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Princh

Princh is a Danish software company, which is headquartered in Aarhus, Denmark. Founded in 2015, Princh develops cloud printing and electronic payment products. The company is headquartered in the city of Aarhus. While utilizing a smartphone or web app, users can locate a nearby printer to their current location, get directions to access said printer, and/or authorize a print and pay for the print job in question. The product is available as a native mobile apps for Android and iOS, as well as on web and desktop products for businesses and libraries. The app connects a network of printer owners and users around the world. Princh supports an array of printable files. == History == The company was founded in 2015. The company is currently based in the southern part of Aarhus. The Princh printing service was officially launched on June 23, 2015. Currently, Princh is available as a service in a multitude of locations such as print shops, libraries, hotels, or universities. Princh is a popular printing and payment product among libraries and can among other places be found in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Germany, United Kingdom, United States, and Canada. == How it works == With the Princh app, users will be able to locate their nearest printer. Once the user is at the printer, the user chooses the document to be printed out and shares it with the Princh app. The user then selects the desired nearby printer entering the printer ID number or scanning the QR-code located on top of the printer, pays electronically and the print job is processed by the printer. Printer owners get access to a personal control panel where they can set printing prices and monitor all Princh activity for their business. == Notes and references ==
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Ari Holtzman

Ari Holtzman is a professor of Computer Science at the University of Chicago and an expert in the area of natural language processing and computational linguistics. Previously, Holtzman was a PhD student at the University of Washington where he was advised by Luke Zettlemoyer. In 2017, he was a member of the winning team for the inaugural Alexa Prize for developing a conversational AI system for the Amazon Alexa device. Holtzman has made multiple contributions in the area of text generation and language models such as the introduction of nucleus sampling in 2019, his work on AI safety and neural fake news detection, and the fine-tuning of quantized large language models.
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Unified Modeling Language

The Unified Modeling Language (UML) is a general-purpose, object-oriented, visual modeling language that provides a way to visualize the architecture and design of a system, similar to the function of a blueprint. UML defines notation for many types of diagrams which focus on aspects such as behavior, interaction, and structure. UML is both a formal metamodel and a collection of graphical templates. The metamodel defines the elements in an object-oriented model such as classes and properties. It is essentially the same thing as the metamodel in object-oriented programming (OOP), however for OOP, the metamodel is primarily used at run time to dynamically inspect and modify an application object model. The UML metamodel provides a mathematical, formal foundation for the graphic views used in the modeling language to describe an emerging system. UML was created in an attempt to define a standard language for object-oriented programming at the OOPSLA '95 Conference. Originally, Grady Booch and James Rumbaugh merged their models into a unified model. This was followed by Booch's company Rational Software purchasing Ivar Jacobson's Objectory company and merging their model into the UML. At the time Rational and Objectory were two of the dominant players in the small world of independent vendors of object-oriented tools and methods. The Object Management Group (OMG) then took ownership of UML. The creation of UML was motivated by the desire to standardize the disparate nature of notational systems and approaches to software design at the time. In 1997, UML was adopted as a standard by the Object Management Group (OMG) and has been managed by this organization ever since. In 2005, UML was also published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) as the ISO/IEC 19501 standard. Since then the standard has been periodically revised to cover the latest revision of UML. Most developers do not use UML per se, but instead produce more informal diagrams, often hand-drawn. These diagrams, however, often include elements from UML. == Use == UML is primarily used for software development (in any industry or domain) but also used outside elsewhere including business processes, system functions, database schemas, workflow in the legal systems, medical electronics, Health care systems, and hardware design.. The UML is used by the OMG itself to define other OMG products such as the Unified Architecture Framework (UAF) and the Systems Modelling Language (SysML) v1. UML is designed for use with many object-oriented software development methods, both today and for the methods when it was first developed – including OMT, Booch method, Objectory, and especially RUP, which it was originally intended to be used with when work began at Rational Software. Although originally intended for object-oriented design documentation, UML has been used effectively in other contexts such as modeling business process. As UML is not inherently linked to a particular programming language, it can be used for modeling a system independent of language. Some UML tools generate source code from a UML model. === Elements === UML diagrams support visualizing system aspects like: Use case diagram for specifying user interactions with systems Class diagram for specifying structures, including data structures Activity diagram for specifying business process workflows Component diagram for specifying how components interface with other components Deployment diagram for specifying how components are deployed and executed on computational nodes In addition to syntactical (notational) elements with well-defined semantics, UML diagrams also allow for free-form comments (notes) that explain aspects such as usage, constraints, and intents. === Sharing === UML models can be exchanged among UML tools via the XML Metadata Interchange (XMI) format. === Cardinality notation === As with database Chen, Bachman, and ISO ER diagrams, class models are specified to use "look-across" cardinalities, even though several authors (Merise, Elmasri & Navathe, amongst others) prefer same-side or "look-here" for roles and both minimum and maximum cardinalities. Recent researchers (Feinerer and Dullea et al.) have shown that the "look-across" technique used by UML and ER diagrams is less effective and less coherent when applied to n-ary relationships of order strictly greater than 2. Feinerer says: "Problems arise if we operate under the look-across semantics as used for UML associations. Hartmann investigates this situation and shows how and why different transformations fail.", and: "As we will see on the next few pages, the look-across interpretation introduces several difficulties which prevent the extension of simple mechanisms from binary to n-ary associations." === Artifacts === An artifact is the "specification of a physical piece of information that is used or produced by a software development process, or by deployment and operation of a system" including models, source code, scripts, executables, tables in database systems, development deliverables, a design documents, and email messages. An artifact is the physical entity that is deployed to a node. Other UML elements such as classes and components are first manifest into artifacts and instances of these artifacts are then deployed. Artifacts can be composed of other artifacts. === Metamodeling === The OMG developed a metamodeling architecture to define UML, called the Meta-Object Facility (MOF). MOF is designed as a four-layered architecture, as shown in the image at right. It provides a meta-meta model at the top, called the M3 layer. This M3-model is the language used by Meta-Object Facility to build metamodels, called M2-models. The most prominent example of a Layer 2 Meta-Object Facility model is the UML metamodel, which describes UML itself. These M2-models describe elements of the M1-layer, and thus M1-models. These would be, for example, models written in UML. The last layer is the M0-layer or data layer. It is used to describe runtime instances of the system. The metamodel can be extended using a mechanism called stereotyping. This has been criticized as being insufficient/untenable by Brian Henderson-Sellers and Cesar Gonzalez-Perez in "Uses and Abuses of the Stereotype Mechanism in UML 1.x and 2.0". == Diagrams == UML 2 defines many types of diagrams – shown as a taxonomy in the image. === Structure diagrams === Structure diagrams emphasize the structure of the system – using objects, classifiers, relationships, attributes and operations. They are used to document software architecture. Class diagram – Describes the structure of a class Component diagram – Describes how a software system is split into components and dependencies between the components Composite structure diagram Deployment diagram Object diagram Package diagram Profile diagram === Behavior diagrams === Behavior diagrams emphasize the behavior of a system by showing collaborations among objects and changes to the internal states of objects. They are used to describe the functionality of a system. Activity diagram – Describes the business and operational activities of components State machine diagram Use case diagram – Depicts of a user's interaction with a system === Interaction diagrams === Interaction diagrams, a subset of behavior diagrams, emphasize the flow of control and data between components of a system. Communication diagram – shows communication between components Interaction overview diagram Sequence diagram – shows interactions arranged in time sequence; can be drawn via tools such as Lucidchart and Draw.io Timing diagram – focuses on timing constraints === Examples === == Adoption == In 2013, UML had been marketed by OMG for many contexts, but aimed primarily at software development with limited success. It has been treated, at times, as a design silver bullet, which leads to problems. UML misuse includes overuse (designing every part of the system with it, which is unnecessary) and assuming that novices can design with it. It is considered a large language, with many constructs. Some people (including Jacobson) feel that UML's size hinders learning and therefore uptake. Visual Studio removed support for UML in 2016 due to lack of use. == History == UML has evolved since the second half of the 1990s and has its roots in the object-oriented programming methods developed in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The image shows a timeline of the history of UML and other object-oriented modeling methods and notation. === Origin === Rational Software hired James Rumbaugh from General Electric in 1994 and after that, the company became the source for two of the most popular object-oriented modeling approaches of the day: Rumbaugh's object-modeling technique (OMT) and Grady Booch's method. They were soon assisted in their efforts by Ivar Jacobson, the creator of the object-oriented software engineeri
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Project Joshua Blue

