The Scientific World Journal Optimization Methods in Information and Management Sciences Guest Editors: Jung-Fa Tsai, C. Alec Chang, Chih-Chou Chiu, and Steve Hsueh-Ming Wang Optimization Methods in Information and Management Sciences The Scientific World Journal Optimization Methods in Information and Management Sciences GuestEditors:Jung-FaTsai,C.AlecChang,Chih-ChouChiu, and Steve Hsueh-Ming Wang Copyright © 2015 Hindawi Publishing Corporation. All rights reserved. This is a special issue published in “The Scientific World Journal.”All articles are open access articles distributed under the Creative Com- mons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Contents Optimization Methods in Information and Management Sciences,Jung-FaTsai,C.AlecChang, Chih-Chou Chiu, and Steve Hsueh-Ming Wang Volume 2015, Article ID 498951, 3 pages Virtual Goods Recommendations in Virtual Worlds, Kuan-Yu Chen, Hsiu-Yu Liao, Jyun-Hung Chen, and Duen-Ren Liu Volume 2015, Article ID 523174, 9 pages A Simulated Annealing Methodology to Multiproduct Capacitated Facility Location with Stochastic Demand, Jin Qin, Hui Xiang, Yong Ye, and Linglin Ni Volume 2015, Article ID 826363, 9 pages An Extended EPQ-Based Problem with a Discontinuous Delivery Policy, Scrap Rate, and Random Breakdown, Singa Wang Chiu, Hong-Dar Lin, Ming-Syuan Song, Hsin-Mei Chen, and Yuan-Shyi P. Chiu Volume 2015, Article ID 621978, 13 pages A Two-Stage Method to Determine Optimal Product Sampling considering Dynamic Potential Market, Zhineng Hu, Wei Lu, and Bing Han Volume 2015, Article ID 167481, 9 pages Integrated DEA Models and Grey System Theory to Evaluate Past-to-Future Performance: A Case of Indian Electricity Industry, Chia-Nan Wang, Nhu-Ty Nguyen, and Thanh-Tuyen Tran Volume 2015, Article ID 638710, 17 pages A Study of the Strategic Alliance for EMS Industry: The Application of a Hybrid DEA and GM (1, 1) Approach, Chia Nan Wang, Nhu Ty Nguyen, Thanh Tuyen Tran, and Bui Bich Huong Volume 2015, Article ID 948793, 14 pages Understanding Transferable Supply Chain Lessons and Practices to a “High-Tech Industry” Using Guidelines from a Primary Sector Industry: A Case Study in the Food Industry Supply Chain, Adrian E. Coronado Mondragon, Christian E. Coronado Mondragon, and Etienne S. Coronado Volume 2015, Article ID 198385, 9 pages The Equivalency between Logic Petri Workflow Nets and Workflow Nets, Jing Wang, ShuXia Yu, and YuYue Du Volume 2015, Article ID 121492, 7 pages A Secure Operational Model for Mobile Payments,Tao-KuChang Volume 2014, Article ID 626243, 14 pages Assessment and Classification of Service Learning: A Case Study of CS/EE Students,Han-YingKao, Yu-Tseng Wang, Chia-Hui Huang, Pao-Lien Lai, and Jen-Yeu Chen Volume 2014, Article ID 183732, 8 pages Advantage Management Strategy in Competition via Technological Race Perspective: Empirical Evidence from the Taiwanese Manufacturing Industry, Tsu-Yi Hung, Yu-Ju Hsiao, and Shih-Wei Wu Volume 2014, Article ID 843436, 10 pages Analyzing Big Data with the Hybrid Interval Regression Methods,Chia-HuiHuang,Keng-ChiehYang, and Han-Ying Kao Volume 2014, Article ID 243921, 8 pages Effect of Temperature Shock and Inventory Surprises on Natural Gas and Heating Oil Futures Returns, John Wei-Shan Hu, Yi-Chung Hu, and Chien-Yu Lin Volume2014,ArticleID457636,10pages Multilayer Perceptron for Robust Nonlinear Interval Regression Analysis Using Genetic Algorithms, Yi-Chung Hu Volume 2014, Article ID 970931, 8 pages Applying Different Independent Component Analysis Algorithms and Support Vector Regression for IT Chain Store Sales Forecasting, Wensheng Dai, Jui-Yu Wu, and Chi-Jie Lu Volume2014,ArticleID438132,9pages Hindawi Publishing Corporation e Scientific World Journal Volume 2015, Article ID 498951, 3 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2015/498951 Editorial Optimization Methods in Information and Management Sciences Jung-Fa Tsai,1 C. Alec Chang,2 Chih-Chou Chiu,1 and Steve Hsueh-Ming Wang3 1 Department of Business Management, National Taipei University of Technology, No. 1, Section 3, Chung-Hsiao East Road, Taipei 10608, Taiwan 2Department of Industrial & Manufacturing Systems Engineering, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65211, USA 3Engineering, Science, and Project Management Department, University of Alaska Anchorage, 3211 Providence Drive, Anchorage, AK 99508-4614, USA Correspondence should be addressed to Jung-Fa Tsai; [email protected] Received 22 December 2014; Accepted 22 December 2014 Copyright © 2015 Jung-Fa Tsai et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. This special issue continues to raise the aim of The Scientific arbitraging