omniomni/omni-engineering huggingface dataset:
Perpetual beta. Perpetual beta is the keeping of software or a system at the beta development stage for an extended or indefinite period of time. It is often used by developers when they continue to release new features that might not be fully tested. Perpetual beta software is not recommended for mission critical machines. However, many operational systems find this to be a much more rapid and agile approach to development, staging, and deployment.

Definition

Perpetual beta has come to be associated with the development and release of a service in which constant updates are the foundation for the habitability or usability of a service.  According to publisher and open source advocate Tim O'Reilly:

Users must be treated as co-developers, in a reflection of open source development practices (even if the software in question is unlikely to be released under an open source license.) The open source dictum, "release early and release often", in fact has morphed into an even more radical position, "the perpetual beta", in which the product is developed in the open, with new features slipstreamed in on a monthly, weekly, or even daily basis. It's no accident that services such as Gmail, Google Maps, Flickr, del.icio.us, and the like may be expected to bear a "Beta" logo for years at a time.

Used in the larger conversation of what defines Web 2.0, O'Reilly described the concept of perpetual beta as part of a customized Internet environment with these applications as distinguishing characteristics:

 Services, not packaged software, with cost-effective scalability.
 Control over unique, hard-to-recreate data sources that get richer as more people use them.
 Trusting users as co-developers.
 Harnessing collective intelligence.
 Leveraging the long tail through customer self-service.
 Software above the level of a single device.
 Lightweight user interfaces, development models, and business models.However, the Internet and the development of open source programs have changed the role of the (end) user. He often does not receive a finished product, but a service that can be called up via the network. Appropriate adaptations of the programs and regular updates are often included. For some program developers, the terms Continuous Beta or Perpetual Beta (both English/Latin/Greek loosely translated for permanent preliminary version or colloquially for permanent banana product) have become commonplace. The user is to be regarded thereby as Mitentwickler (English Co-Developer) in the process of the advancement of a program.

See also
Continuous improvement process

References

Web 2.0 neologisms
Software release
Rotten stone. Rotten stone, sometimes spelled as rottenstone, also known as tripoli, is fine powdered porous rock used as a polishing abrasive for metal smithing, historically for the grinding of optical lenses and in woodworking. It is usually weathered limestone mixed with diatomaceous, amorphous, or crystalline silica. It has similar applications to pumice, but it is generally sold as a finer powder and used for a more glossy polish after an initial treatment with coarser pumice powder. Tripoli particles are rounded rather than sharp, making it a milder abrasive.

It is usually mixed with oil, sometimes water, and rubbed on the surface of varnished or lacquered wood with a felt pad or cloth. Rotten stone is sometimes used to buff stains out of wood. Some polishing waxes contain powdered rotten stone in a paste substrate. For larger polishing jobs, rotten stone mixed with a binder is applied to polishing wheels.

It has also been used to polish brass, such as that found on military uniforms, as well as steel and other metals. Plates used in daguerreotypes were polished using rotten stone, the finest abrasive available at the time.

It is also used to polish jewelry and in toothpastes. Its more common use is as a filler, as used in plastics, paint and rubber.

Sources
Rottenstone has been extensively worked in South Wales along the outcrop of the Carboniferous Limestone, particularly within the Brecon Beacons National Park. It occurs at the top of the sequence where the Upper Limestone Shales have been weathered. Innumerable workings were initiated and later abandoned during the course of the nineteenth century, leaving a characteristic terrain of humps and hollows.  A notable example is that on the flanks of Cribarth exploited by industrial entrepreneur John Christie.

In the United States it is mainly produced in Arkansas, Illinois, and Oklahoma.

