ppxscal/embedding_network huggingface dataset:
The Evolution of Agency: Spectra of Bioagency and Cyberagency
Authors: Kenneth R. Fleischmann
Venue: The Information Society (2007)

This article examines nonhuman agency, or the capacity of nonhumans to carry out goal-directed action. The central argument is that agency should be conceptualized not as a binary (someone/something does or does not have agency) but rather as a spectrum, with degrees of agency. Based upon an empirical study of the design and use of frog dissection simulations (cyberfrogs) in high school biology classes, the author develops two parallel spectra of agency, bioagency and cyberagency, to describe the degrees of agency experienced by biological life forms and technologies. These spectra put agency into an evolutionary perspective, comparing how humans evolved agency over time to how technologies are now evolving agency. The article concludes with challenges for future research to further explore the validity and implications of a notion of cyberagency that evolves over time, can be represented on an analog spectrum, and is independent of human agency.
A framework for the design and verification of software measurement methods
Authors: Naji Habra, Alain Abran, Miguel Lopez, Asma Sellami
Venue: Journal of Systems and Software (2008)

At the core of any engineering discipline is the use of measures, based on ISO standards or on widely recognized conventions, for the development and analysis of the artifacts produced by engineers. In the software domain, many alternatives have been proposed to measure the same attributes, but there is no consensus on a framework for how to analyze or choose among these measures. Furthermore, there is often not even a consensus on the characteristics of the attributes to be measured. In this paper, a framework is proposed for a software measurement life cycle with a particular focus on the design phase of a software measure. The framework includes definitions of the verification criteria that can be used to understand the stages of software measurement design. This framework also integrates the different perspectives of existing measurement approaches. In addition to inputs from the software measurement literature the framework integrates the concepts and vocabulary of metrology. This metrological approach provides a clear definition of the concepts, as well as the activities and products, related to measurement. The aim is to give an integrated view, involving the practical side and the theoretical side, as well as the basic underlying concepts of measurement.
An optimization-based approach to dynamic data transformation for smart visualization
Authors: Zhen Wen, Michelle. X. Zhou
Venue: Proceedings of the 13th international conference on Intelligent user interfaces (2008)

We are building a smart visual dialog system that aids users in investigating large and complex data sets. Given a user's data request, we automate the generation of a visual response that is tailored to the user's context. In this paper, we focus on the problem of data transformation, which is the process of preparing the raw data (e.g., cleaning and scaling) for effective visualization. Specifically, we develop an optimization-based approach to data transformation. Compared to existing approaches, which normally focus on specific transformation techniques, our work addresses how to dynamically determine proper data transformations for a wide variety of visualization situations. As a result, our work offers two unique contributions. First, we provide a general computational framework that can dynamically derive a set of data transformations to help optimize the quality of the target visualization. Second, we provide an extensible, feature-based model to uniformly represent various data transformation operations and visualization quality metrics. Our evaluation shows that our work significantly improves visualization quality and helps users to better perform their tasks.
Finding question-answer pairs from online forums
Authors: Gao Cong, Long Wang, Chin-Yew Lin, Young-In Song, Yueheng Sun
Venue: Proceedings of the 31st annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval (2008)

Online forums contain a huge amount of valuable user generated content. In this paper we address the problem of extracting question-answer pairs from forums. Question-answer pairs extracted from forums can be used to help Question Answering services (e.g. Yahoo! Answers) among other applications. We propose a sequential patterns based classification method to detect questions in a forum thread, and a graph based propagation method to detect answers for questions in the same thread. Experimental results show that our techniques are very promising.
Content-based image retrieval by hierarchical linear subspace method
Authors: Andreas Wichert
Venue: Journal of Intelligent Information Systems (2008)

We describe a hierarchical linear subspace method to query large on-line image databases using image similarity as the basis of the queries. The method is based on the generic multimedia indexing (GEMINI) approach which is used in the IBM query through the image content search system. Our approach is demonstrated on image indexing, in which the subspaces correspond to different resolutions of the images. During content-based image retrieval, the search starts in the subspace with the lowest resolution of the images. In this subspace, the set of all possible similar images is determined. In the next subspace, additional metric information corresponding to a higher resolution is used to reduce this set. This procedure is repeated until the similar images can be determined. For evaluation we used three image databases and two different subspace sequences.
Detecting mountain pine beetle red attack damage with EO-1 Hyperion moisture indices
Authors: J. C. White, N. C. Coops, T. Hilker, M. A. Wulder, A. L. Carroll
Venue: International Journal of Remote Sensing (2007)

The mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae) is the most destructive insect of mature pine forests in western North America. Time series of wetness transformations generated from Landsat imagery have been used to detect mountain pine beetle red attack damage over large areas. With the recent availability of high spatial (QuickBird) and high spectral (Hyperion) resolution satellite sensor imagery, the relationship between spectral moisture indices and levels of red attack damage may be investigated. Six moisture indices were generated from Hyperion data and were compared to the proportion of the Hyperion pixel having red attack damage. Results indicate the Hyperion moisture indices incorporating both the shortwave infrared (SWIR) and near infrared (NIR) regions of the electromagnetic spectrum concurrently, such as the Moisture Stress Index, were significantly correlated to levels of damage (r 2 = 0.51; p = 0.0001). The results corroborate the hypothesis that changes in foliage moisture resulting from mountain pine beetle attack are driving the broad-scale temporal variation in Landsat derived wetness indices. Furthermore, the results suggest that Hyperion data may be used to map low levels of mountain pine beetle red attack damage over large areas that are not consistently captured with Landsat data.
On the Possibility of Small, Service-Free Disk Based Storage Systems
Authors: Jehan-François Pâris, Thomas J. E. Schwarz
Venue: Proceedings of the 2008 Third International Conference on Availability, Reliability and Security (2008)

For many storage providers, the cost of providing service calls exceeds the costs of the hardware being serviced. In this paper, we show that zero-maintenance, small disk arrays are too expensive, but that low-maintenance arrays are feasible and describe a possible implementation. Our evaluation technique replaces Mean Time to Data Loss with the lifespan. Our results also show the impact of the assumption of constant failure rates on the results of modeling
Mechanism design for sensor fusion: tactical networks as a foil for ultra large scale systems
Authors: Kurt C. Wallnau, Mark Klein, Daniel Plakosh
Venue: Proceedings of the 2nd international workshop on Ultra-large-scale software-intensive systems (2008)

Economic mechanisms, such as markets and auctions, offer a design language and mathematical concepts that might prove to be effective in addressing human incentives as first-class elements in the design of ultra large-scale systems. To study this possibility at realistic but controllable scale, we developed an emulation of a combat system tactical data network, and developed a variant of the Vickrey-Clarke-Groves mechanism to allocate network bandwidth for radar sensor fusion. The overall conclusion of the study is that economic mechanisms are a feasible and interesting alternative to traditional systems approaches to resource allocation in systems that are highly dynamic, and that involve many actors engaged in varying activities, and having varying and possibly competing, goals.
The Pretreatment Method for Epicardial Potential Mapping Signals Based on Independent Component Analysis and Wavelet Transform
Authors: Yu Zhou, Cuiwei Yang, Zuxiang Fang
Venue: Proceedings of the 2008 International Conference on BioMedical Engineering and Informatics - Volume 02 (2008)

To guarantee the preciseness and credibility of the epicardial potential mapping (EPM) signals used for cardiac electrophysiology research, pretreatment including denoising and characteristics recognition for EPM signals is necessary. So a new pretreatment method based on independent component analysis (ICA) and wavelet transform (WT) was designed: first to denoise EPM signals based on ICA with a new noise independent component selection measurement: the dispersion of independent components’ projection coefficients to every electrode, then to recognize the EPM signals’ characteristics according to their spline WT in the third scale. The results indicated that the method could denoise EPM signals efficiently with reserving or even strengthening the true depolarization signals detected at electrodes and recognize EPM signals’ characteristics correctly. So this new pretreatment method is fit for EPM system.
An embedding technique based upon block prediction
Authors: Ming-Ni Wu, Chia-Chen Lin, Chin-Chen Chang
Venue: Journal of Systems and Software (2008)

This paper presents a novel data hiding scheme for VQ compression images. This scheme first uses SMVQ prediction to classify encoding blocks into different types, then uses different codebooks and encoding strategies to perform encoding and data hiding simultaneously. In using SMVQ prediction, no extra data is required to identify the combination of encoding strategies and codebook, which helps improve compression performance. Furthermore, the proposed scheme adaptively combines VQ and SMVQ encoding characteristics to provide higher image quality of stego-images while size of the hidden payload remains the same. Experimental results show that the proposed scheme indeed outperforms other previously proposed schemes in image quality of the stego-images and compression performance.
Topology-Independent Link Activation Scheduling Schemes for Mobile CDMA Ad Hoc Networks
Authors: Yi-Sheng Su, Szu-Lin Su, Jung-Shian Li
Venue: IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing (2008)

