OpenRaiser/Intern-Atlas huggingface dataset:
Is Patent Law Technology Specific?
Venue: arXiv cs.CY 2001
Year: 2001

Although patent law purports to cover all manner of technologies, we have noticed recent divergence in the standards applied to biotechnology and to software patents: the Federal Circuit has applied a very permissive standard of obviousness in biotechnology, but a highly restrictive disclosure requirement. The opposite holds true for software patents, which seems to us exactly contrary to sound policy for either industry. These patent standards are grounded in the legal fiction of the "person having ordinary skill in the art" or PHOSITA. We discuss the appropriateness of the PHOSITA standard, concluding that it properly lends flexibility to the patent system. We then discuss the difficulty of applying this standard in different industries, offering suggestions as to how it might be modified to avoid the problems seen in biotechnology and software patents.
Inventing E-Regulation in the US, EU and East Asia: Conflicting Social Visions of the Internet & the Information Society
Venue: arXiv cs.CY 2001
Year: 2001

This paper attempts to assess the international approach to Internet policy in the context of distinctive socio-political frameworks evolving in the US, the European Union (EU), and East Asia. The comparative review will develop a set of underlying structural models of the Information Society particular to each region, along with an analysis of their defining characteristics in relation to one another. This examination demonstrates how each region, given its regulatory legacy, has elected a different mix of good and bad socio-political choices in public policy for the Internet. Despite the range and diversity of paths to e-regulation suggested in these choices, none adequately addresses the underlying issue of how to promote an innovative society that is open to broad social participation. The paper evaluates principal weaknesses in these regional models of Internet policy and argues the need for re-conceptualizing the cultural, political and economic approach to the new information space of the Internet.
Electronic Commerce, Consumer Search and Retailing Cost Reduction
Venue: arXiv cs.HC 2001
Year: 2001

This paper explains four things in a unified way. First, how e-commerce can generate price equilibria where physical shops either compete with virtual shops for consumers with Internet access, or alternatively, sell only to consumers with no Internet access. Second, how these price equilibria might involve price dispersion on-line. Third, why prices may be higher on-line. Fourth, why established firms can, but need not, be more reluctant than newly created firm to adopt e-commerce. For this purpose we develop a model where e-commerce reduces consumers' search costs, involves trade-offs for consumers, and reduces retailing costs.
Variable and Value Ordering When Solving Balanced Academic Curriculum Problems
Venue: arXiv cs.PL 2001
Year: 2001

In this paper we present the use of Constraint Programming for solving balanced academic curriculum problems. We discuss the important role that heuristics play when solving a problem using a constraint-based approach. We also show how constraint solving techniques allow to very efficiently solve combinatorial optimization problems that are too hard for integer programming techniques.
The Minimum Expectation Selection Problem
Venue: arXiv cs.DS 2001
Year: 2001

We define the min-min expectation selection problem (resp. max-min expectation selection problem) to be that of selecting k out of n given discrete probability distributions, to minimize (resp. maximize) the expectation of the minimum value resulting when independent random variables are drawn from the selected distributions. We assume each distribution has finitely many atoms. Let d be the number of distinct values in the support of the distributions. We show that if d is a constant greater than 2, the min-min expectation problem is NP-complete but admits a fully polynomial time approximation scheme. For d an arbitrary integer, it is NP-hard to approximate the min-min expectation problem with any constant approximation factor. The max-min expectation problem is polynomially solvable for constant d; we leave open its complexity for variable d. We also show similar results for binary selection problems in which we must choose one distribution from each of n pairs of distributions.
The Open Language Archives Community and Asian Language Resources
Venue: arXiv cs.CL 2001
Year: 2001

The Open Language Archives Community (OLAC) is a new project to build a worldwide system of federated language archives based on the Open Archives Initiative and the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative. This paper aims to disseminate the OLAC vision to the language resources community in Asia, and to show language technologists and linguists how they can document their tools and data in such a way that others can easily discover them. We describe OLAC and the OLAC Metadata Set, then discuss two key issues in the Asian context: language classification and multilingual resource classification.
Richer Syntactic Dependencies for Structured Language Modeling
Venue: arXiv cs.CL 2001
Year: 2001

The paper investigates the use of richer syntactic dependencies in the structured language model (SLM). We present two simple methods of enriching the dependencies in the syntactic parse trees used for intializing the SLM. We evaluate the impact of both methods on the perplexity (PPL) and word-error-rate(WER, N-best rescoring) performance of the SLM. We show that the new model achieves an improvement in PPL and WER over the baseline results reported using the SLM on the UPenn Treebank and Wall Street Journal (WSJ) corpora, respectively.
Limits To Certainty in QoS Pricing and Bandwidth
Venue: arXiv cs.CY 2001
Year: 2001

