Quantitative demonstration and cost considerations of a software fault removal methodology

This paper presents a demonstration of a methodology for fault removal during software development. The methodology encompasses the entire development history, from system and software requirements generation to system test. Thus it considers not only the faults during software testing after formal configuration controls have been invoked, but also the faults discovered prior to that phase: during system and software requirements generation, preliminary design, detailed design and code and unit testing. The agents for fault discovery used in verification and validation are called activities, techniques and tools (AT & Ts) in this paper, each having a certain maximum potential or capability for fault discovery. The AT & Ts considered include the usual specification review activities, and also certain tools not normally applied in ‘standard’ software development, such as automated requirements aids. Application of the methodology yields numbers of residual faults as of each phase of development, including those remaining to be discovered during operations and maintenance. Some previous experience and data on residual faults correspond to these results, indicating that the methodology and choice of parameters are reasonable. The methodology also allows one to calculate a relative loss due to delay in fault discovery, which, as is well known, rises rapidly when faults are not discovered during the phase in which they are generated.     

Quantitative determination of aflatoxin B1 in chick liver

A method for the rapid and quantitative determination of aflatoxin B1 from small quantities of liver, around 1-2 g, is described. The extraction procedure involves acidification to pH 2 of the aqueous liver homogenates, extraction with chloroform: acetone and HPLC-fluorimetric detection after derivatization with trifluoroacetic acid. Quantitative recovery of aflatoxin B1 from chick liver was achieved and detection at levels of 0.2-1 ppb was proved feasible. The aflatoxin B1 concentration in chick liver after oral administration is also shown.     

Evaluating the application of a decision support system in identifying adequate wastewater treatment for small communities. A case study: the Fluvia River Basin.

The identification of adequate wastewater treatment for small communities is a complex problem since it demands a combination of data from different sources, such as aspects of the community and landscape, the receiving environment and the available wastewater treatment technologies. The Catalan Water Agency (Agència Catalana de l'Aigua) considered using an EDSS (Environmental Decision Support System) as a tool to help water managers select the most adequate treatment for the urban wastewater of nearly 3,500 small communities in Catalonia (Spain). From that moment, EDSS was applied to all the river basins in Catalonia. In this paper the authors present the results obtained for the 76 small communities located in one of these river basins: the Fluvia River Basin. The characteristics of the community used in the reasoning process of the EDSS, the list of selected wastewater treatment alternatives, the technical environmental justification for the selected treatments and the reasons for discarding, favouring or disadvantaging them are presented. Finally, some results for the Fluvia River Basin are compared with those obtained in other Catalan river basins with different characteristics in order to evaluate which are the significant features in identifying adequate wastewater treatments.     

Hydrologic regionalisation impacts on wet-weather control selection.

Continuous simulation is performed using the US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) Storm Water Management Model (SWMM) to evaluate regional differences around the United States in hydrologic and water quality performance of wet-weather controls. Controls are characterised as being limited by peak inflow rate (i.e. any device with little or no storage, such as screens, filters and some proprietary devices) or by storage capacity (e.g., ponds, tanks). For flow-limited devices, results are presented in the form of percentage of annual runoff volume captured (passing through the device) for a given inflow capacity. For storage-limited devices, results are presented in two forms: percentage of annual runoff volume captured as a function of unit basin size and drawdown (drain) time, and as a percentage of total suspended solids captured, for the same two variables. Regional differences are apparent, driven mainly by variations in rainfall patterns around the country.     

Error computation for capacitive displacement transducers using nonlinear bridge circuits

Translated from Izmeritel'naya Tekhnika, No. 3, pp. 10–11, March, 1989.     

Dynamic viscosities of mixtures of n-butyraldehyde and isobutyraldehyde over wide ranges in the state parameters

Dynamic-viscosity measurements are reported for liquid mixtures in the system formed by n-butyraldehyde and isobutyraldehyde.Translated from Inzhenerno-Fizicheskii Zhurnal, Vol. 48, No. 2, pp. 321–322, February, 1985.     

Decision Making Effectiveness in Wildfire Incident Management Teams

During large scale wildfires, suppression activities are carried out under the direction of an Incident Management Team (IMT). The aim of the research was to increase understanding of decision processes potentially related to IMT effectiveness. An IMT comprises four major functions: Command, Operations, Planning, and Logistics. Four methodologies were used to study IMT processes: computer simulation experiments; analyses of wildfire reports; interviews with IMT members; and cognitive ethnographic studies of IMTs. Three processes were important determinants of IMT effectiveness: information management and cognitive overload; matching component function goals to overall goals; and team metacognition to detect and counter task‐disruptive developments. These processes appear to be complex multi‐person analogues of individual Incident Command processes identified previously. The findings have implications for issues such as: creating IMTs; training IMTs; managing IMTs; and providing decision support to IMTs.