In this paper, we study medium access control (MAC) protocols with quality-of-service (QoS) support---topology-independent link activation transmission scheduling---for mobile code-division multiple-access (CDMA) ad hoc networks. QoS provisioning for each communication link is guaranteed without the need to adapt transmission schedules in mobile environments. An interference model which captures the difference between transmission and interference ranges is considered. Under this interference model, an approach to guaranteeing conflict-free transmission slots in each frame (QoS provisioning) for each communication link is proposed. Compared with the previously known method, superior performance is obtained. We then present a topology-independent link activation scheduling framework based on the theory of group divisible (GD) designs. By mathematical properties of GD designs, the proposed framework guarantees conflict-free transmission slots in each frame for each communication link without the overhead due to the recomputation of transmission schedules when the network topology changes. With the proposed framework, we study and evaluate one series of GD design constructions. Based on the results derived, topology-independent link activation scheduling algorithms are then presented. The proposed schemes are designed for different objectives: maximizing the minimum system throughput and/or minimizing the schedule frame length. Numerical results show that the proposed algorithms outperform previously known schemes. The average performance of the proposed schemes is also derived.
Design of Bandwidth Aware and Congestion Avoiding Efficient Routing Algorithms for Networks-on-Chip Platforms
Authors: Maurizio Palesi, Giuseppe Longo, Salvatore Signorino, Rickard Holsmark, Shashi Kumar, Vincenzo Catania
Venue: Proceedings of the Second ACM/IEEE International Symposium on Networks-on-Chip (2008)

In this paper we demonstrate that it is possible to design highly efficient application specific routing algorithms which distribute traffic more uniformly by using information regarding applications communication behavior (communication topology and communication bandwidth). We use off-line analysis to estimate expected load on various links in the network. The result of this analysis is used along with the available routing adaptivity in each router to distribute less traffic to links and paths which are expected to be congested. The methodology for Application Specific Routing Algorithms (APSRA) is extended to incorporate these features to design highly adaptive deadlock free routing algorithms which also distribute traffic more uniformly and reduce network congestion. We show that the number of congested links (links exceeding threshold bandwidth) is reduced by up to 100% with this extension. Significant reduction in average delay is also obtained for both synthetic (up to 25%) as well as a real application (12.5%) communication traffic with this extension to APSRA. We discuss architectural implications and area overhead of our approach on the design of a table based NoC router.
Conversations on Electric and Magnetic Fields in the Cosmos, 1 edition
Authors: Eugene N. Parker
Venue:  (2007)

Today's standard textbooks treat the theoretical structure of electric and magnetic fields, but their emphasis is on electromagnetic radiation and static-electric and magnetic fields. In this book, Eugene Parker provides advanced graduate students and researchers with a much-needed complement to existing texts, one that discusses the dynamic electromagnetism of the cosmos--that is, the vast magnetic fields that are carried bodily in the swirling ionized gases of stars and galaxies and throughout intergalactic space.Parker is arguably the world's leading authority on solar wind and the effects of magnetic fields in the heliosphere, and his originality of thought and distinctive approach to physics are very much in evidence here. Seeking to enrich discussions in standard texts and correct misconceptions about the dynamics of these large-scale fields, Parker engages readers in a series of "conversations" that are at times anecdotal and even entertaining without ever sacrificing theoretical rigor. The dynamics he describes represents the Maxwell stresses of the magnetic field working against the pressure and inertia of the bulk motion of ionized gases, characterized in terms of the magnetic field and gas velocity. Parker shows how this dynamic interaction cannot be fully expressed in terms of the electric current and electric field.Conversations on Electric and Magnetic Fields in the Cosmos goes back to basics to explain why classical hydrodynamics and magnetohydrodynamics are inescapable, even in the deepest reaches of space.
Why did Jim Gray win the Turing Award?
Authors: Michael Stonebraker
Venue: ACM SIGMOD Record (2008)

This short paper is intended to describe for the layman why Jim Gray won so many awards, culminating in his being selected to receive the 1998 ACM Turing Award, arguably the "Nobel Prize of Computer Science". It briefly summarizes his main contributions to our field.
Three-Dimensional Layout of On-Chip Tree-Based Networks
Authors: Hiroki Matsutani, Michihiro Koibuchi, D. Frank Hsu, Hideharu Amano
Venue: Proceedings of the The International Symposium on Parallel Architectures, Algorithms, and Networks (2008)

