5913002
Formal modeling of synchronization methods for concurrent objects in Ada 95
One important role for Ada programming is to aid engineering of concurrent and distributed software. In a concurrent and distributed environment, objects may execute concurrently and need to be synchronized to serve a common goal. Three basic methods by which objects in a concurrent environment can be constructed and synchronized have been identified [1]. To formalize the semantics of these methods and to provide a formal model of their core behavior, we provide some graphic models based on the Petri net formalism. The purpose of this formal modeling is to illustrate the possibility of automatic program analysis for object-oriented features in Ada-95. Models for the three distributed- object synchronization methods are discussed, and a potential deadlock situation for one of the methods/models is illustrated. We conclude with some comparison of the three methods in terms of the model abstractions.
7136406
Towards Automated Development of Multi-Agent Systems Using RADE
To facilitate the development of multi-agent systems and improve the reusability, robustness and feasibility of these systems, we proposed a role-based agent development framework (RADE). In this paper, we present more details on the design of agents and motivations within such framework. We introduce a practical approach to modeling agent’s motivation and specifying agent’s goals, where a role-mapping mechanism is developed based on this design. We also introduce the RTAEMS language based on the extension of TAEMS to model the plan tree for each goal. This representation is used to support the development of general planning/scheduling and collaboration/cooperation mechanisms.
10910603
Hybrid Forward Resampling and Volume Rendering
The transforming and rendering of discrete objects, such as traditional images (with or without depths) and volumes, can be considered as resampling problem – objects are reconstructed, transformed, filtered, and finally sampled on the screen grids. In resampling practices, discrete samples (pixels, voxels) can be considered either as infinitesimal sample points (simply called points) or samples of a certain size (splats). Resampling can also be done either forwards or backwards in either the source domain or the target domain. In this paper, we present a framework that features hybrid forward resampling for discrete rendering. Specifically, we apply this framework to enhance volumetric splatting. In this approach, minified voxels are taken simply as points filtered in screen space; while magnified voxels are taken as spherical splats. In addition, we develop two techniques for performing accurate and efficient perspective splatting. The first one is to efficiently compute the 2D elliptical geometry of perspectively projected splats; the second one is to achieve accurate perspective reconstruction filter. The results of our experiments demonstrate both the effectiveness of antialiasing and the efficiency of rendering using this
15979413
Consumers' Privacy Concerns toward Using Location-Based Services: An Exploratory Framework and Research Proposal
Privacy concerns associated with the use of Location-Based Services (LBS) may ultimately prevent consumers from gaining the ‘anytime anywhere’ convenience. Through a psychological control lens, we examine whether individual difference variables such as locus of control (LOC) could have moderating effects on the relationship between privacy concern and three privacy assurance mechanisms in the LBS context. The paper develops a preliminary research model which conceptualizes the moderating effects of LOC by extending Xu and Teo (2004)’s research model. With an explicit focus on LOC, this study will not only add an important piece of information to our understanding of consumers’ reactions to LBS but also can help frame the ongoing policy and scholarly debate surrounding the relative effectiveness of technology, industry self-regulation and government legislation in ensuring consumers’ privacy. We believe that our findings will be able to offer practical implications for the various players in the LBS landscape: merchants, wireless service providers, wireless device manufacturer, privacy advocates and legislators.
4864247
Data processing and compact representation of measured isotropic spectral BRDF
This paper presents the methods for both data processing and compact representation of measured isotropic spectral BRDF. For the data processing, we develop a numerical method for filtering the noises, re-sampling the data from non-uniform sampling to uniform sampling, and interpolation. For the compact representation, we propose a method to represent the spectral BRDF in both the spectral and spatial domains. In spectral domain, for each pair of the incident and outgoing directions, we represent the spectral BRDF with Fourier coefficients. In spatial domain, for all the outgoing directions of a given incident direction, we represent the same-order Fourier coefficients either directly using a linear combination of spherical harmonics or a linear combination of spherical harmonics and a Gaussian, depending on their angular dependencies. Three Gaussian expressions are presented. Numerical studies are given for a measured isotropic spectral BRDF.
7970424
Effects of Multimedia on Mobile Consumer Behavior: An Empirical Study of Location-Aware Advertising
Location-aware advertising is widely touted as the “killer-app” for mobile commerce to flourish. With the imminent rollout of third-generation mobile networks, advances in multimedia-enabled mobile devices and positioning technologies, its commercial viability is enormous. Location-aware advertising is primarily textbased at the present, but it is envisioned to allow the delivery of multimedia advertisements to geographically targeted consumers. This exploratory study empirically examines the effects of multimedia on consumer behavior in a simulated mobile commerce environment. A structural model was formulated to test the effects of multimedia on entertainment, informativeness, and irritation in the context of location-aware advertising. The results show that multimedia location-aware advertising messages lead to more favorable attitudes and increase the intention to reuse the mobile advertising service. Evidence also suggests that multimedia has a significant impact on purchase behavior.
7143460
A system of high-dimensional, efficient, long-cycle and portable uniform random number generators
We propose a system of multiple recursive generators of modulus <i>p</i> and order <i>k</i> where all nonzero coefficients of the recurrence are equal. The advantage of this property is that a single multiplication is needed to compute the recurrence, so the generator would run faster than the general case. For <i>p</i> = 2<sup>31</sup> − 1, the most popular modulus used, we provide tables of specific parameter values yielding maximum period for recurrence of order <i>k</i> = 102 and 120. For <i>p</i> = 2<sup>31</sup> − 55719 and <i>k</i> = 1511, we have found generators with a period length approximately 10<sup>14100.5</sup>.