Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Trajectory Clustering Algorithm Based on Symmetric Neighborhood

Trajectory clustering is attractive for the task of class identification in spatial database. Existing trajectory clustering algorithm TRCLUS uses global parameters to discover common trajectories. However, it can not discover small and dense clusters and be sensitive to two input parameters. Based on the partition-and-group framework, we propose a simple but effective trajectory clustering algorithm based on symmetric neighborhood named BSNTC, which needs only one input parameter which eases the sensitivity of parameters in a certain extent. The proposed measure considers both neighbors and reverse neighbors of trajectories when estimating its density distribution. Also, we use an accumulator without calculating influence outlier of each trajectory to reduce the computation cost and corresponding storage cost. A comprehensive performance evaluation and analysis shows that our method is not only efficient in the computation but also effective in arbitrary shape and different densities trajectory databases.
A Description of ZZ_INFO_TECH System at KBP 2013

In this paper, we report the participation of ZZ_INFO_TECH team in entity linking task for Knowledge Base Population at Text Analysis Conference 2013. Our team submitted 4 runs for this evaluation task. In our system, we adopts some simple heuristic rules and context similarity to filter irrelevant candidates; extracts multiple features and trains SVM Ranking model to realize candidate ranking; computes five common statistics and trains SVM model to identify NIL query.
DICHROMATIC NUMBER AND FRACTIONAL CHROMATIC NUMBER

The dichromatic number of a graph $G$ is the maximum integer $k$ such that there exists an orientation of the edges of $G$ such that for every partition of the vertices into fewer than $k$ parts, at least one of the parts must contain a directed cycle under this orientation. In 1979, Erdős and Neumann-Lara conjectured that if the dichromatic number of a graph is bounded, so is its chromatic number. We make the first significant progress on this conjecture by proving a fractional version of the conjecture. While our result uses a stronger assumption about the fractional chromatic number, it also gives a much stronger conclusion: if the fractional chromatic number of a graph is at least $t$ , then the fractional version of the dichromatic number of the graph is at least ${\textstyle \frac{1}{4}}t/\log _{2}(2et^{2})$ . This bound is best possible up to a small constant factor. Several related results of independent interest are given.
The Human Edge: Information Technology and Helping People

Contents Foreword Preface Part I: The Foundations Chapter 1: Intercultural Technology Transfer Chapter 2: Information Technology and Helping People Information Technology: Concepts and Terms Information Technology: Trends and Impacts Information Technology and Helping People Part II: Views of Present and Future Chapter 3: External Views of Opportunities and Threats: The Keynotes The Network Revolution: Promises and Pitfalls in the Use of Information Ethics of Information Technology Emerging Trends and Issues in Decision Support Sustems and Related Technologies: Implications for Organizations Emerging Trends and Issues in DSS Impacts Upon and Implications for Organizations Chapter 4: Internal Views of Opportunities and Threats: Scenarios Problem Scenarios Keyword Index to Scenarios Chapter 5: The State of the Art: Concepts, Applications, and Case Studies Information Technology Applied to Facilitating Practice Discussion Information Technology in Professional Preparation and Delivery of Services Discussion Information Technology in Support of Service-Delivery Decisions Discussion Information Technology in Direct Service to Clients Discussion Relevance of the Veterans Administration Decentralized Hospital Computer Plan to Social Work Practice Part Three: Issues and Options Chapter 6: Issues in Information Technology and Social Work: A Synoptic Overview The Leading Edge of Technology and the Growing Edge of Social Change: Past, Present, and Future Perspectives Blending Information Technology and Social Work: A Conceptual Framework Chapter 7: The Central Core: Information Technology, Social Work Practice, Social Work Education Mapping the New Horizons of Social Work Education and Practice Compiling an Encyclopedia of Ignorance: Explorations in Practice Roles and Professional Stance Information Technology and Education for Practice Information Technology and Social Work Education Computer-Assisted Instruction and Experiential Learning Information Technology and Social Work Practice: A Second Look Compiling an Encyclopedia of Ignorance: Explorations in Education for Practice Chapter 8: Values and Ethics Compiling an Encyclopedia of Ignorance: Explorations in Values and Ethics The Relationship of Values to Information Technology and Clinical Social Work International and Global Issues Chapter 9: Science and Knowledge Compiling an Encyclopedia of Ignorance: Explorations in Knowledge Needs and Technology Development Chapter 10: Management and Resource Development Compiling an Encyclopedia of Ignorance: Explorations in Organizational and Resource Problems Barriers to Progress: A Sampling Chapter 11: Actions and Applications Opportunities and Threats: A Sampling Compiling an Encyclopedia of Ignorance: Explorations in Opportunities, Threats, and Actions Principal Conference Agreement Appendixes, References, Bibliography, Index
Smart entry in local retail markets for electricity and natural gas

