Semantic analysis in XTRA,an English — Chinese machine translation system

This paper concerns the resolution of lexical ambiguity in a machine translation environment. We describe the integration of principles of selection restrictions. Preference Semantics, and intelligent relaxation of constraints in handling lexical ambiguity. The approach differs from many previous MT systems in that it is more powerful than brute force systems, while more realistic than systems that assume a large degree of coded encyclopedia information for full understanding.     

A predicate transformer for the progress property ‘to-always’

The temporal property to-always has been proposed for specifying progress properties of concurrent programs. Although the to-always properties are a subset of the leads-to properties for a given program, to-always has more convenient proof rules and in some cases more accurately describes the desired system behavior. In this paper, we give a predicate transformerwta, derive some of its properties, and use it to define to-always. Proof rules for to-always are derived from the properties ofwta. We conclude by briefly describing two application areas, nondeterministic data flow networks and self-stabilizing systems where to-always properties are useful.     

Comparative complexity of the representation of languages by probabilistic automata

We analyze the effect of the degree of isolation of a cut point on the number of states P(U, ) of a probabilistic automaton representing the language U. We give an example of a language Uⁿ consisting of words of length n such that there exist numbers < for which P(Uⁿ, )/P(Uⁿ, )0 as n.Translated from Kibernetika, No. 3, pp. 21–25, May–June, 1989.     

Information Gaps as Communication Needs: A New Semantic Foundation for Some Non-Classical Logics

Semantics connected to some information based metaphor are well-known in logic literature: a paradigmatic example is Kripke semantic for Intuitionistic Logic. In this paper we start from the concrete problem of providing suitable logic-algebraic models for the calculus of attribute dependencies in Formal Contexts with information gaps and we obtain an intuitive model based on the notion of passage of information showing that Kleene algebras, semi-simple Nelson algebras, three-valued ukasiewicz algebras and Post algebras of order three are, in a sense, naturally and directly connected to partially defined information systems. In this way wecan provide for these logic-algebraic structures a raison dêetre different from the original motivations concerning, for instance, computability theory.     

Types with intersection: An introduction

This paper is an informal introduction to the theory of types which use a connective for the intersection of two types and a constant for a universal type, besides the usual connective for function-types. This theory was first devised in about 1977 by Coppo, Dezani and Sallé in the context of-calculus and its main development has been by Coppo and Dezani and their collaborators in Turin. With suitable axioms and rules to assign types to-calculus terms, they obtained a system in which (i) the set of types given to a term does not change under-conversion, (ii) some interesting sets of terms, for example the solvable terms and the terms with normal form, can be characterised exactly by the types of their members, and (iii) the type-apparatus is not so complex as polymorphic systems with quantifier-containing types and therefore probably not so expensive to implement mechanically as these systems.There are in fact several variant systems with different detailed properties. This paper defines and motivates the simplest one from which the others are derived, and describes its most basic properties. No proofs are given but the motivation is shown by examples. A comprehensive bibliography is included.     

Mathematical Analysis and Optimization of Infiltration Processes

A variety of infiltration techniques can be used to fabricate solid materials, particularly composites. In general these processes can be described with at least one time dependent partial differential equation describing the evolution of the solid phase, coupled to one or more partial differential equations describing mass transport through a porous structure. This paper presents a detailed mathematical analysis of a relatively simple set of equations which is used to describe chemical vapor infiltration. The results demonstrate that the process is controlled by only two parameters, and . The optimization problem associated with minimizing the infiltration time is also considered. Allowing and to vary with time leads to significant reductions in the infiltration time, compared with the conventional case where and are treated as constants.     

The Objective Conception of Context and Its Logic

In this paper, an objective conception of contexts based loosely upon situation theory is developed and formalized. Unlike subjective conceptions, which take contexts to be something like sets of beliefs, contexts on the objective conception are taken to be complex, structured pieces of the world that (in general) contain individuals, other contexts, and propositions about them. An extended first-order language for this account is developed. The language contains complex terms for propositions, and the standard predicate ist that expresses the relation that holds between a context and a proposition just in case the latter is true in the former. The logic for the objective conception features a global classical predicate calculus, a local logic for reasoning within contexts, and axioms for propositions. The specter of paradox is banished from the logic by allowing ist to be nonbivalent in problematic cases: it is not in general the case, for any context c and proposition p, that either ist(c,p) or ist(c, ¬ p). An important representational capability of the logic is illustrated by proving an appropriately modified version of an illustrative theorem from McCarthy's classic Blocks World example.     

