AI Code Meme

AI Code Meme — independent reviews, comparisons, pricing and step-by-step guides on Aizhi.

  • PCPaint

    PCPaint

    PCPaint was one of the first IBM PC-based mouse-driven GUI paint programs, released in 1984. It followed after Microsoft Doodle, released in 1983 with the Microsoft Mouse version 1 drivers for DOS, and around the same time as Digital Research’s Draw program. It was developed and created by John Bridges and Doug Wolfgram. It was later developed into Pictor Paint. The hardware manufacturer Mouse Systems bundled PCPaint with millions of computer mice that they sold, making PCPaint one of the best-selling DOS-based paint programs of the mid 1980s. == History == In 1983, Doug Wolfgram bought a Microsoft Mouse and decided to write a drawing program for it. They named it “Mouse Draw”. The interface was primitive but the program functioned well. Wolfgram traveled to SoftCon in New Orleans where he demonstrated the program to Mouse Systems. Mouse Systems was developing an optical mouse and they wanted to bundle a painting program so they agreed to publish Mouse Draw. The original program was written entirely in assembly language with primitive graphics routines developed by Wolfgram. John Bridges worked for an educational software company, Classroom Consortia Media, Inc., developing and writing Apple and IBM graphics libraries for CCM's software. Bridges and Wolfgram were friends who had been connected through a bulletin board system developed and run by Wolfgram. The two collaborated cross country via the BBS, Wolfram in California and Bridges in New York. Mouse Systems wanted the paint program to capture the look and feel of MacPaint. John Bridges and Doug Wolfgram started reworking Mouse Draw into what became PCPaint. The program was completely re-written using Bridge's graphics library and the top-level elements were written in C rather than assembly language. Bridges developed the core graphics code for the first version of PCPaint while Wolfgram worked on the user interface and top-level code. Mouse Systems signed an exclusive agreement with Wolfgram's company, Microtex Industries, Inc., to bundle PCPaint with every mouse they sold. They began publishing PCPaint with their mice in 1984. Microsoft responded in 1985 by bundling a competing product, PC Paintbrush, with version 4 of its DOS drivers for the Microsoft Mouse, replacing its in-house Microsoft Doodle program which it published with version 1 of the DOS drivers in mid-1983. Microsoft’s mouse began to outsell Mouse Systems mouse. In November 1985 Microsoft bundled a cut-down version of PC Paintbrush with Windows 1.0 (called Microsoft Paint), later bundling an updated version of PC Paintbrush with Windows 3.0 (as Paintbrush), impacting PCPaint’s marketshare. In early 1987, Mouse Systems decided that PCPaint wasn't helping to sell mice any longer so they discontinued the bundle deal and returned rights to the code to MicroTex Industries, but retained rights to the name, PCPaint. Wolfgram then combined the paint program with a new animation system he was developing (called GRASP) and Paul Mace Software bought publishing rights to the animation system and PCPaint, which was to be renamed Pictor. Bridges again got involved and took over programming responsibilities for GRASP as well as PCPaint while Wolfgram focused on more of the business details. In creating the first version of PCPaint, Doug had a dual-floppy machine with a Computer Innovations compiler on one disk and source code on the other. John had the "luxury" of a 10MB hard disk in his XT. Data was exchanged daily via 1200, then 2400 baud modems. === Authorship and Ownership === John Bridges and Wolfgram continued to work on PCPaint and GRASP on behalf of Paul Mace Software until 1990. Also in that year, Doug Wolfgram sold his remaining rights to PCPaint (and its animation system, GRASP) to John Bridges. In 1994, GRASP development stopped and so did development of Pictor Paint. John Bridges terminated his GRASP publishing contract with Paul Mace Software, and went off to create GLPro (the next generation of GRASP) with GMEDIA. Along with GLPro, came GLPaint, the successor to PCPaint and Pictor Paint. == Versions == In June 1984, Mouse Systems shipped PCPaint 1.0, the first GUI based Paint program for the IBM PC family of computers. John Bridges and Doug Wolfgram, were the co-authors of PCPaint 1.0. PCPaint 1.0 saved its graphics in a modified BSaved image format with the extension of ".PIC". The release of PCPaint Version 1.5 followed in late 1984, with the additions of graphics image compression for the .PIC format and support for "larger-than-screen" images. PCjr support was also added in this version after overcoming severe memory shortage problems getting PCPaint to run on the 128k PCjr. October 1985 saw the release of PCPaint 2.0. EGA support and publishing features were added to this version. The .PIC format was further refined, offering support for the rapidly expanding graphics capabilities of the PC and efficient image compression. PCPaint 3.1 was released in 1989. Unlike previous versions, it was not bundled with mice but was sold as a stand-alone software product. PCPaint 3.1 offered improved text and image handling, provided 36 types of flood and fill, worked with VGA adapters in hi-res 16-color and 256-color modes, allowed the user to save and retrieve files in a variety of intercompatible formats (.PIC, .GIF, .PCX, .IMG), and printed selected portions of images on color or black-and-white dot matrix, ink jet, and laser printers such as PostScript and HP Laser Jet. PCPaint 3.1 is still in use today by some users of DOS emulation programs like DOSBox and available for free download. Pictor Paint was an improved version, written by John Bridges, and bundled with GRASP GRaphical System for Presentation also written by John Bridges. It was also called "The Painter's Easel". GLPaint, released in 1995, was the last in this series of paint programs written by John Bridges. By 1998 version 7.0 provided support for TrueColor images and the Pictor PIC format was expanded to handle these. == Pictor PIC Image Format == PCPaint 1.0 saved its graphics in a modified BSAVE image format (which was popular at the time) with the file type (extension) of ".PIC". By PCPaint 1.5 this format was extended further to accommodate image compression. With the release of version 2.0 the PICtor PIC image format was developed almost to its present state, with no similarity to the BSAVE format used by earlier versions. Pictor Paint saved its files in a compressed format with the file extension PIC, which was the same format used by PCPaint.

