ppxscal/embedding_network huggingface dataset:
Self-Driving Cars and the Urban Challenge
Authors: Chris Urmson, William "Red" Whittaker
Venue: IEEE Intelligent Systems (2008)

This article provides a brief overview of the benefits of autonomous vehicles and Boss, the autonomous vehicle that won the 2007 DARPA Urban Challenge. Autonomous vehicles will improve traffic safety, increase fuel efficiency, and help reconnect the elderly and disabled to our society. Autonomous-vehicle research has been active for the last 20 years, with the recent Urban Challenge building tremendously on past successes. Boss uses onboard sensing and a priori maps of the road environment to navigate safely and effectively. While the Urban Challenge was successful, there is much work to do as this technology becomes increasingly commercialized.
Characterizing privacy in online social networks
Authors: Balachander Krishnamurthy, Craig E. Wills
Venue: Proceedings of the first workshop on Online social networks (2008)

Online social networks (OSNs) with half a billion users have dramatically raised concerns on privacy leakage. Users, often willingly, share personal identifying information about themselves, but do not have a clear idea of who accesses their private information or what portion of it really needs to be accessed. In this study we examine popular OSNs from a viewpoint of characterizing potential privacy leakage. Our study identifies what bits of information are currently being shared, how widely, and what users can do to prevent such sharing. We also examine the role of third-party sites that track OSN users and compare with privacy leakage on popular traditional Web sites. Our long term goal is to identify the narrow set of private information that users really need to share to accomplish specific interactions on OSNs.
A Noise Elimination Procedure for Printed Circuit Board Inspection System
Authors: Zuwairie Ibrahim, Noor Khafifah Khalid, Ismail Ibrahim, Mohamad Shukri Zainal Abidin, Musa Mohd Mokji, Syed Abdul Rahman Syed Abu Bakar
Venue: Proceedings of the 2008 Second Asia International Conference on Modelling & Simulation (AMS) (2008)

Image difference operation is frequently used in automated printed circuit board (PCB) inspection system as well as in many other image processing applications. During the implementation, this operation brings along the unwanted noise due to misalignment and uneven binarization. Thus, this paper proposes a method to eliminate, if possible, or to reduce as much as possible such noise during the computation of defect detection. This paper used a template PCB image and the tested PCB image as the input. Image subtraction operation will be applied between the images. The results of applying the proposed method showed a significant improvement during the real-time inspection of printed circuitboards.
Comparing bacterial genomes from linear orders of patterns
Authors: Frédéric Guyon, Alain Guénoche
Venue: Discrete Applied Mathematics (2008)

We compare complete genomes from common words denoted MUMs for maximum unique matches. They allow to transform each genome into a linear order. We first evaluate the minimum length of a MUM shared by two genomes to be significant. Secondly, we compute maximal common chains of elements, that are in the same order in genomes. From these chains we define conserved genome segments as long DNA fragments having MUMs in the same order and with a bounded gap length between them. The resulting small number of segments allow to detect main evolutionary events as reversal or transposition of these fragments.
Improving biomedical document retrieval using domain knowledge
Authors: Shuguang Wang, Milos Hauskrecht
Venue: Proceedings of the 31st annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval (2008)

Research articles typically introduce new results or findings and relate them to knowledge entities of immediate relevance. However, a large body of context knowledge related to the results is often not explicitly mentioned in the article. To overcome this limitation the state-of-the-art information retrieval approaches rely on the latent semantic analysis in which terms in articles are projected to a lower dimensional latent space and best possible matches in this space are identified. However, this approach may not perform well enough if the number of explicit knowledge entities in the articles is too small compared to the amount of knowledge in the domain. We address the problem by exploiting a domain knowledge layer, a rich network of relations among knowledge entities in the domain extracted from a large corpus of documents. The knowledge layer supplies the context knowledge that lets us relate different knowledge entities and hence improve the information retrieval performance. We develop and study a new framework for i) learning and aggregating the relations in the knowledge layer from the literature corpus; ii) and for exploiting these relations to improve the information-retrieval of relevant documents.
Executing ultra-large software systems with multiagent systems
Authors: Marc-Philippe Huget
Venue: Proceedings of the 2nd international workshop on Ultra-large-scale software-intensive systems (2008)

