Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
On the Imminent Advent of Botnet Powered Cracking

Botnets have been becoming increasingly resilient, rampant, larger and powerful in recent years. Going beyond traditionally malicious intents of stealing credentials, sending spam and DDoS, botnet herders have now even begun to monetize CPU cycles of zombie machines under their control, by illegal cryptocurrency mining. Following recent advances in efficient password cracking by the use of Markov chains, Context Free Grammar, and other methods for smart generation of candidate passwords for trial and error, the time taken for breaking hashed passwords has greatly decreased when compared to traditional brute forcing. This paper aims to describe the practicality of a botnet specifically designed to break passwords. Various modes of botnet based password breaking and the advantage in terms of highly accelerated hash rates obtained are discussed. Comparisons with hash rates of cloud-based cracking are also discussed. A load distribution model is shown in which workload is homogenously and uniformly distributed across nodes of varying computing power. This model is designed to be independent of the password guessing algorithm or combination of algorithms used. Also, the resilience of passwords against large search spaced brute force attacks by botnets are studied, and its results extrapolated to smart methods of password guessing.
Problems in Digital Microscopy

Three c ase studies are used to illustrate some issues which arise when digital image analysis methods are applied in microscopy. An algorithm is described for estimating the diameters of cashmere bres from out-of-focus images. The process of image formation in diierential interference c ontrast DIC microscopy is modelled, and used t o c onstruct templates for identifying and measuring algal, bacterial and fungal cells. Finally, the three-dimensional structure o f a diatom is recovered by analysing images from a series of focal planes.
End Criteria for Reaching Maximal Oxygen Uptake Must Be Strict and Adjusted to Sex and Age: A Cross-Sectional Study

Objective To describe different end criteria for reaching maximal oxygen uptake (VO2max) during a continuous graded exercise test on the treadmill, and to explore the manner by which different end criteria have an impact on the magnitude of the VO2max result. Methods A sample of 861 individuals (390 women) aged 20–85 years performed an exercise test on a treadmill until exhaustion. Gas exchange, heart rate, blood lactate concentration and Borg Scale6–20 rating were measured, and the impact of different end criteria on VO2max was studied;VO2 leveling off, maximal heart rate (HRmax), different levels of respiratory exchange ratio (RER), and postexercise blood lactate concentration. Results Eight hundred and four healthy participants (93%) fulfilled the exercise test until voluntary exhaustion. There were no sex-related differences in HRmax, RER, or Borg Scale rating, whereas blood lactate concentration was 18% lower in women (P<0.001). Forty-two percent of the participants achieved a plateau in VO2; these individuals had 5% higher ventilation (P = 0.033), 4% higher RER (P<0.001), and 5% higher blood lactate concentration (P = 0.047) compared with participants who did not reach a VO2 plateau. When using RER ≥1.15 or blood lactate concentration ≥8.0 mmol•L–1, VO2max was 4% (P = 0.012) and 10% greater (P<0.001), respectively. A blood lactate concentration ≥8.0 mmol•L–1 excluded 63% of the participants in the 50–85-year-old cohort. Conclusions A range of typical end criteria are presented in a random sample of subjects aged 20–85 years. The choice of end criteria will have an impact on the number of the participants as well as the VO2max outcome. Suggestions for new recommendations are given.
Student cynicism: a study of adaptation, validity and reliability of cynical attitudes toward college scale

The aim of this study is to carry out the validity and reliability study, and the adaptation of the “Cynical Attitudes towards Collage Scale” to Turkish developed by Brockway, Carlson, Jones and Bryant (2002). Study group 1 includes the linguistic equivalence study conducted to determine the consistency between the Turkish and the English form of Cynical Attitudes toward College Scale. The study group 1 constitutes 3rd grade teacher candidates of English Language Teaching Department at Nevşehir Hacı Bektaş Veli University in the academic year of 2016-2017. In study group 2 constitutes teacher candidates who are studying in the 3rd and 4th grades of Education Faculty departments of Science Education, English Language Teaching, Mathematics Education, Early Childhood Education, Elementary Education, Social Science Education, Turkish Language Education and Psychological Counseling and Guidance at Akdeniz University in the academic year of 2016-2017 who were determined based on convenience sampling method. Based on the findings, it can be said
Digitisation and Its Asian Discontents: The Internet, Politics and Hacking in China and Indonesia