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  • IMazing

    IMazing

    iMazing is mobile device management software that allows users to transfer files and data between iOS devices (iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch) and macOS or Windows computers, in addition to many other features beyond the scope of what Apple's own tools enable. == History == Developed by DigiDNA, iMazing was initially released in 2008 as DiskAid, enabling users to transfer data and files from the iPhone or iPod Touch to Mac or Windows computers. DiskAid was renamed iMazing in 2014. Version 2.0 was released on September 13, 2016. In August 2021, version 2.14 of iMazing added a spyware detection feature. The feature is based on Amnesty International’s Mobile Verification Toolkit to detect Pegasus Spyware following the publication of Pegasus Project. == Description == With iMazing, an iPhone or iPad can be used similarly to an external hard drive. It performs tasks that iTunes doesn’t offer, including incremental backups of iOS devices, browsing and exporting text and voicemail messages, managing apps, encryption, and migrating data from an old phone to a new one. The menu bar app iMazing Mini enables automatic, wireless and encrypted backups of iPhones. The iMazing HEIC Converter is a free desktop app for Mac and PC that lets users convert photos from HEIC format to JPG or PNG.

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  • Tokken

    Tokken

    Tokken is a payment system and mobile app most known for being a legal and secure option for businesses transactions within the cannabis industry, because of its compliance with bank requirements. The startup company was created by Lamine Zarrad, a former regulator at the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. == Operability == In order for a person to start using the app, they need to provide evidence, in the form of bioidentification data and mobile carrier records, that they can legally purchase weed. After they have been verified, customers can pay directly through the app at any dispensary that is using Tokken. Tokken turns credit card transactions into a digital token, which can be exchanged back for money that can later be deposited into a bank account. All transactions are logged publicly through a blockchain leger, making the process both anonymous and verified. === Banking services === Tokken has a "pay taxes" function which enables dispensaries to pay their taxes directly to the department.

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  • Tactical NAV

    Tactical NAV

    Tactical NAV, also known as TACNAV-X, is a location-based tracking app designed for use by military personnel. The app is primarily designed to assist in pinpointing enemy fire and mapping waypoints. Tactical NAV also helps users efficiently relay critical information to tactical operations centers for prompt decision-making regarding airstrikes or medical evacuations. The TACNAV-X platform is intended to enhance situational awareness, refine navigation capabilities, and assist in tactical decision-making across various operational environments. == Overview == Tactical NAV allows users to pinpoint enemy fire. == History == Tactical NAV was designed by U.S. Army Captain Jonathan J. Springer, a Field Artillery officer serving as a Battalion Fire Support Officer (FSO) in the 101st Airborne Division. Springer conceived the idea for the app during his third tour in Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. On June 25, 2010, after a rocket attack by the Taliban killed two soldiers in his battalion, he was inspired to create an app that would prevent similar losses in the future, enhance situational awareness, and assist soldiers serving on combat deployments. In 2010, Springer founded TacNav Systems (formerly AppDaddy Technologies) to develop mobile applications for use by military personnel. He tested the app during combat operations in eastern Afghanistan and verified TACNAV-X's accuracy using DAGRs, AFATDS, Falcon View, CPOF, ATAK, and other approved Department of Defense (DoD) systems. As of 2012, the app had been downloaded 8,000 times.

