CEDAR: tools for event generator tuning

I describe the work of the CEDAR collaboration in developing tools for tuning and validating Monte Carlo event generator programs. The core CEDAR task is to interface the Durham HepData database of experimental measurements to event generator validation tools such as the UCL JetWeb system - this has necessitated the migration of HepData to a new relational database system and a Java-based interaction model. The "number crunching" part of JetWeb is also being upgraded, from the Fortran HZTool library to the new C++ Rivet system and a generator interfacing layer named RivetGun. Finally, I describe how Rivet is already being used as a central part of a new generator tuning system, and summarise two other CEDAR activities, HepML and HepForge.Comment: 13 pages, prepared for XI International Workshop on Advanced Computing and Analysis Techniques in Physics Research, Amsterdam, April 23-27 200

LEVERAGING SOA IN BANKING SYSTEMS INTEGRATION

There is no doubt that the systems integration is one of the most important and complicated tasks in software filed especially for complex applications like banking systems. Complexity in integrating banking systems often comes from continues changes in both technical and business features provided by them to meet customer needs. Banking systems always come from different software vendors which mean using platforms and different design and architecture patterns, and this for sure adds extra complexity for integrating them. Serviceoriented architecture (SOA) is a promising method in software filed that aims to build or restructure software systems in a manner that makes their maintenance and integration easier. Agility is the most important goal that should be achieved when building and integrating banking systems. Simply, agility is needed to meet market needs quickly and efficiently and SOA is the way that could provide itSOA, SOI, P2P Integration, Web Services, and Legacy Code

Restructuring for India’s Disputed Borders: An Appraisal

In the present geopolitical melee, the tools of strategic coercion and conflicts are finding new ways to achieve the desired end. The need today is to restructure and reshape a ‘big war military with smart, lean, agile and combined arms joint warfare smart capabilities’. India’s military strategy must focus on ‘offensive domination with maneuver warfare orientation rather than attritionist ground holding mindsets. The restructuring philosophy will accordingly need to focus on a ‘capability-based approach with deterrence based on denial’. The operational need is to move from large bulky formations to modular technology-enabled networked Brigades and Divisional sized Integrated Battle Groups (IBGs). The challenge is to restructure in an institutionalized time-bound manner that is neither too much too soon nor too little too late

T-infinity: The Dependency Inversion Principle for Rapid and Sustainable Multidisciplinary Software Development

The CFD Vision 2030 Study recommends that, NASA should develop and maintain an integrated simulation and software development infrastructure to enable rapid CFD technology maturation.... [S]oftware standards and interfaces must be emphasized and supported whenever possible, and open source models for noncritical technology components should be adopted. The current paper presents an approach to an open source development architecture, named T-infinity, for accelerated research in CFD leveraging the Dependency Inversion Principle to realize plugins that communicate through collections of functions without exposing internal data structures. Steady state flow visualization, mesh adaptation, fluid-structure interaction, and overset domain capabilities are demonstrated through compositions of plugins via standardized abstract interfaces without the need for source code dependencies between disciplines. Plugins interact through abstract interfaces thereby avoiding N 2 direct code-to-code data structure coupling where N is the number of codes. This plugin architecture enhances sustainable development by controlling the interaction between components to limit software complexity growth. The use of T-infinity abstract interfaces enables multidisciplinary application developers to leverage legacy applications alongside newly-developed capabilities. While rein, a description of interface details is deferred until the are more thoroughly tested and can be closed to modification

Connecting for Impact - Multidisciplinary Approaches to Innovation in Small to Medium Sized enterprises (SMEs)

This paper reveals the methodology developed and adopted by groups of Multidisciplinary Design Innovation Masters students whilst working on projects with regional Small to Medium Sized Enterprises (SME’s). It exposes an eight-stage approach and shows how the creation of a ‘problem-space tapestry’ acts as a mediator between different disciplinary approaches. The authors used a combination of observation, interview, post project-analysis and auto ethnographic reflection in order to uncover this process and to draw conclusions about the conditions that are necessary to support university based multidisciplinary design-led innovation projects of this type

ANTI-FRAGILE INFORMATION SYSTEMS

As complex socio-technical systems composed of many interconnected parts, interacting in non-linear, dynamic, emergent, and unexpected ways, Information Systems are fragile. In this paper we introduce the concept of antifragility as an alternative means of apprehending the fragility of Information Systems and a novel way of dealing with risk, uncertainty, and the unknown. Antifragility is the opposite of fragility. Antifragility allows us to go beyond robustness or resilience by moving away from a predictive mode of thinking and decision making to a mode that embraces the unknown and randomness and focuses on the characteristics that render systems fragile rather than trying to assess and predict the chain of events that may harm them. We propose a set of guidelines for moving from the fragile toward the antifragile and explore, for the processes of the IT function, their applications and the questions they raise for practice and research