IoTranx: Transactions for Safer Smart Spaces

Smart spaces such as smart homes deliver digital services to optimize space use and enhance user experience. They are composed of an Internet of Things (IoT), people, and physical content. They differ from traditional computer systems in that their cyber-physical nature ties intimately with the users and the built environment. The impact of ill-programmed applications in such spaces goes beyond loss of data or a computer crash, risking potentially physical harm to the space and its users. Ensuring smart space safety is therefore critically important to successfully deliver intimate and convenient services surrounding our daily lives. By modeling smart space as a highly dynamic database, we present IoT Transactions, an analogy to database transactions, as an abstraction for programming and executing the services as the handling of the devices in smart space. Unlike traditional database management systems that take a “clear room approach,” smart spaces take a “dirty room approach” where imperfection and unattainability of full control and guarantees are the new normal. We identify Atomicity, Isolation, Integrity and Durability (AI 2 D) as the set of properties necessary to define the safe runtime behavior for IoT transactions for maintaining “permissible device settings” of execution and to avoid or detect and resolve “impermissible settings.” Furthermore, we introduce a lock protocol, utilizing variations of lock concepts, that enforces AI 2 D safety properties during transaction processing. We show a brief proof of the protocol correctness and a detailed analytical model to evaluate its performance.

The bifunctional formalism: an alternative treatment of density functionals

The bifunctional formalism presents an alternative how to obtain the functional value from its functional derivative by exploiting homogeneous density scaling. In the bifunctional formalism the density dependence of the functional derivative is suppressed. Consequently, those derivatives have to be treated as formal functional derivatives. For a pointwise correspondence between the true and the formal functional derivative, the bifunctional expression yields the same value as the density functional. Within the bifunctional formalism the functional value can directly be obtained from its derivative (while the functional itself remains unknown). Since functional derivatives are up to a constant uniquely defined, this approach allows for a pointwise comparison between approximate potentials and reference potentials. This aspect is especially important in the field of orbital-free density functional theory, where the burden is to approximate the kinetic energy. Since in the bifunctional approach the potential is approximated directly, full control is given over the latter, and consequently over the final electron densities obtained from variational procedure. Besides the bifunctional formalism itself another concept is introduced, dividing the total non-interacting kinetic energy into a known functional part and a remainder, called Pauli kinetic energy. Only the remainder requires further approximations. For practical purposes sufficiently accurate Pauli potentials for application on atoms, molecular and solid-state systems are presented.

Arel – Investigating [Eu(H2O)9]3+ photophysics and creating a method to by-pass luminescence quantum yield determinations

Lanthanide luminescence has been treated separate from molecular photophysics, although the underlying phenomena are the same. As the optical transitions observed in the trivalent lanthanide ions are forbidden, they do belong to the group that molecular photophysics have yet to conquer, yet the experimental descriptors remains valid. Determining these have proven challenging as full control/knowledge of sample composition is a prerequisite. This has been achieved, and here the luminescence quantum yields (ϕlum), luminescence lifetimes (τobs), oscillator strengths (f ), and the rates of non-radiative (knr) and radiative (kr ≡ A) deactivation of [Eu(H2O)9]3+ was determined for the trigonal tricapped prismatic (TTP) coordination geometry. Further, it was shown that instead of a full photophysical characterization, it is possible to relate changes in transition probabilities to the relative parameter Arel, which does not require reference data. While Arel does not afford comparisons between experiments, it resolves emission intensity changes due to emitter properties—changes in A—from intensity changes due to environmental effects—changes in knr, and differences in the number of photons absorbed. When working with fluorescence this may seem trivial, when working with lanthanide luminescence it is not.

Szpital psychiatryczny jako przykład instytucji totalnej

The aim of this article is attempting to answer the question whether the psychiatric hospital can still be considered as a total institution. The concept of a psychiatric hospital as a total institution was formulated by Erving Goffman. In this type of facility, the personnel has full control over the patient, their time, private life, and mobility. However, a psychiatric hospital is also a special place. Is this type of hospital still a total institution? Is it not better now to call it a quasi-total institution?

Implicit Sense of Academic Futility: An Unexpected Burden From Lower Secondary Education

Vocational and professional training tracks can be a good option for many adolescents, many of whom enter these programs with a sometimes hidden burden of negative experiences and attitudes to school. This paper explores the sense of academic futility in future VET students at the end of lower secondary education. Drawing on qualitative interviews with 25 Czech students in which they described their experiences from lower secondary school, we found that despite the students’ beliefs that their achievement is the product of their own effort, they describe situations from which it is evident that they noticed (i.e., perceived) that they actually did lose control over their results. At the same time, they explicitly claim that they have full control over their own achievement. This implicit sense of academic futility is created by several mechanisms at the school level: the curriculum, ineffective teaching, grading leniency, and teachers’ distrust of students’ capabilities.

