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Personalized Dynamic Composition of Services and Resources in a Wireless Pervasive Computing Environment
Get PDFInteraction Design: a Multidimensional Approach for Learners with Autism
Get PDFIn the special education context of children with autism, the design of educational software needs to focus on their
unique learning styles. In this study, results of a survey in Irish Primary Schools, and interviews with tutors, indicate that characteristics of learners with autism need to be more integrated into the design process. An interaction model, based on Norman’s and Abowd and Beale’s models, provides a basis for mapping special user requirements and instructional strategies onto a model suited to the learner with autism. We propose this extended interaction model as a basis for design guidelines for effective educational software for these special needs learners
Creating and sustaining an effective learning environment in the field of visual art
Get PDFThis paper will consider the issue of creating and sustaining an effective learning environment for the study of visual art within the broader learning situation of an Institute of Technology. It will consider how the perceived threat to effective art education implied by the absorption of the art school into a larger more general educational institution, can be turned to positive advantage. It will aim to show that the changing nature of art practice, from finely crafted object to 'the manipulation of signs' (Forster), can best be facilitated by a pluralistic (in subject terms) learning environment.
It will also consider the importance of the latter in developing an appropriate location for art research, and in turn the influence of the latter on developing an effective learning environment. The common ground between the process of art-making and the research process, first identified by Cornock (1978), will be reconsidered from the point of view of contemporary practice in both areas.
In recent years there has been much debate on the desirability or otherwise of 'separate' education for artists, cf the current arguments over whether or not the National College of Art and Design should merge with UCD. It has been, and still is in some cases, forcefully argued that the most effective learning environment for artists is the independent art school. Whilst there are certain advantages in this, this paper will argue that these are outweighed by the disadvantages. It must also be recognised that the argument for educational 'apartheid' is now largely academic anyway, as in practice many of the old art schools have been incorporated into larger general educational institutions, for example Waterford School of Art is now part of Waterford Institute of Technology.
The paper will take the form of a general contextualising discussion, followed by a specific case-study
Risk factors for ARM are associated with relative lack of macular pigment
Get PDFMacular pigment (MP) is composed of the two dietary carotenoids lutein (L) and zeaxanthin (Z), and is believed to protect against age-related maculopathy (ARM). This study was undertaken to investigate MP optical density with respect to risk factors for ARM, in 828 healthy subjects from an Irish population. MP optical density was measured psychophysically using heterochromatic flicker photometry, serum L and Z were quantified by HPLC, and dietary intake of L and Z was assessed using a validated food-frequency questionnaire. Clinical and personal details were also recorded, with particular attention directed towards risk factors for ARM. We report a statistically significant age-related decline in MP optical density (r2 ¼ 0.082, p < 0.01). Current and past smokers had lower average MP optical density than never smokers and this difference was statistically significant ( p < 0.01). Subjects with a confirmed family history of ARM had significantly lower levels of MP optical density than subjects with no known family history of disease ( p < 0.01). For each of these established risk factors, their statistically significant negative association with MP persisted after controlling for the other two, and also after controlling for other potentially confounding variables such as sex, cholesterol, dietary and serum L ( p < 0.01). In the absence of retinal pathology, and in advance of disease onset, the relative lack of MP seen in association with increasing age, tobacco use and family history of ARM supports the hypothesis that the enhanced risk that these variables represent for ARM may be attributable, at least in part, to a parallel deficiency of macular carotenoids. 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: age-related macular degeneration; age-related maculopathy; antioxidant; blue light damage; lutein; macular pigment; oxidative stress; zeaxanthi
Context-aware Dynamic Personalised Service Re-Composition in a Pervasive Service Environment
Get PDFA pervasive environment needs to take account of a user’s context and preferences in determining which services to provide to the user. Moreover, one of the important features of a pervasive service environment is its dynamic nature, with the ability to adapt services as the context of a user changes, e.g. as he/she moves around. This paper describes how these requirement changes can be sufficiently accounted for by using a personalisation component to ‘decide’ what a user needs, and a composition component to continuously monitor services and the changes associated with them. The paper presents how services can be recomposed dynamically if the changes in context require it. This approach has been incorporated into a platform to support pervasive services. The service composition process used is described, and the way in which personalisation is incorporated into this process is shown. Finally the paper provides a brief account of two prototypes built as a proof of concept for these ideas
