OpenRaiser/Intern-Atlas huggingface dataset:
EMIT: Micro-Invasive Database Configuration Tuning
Venue: arXiv cs.DB 2024
Year: 2024

The process of database knob tuning has always been a challenging task. Recently, database knob tuning methods has emerged as a promising solution to mitigate these issues. However, these methods still face certain limitations.On one hand, when applying knob tuning algorithms to optimize databases in practice, it either requires frequent updates to the database or necessitates acquiring database workload and optimizing through workload replay. The former approach involves constant exploration and updating of database configurations, inevitably leading to a decline in database performance during optimization. The latter, on the other hand, requires the acquisition of workload data, which could lead to data leakage issues. Moreover, the hyperparameter configuration space for database knobs is vast, making it challenging for optimizers to converge. These factors significantly hinder the practical implementation of database tuning. To address these concerns, we proposes an efficient and micro-invasive knob tuning method. This method relies on workload synthesis on cloned databases to simulate the workload that needs tuning, thus minimizing the intrusion on the database. And we utilizing a configuration replacement strategy to filter configuration candidates that perform well under the synthesized workload to find best configuration. And during the tuning process, we employ a knowledge transfer method to extract a common high-performance space, to boost the convergence of the optimizer.
An Information Compensation Framework for Zero-Shot Skeleton-based Action Recognition
Venue: arXiv cs.CV 2024
Year: 2024

Zero-shot human skeleton-based action recognition aims to construct a model that can recognize actions outside the categories seen during training. Previous research has focused on aligning sequences' visual and semantic spatial distributions. However, these methods extract semantic features simply. They ignore that proper prompt design for rich and fine-grained action cues can provide robust representation space clustering. In order to alleviate the problem of insufficient information available for skeleton sequences, we design an information compensation learning framework from an information-theoretic perspective to improve zero-shot action recognition accuracy with a multi-granularity semantic interaction mechanism. Inspired by ensemble learning, we propose a multi-level alignment (MLA) approach to compensate information for action classes. MLA aligns multi-granularity embeddings with visual embedding through a multi-head scoring mechanism to distinguish semantically similar action names and visually similar actions. Furthermore, we introduce a new loss function sampling method to obtain a tight and robust representation. Finally, these multi-granularity semantic embeddings are synthesized to form a proper decision surface for classification. Significant action recognition performance is achieved when evaluated on the challenging NTU RGB+D, NTU RGB+D 120, and PKU-MMD benchmarks and validate that multi-granularity semantic features facilitate the differentiation of action clusters with similar visual features.
A lexicon obtained and validated by a data-driven approach for organic residues valorization in emerging and developing countries
Venue: arXiv cs.IR 2024
Year: 2024

The text mining method presented in this paper was used for annotation of terms related to biological transformation and valorization of organic residues in agriculture in low and middle-income country. Specialized lexicon was obtained through different steps: corpus and extraction of terms, annotation of extracted terms, selection of relevant terms.
Throughput and Link Utilization Improvement in Satellite Networks: A Learning-Enabled Approach
Venue: arXiv cs.NI 2024
Year: 2024

Satellite networks provide communication services to global users with an uneven geographical distribution. In densely populated regions, Inter-satellite links (ISLs) often experience congestion, blocking traffic from other links and leading to low link utilization and throughput. In such cases, delay-tolerant traffic can be withheld by moving satellites and carried to navigate congested areas, thereby mitigating link congestion in densely populated regions. Through rational store-and-forward decision-making, link utilization and throughput can be improved. Building on this foundation, this letter centers its focus on learning-based decision-making for satellite traffic. First, a link load prediction method based on topology isomorphism is proposed. Then, a Markov decision process (MDP) is formulated to model store-and-forward decision-making. To generate store-and-forward policies, we propose reinforcement learning algorithms based on value iteration and Q-Learning. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed method improves throughput and link utilization while consuming less than 20$\%$ of the time required by constraint-based routing.
Unsupervised Neural Motion Retargeting for Humanoid Teleoperation
Venue: arXiv cs.RO 2024
Year: 2024

This study proposes an approach to human-to-humanoid teleoperation using GAN-based online motion retargeting, which obviates the need for the construction of pairwise datasets to identify the relationship between the human and the humanoid kinematics. Consequently, it can be anticipated that our proposed teleoperation system will reduce the complexity and setup requirements typically associated with humanoid controllers, thereby facilitating the development of more accessible and intuitive teleoperation systems for users without robotics knowledge. The experiments demonstrated the efficacy of the proposed method in retargeting a range of upper-body human motions to humanoid, including a body jab motion and a basketball shoot motion. Moreover, the human-in-the-loop teleoperation performance was evaluated by measuring the end-effector position errors between the human and the retargeted humanoid motions. The results demonstrated that the error was comparable to those of conventional motion retargeting methods that require pairwise motion datasets. Finally, a box pick-and-place task was conducted to demonstrate the usability of the developed humanoid teleoperation system.
Freeplane: Unlocking Free Lunch in Triplane-Based Sparse-View Reconstruction Models
Venue: arXiv cs.CV 2024
Year: 2024