The domain of ULSSIS is the domain of superlatives since these systems are ultra-large scale ones in one or several dimensions: number of people, of software components, of lines of code to name a few. Developing and executing these systems require to improve current theories so as to cope with the scalability problem. In this paper, we propose to consider multiagent systems as a possible solution to some executing challenges. We provide some ULSSIS scenarios and the possible agent-based solutions.
Scrum down: a software engineer and a sociologist explore the implementation of an agile method
Authors: Christopher D. Bates, Simeon Yates
Venue: Proceedings of the 2008 international workshop on Cooperative and human aspects of software engineering (2008)

This paper provides an overview and position statement on the work undertaken as part of a project to explore the implementation of Scrum in the context of an interactive digital media software development company. The project is being undertaken in the Communication and Computing Research Centre at Sheffield Hallam University.
RFID security: in the shoulder and on the loading dock
Authors: Ari Juels
Venue: Proceedings of the first ACM conference on Wireless network security (2008)

RFID (Radio-Frequency IDentification) tags are microchips that communicate via radio. In common use today, they promise to become a ubiquitous tool for labeling objects and identifying people. Protection against counterfeiting and privacy infringement in RFID systems is therefore an imperative. The unifying theme of this two-part talk is key distribution, a perennial security challenge in computing systems that is particularly tricky for RFID. I'll discuss human-implantable RFID devices and the intricate privacy and security problems associated with these "prosthetic biometrics." I'll then introduce a new approach to distributing the keys required for privacy protection and authentication in RFID-enhanced supply chains - tracing the lifecycle of tags from the warehouse to the loading dock to the hands of the consumer.
Research on Personal Credit Evaluation System of Commercial Banks
Authors: Li Yuanyuan
Venue: Proceedings of the First International Workshop on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining (2008)

Based on the analysis of personal credit evaluation index systems in and out of China, this paper establishes personal credit evaluation index system of commercial banks suitable for China, which can be divided into three parts: Personal indices, economy indices and credit indices; and this paper builds personal credit synthetic evaluation model based on GEM algorithm to better make use of experts' experiences and wisdom, and to overcome the inconsistency of experts' evaluation results. This evaluation system provides references for commercial banks to make customer loan decisions. Key Words: personal credit; evaluation system; commercial bank
Efficient High Availability Commit Processing
Authors: Heine Kolltveit, Svein-Olaf Hvasshovd
Venue: Proceedings of the 2008 Third International Conference on Availability, Reliability and Security (2008)

Distributed transaction systems require an atomic commitment protocol to preserve ACID properties. A commit protocol should add as little overhead as possible to avoid hampering performance. In this paper, dynamic coordinators are introduced. In main memory primary-backup systems, the approach significantly reduces the time spent during commit processing. The performance of such protocols must be properly evaluated to give system developers the information needed to make an educated choice between them. Thus, simulation results, verified by statistical analysis, are presented. The simulation results show that the performance can be significantly boosted by using optimizations and protocols especially designed for high availability main memory systems.
Simplifying nested radicals and solving polynomials by radicals in minimum depth
Authors: G. Horng, M.-D. A. Huang
Venue: Proceedings of the 31st Annual Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science (1990)

The notion of pure nested radicals and its field-theoretic counterpart, pure root extensions, are defined and used for investigating exact radical solutions.
Topic-bridged PLSA for cross-domain text classification
Authors: Gui-Rong Xue, Wenyuan Dai, Qiang Yang, Yong Yu
Venue: Proceedings of the 31st annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval (2008)