Joshua Blue is a project under development by IBM that focuses on advancing the artificial intelligence field by designing and programming computers to emulate human mental functions. == Goals == According to researchers at IBM's Thomas J. Watson Research Center, the main goal of Joshua Blue is "to achieve cognitive flexibility that approaches human functioning". In short, IBM is aiming to design Joshua Blue to 'think like a human', mainly in terms of emotional thought. == How it will work == A model of Joshua Blue's learning pattern has been created. Similar to how young children learn human traits through interacting with their surroundings, Joshua Blue will acquire knowledge through external stimuli present in its environment. IBM believes that if computers evolve to learn in this way and then comprehend and analyze the knowledge gained using reason, computers could begin to possess a "mind", of sorts, capable of demonstrating complex social behaviors similar to those of humans. Thus far, IBM has revealed that Joshua Blue will be a computer with a network of wires and input nodes that function as a computer nervous system. This nervous system will be used by Joshua Blue to perceive affect or personal emotional feelings. Not only will this network of input nodes help Joshua Blue discover things physically, but it will also allow Joshua Blue to interpret the significance of events. The input nodes, or proprioceptors, will enable Joshua Blue to be aware of things that happen around itself, as well as recognize and attach meaning to the emotional effect produced by interacting with an object in a certain way. In addition, Joshua Blue's proprioceptors will function as pain and pleasure sensors, allowing Joshua Blue to employ a similar "reward and punishment" system that humans use to form behaviors.
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Screen space ambient occlusion

Screen space ambient occlusion (SSAO) is a computer graphics technique for efficiently approximating the ambient occlusion effect in real time. It was developed by Vladimir Kajalin while working at Crytek and was used for the first time in 2007 by the video game Crysis, also developed by Crytek. == Implementation == The algorithm is implemented as a pixel shader, analyzing the scene depth buffer which is stored in a texture. For every pixel on the screen, the pixel shader samples the depth values around the current pixel and tries to compute the amount of occlusion from each of the sampled points. In its simplest implementation, the occlusion factor depends only on the depth difference between sampled point and current point. Without additional smart solutions, such a brute force method would require about 200 texture reads per pixel for good visual quality. This is not acceptable for real-time rendering on current graphics hardware. In order to get high quality results with far fewer reads, sampling is performed using a randomly rotated kernel. The kernel orientation is repeated every N screen pixels in order to have only high-frequency noise in the final picture. In the end this high frequency noise is greatly removed by a NxN post-process blurring step taking into account depth discontinuities (using methods such as comparing adjacent normals and depths). Such a solution allows a reduction in the number of depth samples per pixel to about 16 or fewer while maintaining a high quality result, and allows the use of SSAO in soft real-time applications like computer games. Compared to other ambient occlusion solutions, SSAO has the following advantages: Independent from scene complexity. No data pre-processing needed, no loading time and no memory allocations in system memory. Works with dynamic scenes. Works in the same consistent way for every pixel on the screen. No CPU usage – it can be executed completely on the GPU. May be easily integrated into any modern graphics pipeline. SSAO also has the following disadvantages: Rather local and in many cases view-dependent, as it is dependent on adjacent texel depths which may be generated by any geometry whatsoever. Hard to correctly smooth/blur out the noise without interfering with depth discontinuities, such as object edges (the occlusion should not "bleed" onto objects). Because SSAO operates only on the current depth buffer, it can miss occluding geometry that is not rasterized into the z-buffer and may produce undersampling-related artifacts.
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General Problem Solver

