Lukman Sharif’s scientific contributions

Information security is a complex and critical subject, conventionally only tackled by well-trained and experienced professionals. The importance of an effective password policy at the device level is obvious and often entire networks can be brought down due to the lack of simple password security on a single device. Typically, there are numerous devices on a network but the router is at the heart of any network which connects Local Area Networks (LANs) to the outside world (Internet). The Internet is essentially a collection of different Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and routers using Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) providing connectivity between different ISPs around the globe. The Internet is expanding at an enormous speed and secure exchange of information is needed by organisations and individuals alike. This paper emphasises the need for an effective device-level password security as an essential component of a more comprehensive organisational security policy. As an illustration, a practical implementation of effective password security is carried out using one of the most widely deployed routers in the industry.

Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) has been a theme of considerable importance to Information Systems (IS) professionals in both the business and academic communities for the last two decades. SISP process is intended to ensure that technology activities are properly aligned with the evolving needs and strategies of the organization. Success can be achieved when an organization can achieve balance between IS and its organizational planning, SISP is confirmed as the heart of all IS planning contribution to the competitiveness of the organisation. This paper examines the research on this ever-important topic and focuses on the importance of SISP to IS strategies.

High-definition television (HDTV) is widely regarded as the next-generation of television services and is rapidly becoming the norm for television viewing. HDTV offers a significantly enhanced viewing experience with notably higher picture quality than standard definition television (SDTV). HDTV services are now available in many countries around the world across all the main television platforms, including satellite, cable and terrestrial. There are strong indications of growing consumer demand for HD content in the UK and internationally [6]. In the UK, the delivery of HDTV services on the digital terrestrial television (DTT) platform presents a number of challenges. This paper examines the technical issues that the delivery of HD/DTT service presents, the use for standards, the current and predicted market development for HD-ready equipment and the UK and international roll-out of terrestrial HDTV.

Consumers around the world enjoy digital television from a variety of sources including terrestrial, cable, satellite and broadband Internet broadcast systems. However, it is satellite broadcast systems that have provided consumers real widespread opportunity to enjoy digital television. This paper presents an overview of direct broadcast satellite (DBS) systems used in the delivery of digital television. The key DBS system building blocks are identified including the broadcaster as well as the consumer side of the communication link. This paper also discusses the key technology evolutions that facilitated the introduction of DBS services, the most common services provided through DBS TV technology and the future directions that this technology is likely to take.

Secure routing is vital to the acceptance and use of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) for many applications. However, providing secure routing in WSNs is a challenging task due to the inherently constrained capabilities of sensor nodes. Although a wide variety of routing protocols have been proposed for WSNs, most do not take security into account as a main goal. Routing attacks can have devastating effects on WSNs and present a major challenge when designing robust security mechanisms for WSNs. In this paper, we examine some of the most common routing attacks in WSNs. In particular, we focus on the wormhole routing attack in some detail. A variety of countermeasures have been proposed in the literature for such attacks. However, most of these countermeasures suffer from flaws that essentially render them ineffective for use in large scale WSN deployments. Due to the inherent constraints found in WSNs, there is a need for lightweight and robust security mechanisms. The examination of the wormhole routing attack and some of the proposed countermeasures makes it evident that it is extremely difficult to retrofit existing protocols with defenses against routing attacks. It is suggested that one of the ways to approach this rich field of research problems in WSNs could be to carefully design new routing protocols in which attacks such as wormholes can be rendered meaningless.

This study evaluates the perceptions of stress among Information and Communications Technologry (ICT) students and their coping strategies in dealing with English as the medium of instruction during their university studies. A semi-structured administered survey was conducted using a sample of 267 male students of a Computer Science college from a midsize Middle Eastern university The study also used a phenomenological approach with semi-structured interviews carried out with ten students in order to clarify some qfthefindings qfthis study. Since the research topic is based on student's stress perceptions, the phenomenological analysis of transcribed student's interviews was also an appropriate tool for this study. Phenomenology enables participants to express their feelings about a particular situation or incident in their own point afvieiv which may not be easy to express on a survey. All students who took part in this study thought that they had been stressed at one time or another due to having English as the medium of instruction without a Preparatory Year English Program (PYEP) befbre entering ICT courses. 62% of the students maintained that they have had episodeS of stress due to the English language during their studies at one time or another. The students use different mechanisms to cope up with stress outside the university by engaging themselves in sports, surfing the web, Meditation, hanging out with, friends, sleeping or going in to isolation. The students demand interactive' English language courses, more leisure time activities on campus, proper guidance in English language courses to ease their ICT course-studies. advisory services and peer counsel ling on campus to reduce their stress.

Recent developments emanating from the US, Europe and Asia in relation to advances in 3-D television technology have created a surge in commercial interest. The prospect of 3-D TV in the home and the development of a host of commercial and industrial applications has become an ever closer reality [5]. This paper provides a technical overview of 3-D TV and discusses some of the commercial opportunities offered by this technology as well as the future directions it is likely to follow.