Given its transnational character the Internet is often perceived as a technology that will challenge the frontiers of the nation-state. Asian governments, however, eagerly include the Internet in their policies, thereby inscribing this technology into the narrative of the nation-state. In this article I argue that such uses of the Internet to legitimise governments and their policies deserve as much attention as globalised movements that at times challenge such policies. More empirically grounded research - that moves beyond the utopian/dystopian, online/offline and virtual/real dichotomies - is important to grasp such contradictory uses of the Internet. Studies located outside the U.S. and Europe, the places that dominate Internet studies, will prove of crucial value in rethinking the roles of the Internet in society.
Environmental Effects on Temperature Stress Resistance in the Tropical Butterfly Bicyclus Anynana

Background The ability to withstand thermal stress is considered to be of crucial importance for individual fitness and species' survival. Thus, organisms need to employ effective mechanisms to ensure survival under stressful thermal conditions, among which phenotypic plasticity is considered a particularly quick and effective one. Methodology/Principal Findings In a series of experiments we here investigate phenotypic adjustment in temperature stress resistance following environmental manipulations in the butterfly Bicyclus anynana. Cooler compared to warmer acclimation temperatures generally increased cold but decreased heat stress resistance and vice versa. In contrast, short-time hardening responses revealed more complex patterns, with, e.g., cold stress resistance being highest at intermediate hardening temperatures. Adult food stress had a negative effect on heat but not on cold stress resistance. Additionally, larval feeding treatment showed interactive effects with adult feeding for heat but not for cold stress resistance, indicating that nitrogenous larval resources may set an upper limit to performance under heat stress. In contrast to expectations, cold resistance slightly increased during the first eight days of adult life. Light cycle had marginal effects on temperature stress resistance only, with cold resistance tending to be higher during daytime and thus active periods. Conclusions/Significance Our results highlight that temperature-induced plasticity provides an effective tool to quickly and strongly modulate temperature stress resistance, and that such responses are readily reversible. However, resistance traits are not only affected by ambient temperature, but also by, e.g., food availability and age, making their measurement challenging. The latter effects are largely underexplored and deserve more future attention. Owing to their magnitude, plastic responses in thermal tolerance should be incorporated into models trying to forecast effects of global change on extant biodiversity.
Differences in the intrinsic capacity of peripheral blood mononuclear cells to produce tumor necrosis factor alpha and beta in patients with inflammatory bowel disease and healthy controls.

BACKGROUND Tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF alpha) and beta (TNF beta) appear to play an important role in the regulation of the inflammatory response. The aim of the present study was to investigate the intrinsic capacity of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) to produce these cytokines. METHODS PBMC from 41 patients with Crohn's disease (CD), with ulcerative colitis (UC), and 23 healthy controls (HC) were cultured for 48 h in the presence of the T-cell activators anti-CD3 and anti-CD28. Biologically active total TNF (TNF alpha and beta), TNF alpha, and TNF beta production were measured using a bioassay for biologically active TNF and specific TNF alpha and TNF beta enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays. RESULTS Large interindividual differences in TNF production were observed. Production of biologically active TNF after T-cell stimulation was significantly decreased in UC patients as compared with HC and CD patients (median, 337 U/ml, 800 U/ml, and 1050 U/ml, respectively). Stimulated TNF alpha production in UC patients (median, 432 U/ml) and in CD patients (median, 537 U/ml) did not differ statistically significantly from HC (median, 730 U/ml) as compared with HC and UC patients(median, 800 U/ml and 837 U/ml, respectively). CONCLUSIONS These findings support the concept that UC and CD are homogeneous, clearly distinguishable disease entities but rather a heterogeneous group of diseases. Studies directed to assess the immunogenetic background of these different disease manifestations in IBD are underway.
What Do We Learn from the Weather? The New Climate-Economy Literature