Consider a market with switching costs that is initially served by a monopolistic incumbent. How can a competitor successfully enter this market? We show that an offer to undercut the incumbent by a fixed margin serves this purpose. This strategy dominates traditional entry where the entrant just offers a lower price because it restrains the ability of the incumbent to block entry by limit pricing. We also consider adding a price ceiling to insure customers against future price increases. While this has a strategic advantage in markets with elastic demand, it is too risky if substantial cost increases are possible.
Visual Object Tracking using Particle Filtering with Dual Manifold Models

Compared with affine transformation, projection transformation represents the process of imaging objects more accurately. This paper proposes a novel object tracking method using particle filtering with dual manifold models. One is the covariance manifold used for the object observation model, and the other is the geometric deformation on SL (3) group, where the rank of projection transformation matrix equals 1, adapted to utilize for object dynamic model. Our main contribution is to utilize both the geometry of SL (3) group and covariance manifolds in developing a general particle filtering-based tracking algorithm. Extensive experiments prove that the proposed method can realize stable and accurate tracking of object with significant geometric deformation, even with illumination changes and when an object is obscured.
The Infinite Canvas: A Novel Presentation of Newspaper Search Results on a Tablet

We propose a prototype for displaying news media search results on a tablet device. The Infinite Canvas is intended to enrich the search experience by allowing users to take advantage of spatial relationships in a digital environment to understand connections between news articles. We describe how search results can appear along an X and Y axis. We present the results of evaluations of both the initial prototype and a revised prototype with participants using a tablet in order to (i) better understand user interaction through the completion of tasks and (ii) test assumptions regarding the display of search results by time, relevancy and popularity. Participants responded positively to the infinite canvas, and provided various suggestions for future iterations, which we discuss.
Mobile Guiding System for Parks Based on Highly Precision Electronic Map

Mobile Guiding System for Parks based on highly precision electronic map is of many researchers' concern, but commercial software cannot perform GPS positioning on custom-made maps for parks, and is not accurate enough to satisfy the requirements for drawing high precision electronic maps. This study uses trajectories measured by My Tracks software and a map edited in JOSM software to implement a custom-made electronic map. By processing GPS data gathered by smooth filtering, k-mean algorithm, mean filtering, and weighted-averaging (SKMW), it calibrated a custom-made map for a park mobile guiding system, based on a design from the gvSIG Mini open source project. Using Beijing JiuFeng National Forest Park as a case, this study developed LBS and SNS related service functions. The field test shows that the SKMW method can effectively improve the accuracy of a custom-made electronic map, and the practicality and expandability of a park mobile guiding system.
On approximation algorithms for hierarchical MAX-SAT

