Message-passing environments for metacomputing

In this paper, we present the three libraries PACX-MPI, PLUS, and PVMPI that provide message-passing between different high-performance computers in metacomputing environments. Each library supports the development and execution of distributed metacomputer applications.

The PACX-MPI approach offers a transparent interface for the communication between two or more MPI environments. PVAMPI allows the user spawning parallel processes under the MPI environment. The PLUS protocol bridges the gap between vendor-specific (e.g., MPL, NX, and PARIX) and vendor-independent message-passing environments (e.g., PVM and MPI). Moreover, it offers the ability to create and control processes at application runtime.     

HARNESS: a next generation distributed virtual machine

Heterogeneous Adaptable Reconfigurable Networked SystemS (HARNESS) is an experimental metacomputing system [L. Smarr, C.E. Catlett, Communications of the ACM 35 (6) (1992) 45–52] built around the services of a highly customizable and reconfigurable Distributed Virtual Machine (DVM). The successful experience of the HARNESS design team with the Parallel Virtual Machine (PVM) project has taught us both the features which make the DVM model so valuable to parallel programmers and the limitations imposed by the PVM design. HARNESS seeks to remove some of those limitations by taking a totally different approach to creating and modifying a DVM.     

射频识别技术(RFID)及其在图书馆领域的应用

该文介绍了RFID系统的组成、工作原理及特点,着重阐述了RFID技术在图书馆的应用和在推广应用中存在的问题,最后论述了RFID在图书馆的应用前景。     

Performance evaluation of compromised synchronization control mechanism for distributed virtual environment (DVE)

Synchronization in a distributed virtual environment (DVE) involves mechanisms to ensure a consistent view of a virtual world for all participants. Most applications in the DVE are related to collaborative activities that include non-contention and contention cases. Using transmission of update messages is suitable enough to support synchronization for only non-contention activity. The contention activity requires an additional mechanism to control accessing a common object for synchronization. In this paper, we present the compromised synchronization control mechanism to support both non-contention and contention activities. The mechanism employs frequent update event and multiple-lock checking to control the synchronization. Frequent update event is used to support a dynamic virtual world for non-contention activity. Multiple-lock checking is embedded to ensure consistency when accessing the common object is required simultaneously for the contention event. Performance measurement of the compromised synchronization is provided by simulation in terms of locking time, sampling event, number of logical processes, and traffic tolerance. Prototype application is also implemented to compare the result in a small scale level. Based on the simulation and experimental results, the compromised sychronization control mechanism is capable to support up to 100 participants for the non-contention activity. It provides a good performance of supporting the contention activity in a small scale. The mechanism is considered suitable for collaborative application where contention is considered a critical event.     

A formal description of open distributed processing (ODP) trading based on guidelines for the definition of managed objects (GDMO)

New requirements of growing computer networks and information systems have an influence on extended client/server models with increased functionality. This forms the basis for service management in distributed systems which is realized by a service trading concept. This paper studies the requirements derived from the Open Distributed Processing (ODP) Reference Model in order to consider an open service market. Furthermore, it examines management possibilities for describing the service trading scenario. Because of similar architectures and properties ODP services, service offers, types, exporters and traders are mapped onto management components and modeled as managed objects. Therefore, the Guidelines for the Definition of Managed Objects (GDMO) are used. The final concept allows a precise and unambiguous study of the service trading scenario and provides means for exporting and importing of service offers in a distributed environment.     

Win9x下VxD和应用程序双向通讯的实现(二)

为实现Win9x下高速采样和实时控制，并给用户提供友好的界面，须采用VxD和Win32应用程序相结合的方法，这就要求能在VxD和Win32应用程序之间通讯。在第一部分介绍了用查询方式实现VxD和Win32应用程序的通讯，在第二部分介绍了用消息方式和事件方式进行通讯。这些方法均经过实践的检验，能够适应高速采样和实时控制。     

Win9x下VxD和应用程序双向通讯的实现(一)

为实现Win9x下高速采样和实时控制，并给用户提供友好的界面，须采用VxD和Win32应用程序相结合的方法，这就要求能在VXD和Win32应用程序之间通讯，在第一部分介绍用查询方式实现VXD和Win32应用程序的通讯；在第二部分介绍消息方式和事件方式进行通讯，这些方法均经过实践的检验，能够适应高速采样和实时控制。     

Applying social bookmarking to collective information searching (CIS): An analysis of behavioral pattern and peer interaction for co-exploring quality online resources

