grouped in another volume.

All papers to be presented at the collocated events were included in the electronic version of the proceedings as well.

Since different kinds of reviewing methodologies are applied in different disciplines we integrated the most used reviewing methods into a systemic reviewing methodology for the reviewing process of the papers submitted to the collocated events.

This methodology is based on three-tier reviews: open (or non-blind), double-blind, and participative reviews. Final acceptance depends on the three kinds of reviews. However, a paper should be recommended by non-blind reviewers AND blind reviewers in order to be accepted for presentation at any event and to be included in the respective proceedings. A recommendation to accept made by non-blind reviewers is a necessary condition, but it is not a sufficient one. A submission, to be accepted, should also have a majority of its double-blind reviewers recommending its acceptance. This double necessary conditions generate a more reliable and rigorous reviewing than those reviewing methods based on just one of the indicated methods, or just on the traditional double-blind reviewing.

Double-blind reviewing has been done by a random selection of 3-5 reviewers from about 20,000 IIIS reviewers who classified their research or expertise field in the same theme, area, or subarea where the author classified his/her submission. The random selection (made by a computer program) has been conceived in order to avoid any conscious, or un-conscious, bias that might be done by a human-being selection of the respective reviewers.

IIIS’ non-blind reviewing is based on the essence of what Kaplan (2005, "How to Fix Peer Review", The Scientist, Volume 19, Issue 1, Page 10, Jun. 6) proposed in order to fix peer reviewing problems. Kaplan affirms that “Peer review subsumes two functions. First, peer reviewers attempt to improve manuscripts by offering constructive criticisms about concrete elements … The second function of peer review is to render a decision about the … significance of the findings so that the manuscript can be prioritized for publication. I propose reforming peer review so that the two functions are independent.” With regards to the first function of peer reviewing, Kaplan proposes that “Review of a manuscript would be solicited from colleagues by the authors. The first task of these reviewers would be to identify revisions that could be made to improve the manuscript. Second, the reviewers would be responsible for writing an evaluation of the revised work. This assessment would be mostly concerned with the significance of the findings, and the reviewers would sign it” (emphasis added).

We try to achieve the first function via Kaplan’s non-blind peer reviewing and the second function by the traditional means of double-blind review. This is why acceptance of submissions by the non-blind reviewers is a necessary condition but not a sufficient one. The submission should also have favorable recommendations by the majority of the double-blind reviewers in order to be accepted by IIIS for its presentation and inclusion in the respective conference proceedings.

A third reviewing tier is the participative peer reviewing, which complements the two tiers described above but is not a necessary condition for accepting a submission. An article submitted to a conference being organized by IIIS is immediately displayed for review to those authors who submitted articles in the same theme, area, or sub-area. Accordingly, each submitting author has access to all submissions sent to the same area where he/she submitted his/her article and can comment and evaluate them. This is what we call at IIIS “Participative Peer-to-Peer Reviewing” or PPPR. This kind of reviewing provides additional input to the selection process and assists all participants in placing their presentations in context. It is not a necessary condition but it has a complementary function, especially in those cases where the non-blind reviewers have a strong disagreement or there is no majority of recommendations accepting, or not accepting, the article.

On behalf of the Organizing Committees, I extend our heartfelt thanks to the members of the four Program Committees (from 74 countries), and to the additional 847 reviewers, from 85 countries, each one of whom reviewed at least one of the submitted articles. 327 reviewers, from 65 countries, were suggested by the respective authors for the non-blind peer reviews. Each registered author could get information about: 1) the average of the reviewers’ evaluations according to 8 criteria, and the average of a global evaluation of his/her submission; and 2) the comments and constructive feedback made by the reviewers, who recommended the acceptance of his/her submission, so the author would be able to improve the final version of the paper.

A total of 1792 reviews were made to the 303 submissions that were received, which means that an average of 5.91 reviews were made to each received submission, and an average of 2.12 reviews were made by each reviewer. The 112 papers included in these proceedings, from 33 countries, are 36.96% of the 303 submissions that were initially received. Details for each of the four events are summarized in the following table.

Conference	# of submissions received	# of reviewers that made at least one review	# of reviews made	Average of reviews per reviewer	Average of reviews per submission	# of papers included in the proceedings	% of submissions included in the proceedings
icEIC 2011	58	210	400	1.90	6.90	22	37.93%
ICTA 2011	115	323	758	2.35	6.59	41	35.65%
DeMSET 2011	56	142	326	2.30	5.82	22	39.29%
IREPS 2011	74	172	308	1.79	4.16	27	36.49%
TOTAL	303	847	1792	2.12	5.91	112	36.96%

We are also grateful to the co-editors of these proceedings for the hard work, energy, and eagerness they displayed in preparing them. We express our intense gratitude to Professor William Lesso for his wise and opportune tutoring, for his eternal energy, integrity, and continuous support and advice as Honorary President of IIIS’ conferences, as well as for being a very caring old friend and intellectual father to many of us. We also extend our gratitude to Professor Belkis Sanchez, who brilliantly managed the organizing process. Special thanks to doctors C. Dale Zinn and Jeremy Horne, and to professors Hsing-Wei Chu, Friedrich Welsch, Michael Savoie, Andrés Tremante, Jorge Baralt, Mohammad Siddique, and José Ferrer for chairing, or co-chairing the respective program committees.

We also extend our gratitude to doctors Robert Baker, Joseph Finkelstein, Jeremy Horne, Daniel Katz, Lisbeth Amhag, Merja Bauters and to professors Juha Kettunen, T. Grandon Gill, Bodil Ask, Harald Haugen, Mohamed El-Sayed, and Donald Poochigian, for accepting to address the audience of the General Joint Plenary Sessions with keynote addresses.

We also wish to thank all the authors for the quality of their papers.

We extend our gratitude as well to Juan Manuel Pineda, Leonisol Callaos, Dalia Sánchez, Keyla Guédez, Nidimar Díaz, Marcela Briceño, Cindi Padilla, Louis Barnes, Sean Barnes, Abrahan Marin, and Freddy Callaos for their knowledgeable effort in supporting the organizational process producing the hard copy and CD versions of the proceedings, developing and maintaining the software supporting the interactions of the authors with the reviewing process and the Organizing Committee, as well as for their support in the help desk and in the promotional process.

Professor Nagib C. Callaos,
General Chair