We prove upper and lower bounds on performance guarantees of approximation algorithms for the hierarchical MAX-SAT (H-MAX-SAT) problem. This problem is representative of an important class of PSPACE-hard problems involving graphs, Boolean formulas and other structures that are defined "succinctly". Our first result is that for some constant /spl epsiv/<1, it is PSPACE-hard to approximate the function H-MAX-SAT to within ratio /spl epsiv/. We obtain our result using a known characterization of PSPACE in terms of probabilistically checkable debate systems. As an immediate application, we obtain non-approximability results for functions on hierarchical graphs by combining our result with previously known approximation-preserving reductions to other problems. For example, it is PSPACE-hard to approximate H-MAX-CUT and H-MAX-INDEPENDENT-SET to within some constant factor. Our second result is that there is an efficient approximation algorithm for H-MAX-SAT with performance guarantee 2/3. The previous best bound claimed for this problem was 1/2. One new technique of our algorithm can be used to obtain approximation algorithms for other problems, such as hierarchical MAX-CUT, which are simpler than previously known algorithms and which have performance guarantees that match the previous best bounds.
Iron-Oxide Minerals Affect Extracellular Electron-Transfer Paths of Geobacter spp

Some bacteria utilize (semi)conductive iron-oxide minerals as conduits for extracellular electron transfer (EET) to distant, insoluble electron acceptors. A previous study demonstrated that microbe/mineral conductive networks are constructed in soil ecosystems, in which Geobacter spp. share dominant populations. In order to examine how (semi)conductive iron-oxide minerals affect EET paths of Geobacter spp. , the present study grew five representative Geobacter strains on electrodes as the sole electron acceptors in the absence or presence of (semi)conductive iron oxides. It was found that iron-oxide minerals enhanced current generation by three Geobacter strains, while no effect was observed in another strain. Geobacter sulfurreducens was the only strain that generated substantial amounts of currents both in the presence and absence of the iron oxides. Microscopic, electrochemical and transcriptomic analyses of G. sulfurreducens disclosed that this strain constructed two distinct types of EET path; in the absence of iron-oxide minerals, bacterial biofilms rich in extracellular polymeric substances were constructed, while composite networks made of mineral particles and microbial cells (without polymeric substances) were developed in the presence of iron oxides. It was also found that uncharacterized c-type cytochromes were up-regulated in the presence of iron oxides that were different from those found in conductive biofilms. These results suggest the possibility that natural (semi)conductive minerals confer energetic and ecological advantages on Geobacter, facilitating their growth and survival in the natural environment.
Temporal trends in BMI among adults with diabetes.

OBJECTIVE Increasing obesity within the general population has been accompanied by rising rates of diabetes. The extent to which obesity has increased among people with diabetes is unknown, as are the potential consequences for diabetes outcomes. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS Community medical records (hospital and ambulatory) of all Rochester, Minnesota, residents aged > or =30 years who first met standardized research criteria for diabetes from 1970 to 1989 (n = 1,306) were reviewed to obtain data on BMI and related characteristics as of the diabetes identification date (+/-3 months). Vital status as of 31 December 1999 and date of death for those who died were obtained from medical records, State of Minnesota death tapes, and active follow-up. RESULTS As of the identification date, data on BMI were available for 1,290 cases. Of the 272 who first met diabetes criteria in 1970-1974, 33% were obese (BMI > or =30), including 5% who were extremely obese (BMI > or =40). These proportions increased to 49% (P < 0.001) and 9% (P = 0.012), respectively, for the 426 residents who first met diabetes criteria in 1985-1989. BMI increased significantly with increasing calendar year of diabetes identification in multivariable regression analysis. Analysis of survival revealed an increased hazard of mortality for BMI > or =41, relative to BMI of 23-25 (hazard ratio 1.60, 95% CI 1.09-2.34, P = 0.016). CONCLUSIONS The prevalence of obesity and extreme obesity among individuals at the time they first met criteria for diabetes has increased over time. This is disturbing in light of the finding that diabetic individuals who are extremely obese are at increased risk of mortality compared with their nonobese diabetic counterparts.
Anticipation and Surprises in Central Bank Interest Rate Policy: The Case of the Bundesbank

