ppxscal/embedding_network huggingface dataset:
Exploring the blind spot: audience, purpose, and context in &ldquo;product, process, and profit&rdquo;
Authors: Clay Spinuzzi
Venue: ACM Journal of Computer Documentation (JCD) (2000)

Technical communicators have longed turned to audience, purpose, and context as they analyze situations. But Mirel's article demonstrates that audience-purpose-context is too weak a framework to handle the job of detailed sociopolitical analysis: not only is it inadequate for analyzing the needs of end users, it is also inadequate for analyzing situations within the writer's organization. In this response, this paper explores the weakness of audience-purpose-context and points to alternative sociopolitical frameworks.
A comparison of spatial organization strategies in graphical and tangible user interfaces
Authors: James Patten, Hiroshi Ishii
Venue: Proceedings of DARE 2000 on Designing augmented reality environments (2000)

We present a study comparing how people use space in a Tangible User Interface (TUI) and in a Graphical User Interface (GUI). We asked subjects to read ten summaries of recent news articles and to think about the relationships between them. In our TUI condition, we bound each of the summaries to one of ten visually identical wooden blocks. In our GUI condition, each summary was represented by an icon on the screen. We asked subjects to indicate the location of each summary by pointing to the corresponding icon or wooden block. Afterward, we interviewed them about the strategies they used to position the blocks or icons during the task. We observed that TUI subjects performed better at the location recall task than GUI subjects. In addition, some TUI subjects used the spatial relationship between specific blocks and parts of the environment to help them remember the content of those blocks, while GUI subjects did not do this. Those TUI subjects who reported encoding information using this strategy tended to perform better at the recall task than those who did not.
Parallel multilevel k-way partitioning scheme for irregular graphs
Authors: George Karypis, Vipin Kumar
Venue: Proceedings of the 1996 ACM/IEEE conference on Supercomputing (CDROM) (1996)

In this paper we present a parallel formulation of a multilevel k-way graph partitioning algorithm. The multilevel k-way partitioning algorithm reduces the size of the graph by collapsing vertices and edges (coarsening phase), finds a k-way partition of the smaller graph, and then it constructs a k-way partition for the original graph by projecting and refining the partition to successively finer graphs (uncoarsening phase). A key innovative feature of our parallel formulation is that it utilizes graph coloring to effectively parallelize both the coarsenin and the refinement during the uncoarsening phase. Our algorithm is able to achieve a high degree of concurrency, while maintaining the high quality partitions produced by the serial algorithm. We test our scheme on a large number of graphs from finite element methods, and transportation domains. Our parallel formulation on Cray T3D, produces high quality 128-way partitions on 128 processors in a little over two seconds, for graphs with a million vertices. Thus our parallel algorithm makes it possible to perform dynamic graph partition in adaptive computations without compromising quality.
A proxy-based personal web archiving service
Authors: Herman Chung-Hwa Rao, Yih-Farn Chen, Ming-Feng Chen
Venue: ACM SIGOPS Operating Systems Review (2001)

The Web contains so much information that it is almost beyond measure. How do users manage the useful information that they have seen while screening out the rest that doesn't interest them? Bookmarks help, but bookmarking a page doesn't guarantee that it will be available forever. Search engines are becoming more powerful, but they can't be customized based on the access history of individual users. This paper suggests that a better alternative to managing web information is through a middleware approach based on iPROXY, a programmable proxy server. iPROXY offers a suite of archiving, retrieval, and searching services. It can extend a URL to include commands that archive and retrieve pages. Its modular architecture allows users to plug in new features without having to change existing browsers or servers. Once installed on a network, iPROXY can be accessed by users using different browsers and devices. Internet service providers who offer customers iPROXY will be free to develop new services without having to wait for the dominant browsers to be updated.
Virtual Path Layouts in ATM Networks
Authors: Ladislav Stacho, Imrich Vrto
Venue: SIAM Journal on Computing (2000)

We study virtual path layouts in a very popular type of fast interconnection networks, namely asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) networks. One of the main problems in such networks is to construct path layouts that minimize the hop-number (i.e., the number of virtual paths between any two nodes) as a function of the edge congestion c (i.e., the number of virtual paths going through a link). In this paper we construct for any n vertex network H and any c a virtual path layout with hop-number $O(\frac{diam(H)\log\Delta}{\log c})$, where diam(H) is the diameter of the network H and $\Delta$ is its maximum degree. Involving a general lower bound from [E. Kranakis, D. Krizanc, and A. Pelc, Seventh IEEE Symposium on Parallel and Distributed Processing, IEEE Computer Society, 1995, pp. 662--668], we see that these hop-numbers are optimal for bounded degree networks with the diameter O(log n) for any congestion c. In the case of unbounded degree networks (with the diameter O(log n)) these hop-numbers are optimal for any $c\geq\Delta$. For instance, this gives optimal hop-numbers for hypercube related networks. Moreover, we improve known results for paths and meshes and prove optimal hop-numbers for hypercubes.
A BiCMOS Wideband Amplifier for the Extraction of Base Spreading Resistance with Noise Measurement Techniques
Authors: Frode Larson, Peter Kascak, Mohammed Ismail
Venue: Analog Integrated Circuits and Signal Processing (2000)