The Revolution is Over, Forget It: To the 30th Anniversary of the Russian Federation

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the power in post-Soviet Russia was seized by the leaders of the democratic movement - first wave democrats, and the more progressive Soviet nomenclature. As a result of the miscalculations made by the leaders of the democratic movement, the representatives of the Soviet nomenclature soon started displacing the first wave democrats and the reformers of the Gaidar call from the Russian governmental bodies in order to gain full control over the governance in the country. This appeared to be a manifestation of the more general and fundamental process, where the Russian nomenclature separated from the democratic movement, emerging as a new ruling stratum - the immediate heir to the Soviet nomenclature. The turning point, which accelerated the separation and the retreat of the Russian nomenclature from liberal and democratic principles of the countrys modernization, was the beginning of the Chechen tragedy in 1994. Not only did the Chechen events separate the Russian nomenclature and the democratic movement but also split the democratic movement itself. The goal of the article is to examine the transformation of the relationship between the democratic movement and the soviet and, later on, Russian nomenclature during the revolutionary changes of the early 1990s.

Ethiopia's conflict faces a critical juncture

Significance The claims were made during a 30-minute televised broadcast apparently from the frontlines of the war; Abiy on November 22 promised to lead the fighting in person. Authorities say they have since recaptured multiple towns. Tigrayan officials have dismissed this as propaganda, saying that their forces have made “adjustments” but remain in full control of the wider situation. Impacts Abiy’s absence may create a political vacuum in Addis Ababa, potentially blocking further peace efforts for now. Disruptions to provision of public services will likely worsen, particularly in Addis Ababa and across Amhara. Hard-nosed Tigrayan preconditions for talks could win Abiy some sympathy from Western countries. Eritrea will be watching developments closely and may intensify its involvement again, especially if it fears a Tigrayan victory.

AN AUTOMATED ENERGY BILL METERING SYSTEM BASED ON GSM TECHNOLOGY

The measurement of the energy consumed by residential and commercial buildings by utility provider is important in billing, control, and monitoring of the usage of energy. Traditional metering techniques used for the measurement of energy are not convenient and is prone to different forms of irregularities. These irregularities include meter failure, meter tampering, inaccuracies in billing due to human error, energy theft, and loss of revenue due to corruption, etc. This research study proposed the design and construction of a microcontroller-based electric energy metering system using the Global System for Mobile communication (GSM) network. This system provides a solution to the irregularities posed by the traditional metering technique by allowing the utility provider have access to remote monitoring capabilities, full control over consumer load, and remote power disconnection in the case of energy theft. Proteus simulation software was used to model the system hardware and the software was obtained by using embedded C programming and visual basic. It was observed that the system could remotely take accurate energy readings, provided full control over consumer loads and execute remote disconnection in case of energy theft. The system provides high performance and high accuracy in power monitoring and power management.

Understanding the psycho-social context for a new early intervention for resistance to change that aims to strike a beneficial balance between structure and flexibility

Background Emotional and behavioural problems linked to changes to expectations – resistance to change – are linked to disability in neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism spectrum disorder (ASD), Prader-Willi (PWS) and fragile X syndromes (FXS). Structuring routines is best practice for minimising current resistance to change. But complete structure is impractical and flexibility in early life may actually reduce later resistance by supporting cognitive development. We aimed to examine the psycho-social context of families with children at risk of developing resistance to change so as to identify design requirements for an intervention that strikes a beneficial balance between structure and flexibility. Methods Thirty-six caregivers of children aged 4–12 years (17 ASD, 15 PWS, and 4 FXS) took part in an interview designed collaboratively with 12 professional stakeholders. Results Children need to feel like they are in control of flexibility but they also need support in choice making, understanding plans (using individually tailored visuals) and anxiety reduction. Caregivers need an accessible approach that they have full control over, and which they can tailor for their child. Caregivers also need clear guidance, education and support around structure and flexibility. Conclusions We propose a digital approach which addresses the needs identified. It tackles the most perplexing challenge by presenting flexibility to children in the context of a game that children can feel they have full control over, whilst caregivers can maintain control in reality. Furthermore, individualised support for children and caregivers would be enabled.

NRC Designs—New Tools for Successful Agricultural Experiments

In a nested row–column design (NRC), the experimental units in each of n blocks are grouped into n1 rows and n2 columns. Due to its structure, this experimental design allows full control of the experimental material and a relatively simple feedback loop within the “statistical triangle”. By applying such designs in agricultural experiments, we provide an insurance policy against future unexpected problems. Until now, the cost of this policy has been a complex statistical analysis of experimental data. This paper proposes a new “direct” approach to ANOVA based on the latest literature on the subject. The paper provides the theoretical foundations of this approach, indicates the possibility of applying it to factorial and near-factorial experiments, and supplements the theory with a familiar letter-based representation of all-pairwise comparisons, which has so far been lacking in the literature. The methodology is illustrated by the analysis of a field experiment carried out to improve the use of fungicides against late blight in tomato processing. The presented analytical tools are supplemented with code in R.