Market reaction to a change in official interest rates will depend on the extent to which the change is anticipated, and on how it is interpreted as a signal of future policy. In this paper, a technique is developed to separate the anticipated and unanticipated components of such changes, and applied to estimate the response of euro--deutsche mark interest rates to adjustments in the Bundesbank's Lombard and discount rates.
Adaptive mesh simplification using distance to focus of attention for multiple points of view

Multiresolution modelling has been widely accepted as a good approach in order to reach a compromise between quality and performance in the rendering of complex geometries. Adaptive simplification techniques that preserve visually outstanding features have also been explored. However, the presence of external factors, such as lights or movement, may also influence visual attention. The goal of this paper is to present a technique based on Distance Transforms that allows to classify the mesh's elements according to their proximity to the focus of attention, and to make use of this information for weighting the approximation error which will be tolerated during the mesh simplification process. The approach followed in this work precomputes the correspondence between image pixels and mesh's elements for a given set of points of view performing correspondence estimates for other points of view. The results achieved so far show the feasibility of the proposed approach.
Lifting-based Wavelet Transform with Directionally Spatial Prediction

This paper incorporates the directionally spatial prediction (DSP) into the conventional lifting-based wavelet transforms and proposes a novel, efficient and flexible lifting structure (referred as DSP-lifting hereafter). Each lifting stage can be performed at the direction, where pixels have a strong correlation, rather than always at the horizontal or vertical direction. The proposed DSP enables the predicting and updating process at the fractional pixel without any constraint on the interpolation, which fully exploit the spatial correlation among pixels. Furthermore in the 2D transform, the direction of the first 1D transform is no longer requested to be vertical to that of the second so that the second 1D transform can utilize the spatial correlation better. The proposed DSP-lifting guarantees the perfect reconstruction. We also investigate the techniques to efficiently estimate and code the directional data, thus increasing the precision of spatial prediction and reducing the overhead bits. Experimental results have shown that the proposed DSP-lifting scheme can significantly outperform JPEG 2000 in terms of PSNR (up to 2dB) and visual quality.
An Anycast Routing Protocol for Wireless Mesh Access Network

Wireless mesh network is a new broad bandwidthdistributing wireless access network system. It can accessInternet through Gateway nodes. When network load of accessis heavy or network size is expanding, One gateway node willbecome a bottleneck of the access network because of theserious congestion of a large number of data packetstransmitted to the gateway node. Based on the research ofDSR(Dynamic Source Routing Protocol) and anycast service, amulti-gateway wireless mesh network routing protocol(MAMSR) was presented. In this protocol, the anycast groupmembers were multiple gateways, and DSR was expanded tosupport anycast. Simulation results show MAMSR caneffectively solve the congestion of single gateway, maintainhigh packet mailing rate¿low delay and routing cost, andmake the access network run stably and efficiently.
Eyetracking Evaluation of Different Chart Types Used for Web-Based System Data Visualization

This article presents a pilot study of evaluation of different chart types. We have prepared 33 charts together with corresponding tasks for participants, who were supposed to find some required information on them. During this process we have used an eyetracking device to record their gaze movements. This enabled us to observe how each chart was scanned by participants while looking for answers to the tasks. Furthermore, we analysed the correctness of their responses and their subjective ratings of the charts, in order to find designs that were the most suitable for different scenarios, such as comparing two values, presentation of large datasets etc.
OWL-OLM : interactive ontology-based elicitation of user models

User-adaptive systems for the SemanticWeb need approaches for user modeling that work, unlike traditional approaches, under the open-world assumption. A novel framework for eliciting a user’s conceptualization based on an ontology-driven dialog is presented here. It has been integrated in an RDF/OWL-based adaptive semantic-web software architecture for learning content management. We illustrate the implemented framework with an application scenario to deal with the cold start problem and to enable tailoring the system’s behavior to the needs of each individual user.
A Model-Based Framework for Building Self-Adaptive Distributed Software