See also
 Metal polishing
 Pumice
 Wood finishing

References

External links
On Rotten-Stone and Emery.  Penny Magazine of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.  July 15, 1843 Volume 12, p. 270

Abrasives
Metalworking
Industrial minerals
Nuclear Instrumentation Module. The Nuclear Instrumentation Module (NIM) standard defines mechanical and electrical specifications for electronics modules used in experimental particle and nuclear physics. The concept of modules in electronic systems offers enormous advantages in flexibility, interchange of instruments, reduced design effort, ease in updating and maintaining the instruments.

The NIM standard is one of the first (and perhaps the simplest) such standards. First defined by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission's report TID-20893 in 1968–1969, NIM was most recently revised in 1990 (DOE/ER-0457T). It provides a common footprint for electronic modules (amplifiers, ADCs, DACs, CFDs, etc.), which plug into a larger chassis (NIM crate, or NIM bin). The crate must supply ±12 and ±24 volts DC power to the modules via a backplane; the standard also specifies ±6 V DC and 220 V or 110 V AC pins, but not all NIM bins provide them. Mechanically, NIM modules must have a minimum standard width of 1.35 in (34 mm), a maximum faceplate height of 8.7 in (221 mm) and depth of 9.7 in (246 mm). They can, however, also be built in multiples of this standard width, that is, double-width, triple-width etc.

The NIM standard also specifies cabling, connectors, impedances and levels for logic signals. The fast logic standard (commonly known as NIM logic) is a current-based logic, negative "true" (at −16 mA into 50 ohms = −0.8 volts) and 0 mA for "false";  is also specified.
Apart from the above-mentioned mechanical/physical and electrical specifications/restrictions, the individual is free to design their module in any way desired, thus allowing for new developments and improvements for efficiency or looks/aesthetics.

NIM modules cannot communicate with each other through the crate backplane; this is a feature of later standards such as CAMAC and VMEbus. As a consequence, NIM-based ADC modules are nowadays uncommon in nuclear and particle physics. NIM is still widely used for amplifiers, discriminators, nuclear pulse generators and other logic modules that do not require digital data communication but benefit from a backplane connector that is better suited for high-power use.

Standard pin assignments

See also
 BNC connectors for analog and logic signals
 Computer Automated Measurement and Control (CAMAC)
 Data acquisition
 LEMO connectors, for higher density modules
 Nuclear electronics
 RG-58 50 ohm coaxial cable for timing and logic signals
 RG-62 93 ohm coaxial cable for spectroscopy signals
 VMEbus

References

Experimental particle physics
Jan Jones (novelist). Janice Rosemary Jones (known as Jan Jones) (born 24 December 1955) is a British former software engineer, now a writer of romantic fiction and short stories. Her debut novel, Stage By Stage, was published in July 2005 and won the Romantic Novelists' Association Joan Hessayon Award the same year.

In her first career as software engineer, she was the architect of the SuperBASIC programming language for the Sinclair QL personal computer while working at Sinclair Research in the early 1980s. Before joining Sinclair Research, she worked at British Gas and the Royal School of Mines as a programmer and lecturer.

Bibliography

Source:

Technical 
 QL SuperBasic: The Definitive Handbook. McGraw-Hill, 1984  (e-book reissue 2014)

Fiction

Single novels
 Stage by Stage (2005)
 Fair Deception (2009)
 Fortunate Wager (2009)
 The Kydd Inheritance (2011)

Penny Plain Mysteries
 The Jigsaw Puzzle (2013)
 Just Desserts (2014)
 Local Secrets (2014)

Anthology in collaboration
 Holiday Fling (2014) (with Christina Jones, Jane Wenham-Jones, Jane Bidder, Grace Wynne-Jones, Gill Sanderson, Eve Bourton, Caroline Dunford and Laura Wilkinson)

References and sources

British women writers
British computer programmers
Sinclair Research
1955 births
Living people
Across. Across may refer to:

Technology and engineering
 Across Language Server, a software platform
 ACROSS Project, an R&D project in social robotics
 Suzuki Across (motorcycle), a motorcycle manufactured by Suzuki
 Suzuki Across (crossover), an automobile based on the Toyota RAV4

