Optimization of Discrete-parameter Multiprocessor Systems using a Novel Ergodic Interpolation Technique

Modern multi-core systems have a large number of design parameters, most of which are discrete-valued, and this number is likely to keep increasing as chip complexity rises. Further, the accurate evaluation of a potential design choice is computationally expensive because it requires detailed cycle-accurate system simulation. If the discrete parameter space can be embedded into a larger continuous parameter space, then continuous space techniques can, in principle, be applied to the system optimization problem. Such continuous space techniques often scale well with the number of parameters. We propose a novel technique for embedding the discrete parameter space into an extended continuous space so that continuous space techniques can be applied to the embedded problem using cycle accurate simulation for evaluating the objective function. This embedding is implemented using simulation-based ergodic interpolation, which, unlike spatial interpolation, produces the interpolated value within a single simulation run irrespective of the number of parameters. We have implemented this interpolation scheme in a cycle-based system simulator. In a characterization study, we observe that the interpolated performance curves are continuous, piece-wise smooth, and have low statistical error. We use the ergodic interpolation-based approach to solve a large multi-core design optimization problem with 31 design parameters. Our results indicate that continuous space optimization using ergodic interpolation-based embedding can be a viable approach for large multi-core design optimization problems.Comment: A short version of this paper will be published in the proceedings of IEEE MASCOTS 2015 conferenc

Fatigue behavior of flexhoses and bellows due to flow-induced vibrations

The analysis and results developed in a fresh approach to calculate flow induced vibration response of a flexible flow passage are summarized. The vibration results are further examined in the frequency domain to obtain dominant frequency information. A cumulative damage analysis due to cyclic strains is performed to obtain the number of cycles to failure for a metallic bellows of particular specifications under a variety of operational conditions. Sample plots of time and frequency domain responses are included. The complex listing of a computer program is provided. The program successively executes each of the analyses needed to calculate the vibration response, the frequency response, the cyclic strains and the number of cycles to failure. The program prompts the user for necessary input information. Sample data from the program is provided. The fatigue life results obtained by the computer model lie within an acceptable range of previously measured available data

Obstacles to private power investments in India

This paper aims to highlight the critical importance of cost recovery in attracting and sustaining private investment for power development. Based on a brief review of Indian experience, it suggests that in the absence of requisite cost recovery, reform of sector policies and institutions alone, is unlikely to mobilise private investment for power development. The paper also suggests that far more focused attention and efforts than in the past need to be given to achieving adequate cost recovery as well as to implications of failure in achieving it

Finance And Accounting Outsourcing: Three Studies Related To The Ethical And Economic Dimensions Of Accounting Outsourcing

This dissertation evaluates the economic and ethical considerations underlying the outsourcing of professional services such as finance and accounting. The dissertation is comprised of three separate, but related studies. The first study explores the adequacy of the disclosure rules recommended in the revised ethics rulings regarding disclosure of outsourcing relationships and the resulting ethical and economic repercussions for both, the AICPA members and their clients. The second study analyzes the disclosure rules recommended in the AICPA ethics rulings regarding disclosure of outsourcing relationships from an ethical standpoint. The third study adopts the perspective of the third party service provider. The third study analyzes the factors that provide a competitive advantage to leading service providers in accounting outsourcing markets in India. Taken together, these studies address issues that have not been addressed previously in accounting literature and will advance our understanding of a fast-growing phenomenon, the outsourcing of accounting services. Finance and accounting outsourcing may strongly influence the choice of future organizational form and structure thus making it important to develop an early understanding of this industry