Advanced services require more reliable bandwidth than currently provided by the Internet Protocol, even with the reliability enhancements provided by TCP. More reliable bandwidth will be provided through QoS (quality of service), as currently discussed widely. Yet QoS has some implications beyond providing ubiquitous access to advance Internet service, which are of interest from a policy perspective. In particular, what are the implications for price of Internet services? Further, how will these changes impact demand and universal service for the Internet. This paper explores the relationship between certainty of bandwidth and certainty of price for Internet services over a statistically shared network and finds that these are mutually exclusive goals.
New approach for network monitoring and intrusion detection
Venue: arXiv cs.CR 2001
Year: 2001

The approach for a network behavior description in terms of numerical time-dependant functions of the protocol parameters is suggested. This provides a basis for application of methods of mathematical and theoretical physics for information flow analysis on network and for extraction of patterns of typical network behavior. The information traffic can be described as a trajectory in multi-dimensional parameter-time space with dimension about 10-12. Based on this study some algorithms for the proposed intrusion detection system are discussed.
Mixed-Initiative Interaction = Mixed Computation
Venue: arXiv cs.PL 2001
Year: 2001

We show that partial evaluation can be usefully viewed as a programming model for realizing mixed-initiative functionality in interactive applications. Mixed-initiative interaction between two participants is one where the parties can take turns at any time to change and steer the flow of interaction. We concentrate on the facet of mixed-initiative referred to as `unsolicited reporting' and demonstrate how out-of-turn interactions by users can be modeled by `jumping ahead' to nested dialogs (via partial evaluation). Our approach permits the view of dialog management systems in terms of their native support for staging and simplifying interactions; we characterize three different voice-based interaction technologies using this viewpoint. In particular, we show that the built-in form interpretation algorithm (FIA) in the VoiceXML dialog management architecture is actually a (well disguised) combination of an interpreter and a partial evaluator.
On Equivalence and Canonical Forms in the LF Type Theory
Venue: arXiv cs.LO 2001
Year: 2001

Decidability of definitional equality and conversion of terms into canonical form play a central role in the meta-theory of a type-theoretic logical framework. Most studies of definitional equality are based on a confluent, strongly-normalizing notion of reduction. Coquand has considered a different approach, directly proving the correctness of a practical equivalance algorithm based on the shape of terms. Neither approach appears to scale well to richer languages with unit types or subtyping, and neither directly addresses the problem of conversion to canonical. In this paper we present a new, type-directed equivalence algorithm for the LF type theory that overcomes the weaknesses of previous approaches. The algorithm is practical, scales to richer languages, and yields a new notion of canonical form sufficient for adequate encodings of logical systems. The algorithm is proved complete by a Kripke-style logical relations argument similar to that suggested by Coquand. Crucially, both the algorithm itself and the logical relations rely only on the shapes of types, ignoring dependencies on terms.
Counting is Easy
Venue: arXiv cs.CC 2001
Year: 2001

For any fixed $k$, a remarkably simple single-tape Turing machine can simulate $k$ independent counters in real time. Informally, a counter is a storage unit that maintains a single integer (initially 0), incrementing it, decrementing it, or reporting its sign (positive, negative, or zero) on command. Any automaton that responds to each successive command as a counter would is said to simulate a counter. (Only for a sign inquiry is the response of interest, of course. And zeroness is the only real issue, since a simulator can readily use zero detection to keep track of positivity and negativity in finite-state control. In this paper we describe a remarkably simple real-time simulation, based on just five simple rewriting rules, of any fixed number $k$ of independent counters. On a Turing machine with a single, binary work tape, the simulation runs in real time, handling an arbitrary counter command at each step. The space used by the simulation can be held to $(k+ε) \log_2 n$ bits for the first $n$ commands, for any specified $ε> 0$.
Mragyati : A System for Keyword-based Searching in Databases
Venue: arXiv cs.DB 2001
Year: 2001

The web, through many search engine sites, has popularized the keyword-based search paradigm, where a user can specify a string of keywords and expect to retrieve relevant documents, possibly ranked by their relevance to the query. Since a lot of information is stored in databases (and not as HTML documents), it is important to provide a similar search paradigm for databases, where users can query a database without knowing the database schema and database query languages such as SQL. In this paper, we propose such a database search system, which accepts a free-form query as a collection of keywords, translates it into queries on the database using the database metadata, and presents query results in a well-structured and browsable form. Th eysytem maps keywords onto the database schema and uses inter-relationships (i.e., data semantics) among the referred tables to generate meaningful query results. We also describe our prototype for database search, called Mragyati. Th eapproach proposed here is scalable, as it does not build an in-memory graph of the entire database for searching for relationships among the objects selected by the user's query.
The Delay-Insensitivity, the Hazard-Freedom, the Semi-Modularity and the Technical Condition of Good Running of the Discrete Time Asynchronous Automata
Venue: arXiv cs.LO 2001
Year: 2001

