Use of questionnaire-based data to assess dog personality

AbstractThe study of dog personality is of general academic interest and also has applications for the management of both working dogs and pets. However, acquiring direct behavioral assessments of large numbers of animals is both time consuming and logistically difficult. An alternative approach that is becoming increasingly common is the collection of questionnaire-based information directly from dog owners. In this review, we discuss some commonly used questionnaires for dog personality traits and findings that have been published using these tools. We suggest that the use of such questionnaires may contribute to research that is based on estimation of effects from large sample sizes, for example, genomic analyses of dog personality traits

Stevenson’s Careful Observances

In his own time, Robert Louis Stevenson was admired as a careful technician of language, a stylist to be put in the company of de Quincey or Pater. In our time, he is known primarily as the author of potboiling plot-driven Gothic tales and adventure yarns. Stevenson himself saw no contradiction in pursuing what Lionel Johnson called his “stylistic nicety and exactitude” in fiction aimed at the mass market, but critics both then and now have largely sidestepped the question of how to reconcile these twin allegiances. In this essay I read The Wrecker (1892), arguably the most densely plotted of Stevenson’s novels, as an extended meditation on the historicity of words. The novel continually calls attention to the “refractive” quality of certain keywords around which the story is structured. At the same time, The Wrecker is concerned with the dynamics of narrativity. It is concerned not just with the procedures by which fictional events are translated into intelligible story, but also with the many ways in which narratives are generated through collaboration: between writers and the literary traditions they work in, between writers and words in their historicity, between writers and their readers—real, imagined, and unforeseen

Aerial Ice Dam Control & Removal

A multirotor mounted solution was sought to drop salt on winter rooftop ice dams, allowing backed-up meltwater to flow through and prevent water damage. Two mechanisms were developed and prototyped. The prototypes had rapid interchangeability and a unified static multirotor mount. One mechanism deploys seven standard throw-able ice pucks, while the other deploys 48 oz of granular ice melt. They are controlled manually by one transmitter/receiver system. Both mechanisms function as intended

An Evaluation of Nantucket's Town Facilities

The Town of Nantucket is confronted with the issue of maintaining and improving its municipal facilities in the face of growing demands, limited budgets, and a lack of centralized information. Per request of the Assistant Town Manager and Town Facilities Manager, we completed a baseline facilities assessment and compiled the information into a database. This entailed conducting site visits, stakeholder interviews, and community-wide surveys. We discovered that many facilities were not efficiently fulfilling their intended purposes, and thus we recommended structural repairs, the consolidation and relocation of several departments, and the continued use and development of the database to improve facility maintenance and management