Received: August 16, 2013 Reconfiguration is widely used for evolving and adapting systems that cannot be shut down for update. However, in distributed systems, supporting reconfiguration is a challenging task since a reconfiguration consists of distributed reconfiguration actions that need to be coordinated and the application consistency must be preserved. To address this challenge, we propose a framework based on a reflexive three layer architecture model for the development of distributed dynamic and reliable component-based applications. The bottom layer of this model is the application layer. It contains the system's application-level functionality. The change management layer is the middle layer. It reacts to changes in state reported from the application layer. The uppermost layer is the self-adaptation layer that introduces the self-adaptation capabilities to the framework itself. It ensures the service continuity of the change management layer and manages the adaptation of this last to the changes which it carries out itself on the application layer. The framework is conceived especially for supporting the distributed reconfigurations. For that, it incorporates a negotiation and coordination mechanism for managing this type of reconfiguration. Moreover, it incorporates a separate system for ensuring the reliability of the application. The paper introduces a prototype implementation of the proposed framework and its empirical evaluation. Povzetek: Clanek predstavlja okolje za gradnjo samo-prilagodljivega porazdeljenega programja.
The European Union and refugees: towards more restrictive asylum policies in the European Union?

Several scholars have argued that European countries have decided to cooperate on asylum and migration matters at the EU level in order to develop more restrictive policies. In particular, it has been argued that European states have ‘venue-shopped’ to a new policy-venue in order to escape national constraints. This paper puts this argument to the test by assessing the extent to which the development of EU cooperation on asylum matters has indeed led to the adoption of more restrictive asylum standards. The paper argues that, actually, EU asylum cooperation has led to an overall increase in protection standards for asylum-seekers and refugees. This outcome is explained by two main factors: the increasing ‘judicialisation’ of asylum in the EU and institutional changes in the EU asylum policy area that have strengthened the role of more ‘refugee-friendly’ institutions.
Practical Query Answering over Hi (DL-LiteR) Knowledge Bases

The language Hi(DL-LiteR) is obtained from DL-LiteR by adding meta-modeling features, and is equipped with a query language that is able to express higher-order queries. We investigate the problem of answering a particular class of such queries, called instance higher-order queries posed over Hi(DL-LiteR) knowledge bases (KBs). The only existing algorithm for this problem is based on the idea of reducing the evaluation of a higher-order query Q over a Hi(DL-LiteR) KB to the evaluation of a union of first-order queries over a DL-LiteR KB, built from Q by instantiating all metavariables in all possible ways. Even though of polynomial time complexity with respect to the size of the KB, this algorithm turns out to be inefficient in practice. In this paper we present a new algorithm, called Smart Binding Planner (SBP), that compiles Q into a program, that issues a sequence of first-order conjunctive queries, where each query has the goal of providing the bindings for meta-variables of the next ones, and the last one completes the process by computing the answers to Q. We also illustrate some experiments showing that, in practice, SBP is significantly more efficient than the previous approach.
Fiscal Policy and Equality of Opportunity in Uruguay

According to the standard indicators of distributive effect, Uruguayan fiscal policy (in particular, social spending) is progressive. The aim of this paper is to compare this result with the conclusions derived from the perspective of equality of opportunity. Under this view, fiscal policy should equalize not the overall income but eliminate the effect of factors beyond the responsibility of individuals (circumstances). To assess the distributive effect of fiscal policy we calculate the Gini index for different income concepts which take into account different programs of the tax-benefit system. Then, we calculate the equality of opportunity for each income concept. Circumstances identified in this paper are the level of education attained by parents and self-reported ethnicity. To analyze the robustness of the results, we calculate several measures used in the empirical literature of equality of opportunities. Though according to the welfarist analysis we conclude that the tax-benefit system has an equalizing effect, we cannot conclude that it compensates the disadvantages due to circumstances.