Archives for 2005

Today I read a paper titled “An Algorithm for Transforming Color Images into Tactile Graphics”

The abstract is:
This paper presents an algorithm that transforms color visual images, like photographs or paintings, into tactile graphics.

In the algorithm, the edges of objects are detected and colors of the objects are estimated.

Then, the edges and the colors are encoded into lines and textures in the output tactile image.

Design of the method is substantiated by various qualities of haptic recognizing of images.

Also, means of presentation of the tactile images in printouts are discussed.

Example translated images are shown.

Today I read a paper titled “Uniform Proofs of Order Independence for Various Strategy Elimination Procedures”

The abstract is:
We provide elementary and uniform proofs of order independence for various strategy elimination procedures for finite strategic games, both for dominance by pure and by mixed strategies.

The proofs follow the same pattern and focus on the structural properties of the dominance relations.

They rely on Newman’s Lemma established in 1942 and related results on the abstract reduction systems.

Today I read a paper titled “An In-Place Sorting with O(n log n) Comparisons and O(n) Moves”

The abstract is:
We present the first in-place algorithm for sorting an array of size n that performs, in the worst case, at most O(n log n) element comparisons and O(n) element transports.

This solves a long-standing open problem, stated explicitly, e.g., in [J.I.

Munro and V.

Raman, Sorting with minimum data movement, J.

Algorithms, 13, 374-93, 1992], of whether there exists a sorting algorithm that matches the asymptotic lower bounds on all computational resources simultaneously.

Today I read a paper titled “Traffic Accident Analysis Using Decision Trees and Neural Networks”

The abstract is:
The costs of fatalities and injuries due to traffic accident have a great impact on society.

This paper presents our research to model the severity of injury resulting from traffic accidents using artificial neural networks and decision trees.

We have applied them to an actual data set obtained from the National Automotive Sampling System (NASS) General Estimates System (GES).

Experiment results reveal that in all the cases the decision tree outperforms the neural network.

Our research analysis also shows that the three most important factors in fatal injury are: driver’s seat belt usage, light condition of the roadway, and driver’s alcohol usage.

Today I read a paper titled “Multidimensional data classification with artificial neural networks”

The abstract is:
Multi-dimensional data classification is an important and challenging problem in many astro-particle experiments.

Neural networks have proved to be versatile and robust in multi-dimensional data classification.

In this article we shall study the classification of gamma from the hadrons for the MAGIC Experiment.

Two neural networks have been used for the classification task.

One is Multi-Layer Perceptron based on supervised learning and other is Self-Organising Map (SOM), which is based on unsupervised learning technique.

The results have been shown and the possible ways of combining these networks have been proposed to yield better and faster classification results.

Today I read a paper titled “Mobile Re-Finding of Web Information Using a Voice Interface”

The abstract is:
Mobile access to information is a considerable problem for many users, especially to information found on the Web.

In this paper, we explore how a voice-controlled service, accessible by telephone, could support mobile users’ needs for refinding specific information previously found on the Web.

We outline challenges in creating such a service and describe architectural and user interfaces issues discovered in an exploratory prototype we built called WebContext.

We also present the results of a study, motivated by our experience with WebContext, to explore what people remember about information that they are trying to refind and how they express information refinding requests in a collaborative conversation.

As part of the study, we examine how end-usercreated Web page annotations can be used to help support mobile information re-finding.

We observed the use of URLs, page titles, and descriptions of page contents to help identify waypoints in the search process.

Furthermore, we observed that the annotations were utilized extensively, indicating that explicitly added context by the user can play an important role in re-finding.

Today I read a paper titled “The Anatomy of the Grid – Enabling Scalable Virtual Organizations”

The abstract is:
“Grid” computing has emerged as an important new field, distinguished from conventional distributed computing by its focus on large-scale resource sharing, innovative applications, and, in some cases, high-performance orientation.

In this article, we define this new field.

First, we review the “Grid problem,” which we define as flexible, secure, coordinated resource sharing among dynamic collections of individuals, institutions, and resources-what we refer to as virtual organizations.

In such settings, we encounter unique authentication, authorization, resource access, resource discovery, and other challenges.

It is this class of problem that is addressed by Grid technologies.

Next, we present an extensible and open Grid architecture, in which protocols, services, application programming interfaces, and software development kits are categorized according to their roles in enabling resource sharing.