This paper presents a BiCMOS wide band amplifier optimized for maximum sensitivity to noise introduced in the base spreading resistance. It was used to characterize the base spreading resistance of bipolar devices found in Orbit&rsquo;s low-noise, n-well BiCMOS process available through MOSIS. The base spreading resistance is extracted by measuring the output power spectral density of the aforementioned amplifier and isolating the amount caused by thermal noise in the base. The results give insight as to what noise sources are significant in this technology.
WebSplitter: a unified XML framework for multi-device collaborative Web browsing
Authors: Richard Han, Veronique Perret, Mahmoud Naghshineh
Venue: Proceedings of the 2000 ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work (2000)

WebSplitter symbolizes the union of pervasive multi-device computing and collaborative multi-user computing. WebSplitter provides a unified XML framework that enables multi-device and multi-user Web browsing. WebSplitter splits a requested Web page and delivers the appropriate partial view of each page to each user, or more accurately to each user's set of devices. Multiple users can participate in the same browsing session, as in traditional conferencing groupware. Depending on the access privileges of the user to the different components of content on each page, WebSplitter generates a personalized partial view. WebSplitter further splits the partial view among the devices available to each user, e.g. laptop, wireless PDA, projection display, stereo speakers, orchestrating a composite presentation across the devices. A wireless PDA can browse while remotely controlling the multimedia capabilities of nearby devices. The architecture consists of an XML metadata policy file defining access privileges to XML tags on a Web page, a middleware proxy that splits XML Web content to create partial views, and a client-side component, e.g. applet, enabling user login and reception of pushed browsing data. Service discovery finds and registers proxies, browsing sessions, and device capabilities. We demonstrate the feasibility of splitting the different tags in an XML Web page to different end users browsers, and of pushing updates from the browsing session to heterogeneous devices, including a laptop and a PDA.
H2 and $H_\infty$ Robust Filtering for Discrete-Time Linear Systems
Authors: José C. Geromel, Jacques Bernussou, GERMAIN GARCIA
Venue: SIAM Journal on Control and Optimization (2000)

This paper investigates robust filtering design problems in H2 and $H_\infty$ spaces for discrete-time systems subjected to parameter uncertainty which is assumed to belong to a convex bounded polyhedral domain. It is shown that, by a suitable change of variables, both design problems can be converted into convex programming problems written in terms of linear matrix inequalities (LMI). The results generalize the ones available in the literature to date in several directions. First, all system matrices can be corrupted by parameter uncertainty and the admissible uncertainty may be structured. Then, assuming the order of the uncertain system is known, the optimal guaranteed performance H2 and $H_\infty$ filters are proven to be of the same order as the order of the system. Comparisons with robust filters for systems subjected to norm-bounded uncertainty are provided in both theoretical and practical settings. In particular, it is shown that under the same assumptions the results here are generally better as far as the minimization of a guaranteed cost expressed in terms of H2 or $H_\infty$ norms is considered. Some numerical examples illustrate the theoretical results.
Deletion in two-dimensional quad trees
Authors: Hanan Samet
Venue: Communications of the ACM (1980)

An algorithm for deletion in two-dimensional quad trees that handles the problem in a manner analogous to deletion in binary search trees is presented. The algorithm is compared with a proposed method for deletion which reinserts all of the nodes in the subtrees of the deleted node. The objective of the new algorithm is to reduce the number of nodes that need to be reinserted. Analysis for complete quad trees shows that the number of nodes requiring reinsertion is reduced to as low as 2/9 of that required by the old algorithm. Simulation tests verify this result. Reduction of the number of insertions has a similar effect on the number of comparison operations. In addition, the total path length (and balance) of the resulting tree is observed to remain constant or increase slightly when the new algorithm for deletion is used, whereas use of the old algorithm results in a significant increase in the total path length for large trees.
A New Class of Sequential Circuits with Combinational Test Generation Complexity
Authors: Hideo Fujiwara
Venue: IEEE Transactions on Computers (2000)

