A beginner's guide to belief revision and truth maintenance systems

This brief note is intended to familiarize the non-TMS audience with some of the basic ideas surrounding classic TMS's (truth maintenance systems), namely the justification-based TMS and the assumption-based TMS. Topics of further interest include the relation between non-monotonic logics and TMS's, efficiency and search issues, complexity concerns, as well as the variety of TMS systems that have surfaced in the past decade or so. These include probabilistic-based TMS systems, fuzzy TMS systems, tri-valued belief systems, and so on

Image processing mini manual

The intent is to provide an introduction to the image processing capabilities available at the Langley Research Center (LaRC) Central Scientific Computing Complex (CSCC). Various image processing software components are described. Information is given concerning the use of these components in the Data Visualization and Animation Laboratory at LaRC

POSITION CONTROL OF VTOL SYSTEM USING ANFIS VIA HARDWARE IN THE LOOP

Electric motors have been widely applied in various equipment. One application is found in Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). An electric motor speed control system that can balance the aircraft's position is one of the mandatory features that must be owned by the aircraft. The position balancer control also supports the Vertical Take-Off Landing (VTOL) system. This study's VTOL position control system uses Hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) method with MATLAB Simulink and Arduino. ANFIS (Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inferences System) is used as a position control algorithm. The controller performance is compared with conventional PID and FLC (Fuzzy Logic Controller). The system is tested as an initial position variation and loading test. The experiment shows that HIL can help fast prototyping by faster changes in the controller algorithms and is easy to program. The result is varied in each experiment. In the ISE (Integral Square of Error) point of view, ANFIS is better than PID by 100 % and has a very small difference from FLC in the initial position test. ANFIS is better by 95.44% and 4.56% compared with PID and FLC in the loading test, respectively

ENHANCE CATALOGIZED SYSTEM INFORMATION IN THE LIBRARY, ARCHIVES AND DOCUMENTATION OF DISTRICT SOUTH TAPANULI

Whereas South Tapanuli students used the Willem Iskandar Regional Library as a source of teaching and learning, it was found that not many used the library. Whereas Padangsidimpuan students in visiting or borrowing books to the Willem Iskandar Regional Library, the researchers saw from the list of borrowed books, sometimes only 6 people borrow books a week and sometimes they don't exist at all, sometimes even in doing homework (PR) students are more often choose to use the Internet, because they think it is easier and faster. This shows that the low interest of MAN 1 Padangsidimpuan students in using the library as a source of learning. It should be learned not only in the study room, but it is very important to develop knowledge by reading a lot of books in the library. And the inhibiting factors for student interest are low student interest in reading, the location of the library is too far from the classroom, facilities in the library very limited, library collection that uses a lot of old books.

Understanding Opportunities in Social Entrepreneurship: A Critical Realist Abstraction

The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version. The Publisher's final version can be found by following the DOI link.This paper extends social entrepreneurship (SE) research by drawing upon a critical realist perspective to analyse dynamic structure/agency relations in SE opportunity emergence, illustrated by empirical evidence. Our findings demonstrate an agential aspect (opportunity actualisation following a path-dependent seeding-growing-shaping process) and a structural aspect (institutional, cognitive and embedded structures necessary for SE opportunity emergence) related to SE opportunities. These structures provide three boundary conditions for SE agency: institutional discrimination, an SE belief system and social feasibility. Within this paper, we develop a novel theoretical framework to analyse SE opportunities plus, an applicable tool to advance related empirical research

An examination of Positivist and Critical Realist Philosophical Approaches to Nursing Research

This paper emphasises the importance for researchers to explicitly locate their work within a philosophical framework. It examines the ontological, epistemological and methodological similarities and differences of Positivism and Critical Realism; highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of these philosophical approaches in relation to nursing research. Whilst acknowledging several limitations and risks associated with undertaking research from a critical realist perspective it concludes that this perspective still appears to provide a more appropriate foundation for systematic enquiry within the discipline of nursing than is achieved by adopting a positivist approach to such investigation

CBR-ESiCA (Case-Based Reasoning - Expert System in Complaint Analysis)