With the advancement of Web 2.0 applications, this study aims to advocate that social bookmarking (SB) applications could support mutual exchange of finding information in a manner of collective information searching (CIS). A social bookmarking system, namely ‘WeShare,’ was developed, and conducted with 127 junior high school students for performing the given assignment in this study. The participants’ activities of collecting and reviewing relevant information were traced by log data for later analysis. To initially unveil the participants’ behaviors in the use of social bookmarking for co-exploring the Internet resources, this study proposed some quantitative indicators to represent students’ personal contributions (‘Bookmarks from the Internet,’ ‘Bookmarks from WeShare,’ ‘Annotations on personal bookmarks,’ ‘Comments on others’ bookmarks’) and peer feedback (‘The number of bookmarks collected by peers,’ ‘The number of bookmarks commented on by peers,’ ‘The number of comments from peers’). By the method of cluster analysis, some behavioral patterns regarding how participants collectively search the Internet by use of WeShare were identified. Furthermore, the findings suggest that personal contributions to citing and commenting on peers’ bookmarks are important to the advancement of collective information searching activities for finding quality information on the Internet.     

校园一卡通网络机房系统的设计与实现

本文介绍利用局域网的客户端-服务器数据库操作模式,设计校园一卡通的子系统:网络机房记费与管理系统.该系统充分利用了数据库的远程通信与管理技术,搭建了三层服务器、客户端管理层次模型:客户端-服务器(客户端)-服务器(数据库).介绍了校园一卡通的设计思路,机房管理子系统的开发原理,系统的详细构造,以及数据库系统的维护等.同时分析了在系统实现过程中的一些关键问题,并对此提供了相应的解决方案.     

Transforming information systems development through computer-aided systems engineering (CASE): lessons from practice

In dealing with the challenges posed by the ongoing problem of developing and integrating an evermore complex and diverse range of information systems in a timely manner, practitioners continue to grapple with important issues such as increasing developer productivity and bringing quality improvements to the process and product of systems development. Many organizations have adopted computer‐aided systems engineering (CASE) tools with such outcomes in mind. With few exceptions, previous research into the phenomenon of CASE adoption and use has been survey based in the main, and has resulted in some confusion over the benefits to be derived from the use of CASE tools within the systems development process. This paper extends previous work as part of an interpretive, case‐based research strategy to examine the adoption and use of integrated CASE (I‐CASE) in a single organization. Such an approach facilitates a deeper understanding of the impact that CASE exerts on the process and product of systems development. Based on the experience of practitioners in the organization studied, a set of recommendations is presented. The findings of this study also lend support to the view that an I‐CASE development platform does indeed have the potential to exert a positive impact on the development process and its product.     

Automated classification of building information modeling (BIM) case studies by BIM use based on natural language processing (NLP) and unsupervised learning

This paper comparatively analyzes a method to automatically classify case studies of building information modeling (BIM) in construction projects by BIM use. It generally takes a minimum of thirty minutes to hours of collection and review and an average of four information sources to identify a project that has used BIM in a manner that is of interest. To automate and expedite the analysis tasks, this study deployed natural language processing (NLP) and commonly used unsupervised learning for text classification, namely latent semantic analysis (LSA) and latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA). The results were validated against one of representative supervised learning methods for text classification—support vector machine (SVM). When LSA and LDA detected phrases in a BIM case study that had higher similarity values to the definition of each BIM use than the threshold values, the system determined that the project had deployed BIM in the detected approach. For the classification of BIM use, the BIM uses specified by Pennsylvania State University were utilized. The approach was validated using 240 BIM case studies (512,892 features). When BIM uses were employed in a project, the project was labeled as “1”; when they were not, the project was labeled as “0.” The performance was analyzed by changing parameters: namely, document segmentation, feature weighting, dimensionality reduction coefficient (k-value), the number of topics, and the number of iterations. LDA yielded the highest F1 score, 80.75% on average. LDA and LSA yielded high recall and low precision in most cases. Conversely, SVM yielded high precision and low recall in most cases and fluctuations in F1 scores.     