We introduce a new class of sequential circuits with combinational test generation complexity which we call internally balanced structures. It is shown that sequential circuits can be classified by their structure as follows: {sequential circuits of acyclic structure} ¿ {sequential circuits of internally balanced structure} ¿ {sequential circuits of balanced structure} and that internally balanced structures allow test generation with combinational test generation complexity. On the other hand, if finite state machines (FSMs) are classified by their realization possibility, it can be shown that {FSMs which can be realized as a sequential circuit of acyclic structure} = {FSMs which can be realized as a sequential circuit of internally balanced structure} ¿ {FSMs which can be realized as a sequential circuit of balanced structure}. Hence, any FSM realizable with acyclic structure can be also realized with internally balanced structure which allows test generation with combinational test generation complexity. In addition, we discuss the definition of test generation possibility with combinational test generation complexity and introduce a new definition which covers the previous narrow definition. Finally, we study applications to design for testability based on the partial scan and to test generation time reduction for sequential circuits in general, using characteristics of the internally balanced structures. The experimental results shows the effectiveness of this approach.
On the numerical solution of boundary value problems for linear ordinary differential equations
Authors: James T. Day, George W. Collins,  II
Venue: Communications of the ACM (1964)

A numerical method is presented for the solution of boundary value problems involving linear ordinary differential equations. The method described is noniterative and makes use of any one-step numerical integration scheme to reduce the problem from one of boundary values to one of initial values. Comments are made concerning some numerical results of applying the method to a specific problem. In addition an extension of the algorithm described to more general problems is discussed.
Controlling the robots of Web search engines
Authors: J. Talim, Z. Liu, Ph. Nain, E. G. Coffman,  Jr.
Venue: Proceedings of the 2001 ACM SIGMETRICS international conference on Measurement and modeling of computer systems (2001)

Robots are deployed by a Web search engine for collecting information from different Web servers in order to maintain the currency of its data base of Web pages. In this paper, we investigate the number of robots to be used by a search engine so as to maximize the currency of the data base without putting an unnecessary load on the network. We adopt a finite-buffer queueing model to represent the system. The arrivals to the queueing system are Web pages brought by the robots; service corresponds to the indexing of these pages. Good performance requires that the number of robots, and thus the arrival rate of the queueing system, be chosen so that the indexing queue is rarely starved or saturated. Thus, we formulate a multi-criteria stochastic optimization problem with the loss rate and empty-buffer probability being the criteria. We take the common approach of reducing the problem to one with a single objective that is a linear function of the given criteria. Both static and dynamic policies can be considered. In the static setting the number of robots is held fixed; in the dynamic setting robots may be re-activated/de-activated as a function of the state. Under the assumption that arrivals form a Poisson process and that service times are independent and exponentially distributed random variables, we determine an optimal decision rule for the dynamic setting, i.e., a rule that varies the number of robots in such a way as to minimize a given linear function of the loss rate and empty-buffer probability. Our results are compared with known results for the static case. A numerical study indicates that substantial gains can be achieved by dynamically controlling the activity of the robots.
Algorithms for computing the volume and other integral properties of solids. II. A family of algorithms based on representation conversion and cellular approximation
Authors: Yong Tsui Lee, Aristides A. G. Requicha
Venue: Communications of the ACM (1982)

This paper discusses a family of algorithms for computing the volume, moments of inertia, and other integral properties of geometrically complex solids, e.g. typical mechanical parts. The algorithms produce approximate decompositions of solids into cuboid cells whose integral properties are easy to compute. The paper focuses on versions of the algorithms which operate on solids represented by Constructive Solid Geometry (CSG), i.e., as set-theoretical combinations of primitive solid &ldquo;building blocks.&rdquo; Two known algorithms are summarized and a new algorithm is presented. The efficiencies and accuracies of the three algorithms are analyzed theoretically and compared experimentally. The new algorithm uses recursive subdivision to convert CSG representations of complex solids into approximate cellular decompositions based on variably sized blocks. Experimental data show that the new algorithm is efficient and has predictable accuracy. It also has other potential applications, e.g., in producing approximate octree representations of complex solids and in robot navigation.
Natural command names and initial learning: a study of text-editing terms
Authors: T. K. Landauer, K. M. Galotti, S. Hartwell
Venue: Communications of the ACM (1983)

In the first of two studies of &ldquo;naturalness&rdquo; in command names, computer-naive typists composed instructions to &ldquo;someone else&rdquo; for correcting a sample text. There was great variety in their task-descriptive lexicon and a lack of correspondence between both their vocabulary and their underlying conceptions of the editing operations and those of some computerized text editors. In the second study, computer-naive typists spent two hours learning minimal text-editing systems that varied in several ways. Lexical naturalness (frequency of use in Study 1) made little difference in their performance. By contrast, having different, rather than the same names for operations requiring different syntax greatly reduced difficulty. It is concluded that the design of user-compatible commands involves deeper issues than are captured by the slogan &ldquo;naturalness.&rdquo; However, there are limitations to our observations. Only initial learning of a small set of commands was at issue and generalizations to other situations will require further testing.
Final examination scheduling
Authors: Sol Broder
Venue: Communications of the ACM (1964)