Three-dimensional Network-on-Chip (3-D NoC) is an emerging research area exploring the network architecture of 3-D ICs that stack several smaller wafers or dice for reducing wire length and wire delay. Various network topologies such as meshes, tori, and trees have been used for NoCs. In particular, much attention has been focused on tree-based topologies, such as Fat Trees and Fat H-Tree, because of their relatively short hop-count that enables lower latency communication compared to meshes or tori. However, since on-chip tree-based networks in their 2-D layouts have long wire links around the root, they generate serious wire delay, posing severe problems to modern VLSI design. In this paper, we propose a 3-D layout scheme of trees including Fat Trees and Fat H-Tree for 3-D ICs in order to resolve the trees' intrinsic disadvantage. The 3-D layouts are compared with the original 2-D layouts in terms of network logic area, wire length, wire delay, number of repeaters inserted, and energy consumption. Evaluation results show that 1) total wire length is reduced by 25.0% to 50.0%; 2) wire delay is improved and repeater buffers that consume considerable energy can be removed; 3) flit transmission energy is reduced by up to 47.0%; 4) area overhead is at most 7.8%, which compares favorably to those for 3-D mesh and torus.
An approach for adaptive DRAM temperature and power management
Authors: Song Liu, Seda Ogrenci Memik, Yu Zhang, Gokhan Memik
Venue: Proceedings of the 22nd annual international conference on Supercomputing (2008)

With rising capacities and higher accessing frequencies, high-performance DRAMs are providing increasing memory access bandwidth to the processors. However, the increasing DRAM performance comes with the price of higher power consumption and temperature in DRAM chips. Traditional low power approaches for DRAM systems focus on utilizing low power modes, which is not always suitable for high performance systems. Existing DRAM temperature management techniques, on the other hand, utilize generic temperature management methods inherited from those applied on processor cores. These methods reduce DRAM temperature by controlling the number of DRAM accesses, similar to throttling the processor core, which incurs significant performance penalty. In this paper, we propose a customized low power technique for high performance DRAM systems, namely the Page Hit Aware Write Buffer (PHA-WB). The PHA-WB improves DRAM page hit rate by buffering write operations that may incur page misses. This approach reduces DRAM system power consumption and temperature without any performance penalty. Our proposed Throughput-Aware PHA-WB (TAP) dynamically configures the write buffer for different applications and workloads, thus achieves the best trade off between DRAM power reduction and buffer power overhead. Our experiments show that a system with TAP could reduce the total DRAM power consumption by up to 18.36% (8.64% on average). The steady-state temperature can be reduced by as much as 5.10°C and by 1.93°C on average across eight representative workloads.
Optimization of markers in clothing industry
Authors: Iztok Fister, Marjan Mernik, Bogdan Filipič
Venue: Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence (2008)

The optimization of markers is one of the most important preparatory steps for production in the clothing industry. It determines the sizes of clothes to be laid and cut together. Markers are built on a work order basis. The work order is a matrix of sizes by colors that have to be covered by markers in an optimal way. The optimal way can be defined in a number of ways: it can be the minimum number of markers to accomplish the work order, or the least time for fulfilling the work order, or the minimal amount of cloth used. In this article, the problem of marker optimization is treated formally. The problem is transformed into the 0/1 knapsack problem and solved using evolutionary algorithms. The results obtained on ten real-world work orders show an important improvement over the previously best known solutions.
Designing a Virtual Organizational Memory- A Case Study
Authors: Bouarfa Hafida
Venue: Proceedings of the 2008 International Workshop on Advanced Information Systems for Enterprises (2008)

Knowledge is often the property of individual decision makers in the organizations and when they leave, their experience is lost by the organization at a great cost. The utilization of an organizational memory is essential in order to avoid knowledge loss. In virtual organizations, where the cooperation between the partners has a restricted life span, this cost may be significant. Existing research is deficient in the utilization of the concepts virtual organization and Knowledge management together. This research has undertaken to study these two concepts together. This paper presents the process of designing an organizational memory for a virtual organization. This process is described on the basis of a case study chosen in the building field. It shows the limits of existing acquisition methods for virtual organisations, some propositions are done to extend one of these methods. A virtual organizational memory for post seismic evaluation is developed using case-based reasoning technique.
Optimized, decentralized workflow execution in grid environments
Authors: Walter Binder, Ion Constantinescu, Boi Faltings, Nadine Heterd
Venue: Multiagent and Grid Systems (2007)

This article describes an original approach for the optimized execution of computational tasks in Grid environments. Tasks are represented as workflows that define interactions between different services. Functional service descriptions written in OWL-S are extended with non-functional properties, allowing to specify the resource requirements of services depending on given inputs. Based on such annotations, a mathematical model is derived to estimate the execution costs of a workflow. Moreover, an optimization algorithm is presented that distributes the execution of a workflow in a Grid, supporting the dynamic deployment of software components on demand, in order to fulfill user requirements, such as a limit on the total workflow execution time. Workflows are executed in a fully decentralized way, avoiding inefficient triangular routing of messages.