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  • Rule-based machine translation

    Rule-based machine translation

    Rule-based machine translation (RBMT) is a classical approach of machine translation systems based on linguistic information about source and target languages. Such information is retrieved from (unilingual, bilingual or multilingual) dictionaries and grammars covering the main semantic, morphological, and syntactic regularities of each language. Having input sentences, an RBMT system generates output sentences on the basis of analysis of both the source and the target languages involved. RBMT has been progressively superseded by more efficient methods, particularly neural machine translation. == History == The first RBMT systems were developed in the early 1970s. The most important steps of this evolution were the emergence of the following RBMT systems: Systran Japanese MT systems Today, other common RBMT systems include: Apertium GramTrans == Types of RBMT == There are three different types of rule-based machine translation systems: Direct Systems (Dictionary Based Machine Translation) map input to output with basic rules. Transfer RBMT Systems (Transfer Based Machine Translation) employ morphological and syntactical analysis. Interlingual RBMT Systems (Interlingua) use an abstract meaning. RBMT systems can also be characterized as the systems opposite to Example-based Systems of Machine Translation (Example Based Machine Translation), whereas Hybrid Machine Translations Systems make use of many principles derived from RBMT. == Basic principles == The main approach of RBMT systems is based on linking the structure of the given input sentence with the structure of the demanded output sentence, necessarily preserving their unique meaning. The following example can illustrate the general frame of RBMT: A girl eats an apple. Source Language = English; Demanded Target Language = German Minimally, to get a German translation of this English sentence one needs: A dictionary that will map each English word to an appropriate German word. Rules representing regular English sentence structure. Rules representing regular German sentence structure. And finally, we need rules according to which one can relate these two structures together. Accordingly, we can state the following stages of translation: 1st: getting basic part-of-speech information of each source word: a = indef.article; girl = noun; eats = verb; an = indef.article; apple = noun 2nd: getting syntactic information about the verb "to eat": NP-eat-NP; here: eat – Present Simple, 3rd Person Singular, Active Voice 3rd: parsing the source sentence: (NP an apple) = the object of eat Often only partial parsing is sufficient to get to the syntactic structure of the source sentence and to map it onto the structure of the target sentence. 4th: translate English words into German a (category = indef.article) => ein (category = indef.article) girl (category = noun) => Mädchen (category = noun) eat (category = verb) => essen (category = verb) an (category = indef. article) => ein (category = indef.article) apple (category = noun) => Apfel (category = noun) 5th: Mapping dictionary entries into appropriate inflected forms (final generation): A girl eats an apple. => Ein Mädchen isst einen Apfel. == Ontologies == An ontology is a formal representation of knowledge that includes the concepts (such as objects, processes etc.) in a domain and some relations between them. If the stored information is of linguistic nature, one can speak of a lexicon. In NLP, ontologies can be used as a source of knowledge for machine translation systems. With access to a large knowledge base, rule-based systems can be enabled to resolve many (especially lexical) ambiguities on their own. In the following classic examples, as humans, we are able to interpret the prepositional phrase according to the context because we use our world knowledge, stored in our lexicons:I saw a man/star/molecule with a microscope/telescope/binoculars.Since the syntax does not change, a traditional rule-based machine translation system may not be able to differentiate between the meanings. With a large enough ontology as a source of knowledge however, the possible interpretations of ambiguous words in a specific context can be reduced. === Building ontologies === The ontology generated for the PANGLOSS knowledge-based machine translation system in 1993 may serve as an example of how an ontology for NLP purposes can be compiled: A large-scale ontology is necessary