Creating 3D assets from single-view images is a complex task that demands a deep understanding of the world. Recently, feed-forward 3D generative models have made significant progress by training large reconstruction models on extensive 3D datasets, with triplanes being the preferred 3D geometry representation. However, effectively utilizing the geometric priors of triplanes, while minimizing artifacts caused by generated inconsistent multi-view images, remains a challenge. In this work, we present \textbf{Fre}quency modulat\textbf{e}d tri\textbf{plane} (\textbf{Freeplane}), a simple yet effective method to improve the generation quality of feed-forward models without additional training. We first analyze the role of triplanes in feed-forward methods and find that the inconsistent multi-view images introduce high-frequency artifacts on triplanes, leading to low-quality 3D meshes. Based on this observation, we propose strategically filtering triplane features and combining triplanes before and after filtering to produce high-quality textured meshes. These techniques incur no additional cost and can be seamlessly integrated into pre-trained feed-forward models to enhance their robustness against the inconsistency of generated multi-view images. Both qualitative and quantitative results demonstrate that our method improves the performance of feed-forward models by simply modulating triplanes. All you need is to modulate the triplanes during inference.
Shared-unique Features and Task-aware Prioritized Sampling on Multi-task Reinforcement Learning
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2024
Year: 2024

We observe that current state-of-the-art (SOTA) methods suffer from the performance imbalance issue when performing multi-task reinforcement learning (MTRL) tasks. While these methods may achieve impressive performance on average, they perform extremely poorly on a few tasks. To address this, we propose a new and effective method called STARS, which consists of two novel strategies: a shared-unique feature extractor and task-aware prioritized sampling. First, the shared-unique feature extractor learns both shared and task-specific features to enable better synergy of knowledge between different tasks. Second, the task-aware sampling strategy is combined with the prioritized experience replay for efficient learning on tasks with poor performance. The effectiveness and stability of our STARS are verified through experiments on the mainstream Meta-World benchmark. From the results, our STARS statistically outperforms current SOTA methods and alleviates the performance imbalance issue. Besides, we visualize the learned features to support our claims and enhance the interpretability of STARS.
IENE: Identifying and Extrapolating the Node Environment for Out-of-Distribution Generalization on Graphs
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2024
Year: 2024

Due to the performance degradation of graph neural networks (GNNs) under distribution shifts, the work on out-of-distribution (OOD) generalization on graphs has received widespread attention. A novel perspective involves distinguishing potential confounding biases from different environments through environmental identification, enabling the model to escape environmentally-sensitive correlations and maintain stable performance under distribution shifts. However, in graph data, confounding factors not only affect the generation process of node features but also influence the complex interaction between nodes. We observe that neglecting either aspect of them will lead to a decrease in performance. In this paper, we propose IENE, an OOD generalization method on graphs based on node-level environmental identification and extrapolation techniques. It strengthens the model's ability to extract invariance from two granularities simultaneously, leading to improved generalization. Specifically, to identify invariance in features, we utilize the disentangled information bottleneck framework to achieve mutual promotion between node-level environmental estimation and invariant feature learning. Furthermore, we extrapolate topological environments through graph augmentation techniques to identify structural invariance. We implement the conceptual method with specific algorithms and provide theoretical analysis and proofs for our approach. Extensive experimental evaluations on two synthetic and four real-world OOD datasets validate the superiority of IENE, which outperforms existing techniques and provides a flexible framework for enhancing the generalization of GNNs.
The Embodied World Model Based on LLM with Visual Information and Prediction-Oriented Prompts
Venue: arXiv cs.AI 2024
Year: 2024

In recent years, as machine learning, particularly for vision and language understanding, has been improved, research in embedded AI has also evolved. VOYAGER is a well-known LLM-based embodied AI that enables autonomous exploration in the Minecraft world, but it has issues such as underutilization of visual data and insufficient functionality as a world model. In this research, the possibility of utilizing visual data and the function of LLM as a world model were investigated with the aim of improving the performance of embodied AI. The experimental results revealed that LLM can extract necessary information from visual data, and the utilization of the information improves its performance as a world model. It was also suggested that devised prompts could bring out the LLM's function as a world model.
Extrapolability Improvement of Machine Learning-Based Evapotranspiration Models via Domain-Adversarial Neural Networks
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2024
Year: 2024

