A Multilevel Evolutionary Algorithm Applied to the Maximum Satisfiability Problems

The maximum satisfiability problem that is known to be nondeterministic polynomial (NP) complete plays a central role problem in many applications in the fields of very large-scale integration (VLSI) computer-aided design, computing theory, artificial intelligence, and defense. Given a set of m clauses and n Boolean variables, the maximum satisfiability problem refers to the task of finding an assignment of values to the variables that maximizes the number of satisfied clauses (or minimizes the number of unsatisfied clauses) In this chapter, a multilevel evolutionary algorithm is proposed for the maximum satisfiability problem. The multilevel process works by grouping the variables defining the problem to form clusters, uses the clusters to define a new problem, and is repeated until the problem size falls below some threshold. The coarsest problem is then given an initial assignment of values to variables and the assignment is successively refined on all the problems starting with the coarsest and ending with the original

Taushetens pris. Informasjonsstrategi og beslutninger

Mangel på informasjon kan være fatalt for en organisasjon. Man kan ende opp med å lede nærmest i blinde. Avhandlingen viser at dette sannsynligvis var medvirkende til at noen organisasjoner har måttet avvikles, noe som henvises til avhandlingens tittel, for hva er taushetens pris? Det korte svaret er gjerne utrygghet, og at det å lede uten trygghet er problematisk. I avhandlingen møter vi tre typer aktører. Nok. Sentrene som er privat ideelle organisasjoner og som jobber med seksualiserte traumer. Nok. Norge som er Nok. Sentrenes paraplyorganisasjon og som jobber politisk. Og Bufdir (Barne-, ungdoms- og familiedirektoratet), som både er sentrenes tilskuddsforvalter og fagdirektorat. Aktørene forskes på gjennom semistrukturerte intervjuer med representanter fra hver type aktør. Det er også valgt å benytte seg av identifiserte informanter i avhandlingen, noe som begrunnes nøye. Ved siden av intervjuene, er det innhentet data fra tilgjengelige årsrapporter til alle aktørene. Det trekkes også inn eksterne rapporter om tematikken, som er avhandlingens kontekst. Avhandlingen søker å gå utover valgt kontekst i sine funn og avklaringer. Det benyttes stor bredde i teori, fra flere teoretiske perspektiver, men med vektlegging av ledelsesteori og psykologi. Avhandlingen baserer seg dermed på tre innfallsvinkler; Ledelsesteori, psykologi og empiri, som sammen jobber for å skape et teoretisk bidrag til et felt som det er lite forskning på. Avhandlingen ser på effekter av manglende informasjonsflyt mellom aktørene når det kommer til finansieringsordningen til sentrene, en ordning som over flere år er blitt kritisert. Avhandlingen viser videre at god informasjonsflyt ville vært dempende på de negative effektene, av usikkerheten, finansieringsordningen påfører sentrene. Er det så mulig å finne fellesnevnere for hva som er god informasjonsflyt? Først må man gi verdi til begrepet. Denne avhandlingen definerer god informasjonsflyt som noe som tar hensyn til både sender og mottakers behov, uten at det kommer i konflikt med organisatoriske begrensninger som taushetsplikt. Avhandlingen legger opp til at dette er mulig, men at det finnes fremmere og hemmere, og at svaret finnes på samme sted som det gjerne gjør innen all interaksjon mellom mennesker; det mellommenneskelige. Løsningen ligger akkurat her, i relasjonen, mellom sender og mottaker. Avhandlingen benytter seg av en rekke modeller fra ulike fagdisipliner hvor oversikten med sidetall er bak innholdsfortegnelsen. I tillegg har kandidaten utviklet en egen modell, «Soft skills i informasjonsflyt» som en finner på side 11, basert på funn i avhandlingen.Lack of information can be fatal for an organization. You can end up leading almost blindly. The thesis shows that this probably contributed to the fact that some organizations have had to liquidate, which is referred to in the thesis's title, for what is the price of silence? The short answer is often insecurity, and that leading without security is problematic. In the thesis we meet three types of actors. Nok. centers which are private non-profit organizations, that work with sexualized trauma. Nok. Norge which is the Nok. center’s umbrella organization, who works politically. And Bufdir (the Directorate for Children, Youth and Family Affairs), which is both the center’s grant manager and profession directorate. The actors are researched through semi-structured interviews with representatives from each type of actor. It has also been chosen to use identified informants in the thesis, which is carefully justified. Aside from the interviews, data has been obtained from available annual reports for all the actors. External reports on the topic, which is the context of the thesis, have been drawn in. But the thesis seeks to go beyond the chosen context in its findings and clarifications. A great breadth of theory is used, from several theoretical perspectives, but with an emphasis on management theory and psychology. The thesis is thus based on three approaches: Management theory, psychology, and empiricism, which together work to create a theoretical contribution to a field in which there is little research. The thesis looks at the effects of a lack of information flow between the actors when it comes to the financing arrangement for the centers. An arrangement that has been criticized over several years. The thesis further shows that a good flow of information would have mitigated the negative effects of the uncertainty the funding arrangement imposes on the centers. Is it then possible to find common denominators for what constitutes good information flow? First, one must give value to the term. This thesis defines good information flow as something that takes into account the needs of both sender and receiver, without it coming into conflict with organizational restrictions such as confidentiality. The thesis proposes that this is possible, but that there are promoters and inhibitors. And that the answer is found in the same place as it often does within all interaction between people; the interpersonal. The solution lies right here, in the relationship between sender and receiver. The thesis makes use of several models from various disciplines where the overview, with page numbers, is behind the table of contents. In addition, the candidate has developed a separate model, "Soft skills in information flow" which can be found on page 11, based on findings in the thesis