A rapidly growing body of research applies panel methods to examine how temperature, precipitation, and windstorms influence economic outcomes. These studies focus on changes in weather realizations over time within a given spatial area and demonstrate impacts on agricultural output, industrial output, labor productivity, energy demand, health, conflict, and economic growth among other outcomes. By harnessing exogenous variation over time within a given spatial unit, these studies help credibly identify (i) the breadth of channels linking weather and the economy, (ii) heterogeneous treatment effects across different types of locations, and (iii) non-linear effects of weather variables. This paper reviews the new literature with two purposes. First, we summarize recent work, providing a guide to its methodologies, data sets, and findings. Second, we consider applications of the new literature, including insights for the "damage function" within models that seek to assess the potential economic effects of future climate change.
Browsing behavior mimicking attacks on popular web sites for large botnets

With the significant growth of botnets, application layer DDoS attacks are much easier to launch using large botnet, and false negative is always a problem for intrusion detection systems in real practice. In this paper, we propose a novel application layer DDoS attack tool, which mimics human browsing behavior following three statistical distributions, the Zipf-like distribution for web page popularity, the Pareto distribution for page request time interval for an individual browser, and the inverse Gaussian distribution for length of browsing path. A Markov model is established for individual bot to generate attack request traffic. Our experiments indicated that the attack traffic that generated by the proposed tool is pretty similar to the real traffic. As a result, the current statistics based detection algorithms will result high false negative rate in general. In order to counter this kind of attacks, we discussed a few preliminary solutions at the end of this paper.
Ecological-Enactive Cognition as engaging with a field of relevant affordances

The topic of this Oxford handbook is “4E cognition”: cognition as embodied, embedded, enactive, and extended. However, one important “E” is missing: an E for ecological. We sketch an ecological-enactive approach to cognition that presents a framework for bringing together the embodied/enactive program with the ecological program originally developed by James Gibson, in which affordances are central. We call this framework the skilled intentionality framework. The skilled intentionality framework is a philosophical approach to understanding the situated and affective embodied mind. It is a new conceptual framework for the field of 4E cognitive science that focuses on skilled action and builds upon an enriched notion of affordances. We define skilled intentionality as the selective engagement with multiple affordances simultaneously in a concrete situation. The skilled intentionality framework clarifies how complementary insights on affordance responsiveness from philosophy/phenomenology, ecological psychology, emotion psychology, and neurodynamics hang together in an intertwined way.
STUDENTS’ SELF-EFFICACY OF NICENET IN EFL CLASSROOM

This study attempts to measure students’ Self Efficacy in Nicent in EFL Classroom and to investigate whether or not there was any difference between male and female students. This study adopted a mixed method. Data gathered through questionnaire, interview and relevant documents. The study was conducted at the English Language Education study program, in Halu Oleo University. Fifty students participated in this study by filling out a questionnaire and 8 students were interviewed to obtain more information related to their response in the questionnaire. Findings of the study indicate that students’ self-efficacy were categorized into high level and medium level. Regarding differences between male and female’s self-efficacy in using Nicenet, the result of this study revealed no significant differences among them.
Synchronous Tracking Control of Parallel Manipulators Using Cross-coupling Approach

This paper presents a cross-coupled control approach to the tracking control of parallel manipulators in a synchronous manner. Based on the synchronization goal, the position synchronization error is investigated by considering motion synchronization between each actuator joint and its adjacent ones. A decentralized trajectory tracking controller is then developed with feedback of both position and synchronization errors, formed with a combination of feedforward, feedback and a saturation control. It is proven that this tracking controller can asymptotically stabilize both position and synchronization errors of the system. The proposed controller does not require the explicit use of the system dynamic model. Experiments performed on a 3-DOF parallel manipulator demonstrate improved performance with the proposed synchronous control design.
Verifying SAT and SMT in Coq for a fully automated decision procedure

