Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Writer identification in medieval and modern handwriting

Writer identification is the task of associating a handwriting sample with the identity of the correct writer. It can be used to confirm or refute the authenticity of a document, or to link together documents produced by the same writer. This problem has applications in several areas, including forensics and palaeography -- the study of historical books and writings. Rigorous manual writer identification requires the exhaustive comparison of character details, and is very time-consuming, making computer automation of all or part of this process attractive. Most research into automated writer identification has originated in forensic science, although more recently applications to historical texts are increasing. With mass digitisation of texts on the rise in libraries and collections, organising this new data is a growing problem. However, different types of writing have different characteristics, and require different handling. This thesis focuses on how medieval English manuscripts from the 14th--15th centuries compare to the contemporary handwriting datasets used for much of the research and feature development in this area. The work presented here is based on an in-depth application of the grapheme codebook approach to offline writer identification. It finds domain-specific considerations throughout the process, particularly in grapheme creation and comparison and in the influence of document sources on system accuracy. Additionally, over the course of the data analysis, methods are proposed for the visualisation of extracted features, for quantifying the impact of sample source on identification accuracy, and for a nearest-neighbour-based verification system.
Comparing the efficiency of serial and parallel algorithms for training artificial neural networks using computer clusters

An estimation of the number of multiplication and addition operations for training artififfcial neural networks by means of consecutive and parallel algorithms on a computer cluster is carried out. The evaluation of the efficiency of these algorithms is developed. The multilayer perceptron, the Volterra network and the cascade-correlation network are used as structures of artififfcial neural networks. Different methods of non-linear programming such as gradient and non-gradient methods are used for the calculation of the weight coefficients.
Multicast delivery of web pages or how to make web servers pushy

1 Making the Case The Web has gained tremendously in popularity over the last several years. Web administrators are struggling to upgrade their servers to handle the huge volumes of requests. One approach to handling the large volume of requests has been to simply buy more hardware. Other solutions have been investigated including improvements in the HTTP protocol , the use of transparent server replicationn1] and caching of hot pagess2]. At issue is how Web pages can be delivered to increasing numbers of users given limited server capacity and network bandwidth. Another technique that can be used in conjunction with caching and replication to improve scalabil-ity is multicast delivery. With this approach Web pages are delivered to multiple awaiting clients using one server response instance and using underlying network support for point-to-multipoint communication. Although multicast delivery has long been viewed as an approach to provide scalable services 3, 4, 5, 6, 7], its use for multicast Web delivery on an end-to-end basis (multicast from server directly to clients) has received less attention. This has been for mainly three reasons: 1. The Web is largely viewed as a \pull" service where clients' needs for pages are satissed through individualized point-to-point transmission. 2. There is lingering doubt over the usefulness of multicast Web page delivery. The beneets of the server and network aggregation provided by multicast delivery are clear. What is in doubt is whether these beneets may be more than oo-set by the overheads within the server and the network to support multicast delivery. 3. End-to-end multicast is not widely deployed over the commercial Internet. Our work addresses the rst two points above explicitly. First, access to Web sites typically follows a skewed pattern with a small number of hot pages being accessed very frequently, a larger number (but still small) of warm pages being accessed with moderate frequency and a large number of cold pages being accessed infrequently or in some cases rarely. Multiple requests received for the hot and warm pages can be aggregated and responded to once by the server. Multicast delivery support within the network can insure a similar form of bandwidth ag-gregation. An important aspect of our approach is that the system can be built such that clients of a multicast delivery Web server can maintain the illusion that they are interacting with the server according to a pull paradigm. In addition to deening an architecture …
Bayesian Methods for Data Analysis

Approaches for statistical inference Introduction Motivating Vignettes Defining the Approaches The Bayes-Frequentist Controversy Some Basic Bayesian Models The Bayes approach Introduction Prior Distributions Bayesian Inference Hierarchical Modeling Model Assessment Nonparametric Methods Bayesian computation Introduction Asymptotic Methods Noniterative Monte Carlo Methods Markov Chain Monte Carlo Methods Model criticism and selection Bayesian Modeling Bayesian Robustness Model Assessment Bayes Factors via Marginal Density Estimation Bayes Factors via Sampling over the Model Space Other Model Selection Methods The empirical Bayes approach Introduction Parametric EB Point Estimation Nonparametric EB Point Estimation Interval Estimation Bayesian Processing and Performance Frequentist Performance Empirical Bayes Performance Bayesian design Principles of Design Bayesian Clinical Trial Design Applications in Drug and Medical Device Trials Special methods and models Estimating Histograms and Ranks Order Restricted Inference Longitudinal Data Models Continuous and Categorical Time Series Survival Analysis and Frailty Models Sequential Analysis Spatial and Spatio-Temporal Models Case studies Analysis of Longitudinal AIDS Data Robust Analysis of Clinical Trials Modeling of Infectious Diseases Appendices Distributional Catalog Decision Theory Answers to Selected Exercises References Author Index Subject Index Index Exercises appear at the end of each chapter.
Cooperative controller design for synchronization of networked uncertain Euler–Lagrange systems

