44372041
Software Engineering Process Benchmarking
This paper proposes a Software Engineering Process (SEP) benchmarking methodology and a benchmark-gap analysis technique to assist industrial practitioners in quantitative software engineering. This work adopts the comprehensive SEP Assessment model (SEPRM), as a foundation to SEP benchmarking. In this approach, a number of conventional benchmarking challenges may be overcome. Case studies are presented to demonstrate the usage of the benchmarking technologies and supporting tools.
18101194
The Real-Time Process Algebra (RTPA)
The real-time process algebra (RTPA) is a set of new mathematical notations for formally describing system architectures, and static and dynamic behaviors. It is recognized that the specification of software behaviors is a three-dimensional problem known as: (i) mathematical operations, (ii) event/process timing, and (iii) memory manipulations. Conventional formal methods in software engineering were designed to describe the 1-D (type (i)) or 2-D (types (i) and (iii)) static behaviors of software systems via logic, set and type theories. However, they are inadequate to address the 3-D problems in real-time systems. A new notation system that is capable to describe and specify the 3-D real-time behaviors, the real-time process algebra (RTPA), is developed in this paper to meet the fundamental requirements in software engineering.RTPA is designed as a coherent software engineering notation system and a formal engineering method for addressing the 3-D problems in software system specification, refinement, and implementation, particularly for real-time and embedded systems. In this paper, the RTPA meta-processes, algebraic relations, system architectural notations, and a set of fundamental primary and abstract data types are described. On the basis of the RTPA notations, a system specification method and a refinement scheme of RTPA are developed. Then, a case study on a telephone switching system is provided, which demonstrates the expressive power of RTPA on formal specification of both software system architectures and behaviors. RTPA elicits and models 32 algebraic notations, which are the common core of existing formal methods and modern programming languages. The extremely small set of formal notations has been proven sufficient for modeling and specifying real-time systems, their architecture, and static/dynamic behaviors in real-world software engineering environment.
21455681
A layered reference model of the brain
Based on the advances of research in cognitive informatics and related fields, this paper attempts to develop a layered reference model of the brain that explains the functional mechanisms and cognitive processes of the natural intelligence. A variety of life functions and cognitive processes have been identified in cognitive informatics, cognitive science, neuropsychology, and neurophilosophy. In order to formally and rigorously describe a comprehensive and coherent set of mental processes and their relationships, an integrated reference model of the brain is established, which encompasses 37 cognitive processes at six layers known as the sensation, memory, perception, action, meta and higher cognitive layers from bottom up. The reference model of the brain may be applied to explain a wide range of physiological, psychological, and cognitive phenomena in cognitive informatics, particularly relationships between the inherited and the acquired life functions, as well as the subconscious and conscious cognitive processes.
21184887
The cognitive processes of abstraction and formal inferences
Theoretical research is predominately an inductive process; while applied research is mainly a deductive process. Both inference processes are based on the cognitive process and means of abstraction. This paper describes the cognitive processes of abstraction and formal inferences such as deduction, induction, abduction, and analogy. The hierarchy of abstraction and the descriptivity of abstract means at different levels are analyzed. A set of mathematical models of formal inference methodologies are developed. Formal descriptions of the five cognitive processes of abstraction and inferences are presented using real-time process algebra (RTPA). Applications of abstraction and formal inferences in dealing with complicated problems in large-scale software system development in software engineering are discussed.