Enjoying the power of SAT and SMT solvers in the Coq proof as- sistant without compromising soundness requires more than a yes/no answer from them. SAT and SMT solvers should also return a proof witness that can be checked by an external tool. We propose a fully certified checker for such witnesses written in Coq. It can currently check witnesses from the SAT solvers ZChaff and MiniSat and from the SMT solver VeriT. Experiments highlight the efficiency of this checker. On top of it, new reflexive Coq tactics have been built that can decide a subset of Coq's logic by calling external provers and carefully checking their answers.
River Courses Affected by Landslides and Implications for Hazard Assessment: A High Resolution Remote Sensing Case Study in NE Iraq-W Iran

The objective of this study is to understand the effect of landslides on the drainage network within the area of interest. We thus test the potential of rivers to record the intensity of landslides that affected their courses. The study area is located within the Zagros orogenic belt along the border between Iraq and Iran. We identified 280 landslides through nine QuickBird scenes using visual photo-interpretation. The total landslide area of 40.05 km2 and their distribution follows a NW–SE trend due to the tectonic control of main thrust faults. We observe a strong control of the landslides on the river course. We quantify the relationship between riverbed displacement and mass wasting occurrences using landslide sizes versus river offset and hypsometric integrals. Many valleys and river channels are curved around the toe of landslides, thus producing an offset of the stream which increases with the landslide area. The river offsets were quantified using two geomorphic indices: the river with respect to the basin midline (Fb); and the offset from the main river direction (Fd). Hypsometry and stream offset seem to be correlated. In addition; the analysis of selected river courses may give some information on the sizes of the past landslide events and therefore contribute to the hazard assessment.
J ul 2 01 2 Nonlinear Schrödinger equation for a PT symmetric delta-functions double well

The time-independent nonlinear Schrödinger equation is solved for two attractive delta-function shaped potential wells where an imaginary loss term is added in one well, and a gain term of the same size but with opposite sign in the other. We show that for vanishing nonlinearity the model captures all the features known from studies of PT symmetric optical wave guides, e.g., the coalescence of modes in an exceptional point at a critical value of the loss/gain parameter, and the breaking of PT symmetry beyond. With the nonlinearity present, the equation is a model for a Bose-Einstein condensate with loss and gain in a double well potential. We find that the nonlinear Hamiltonian picks as stationary eigenstates exactly such solutions which render the nonlinear Hamiltonian itself PT symmetric, but observe coalescence and bifurcation scenarios different from those known from linear PT symmetric Hamiltonians.
A 60 GHz Variable Gain Amplifier with a Low Phase Imbalance in 0.18 μm SiGe BiCMOS Technology

A 60GHz variable gain amplifier is designed and fabricated in 0.18 μm SiGe BiCMOS technology. A phase compensation technique is employed for the minimization of the phase imbalance at different gain states. With a 3.3 V supply, the amplifier achieves a variable gain ranging from -2.7 dB to 17.7 dB at 60 GHz, consuming DC power of 50 mW. The measured RMS phase imbalance is less than 2.8° at 57-66 GHz of the 60 GHz full band. The output 1-dB gain compression point is >; 2 dBm for all of the gain states at 60 GHz.
Race and the Digital Divide

Abstract In recent years, a plethora of public and private programs in the United States have been created to close the "Digital Divide. " Interestingly, however, we know very little about the underlying causes of racial differences in rates of computer and Internet access. In this paper, I use data from the Computer and Internet Use Supplement to the August 2000 Current Population Survey (CPS) to explore this question. Estimates from the CPS indicate that Mexican-Americans are roughly one-half as likely to own a computer and one-third as likely to have Internet access at home as whites. The black home computer rate is 59 percent of the white rate and the black home Internet access rate is 51 percent of the white rate. Using Blinder-Oaxaca decompositions, I find that racial differences in education, income and occupation contribute substantially to the black/white and Mexican-American/white gaps in home computer and Internet access rates. The digital divide between races, however, is not simply an "income divide" as income differences explain only 10 to 30 percent of the gaps in access to technology. I do not find evidence that price or school differences are responsible for the remaining gaps. I find some evidence, however, that language barriers may be important in explaining low rates of computer and Internet access among Mexican-Americans.
Randomised pair comparison: an economic and robust method for audiovisual quality assessment