In many Web applications, such as blog classification and new-sgroup classification, labeled data are in short supply. It often happens that obtaining labeled data in a new domain is expensive and time consuming, while there may be plenty of labeled data in a related but different domain. Traditional text classification ap-proaches are not able to cope well with learning across different domains. In this paper, we propose a novel cross-domain text classification algorithm which extends the traditional probabilistic latent semantic analysis (PLSA) algorithm to integrate labeled and unlabeled data, which come from different but related domains, into a unified probabilistic model. We call this new model Topic-bridged PLSA, or TPLSA. By exploiting the common topics between two domains, we transfer knowledge across different domains through a topic-bridge to help the text classification in the target domain. A unique advantage of our method is its ability to maximally mine knowledge that can be transferred between domains, resulting in superior performance when compared to other state-of-the-art text classification approaches. Experimental eval-uation on different kinds of datasets shows that our proposed algorithm can improve the performance of cross-domain text classification significantly.
Using application information to drive adaptive grid middleware scheduling decisions
Authors: Vladimir Janjic, Kevin Hammond, Yang Yang
Venue: Proceedings of the 2nd workshop on Middleware-application interaction: affiliated with the DisCoTec federated conferences 2008 (2008)

We are in the process of building a dynamic, adaptive scheduler for parallel Grid programs, which will form part of the SymGrid-Par middleware for execution of symbolic programs on the Grid. This scheduler will dynamically interact with the applications it controls to obtain foreknowledge of application demands for resources. By monitoring the previous behaviour of the application, it will also be able to obtain foresight of the application's future behaviour. Using both foreknowledge and foresight, this "prescient" scheduler will be able to adapt quickly to changing application demands by tuning the amount of resources allocated to applications "on the fly".
Performance Analysis of an Efficient Flow Control Mechanism with Job Threshold in InfiniBand Networks
Authors: Shihang Yan, Irfan Awan, Geyong Min
Venue: Proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on Advanced Information Networking and Applications (2008)

InfiniBand Architecture (IBA) is defined as a switch-based interconnection technology with high-bandwidth and low-latency. It is suitable for constructing high-speed networks for cluster systems and has been ratified as a new industry standard for the server I/O and inter-processor communication. In this paper, we propose an efficient flow control mechanism with job threshold for InfiniBand networks. This new scheme can reduce the delay, blocking probability, and mean queue length as well as enhance the Quality of Service (QoS) of InfiniBand networks. The principle of maximum entropy (ME) is adopted as an effective methodology to analyze the new mechanism with the generalized exponential (GE)-Type distribution for modeling the inter-arrival times and service times of the input traffic. Moreover, typical numerical experiments are included to validate the results of ME algorithm against simulation.
TRAT: traffic-aware topology control algorithm for energy efficiency in wireless sensor networks
Authors: Yeonsu Jung, Junghyo Kim, Yunju Baek
Venue: Proceedings of the 2nd international conference on Ubiquitous information management and communication (2008)

In wireless sensor networks, a number of nodes deployed in dense manner should be self-configured to establish the topology that provides communication and sensing coverage under stringent energy constraints. To establish an efficient topology, we propose the TRaffic-Aware Topology control (TRAT) algorithm that reduces energy consumption by considering the total amount of data flows in the network. Our algorithm controls the number of active nodes and adjusts nodal transmission power with traffic information. According to our results, the proposed algorithm shows about a 30% better performance than other methods in terms of energy efficiency.
Upcoming Events
Venue: IEEE MultiMedia (2008)

This department presents publishing opportunities to multimedia researchers, as well as announcing pertinent upcoming conferences.
On spreading recommendations via social gossip
Authors: Yaacov Fernandess, Dahlia Malkhi
Venue: Proceedings of the twentieth annual symposium on Parallelism in algorithms and architectures (2008)

