7,032 research outputs found
Ontology (Science)
Increasingly, in data-intensive areas of the life sciences, experimental results are being described in algorithmically useful ways with the help of ontologies. Such ontologies are authored and maintained by scientists to support the retrieval, integration and analysis of their data. The proposition to be defended here is that ontologies of this type – the Gene Ontology (GO) being the most conspicuous example – are a _part of science_. Initial evidence for the truth of this proposition (which some will find self-evident) is the increasing recognition of the importance of empirically-based methods of evaluation to the ontology develop¬ment work being undertaken in support of scientific research. Ontologies created by scientists must, of course, be associated with implementations satisfying the requirements of software engineering. But the ontologies are not themselves engineering artifacts, and to conceive them as such brings grievous consequences. Rather, ontologies such as the GO are in different respects comparable to scientific theories, to scientific databases, and to scientific journal publications. Such a view implies a new conception of what is involved in the author¬ing, maintenance and application of ontologies in scientific contexts, and therewith also a new approach to the evaluation of ontologies and to the training of ontologists
Addressing performance requirements in the FDT-based design of distributed systems
The development of distributed systems is generally regarded as a complex and costly task, and for this reason formal description techniques such as LOTOS and ESTELLE (both standardized by the ISO) are increasingly used in this process. Our experience is that LOTOS can be exploited at many stages on the design trajectory, from requirements specification to implementation, but that the language elements do not allow direct formalization of performance requirements. To avoid duplication of effort by using two formalisms with distinct approaches, we propose a design method that incorporates performance constraints in an heuristic but effective manner
Improved Accuracy and Parallelism for MRRR-based Eigensolvers -- A Mixed Precision Approach
The real symmetric tridiagonal eigenproblem is of outstanding importance in
numerical computations; it arises frequently as part of eigensolvers for
standard and generalized dense Hermitian eigenproblems that are based on a
reduction to tridiagonal form. For its solution, the algorithm of Multiple
Relatively Robust Representations (MRRR) is among the fastest methods. Although
fast, the solvers based on MRRR do not deliver the same accuracy as competing
methods like Divide & Conquer or the QR algorithm. In this paper, we
demonstrate that the use of mixed precisions leads to improved accuracy of
MRRR-based eigensolvers with limited or no performance penalty. As a result, we
obtain eigensolvers that are not only equally or more accurate than the best
available methods, but also -in most circumstances- faster and more scalable
than the competition
Semi-Supervised Single- and Multi-Domain Regression with Multi-Domain Training
We address the problems of multi-domain and single-domain regression based on
distinct and unpaired labeled training sets for each of the domains and a large
unlabeled training set from all domains. We formulate these problems as a
Bayesian estimation with partial knowledge of statistical relations. We propose
a worst-case design strategy and study the resulting estimators. Our analysis
explicitly accounts for the cardinality of the labeled sets and includes the
special cases in which one of the labeled sets is very large or, in the other
extreme, completely missing. We demonstrate our estimators in the context of
removing expressions from facial images and in the context of audio-visual word
recognition, and provide comparisons to several recently proposed multi-modal
learning algorithms.Comment: 24 pages, 6 figures, 2 table
The Development of Citizen Oriented Informatics
We define the concept of citizen-oriented computer application. Quality characteristics are set for computer applications developed in the conditions of citizen-oriented computing and outline the development cycle for these applications. It defines the conditions of existence for citizen-oriented applications. Average and long-term strategies are elaborated.Distributed Applications, Metrics, Citizen-Orientation, Strategies
Language design for a personal learning environment design language
Approaching technology-enhanced learning from the perspective of a learner, we foster the idea of learning environment design, learner interactions, and tool interoperability. In this paper, we shortly summarize the motivation for our personal learning environment approach and describe the development of a domain-specific language for this purpose as well as its realization in practice. Consequently, we examine our learning environment design language according to its lexis and syntax, the semantics behind it, and pragmatical aspects within a first prototypic implementation. Finally, we discuss strengths, problematic aspects, and open issues of our approach
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