to help parsing in the active modules of the machine translation system. In the PANGLOSS example, about 50,000 nodes were intended to be subsumed under the smaller, manually-built upper (abstract) region of the ontology. Because of its size, it had to be created automatically. The goal was to merge the two resources LDOCE online and WordNet to combine the benefits of both: concise definitions from Longman, and semantic relations allowing for semi-automatic taxonomization to the ontology from WordNet. A definition match algorithm was created to automatically merge the correct meanings of ambiguous words between the two online resources, based on the words that the definitions of those meanings have in common in LDOCE and WordNet. Using a similarity matrix, the algorithm delivered matches between meanings including a confidence factor. This algorithm alone, however, did not match all meanings correctly on its own. A second hierarchy match algorithm was therefore created which uses the taxonomic hierarchies found in WordNet (deep hierarchies) and partially in LDOCE (flat hierarchies). This works by first matching unambiguous meanings, then limiting the search space to only the respective ancestors and descendants of those matched meanings. Thus, the algorithm matched locally unambiguous meanings (for instance, while the word seal as such is ambiguous, there is only one meaning of seal in the animal subhierarchy). Both algorithms complemented each other and helped constructing a large-scale ontology for the machine translation system. The WordNet hierarchies, coupled with the matching definitions of LDOCE, were subordinated to the ontology's upper region. As a result, the PANGLOSS MT system was able to make use of this knowledge base, mainly in its generation element. == Components == The RBMT system contains: a SL morphological analyser - analyses a source language word and provides the morphological information; a SL parser - is a syntax analyser which analyses source language sentences; a translator - used to translate a source language word into the target language; a TL morphological generator - works as a generator of appropriate target language words for the given grammatica information; a TL parser - works as a composer of suitable target language sentences; Several dictionaries - more specifically a minimum of three dictionaries: a SL dictionary - needed by the source language morphological analyser for morphological analysis, a bilingual dictionary - used by the translator to translate source language words into target language words, a TL dictionary - needed by the target language morphological generator to generate target language words. The RBMT system makes use of the following: a Source Grammar for the input language which builds syntactic constructions from input sentences; a Source Lexicon which captures all of the allowable vocabulary in the domain; Source Mapping Rules which indicate how syntactic heads and grammatical functions in the source language are mapped onto domain concepts and semantic roles in the interlingua; a Domain Model/Ontology which defines the classes of domain concepts and restricts the fillers of semantic roles for each class; Target Mapping Rules which indicate how domain concepts and semantic roles in the interlingua are mapped onto syntactic heads and grammatical functions in the target language; a Target Lexicon which contains appropriate target lexemes for each domain concept; a Target Grammar for the target language which realizes target syntactic constructions as linearized output sentences. == Advantages == No bilingual texts are required. This makes it possible to create translation systems for languages that have no texts in common, or even no digitized data whatsoever. Domain independent. Rules are usually written in a domain independent manner, so the vast majority of rules will "just work" in every domain, and only a few specific cases per domain may need rules written for them. No quality ceiling. Every error can be corrected with a targeted rule, even if the trigger case is extremely rare. This is in contrast to statistical systems where infrequent forms will be washed away by default. Total control. Because all rules are hand-written, you can easily debug a rule-based system to see exactly where a given error enters the system, and why. Reusability. Because RBMT systems are generally built from a strong source language analysis that is fed to a transfer step and target language generator, the source language analysis and targe

