Special issue on information systems quality management in practice

Software Quality Journal -     

Bandwidth selection in kernel density estimation for interval-grouped data

When interval-grouped data are available, the classical Parzen–Rosenblatt kernel density estimator has to be modified to get a computable and useful approach in this context. The new nonparametric grouped data estimator needs of the choice of a smoothing parameter. In this paper, two different bandwidth selectors for this estimator are analyzed. A plug-in bandwidth selector is proposed and its relative rate of convergence obtained. Additionally, a bootstrap algorithm to select the bandwidth in this framework is designed. This method is easy to implement and does not require Monte Carlo. Both proposals are compared through simulations in different scenarios. It is observed that when the sample size is medium or large and grouping is not heavy, both bandwidth selection methods have a similar and good performance. However, when the sample size is large and under heavy grouping scenarios, the bootstrap bandwidth selector leads to better results.     

Requirement-based approach for groupware environments design

Groupware applications have special features that, if they were taken into account from the very beginning, could reasonably improve the quality of the system. Such features concern human-computer-human interactions, i.e. a further step in the human-computer interaction field: communication, collaboration, cooperation and coordination, time, space, and awareness are issues to be considered. This paper presents a novel approach to gather requirements for groupware applications. The proposal is based on a methodology that includes the use of templates to gather the information regarding the different types of requirements. The requirements templates have been extended to include new information to give account of specific features concerning groupware applications. The information gathered is managed in a CASE tool we have developed; then general and specific diagrams are automatic or semi-automatically generated.     

An algorithm for computerized automatic tuning of power system stabilizers

The main objective of this paper is to relieve the power system engineers from the burden of the complex and time-consuming process of power system stabilizer (PSS) tuning. To achieve this goal, the paper proposes an automatic process for computerized tuning of PSSs, which is based on an iterative process that uses a linear matrix inequality (LMI) solver to find the PSS parameters. It is shown in the paper that PSS tuning can be written as a search problem over a non-convex feasible set. The proposed algorithm solves this feasibility problem using an iterative LMI approach and a suitable initial condition, corresponding to a PSS designed for nominal operating conditions only (which is a quite simple task, since the required phase compensation is uniquely defined). Some knowledge about the PSS tuning is also incorporated in the algorithm through the specification of bounds defining the allowable PSS parameters. The application of the proposed algorithm to a benchmark test system and the nonlinear simulation of the resulting closed-loop models demonstrate the efficiency of this algorithm.     

A Hybrid Intelligent Morphological Approach for Stock Market Forecasting

In this paper, a hybrid intelligent morphological approach is presented for stock market forecasting. It consists of a hybrid intelligent model composed of a Modular Morphological Neural Network (MMNN) and a Modified Genetic Algorithm (MGA), which searches for the minimum number of time lags for a correct time series representation, as well as by the initial weights, architecture and number of modules of the MMNN. Each element of the MGA population is trained via Back Propagation (BP) algorithm to further improve the parameters supplied by the MGA. Initially, the proposed method chooses the most tuned prediction model for time series representation, then it performs a behavioral statistical test in the attempt to adjust time phase distortions that appear in financial time series. An experimental analysis is conducted with the proposed method using four real world time series and five well-known performance measurements, demonstrating consistent better performance of this kind of morphological system.     

Randomized constraint solvers: a comparative study

The complexity of constraints is a major obstacle for constraint-based software verification. Automatic constraint solvers are fundamentally incomplete: input constraints often build on some undecidable theory or some theory the solver does not support. This paper proposes and evaluates several randomized solvers to address this issue. We compared the effectiveness of a symbolic solver (CVC3), a random solver, two heuristic search solvers, and seven hybrid solvers (i.e. mix of random, symbolic, and heuristic solvers). We evaluated the solvers on a benchmark generated with a concolic execution of 9 subjects. The performance of each solver was measured by its precision, which is the fraction of constraints that the solver can find solution out of the total number of constraints that some solver can find solution. As expected, symbolic solving subsumes the other approaches for the 4 subjects that only generate decidable constraints. For the remaining 5 subjects, which contain undecidable constraints, the hybrid solvers achieved the highest precision (fraction of constraints that a solver can find a solution out of the total number of satisfiable constraints). We also observed that the solvers were complementary, which suggests that one should alternate their use in iterations of a concolic execution driver.     

Slicing the metric space to provide quick indexing of complex data in the main memory

Searching in a dataset for elements that are similar to a given query element is a core problem in applications that manage complex data, and has been aided by metric access methods (MAMs). A growing number of applications require indices that must be built faster and repeatedly, also providing faster response for similarity queries. The increase in the main memory capacity and its lowering costs also motivate using memory-based MAMs. In this paper, we propose the Onion-tree, a new and robust dynamic memory-based MAM that slices the metric space into disjoint subspaces to provide quick indexing of complex data. It introduces three major characteristics: (i) a partitioning method that controls the number of disjoint subspaces generated at each node; (ii) a replacement technique that can change the leaf node pivots in insertion operations; and (iii) range and k-NN extended query algorithms to support the new partitioning method, including a new visit order of the subspaces in k-NN queries. Performance tests with both real-world and synthetic datasets showed that the Onion-tree is very compact. Comparisons of the Onion-tree with the MM-tree and a memory-based version of the Slim-tree showed that the Onion-tree was always faster to build the index. The experiments also showed that the Onion-tree significantly improved range and k-NN query processing performance and was the most efficient MAM, followed by the MM-tree, which in turn outperformed the Slim-tree in almost all the tests.     

Optimization of interval type-2 fuzzy logic controllers for a perturbed autonomous wheeled mobile robot using genetic algorithms

We describe a tracking controller for the dynamic model of a unicycle mobile robot by integrating a kinematic and a torque controller based on type-2 fuzzy logic theory and genetic algorithms. Computer simulations are presented confirming the performance of the tracking controller and its application to different navigation problems.