Arts and entertainment
 Across Entertainment, a Japanese voice-acting agency
 Across, a musical project of American rapper Lil Ugly Mane
 Across, a 2014 EP by Kilo Kish
 ACROSS, a fictional secret organization which is the subject of the manga and anime series Excel Saga

See also
 Accross, a short name of Accrington and Rossendale College
DREAM (software). The Distributed Real-time Embedded Analysis Method (DREAM) is a platform-independent open-source tool for the verification and analysis of distributed real-time and embedded (DRE) systems  which focuses on the practical application of formal verification and timing analysis to real-time middleware. DREAM supports formal verification of scheduling based on task timed automata using the Uppaal model checker and the Verimag IF toolset as well as the random testing of real-time components using a discrete event simulator. DREAM is developed at the Center for Embedded Computer Systems at the University of California, Irvine, in cooperation with researchers from Vanderbilt University.

References

External links
DREAM website
Center for Embedded Computer Systems 
Uppaal website
IF toolset website

Formal methods
Simple Grid Protocol. Simple Grid Protocol is a free open source grid computing package. Developed & maintained by Brendan Kosowski, the package includes the protocol & software tools needed to get a computational grid up and running on Linux & BSD.

Coded in SBCL (Steel Bank Common Lisp), Simple Grid Protocol allows computer programs to utilize the unused CPU resources of other computers on a network or the Internet.

As of version 1.2, Simple Grid Protocol can execute multiple programming threads on multiple computers concurrently. Custom multi-threading functions (utilizing operating system threads) for Linux & BSD allow multi-threading on single-thread SBCL implementations. Originally coded in CLISP, version 1.2 included the change to SBCL coding.

BSD Operating Systems supported include FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD & DragonFly BSD.

An optional XML interface allows any XML capable programming language to send Lisp programs to the grid for execution.

External links 
Simple Grid Protocol home page

Grid computing
Common Lisp (programming language) software
Cleanroom software engineering. The cleanroom software engineering  process is a software development process intended to produce software with a certifiable level of reliability. The central principles are software development based on formal methods, incremental implementation under statistical quality control, and statistically sound testing.

History 
The cleanroom process was originally developed by Harlan Mills and several of his colleagues including Alan Hevner at IBM.

The cleanroom process first saw use in the mid to late 1980s. Demonstration projects within the military began in the early 1990s. Recent work on the cleanroom process has examined fusing cleanroom with the automated verification capabilities provided by specifications expressed in CSP.

Philosophy 
The focus of the cleanroom process is on defect prevention rather than defect removal. The name "cleanroom" was chosen to evoke the cleanrooms used in the electronics industry to prevent the introduction of defects during the fabrication of semiconductors.

Central principles 
The basic principles of the cleanroom process are

Software development based on formal methods Software tool support based on some mathematical formalism includes model checking, process algebras, and Petri nets. The Box Structure Method might be one such means of specifying and designing a software product. Verification that the design correctly implements the specification is performed through team review, often with software tool support.

Incremental implementation under statistical quality control Cleanroom development uses an iterative approach, in which the product is developed in increments that gradually increase the implemented functionality. The quality of each increment is measured against pre-established standards to verify that the development process is proceeding acceptably. A failure to meet quality standards results in the cessation of testing for the current increment and a return to the design phase.

Statistically sound testing Software testing in the cleanroom process is carried out as a statistical experiment. Based on the formal specification, a representative subset of software input/output trajectories is selected and tested. This sample is then statistically analyzed to produce an estimate of the reliability of the software and a level of confidence in that estimate.

References

Further reading

External links
 An introduction

Software quality
Lord Clive-class monitor. The Lord Clive-class monitor, sometimes referred to as the General Wolfe class, were ships designed for shore bombardment and were constructed for the Royal Navy during the First World War.