We describe requirements that we believe any such mechanisms must satisfy, and we discuss the central role played by the intergrid protocols that enable interoperability among different Grid systems.

Finally, we discuss how Grid technologies relate to other contemporary technologies, including enterprise integration, application service provider, storage service provider, and peer-to-peer computing.

We maintain that Grid concepts and technologies complement and have much to contribute to these other approaches.

Today I read a paper titled “The Gibbs Representation of 3D Rotations”

The abstract is:
This paper revisits the little-known Gibbs-Rodrigues representation of rotations in a three-dimensional space and demonstrates a set of algorithms for handling it.

In this representation the rotation is itself represented as a three-dimensional vector.

The vector is parallel to the axis of rotation and its three components transform covariantly on change of coordinates.

The mapping from rotations to vectors is 1:1 apart from computation error.

The discontinuities of the representation require special handling but are not problematic.

The rotation matrix can be generated efficiently from the vector without the use of transcendental functions, and vice-versa.

The representation is more efficient than Euler angles, has affinities with Hassenpflug’s Argyris angles and is very closely related to the quaternion representation.

While the quaternion representation avoids the discontinuities inherent in any 3-component representation, this problem is readily overcome.

The present paper gives efficient algorithms for computing the set of rotations which map a given vector to another of the same length and the rotation which maps a given pair of vectors to another pair of the same length and subtended angle.

Today I read a paper titled “An implemented model of punning riddles”

The abstract is:
In this paper, we discuss a model of simple question-answer punning, implemented in a program, JAPE, which generates riddles from humour-independent lexical entries.

The model uses two main types of structure: schemata, which determine the relationships between key words in a joke, and templates, which produce the surface form of the joke.

JAPE succeeds in generating pieces of text that are recognizably jokes, but some of them are not very good jokes.

We mention some potential improvements and extensions, including post-production heuristics for ordering the jokes according to quality..

Today I read a paper titled “Ranking Pages by Topology and Popularity within Web Sites”

The abstract is:
We compare two link analysis ranking methods of web pages in a site.

The first, called Site Rank, is an adaptation of PageRank to the granularity of a web site and the second, called Popularity Rank, is based on the frequencies of user clicks on the outlinks in a page that are captured by navigation sessions of users through the web site.

We ran experiments on artificially created web sites of different sizes and on two real data sets, employing the relative entropy to compare the distributions of the two ranking methods.

For the real data sets we also employ a nonparametric measure, called Spearman’s footrule, which we use to compare the top-ten web pages ranked by the two methods.

Our main result is that the distributions of the Popularity Rank and Site Rank are surprisingly close to each other, implying that the topology of a web site is very instrumental in guiding users through the site.

Thus, in practice, the Site Rank provides a reasonable first order approximation of the aggregate behaviour of users within a web site given by the Popularity Rank.

Today I read a paper titled “A symbolic description of punning riddles and its computer implementation”

The abstract is:
Riddles based on simple puns can be classified according to the patterns of word, syllable or phrase similarity they depend upon.

We have devised a formal model of the semantic and syntactic regularities underlying some of the simpler types of punning riddle.

We have also implemented this preliminary theory in a computer program which can generate riddles from a lexicon containing general data about words and phrases; that is, the lexicon content is not customised to produce jokes.

Informal evaluation of the program’s results by a set of human judges suggest that the riddles produced by this program are of comparable quality to those in general circulation among school children..

Today I read a paper titled “An Exploratory Study of Mobile Computing Use by Knowledge Workers”

The abstract is:
This paper describes some preliminary results from a 20-week study on the use of Compaq iPAQ Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) by 10 senior developers, analysts, technical managers, and senior organisational managers.

The goal of the study was to identify what applications were used, how and where they were used, the problems and issues that arose, and how use of the iPAQs changed over the study period.

The paper highlights some interesting uses of the iPAQs, and identifies some of the characteristics of successful mobile applications.

Today I read a paper titled “An Automatic Method of Finding Topic Boundaries”

The abstract is:
This article outlines a new method of locating discourse boundaries based on lexical cohesion and a graphical technique called dotplotting.

The application of dotplotting to discourse segmentation can be performed either manually, by examining a graph, or automatically, using an optimization algorithm.

The results of two experiments involving automatically locating boundaries between a series of concatenated documents are presented.

Areas of application and future directions for this work are also outlined..