7795893
Region-based memory management in cyclone
Cyclone is a type-safe programming language derived from C. The primary design goal of Cyclone is to let programmers control data representation and memory management without sacrificing type-safety. In this paper, we focus on the region-based memory management of Cyclone and its static typing discipline. The design incorporates several advancements, including support for region subtyping and a coherent integration with stack allocation and a garbage collector. To support separate compilation, Cyclone requires programmers to write some explicit region annotations, but a combination of default annotations, local type inference, and a novel treatment of region effects reduces this burden. As a result, we integrate C idioms in a region-based framework. In our experience, porting legacy C to Cyclone has required altering about 8% of the code; of the changes, only 6% (of the 8%) were region annotations.
5958340
Cyclone: A Safe Dialect of C
Cyclone is a safe dialect of C. It has been designed from the ground up to prevent the buffer overflows, format string attacks, and memory management errors that are common in C programs, while retaining C’s syntax and semantics. This paper examines safety violations enabled by C’s design, and shows how Cyclone avoids them, without giving up C’s hallmark control over low-level details such as data representation and memory management.
1558516
Strider: a black-box, state-based approach to change and configuration management and support
Abstract We describe a new approach, called Strider, to Change and Configuration Management and Support (CCMS). Strider is a black-box approach: without relying on specifications, it uses state differencing to identify potential causes of differing program behaviors, uses state tracing to identify actual, run-time state dependencies, and uses statistical behavior modeling for noise filtering. Strider is a state-based approach: instead of linking vague, high level descriptions and symptoms to relevant actions, it models management and support problems in terms of individual, named pieces of low level configuration state and provides precise mappings to user-friendly information through a computer genomics database. We use troubleshooting of configuration failures to demonstrate that the Strider approach reduces problem complexity by several orders of magnitude, making root-cause analysis possible.
6142906
Multiple attribute decision making based on fuzzy preference information on alternatives: Ranking and weighting
This paper investigates the multiple attribute decision making (MADM) problem with fuzzy preference information on alternatives and proposes an eigenvector method to rank them. Three optimization models are introduced to assess the relative importance weights of attributes in a MADM problem, which integrate subjective fuzzy preference relations and objective information in different ways. Since the decisions these models lead to are based on both subjective and objective information, they are more balanced and credible than those that consider only one type of information. An example is provided to illustrate the application of the proposed models.
32026454
Color-texture image segmentation by integrating directional operators into JSEG method
We presented a new color-texture image segmentation method that combined directional operators and the JSEG (J measure based SEGmentation) algorithm. In particular, two major contributions were set forth in this paper. (1) The two measures defined in JSEG and HSEG (H measure based SEGmentation) were discussed respectively and then we found the over-segmentation problem of JSEG could be attributed partly to the absence of color discontinuity in the J measure. Moreover, we have also proven in essence the H measure is isotropic operators for edge detection in images. (2) A new measure was proposed by integrating directional operators into the J measure, on which our segmentation method was based. The new segmentation method took account of both textural homogeneity and color discontinuity in local regions. Performance improvement due to the proposed modification was demonstrated on a variety of real color images.
1602403
Using Mobile Agent Results to Create Hard-to-Detect Computer Viruses
The theory of computer viruses has been studied by several authors, though there is no systematic theoretical study up to now. The long time open question in this area is as follows: Is it possible to design a signature-free (including dynamic signatures which we will define late) virus? In this paper, we give an affirmative answer to this question from a theoretical viewpoint. We will introduce a new stronger concept: dynamic signatures of viruses, and present a method to design viruses which are static signature-free and whose dynamic signatures are hard to determine unless some cryptographic assumption fails. We should remark that our results are only for theoretical interest and may be resource intensive in practice.
40360434
Measurement of the cognitive functional complexity of software
One of the central problems in software engineering is its inherited complexity. It is recognized that cognitive informatics plays an important role in understanding the fundamental characteristics of software. This paper models the cognitive weights of basic control structures of software, and develops a new concept of cognitive functional size for measuring software complexity. Comparative case studies between the cognitive functional size and physical sizes of 20 programs are conducted. It is found that for a given design, although the physical sizes of software may vary in a wide range, the cognitive functional sizes are much stable and independent from implementation technologies and programming languages. Therefore, the cognitive functional size provides a novel, stable and practical software complexity measurement and is helpful to explain the fundamental nature of software complexity in the phase of design, implementation, or maintenance in software engineering.