This paper addresses the synchronization problems with/without a dynamic leader for a team of distributed Lagrange systems on digraph. A systematic way to design and analyze the distributed control algorithms is presented. The contributions of the paper are twofold. First, the adaptive coordination control protocols are proposed for synchronization of networked uncertain Lagrange systems with/without tracking. This protocol can guarantee synchronization in finite time. Second, the design of the distributed tracking controller for the networked dynamic systems is proposed by using Lyapunov methods. The development is suitable for the general digraph communication topologies. Simulation examples are included to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithms. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
A Survey on Secure Multi-hop Code Dissemination Protocols in Wireless Sensor Networks

Code dissemination in Wireless Sensor Network can be subjected to security issues. Authentication and confidentiality of the data should be ensured in such cases. The lack of security mechanisms would be a cause of vulnerability. An adversary could capture one of the nodes and use it to send malicious program images into the network to deplete the power resources and prevents authorized users from having their actual rights. This paper proposes a survey on various security methods used in code dissemination protocols, to ensure the safe transmission of program image through the network.
Maximum Likelihood Estimation of Peers" Performance in P2P Networks

The problem of encouraging trustworthy behavior in P2P online communities by managing peers’ reputations has drawn a lot of attention recently. However, most of the proposed solutions exhibit the following two problems: huge implementation overhead and unclear trust related model semantics. In this paper we show that a simple probabilistic technique, maximum likelihood estimation namely, can reduce these two problems substantially when employed as the feedback aggregation strategy. Thus, no complex exploration of the feedback is necessary. Instead, simple, intuitive and efficient probabilistic estimation methods suffice.
CONFERENCE REVIEW SYSTEM: A CASE OF STUDY

This report presents the OO-H solution to the Conference Review System case study proposed in the IWWOST’01. We first introduce the main concepts of OO-H. We then perform an analysis of the case study, and establish the functional requirements each actor’s interface should fulfil. We also present the UML use-case and class diagrams that constitute the basis on which OO-H defines its own models. Next, following the OO-H notation, we present the interface navigation model for each actor of the system. We also briefly illustrate how these models are transformed into an XML specification that feeds a model compiler, capable of generating an operative version of the modelled interface. 1.A brief introduction to OO-H The OO-H (Object Oriented Hypermedia) Method is a generic model, based on the object oriented paradigm, that provides the designer with the semantics and notation necessary for the development of web-based interfaces and its connection with previously existing application logic modules. OO-H defines a set of diagrams, techniques and tools that shape a sound approach to the modelling of web interfaces. The OO-H proposal includes: a Design Process a Pattern Catalog a Navigation Access Diagram (NAD) an Abstract Presentation Diagram (APD) a CASE tool that allows to automate the development of web applications In this paper we will focus on the views OO-H defines to extend those provided by ‘traditional software’ production environments, namely (1) the Navigational Access Diagram (NAD), that defines a navigation view, and (2) the Abstract Presentation Diagram (APD), that gathers the concepts related to abstract presentation. The NAD diagram enriches the domain view provided in the UML [5] use-cases and class diagrams with navigation and interaction features. Also, to define navigation and visualization constraints, OO-H uses the Object Constraint Language (OCL [6]), a subset of the standard UML that allows software developers to write constraints over object models. OO-H associates such constraints to the NAD models by means of filters, that will be explained below. On the other hand, the definition of abstract pages in the APD is based on a set of XML DTD’s [1]. Both the NAD and the APD capture
Theory of scheduling

Feel lonely? What about reading books? Book is one of the greatest friends to accompany while in your lonely time. When you have no friends and activities somewhere and sometimes, reading book can be a great choice. This is not only for spending the time, it will increase the knowledge. Of course the b=benefits to take will relate to what kind of book that you are reading. And now, we will concern you to try reading theory of scheduling as one of the reading material to finish quickly.
Big Data or Big Fail? The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and the missing role of Statistics