Subjective quality perception studies with human observers are essential for multimedia system design. Such studies are known to be expensive and difficult to administer. They require time, a detailed knowledge of experimental designs and a level of control which can often only be achieved in a laboratory setting. Hence, only very few researchers consider running subjective studies at all. In this paper we present Randomised Pair Comparison (r/pc), an easy-to-use, flexible, economic and robust extension to conventional pair comparison methods. r/pc uses random sampling to select a unique and small subset of pairs for each assessor, thus separating session duration from the experimental design. With r/pc an experimenter can freely define the duration of sessions and balance between costs and accuracy of an experiment. On a realistic example study we show that r/pc is able to create stable results with an accuracy close to full factorial designs, yet much lower costs. We also provide initial evidence that r/pc can avoid unpleasant fatigue and learning effects which are common in long experiment sessions.
Fighting together? understanding bilateral cooperation in the realm of counterterrorism

ABSTRACT Since September 11, there has been marked rise in research on the transnational aspect of terrorist organizations, such as Hezbollah, Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. However, there has been little focus on when and why nations sometimes cooperate in counterterrorism, while at other times they deal with the challenge of terrorism separately. Our contribution here is two-fold. First, we develop a conceptual framework that identifies the different ways in which polities cooperate when they are executing CT policies. Second, using a newly collected dataset of CT campaigns and state cooperation from 1970 to 2007, we test the theoretical framework in an effort to explain under which conditions countries choose to cooperate or fight alone. The results indicate that traditional power-centric explanations for cooperation matter, but not to the exclusion of less-tangible factors such as identity and the nature of the violence used by the terrorist group.
A link between cepstral shrinking and the weighted product rule in audio-visual speech recognition

The weighted product rule has been shown empirically to be of great beneﬁt in audio-visual speech recognition (AVSR), for isolated word recognition tasks. A ﬁrm theoretical ba- sis for the selection of eﬀective weights is of considerable interest to the audio-visual speech processing community. In this paper a clear link is established between the selection of eﬀective weightings and the approximately isotropic shrinkage that the distribution of acoustic cepstral features undergo in the presence of additive noise. An elucidation of the theoretical relationship between the cepstral shrinkage and the variance of the HMM audio log-likelihoods is then explored.
Correlation between serum levels of some cholesterol precursors and activity of HMG-CoA reductase in human liver.

The possibility that the serum concentrations of various cholesterol precursors may reflect the activity of the hepatic HMG-CoA reductase was investigated in humans under different conditions. The serum levels of squalene, free and esterified lanosterol, (4 alpha, 4 beta, 14 alpha-trimethyl-5 alpha-cholest-8, 24-dien-3 beta-ol), two dimethylsterols (4 alpha, 4 beta-dimethyl-5 beta-cholest-8-en-3 beta-ol and 4 alpha, 4 beta-dimethyl-5 alpha-cholest-8, 24-dien-3 beta-ol), two methostenols (4 alpha-methyl-5 alpha-cholest-7-en-3 beta-ol and 4 alpha-methyl-5 alpha-cholest-8-en-3 beta-ol), two lathosterols (5 alpha-cholest-7-en-3 beta-ol and 5 alpha-cholest-8-en-3 beta-ol) and desmosterol (cholest-5, 24-dien-3 beta-ol) were measured in untreated patients (n = 7) and patients treated with cholestyramine (QuestranR, 8 g twice daily for 2-3 weeks, n = 5) or chenodeoxycholic acid (15 mg/kg body weight daily for 3-4 weeks, n = 8) prior to elective cholecystectomy. The activity of the hepatic microsomal HMG-CoA reductase was measured in liver biopsies taken in connection with the operation. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)