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  • Glyph (data visualization)

    Glyph (data visualization)

    In the context of data visualization, a glyph is any marker, such as an arrow or similar marking, used to specify part of a visualization. This is a representation to visualize data where the data set is presented as a collection of visual objects. These visual objects are collectively called a glyph. It helps visualizing data relation in data analysis, statistics, etc. by using any custom notation. In the context of data visualization, a glyph is the visual representation of a piece of data where the attributes of a graphical entity are dictated by one or more attributes of a data record. == Constructing glyphs == Glyph construction can be a complex process when there are many dimensions to be represented in the visualization. Maguire et al proposed a taxonomy based approach to glyph-design that uses a tree to guide the visual encodings used to representation various data items. Duffy et al created perhaps one of the most complex glyph representations with their representation of sperm movement.

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  • Collateral freedom

    Collateral freedom

    Collateral freedom is an anti-censorship strategy that attempts to make it economically prohibitive for censors to block content on the Internet. This is achieved by hosting content on cloud services that are considered by censors to be "too important to block", and then using encryption to prevent censors from identifying requests for censored information that is hosted among other content, forcing censors to either allow access to the censored information or take down entire services.

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  • Resilience week

    Resilience week

    Resilience week is an annual symposium established to enable cross-disciplinary and role based discussions to advance strategies and research that engenders resilience in critical infrastructure systems and communities. Damaging storms, cyber attack and the interconnection of critical infrastructure systems can lead to cascading events that not only affect local but also across regions. However, many of these interdependencies are not easily recognized and obscure and complicate the mitigation of risk. The purpose of the symposia series is hence to facilitate best practice in managing critical infrastructure risks, by bringing together businesses, government and researchers. == Background == Originally organized in 2008 as a focus on the new research area of resilient control systems, including the disciplinary areas of control system, cyber-security, cognitive psychology and any number of critical infrastructure domains. Resilience has long been recognized as an area that requires not only the contributions of multiple disciplines or multidisciplinary participation, but interdisciplinary interaction where there is a common language and familiarity of the contributors to what other disciplines (and roles) contribute. The resulting interactions developed by Resilience Week and associated activities are intended to culture this sharing environment as a safe zone for inclusion; more importantly, an environment that lends to developing the new science and practice. As the attributes of resilience are complex, the contributions and topics for the event have included both the disciplinary and the project considerations, in keynotes, panels and research presentations. Keynotes have included senior leadership in the Department of Energy, Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, the National Science Foundation, and other agencies in addition to National Academy and professional organization fellows and senior industry leaders. Project panels and research presentations include emergent topics in resilience to climate change, cyber attack, damaging storms and the energy assurance. Topics Areas of focus have included: Control Systems Cyber Systems Cognitive Systems Communications Systems Communities and Infrastructure Project Focus Areas have included: Dependencies and Interdependencies Cyber Resilience for Operating Technology Commercializing Research and Development Building Critical Infrastructure Resilience through Distributed Energy Resources Energy Equity and Community Resilience Proceedings are developed for each year of the event, documenting the diversity of the research and engagements within these topical areas. == Impacts for the future == Since its inception, the Resilience Week community has evolved from one that primarily included only university researchers to one that includes many government laboratories, universities and private industries in the US and internationally. This type of collaboration forms a feedback loop that informs the research with the current needs and hones best practices. The future of the event is to further advance discussions that advance investment, recognize priorities and expedite technologies and tools to proactively address our energy future, in light of the natural and manmade challenges, and rationalizing the complex relationships that exist in critical infrastructure.