Modular Control and Coordination of Discrete-Event Systems

In the supervisory control of discrete-event systems based on controllable languages, a standard way to handle state explosion in large systems is by modular supervision: either horizontal (decentralized) or vertical (hierarchical). However, unless all the relevant languages are prefix-closed, a well-known potential hazard with modularity is that of conflict. In decentralized control, modular supervisors that are individually nonblocking for the plant may nevertheless produce blocking, or even deadlock, when operating on-line concurrently. Similarly, a high-level hierarchical supervisor that predicts nonblocking at its aggregated level of abstraction may inadvertently admit blocking in a low-level implementation. In two previous papers, the authors showed that nonblocking hierarchical control can be guaranteed provided high-level aggregation is sufficiently fine; the appropriate conditions were formalized in terms of control structures and observers. In this paper we apply the same technique to decentralized control, when specifications are imposed on local models of the global process; in this way we remove the restriction in some earlier work that the plant and specification (marked) languages be prefix-closed. We then solve a more general problem of coordination: namely how to determine a high level coordinator that forestalls conflict in a decentralized architecture when it potentially arises, but is otherwise minimally intrusive on low-level control action. Coordination thus combines both vertical and horizontal modularity. The example of a simple production process is provided as a practical illustration. We conclude with an appraisal of the computational effort involved.     

A geometric view of parametric linear programming

We present a new definition of optimality intervals for the parametric right-hand side linear programming (parametric RHS LP) Problem () = min{c ^t x¦Ax =b + ¯b,x 0}. We then show that an optimality interval consists either of a breakpoint or the open interval between two consecutive breakpoints of the continuous piecewise linear convex function (). As a consequence, the optimality intervals form a partition of the closed interval {; ¦()¦ < }. Based on these optimality intervals, we also introduce an algorithm for solving the parametric RHS LP problem which requires an LP solver as a subroutine. If a polynomial-time LP solver is used to implement this subroutine, we obtain a substantial improvement on the complexity of those parametric RHS LP instances which exhibit degeneracy. When the number of breakpoints of () is polynomial in terms of the size of the parametric problem, we show that the latter can be solved in polynomial time.This research was partially funded by the United States Navy-Office of Naval Research under Contract N00014-87-K-0202. Its financial support is gratefully acknowledged.     

‘Use’ discourses in system development: Can communication be improved?

This paper aims to provide a basis for renewed talk about use in computing. Four current discourse arenas are described. Different intentions manifest in each arena are linked to failures in translation, different terminologies crossing disciplinary and national boundaries non-reflexively. Analysis of transnational use discourse dynamics shows much miscommunication. Conflicts like that between the Scandinavian System Development School and the usability approach have less current salience. Renewing our talk about use is essential to a participatory politics of information technology and will lead to clearer perception of the implications of letting new systems becoming primary media of social interaction.     

Toward Cultural Oncology: The Evolutionary Information Dynamics of Cancer

'Racial' disparities among cancers, particularly of the breast and prostate, are something of a mystery. For the US, in the face of slavery and its sequelae, centuries of interbreeding has greatly leavened genetic differences between Blacks and Whites, but marked contrasts in disease prevalence and progression persist. Adjustment for socioeconomic status and lifestyle, while statistically accounting for much of the variance in breast cancer, only begs the question of ultimate causality. Here we propose a more basic biological explanation that extends the theory of immune cognition to include an elaborate tumor control mechanism constituting the principal selection pressure acting on pathologically mutating cell clones. The interplay between them occurs in the context of an embedding, highly structured, system of culturally-specific psychosocial stress. A rate distortion argument finds that larger system able to literally write an image of itself onto the disease process, in terms of enhanced risk behaviour, accelerated mutation rate, and depressed mutation control. The dynamics are analogous to punctuated equilibrium in simple evolutionary systems, accounting for the staged nature of disease progression. We conclude that 'social exposures' are, for human populations, far more than incidental cofactors in cancer etiology. Rather, they are part of the basic biology of the disorder. The aphorism that culture is as much a part of human biology as the enamel on our teeth appears literally true at a fundamental cellular level.     

Records of turing machines

Suppose a Turing machine is equipped with an extra tape. At each step of a computation being performed, it prints symbol read move symbol symbol printed on a square of the extra tape. It then moves the extra tape one square to the left. This procedure yields arecord of the computation.If is a finite alphabet, let be the set of triples (a, b, c) wherea ,c , andb {–1, 0, 1}. We will characterize those sequences of symbols of that are records of computations of Turing machines.This research was supported in part by AFOSR Grant GP-68-1402.     

The growth of configurations

The transition ruleF of a cellular automaton may sometimes be regarded as a rule of growth of a crystal from a seed. A study is made of the iterates,F,F ² .For certain one-dimensional growth rules, the limiting shapes of the crystals are computed, and an asymptotic formula for the size of the crystal as a function of time is obtained.     