General Problem Solver (GPS) is a computer program created in 1957 by Herbert A. Simon, J. C. Shaw, and Allen Newell (RAND Corporation) intended to work as a universal problem solver machine. In contrast to the former Logic Theorist project, the GPS works with means–ends analysis. == Overview == Any problem that can be expressed as a set of well-formed formulas (WFFs) or Horn clauses, and that constitutes a directed graph with one or more sources (that is, hypotheses) and sinks (that is, desired conclusions), can be solved, in principle, by GPS. Proofs in the predicate logic and Euclidean geometry problem spaces are prime examples of the domain of applicability of GPS. It was based on Simon and Newell's theoretical work on logic machines. GPS was the first computer program that separated its knowledge of problems (rules represented as input data) from its strategy of how to solve problems (a generic solver engine). GPS was implemented in the third-order programming language, IPL. While GPS solved simple problems such as the Towers of Hanoi that could be sufficiently formalized, it could not solve any real-world problems because the search was easily lost in the combinatorial explosion. Put another way, the number of "walks" through the inferential digraph became computationally untenable. (In practice, even a straightforward state space search such as the Towers of Hanoi can become computationally infeasible, albeit judicious prunings of the state space can be achieved by such elementary AI techniques as A and IDA). The user defined objects and operations that could be done on the objects, and GPS generated heuristics by means–ends analysis in order to solve problems. It focused on the available operations, finding what inputs were acceptable and what outputs were generated. It then created subgoals to get closer and closer to the goal. The GPS paradigm eventually evolved into the Soar architecture for artificial intelligence.
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TD-Gammon

