Rüdiger Zarnekow Knihy

2 chapter contains examples of intelligent agents, arranged according to their appli cation areas. Chapter 7 closes with a prospective view of the future development of intelligent agents. Everyone concerned with the Internet and the new possibilities of information and communication technology knows that nowadays there is no area that is devel oping faster. The authors are aware of the dynamics of this research area and its effects when they describe such a fast developing area in a slow, traditional me dium like a book. One thing is sure today: when the book appears on the market, new intelligent agents will already exist and some of the hypotheses made by this book will have been shown to be incorrect. Why, despite this, does it make sense to write a classical book on this subject? Is there an alternative? Experience shows that the majority of the people in business and public life who make decisions on the use of new technologies continue to prefer books and articles in periodicals rather than electronic sources such as the Internet. Or is there some other reason for the enormous success of Nicolas Negroponte's book Being Digital, which we thank for multimedia and many concepts of the digital and networked world, and even intelligent agents? Today, a book is still the only way to establish a new area.

After years of apparent dormancy, once again companies are paying more att- tion to information management. IT departments and CIOs are confronted with a number of new challenges, which force them to reconsider past information m- agement strategies and solutions. Recently cited as positive trends in IT are only those developments concerning stronger customer service and process orientation or pertaining to new forms of IT governance. Questions about the efficiency and effectiveness of company IT utilization are once again taking center stage. More and more IT departments are under pressure to perform with regard to quality, functionality, and transparency, especially when performance does not mirror customers’ requirements. The intensity with which discussions are taking place about costs, outsourcing, or offshoring between IT and other business units epi- mizes this pressure. This text addresses the challenges to information management. Using the model for integrated information management, this book presents a framework for the management of IT services and a tangible organization of information mana- ment. In defining the model we were guided by two principles.