This paper introduces and analyzes a variant of distributed gossip which is motivated by the sharing of recommendations in a social network. The social settings bear two implications on gossip. First, rumors fade after a few hops, and so does our gossip mechanism. Second, users require a rumor to be substantiated by multiple, independent sources in order to adopt it. Consequently, in our social gossip a message is adopted only when it is received over a threshold of independent paths. Social gossip is a new, highly relevant and practically motivated variant of distributed gossip, whose analysis contributes to the fundamental theory of distributed algorithms.
Nucleus and cytoplast contour detector of cervical smear image
Authors: Meng-Husiun Tsai, Yung-Kuan Chan, Zhe-Zheng Lin, Shys-Fan Yang-Mao, Po-Chi Huang
Venue: Pattern Recognition Letters (2008)

This paper develops a cytoplast and nucleus contour (CNC) detector to sever the nucleus and cytoplast from a cervical smear image. This paper proposes the bi-group enhancer to make a clear-cut separation for the pixels laid between two objects, and the maximal color difference (MCD) method to draw the aptest nucleus contour. The CNC detector adopts a median filter to sweep off noises, the bi-group enhancer to suppress the noises and brighten the object contours, the K-mean algorithm to discern the cytoplast from the background, and the MCD method to extract the nucleus contour. The experimental results show that the CNC detector can give an impressive performance. Besides cervical smear images, these proposed techniques can be utilized in segmenting objects from other images.
Technology strategy and managementThe puzzle of Apple
Authors: Michael Cusumano
Venue: Communications of the ACM (2008)

Given Apple's unique characteristics, should it strive to be a platform or a product leader?
Smoke plume detection in the eastern United States using MODIS
Authors: Y. Xie, J. J. Qu, X. Xiong, X. Hao, N. Che, W. Sommers
Venue: International Journal of Remote Sensing (2007)

In the eastern United States large amounts of smoke emitted from both wildfires and prescribed fires affect the regional air quality and long-term climate and may have an impact on public health. Satellite remote sensing is an effective approach for detecting and monitoring the smoke plume. The spectral characteristics of smoke plume are measurably different from those of other cover types, such as vegetation, cloud, snow, and so on. A multi-threshold method has been developed for detecting smoke plumes with eight MODIS spectral bands based on the analysis of spectral characteristics of different cover types. A series of tests are applied to all pixels in one granule (5-min measurements) to filter out non-smoke pixels step by step with water masking. At each step, specific thresholds are utilized. The results have been validated with true color images for a number of cases from different areas and time, showing that the algorithm works well except for a few missing or incorrect identified smoke pixels.
Affordance in mobile speech-based user interaction
Authors: Lars Bo Larsen, Kasper L. Jensen, Søren Larsen, Morten H. Rasmussen
Venue: Proceedings of the 9th international conference on Human computer interaction with mobile devices and services (2007)

We discuss the design of speech-based interaction systems from the perspective of affordance. It is our claim that many of the problems associated with speech interaction stems from a lack of a deeper understanding of the communicative nature of speech in combination with graphical interfaces. Today's graphical interfaces are almost universally based on the Direct Manipulation (DM) interaction paradigm, whereas speech interaction is in nature conversational. However, most multi modal systems accepting spoken input are designed with the DM paradigm as the underlying interaction model, often forcing the spoken input to correspond to simple commands, which are replicated in the GUI anyway. We will discuss how speech-based interfaces can be designed, taking into account that the DM paradigm is not supported by speech. We demonstrate this through the design of a concrete application for a portable device (PDA), and show how an underlying architecture can be built to support both spoken input and DM interfaces.
A Practical Paradigm and Platform for Video-Based Human-Computer Interaction
Authors: Jason J. Corso, Guangqi Ye, Darius Burschka, Gregory D. Hager
Venue: Computer (2008)

New technologies that use multimodal input, human experience, and modern hardware's full computational power could mitigate current limitations in human-computer interaction. The 4D Touchpad, a video-based interaction platform, makes robust, natural interaction between humans and computers possible.
A Slepian-Wolf based cross layer scheme suitable to sensor networks
Authors: Arulsaravana Jeyaraj, Syed Jafar, Magda El Zarki
Venue: Proceedings of the 2nd international conference on Mobile multimedia communications (2006)