TD-Gammon is a computer backgammon program developed in the 1990s by Gerald Tesauro at IBM's Thomas J. Watson Research Center. Its name comes from the fact that it is an artificial neural net trained by a form of temporal-difference learning, specifically TD-Lambda. It explored strategies that humans had not pursued and led to advances in the theory of correct backgammon play. In 1993, TD-Gammon (version 2.1) was trained with 1.5 million games of self-play, and achieved a level of play just slightly below that of the top human backgammon players of the time. In 1998, during a 100-game series, it was defeated by the world champion by a mere margin of 8 points. Its unconventional assessment of some opening strategies had been accepted and adopted by expert players. TD-gammon is commonly cited as an early success of reinforcement learning and neural networks, and was cited in, for example, papers for deep Q-learning and AlphaGo. == Algorithm for play and learning == During play, TD-Gammon examines on each turn all possible legal moves and all their possible responses (lookahead search), feeds each resulting board position into its evaluation function, and chooses the move that leads to the board position that got the highest score. In this respect, TD-Gammon is no different than almost any other computer board-game program. TD-Gammon's innovation was in how it learned its evaluation function. TD-Gammon's learning algorithm consists of updating the weights in its neural net after each turn to reduce the difference between its evaluation of previous turns' board positions and its evaluation of the present turn's board position—hence "temporal-difference learning". The score of any board position is a set of four numbers reflecting the program's estimate of the likelihood of each possible game result: White wins normally, Black wins normally, White wins a gammon, Black wins a gammon. For the final board position of the game, the algorithm compares with the actual result of the game rather than its own evaluation of the board position. The core of TD-gammon is a neural network with 3 layers. The input layer has two types of neurons. One type codes for the board position. They are non-negative integers ranging from 0 to 15, indicating the number of White or Black checkers at each board location. There are 99 input neurons for each, totaling 198 neurons. Another type codes for hand-crafted features previously used in Neurogammon. These features encoded standard concepts used by human experts, such as "advanced anchor," "blockade strength," "home board strength" and the probability of a "blot" (single checker) being hit. The hidden layer contains hidden neurons. Later versions had more of these. The output layer contains 4 neurons, representing the network's estimate of the probability ("equity") that the current board would lead to. The 4 neurons code for: White normal win, White gammon win, Black normal win, Black gammon win. Backgammon win is so rare that Tesauro opted to not represent it. After each turn, the learning algorithm updates each weight in the neural net according to the following rule: w t + 1 − w t = α ( Y t + 1 − Y t ) ∑ k = 1 t λ t − k ∇ w Y k {\displaystyle w_{t+1}-w_{t}=\alpha (Y_{t+1}-Y_{t})\sum _{k=1}^{t}\lambda ^{t-k}\nabla _{w}Y_{k}} where: It was found that picking small λ {\displaystyle \lambda } offered performance roughly equally good, and large λ {\displaystyle \lambda } degraded performance. Because of this, after 1992, TD-Gammon was trained with λ = 0 {\displaystyle \lambda =0} , degenerating into standard TD-learning. This saved compute by a factor of 2. == Development history == Version 1.0 used simple 1-ply search: every next move is scored by the neural net, and the highest-scoring move is selected. Versions 2.0 and 2.1 used 2-ply search: Make a 1-ply analysis to remove unlikely moves ("forward pruning"). Make a 2-play minimax analysis for only the likely moves. Pick the best move, probability-weighted by each of the opponent's 21 possible dice rolls (weighting non-doubles twice as much as doubles). Versions 3.0 and 3.1 used 3-ply search, using 21 2 = 441 {\displaystyle 21^{2}=441} possible dice rolls instead of 21. The last version, 3.1, was trained specifically for an exhibition match against Malcolm Davis at the 1998 AAAI Hall of Champions. It lost at -8 points, mainly due to one blunder, where TD-Gammon opted to double and got gammoned at -32 points. == Experiments and stages of training == Unlike previous neural-net backgammon programs such as Neurogammon (also written by Tesauro), where an expert trained the program by supplying the "correct" evaluation of each position, TD-Gammon was at first programmed "knowledge-free". In early experimentation, using only a raw board encoding with no human-designed features, TD-Gammon reached a level of play comparable to Neurogammon: that of an intermediate-level human backgammon player. Even though TD-Gammon discovered insightful features on its own, Tesauro wondered if its play could be improved by using hand-designed features like Neurogammon's. Indeed, the self-training TD-Gammon with expert-designed features soon surpassed all previous computer backgammon programs. It stopped improving after about 1,500,000 games (self-play) using a three-layered neural network, with 198 input units encoding expert-designed features, 80 hidden units, and one output unit representing predicted probability of winning. == Advances in backgammon theory == TD-Gammon's exclusive training through self-play (rather than imitation learning) enabled it to explore strategies that humans previously had not considered or had ruled out erroneously. Its success with unorthodox strategies had a significant impact on the backgammon community. Late 1991, Bill Robertie, Paul Magriel, and Malcolm Davis, were invited to play against TD-Gammon (version 1.0). A total of 51 games were played, with TD-Gammon losing at -0.25 ppg. Robertie found TD-Gammon to be at the level of a competent advanced player, and better than any previous backgammon program. Robertie subsequently wrote about the use of TD-Gammon for backgammon study. For example, on the opening play, the conventional wisdom was that given a roll of 2-1, 4-1, or 5-1, White should move a single checker from point 6 to point 5. Known as "slotting", this technique trades the risk of a hit for the opportunity to develop an aggressive position. TD-Gammon found that the more conservative play of splitting 24-23 was superior. Tournament players began experimenting with TD-Gammon's move, and found success. Within a few years, slotting had disappeared from tournament play, replaced by splitting, though in 2006 it made a reappearance for 2-1. Backgammon expert Kit Woolsey found that TD-Gammon's positional judgement, especially its weighing of risk against safety, was superior to his own or any human's. TD-Gammon's excellent positional play was undercut by occasional poor endgame play. The endgame requires a more analytical approach, sometimes with extensive lookahead. TD-Gammon's limitation to two-ply lookahead put a ceiling on what it could achieve in this part of the game. TD-Gammon's strengths and weaknesses were the opposite of symbolic artificial intelligence programs and most computer software in general: it was good at matters that require an intuitive "feel" but bad at systematic analysis. It is also poor at doubling strategies. This is likely due to the fact that the neural network is trained without the doubling cube, with the doubling added by feeding the neural network's cubeless equity estimates into theoretically-based heuristic formulae. This was particularly the case in the 1998 exhibition match, where it played 100 games against Malcolm Davis. A single doubling blunder lost the match. TD-gammon was never commercialized or released to the public in some other form, but it inspired commercial backgammon programs based on neural networks, such as JellyFish (1994) and Snowie (1998).
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Semantic parameterization

Semantic parameterization is a conceptual modeling process for expressing natural language descriptions of a domain in first-order predicate logic. The process yields a formalization of natural language sentences in Description Logic to answer the who, what and where questions in the Inquiry-Cycle Model (ICM) developed by Colin Potts and his colleagues at the Georgia Institute of Technology. The parameterization process complements the Knowledge Acquisition and autOmated Specification (KAOS) method, which formalizes answers to the when, why and how ICM questions in Temporal Logic, to complete the ICM formalization. The artifacts used in the parameterization process include a dictionary that aligns the domain lexicon with unique concepts, distinguishing between synonyms and polysemes, and several natural language patterns that aid in mapping common domain descriptions to formal specifications. == Relationship to other theories == Semantic Parameterization defines a meta-model consisting of eight roles that are domain-independent and reusable. Seven of these roles correspond to Jeffrey Gruber's thematic relations and case roles in Charles Fillmore's case grammar: The Inquiry-Cycle Model (ICM) was introduced to drive elicitation between engineers and stakeholders in requirements engineering. The ICM consists of who, what, where, why, how and when questions. All but the when questions, which require a Temporal Logic to represent such phenomena, have been aligned with the meta-model in semantic parameterization using Description Logic (DL). == Introduction with Example == The semantic parameterization process is based on Description Logic, wherein the TBox is composed of words in a dictionary, including nouns, verbs, and adjectives, and the ABox is partitioned into two sets of assertions: 1) those assertions that come from words in the natural language statement, called the grounding, and 2) those assertions that are inferred by the (human) modeler, called the meta-model. Consider the following unstructured natural language statement (UNLS) (see Breaux et al. for an extended discussion): UNLS1.0 The customer1,1 must not share2,2 the access-code3,3 of the customer1,1 with someone4,4 who is not the provider5,4. The modeler first identifies intensional and extensional polysemes and synonyms, denoted by the subscripts: the first subscript uniquely refers to the intensional index, i.e., the same first index in two or more words refer to the same concept in the TBox; the second subscript uniquely refers to the extensional index, i.e., two same second index in two or more words refer to the same individual in the ABox. This indexing step aligns words in the statement and concepts in the dictionary. Next, the modeler identifies concepts from the dictionary to compose the meta-model. The following table illustrates the complete DL expression that results from applying semantic parameterization.
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Intel Management Engine

