Silicon Valley Policy

Silicon Valley is hom e to the m ostdynam ic industries in the C aliforniaeconom y .These industries —— thehigh-tech sector—— are driven by in-novation,and each new wave of inno-vation is usually led by cre ativeentrepreneurs starting new firm s.D uri…     

A spatial warping method for freeform modeling based on a level-set method

Providing an intuitive and effective tool for freeform geometric modeling is important for product design. We introduce in this paper a level-set based spatial warping method for freeform modeling, allowing shape deformation to be initialed by rigid body transformations of volumetric tools. Intuitive user operations including imprinting, deformation and smoothing are developed to shield the user from the underlying geometric complexity. Unlike mesh-based spatial warping methods, the developed method represents a digital model by implicit distance field data and describes its change of geometry by the level-set method. This guarantees the generation of topologically correct triangular mesh models and circumvents the error-prone remeshing and mesh-repairing processes, thus preventing topological errors such as self-intersections. We present this method with algorithm details, numerical experiments and modeling examples.     

An Efficient Authentication Scheme for Access Control in Mobile Pay-TV Systems

In a mobile pay-TV system, a large number of messages are exchanged for mutual authentication purposes. In traditional authentication schemes, with one-to-one delivery, one authentication message per request is delivered from a head end system to subscribers. This results in the delivery of a large quantity of messages and therefore is inefficient and costly. Moreover, since most traditional schemes use an RSA-based signature for identity validation and nonrepudiation of communication, they suffer from high communication costs. Due to its wireless nature, mobile pay-TV is vulnerable to attacks during hand-off. As traditional schemes do not support hand-off authentication, they are insecure during hand-off. With these shortcomings, they are not suitable for mobile pay-TV. In this paper, we propose an innovative authentication scheme, in which, by providing one-to-many facility, only one authentication message for multiple requests is broadcasted from the head end system to subscribers. By employing bilinear property of pairing and elliptic curve cryptography, our scheme provides one-to-many facility in the case of multiple requests for the same service in a short period of time. This new scheme achieves better broadcast efficiency and performance on communication costs than traditional ones. Additionally, this scheme provides a hand-off authentication mechanism to protect the access of services while preventing attacks during hand-off; therefore, the scheme is more secure to support access control. Moreover, to provide anonymous authentication for protecting identity privacy, the scheme adopts an identity-based scheme while traditional schemes do not apply. The scheme inherits advantages of the identity-based scheme that a public key does not need to be certificated, the certification authority mechanism will not be needed and the key exchange overhead can be reduced. With these advantages of our scheme, it is well suited for mobile pay-TV system.     

An online GA-based output-feedback direct adaptive fuzzy-neural controller for uncertain nonlinear systems.

In this paper, we propose a novel design of a GA-based output-feedback direct adaptive fuzzy-neural controller (GODAF controller) for uncertain nonlinear dynamical systems. The weighting factors of the direct adaptive fuzzy-neural controller can successfully be tuned online via a GA approach. Because of the capability of genetic algorithms (GAs) in directed random search for global optimization, one is used to evolutionarily obtain the optimal weighting factors for the fuzzy-neural network. Specifically, we use a reduced-form genetic algorithm (RGA) to adjust the weightings of the fuzzy-neural network. In RGA, a sequential-search -based crossover point (SSCP) method determines a suitable crossover point before a single gene crossover actually takes place so that the speed of searching for an optimal weighting vector of the fuzzy-neural network can be improved. A new fitness function for online tuning the weighting vector of the fuzzy-neural controller is established by the Lyapunov design approach. A supervisory controller is incorporated into the GODAF controller to guarantee the stability of the closed-loop nonlinear system. Examples of nonlinear systems controlled by the GODAF controller are demonstrated to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.     

X window based group collaborative editing system

Group collaborative editing is an activity by which people geographically dispersed can edit the same document simultaneously. It makes use of computers and network communication to provide an interactive and convenient environment, so people can save much of their time and cost. We have developed a group collaborative editing system which not only allows participants to jointly view and process multimedia documents but also provides real-time interactive conversation facilities to let users feel realistic and friendly. This paper describes the concepts of group collaboration and the mechanisms of our system. It also presents the interface design strategy and the synchronization control method.     

