Why not one big database? Principles for data ownership

This research concerns incentive principles which drive information sharing and affect database value. Many real world centralization and standardization efforts have failed, typically because departments lacked incentives or needed greater local autonomy. While intangible factors such as “ownership” have been described as the key to providing incentives, these soft issues have largely eluded formal characterization. Using an incomplete contracts approach from economics, we model the costs and benefits of restructuring organizational control, including critical intangible factors, by explicitly considering the role of data “ownership”. There are two principal contributions from the approach taken here. First, it defines mathematically precise terms for analysing the incentive costs and benefits of changing control. Second, this theoretical framework leads to the development of a concrete model and seven normative principles for improved database management. These principles may be instrumental to designers in a variety of applications such as the decision to decentralize or to outsource information technology and they can be useful in determining the value of standards and translators. Applications of the proposed theory are also illustrated through case histories.     

“Planning”, “siting” and the local acceptance of wind power: Some lessons from the French case

After some years of trifling development under a system of public tenders (1995–2000), French politicians progressively changed the national policy framework for feed-in tariffs (December 2000) and wind power development zones (July 2005). The new policy framework has triggered a beginning of takeoff in wind power capacity. The paper examines French wind power development in the light of two key dimensions and concepts related to wind power policy: “planning” and “siting” (Part 1). We particularly focus on the recent French legislative debate, which led to the adoption of the new policy framework (Part 2). The French case shows that the recourse to planning tools was not tailor-made for siting issues but resulted from a political fight over the decentralization of energy policy. The policy outcome, which we call “flexible decentralized planning”, is both interesting and ambiguous. It is interesting in that it develops interfaces between planning tools and siting institutions. It is ambiguous in that it is potentially very hierarchical: the final decision power is left in State-planners’ hands, making it unpredictable the extent to which room will genuinely be provided for siting processes to take place.     

Towards decentralization: Energy planning in Guangdong,PR China

Even before the recently announced Chinese decentralization policy, Guangdong Province had been given substantially increased autonomy in international cooperation and financial and investment planning. For the energy sector, where decentralization is only partial, it is shown that constraining factors inhibit full exhaustion of Guangdong's autonomy. Administrative structures and processes have not yet been adapted to the requirements of decentralized planning, especially regarding horizontal communication, information and coordination. Furthermore, coexistence of centralized and decentralized responsibilities reinforces inertial tendencies within provincial institutions. However, scope exists for the Province to utilize its planning autonomy more fully, through realigning structure and processes of provincial energy planning institutions.     

Equitable Gender Participation in Local Water Governance: An Insight into Institutional Paradoxes

The participation of local stakeholders in governance of water resources is regarded as inalienable for ensuring efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability. To enhance gender balance in the water governance process, institutions are being designed and executed globally to elicit enhanced participation of women. This paper contends that in the context of local communities, the new institutional framework is divorced from the traditional social institutions that in turn operationalize their resource management systems. Based upon empirical evidence from rural Indian setting, the paper deciphers the paradoxes between the two sets of institutional paradigms and illustrates how these paradoxes at the ‘interface’ between the local community context and the development strategy lead to problems with effective women’s participation. On the basis of the findings, it argues that the institutional paradigm for achieving equitable gender participation in local water governance does not represent a truly ‘bottom-up’ approach. It further raises the concern that if the institutional paradigm for participation is contradictory to local institutions, then how can the objectives of participation founded thereupon be seen as achievable? The paper proposes the need to design participatory paradigms that are more realistically rooted in community-based institutional frameworks so as to enhance effectiveness of the endeavors.     

阅读梁思成之七 梁思成的城市规划思想综述：1930—1949

本文通过细读梁思成在1930年与张锐合作的天津规划,以及梁在1930-1949年间的一系列规划写作,仔细梳理他的规划思想的来源和运用。     

嵌入 山水秀设计的上海青浦朱家角人文艺术馆

文章通过对山水秀建筑事务所设计的朱家角人文艺术馆的介绍,分析了建筑师祝晓峰在传统文脉中嵌入新建筑的设计策略,该设计营造了一种艺术参观的体验,它根植于朱家角,而建筑是这一体验的载体。     

Resource management in decentralized industrial Automated Guided Vehicle systems

This paper proposes an advanced decentralized method where an Automated Guided Vehicle (AGV) can optimally insert charging stations into an already assigned optimal tour of task locations. In today's industrial AGV systems, advanced algorithms and techniques are used to control the whole fleet of AGVs robustly and efficiently. While in academia, much research is conducted towards every aspect of AGV control. However, resource management or battery management is still one aspect which is usually omitted in research. In current industrial AGV systems, AGVs operate until their resource level drops below a certain threshold. Subsequently, they head to a charging station to charge fully. This programmed behaviour may have a negative impact on the manufacturing systems performance. AGVs lose time charging at inconvenient moments while this time loss could be avoided. Using the approach, an AGV can choose independently when it will visit a charging station and how long it will charge there. A general constrained optimization algorithm will be used to solve the problem and the current industrial resource management will be used as a benchmark. We use a simple extension of the Traveling Salesman Problem (TSP) representation to model our approach. The paper follows a decentral approach which is in the interest of the authors. The result of the proposal is a compact and practical method which can be used in today's operative central or decentral controlled AGV systems.     

基于有限状态自动机的组合Web服务性能优化

组合Web服务的业务流程可以通过有限状态自动机来描述。传统的组合Web服务采用集中式的执行方式,它会带来不必要的网络流量和数据堵塞,造成大量的通信开销。提出一种基于有限状态自动机的非集中式的执行策略,在自动机的状态空间中运用启发式搜索算法执行总体代价最优的路径,从而有效减少消息传递数量,提高系统吞吐量。基于该方案设计了一个原型系统来验证系统整体性能的最优化。     

基于区块链技术的跨境商品授权与存证系统

随着海外产品在国内市场的推广,做好跨境电商的信任机制和防伪工作成为了新的技术难点。传统的集中式存储方式容易受到信息篡改的威胁,传统的第三方交易平台提供的信任机制无法满足物联网信息高度自动化趋势的需求。基于区块链技术记录交易信息,设计智能合约进行分级授权。利用基于身份的数字签名技术实现信息认证,提出一种授权与存证方案,并且做了相关的仿真实验,实现了一个去中心化、安全可靠的海外入境商品的授权与存证中心化系统。     

射流分级技术在钨制品中的应用

为解决钨粉团聚及粒度控制对后续制品的影响,研究了四种分散分级方式,分析了不同钨粉产物的 SEM 形貌与粒度分布。结果表明采用射流分级技术实现了钨粉精确分级,分级后中粉产物粒径收窄明显。该技术对于 喷涂粉末以及致密 / 多孔材料的制备提供了可控技术手段。