On characterizations of recursively enumerable languages

Summary Geffert has shown that earch recursively enumerable languageL over can be expressed in the formL{h(x) ^–1 g(x)x in ⁺} ^* where is an alphabet andg, h is a pair of morphisms. Our purpose is to give a simple proof for Geffert's result and then sharpen it into the form where both of the morphisms are nonerasing. In our method we modify constructions used in a representation of recursively enumerable languages in terms of equality sets and in a characterization of simple transducers in terms of morphisms. As direct consequences, we get the undecidability of the Post correspondence problem and various representations ofL. For instance,L =(L ₀) ^* whereL ₀ is a minimal linear language and is the Dyck reductiona, A.     

A Fat Boundary Method for the Poisson Problem in a Domain with Holes

We consider the Poisson equation with Dirichlet boundary conditions, in a domain , where ⁿ , and B is a collection of smooth open subsets (typically balls). The objective is to split the initial problem into two parts: a problem set in the whole domain , for which fast solvers can be used, and local subproblems set in narrow domains around the connected components of B, which can be solved in a fully parallel way. We shall present here a method based on a multi-domain formulation of the initial problem, which leads to a fixed point algorithm. The convergence of the algorithm is established, under some conditions on a relaxation parameter . The dependence of the convergence interval for upon the geometry is investigated. Some 2D computations based on a finite element discretization of both global and local problems are presented.     

Organisational development issues and the implementation of the Clean Technology paradigm in industry

Environmental protection activities in industry have rapidly increased in number over the last years. Additionally, surveys of environmental activities have identified a change in the kind or in the approaches used to environmental problem solving. A new paradigm Clean Technology has been developed which gradually seems to replace the Clean-up Technology paradigm and the older Dilute and Disperse paradigm. The new Clean Technology paradigm brings with it not only a new way of looking at environmental protection, but also a range of rules guiding the application of technology and the design of technological systems. This paper presents a few case studies highlighting and evaluating Clean Technology activities.     

An Algebraic Approach to Propositional Fuzzy Logic

We investigate the variety corresponding to a logic (introduced in Esteva and Godo, 1998, and called there), which is the combination of ukasiewicz Logic and Product Logic, and in which Gödel Logic is interpretable. We present an alternative (and slightly simpler) axiomatization of such variety. We also investigate the variety, called the variety of algebras, corresponding to the logic obtained from by the adding of a constant and of a defining axiom for one half. We also connect algebras with structures, called f-semifields, arising from the theory of lattice-ordered rings, and prove that every algebra can be regarded as a structure whose domain is the interval [0, 1] of an f-semifield , and whose operations are the truncations of the operations of to [0, 1]. We prove that such a structure is uniquely determined by up to isomorphism, and we establish an equivalence between the category of algebras and that of f-semifields.     

Personalized Course Navigation Based on Grey Relational Analysis

Web personalization has quickly changed from a value-added facility to a service required in presenting large quantities of information because individual users of the Internet have various needs and preferences in seeking information. This paper presents a novel personalized recommendation system with online preference analysis in a distance learning environment called Coursebot. Users can both browse and search for course materials by using the interface of Coursebot. Moreover, the proposed system includes appropriate course materials ranked according to a users interests. In this work, an analysis measure is proposed to combine typical grey relational analysis and implicit rating, and thus a users interests are calculated from the content of documents and the users browsing behavior. This algorithms low computational complexity and ease of adding knowledge support online personalized analysis. In addition, the user profiles are dynamically revised to provide efficiently personalized information that reflects a users interests after each page is visited.     

Coordinating Multiple Agents via Reinforcement Learning

In this paper, we attempt to use reinforcement learning techniques to solve agent coordination problems in task-oriented environments. The Fuzzy Subjective Task Structure model (FSTS) is presented to model the general agent coordination. We show that an agent coordination problem modeled in FSTS is a Decision-Theoretic Planning (DTP) problem, to which reinforcement learning can be applied. Two learning algorithms, coarse-grained and fine-grained, are proposed to address agents coordination behavior at two different levels. The coarse-grained algorithm operates at one level and tackle hard system constraints, and the fine-grained at another level and for soft constraints. We argue that it is important to explicitly model and explore coordination-specific (particularly system constraints) information, which underpins the two algorithms and attributes to the effectiveness of the algorithms. The algorithms are formally proved to converge and experimentally shown to be effective.     

Negotiating Boundaries. Configuration Management in Software Development Teams

Using case-study material from threesmall software development teams, this paper analysesthe regionalisation of design spaces. Its mainpurpose is to understand problems and practices ofcooperative work in such spaces. Configurationmanagement is used to denote both a practice andsupporting software tools and their relationship. Amajor concern is how to develop practices and toolsthat support cooperation across multipleorganisational and social boundaries whilesimultaneously being respectful of regionalisations.