Many companies concern most about their level of customer complaints. The numbers of customer complaints are usually used as business performance indicator. A lot of companies handle a survey in order to get response or complaint from their customers and make an analytical study on it. In this research, the author has developed Case-Based Reasoning Expert System in Complaint Analysis (CBR-ESiCA) in order to automate all the processes involved in categorizing the customer complaints into particular complaint category. The scope of the research is customer complaints regarding to home care products. CBR-ESiCA categorizes customer complaints into one of eight key complaint categories. New complaints are solved by adapting previously successful solutions to similar complaints. The main objective of the system is to categorize customer complaints into particular complaint categories and generate report based on analytical study made

Framework for Academic Advice through Mobile Applications

The increasing rate of high (secondary) school leavers choosing academic majors to study at the university without proper guidance has most times left students with unfavorable consequences including low grades, extra year(s), the need to switch programs and ultimately having to withdraw from the university. In a bid to proffer a solution to the issue, this research aims to build an expert system that recommends university or academic majors to high school students in developing countries where there is a dearth of human career counselors. This is to reduce the adverse effects caused as a result of wrong choices made by students. A mobile rule-based expert system supported with ontology was developed for easy accessibility by the students

Fostering criticality in a beginners’ Japanese language course: a case study in a UK higher education modern languages degree programme

This thesis examines the development of criticality based on an empirical study in beginners' Japanese language courses within a UK Modem Languages Degree Programme. A starting point for this study is Barnett's (1997) claim concerning the significance of fostering criticality and setting educational aims against the current trend of mass education at the Higher Education. The empirical base is inspired by the Criticality Project by the University of Southampton which, also based on Barnett's model, investigates a whole Modern Languages course. This thesis, however focuses on the phases of Modern Language Studies which have not been explored: beginners' level language courses with the example being a n on-European language. The examination of the current issues of Modem Languages Degree Programmes illustrates the fact that there is a problem of a lack of coordination of the diversity of various components within programmes. The nature of language modules, especially at beginners' level, inclines to the acquisition of practical language skills focusing on grammar rather than on 'content', and widens the gap from academic content modules. In this thesis, the notion of criticality is highlighted as a single 'linkage' connecting each component to others. This issue needs to be examined from two perspectives: the empirical study of criticality development in beginners' level language courses and the theoretical concept of criticality. Action Research was conducted in beginners' Japanese language courses at a Modern Languages Degree Programme where the researcher was teaching. Lessons with activities which target criticality development in cultural and language dimensions were inserted in the existing grammar based language course framework. The observations of beginners' level language lessons in other institutions ensured the aims and syllabus of the normal lessons of the target courses have the same standard as them. Various types of qualitative data were collected. Among them, particularly the participants' output data; group interviews and post-lesson questionnaires became the main sources of analysis of this study. The analysis of empirical data made two important resources for criticality visible: skills and knowledge. Skills appeared as the students' theory building process comprising three stages: inquiry, analysis and conclusion. The concept of inquiry stage corresponds to inquiry and scepticism which was highlighted by a review of Critical Pedagogy and Critical Thinking. From these examinations of two perspectives, one from empirical and another one from theoretical, the fundamental concept of 'being critical' is defined as inquiry and scepticism. During the theory building process, various kinds of knowledge are employed, and the students' theories were presented according to nine thematic categories comprising culture, language, and learning process. The factors contributing to the development of criticality are found to be cultural and linguistic dimensions and also the learning process itself. The analysis of empirical data also highlights the existence of criticality specifically in the language modules and that criticality could work as a connection among the components of Modern Languages Degree Programme. Barnett's theoretical criticality model of domains and levels is supported by the empirical data, but they also showed that criticality development does not appear in a neat order nor the steady progression from lower to higher levels as in his framework. It is concluded from this study that both instrumental and educational aims can be and need to be compatible in language modules even at the beginners' level and all the components of Modern Languages Degree Programme need to be connected by a single linkage, criticality, which realizes an educational aim of the Modern Languages Degree Programme. However, it also implies that further research is needed to bring the issues to the level of curriculum development