A HOLISTIC APPROACH TO COMPUTER INTEGRATED MANUFACTURING ARCHITECTURE AND SYSTEMS DESIGN

This work addresses the problem of finding an improved solution to Computer Integrated Manufacturing (ClM) Architecture and Systems Design. The current approaches are shown to be difficult to understand and use, over complex. In spite of their complexity of approach they lack comprehensiveness and omit many factors and dimensions considered essential for success in today's competitive and often global market place. A new approach to ClM Architecture and Systems Design is presented which offers a simpler, more flexible and more robust format for defining a particular ClM System within a general architectural framework. At the same time this new approach is designed to offer a comprehensive and holistic solution. The research work involved the investigation of current approaches and research and development initiatives focusing particularly on the CIM-OSA and GRAI Integrated methodologies in the field of ClM Architecture. The strengths and weaknesses of the various approaches are examined. Developments in other related fields including manufacturing systems, manufacturing management, information technology and systems generally have been investigated regarding their relevance and possible contribution to an improved solution. The author has built on his practical experience in creating, designing and managing the implementation of a global CIM system. The authors work on several publicly funded collaborative research and development projects relevant to the problem area is described. These include CIM-OSA, IMOCIM and TIQS projects. In the latter two projects the author was instrumental in developing the methodological approach based on a systems approach to business processes in connection with the design of quality and manufacturing systems. Both of these projects have contributed to this work. The author has also participated in the global IMS programme as a rapporteur for the European Commission and this helped to provide a global perspective on the problems of manufacturing companies as they attempt to compete in a world wide market place. The results of this work provide the basis for a radically improved approach to ClM Architecture and Systems Design based on the holistic view of an enterprise. The approach developed supports the business process view of an enterprise; addresses the people and organisational aspects; leads to ClM solutions focused on meeting enterprise goals; and is able to deal with a significantly increased scope and complexity compared with existing methods yet is easily understood and more simple to simple to apply than current approaches

Forschungs- und Entwicklungsprojekte: Virtuelle Maschinen: zSeries- und S/390-Partitionierung

Der gleichzeitige Betrieb mehrerer Gast-Betriebssysteme auf einem einzigen physischen Rechner unter einem Host-Betriebssystem ist eine leistungsfähige moderne Entwicklung. Bekannte Beispiele sind VMware für die IA32-Architektur sowie das Betriebssystem z/VM und die PR/SM-LPAR Einrichtungen der zSeries-Architektur. Die Nutzung eines Betriebssystems als Gast bedingt einen Leistungsverlust. Die als Partitionierung bezeichnete Zuordnung von Systemressourcen zu den einzelnen Gast-Betriebssysteme ist schwierig, wenn eine dynamische Anpassung an sich ändernde Lastprofile erforderlich ist. Diese Probleme lassen sich mittels Erweiterungen der Hardwarearchitektur adressieren, sowie durch Softwarestrukturen, welche diese Erweiterungen nutzen. Die Erweiterungen der Hardwarearchitektur gehen über das hinaus, was auf heutigen Rechnerarchitekturen wie IA32 oder Mips verfügbar ist. Der vorliegende Beitrag erläutert den optimalen Betrieb von Gast-Betriebssystemen und die begleitenden Partitionierungsmöglichkeiten auf der zSeries-Plattform und beschreibt die zusätzlichen Hardware und Software-Einrichtungen, welche dies ermöglichen.The capability to run multiple guest operating systems simultaneously on a single hardware platform is a powerful feature in a modern computer system.Well-known examples are VMware for the IA32-architecture and the z/VM operating system and the PR/SM-LPAR facilities of the zSeries architecture. Running an operating system as a guest results in a performance degradation. Partitioning of system resources and assigning them to individual guests may be difficult, if a dynamic adaptation to an ever changing load profile is required. Extensions of the hardware architecture and their exploitation by software permit to address these problems. Such extensions have not been available on existing architectures like IA32 or Mips. The following paper discusses the operation of guest operating systems and associated partitioning capabilities available in zSeries systems and describes supporting hardware and software facilities

Lattice gauge theories dynamical fermions and parallel computation

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:D71683/87 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Large Language Models for Intent-Driven Session Recommendations

Intent-aware session recommendation (ISR) is pivotal in discerning user intents within sessions for precise predictions. Traditional approaches, however, face limitations due to their presumption of a uniform number of intents across all sessions. This assumption overlooks the dynamic nature of user sessions, where the number and type of intentions can significantly vary. In addition, these methods typically operate in latent spaces, thus hinder the model's transparency.Addressing these challenges, we introduce a novel ISR approach, utilizing the advanced reasoning capabilities of large language models (LLMs). First, this approach begins by generating an initial prompt that guides LLMs to predict the next item in a session, based on the varied intents manifested in user sessions. Then, to refine this process, we introduce an innovative prompt optimization mechanism that iteratively self-reflects and adjusts prompts. Furthermore, our prompt selection module, built upon the LLMs' broad adaptability, swiftly selects the most optimized prompts across diverse domains. This new paradigm empowers LLMs to discern diverse user intents at a semantic level, leading to more accurate and interpretable session recommendations. Our extensive experiments on three real-world datasets demonstrate the effectiveness of our method, marking a significant advancement in ISR systems

Reason-Resilience and security of geospatial data for critical infrastructures

Peer reviewe

Skilloscopy: Bayesian modeling of decision makers' skill

This paper proposes and demonstrates an approach, Skilloscopy, to the assessment of decision makers. In an increasingly sophisticated, connected and information-rich world, decision making is becoming both more important and more difficult. At the same time, modelling decision-making on computers is becoming more feasible and of interest, partly because the information-input to those decisions is increasingly on record. The aims of Skilloscopy are to rate and rank decision makers in a domain relative to each other: the aims do not include an analysis of why a decision is wrong or suboptimal, nor the modelling of the underlying cognitive process of making the decisions. In the proposed method a decision-maker is characterised by a probability distribution of their competence in choosing among quantifiable alternatives. This probability distribution is derived by classic Bayesian inference from a combination of prior belief and the evidence of the decisions. Thus, decision-makers’ skills may be better compared, rated and ranked. The proposed method is applied and evaluated in the gamedomain of Chess. A large set of games by players across a broad range of the World Chess Federation (FIDE) Elo ratings has been used to infer the distribution of players’ rating directly from the moves they play rather than from game outcomes. Demonstration applications address questions frequently asked by the Chess community regarding the stability of the Elo rating scale, the comparison of players of different eras and/or leagues, and controversial incidents possibly involving fraud. The method of Skilloscopy may be applied in any decision domain where the value of the decision-options can be quantified

The IceCube Neutrino Observatory: Instrumentation and Online Systems

The IceCube Neutrino Observatory is a cubic-kilometer-scale high-energy neutrino detector built into the ice at the South Pole. Construction of IceCube, the largest neutrino detector built to date, was completed in 2011 and enabled the discovery of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos. We describe here the design, production, and calibration of the IceCube digital optical module (DOM), the cable systems, computing hardware, and our methodology for drilling and deployment. We also describe the online triggering and data filtering systems that select candidate neutrino and cosmic ray events for analysis. Due to a rigorous pre-deployment protocol, 98.4% of the DOMs in the deep ice are operating and collecting data. IceCube routinely achieves a detector uptime of 99% by emphasizing software stability and monitoring. Detector operations have been stable since construction was completed, and the detector is expected to operate at least until the end of the next decade.Comment: 83 pages, 50 figures; updated with minor changes from journal review and proofin