Practical implementation of video compression for distributed sources is currently an active research area. The distributed compression paradigm based on the Slepian-Wolf model has been proposed for low-complexity video compression algorithms and energy efficient wireless sensor networks. In this paper we consider joint source-channel resource allocation for sensor network applications based on the Slepian-Wolf paradigm in fading channel environments. The sensor nodes are modelled as a multiuser uplink channel transmitting correlated information. We study an efficient cross layer variable source rate allocation for the individual nodes based on the multi-access channel capacity and discuss efficient ways to compress and transmit the data over the wireless channel.
On Design of Oligonucleotide SNP Arrays and Methods for Genotype Calling
Authors: Wenjiang J. Fu, Ming Li, Lin Wan, Minghua Deng, Minping Qian
Venue: Proceedings of the 2008 International Conference on BioMedical Engineering and Informatics - Volume 01 (2008)

The fast development of array technology has raised the density of oligonucleotide SNP arrays from 10K and 50K to 100K and 500K. However, methods for SNP genotyping have not been developed as fast. Most methods are based on sample-dependent multi-array training and may not be suitable for cross-laboratory studies and small sample studies, few use full information of array technology efficiently. It has been suggested that mismatch probes are of no use in genotyping and thus should be removed, and that multiple probes are redundant and should be reduced. We study the effect of reduced probes on genotype calling and conclude that reduction of probes in SNP interrogation substantially increases genotyping error. Furthermore, elimination of mismatch probes increases error rate by 50 folds. Thus caution should be used in SNP array design. Array design with fewer probes for more SNPs in single array may sacrifice genotyping quality.
Beyond time and error: a cognitive approach to the evaluation of graph drawings
Authors: Weidong Huang, Peter Eades, Seok-Hee Hong
Venue: Proceedings of the 2008 conference on BEyond time and errors: novel evaLuation methods for Information Visualization (2008)

Time and error are commonly used to measure the effectiveness of graph drawings. However, such measures are limited in providing more fundamental knowledge that is useful for general visualization design. We therefore apply a cognitive approach in evaluations. This approach evaluates graph drawings from a cognitive perspective, measuring more than just time and error. Three user studies are conducted to demonstrate the usefulness of this approach.
On-line discovery of temporal-difference networks
Authors: Takaki Makino, Toshihisa Takagi
Venue: Proceedings of the 25th international conference on Machine learning (2008)

We present an algorithm for on-line, incremental discovery of temporal-difference (TD) networks. The key contribution is the establishment of three criteria to expand a node in TD network: a node is expanded when the node is well-known, independent, and has a prediction error that requires further explanation. Since none of these criteria requires centralized calculation operations, they are easily computed in a parallel and distributed manner, and scalable for bigger problems compared to other discovery methods of predictive state representations. Through computer experiments, we demonstrate the empirical effectiveness of our algorithm.
A Simple Model for the Effectiveness of Delaying Strategies for Telecommunications Churn Reduction
Authors: Maurizio Naldi
Venue: Proceedings of the Tenth International Conference on Computer Modeling and Simulation (2008)

Churn represents a major source of concern for telecommunications operators. Since customer migration is somewhat supported in most regulated environments, deadlines are often set for the completion of porting operations, and sanctions are imposed in the case of violations. However, the donor operator may be led to adopt delaying strategies if the gain to be obtained exceeds the sanctions. A model isproposed to evaluate the effectiveness of such practices, relying on simple models for the customer lifetime value and for the customer behaviour. Closed form expressions are derived for the minimum sanction value effective to discourage the operator from introducing undue delays in porting operations. It is shown that, under the safest conditions forthe donor operator, this value needs not be larger than twice the net average revenue per user.