The paper studies some important properties of the asynchronous (=timed) automata: the delay-insensitivity, the hazard-freedom, the semi-modularity and the technical condition of good running. Time is discrete.
Proliferation of SDDS Support for Various Platforms and Languages
Venue: arXiv cs.DB 2001
Year: 2001

Since Self-Describing Data Sets (SDDS) were first introduced, the source code has been ported to many different operating systems and various languages. SDDS is now available in C, Tcl, Java, Fortran, and Python. All of these versions are supported on Solaris, Linux, and Windows. The C version of SDDS is also supported on VxWorks. With the recent addition of the Java port, SDDS can now be deployed on virtually any operating system. Due to this proliferation, SDDS files serve to link not only a collection of C programs, but programs and scripts in many languages on different operating systems. The platform independent binary feature of SDDS also facilitates portability among operating systems. This paper presents an overview of various benefits of SDDS platform interoperability.
Application Software Structure Enables Nif Operations Kirby W. Fong
Venue: arXiv cs.SE 2001
Year: 2001

The NIF Integrated Computer Control System (ICCS) application software uses a set of service frameworks that assures uniform behavior spanning the front-end processors (FEPs) and supervisor programs. This uniformity is visible both in the way each program employs shared services and in the flexibility it affords for attaching graphical user interfaces (GUIs). Uniformity of structure across applications is desired for the benefit of programmers who will be maintaining the many programs that constitute the ICCS. In this paper, the framework components that have the greatest impact on the application structure are discussed.
Gemini MCAO Control System
Venue: arXiv cs.OH 2001
Year: 2001

The Gemini Observatory is planning to implement a Multi Conjugate Adaptive Optics (MCAO) System as a facility instrument for the Gemini-South telescope. The system will include 5 Laser Guide Stars, 3 Natural Guide Stars, and 3 Deformable mirrors optically conjugated at different altitudes to achieve near-uniform atmospheric compensation over a 1 arc minute square field of view. The control of such a system will be split into 3 main functions: the control of the opto-mechanical assemblies of the whole system (including the Laser, the Beam Transfer Optics and the Adaptive Optics bench), the control of the Adaptive Optics System itself at a rate of 800FPS and the control of the safety system. The control of the Adaptive Optics System is the most critical in terms of real time performances. The control system will be an EPICS based system. In this paper, we will describe the requirements for the whole MCAO control system, preliminary designs for the control of the opto-mechanical devices and architecture options for the control of the Adaptive Optics system and the safety system.
System Integration of High Level Applications during the Commissioning of the Swiss Light Source
Venue: arXiv cs.SE 2001
Year: 2001

The commissioning of the Swiss Light Source (SLS) started in Feb. 2000 with the Linac, continued in May 2000 with the booster synchrotron and by Dec. 2000 first light in the storage ring were produced. The first four beam lines had to be operational by August 2001. The thorough integration of all subsystems to the control system and a high level of automation was prerequisite to meet the tight time schedule. A careful balanced distribution of functionality into high level and low level applications allowed an optimization of short development cycles and high reliability of the applications. High level applications were implemented as CORBA based client/server applications (tcl/tk and Java based clients, C++ based servers), IDL applications using EZCA, medm/dm2k screens and tcl/tk applications using CDEV. Low level applications were mainly built as EPICS process databases, SNL state machines and customized drivers. Functionality of the high level application was encapsulated and pushed to lower levels whenever it has proven to be adequate. That enabled to reduce machine setups to a handful of physical parameters and allow the usage of standard EPICS tools for display, archiving and processing of complex physical values. High reliability and reproducibility were achieved with that approach.
Distributed Control System for the Test Interferometer of the ALMA Project
Venue: arXiv cs.DC 2001
Year: 2001

The control system (TICS) for the test interferometer being built to support the development of the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA)will itself be a prototype for the final ALMA array, providing a test for the distributed control system under development. TICS will be based on the ALMA Common Software (ACS) (developed at the European Southern Observatory), which provides CORBA-based services and a device management framework for the control software. Simple device controllers will run on single board computers, one of which (known as an LCU) is located at each antenna; whereas complex, compound device controllers may run on centrally located computers. In either circumstance, client programs may obtain direct CORBA references to the devices and their properties. Monitor and control requests are sent to devices or properties, which then process and forward the commands to the appropriate hardware devices as required. Timing requirements are met by tagging commands with (future) timestamps synchronized to a timing pulse, which is regulated by a central reference generator, and is distributed to all hardware devices in the array. Monitoring is provided through a publish/subscribe CORBA-based service.
Experiences with advanced CORBA services
Venue: arXiv cs.PF 2001
Year: 2001

The Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA) is successfully used in many control systems (CS) for data transfer and device modeling. Communication rates below 1 millisecond, high reliability, scalability, language independence and other features make it very attractive. For common types of applications like error logging, alarm messaging or slow monitoring, one can benefit from standard CORBA services that are implemented by third parties and save tremendous amount of developing time. We have started using few CORBA services on our previous CORBA-based control system for the light source ANKA [1] and use now several CORBA services for the ALMA Common Software (ACS) [2], the core of the control system of the Atacama Large Millimeter Array. Our experiences with the interface repository (IFR), the implementation repository, the naming service, the property service, telecom log service and the notify service from different vendors are presented. Performance and scalability benchmarks have been performed.
Combining Propagation Information and Search Tree Visualization using ILOG OPL Studio
Venue: arXiv cs.PL 2001
Year: 2001

In this paper we give an overview of the current state of the graphical features provided by ILOG OPL Studio for debugging and performance tuning of OPL programs or external ILOG Solver based applications. This paper focuses on combining propagation and search information using the Search Tree view and the Propagation Spy. A new synthetic view is presented: the Christmas Tree, which combines the Search Tree view with statistics on the efficiency of the domain reduction and on the number of the propagation events triggered.
Prototyping CLP(FD) Tracers: a Trace Model and an Experimental Validation Environment
Venue: arXiv cs.PL 2001
Year: 2001

Developing and maintaining CLP programs requires visualization and explanation tools. However, existing tools are built in an ad hoc way. Therefore porting tools from one platform to another is very difficult. We have shown in previous work that, from a fine-grained execution trace, a number of interesting views about logic program executions could be generated by trace analysis. In this article, we propose a trace model for constraint solving by narrowing. This trace model is the first one proposed for CLP(FD) and does not pretend to be the ultimate one. We also propose an instrumented meta-interpreter in order to experiment with the model. Furthermore, we show that the proposed trace model contains the necessary information to build known and useful execution views. This work sets the basis for generic execution analysis of CLP(FD) programs.
The Overview of the National Ignition Facility Distributed Computer Control System
Venue: arXiv cs.SE 2001
Year: 2001

The Integrated Computer Control System (ICCS) for the National Ignition Facility (NIF) is a layered architecture of 300 front-end processors (FEP) coordinated by supervisor subsystems including automatic beam alignment and wavefront control, laser and target diagnostics, pulse power, and shot control timed to 30 ps. FEP computers incorporate either VxWorks on PowerPC or Solaris on UltraSPARC processors that interface to over 45,000 control points attached to VME-bus or PCI-bus crates respectively. Typical devices are stepping motors, transient digitizers, calorimeters, and photodiodes. The front-end layer is divided into another segment comprised of an additional 14,000 control points for industrial controls including vacuum, argon, synthetic air, and safety interlocks implemented with Allen-Bradley programmable logic controllers (PLCs). The computer network is augmented asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) that delivers video streams from 500 sensor cameras monitoring the 192 laser beams to operator workstations. Software is based on an object-oriented framework using CORBA distribution that incorporates services for archiving, machine configuration, graphical user interface, monitoring, event logging, scripting, alert management, and access control. Software coding using a mixed language environment of Ada95 and Java is one-third complete at over 300 thousand source lines. Control system installation is currently under way for the first 8 beams, with project completion scheduled for 2008.
A Computational Economy for Grid Computing and its Implementation in the Nimrod-G Resource Brok
Venue: arXiv cs.DC 2001
Year: 2001

Computational Grids, coupling geographically distributed resources such as PCs, workstations, clusters, and scientific instruments, have emerged as a next generation computing platform for solving large-scale problems in science, engineering, and commerce. However, application development, resource management, and scheduling in these environments continue to be a complex undertaking. In this article, we discuss our efforts in developing a resource management system for scheduling computations on resources distributed across the world with varying quality of service. Our service-oriented grid computing system called Nimrod-G manages all operations associated with remote execution including resource discovery, trading, scheduling based on economic principles and a user defined quality of service requirement. The Nimrod-G resource broker is implemented by leveraging existing technologies such as Globus, and provides new services that are essential for constructing industrial-strength Grids. We discuss results of preliminary experiments on scheduling some parametric computations using the Nimrod-G resource broker on a world-wide grid testbed that spans five continents.