Design
The slow progress of the war led to the need for more shore bombardment ships and various schemes for using spare heavy guns were considered. Heavier guns such as 13.5-inch and 15-inch weapons had no available mountings so the main armament consisted of a single twin  gun turret taken from decommissioned Majestic-class pre-dreadnought battleships.

The ships were ordered after the Abercrombie class had begun building and the hull form was a near repeat of that design. Extra quick-firing artillery for protection from destroyers and torpedo boats was also fitted in most ships and consisted of up to four six-inch guns.

Ships

18-inch conversions

Three of the ships, HMS General Wolfe, Lord Clive and Prince Eugene, were to be converted to take the BL 18-inch guns that had originally been allocated to .
The guns were mounted aft, permanently arranged to fire over the starboard beam. The mounting consisted of two massive side girders parallel to the barrel, between which the gun was slung. At the forward end was a support about which the gun could train in a limited arc, with a hydraulic cylinder providing ten degrees of traverse each side of the mounting center line. The gun was loaded at the fixed angle of 10 degrees, but firing was only allowed between 22 degrees and 45 degrees of elevation, to distribute the large firing forces evenly between the forward and after supports. The mounting was covered by a large non-traversing half-inch steel plate shield fixed to the deck.

The enormous rounds and charges were transported to the gunhouse on a light railway fixed to the main deck. Work was completed on Lord Clive and General Wolfe but the end of World War I intervened before Prince Eugene was finished. Both of the converted ships saw action. The original 12-inch turret was left in place on them to maintain stability.

General Wolfe fired on a railway bridge at Snaeskerke, four miles (6 km) south of Ostend, Belgium, on 28 September 1918. The range of 36,000 yards (33 km) made this the greatest range at which a Royal Navy vessel has ever engaged an enemy target using guns. Lord Clive fired a mere four rounds with the replacement gun at enemy targets.

The guns used were as follows:
 The gun from the rear turret of Furious was to have been fitted to Prince Eugene;
 The gun intended for the forward turret of Furious was fitted to General Wolfe;
 The gun fitted to Lord Clive was a spare.

Citations

Bibliography
  Vol. 1 • Vol. 2

Dittmar, F. J. & Colledge, J. J., "British Warships 1914-1919", (Ian Allan, London, 1972), 

 

 
Monitor classes
Ship classes of the Royal Navy
Agent Communications Language. Agent Communication Language (ACL), proposed by the Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents (FIPA), is a proposed standard language for agent communications.  Knowledge Query and Manipulation Language (KQML) is another proposed standard.

The most popular ACLs are:

 FIPA-ACL (by the Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents, a standardization consortium)
 KQML (Knowledge Query and Manipulation Language)

Both rely on speech act theory developed by Searle in the 1960s and enhanced by Winograd and Flores in the 1970s. They define a set of performatives, also called Communicative Acts, and their meaning (e.g. ask-one). The content of the performative is not standardized, but varies from system to system.

To make agents understand each other they have to not only speak the same language, but also have a common ontology. An ontology is a part of the agent's knowledge base that describes what kind of things an agent can deal with and how they are related to each other.

Examples of frameworks that implement a standard agent communication language (FIPA-ACL) include FIPA-OS
and Jade.

References

Formal languages
Knowledge representation
Agent communications languages
ApacheBench. ApacheBench (ab is the real program file name) is a single-threaded command line computer program used for benchmarking (measuring the performance of) HTTP web servers.  Originally it was used to test the Apache HTTP Server but it is generic enough to test any web server supporting HTTP/1.0 or HTTP/1.1 protocol versions.

The ab tool is written in C and it comes bundled with the standard Apache source distribution, and like the Apache web server itself, is free, open source software and distributed under the terms of the Apache License.

History
The original program was named zb "ZeusBench V1.0" and it was written by Adam Twiss (Zeus Technology), in 1996, in order to test performance of Zeus Web Server. Soon later Twiss licensed (donated) that program to the Apache Group so that the derived program was renamed ab "ApacheBench".