The Intel Management Engine (ME), also known as the Intel Manageability Engine, is an autonomous subsystem that has been incorporated in virtually all of Intel's processor chipsets since 2008. It is located in the Platform Controller Hub of modern Intel motherboards. The Intel Management Engine always runs as long as the motherboard is receiving power, even when the computer is turned off. This issue can be mitigated with the deployment of a hardware device which is able to disconnect all connections to mains power as well as all internal forms of energy storage. The Electronic Frontier Foundation and some security researchers have voiced concern that the Management Engine is a backdoor. Intel's main competitor, AMD, has incorporated the equivalent AMD Secure Technology (formally called Platform Security Processor) in virtually all of its post-2013 CPUs. == Difference from Intel AMT == The Management Engine is often confused with Intel AMT (Intel Active Management Technology). AMT runs on the ME, but is only available on processors with vPro. AMT gives device owners remote administration of their computer, such as powering it on or off, and reinstalling the operating system. However, the ME itself has been built into all Intel chipsets since 2008, not only those with AMT. While AMT can be unprovisioned by the owner, there is no official, documented way to disable the ME. == Design == The subsystem primarily consists of proprietary firmware running on a separate microprocessor that performs tasks during boot-up, while the computer is running, and while it is asleep. As long as the chipset or SoC is supplied with power (via battery or power supply), it continues to run even when the system is turned off. Intel claims the ME is required to provide full performance. Its exact workings are largely undocumented and its code is obfuscated using confidential Huffman tables stored directly in hardware, so the firmware does not contain the information necessary to decode its contents. === Hardware === Starting with ME 11 (introduced in Skylake CPUs), it is based on the Intel Quark x86-based 32-bit CPU and runs the MINIX 3 operating system. The ME firmware is stored in a partition of the SPI BIOS Flash, using the Embedded Flash File System (EFFS). Previous versions were based on an ARC core, with the Management Engine running the ThreadX RTOS. Versions 1.x to 5.x of the ME used the ARCTangent-A4 (32-bit only instructions) whereas versions 6.x to 8.x used the newer ARCompact (mixed 32- and 16-bit instruction set architecture). Starting with ME 7.1, the ARC processor could also execute signed Java applets. The ME has its own MAC and IP address for the out-of-band management interface, with direct access to the Ethernet controller; one portion of the Ethernet traffic is diverted to the ME even before reaching the host's operating system, for what support exists in various Ethernet controllers, exported and made configurable via Management Component Transport Protocol (MCTP). The ME also communicates with the host via PCI interface. Under Linux, communication between the host and the ME is done via /dev/mei or /dev/mei0. Until the release of Nehalem processors, the ME was usually embedded into the motherboard's northbridge, following the Memory Controller Hub (MCH) layout. With the newer Intel architectures (Intel 5 Series onwards), the ME is integrated into the Platform Controller Hub (PCH). === Firmware === By Intel's current terminology as of 2017, ME is one of several firmware sets for the Converged Security and Manageability Engine (CSME). Prior to AMT version 11, CSME was called Intel Management Engine BIOS Extension (Intel MEBx). Management Engine (ME) – mainstream chipsets Server Platform Services (SPS) – server chipsets and SoCs Trusted Execution Engine (TXE) – tablet/embedded/low power It was also found that the ME firmware version 11 runs MINIX 3. Management of the ME modules for provisioning inside the UEFI is done via a tool called Intel Flash Image Tool (FITC). ==== Modules ==== Active Management Technology (AMT) Intel Boot Guard (IBG) and Secure Boot Quiet System Technology (QST), formerly known as Advanced Fan Speed Control (AFSC), which provides support for acoustically optimized fan speed control, and monitoring of temperature, voltage, current and fan speed sensors that are provided in the chipset, CPU and other devices present on the motherboard. Communication with the QST firmware subsystem is documented and available through the official software development kit (SDK). Protected Audio Video Path, enforces HDCP Intel Anti-Theft Technology (AT), discontinued in 2015 Serial over LAN (SOL) Intel Platform Trust Technology (PTT), a firmware-based Trusted Platform Module (TPM) Near Field Communication, a middleware for NFC readers and vendors to access NFC cards and provide secure element access, found in later MEI versions. == The intricacies of working with Intel ME == It should also be noted that the ME region requires special cleaning and subsequent initialisation, for example, after replacing the platform hub on the motherboard. Usually, this requires an SPI programmer. There are known successful cases of this operation being performed. == Security vulnerabilities == Several weaknesses have been found in the ME. On May 1, 2017, Intel confirmed a Remote Elevation of Privilege bug (SA-00075) in its Management Technology. Every Intel platform with provisioned Intel Standard Manageability, Active Management Technology, or Small Business Technology, from Nehalem in 2008 to Kaby Lake in 2017 has a remotely exploitable security hole in the ME. Several ways to disable the ME without authorization that could allow ME's functions to be sabotaged have been found. Additional major security flaws in the ME affecting a very large number of computers incorporating ME, Trusted Execution Engine (TXE), and Server Platform Services (SPS) firmware, from Skylake in 2015 to Coffee Lake in 2017, were confirmed by Intel on November 20, 2017 (SA-00086). Unlike SA-00075, this bug is even present if AMT is absent, not provisioned or if the ME was "disabled" by any of the known unofficial methods. In July 2018, another set of vulnerabilities was disclosed (SA-00112). In September 2018, yet another vulnerability was published (SA-00125). === Ring −3 rootkit === A ring −3 rootkit was demonstrated by Invisible Things Lab for the Q35 chipset; it does not work for the later Q45 chipset as Intel implemented additional protections. The exploit worked by remapping the normally protected memory region (top 16 MB of RAM) reserved for the ME. The ME rootkit could be installed regardless of whether the AMT is present or enabled on the system, as the chipset always contains the ARC ME coprocessor. (The "−3" designation was chosen because the ME coprocessor works even when the system is in the S3 state. Thus, it was considered a layer below the System Management Mode rootkits.) For the vulnerable Q35 chipset, a keystroke logger ME-based rootkit was demonstrated by Patrick Stewin. === Zero-touch provisioning === Another security evaluation by Vassilios Ververis showed serious weaknesses in the GM45 chipset implementation. In particular, it criticized AMT for transmitting unencrypted passwords in the SMB provisioning mode when the IDE redirection and Serial over LAN features are used. It also found that the "zero touch" provisioning mode (ZTC) is still enabled even when the AMT appears to be disabled in BIOS. For about 60 euros, Ververis purchased from GoDaddy a certificate that is accepted by the ME firmware and allows remote "zero touch" provisioning of (possibly unsuspecting) machines, which broadcast their HELLO packets to would-be configuration servers. === SA-00075 (a.k.a. Silent Bob is Silent) === In May 2017, Intel confirmed that many computers with AMT have had an unpatched critical privilege escalation vulnerability (CVE-2017-5689). The vulnerability was nicknamed "Silent Bob is Silent" by the researchers who had reported it to Intel. It affects numerous laptops, desktops and servers sold by Dell, Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard (later Hewlett Packard Enterprise and HP Inc.), Intel, Lenovo, and possibly others. Those researchers claimed that the bug affects systems made in 2010 or later. Other reports claimed the bug also affects systems made as long ago as 2008. The vulnerability was described as giving remote attackers: "full control of affected machines, including the ability to read and modify everything. It can be used to install persistent malware (possibly in firmware), and read and modify any data." === PLATINUM === In June 2017, the PLATINUM cybercrime group became notable for exploiting the serial over LAN (SOL) capabilities of AMT to perform data exfiltration of stolen documents. SOL is disabled by default and must be enabled to exploit this vulnerability. === SA-00086 === Some months after the previous bugs, and subsequent warnings from the EFF, securi
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Guideline execution engine