A method for scheduling final examinations to yield a minimal number of student conflicts is described. The &ldquo;minimization&rdquo; is achieved by repetitively evaluating a nonlinear set of equations. Imbedded in the process is a random or Monte Carlo selection of assignments. As in such heuristic techniques, the solution may not be optimum and many solutions may be found which yield locally minimal results. Computer programs are described and empirical results given.
Event-driven programming is simple enough for CS1
Authors: Kim B. Bruce, Andrea P. Danyluk, Thomas P. Murtagh
Venue: ACM SIGCSE Bulletin (2001)

We have recently designed a CS 1 course that integrates event-driven programming from the very start. Our experience teaching this course runs counter to the prevailing sense that these techniques would add complexity to the content of CS 1. Instead, we found that they were simple to present and that they also simplified the presentation of other material in the course. In this paper, we explain the approach we used to introduce event-driven methods and discuss the factors underlying our success.
Configuration compression for FPGA-based embedded systems
Authors: Andreas Dandalis, Viktor K. Prasanna
Venue: Proceedings of the 2001 ACM/SIGDA ninth international symposium on Field programmable gate arrays (2001)

FPGAs are a promising technology for developing high-performance embedded systems. The density and performance of FPGAs have drastically improved over the past few years. Consequently, the size of the configuration bit-streams has also increased considerably. As a result, the cost-effectiveness of FPGA-based embedded systems is significantly affected by the memory required for storing various FPGA configurations. This paper proposes a novel compression technique that reduces the memory required for storing FPGA configurations and results in high decompression efficiency. Decompression efficiency corresponds to the decompression hardware cost as well as the decompression rate. The proposed technique is applicable to any SRAM-based FPGA device since configuration bit-streams are processed as raw data. The required decompression hardware is simple and is independent of the individual semantics of configuration bit-streams or specific features of the on-chip configuration mechanism. Moreover, the time to configure the device is not affected by our compression technique. Using our technique, we demonstrate up to $41 \%$ savings in memory for configuration bit-streams of several real-world applications.
Tools for application-oriented performance tuning
Authors: John Mellor-Crummey, Robert Fowler, David Whalley
Venue: Proceedings of the 15th international conference on Supercomputing (2001)

Application performance tuning is a complex process that requires assembling various types of information and correlating it with source code to pinpoint the causes of performance bottlenecks. Existing performance tools don't adequately support this process in one or more dimensions. We discuss some of the critical utility and usability issues for application-level performance analysis tools in the context of two performance tools, MHSim and HPCView, that we built to support our own work on data layout and optimizing compilers. MHsim is a memory hierarchy simulator that produces source-level information not otherwise available about memory hierarchy utilization and the causes of cache conflicts. HPCView is a tool that combines data from arbitrary sets of instrumentation sources and correlates it with program source code. Both tools report their results in scope-hierarchy views of the corresponding source code and produce their output as HTML databases that can be analyzed portably and collaboratively using a commodity browser. In addition to daily use within our group, the tools are being used successfully by several code development teams in DoD and DoE laboratories.
NetSolve: a network server for solving computational science problems
Authors: Henri Casanova, Jack Dongarra
Venue: Proceedings of the 1996 ACM/IEEE conference on Supercomputing (CDROM) (1996)

This paper presents a new system, called NetSolve, that allows users to access computational resources, such as hardware and software, distributed across the network. The development of NetSolve was motivated by the need for an easy-to-use, efficient mechanism for using computational resources remotely. Ease of use is obtained as a result of different interfaces, some of which require no programming effort from the user. Good performance is ensured by a load-balancing policy that enables NetSolve to use the computational resources available as efficiently as possible. NetSolve offers the ability to look for computational resources on a network, choose the best one availab le, solve a problem (with retry for fault-tolerance), and return the answer to the user.
Beyond programming languages
Authors: Terry Winograd
Venue: Communications of the ACM (1979)

As computer technology matures, our growing ability to create large systems is leading to basic changes in the nature of programming. Current programming language concepts will not be adequate for building and maintaining systems of the complexity called for by the tasks we attempt. Just as high level languages enabled the programmer to escape from the intricacies of a machine's order code, higher level programming systems can provide the means to understand and manipulate complex systems and components. In order to develop such systems, we need to shift our attention away from the detailed specification of algorithms, towards the description of the properties of the packages and objects with which we build. This paper analyzes some of the shortcomings of programming languages as they now exist, and lays out some possible directions for future research.
Parallel methods and tools for predicting material properties
Authors: Andreas Stathopoulos, Serdar Öğüt, Yousef Saad, James Chelikowsky, Hanchul Kim
Venue: Computing in Science and Engineering (2000)

The authors present a parallel implementation of an electronic-structure application on the Cray T3D and T3E. This implementation has enabled the authors to perform some breakthrough calculations-for example, predicting the optical properties of systems on the order of 1,000 atoms from first principles.