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  • Control engineering

    Control engineering

    Control engineering, also known as control systems engineering and, in some European countries, automation engineering, is an engineering discipline that deals with control systems, applying control theory to design equipment and systems with desired behaviors in control environments. The discipline of controls overlaps and is usually taught along with electrical engineering, chemical engineering and mechanical engineering at many institutions around the world. The practice uses sensors and detectors to measure the output performance of the process being controlled; these measurements are used to provide corrective feedback helping to achieve the desired performance. Systems designed to perform without requiring human input are called automatic control systems (such as cruise control for regulating the speed of a car). Multi-disciplinary in nature, control systems engineering activities focus on implementation of control systems mainly derived by mathematical modeling of a diverse range of systems. == Overview == Modern day control engineering is a relatively new field of study that gained significant attention during the 20th century with the advancement of technology. It can be broadly defined or classified as practical application of control theory. Control engineering plays an essential role in a wide range of control systems, from simple household washing machines to high-performance fighter aircraft. It seeks to understand physical systems, using mathematical modelling, in terms of inputs, outputs and various components with different behaviors; to use control system design tools to develop controllers for those systems; and to implement controllers in physical systems employing available technology. A system can be mechanical, electrical, fluid, chemical, financial or biological, and its mathematical modelling, analysis and controller design uses control theory in one or many of the time, frequency and complex-s domains, depending on the nature of the design problem. Control engineering is the engineering discipline that focuses on the modeling of a diverse range of dynamic systems (e.g. mechanical systems) and the design of controllers that will cause these systems to behave in the desired manner. Although such controllers need not be electrical, many are and hence control engineering is often viewed as a subfield of electrical engineering. Electrical circuits, digital signal processors and microcontrollers can all be used to implement control systems. Control engineering has a wide range of applications from the flight and propulsion systems of commercial airliners to the cruise control present in many modern automobiles. In most cases, control engineers utilize feedback when designing control systems. This is often accomplished using a proportional–integral–derivative controller (PID controller) system. For example, in an automobile with cruise control the vehicle's speed is continuously monitored and fed back to the system, which adjusts the motor's torque accordingly. Where there is regular feedback, control theory can be used to determine how the system responds to such feedback. In practically all such systems stability is important and control theory can help ensure stability is achieved. Although feedback is an important aspect of control engineering, control engineers may also work on the control of systems without feedback. This is known as open loop control. A classic example of open loop control is a washing machine that runs through a pre-determined cycle without the use of sensors. == History == Automatic control systems were first developed over two thousand years ago. The first feedback control device on record is thought to be the ancient Ktesibios's water clock in Alexandria, Egypt, around the third century BCE. It kept time by regulating the water level in a vessel and, therefore, the water flow from that vessel. This certainly was a successful device as water clocks of similar design were still being made in Baghdad when the Mongols captured the city in 1258 CE. A variety of automatic devices have been used over the centuries to accomplish useful tasks or simply just to entertain. The latter includes the automata, popular in Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries, featuring dancing figures that would repeat the same task over and over again; these automata are examples of open-loop control. Milestones among feedback, or "closed-loop" automatic control devices, include the temperature regulator of a furnace attributed to Drebbel, circa 1620, and the centrifugal flyball governor used for regulating the speed of steam engines by James Watt in 1788. In his 1868 paper "On Governors", James Clerk Maxwell was able to explain instabilities exhibited by the flyball governor using differential equations to describe the control system. This demonstrated the importance and usefulness of mathematical models and methods in understanding complex phenomena, and it signaled the beginning of mathematical control and systems theory. Elements of control theory had appeared earlier but not as dramatically and convincingly as in Maxwell's analysis. Control theory made significant strides over the next century. New mathematical techniques, as well as advances in electronic and computer technologies, made it possible to control significantly more complex dynamical systems than the original flyball governor could stabilize. New mathematical techniques included developments in optimal control in the 1950s and 1960s followed by progress in stochastic, robust, adaptive, nonlinear control methods in the 1970s and 1980s. Applications of control methodology have helped to make possible space travel and communication satellites, safer and more efficient aircraft, cleaner automobile engines, and cleaner and more efficient chemical processes. Before it emerged as a unique discipline, control engineering was practiced as a part of mechanical engineering and control theory was studied as a part of electrical engineering since electrical circuits can often be easily described using control theory techniques. In the first control relationships, a current output was represented by a voltage control input. However, not having adequate technology to implement electrical control systems, designers were left with the option of less efficient and slow responding mechanical systems. A very effective mechanical controller that is still widely used in some hydro plants is the governor. Later on, previous to modern power electronics, process control systems for industrial applications were devised by mechanical engineers using pneumatic and hydraulic control devices, many of which are still in use today. === Mathematical modelling === David Quinn Mayne, (1930–2024) was among the early developers of a rigorous mathematical method for analysing Model predictive control algorithms (MPC). It is currently used in tens of thousands of applications and is a core part of the advanced control technology by hundreds of process control producers. MPC's major strength is its capacity to deal with nonlinearities and hard constraints in a simple and intuitive fashion. His work underpins a class of algorithms that are probably correct, heuristically explainable, and yield control system designs which meet practically important objectives. == Control systems == == Control theory == == Education == At many universities around the world, control engineering courses are taught primarily in electrical engineering and mechanical engineering, but some courses can be instructed in mechatronics engineering, and aerospace engineering. In others, control engineering is connected to computer science, as most control techniques today are implemented through computers, often as embedded systems (as in the automotive field). The field of control within chemical engineering is often known as process control. It deals primarily with the control of variables in a chemical process in a plant. It is taught as part of the undergraduate curriculum of any chemical engineering program and employs many of the same principles in control engineering. Other engineering disciplines also overlap with control engineering as it can be applied to any system for which a suitable model can be derived. However, specialised control engineering departments do exist, for example, in Italy there are several master in Automation & Robotics that are fully specialised in Control engineering or the Department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering at the University of Sheffield or the Department of Robotics and Control Engineering at the United States Naval Academy and the Department of Control and Automation Engineering at the Istanbul Technical University. Control engineering has diversified applications that include science, finance management, and even human behavior. Students of control engineering may start with a linear control system course dealing with the time and complex-s domain, which req

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  • T-vertices

    T-vertices

    T-vertices is a term used in computer graphics to describe a problem that can occur during mesh refinement or mesh simplification. The most common case occurs in naive implementations of continuous level of detail, where a finer-level mesh is "sewn" together with a coarser-level mesh by simply aligning the finer vertices on the edges of the coarse polygons. The result is a continuous mesh, however due to the nature of the z-buffer and certain lighting algorithms such as Gouraud shading, visual artifacts can often be detected. Some modeling algorithms such as subdivision surfaces will fail when a model contains T-vertices.