The so called “Big Data” are data which we think as being “big” because of their volume, their amount per unit of time and because they are un- structured. The usual sources of big data are administrative repositories, transaction data or social media and social network feeds. Someone defines big data as those data which cannot be analyzed on a desktop machine or stored on one’s hard disk. These ways of defining big data completely miss the point of view of Statistics: they seem to be tailored more to advertising campaign of SaS or storage solution rather than to Science. Moreover, recent big fails, like e.g. the famous/infamous Google Flu Trend experiment, raised a series of popular news paper articles against the validity of information contained in these data and Statistics itself, even though none of these bad practices has been conducted by statisticians. While Information Technol- ogy and Computer Science are good at efficiently retrive and manage them, these data should be soon brought back into the field of Statistics to where data belong and this Special Issues of EJASA is one important step in this direction.
Performance analysis of discrete-time disturbance observer for second-order systems

The disturbance observer (DOB) has been widely used in high speed and high precision motion control applications. Though most of DOBs have been implemented as the discrete-time form in digital devices, we are still short of the researches on discrete-time DOB in spite of rich references on continuous-time DOB. In this paper, we will discuss the disturbance rejection property and measurement noise effect of a discrete-time DOB. Especially, we focus on revealing the role of sampling time in designing the discrete-time DOB for second order systems. Finally, we show the validity of analysis through simulations and experiments for optical disk drive systems.
Imitation learning at all levels of game-AI

Imitation is a powerful mechanism the human brain applies to extend its repertoire of solutions and behaviors suitable to solve problems of various kinds. From an abstract point of view, the major advantage of this strategy is that it reduces the search space of apropriate solutions. In this contribution, we discuss if and how the principle of imitation learning can facilitate the programing of life-like computer game charecters. We present different algorithms that learn from human generated training data and we show that machine learning can be applied on different levels of cognitive abstraction.
OntoReST: A RST-based Ontology for Maintaining Semantic Consistency in Collaborative Writing

Collaborative writing is the process by which more than one author contributes to the content of a document. Multi-synchronous collaboration is very efficient for reducing task completion time but is known to produce inconsistent documents. Most existing collaborative writing environments do not really check the semantic consistency of documents. They rely on authors to verify the coherence of the document. This introduces a severe overhead for authors to achieve efficient collaboration. To address this lack, we use semantic web technologies and a discourse theory called Rhetorical Structure Theory (RST) to reduce the overhead of consistency checking. We develop {\em OntoReST}, an ontology based on RST that helps detect incoherent texts automatically. \emph{ OntoReST} also provides authors with valuable information about the semantic structure of texts which contributes towards more coherent documents.
ChatVis: A visualization Tool for Instant Messaging

This report presents ChatVis as a 2,800 LOC tool for visualizing activities in instant messaging conversations. The tool visualizes at four different levels, starting from the conversation level down to the message level, the word level and finally the character level. The tool provides means to visualize the typing speed and rhythms of an arbitrary number of conversers. Additionally, it attempts to visualize intangible characteristic of a typed message such as hesitance (uncertainty) and emphasis. ChatVis allows for mouse as well as keyboard interactions to give the user a variety of filtering and zooming options. The system state is always saved allowing for animation through temporal aspects of the conversation. Moreover, the conversation can be persisted to XML and loaded back on demand for comparison purposes amongst different people.
Design and implementation of on-line analytical processing (OLAP) of spatial data

On-line analytical processing (OLAP) has gained its popularity in database industry. With a huge amount of data stored in spatial databases and the introduction of spatial components to many relational or object-relational databases, it is important to study the methods for spatial data warehousing and on-line analytical processing of spatial data. This thesis investigates methods for spatial OLAP, by integration of nonspatial on-line analytical processing (OLAP) methods with spatial database implementation techniques. A spatial data warehouse model, which consists of both spatial and nonspatial dimensions and measures, is proposed. Methods for computation of spatial data cubes and analytical processing on such spatial data cubes are studied, with several strategies proposed, including approximation and partial materialization of the spatial objects resulting from spatial OLAP operations. Some techniques for selective materialization of the spatial computation results are worked out, and the performance study has demonstrated the e ectiveness of these techniques. Spatial OLAP has been partially implemented as a part of GeoMiner, a system prototype for spatial data mining.
System dynamics-background, methodology and applications.2. Applications

