The Evolution of Complexity in Apple Darwin: A Common Coupling Point of View

Common coupling increases the interdependencies between software modules. It should be avoided if possible. In previous work, we presented two types of categorization of common coupling, one is for single-kernel-based software, one is for multi-kernel-based-software. In this paper, we analyze the relationships between these two types of categorization and apply them to study the evolution of the complexity of Apple Darwin. The same conclusion about Darwin’s evolution is drawn based on the two types of categorization of common coupling: From version XNU-517 to version XNU-792, Darwin has restructured to reduce the number of difficulty-inducing high category (level) global variables in order to reduce the system complexity. However, due to the definition-use dependencies, the complexity of Darwin induced by global variables has increased from version XNU-517 to version XNU-792. 1

Sony Pictures and the U.S. Federal Government: A Case Study Analysis of the Sony Pictures Entertainment Hack Crisis Using Normal Accidents Theory

In this case study, I analyze the 2014 North Korean computer database hack of Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE), a serious national security crisis of cyberterrorism. I utilize Normal Accidents theory as a lens, to help explain how the accident within one system (SPE) and later crisis lead to the interaction with a second system (U.S. Federal Government), the development of a new crisis, and the need for a crisis response from system two. The evolution of a single organization’s accident into a national security crisis does not occur without specific complex interactions that take place to connect the two systems together. To explain this interconnectedness between systems, I introduce two new constructs: 1) common denominator and 2) common goal, which expand Normal Accidents theory allowing it to account for the coupling between the two independent systems (SPE & United States Government) through non-linear interactions. Overall, this case study provides important insight for future crisis communication planning, response, and development regarding between-organization interaction during a crisis

The Pervasiveness of Global Data in Evolving Software Systems

Abstract. In this research, we investigate the role of common coupling in evolving software systems. It can be argued that most software de-velopers understand that the use of global data has many harmful side-effects, and thus should be avoided. We are therefore interested in the answer to the following question: if global data does exist within a soft-ware project, how does global data usage evolve over a software project’s lifetime? Perhaps the constant refactoring and perfective maintenance eliminates global data usage, or conversely, perhaps the constant addi-tion of features and rapid development introduce an increasing reliance on global data? We are also interested in identifying if global data usage patterns are useful as a software metric that is indicative of an interesting or significant event in the software’s lifetime. The focus of this research is twofold: first to develop an effective and automatic technique for studying global data usage over the lifetime of large software systems and secondly, to leverage this technique in a case-study of global data usage for several large and evolving software systems in an effort to reach answers to these questions.

Mapping Diversity in Milan. Historical Approaches to Urban Immigration

An historical and spatial approach is crucial to the understanding of any city. Waves of immigration and population movements from different sources have constructed the cultural mix of this financial, industrial and market city over time. To focus just on the new foreign immigration into Milan over the last 25 years or so risks omitting the deep historical fissures created by previous (and bigger) waves of population movements – the traces left by these populations in the urban fabric and their role in subjective experience. Moreover, the historical and spatial comparison of various types and moments of population movement can help us to understand the changes to this city at macro and micro-levels. This paper uses a mixture of approaches in order to understand and map diversity in Milan, its province and its region. It is intended as a discussion paper to be looked at in conjunction with the work and arguments laid out in other research projects and published work. Methodologies used in this paper range from straightforward historical research (using documents and archives) to photography, micro-history (the examination of one small area – in this case one housing block) and oral historical interviews.Immigration, Urban Space, Periphery (Periferia), Memory, Housing

Conception and development of a system used to organize and facilitate access to environmental information

In São Paulo State's ) coastal area, Brazil, for several years, a chemical company discharged, without any sort of environmental control, a blend of industrial waste composed of Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs). Lawsuits forced the company to identify and limit such deposits in order to perform the environmental recovery. A recovery project was developed demanding preparation and handling of a large amount of documents, satellite images, aerial photographs, maps and videos with the increase of the information and knowledge management issues. This condition became even more critical as the projects started to become cross-disciplinary, involving a growing number of experts, many of them established in different cities. These circumstances led to develop an Environmental Information System (BASGEO) enabling the organization and facilitation of access to such documents while increasing information safety. This work shows the development of this system and the difficulties related to the management and handling of environmental documents. The research method used was the direct observation of the system development and the semi-structured interview conducted with executives and administrative employees of the company. The results show several gains provided by the BASGEO, improving and accelerating access to information, significantly reducing the need for displacements to transport documents, thus reflecting increased safety