12841371
Implementing the Real-Time Processes of RTPA using Real-Time Java
This paper discusses the implementation of the real-time processes of real-time process algebra (RTPA) using real-time Java. The difficulty in implementing real-time software from formal specifications comes from the fact that some realtime features expressed using a formal specification language cannot be easily transformed into a programming language. The paper shows how a combination of a real-time support library for RTPA (RTPASupportLib) and the recently developed extensions to real-time Java can overcome some of these difficulties. The strategies and techniques employed in implementing RTPA real-time features such as concurrency, interleaving, and interrupt/event/time-driven dispatching of real-time processes are presented. A number of case studies on the implementation of RTPA real-time features show that the approach is a feasible one
21557809
Formal description of the cognitive process of problem solving
One of the fundamental human cognitive processes is problem solving. Most of the decisions we make relate to some kind of problems we try to solve no matter how trivial and critical the problem may be. The problem solving process entails performing in a new situation with information acquired and knowledge learned from past situations. As a higher level cognitive process, problem solving involves the correlation process effort to connect newly encounter problem object(s) with the object-attribute-relation (OAR) model representation of knowledge in the brain. The goal of problem solving is to search along various solution paths within the problem solver's knowledge base in the memory. When a problem object is identified, problem solving can be perceived as a search process in the memory space for finding a relationship between a set of problem-solving goals and a set of alternative paths. This paper presents a mathematical and cognitive model that describes problem solving as a cognitive process. The cognitive structures of the brain and the mechanisms of internal knowledge representation behind the cognitive process of problem solving are explained. The cognitive process is then formally and rigorously described using real-time process algebra (RTPA) base on the aforementioned models. Extended discussions are presented on applications of the cognitive process model of problem solving in software engineering and psychology.
3032688
Statistical Identification of Key Phrases for Text Classification
Algorithms for text classification generally involve two stages, the first of which aims to identify textual elements (words and/or phrases) that may be relevant to the classification process. This stage often involves an analysis of the text that is both language-specific and possibly domain-specific, and may also be computationally costly. In this paper we examine a number of alternative keyword-generation methods and phrase-construction strategies that identify key words and phrases by simple, language-independent statistical properties. We present results that demonstrate that these methods can produce good classification accuracy, with the best results being obtained using a phrase-based approach.
16922921
Wire space estimation and routability analysis
This paper presents a new stochastic model for two-dimensional layouts of large size. Two problems are addressed. (1) Under the condition that the number of wires emanating from a block is Poisson distributed, determine the distribution of channel width, thus estimating the average channel width. (2) Given T tracks for each channel, determine the success probability of routing an M/spl times/M cell array chip. For both problems, closed formulas are obtained. The experiment demonstrates the effectiveness of our approach. The results can be applied to gate array, field-programmable gate array design, etc.
16463784
Privacy Preserving Data Generation for Database Application Performance Testing
Synthetic data plays an important role in software testing. In this paper, we initiate the study of synthetic data generation models for the purpose of application software performance testing. In particular, we will discuss models for protecting privacy in synthetic data generations. Within this model, we investigate the feasibility and techniques for privacy preserving synthetic database generation that can be used for database application performance testing. The methodologies that we will present will be useful for general privacy preserving software performance testing.
22146424
RETR: Reverse Engineering to Requirements
Reverse engineering aims at extracting many kinds of information from existing software and using this information for system renovation and program understanding. The goal of this full day WCRE'05 workshop is to identify methods and techniques for Reverse Engineering from software to Requirements (RETR).
1564877
Analysis of a cone-based distributed topology control algorithm for wireless multi-hop networks
The topology of a wireless multi-hop network can be controlled by varying the transmission power at each node. In this paper, we give a detailed analysis of a cone-based distributed topology control algorithm. This algorithm, introduced in [16], does not assume that nodes have GPS information available; rather it depends only on directional information. Roughly speaking, the basic idea of the algorithm is that a node <i>u</i> transmits with the minimum power <i>p<subscrpt>u, α</subscrpt></i> required to ensure that in every cone of degree α around <i>u</i>, there is some node that <i>u</i> can reach with power <i>p<subscrpt>u, α</subscrpt></i>. We show that taking α = 5π/6 is a necessary and sufficient condition to guarantee that network connectivity is preserved. More precisely, if there is a path from <i>s</i> to <i>t</i> when every node communicates at maximum power then, if α ⪇ 5π/6, there is still a path in the smallest symmetric graph <i>G</i><subscrpt>α</subscrpt> containing all edges (<i>u, v</i>) such that <i>u</i> can communicate with <i>v</i> using power <i>p<subscrpt>u, α</subscrpt></i>. On the other hand, if α > 5π/6, connectivity is not necessarily preserved. We also propose a set of optimizations that further reduce power consumption and prove that they retain network connectivity. Dynamic reconfiguration in the presence of failures and mobility is also discussed. Simulation results are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the algorithm and the optimizations.