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  • DataViva

    DataViva

    DataViva is an information visualization engine created by the Strategic Priorities Office of the government of Minas Gerais. DataViva makes official data about exports, industries, locations and occupations available for the entirety of Brazil through eight apps and more than 100 million possible visualizations. The first set of datum – also available at ALICEWEB – is provided by MDIC (Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade) / SECEX (Secretariat of Foreign Trade), an official institution of the Government of Brazil and shows foreign trade statistics for all exporting municipalities in the country. The other database, provided by Ministério do Trabalho e Emprego (MTE – Ministry of Labor and Employment), shows information about all the industries and occupations in Brazil (RAIS – Annual Social Information Report). The platform consists of eight core applications, each of which allows different ways of visualizing the data available. Some applications are descriptive, that is, showing data aggregated at various levels in a simple and comparative way, such as Treemapping. Others are prescriptive, using calculations that allow an analytic visualization of the data, based on theories such as the Product Space. All the applications are generated using D3plus, an open source JavaScript library built on top of D3.js by Alexander Simoes and Dave Landry. Inspired by The Observatory of Economic Complexity, DataViva is an open data, open-source, and free to use tool. It was developed in a partnership with Datawheel, co-founded by MIT Media Lab Professor César Hidalgo, and is maintained by the Government of Minas Gerais.

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  • Secure element

    Secure element

    A secure element (SE) is a secure operating system (OS) in a tamper-resistant processor chip or secure component. It can protect assets (root of trust, sensitive data, keys, certificates, applications) against high-level software and hardware attacks. Applications that process this sensitive data on an SE are isolated and so operate within a controlled environment not affected by software (including possible malware) found elsewhere on the OS. The hardware and embedded software meet the requirements of the Security IC Platform Protection Profile [PP 0084] including resistance to physical tampering scenarios described within it. More than 96 billion secure elements were produced and shipped between 2010 and 2021. SEs exist in various form factors, as devices such as smart cards, UICCs, or smart microSD cards, or embedded, or integrated, as parts of larger devices. SEs are an evolution of the chips in earlier smart cards, which have been adapted to suit the needs of numerous use cases, such as smartphones, tablets, set-top boxes, wearables, connected cars, and other internet of things (IoT) devices. The technology is widely used by technology firms such as Oracle, Apple and Samsung. SEs provide secure isolation, storage and processing for applications (called applets) they host while being isolated from the external world (e.g. rich OS and application processor when embedded in a smartphone) and from other applications running on the SE. Java Card and MULTOS are the most deployed standardized multi-application operating systems currently used to develop applications running on SEs. Since 1999, GlobalPlatform has been the body responsible for standardizing secure element technologies to support a dynamic model of application management in a multi-actor model. GlobalPlatform also runs Functional and Security Certification programmes for secure elements, and hosts a list of Functional Certified and Security Certified products. GlobalPlatform technology is also embedded in other standards such as ETSI SCP (now SET) since release 7. A Common Criteria Secure Element Protection Profile has been released targeting EAL4+ level with ALC_DVS.2 and AVA_VAN.5 extension to standardize the security features of a secure element across markets.

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  • Video imprint (computer vision)

    Video imprint (computer vision)

    Proposed as an extension of image epitomes in the field of video content analysis, video imprint is obtained by recasting video contents into a fixed-sized tensor representation regardless of video resolution or duration. Specifically, statistical characteristics are retained to some degrees so that common video recognition tasks can be carried out directly on such imprints, e.g., event retrieval, temporal action localization. It is claimed that both spatio-temporal interdependences are accounted for and redundancies are mitigated during the computation of video imprints. The option of computing video imprints exploiting the epitome model has the advantage of more flexible input feature formats and more efficient training stage for video content analysis.