Seasonal influences on fungal community structure in unimproved and improved upland grassland soils
No full textSeasonal and management influences on the fungal community structure of two upland grassland soils were investigated. An upland site containing both unimproved floristically diverse (U4a) and improved mesotrophic (MG7b) grassland types was selected. Samples from both grassland types were taken at five times in one year. Soil fungal community structure was assessed using fungal automated ribosomal intergenic spacer analysis (ARISA), a DNA-profiling approach. A grassland management regime was found to strongly affect fungal community structure, with fungal ARISA profiles from unimproved and improved grassland soils differing significantly. The number of fungal ribotypes found was higher in unimproved than improved grassland soils, providing evidence that improvement may reduce the suitability of upland soil as a habitat for specific groups of fungi. Seasonal influences on fungal community structure were also noted, with samples taken in autumn (October) more correlated with change in ribotype profiles than samples from other seasons. However, seasonal variation did not obscure the measurement of differences in the fungal community structure that were due to agricultural improvement, with canonical correspondence analysis indicating grassland type had a stronger influence on fungal profiles than did season
Principles of secure network configuration: Towards a formal basis for self-configuration
Get PDFThe challenge for autonomic network management is the provision of future network management systems that have the characteristics of self-management, self-configuration, self-protection and self-healing, in accordance with the high level objectives of the enterprise or human end-user. This paper proposes an abstract model for network configuration that is intended to help understand fundamental underlying issues in self-configuration. We describe the cascade problem in self-configuring networks: when individual network components that are securely configured are connected together (in an apparently secure manner), a configuration cascade can occur resulting in a mis-configured network. This has implications for the design of self-configuring systems and we discuss how a soft constraint-based framework can provide a solution
Ontology-based Policy Rule Specification and Integration
Get PDFA formal transformation between knowledge contained in Operations Support Systems (OSS) views is required to automate the deployment of OSS. This paper details progress towards the integration of policy languages at the business view of the TeleManagement Forum (TMF) Next Generation Operations Support System (NGOSS), with the specification of a formal language for the TMF’s Shared Information and Data Policy Aggregated Business Entities
Target Shareholder Returns: their Magnitude and Determinants following Takeover Announcements by Domestic and International Acquirers
Get PDFSynergy is frequently cited as the motive behind much of the global merger and acquisition activity. A large volume of empirical evidence suggests target shareholders gain substantially with acquirers experiencing small losses or at best a break-even position. Most of the studies focus primarily on domestic transactions and on bid characteristics in an attempt to explain potential value changes. Whilst recent research, largely in the US context, has started to take place on the implications of international acquisitions, there is a scarcity of evidence in the UK. The aim of this paper is to address this shortcoming and to examine the magnitude and determinants of value changes to shareholders of target firms. This study uses a specially constructed data set covering 299 takeover announcements for publicly quoted UK target firms by both domestic and international firms over the period 1990 to 1998. The volume of transactions is considerably higher in the 1995-98 period in contrast to 1990–94 era. Average bid value does not differ across country of acquirer. It is found that target firms are characterised by high levels of institutional ownership. The results suggest engagement in the merger process appears to improve the welfare of target shareholders while the determinants of value changes indicate that corporate governance proxies, relative firm performance and bid features do help explain potential returns. It is concluded that mergers and acquisitions continue to play an important role in restructuring the corporate landscape in the UK with total value of bids in our sample amounting to £160 billion
Initial results from an IPv6 Darknet
Get PDFA darknet is an advertised and routed portion of Internet address space that contains no advertised services. Any traffic observed on a darknet is therefore illegitimate and darknets are useful tools for observing the level of background ‘noise’ on a larger network. Darknets have been used in existing IPv4 networks to help to identify malicious traffic, malware trends, or the consequences of misconfiguration. We have created what may be the world’s first IPv6 darknet to help us observe the ‘noise’ present on the IPv6 Internet and to see how this differs from the IPv4 Internet. Initial results suggest that the level of undirected malicious software active on the IPv6 Internet is currently minimal and there is no apparent undirected port-scanning activity. We suspect this is partially a (predicted) consequence of the larger IPv6 address space and also an indication of the immaturity of the IPv6 Internet at the present time