Impact of information technology on users' work environment: A case of computer aided design (CAD) system implementation

Study of the possible impacts of a new information system or technology on its users is an important area of MIS research. Understanding and identifying favorable and unfavorable impacts of implementation on users should be helpful in developing better design guidelines and choices to take full advantage of the potential of information technology, while minimizing the possible negative consequences for users. This paper presents the details of impacts created by the implementation of a computer aided design (CAD) system for part designers at an automotive parts manufacturer. The paper employs equity–implementation (E–I) model as a framework to help identify and analyze the impacts of CAD technology implementation on part designers' work environment. The paper identifies changes in the designers' inputs and outcomes as a result of CAD implementation. On the whole the impacts were found to be favorable for designers, the manufacturing organization, and its customers. The paper concludes that the E–I model provides a useful framework to help assess the nature of impacts created by the new system. The reactions of designers to the new system were also found to be consistent with the E–I model.     

Harnessing information and communication technologies (ICTs) to address urban poverty: Emerging open policy lessons for the open knowledge economy

Urban poverty is a complex socio-economic problem. The expected doubling of the urban population relative to rural areas by 2050 without a corresponding economic and infrastructure growth will worsen the problem, especially in emerging economies. Poor urban residents face rising unemployment and underemployment, constrained access to financial services, market exploitation, poor housing, crime, unsatisfactory health services and scant education opportunities. Several players have attempted to address these problems through information and communication technologies. This paper isolated a few of these to determine critical success factors on the economic empowerment front.     

The Performance Metric for Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) in SOA system: Theoretical underpinnings and empirical illustrations for information processing

Now days, the businesses are going online and e-Commerce industry is on its boom. In this changing era of development, services are to be Robust, Agile, Accessible and Available to its clients. For secured and guaranteed delivery of services, every big organization is shifting their service delivery model to Enterprise Service Bus (ESB). It promises to set up a strong guideline to build System Oriented Architecture (SOA) system, which leverages multiple services from different application domains. This paper presents an analytical survey of ESB on different parameters influencing the performance of SOA in the present changing scenario and service patterns.     

Professional development to enhance teachers' practices in using information and communication technologies (ICTs) as cognitive tools: Lessons learned from a design-based research study

Technology integration in K-12 classrooms is usually overly teacher-centered and has insufficient impact on students' learning, especially in enhancing students' higher-order cognitive skills. The purpose of this project is to facilitate science teachers' use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) as cognitive tools to shift their practices from traditional teacher-centered methods to constructivist, student-centered ones. This paper describes the outcomes and lessons learned from an application of design-based research (DBR) in the implementation and refinement of a teacher professional development (PD) program that is a key component of the overall project. This DBR study involved 25 middle-school science teachers from 24 schools whose implementation of cognitive tools with their students in science classrooms and virtually through a social networking site were observed over four years. A mixed-methodology was utilized to examine the impact of the cognitive tools intervention on teachers' classroom practices and students' development of new literacy skills. Identifying reusable design principles related to technology integration was another focus of the DBR study. The results revealed teachers' positive changes in their classroom practices by gradually allowing students to take control over the use of technology, and positive impact on students' ICT skills and science learning. Design principles for future professional development programs aimed at preparing teachers to adopt a cognitive tools approach are described.     

BECAUSE European workshop Sophia-Antipolis (France) 14–16 October 1992. General presentation of the BECAUSE Benchmark Set: BBS

Within the framework of the ESPRIT Project named BECAUSE (5417), entitled “Benchmarking of Concurrent Architectures for their Use in Scientific Engineering”, a set of industrial benchmarks was specified. The BECAUSE Benchmark Set (BBS) is scientifically application oriented. The various Test Programs have been extracted and specified from real industrial software such as electromagnetics software, semi-conductor simulation and computational fluid dynamics. The aim was to provide a general tool to industry in order to evaluate new generations of parallel computers and supercomputers in terms of memory capacity and computational power. Before parallelising a complete application, a scientific developer must answer the questions: ‘What is the performance of a given machine on my application and is it worth spending time to parallelise it?’ The BBS has been designed to provide simple benchmarks, as close as possible to critical parts of real scientific applications. Thus, by implementing various tests selected within the BBS, the user can get information useful to answer these questions. The serial version of the entire set of BBS is public and available on a mail server.

In this paper, the objectives of the BECAUSE Project are recalled in order to replace the BBS in the context of this ESPRIT Project. Then, the applications from which test programs have been extracted are presented and all tests are described in detail. The next part is dedicated to the practical organisation of the BBS and is concerned with such aspects as documentation, input data and how to get the BBS, so that the BBS can be used inside and outside of the Project to assess parallel machines. As a conclusion, further developments are presented.