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  • Z-order

    Z-order

    Z-order is an ordering of overlapping two-dimensional objects, such as windows in a stacking window manager, shapes in a vector graphics editor, or objects in a 3D application. One of the features of a typical GUI is that windows may overlap, so that one window hides part or all of another. When two windows overlap, their Z-order determines which one appears on top of the other. == Definition == The term "Z-order" refers to the order of objects along the Z-axis. In coordinate geometry, X typically refers to the horizontal axis (left to right), Y to the vertical axis (up and down), and Z refers to the axis perpendicular to the other two (forward or backward). One can think of the windows in a GUI as a series of planes parallel to the surface of the monitor. The windows are therefore stacked along the Z-axis, and the Z-order information thus specifies the front-to-back ordering of the windows on the screen. An analogy would be some sheets of paper scattered on top of a table, each sheet being a window, the table your computer screen, and the top sheet having the highest Z value. == Use == Typically, users of a GUI can affect the Z-order by selecting a window to be brought to the foreground (that is, "above" or "in front of" all the other windows). Some window managers allow interaction with windows while they are not in the foreground, while others will bring a window to the front whenever it receives input from the user. It is also possible for special windows to be designated "always on top"; these are then fixed to the top of the Z-order so that (with few exceptions) no other window can overlap them. When dealing with visual objects on a computer screen, an object with a Z-order of 1 would be visually "underneath" an object with a Z-order of 2 or greater. This is the same as making "layers" of objects where the Z-order determines what object is on top of another. An HTML page can use CSS to specify the Z-order so that some objects can be layered over others. Z-ordering is also used in 3D applications to determine object visibility based on overlap from other objects. This confers a speed advantage to the user as the computer does not need to render unseen objects. In practice, of course, some objects may be only partially obscured, and this is a complication that must be taken into account. In early real-time 3D graphics, Z-order was applied on a per-polygon basis to avoid using Z-buffer, which was considered expensive at the time. In modern 3D graphics, Z-order is used for order-dependent rendering, for example with semi-transparent objects. It can also be used to reduce the problem of Z-fighting, by either rendering farther objects first and then using weak inequality as the depth test or, conversely, rendering front-to-back and using strict inequality. == z-index == The actual number assigned to a particular place in the Z-order is sometimes known as the z-index. In particular the CSS property that sets the stack order of specific elements is known as the z-index. An element with greater stack order is always in front of another element with lower stack order. Negative values can also be used in the same manner. A negative value will appear behind a positive one. z-index only works on elements that have a position value (e.g. position: relative;) and for many coders, this one of the first things to investigate when debugging why the z-index isn't working. Like all other CSS properties, it can be set with JavaScript, with the following syntax:

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  • Random (software)

    Random (software)

    Random was an iOS mobile app that used algorithms and human-curation to create an adaptive interface to the Internet. The app served a remix of relevance and serendipity that allowed people to find diverse topics and interesting content that they might not have encountered otherwise. Random did not require a login or sign-up - the use of the app was anonymous. The app was powered by an artificial intelligence that learned from direct and indirect user interactions inside the app. While learning and adapting to a person, Random created a unique anonymous choice profile that was then used for recommending topics and content. The app didn't recommend the same content twice. == User interface == Random's user interface was made of ever-changing topic blocks that contained keywords and images. By choosing any of the blocks, the user would see related web content. By closing the web content, the user could access new related topics. The user interface allowed people to get more information about a specific topic area or then just leap freely from topic to topic. The content recommended by Random could be any type of web content, varying from news articles to long-form stories and from photographs to videos. Every user of the Random was curating content for other users by using the app. == History == Random was launched in March 2014. The startup was backed by Skype co-founder Janus Friis. The Random app received a strong reception from the likes of The New York Times, TechCrunch, New Scientist, Vice, and other leading publications. The app went on to gain traction with an active and loyal user community of several hundreds of thousands. This was not enough to support the free app model the team strongly believed in, and the service was terminated in December 2015. == Reception == Various reviews in media have emphasized that Random enables people to break their filter bubble and find diverse content they might not find elsewhere. Alan Henry of Lifehacker wrote: "Random... breaks you out by intentionally guiding you to new topics and interesting articles at sites you may not otherwise read." Vice Motherboard's Claire Evans says that: "Random never turns into a filter bubble, because it perpetually injects the irrational into my experience… in a cocktail of relevancy and serendipity." The app has been said to have a unique, minimalistic user experience. Kit Eaton of The New York Times commented that Random "let's you browse the news in a different way to all the other news sites you've probably ever used." Mashable reviewed Random by concluding that the "app may be one of the most simple content-discovery apps on the market."

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