Type

• Master Thesis Business Information Systems

Status

offered

Tutor

• Pierre Maier

Abstract

Information systems can be considered linguistic artifacts (Stamper 1987, Ortner 1993, Frank 2021). They are constituted through software languages and can only be used if they represent concepts prospective users are familiar with. As a result, the integration of information systems can be considered a semantic issue, too (Frank 2008): Different information systems may utilize various domain concepts in different formats, but still must be enabled to effectively and efficiently communicate with each other.

Integration continues to be an issue for many corporations across various domains and industries, caused, among other reasons, by an increasing number of heterogeneous vendors each of which uses its own domain language. Resulting systems communication issues are addressed by various means, e.g, by boling down all concepts to a “global schema” which the concepts used in another information system must be mapped to. Existing solutions are, however, faced with various insufficiencies and may lead to conceptual redundancy, error-prone semantic reconstruction efforts, and miscommunication between systems. These insufficiencies threathen the integrity of information systems and, with that, their effective and efficient use in organizations.

Existing technical landscapes are often based on so-called two-level software languages, such as Java, C#, Python, UML, or the ERM language (cf. Kühne 2007, Atkinson and Kühne 2008). Two-level languages provide developers with control over two levels of abstraction: a type level and an instance level. In object-oriented development, this corresponds to classes and objects. The dominant two-level development style prohibits the use of further abstraction levels to facilitate the communication between information systems: all communication is restricted to a type and an instance level.

This restriction is alleviated in multi-level software languages, which, among others, allow for the definition of an unbounded number of classification levels. Multi-level software languages have been motivated by limitations of two-level languages in various application scenarios, among the issues of integration with two-level languages outlined above (Frank 2022). However, apart from theoretical discussions about potential prospects of using multi-level languages for the integration of information systems, no detailed conception of how to apply multi-level languages for integration has yet been elaborated. As part of this thesis, you are asked to investigate in detail when and how multi-level languages may aid integration issues, what obstacles arise, and how they might be counteracted. 

The thesis is part of an ongoing research project with Oracle. As part of thesis, students may be granted an internship at Oracle, providing access to Oracle’s huge data sources which may be used to conduct experiments. Proficiency in English is a prequisite for this. 

Application Deadline: 30 September 2025. Application process will be closed as soon as a suited candidate is found. You can submit your application by sending a short statement of motivation, your current transcript of records, and your CV to pierre.maier (at) uni-due.de AND Sekretariat.IIS (at) icb.uni-due.de. 

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• Frank U (2008) Integration: Reflections on a Pivotal Concept for Designing and Evaluating Information Systems. Information Systems and e-Business Technologies: 2nd International United Information Systems Conference, UNISCON 2008, Klagenfurt, Austria, April 22-25, 2008, Proceedings, pp 111–122
• Frank U (2021) Language, Change, and Possible Worlds: Philosophical Considerations of the Digital Transformation. In: Siegetsleitner A, Oberprantacher A, Frick M-L, Metschl U (eds). Crisis and Critique: Philosophical Analysis of Current Events, Proceedings of the 42nd International Wittgenstein Symposium. De Gruyter: Berlin, Boston, MA, pp 117–138
• Frank U (2022) Multi-Level Modeling: Cornerstones of a Rationale. Software and Systems Modeling 21:451–480
• Frank U, Töpel D (2020) Contingent Level Classes: Motivation, Conceptualization, Modeling Guidelines, and Implications for Model Management. MODELS '20: Proceedings of the 23rd ACM/IEEE International Conference on Model Driven Engineering Languages and Systems: Companion Proceedings
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• Ortner E (1993) Software-Engineering als Sprachkritik: Die Sprachkritische Methode des Fachlichen Software-Entwurfs. Universitätsverlag Konstanz: Konstanz
• Stamper R (1987) Semantics. In: Boland RJ, Hirschheim R (eds). Critical Issues in Information Systems Research. John Wiley & Sons: Chichester, pp 43–78