purposes. Next, significant temperature shock WorldJournalintheoperationsresearchsubjectareathrough effectonboththeconditionalmeanandvolatilityofnatural its cutting-edge presentation of advanced research, carefully gas and heating oil prices suggests that when the market developed applications, and innovative technology compo- expects the degree days in the future to be higher than aver- nents. This special issue also provides a forum for researchers age, energy demand increases, increasing the near-month and and practitioners to review and disseminate quality research far-month natural gas and heating oil futures returns. The work on optimization methods and their applications in the nonlinear temperature effects exist for natural gas futures context of information and management sciences and to returns, suggesting the market expects the degree day volatil- identify critical issues for further developments. This special ity to increase with natural gas demand. Also, the results indi- issue involves original papers, selected by the editors and rel- cate that expected inventory surprises significantly and neg- ated to the various researches themes on optimization meth- atively affect the far-month natural gas futures returns only. ods in information and management sciences. These papers Moreover, volatility of natural gas futures returns is higher on arerelatedtovarioussubjectssuchascomputerscienceand Thursdays and that of near-month heating oil futures returns electric engineering, computational intelligence, big data, is higher on Wednesdays than other days, coinciding with security, management strategy, data envelopment analysis, the release of the weekly natural gas and heating oil storage facility location problem, production planning, and workflow report by the Energy Information Administration (EIA), nets. The research area represented by the papers accepted respectively. Additionally, storage announcement for natural for the special issue should be of interest for a wide scientific gas significantly affects near-month and far-month natural community because of its multidisciplinary character. The gas futures returns. However, storage effect does not exist for accepted papers of this special issue are briefly described as heating oil futures returns. Furthermore, both natural gas and below. heating oil futures returns are affected more by the weighted J.W.-S.Huetal.provideseveralnotablefindingsfromthe average temperature reported by multiple weather reporting empirical studies. First, the expected temperature shock sig- stations than that reported by a single weather reporting nificantly and positively affects both the near-month and far- station. month natural gas and heating oil futures returns. This sug- “Applying Different Independent Component Analysis geststhattheinvestorsshouldinvestaportionoftheirfunds Algorithms and Support Vector Regression for IT Chain Store on the weather derivative commodities for their hedging and SalesForecasting”byW.Daietal.utilizesthreedifferentICA 2 The Scientific World Journal methods including spatial ICA (sICA), temporal ICA (tICA), SMEs) tend to adopt the “catch-up” strategy to keep up with and spatiotemporal ICA (stICA) to extract features from the their competitors in order to remain in the technological sales data and compare their performance in sales forecasting race. The result indicates that, under financial constraints, of IT chain store. Experimental results from real sales data Taiwanese manufacturing firms attempt to invest in R&D to show that the sales forecasting scheme by integrating stICA catch up with their rivals or to avoid being eliminated from and SVR outperforms the comparison models in terms of the race. forecasting error. The stICA is a promising tool for extracting “A Study of the Strategic Alliance for EMS Industry: The effective features from branch sales data and the extracted Application of a Hybrid DEA and GM (1, 1) Approach” by features can improve the prediction performance of SVR for C. N. Wang et al. aims to develop effective methods to assist sales forecasting. enterprise to measure the firms’ operation efficiency, find out “Assessment and Classification of Service Learning: A the candidate priority under several different inputs and out- Case Study of CS/EE Students” by H.-Y. Kao et al. investigates puts,andforecastthevaluesofthosevariablesinthefuture. the undergraduate students in computer science/electric The methodologies are constructed by the concepts of data engineering (CS/EE) in Taiwan to measure their perceived envelopment analysis (DEA) and grey model (GM). Realistic benefits from the experiences in service learning coursework.