Measuring Container Port Complementarity and Substitutability with Automatic Identification System (AIS) Data – Studying the Inter-port Relationships in the Oslo Fjord Multi-port Gateway Region

This paper considers the degree of competition among small and medium-sized container ports located in a multi-port gateway region. The level of port competition is evaluated by means of an analysis of the revealed preferences in the port-calling pattern of container feeder vessels deployed on their various links and routes. Unit of analysis is feeder vessel sailing legs and ports stays at/between adjacent container ports. At these ports’ terminals, ships are moored and loading and unloading of containers are performed. The vessel movement data is provided by the Automatic Identification System (AIS). A study of the principal container ports in the Oslo Fjord area is performed, measuring the actual container feeder traffic during the year of 2015. It is demonstrated to which extent ports in the Oslo Fjord region are acting as substitutes, and to which extent they are functioning more as a complement to each other

Samhandling og måloppnåelse i FLO

Denne studien ser på samhandling, ledelse, beslutninger, ansvar, roller og myndighet og deres betydning for måloppnåelse i Forsvarets logistikkorganisasjon (FLO). En kvalitativt studie er valgt og oppgaven tar for seg to vinklinger. Den første delen ser på intraorganisatoriske faktorer både fra et ledelsesperspektiv og ansattperspektiv i FLO og i relasjon mot blant annet Forsvarsmateriell (FMA). Bakteppet er opprettelsen av FLO strategiske anskaffelser (FLO SA) etter anbefaling fra K10+ programmet. Den andre vinklingen ser på konsekvenser av faktorene relatert mot Personlig bekledning og utrustning (PBU) kategorien i FLO SA. Samlet ser problemstillingen på hvilke intraorganisatoriske faktorer som påvirker FLO SA PBU sin evne til å nå de mål Forsvaret setter for anskaffelser av PBU opp mot de mål som er satt for 2021-2022. Sentral organisasjonsteori innen det instrumentelle og kulturelle perspektivet er brukt for å forklare og forstå hvordan FLO kan fremstå. De ulike organisasjonene i forsvarssektoren synes omforent om målet som er å fremskaffe riktig materiell, til riktig tid, i riktig mengde og til riktig pris. Det er også gode erfaringer med opprettelsen av kategoriteam i FLO. Studiet peker derimot på at forståelsen for, og bruken av direktiver, bestemmelser og instrukser er ulik alt etter hvem som leser eller operasjonaliserer dem. Dette synet forsterkes av respondentenes meninger. Den ulike forståelsen, eller uenigheten om ansvar, roller og myndighet fremstår tidvis som en hemmende faktor internt i FLO. Det påvises delvis overlappende roller og ansvarsbeskrivelser i direktiver og bestemmelser, og styringslinjene kan oppleves som uklare. Videre peker studiet på at tiden antatt er moden for å tenke nytt sett i lys av at PBU kategorien ikke leverer i henhold til det som forventes. Det fremlegges en hypotese om at sammenslåing av av fagmiljøer innen PBU området, sammen med bruk av lengre strategiske avtaler med aktører det sivile markedet er en farbar vei.This study looks at interaction, leadership, decisions, responsibilities, roles and authority and their significance for goal achievement in the Norwegian Defense Logistics Organization (NDLO). A qualitative study has been selected and the thesis deals with two angles. The first part looks at intra-organizational factors from both a management and employee perspective in NDLO and in relation to, among other things, Norwegian Defense Material Agency (NDMA). The backdrop is the creation of NDLO Strategic Acquisitions (NDLO SA) on the recommendation of the K10 + program. The second approach looks at the consequences of the factors related to the Personal Apparel and Equipment (PAE) category in NDLO SA. Overall, the issue looks at what intra-organizational factors affect NDLO SA PAE's ability to achieve the goals the Defense sets for procurement of PAEs against the goals set for 2021-2022. Central organizational theory within the instrumental and cultural perspective is used to explain and understand how NDLO can appear. The various organizations in the defense sector seem to agree on the goal of providing the right material, at the right time, in the right amount and at the right price. There is also good experience with the establishment of category teams in NDLO. The study, on the other hand, points out that the understanding and use of directives, regulations and instructions differ according to who reads or operationalizes them. This view is reinforced by the respondents' opinions. The different understanding, or disagreement about responsibility, roles and authority, sometimes appears as an inhibiting factor internally in the NDLO. Partially overlapping roles and descriptions of responsibilities are identified in directives and regulations, and the management lines may be perceived as unclear. Furthermore, the study points out that the time is expected to be ripe for new thinking in light of the PAE category not delivering according to what is expected. A hypothesis is presented. The merging of professional environments within the PAE area, together with the use of longer strategic agreements with actors in the civilian market is introduced as a liable pathway