For part 2, see ibid., October 1993. System dynamics is a methodology for modelling and redesign of manufacturing, business, and similar systems which are part man, part machine. Some management consultants make extensive use of system dynamics, whilst others do not. Why is this so, and is it primarily an educational problem? The author describes the methodology, traces its history, and shows how it fits into a problem-solving spectrum in between, but overlapping with, system theory and system thinking. He considers what can be done to better exploit system dynamics in the area of improving business competitiveness. The solution proposed is to integrate the use of servotheory within the system dynamics framework. The illustrative example chosen requires the smoothing of material flow within a supply chain via the effective use of all available marketplace information in contrast to acting only on distorted orders passed on by the adjacent echelon. It is concluded that the ideal background for a successful system dynamicist is good experience in both control and industrial engineering.
Computational Methods for the Study of Dynamic Economies

From the Publisher: Macroeconomics increasingly uses stochastic dynamic general equilibrium models to understand theoretical and policy issues. Unless very strong assumptions are made, understanding the properties of particular models requires solving the model using a computer. This volume brings together leading contributors in the field who explain in detail how to implement the computational techniques needed to solve dynamic economics models. A broad spread of techniques are covered, and their application in a wide range of subjects discussed. The book provides the basics of a toolkit which researchers and graduate students can use to solve and analyse their own theoretical models.
A dependently typed language with nontermination

A DEPENDENTLY TYPED LANGUAGE WITH NONTERMINATION Vilhelm Sjoberg Stephanie Weirich We propose a full-spectrum dependently typed programming language, Zombie, which supports general recursion natively. The Zombie implementation is an elaborating typechecker. We prove type saftey for a large subset of the Zombie core language, including features such as computational irrelevance, CBV-reduction, and propositional equality with a heterogeneous, completely erased elimination form. Zombie does not automatically β-reduce expressions, but instead uses congruence closure for proof and type inference. We give a specification of a subset of the surface language via a bidirectional type system, which works “up-to-congruence,” and an algorithm for elaborating expressions in this language to an explicitly typed core language. We prove that our elaboration algorithm is complete with respect to the source type system. Zombie also features an optional termination-checker, allowing nonterminating programs returning proofs as well as external proofs about programs.
Study on Explicit Memory Management for CBEA Green Computing Architecture

Heterogeneous multi-core processors are attractive for power efficient green computing because of their ability to meet varied resource requirements. The multi-level memory hierarchy of Cell Broadband Engine Architecture (CBEA) which requires explicit management by software poses significant challenges to performance increasing and programming. In this paper, with analysis of characteristic of the architecture, we implemented four access methods and a corresponding access library with a uniform memory access interface. Besides getting performance boosts beyond current level technology, the memory access library with uniform access interface could collect profile information of memory management for further performance optimization. Experimental results show the performance of proposed method is better than related works and profile information provided by the method is helpful for programmer to optimize application performance.
Likelihood Functions Synthesis for Multitarget Multiple-Sensor Tracking Applications using GPGPU

One-dimensional interpolation of the bearing function profile using small look-up-table as an alternative for run-time computation using direct formula is proposed in the paper. Computation of profile values is not necessary for large distances because a Gaussian profile is assumed so distance values are zeros. GPGPU are feasible for processing in parallel and are used in tests. The best results are obtained for conditional approach with distance test and look-up table of function profile.
Building Parallel Programs: SMPs, Clusters & Java

Readers learn the craft of designing and building parallel programsspecifically programs that employ multiple processors operating at once to solve a large computational problemwith the clear presentation and fresh, contemporary approach found in Kaminsky's BUILDING PARALLEL PROGRAMS. Written by experienced instructor and industry developer Alan Kaminsky, this book addresses techniques for parallel programming on both major categories of parallel computersSMPs and clusters. Readers gain first-hand experience working with the increasingly popular programming language, Java, as they complete programs from the text written in Java and work with a unique, author-developed Java class library. The book even emphasizes how to use performance metrics in the design of parallel programs, a topic not even addressed in most other texts.
Integrated multichannel wireless biotelemetry system

Wireless telemetry of bioelectric signals, specifically neural recordings, is desirable in many research and clinical applications. These include, but are not limited to: telemetry and recording of neural activity in laboratory animals, telemetry of EEG, telemetry of short-term implanted electrode arrays for epilepsy medical diagnosis, functional electrical stimulation (FES) systems, and implantable neuroprosthetic devices for sensory and command control. The present use of either head-mounted connectors attached to wires in lab animals, or transcutaneous leads for cortical monitoring in clinical patients, is often a major restriction in the effectiveness and duration of the recording process. We report on a fully-integrated design for a 16-channel neural amplifier array combined with a UHF-FM transmitter that would allow near co-location of the amplifier and electrodes as well as eliminate troublesome signal interconnecting wires to remote recording equipment. The power required by the integrated biotelemetry system is sufficiently low to allow transcutaneous power transfer to one or more of these devices via a magnetically-coupled link.