Modelling and Rendering Graphics Scenes Composed of Multiple Volumetric Datasets

This paper presents a method for modelling graphics scenes consisting of multiple volumetric objects. A two-level hierarchical representation is employed, which enables the reduction of the overall storage consumption as well as rendering time. With this approach, different objects can be derived from the same volumetric dataset, and 2D images can be trivially integrated into a scene. The paper also describes an efficient algorithm for rendering such scenes on ordinary workstations, and addresses issues concerning memory requirements and disk swapping.     

Resource brokering using a multi‐site resource allocation strategy for computational grids

Grid computing employs heterogeneous resources which may be installed on different platforms, hardware/software, computer architectures, and perhaps using different computer languages to solve large‐scale computational problems. As many more Grids are being developed worldwide, the number of multi‐institutional collaborations is growing rapidly. However, to realize Grid computing's full potential, it is expected that Grid participants must be able to share one another's resources. This paper presents a resource broker that employs the multi‐site resource allocation (MSRA) strategy and the dynamic domain‐based network information model that we propose to allocate Grid resources to submitted jobs, where the Grid resources may be dispersed at different sites, and owned and governed by different organizations or institutes. The jobs and resources may also belong to different clusters/sites. Resource statuses collected by the Ganglia, and network bandwidths gathered by the Network Weather Service, are both considered in the proposed scheduling approach. A dynamic domain‐based model for network information measurement is also proposed to choose the most appropriate resources that meet the jobs' execution requirements. Experimental results show that MSRA outperformed the other tested strategies. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Modeling and evaluating IPTV applications in WiMAX networks

Internet Protocol-based Television (IPTV) is a digital television service which delivers television content via an IP network. The rapid growth of wireless network technology in recent years has changed, the way people access the Internet. Adding mobility to IPTV can create a truly compelling ubiquitous service which spans different network domains and varied IP-enabled terminals and devices, such as set-top boxes, PCs and cell phones. However, extending IPTV service to wireless networks requires overcoming bandwidth bottlenecks and high packet loss rates. Following the IEEE 802.16 standard, worldwide interoperability for microwave access (WiMAX) features high data rates and large service coverage, offering a wireless broadband solution for IPTV services. While previous research has focused on creating a broadband IPTV service few studies have practically evaluated IPTV applications in a wireless broadband network environment. In this paper, we model and evaluate a common constant bit rate (CBR)¹ based IPTV application and an IPTV live streaming (PPStreaming)² application while retrieving IPTV content via a WiMAX network. We also use the NS2 simulation tool to evaluate the performance of these two IPTV applications. The evaluation metrics include latency, packet loss, data rate and throughput statistics when the two IPTV applications are run in the WiMAX network. ¹The simplest IPTV solution is to convey video content by CBR. IPTV operators and content delivery networks relay CBR streaming content to control the demand for network capacity. Broadcasters prefer CBR video as it conserves bandwidth resources, but CBR delivery can degrade video quality result in higher overall demand on network capacity. ²PPStreaming (also referred to as P2P streaming Internet TV) is a network for live media streaming. In principle it’s similar to BitTorrent (BT) in that it provides stable and smooth broadcast of TV programs to broadband users. Unlike traditional streaming media, PPStreaming adopts P2P-streaming technology and supports full-scale visits with tens of thousands of simultaneous users. Its client software can be used in the browser or as a standalone executable.     

Sequencing mixed-model assembly lines with genetic algorithms

This research introduces the use of an artificial-intelligence based technique, genetic algorithms (GA), to solve mixed-model assembly-line sequencing problems. This paper shows how practitioners can comfortably implement this approach to solve practical problems. A substantial example is given for which GA produces a solution in just a matter of seconds that improves upon Toyota's Goal Chasing Algorithm. The new method is then investigated on a test bed of 80 problems. Results indicate GA generates an improved sequence over Goal Chasing on 50 of the problems and also shows a performance advantage of 2% across all 80 problems using Toyota's variability of parts consumption criterion. The paper concludes that further investigation to fine tune the GA methodology is warranted. It also points out that the GA approach can readily be used by practitioners to address a variety of managerial goals concurrently, such as inventory and work load equalization.