Investigation and development of analytical techniques for trace level detection of drugs, explosives and their precursors

The present dissertation investigates drugs, explosives and their precursors with different analytical techniques and performs improvements, extensions and evaluations for these techniques. This is done for laboratory as well as on-site analytical techniques.Die vorliegende Dissertation beschäftigt sich mit der Untersuchung von Drogen, Sprengstoffen und deren Vorstufen mittels verschiedener analytischer Techniken. Dabei werden die verwendeten Techniken evaluiert, verbessert und erweitert. Die Untersuchungen erfolgen sowohl für Labor- als auch für Vorort-Techniken

Paper Spray Ionization: Applications and Perspectives

Paper spray ionization has grown to become one of the most successful ambient ionization methods within the past decade. Requiring little to no sample preparation and being remarkably simple to construct, this technique has seen application in a wide number of fields. This review approaches the mechanism of how paper spray works, and seeks to better classify what it is and is not in a rapidly expanding field of ambient techniques. Additionally, many applications of the technique in clinical, forensic, environmental, and reaction monitoring regimes are explored. Finally, perspectives towards the future of how paper spray could be utilized will be expanded upon, including unexplored substrates and possibilities for the 'omics space

Integrating Citizen Deliberation into Climate Governance: Lessons on Robust Design from Six Climate Assemblies

Recent years have seen a ‘wave’ of national climate assemblies, which bring together randomly-selected citizens to deliberate and make recommendations on aspects of the climate crisis. Assessments of the legitimacy of these interventions and their capacity to improve climate governance have focused on their internal design characteristics, but the fundamental question of how they are integrated into complex constellations of political and policy institutions is underexplored. This article constructs a framework for understanding their integrative design characteristics, drawing on recent work on ‘robust governance’. The framework is used to explore the connection of six national-level climate assemblies with political institutions, public debate and civil society. Our findings highlight immense variety in the integrative design of these climate assemblies. This variety challenges the view of assemblies as a standardised object with predictable effects on legitimacy and governance capacity, whilst also refining deliberative systems theory’s highly abstracted conceptions of integration and impact

Commoning the food system: Barriers, opportunities and resilience strategies on the case of CampiAperti, Bologna, Italy

The concept of ‘Food sovereignty’ was articulated by the global peasant movement La Via Campesina in 1994, in response to the neo-liberalisation of agriculture. Most academic research on food sovereignty focusses on the global South, and only little attention has been paid to the European peasant movement and their strategies to build food sovereignty in a context in which, according to European La Via Campesina, the EU Common Agricultural Policy is putting a small farm out of business every three minutes, and agro-industry emits one fourth of all carbon emissions in the continent. This thesis discusses the transformative potential of food production and the decommodification of foodstuff from a commons and commoning perspective. Analysing the case of CampiAperti, a producer Association in Bologna, Italy, I demonstrate multiple production systems in use-value through the lens of the peasant condition where farmers have taken ownership over the production stages of their selected craft, and through commoning have put in place an agroecological value system based on animal and labour rights. In exerting their value system, two autopoietic mechanisms were developed to assert their ecological and social boundaries from the state, capitalist system and free-riders. The first one is the participatoryguarantee-system (PGS), and the second is the collaborative price-mechanism (CPM). The PGS is instrumental to self-certifying their foodstuff, which raises the critical question of boundaries and enclosures from a commons perspective. While the CPM is used to eliminate competitive behaviour amongst producers by setting their own ‘just prices’. This mechanism is scrutinised on competition, and on the tension between guaranteeing a livelihood for farmer and the affordability of their foodstuff for consumers. Both PGS and CPM mechanism defy the capitalist logic of neo-liberalisation of the food system as well as the logics of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), and thus these mechanisms are strategic political tools to emancipate from the capitalist food market and are employed to self-govern their own markets. Foodstuff is evaluated as a common good, arguing that the created food system is a closed commons circuit.  Conducting fieldwork on farms, markets, and assemblies, the study addresses the possibility of materialising food sovereignty by examining production and distribution of foodstuff in usevalue. It utilises a practice-centred approach and draws on a mixed-method, multi-sited ethnographic strategy to explore how individuals take responsibility of their re/production and examines the producer’s commitment to participate in self-governing the food system through commoning. The ethnographic study is supplemented with a discourse and conversational analysis to get a deeper understanding of CampiAperti’s organisation and of their complex horizontal governance structure