A guideline execution engine is a computer program which can interpret a clinical guideline represented in a computerized format and perform actions towards the user of an electronic medical record. A guideline execution engine needs to communicate with a host clinical information system. Virtual Medical Record (vMR) is one possible interface which can be used. The engine's main function is to manage instances of executed guidelines of individual patients. == Architecture == The following modules are generally needed for any engine: interface to clinical information system new guidelines loading module guideline interpreter module clinical events parser alert/recommendations dispatch == Guideline Interchange Format == The Guideline Interchange Format (GLIF) is a computer representation format for clinical guidelines. Represented guidelines can be executed using a guideline execution engine. The format has several versions as it has been improved. In 2003 GLIF3 was introduced. == Use of third party workflow engine as a guideline execution engine == Some commercial electronic health record systems use a workflow engine to execute clinical guidelines. RetroGuide and HealthFlow are examples of such an approach.
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Knowledge value chain

A knowledge value chain is a sequence of intellectual tasks by which knowledge workers build their employer's unique competitive advantage and/or social and environmental benefit. As an example, the components of a research and development project form a knowledge value chain. Productivity improvements in a knowledge value chain may come from knowledge integration in its original sense of data systems consolidation. Improvements also flow from the knowledge integration that occurs when knowledge management techniques are applied to the continuous improvement of a business process or processes. The term first started coming into common use around 1999, appearing in management-related talks and papers. It was registered as a trademark in 2004 by TW Powell Co., a Manhattan company. Knowledge value chain processes Knowledge acquisition Knowledge storage Knowledge dissemination Knowledge application
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GENESIS (software)

