title: The design of an optimistic AND-parallel Prolog

authors: Cleary, John G.

subjects: Computer Science

abstract: A distributed AND-parallel Prolog implementation is described.  The system can correctly handle all pure Prolog programs.  In particular, it deals with the problem of distributed backtracking.  Conflicts in variable bindings are resolved by assigning a time value to every unification. Bindings with smaller time values are given precedence over those with larger time values.  The algorithm is based on the optimistic Time Warp system, with Prolog-specific optimizations.  The optimizations include two new unification algorithms that permit unification and backtracking in any order.  The result is a system which can fully exploit the parallelism available in both dependent and independent AND-parallelism.

text: The design of an optimistic AND-parallel Prolog A distributed AND-parallel Prolog implementation is described.  The system can correctly handle all pure Prolog programs.  In particular, it deals with the problem of distributed backtracking.  Conflicts in variable bindings are resolved by assigning a time value to every unification. Bindings with smaller time values are given precedence over those with larger time values.  The algorithm is based on the optimistic Time Warp system, with Prolog-specific optimizations.  The optimizations include two new unification algorithms that permit unification and backtracking in any order.  The result is a system which can fully exploit the parallelism available in both dependent and independent AND-parallelism.

year: 1993-10

title: Children’s query formulation and search result exploration

authors: Vanderschantz, Nicholas

subjects: computer science

abstract: Our research aims at understanding children’s information search and their use of information search tools during educational pursuits. We conducted an observation study with 50 New Zealand school children between the ages of 9 and 13 years old. In particular, we studied the way that children constructed search queries and interacted with the Google search engine when undertaking a range of educationally appropriate inquiry tasks. As a result of this in situ study, we identified typical query-creation and query-reformulation strategies that children use. The children worked through 250 tasks, and created a total of 550 search queries. 64.4% of the successful queries made were natural language queries compared to only 35.6% keyword queries. Only three children used the related searches feature of the search engine, while 46 children used query suggestions. We gained insights into the information search strategies children use during their educational pursuits. We observed a range of issues that children encountered when interacting with a search engine to create searches as well as to triage and explore information in the search engine results page lists. We found that search tasks posed as questions were more likely to result in query constructions based on natural language questions, while tasks posed as instructions were more likely to result in query constructions using natural language sentences or keywords. Our findings have implications for both educators and search engine designers.

text: Children’s query formulation and search result exploration Our research aims at understanding children’s information search and their use of information search tools during educational pursuits. We conducted an observation study with 50 New Zealand school children between the ages of 9 and 13 years old. In particular, we studied the way that children constructed search queries and interacted with the Google search engine when undertaking a range of educationally appropriate inquiry tasks. As a result of this in situ study, we identified typical query-creation and query-reformulation strategies that children use. The children worked through 250 tasks, and created a total of 550 search queries. 64.4% of the successful queries made were natural language queries compared to only 35.6% keyword queries. Only three children used the related searches feature of the search engine, while 46 children used query suggestions. We gained insights into the information search strategies children use during their educational pursuits. We observed a range of issues that children encountered when interacting with a search engine to create searches as well as to triage and explore information in the search engine results page lists. We found that search tasks posed as questions were more likely to result in query constructions based on natural language questions, while tasks posed as instructions were more likely to result in query constructions using natural language sentences or keywords. Our findings have implications for both educators and search engine designers.

year: 2021

title: End-user informed demographic projections for Hamilton up to 2041

authors: Cameron, Michael Patrick

subjects: cohort component model

abstract: This report provides a set of projections of the population of Hamilton City and the larger Hamilton Zone. The projections have been calculated by means of the cohort component model. The projections can be considered alongside official Statistics New Zealand projections, but differ from the latter in terms of assumptions made about net migration. These assumptions constitute a number of scenarios that were informed by the Hamilton City Council and local consultations. These scenarios are linked to the potential impact of a number of economic development activities. The report also contains projections of the number of households, the labour force and two ethnic groups: Māori and New Zealand Europeans. In addition, a dwellings-based methodology is used to produce small area (Census Area Unit) projections. Across the scenarios, Hamilton City’s projected population growth over the next two decades ranges from 13.8 percent to 36.0 percent. This is between 1.5 to 12.2 percentage points higher than the corresponding projected national growth.

text: End-user informed demographic projections for Hamilton up to 2041 This report provides a set of projections of the population of Hamilton City and the larger Hamilton Zone. The projections have been calculated by means of the cohort component model. The projections can be considered alongside official Statistics New Zealand projections, but differ from the latter in terms of assumptions made about net migration. These assumptions constitute a number of scenarios that were informed by the Hamilton City Council and local consultations. These scenarios are linked to the potential impact of a number of economic development activities. The report also contains projections of the number of households, the labour force and two ethnic groups: Māori and New Zealand Europeans. In addition, a dwellings-based methodology is used to produce small area (Census Area Unit) projections. Across the scenarios, Hamilton City’s projected population growth over the next two decades ranges from 13.8 percent to 36.0 percent. This is between 1.5 to 12.2 percentage points higher than the corresponding projected national growth.

year: 2007-12