Since 1997, 1998 ab has been further developed and maintained, as a support program included in Apache HTTP server, from version 1.0 (1997,1998) to version 2.3 (2021) and later.

Example usage
ab -n 10000 -c 10 "http://localhost/index.html"

This will execute 10000 HTTP GET requests, processing up to 10 requests concurrently, to the specified URL, in this example, http://localhost/index.html which requires that a web server is running on port 80 of the same computer where ab is run.

For an extended example of ab output see also ab output for Squid performance tuning.

Concurrency versus threads
Note that ApacheBench will only use one operating system thread regardless of the concurrency level (specified by the  parameter).  In some cases, especially when benchmarking high-capacity servers, a single instance of ApacheBench can itself be a bottleneck.  When using ApacheBench on hardware with multiple processor cores, additional instances of ApacheBench may be used in parallel to more fully saturate the target URL.

Detecting ApacheBench
The ApacheBench User Agent string is  where MAJOR and MINOR represent the major and minor version numbers of the program.  It is usually not correctly categorised by web server log analysers such as Webalizer or AWStats, so running ApacheBench with a great number of requests may skew the results of the reports generated by these programs.

See also
 Internet Application Management
 Web server benchmarking

References

External links
 Manual page for the 'ab' tool
 Apache HTTPD official website

Apache Software Foundation
Load testing tools
Waterman Whatsit. The Whatsit is a swept-wing, tail-less airplane designed by Waldo Waterman between 1911 (when he first got the idea) and 1932 (when the prototype was finally in testing phase). Waterman completed the prototype with friend and fellow engineer, Max B. Harlow. It was intended to be an aircraft which could be landed on the street, and owned by regular people.

Initial designs of the plane were unstable, and it was shelved after some modification, until 1934, when its creator noticed that it met the design specifications of a government request for an inexpensive "Model-T of the air" for the common man. The plane was then rebuilt and named the Arrowplane, which became the prototype for the production-line Arrowbile.

The original Whatsit was donated by Waterman himself in 1950 to the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum.

References

1930s United States civil utility aircraft
Carbon filtering. Carbon filtering is a method of filtering that uses a bed of activated carbon to remove impurities from a fluid using adsorption.

Mechanism
Carbon filtering works by adsorption, in which pollutants in the fluid to be treated are trapped inside the pore structure of a carbon substrate. The substrate is made of many carbon granules, each of which is itself highly porous. As a result, the substrate has a large surface area within which contaminants can be trapped. Activated carbon is typically used in filters, as it has been treated to have a much higher surface area than non treated carbon. One gram of activated carbon has a surface area in excess of 3,000 m2 (32,000 sq ft).

Common uses
Carbon filtering is commonly used for water purification, air filtering and industrial gas processing, for example the removal of siloxanes and hydrogen sulfide from biogas.  It is also used in a number of other applications, including respirator masks, the purification of sugarcane, some methods of coffee decaffeination, and in the recovery of precious metals, especially gold. It is also used in cigarette filters and in the EVAP used in cars.

When filtering water, charcoal carbon filters are most effective at removing chlorine, particles such as sediment, volatile organic compounds (VOCs), taste and odor.  They are not effective at removing minerals, salts, and dissolved inorganic substances.

Specifications
Each carbon filter is typically given a micron rating that specifies the size of particle which the filter can remove from a fluid. Typical particle sizes which can be removed by carbon filters range from 0.5 to 50 μm. The efficacy of a carbon filter depends not only on its particle size, but also on the rate of flow of fluid through the filter. For example, if a fluid is allowed to flow through the filter at a slower rate, the contaminants will be exposed to the filter media for a longer amount of time, which will tend to result in fewer impurities.

See also 

 Water filter
 List of waste-water treatment technologies

References

Further reading

 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Washington, D.C. (2013). "Granular Activated Carbon." Drinking Water Treatability Database.

Water technology
Filters
Gas technologies