Heterogeneous Computing with Focus on Mechanical Engineering

During the past few years there has been a revolution in the design of desktop computers. Most processors today include more than one processor core, allowing parallel execution of programs. Furthermore, most commodity computers include a graphical processor that outperforms the central processor by at least one order of magnitude. Tapping into this vast resource is commonly referred to as heterogeneous computing. The change in hardware invalidates old software-design truths. There is therefore need for new algorithms, and research into adapting existing algorithms to these architectures. Our main focus has been to accelerate algorithms relevant for mechanical engineering. In this dissertation we present four algorithms devoted to take advantage of the computational strengths of heterogeneous architectures. Each work is based on state-of-the-art hardware available at the time the research was performed. First we describe an algorithm for high-quality visualization of parametric surfaces. This is useful in a CAD setting, were an accurate rendering is important for visual validation of model quality. We further describe simulation of shallow-water waves using a state-of-the-art numerical scheme. Our accelerated implementation gave a speedup of up to 40 times compared to an optimized reference implementation. Our implementation features real time simulation and visualization of semi-realistic nonlinear wave effects. Finally we present two algorithms for shape simplification of 3D-models. The algorithms aim at reducing time spent on preparing models for finite element analysis. Finite element analysis is important to determine mechanical properties of objects prior to manufacture. Such analysis can be used to investigate thermal behavior and determine the strengths and weaknesses of physical components. Before the analysis can take place the models must undergo a preparation phase where shape simplification plays an important role. The first work we describe for shape simplification is a hybrid algorithm, using graphics hardware for the computationally demanding operations, and the main processor for maintaining the data structure. Our second work describes a shape simplification algorithm highly suitable for heterogeneous architectures and a reference implementation on the Cell BE

Deep learning based decomposition for visual navigation in industrial platforms

In the heavy asset industry, such as oil & gas, offshore personnel need to locate various equipment on the installation on a daily basis for inspection and maintenance purposes. However, locating equipment in such GPS denied environments is very time consuming due to the complexity of the environment and the large amount of equipment. To address this challenge we investigate an alternative approach to study the navigation problem based on visual imagery data instead of current ad-hoc methods where engineering drawings or large CAD models are used to find equipment. In particular, this paper investigates the combination of deep learning and decomposition for the image retrieval problem which is central for visual navigation. A convolutional neural network is first used to extract relevant features from the image database. The database is then decomposed into clusters of visually similar images, where several algorithms have been explored in order to make the clusters as independent as possible. The Bag-of-Words (BoW) approach is then applied on each cluster to build a vocabulary forest. During the searching process the vocabulary forest is exploited to find the most relevant images to the query image. To validate the usefulness of the proposed framework, intensive experiments have been carried out using both standard datasets and images from industrial environments. We show that the suggested approach outperforms the BoW-based image retrieval solutions, both in terms of computing time and accuracy. We also show the applicability of this approach on real industrial scenarios by applying the model on imagery data from offshore oil platforms.publishedVersio