Machine learning-based hydrological prediction models, despite their high accuracy, face limitations in extrapolation capabilities when applied globally due to uneven data distribution. This study integrates Domain-Adversarial Neural Networks (DANN) to improve the geographical adaptability of evapotranspiration (ET) models. By employing DANN, we aim to mitigate distributional discrepancies between different sites, significantly enhancing the model's extrapolation capabilities. Our results show that DANN improves ET prediction accuracy with an average increase in the Kling-Gupta Efficiency (KGE) of 0.2 to 0.3 compared to the traditional Leave-One-Out (LOO) method. DANN is particularly effective for isolated sites and transition zones between biomes, reducing data distribution discrepancies and avoiding low-accuracy predictions. By leveraging information from data-rich areas, DANN enhances the reliability of global-scale ET products, especially in ungauged regions. This study highlights the potential of domain adaptation techniques to improve the extrapolation and generalization capabilities of machine learning models in hydrological studies.
Imitating the Functionality of Image-to-Image Models Using a Single Example
Venue: arXiv cs.CV 2024
Year: 2024

We study the possibility of imitating the functionality of an image-to-image translation model by observing input-output pairs. We focus on cases where training the model from scratch is impossible, either because training data are unavailable or because the model architecture is unknown. This is the case, for example, with commercial models for biological applications. Since the development of these models requires large investments, their owners commonly keep them confidential, and reveal only a few input-output examples on the company's website or in an academic paper. Surprisingly, we find that even a single example typically suffices for learning to imitate the model's functionality, and that this can be achieved using a simple distillation approach. We present an extensive ablation study encompassing a wide variety of model architectures, datasets and tasks, to characterize the factors affecting vulnerability to functionality imitation, and provide a preliminary theoretical discussion on the reasons for this unwanted behavior.
FOCUS: Forging Originality through Contrastive Use in Self-Plagiarism for Language Models
Venue: arXiv cs.CL 2024
Year: 2024

Pre-trained Language Models (PLMs) have shown impressive results in various Natural Language Generation (NLG) tasks, such as powering chatbots and generating stories. However, an ethical concern arises due to their potential to produce verbatim copies of paragraphs from their training data. This is problematic as PLMs are trained on corpora constructed by human authors. As such, there is a pressing need for research to promote the generation of original content by these models. In this study, we introduce a unique "self-plagiarism" contrastive decoding strategy, aimed at boosting the originality of text produced by PLMs. Our method entails modifying prompts in LLMs to develop an amateur model and a professional model. Specifically, the amateur model is urged to plagiarize using three plagiarism templates we have designed, while the professional model maintains its standard language model status. This strategy employs prompts to stimulate the model's capacity to identify non-original candidate token combinations and subsequently impose penalties. The application of this strategy is integrated prior to the model's final layer, ensuring smooth integration with most existing PLMs (T5, GPT, LLaMA) without necessitating further adjustments. Implementing our strategy, we observe a significant decline in non-original sequences comprised of more than three words in the academic AASC dataset and the story-based ROCStories dataset.
The Power of Summary-Source Alignments
Venue: arXiv cs.CL 2024
Year: 2024

Multi-document summarization (MDS) is a challenging task, often decomposed to subtasks of salience and redundancy detection, followed by text generation. In this context, alignment of corresponding sentences between a reference summary and its source documents has been leveraged to generate training data for some of the component tasks. Yet, this enabling alignment step has usually been applied heuristically on the sentence level on a limited number of subtasks. In this paper, we propose extending the summary-source alignment framework by (1) applying it at the more fine-grained proposition span level, (2) annotating alignment manually in a multi-document setup, and (3) revealing the great potential of summary-source alignments to yield several datasets for at least six different tasks. Specifically, for each of the tasks, we release a manually annotated test set that was derived automatically from the alignment annotation. We also release development and train sets in the same way, but from automatically derived alignments. Using the datasets, each task is demonstrated with baseline models and corresponding evaluation metrics to spur future research on this broad challenge.
An Iris for Expected Cost Analysis
Venue: arXiv cs.PL 2024
Year: 2024