GENESIS (The General Neural Simulation System) is a simulation environment for constructing realistic models of neurobiological systems at many levels of scale including: sub-cellular processes, individual neurons, networks of neurons, and neuronal systems. These simulations are “computer-based implementations of models whose primary objective is to capture what is known of the anatomical structure and physiological characteristics of the neural system of interest”. GENESIS is intended to quantify the physical framework of the nervous system in a way that allows for easy understanding of the physical structure of the nerves in question. “At present only GENESIS allows parallelized modeling of single neurons and networks on multiple-instruction-multiple-data parallel computers.” Development of GENESIS software spread from its home at Caltech to labs at the University of Texas at San Antonio, the University of Antwerp, the National Centre for Biological Sciences in Bangalore, the University of Colorado, the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center, the San Diego Supercomputer Center, and Emory University. == Neurons and Neural Systems == GENESIS works by creating simulation environments for constructing models of neurons or neural systems. "Nerve cells are capable of communicating with each other in such a highly structured manner as to form neuronal networks. To understand neural networks, it is necessary to understand the ways in which one neuron communicates with another through synaptic connections and the process called synaptic transmission". Neurons have a specialized structure for their function, they "are different from most other cells in the body in that they are polarized and have distinct morphological regions, each with specific functions". The two important regions of a neuron are the dendrite and the axon. "Dendrites are the region where one neuron receives connections from other neurons. The cell body or soma contains the nucleus and the other organelles necessary for cellular function. The axon is a key component of nerve cells over which information is transmitted from one part of the neuron (e.g., the cell body) to the terminal regions of the neuron". The third important piece of a neuron is the synapse. "The synapse is the terminal region of the axon this is where one neuron forms a connection with another and conveys information through the process of synaptic transmission". Neural networks like the ones simulated with GENESIS software can quickly become highly complex and difficult to understand. "Just a few interconnected neurons (a microcircuit) can perform sophisticated tasks such as mediate reflexes, process sensory information, generate locomotion and mediate learning and memory. Even more complex networks, macrocircuits, consist of multiple embedded microcircuits. Macrocircuits mediate higher brain functions such as object recognition and cognition". GENESIS endeavors to simulate neural systems as they are found in nature. Often, "a neuron can receive contacts from up to 10,000 presynaptic neurons, and, in turn, any one neuron can contact up to 10,000 postsynaptic neurons. The combinatorial possibility could give rise to enormously complex neuronal circuits or network topologies, which might be very difficult to understand". == History == GENESIS was developed by Dr. James M. Bower, in the Caltech laboratory, and first released to the public in 1988 in association with the first Methods in Computational Neuroscience Course at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA. Full source code for the software was released in the same year under an open software model for development. It's now supported by the Computational Biology Initiative at the University of Texas at San Antonio and is available free along with tutorial guides on its use. P-GENESIS, a parallel version of GENESIS, was first run in 1990 on the Intel Delta, which was the prototype for the Intel Paragon family of massively parallel supercomputers. == How GENESIS Works == GENESIS is useful in creating a simulation environment for constructing models of neurobiological systems, such as: sub-cellular processes individual neurons networks of neurons neuronal systems The GENESIS system is complicated, but relatively easy to use. An individual can input commands through one of three ways: script files, graphical user interface, or the GENESIS command shell. These commands are then processed by the script language interpreter. "The Script Language Interpreter processes commands entered through the keyboard, script files, or the graphical user interface, and passes them to the GENESIS simulation engine. The simulation engine also loads compiled object libraries, reads and writes data files, and interacts with the graphical user interface". Below is a graphical representation of the user input process and a sample GENESIS output. == Applications == Most current applications for GENESIS involve realistic simulations of biological systems. It is usually used to simulate the behavior of larger brain structures, for example the cerebral cortex. These studies most often occur in lab courses in neural simulation at Caltech and the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, Massachusetts. GENESIS can be used in combination with Yale University’s software called NEURON as a means for scientists to collaborate to construct a physical description of the nervous system. The GENESIS software can also be used with Kinetikit in the modeling of signal transduction pathways. GENESIS has been used in many studies. Some of these studies involve research that focuses on the development of software that would be useful across many disciplines. Others are studies of neurons, such as Purkinje cells. These studies used GENESIS to simulate Purkinje cells and could be useful for the planning and development of later experiments using the GENESIS software. There may also be biomedical applications of the software. For example, St. Jude Medical in Europe has developed an implanted GENESIS device.
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Feng Office Community Edition

Feng Office Community Edition (formerly OpenGoo) is an open-source collaboration platform developed and supported by Feng Office and the OpenGoo community. It is a fully featured online office suite with a similar set of features as other online office suites, like Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, Zimbra, LibreOffice Online and Zoho Office Suite. The application can be downloaded and installed on a server. Feng Office could also be categorized as collaborative software and as personal information manager software. == Features == Feng Office Community Edition main features include project management, document management, contact management, e-mail and time management. Text documents and presentations can be created and edited online. Files can be uploaded, organized and shared, independent of file formats. Organization of the information in Feng Office Community Edition is done using workspaces and tags. The application presents the information stored using different interfaces such as lists, dashboards and calendar views. == Licensing == Feng Office Community Edition is distributed under the GNU Affero General Public License, version 3 only. == Technology used == Feng Office uses PHP, JavaScript, AJAX (ExtJS) and MySQL technology. Several open source projects served as a basis for development. ActiveCollab's last open sourced release was used as the initial code base. It includes CKEditor for online document editing. == System requirements == The server could run on any operating system. The system needs the following packages: Apache HTTP Server 2.0+ PHP 5.0+ MySQL 4.1+ (InnoDB support recommended) On the client side, the user is only required to use a modern Web browser. == History == OpenGoo started as a degree project at the faculty of Engineering of the University of the Republic, Uruguay. The project was presented and championed by Software Engineer Conrado Viña. Software Engineers Marcos Saiz and Ignacio de Soto developed the first prototype as their thesis. Professors Eduardo Fernández and Tomas Laurenzo served as tutors. Conrado, Ignacio and Marcos founded the OpenGoo community and remain active members and core developers. The thesis was approved with the highest score. In 2008, Viña joined the Uruguayan software development company Moove It. Currently there is a second project for OpenGoo at the same university being developed by students Fernando Rodríguez, Ignacio Vázquez and Juan Pedro del Campo. Their project aims to build an open source Web-based spreadsheet. In December 2009 the OpenGoo name was changed to Feng Office Community Edition.
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Predictive Model Markup Language

The Predictive Model Markup Language (PMML) is an XML-based predictive model interchange format conceived by Robert Lee Grossman, then the director of the National Center for Data Mining at the University of Illinois at Chicago. PMML provides a way for analytic applications to describe and exchange predictive models produced by data mining and machine learning algorithms. It supports common models such as logistic regression and other feedforward neural networks. Version 0.9 was published in 1998. Subsequent versions have been developed by the Data Mining Group. Since PMML is an XML-based standard, the specification comes in the form of an XML schema. PMML itself is a mature standard with over 30 organizations having announced products supporting PMML. == PMML components == A PMML file can be described by the following components: Header: contains general information about the PMML document, such as copyright information for the model, its description, and information about the application used to generate the model such as name and version. It also contains an attribute for a timestamp which can be used to specify the date of model creation. Data Dictionary: contains definitions for all the possible fields used by the model. It is here that a field is defined as continuous, categorical, or ordinal (attribute optype). Depending on this definition, the appropriate value ranges are then defined as well as the data type (such as, string or double). Data Transformations: transformations allow for the mapping of user data into a more desirable form to be used by the mining model. PMML defines several kinds of simple data transformations. Normalization: map values to numbers, the input can be continuous or discrete. Discretization: map continuous values to discrete values. Value mapping: map discrete values to discrete values. Functions (custom and built-in): derive a value by applying a function to one or more parameters. Aggregation: used to summarize or collect groups of values. Model: contains the definition of the data mining model. E.g., A multi-layered feedforward neural network is represented in PMML by a "NeuralNetwork" element which contains attributes such as: Model Name (attribute modelName) Function Name (attribute functionName) Algorithm Name (attribute algorithmName) Activation Function (attribute activationFunction) Number of Layers (attribute numberOfLayers) This information is then followed by three kinds of neural layers which specify the architecture of the neural network model being represented in the PMML document. These attributes are NeuralInputs, NeuralLayer, and NeuralOutputs. Besides neural networks, PMML allows for the representation of many other types of models including support vector machines, association rules, Naive Bayes classifier, clustering models, text models, decision trees, and different regression models. Mining Schema: a list of all fields used in the model. This can be a subset of the fields as defined in the data dictionary. It contains specific information about each field, such as: Name (attribute name): must refer to a field in the data dictionary Usage type (attribute usageType): defines the way a field is to be used in the model. Typical values are: active, predicted, and supplementary. Predicted fields are those whose values are predicted by the model. Outlier Treatment (attribute outliers): defines the outlier treatment to be use. In PMML, outliers can be treated as missing values, as extreme values (based on the definition of high and low values for a particular field), or as is. Missing Value Replacement Policy (attribute missingValueReplacement): if this attribute is specified then a missing value is automatically replaced by the given values. Missing Value Treatment (attribute missingValueTreatment): indicates how the missing value replacement was derived (e.g. as value, mean or median). Targets: allows for post-processing of the predicted value in the format of scaling if the output of the model is continuous. Targets can also be used for classification tasks. In this case, the attribute priorProbability specifies a default probability for the corresponding target category. It is used if the prediction logic itself did not produce a result. This can happen, e.g., if an input value is missing and there is no other method for treating missing values. Output: this element can be used to name all the desired output fields expected from the model. These are features of the predicted field and so are typically the predicted value itself, the probability, cluster affinity (for clustering models), standard error, etc. The latest release of PMML, PMML 4.1, extended Output to allow for generic post-processing of model outputs. In PMML 4.1, all the built-in and custom functions that were originally available only for pre-processing became available for post-processing too. == PMML 4.0, 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3 == PMML 4.0 was released on June 16, 2009. Examples of new features included: Improved Pre-Processing Capabilities: Additions to built-in functions include a range of Boolean operations and an If-Then-Else function. Time Series Models: New exponential Smoothing models; also place holders for ARIMA, Seasonal Trend Decomposition, and Spectral density estimation, which are to be supported in the near future. Model Explanation: Saving of evaluation and model performance measures to the PMML file itself. Multiple Models: Capabilities for model composition, ensembles, and segmentation (e.g., combining of regression and decision trees). Extensions of Existing Elements: Addition of multi-class classification for Support Vector Machines, improved representation for Association Rules, and the addition of Cox Regression Models. PMML 4.1 was released on December 31, 2011. New features included: New model elements for representing Scorecards, k-Nearest Neighbors (KNN) and Baseline Models. Simplification of multiple models. In PMML 4.1, the same element is used to represent model segmentation, ensemble, and chaining. Overall definition of field scope and field names. A new attribute that identifies for each model element if the model is ready or not for production deployment. Enhanced post-processing capabilities (via the Output element). PMML 4.2 was released on February 28, 2014. New features include: Transformations: New elements for implementing text mining New built-in functions for implementing regular expressions: matches, concat, and replace Simplified outputs for post-processing Enhancements to Scorecard and Naive Bayes model elements PMML 4.3 was released on August 23, 2016. New features include: New Model Types: Gaussian Process Bayesian Network New built-in functions Usage clarifications Documentation improvements Version 4.4 was released in November 2019. == Release history == == Data Mining Group == The Data Mining Group is a consortium managed by the Center for Computational Science Research, Inc., a nonprofit founded in 2008. The Data Mining Group also developed a standard called Portable Format for Analytics, or PFA, which is complementary to PMML.
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Ramification problem

In philosophy and artificial intelligence (especially, knowledge based systems), the ramification problem is concerned with the indirect consequences of an action. It might also be posed as how to represent what happens implicitly due to an action or how to control the secondary and tertiary effects of an action. It is strongly connected to, and is opposite the qualification side of, the frame problem. Limit theory helps in operational usage. For instance, in KBE derivation of a populated design (geometrical objects, etc., similar concerns apply in shape theory), equivalence assumptions allow convergence where potentially large, and perhaps even computationally indeterminate, solution sets are handled deftly. Yet, in a chain of computation, downstream events may very well find some types of results from earlier resolutions of ramification as problematic for their own algorithms.
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