We present ExpIris, a separation logic framework for the (amortized) expected cost analysis of probabilistic programs. ExpIris is based on Iris, parametric in the language and the cost model, and supports both imperative and functional languages, concurrency, higher-order functions and higher-order state. ExpIris also offers strong support for correctness reasoning, which greatly eases the analysis of programs whose expected cost depends on their high-level behavior. To enable expected cost reasoning in Iris, we build on the expected potential method. The method provides a kind of "currency" that can be used for paying for later operations, and can be distributed over the probabilistic cases whenever there is a probabilistic choice, preserving the expected value due to the linearity of expectations. We demonstrate ExpIris by verifying the expected runtime of a quicksort implementation and the amortized expected runtime of a probabilistic binary counter.
Visual place recognition for aerial imagery: A survey
Venue: arXiv cs.CV 2024
Year: 2024

Aerial imagery and its direct application to visual localization is an essential problem for many Robotics and Computer Vision tasks. While Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) are the standard default solution for solving the aerial localization problem, it is subject to a number of limitations, such as, signal instability or solution unreliability that make this option not so desirable. Consequently, visual geolocalization is emerging as a viable alternative. However, adapting Visual Place Recognition (VPR) task to aerial imagery presents significant challenges, including weather variations and repetitive patterns. Current VPR reviews largely neglect the specific context of aerial data. This paper introduces a methodology tailored for evaluating VPR techniques specifically in the domain of aerial imagery, providing a comprehensive assessment of various methods and their performance. However, we not only compare various VPR methods, but also demonstrate the importance of selecting appropriate zoom and overlap levels when constructing map tiles to achieve maximum efficiency of VPR algorithms in the case of aerial imagery. The code is available on our GitHub repository -- https://github.com/prime-slam/aero-vloc.
Bringing active learning, experimentation, and student-created videos in engineering: A study about teaching electronics and physical computing integrating online and mobile learning
Venue: arXiv cs.CY 2024
Year: 2024

Active Learning (AL) is a well-known teaching method in engineering because it allows to foster learning and critical thinking of the students by employing debate, hands-on activities, and experimentation. However, most educational results of this instructional method have been achieved in face-to-face educational settings and less has been said about how to promote AL and experimentation for online engineering education. Then, the main aim of this study was to create an AL methodology to learn electronics, physical computing (PhyC), programming, and basic robotics in engineering through hands-on activities and active experimentation in online environments. N=56 students of two engineering programs (Technology in Electronics and Industrial Engineering) participated in the methodology that was conceived using the guidelines of the Integrated Course Design Model (ICDM) and in some courses combining mobile and online learning with an Android app. The methodology gathered three main components: (1) In-home laboratories performed through low-cost hardware devices, (2) Student-created videos and blogs to evidence the development of skills, and (3) Teacher support and feedback. Data in the courses were collected through surveys, evaluation rubrics, semi-structured interviews, and students grades and were analyzed through a mixed approach. The outcomes indicate a good perception of the PhyC and programming activities by the students and suggest that these influence motivation, self-efficacy, reduction of anxiety, and improvement of academic performance in the courses. The methodology and previous results can be useful for researchers and practitioners interested in developing AL methodologies or strategies in engineering with online, mobile, or blended learning modalities.
Boosting Sortition via Proportional Representation
Venue: arXiv cs.GT 2024
Year: 2024

Sortition is based on the idea of choosing randomly selected representatives for decision making. The main properties that make sortition particularly appealing are fairness -- all the citizens can be selected with the same probability -- and proportional representation -- a randomly selected panel probably reflects the composition of the whole population. When a population lies on a representation metric, we formally define proportional representation by using a notion called the core. A panel is in the core if no group of individuals is underrepresented proportional to its size. While uniform selection is fair, it does not always return panels that are in the core. Thus, we ask if we can design a selection algorithm that satisfies fairness and ex post core simultaneously. We answer this question affirmatively and present an efficient selection algorithm that is fair and provides a constant-factor approximation to the optimal ex post core. Moreover, we show that uniformly random selection satisfies a constant-factor approximation to the optimal ex ante core. We complement our theoretical results by conducting experiments with real data.
Robustness of Practical Perceptual Hashing Algorithms to Hash-Evasion and Hash-Inversion Attacks
Venue: arXiv cs.CR 2024
Year: 2024

Perceptual hashing algorithms (PHAs) are widely used for identifying illegal online content and are thus integral to various sensitive applications. However, due to their hasty deployment in real-world scenarios, their adversarial security has not been thoroughly evaluated. This paper assesses the security of three widely utilized PHAs - PhotoDNA, PDQ, and NeuralHash - against hash-evasion and hash-inversion attacks. Contrary to existing literature, our findings indicate that these PHAs demonstrate significant robustness against such attacks. We provide an explanation for these differing results, highlighting that the inherent robustness is partially due to the random hash variations characteristic of PHAs. Additionally, we propose a defense method that enhances security by intentionally introducing perturbations into the hashes.