Approximate dynamic programming for large scale systems

Sequential decision making under uncertainty is at the heart of a wide variety of practical problems. These problems can be cast as dynamic programs and the optimal value function can be computed by solving Bellman's equation. However, this approach is limited in its applicability. As the number of state variables increases, the state space size grows exponentially, a phenomenon known as the curse of dimensionality, rendering the standard dynamic programming approach impractical. An effective way of addressing curse of dimensionality is through parameterized value function approximation. Such an approximation is determined by relatively small number of parameters and serves as an estimate of the optimal value function. But in order for this approach to be effective, we need Approximate Dynamic Programming (ADP) algorithms that can deliver `good' approximation to the optimal value function and such an approximation can then be used to derive policies for effective decision-making. From a practical standpoint, in order to assess the effectiveness of such an approximation, there is also a need for methods that give a sense for the suboptimality of a policy. This thesis is an attempt to address both these issues. First, we introduce a new ADP algorithm based on linear programming, to compute value function approximations. LP approaches to approximate DP have typically relied on a natural `projection' of a well studied linear program for exact dynamic programming. Such programs restrict attention to approximations that are lower bounds to the optimal cost-to-go function. Our program -- the `smoothed approximate linear program' -- is distinct from such approaches and relaxes the restriction to lower bounding approximations in an appropriate fashion while remaining computationally tractable. The resulting program enjoys strong approximation guarantees and is shown to perform well in numerical experiments with the game of Tetris and queueing network control problem. Next, we consider optimal stopping problems with applications to pricing of high-dimensional American options. We introduce the pathwise optimization (PO) method: a new convex optimization procedure to produce upper and lower bounds on the optimal value (the `price') of high-dimensional optimal stopping problems. The PO method builds on a dual characterization of optimal stopping problems as optimization problems over the space of martingales, which we dub the martingale duality approach. We demonstrate via numerical experiments that the PO method produces upper bounds and lower bounds (via suboptimal exercise policies) of a quality comparable with state-of-the-art approaches. Further, we develop an approximation theory relevant to martingale duality approaches in general and the PO method in particular. Finally, we consider a broad class of MDPs and introduce a new tractable method for computing bounds by consider information relaxation and introducing penalty. The method delivers tight bounds by identifying the best penalty function among a parameterized class of penalty functions. We implement our method on a high-dimensional financial application, namely, optimal execution and demonstrate the practical value of the method vis-a-vis competing methods available in the literature. In addition, we provide theory to show that bounds generated by our method are provably tighter than some of the other available approaches

Performance Appraisal of Urban Co-operative Banks in North Gujarat

The idea of co-operative took concrete shape in India for the first time in 1904, when 'Co-operative Credit Societies Act 1904' was passed, amended in 1912 and 1919, which has widened the scope of the co-operative movement in India. The co-operative banking sector in the Indian Economy holds a distinct identity, as it is the only institution of micro credit dispersion. The phenomenal growth of co-operative enterprise in recent years is a positive proof of the fact that among various financial institution agencies, they have been recognized as the best for supplying unexploitative, cheap, sound and dynamic credit to small borrowers, professionals, artisans and the weaker sections of society. Due to certain changes in the banking sector and new economic policies, the co-operative sector in general and Urban Co-operative Banks (UCBs) in particular, have undergone a crisis. At the same time the failure of some good Schedule Banks and Urban Banks has also attracted the attention of the people and raised the question of security of their funds. So that need to the find actual financial stability of the UCBs and assure investors about the operational as well as financial efficiency of the UCBs has been felt. Distinctive feature of the UCBs as compared to other banks have motivated the researcher to under taken research on the financial position of the UCBs. To examine profitability, financial efficiency of banks of North Gujarat, the data related to all the twenty Urban Co-operative Banks for the past seven years viz. 1997-98 to 2003-2004 have been collected and various techniques of measuring performance like, Common Size Statement, Ratio Analysis and several statistical techniques have been applied to analyze and draw conclusions

Molecular diffusion in polymer solutions by a microinterferometric method

The object of this investigation of molecular diffusion in aqueous polymer solutions was to study the effect of solute concentration on the differential diffusion coefficient and also to study the effect of polymer concentration on the mean integral diffusion coefficient. For this purpose a microinterferometric method was used. Two non-ionic, water soluble polymers, Carboxymethylcellulose (CMC) and Carboxypolymethylene (Carbopol), were used in the study with D-Glucose as a solute. The differential diffusion coefficient was found to increase with increases in solute concentration in all cases. For CMC, the integral diffusion coefficient at first decreased with increasing polymer concentration but became constant after a certain value of polymer concentration has been reached. For Carbopol, the integral diffusion coefficient decreased with increasing polymer concentration. It appears that the Wilke-Chang correlation may approximately predict the differential diffusivity of the solute at very low solute concentrations in the polymeric solutions with a probable error of ± 10% --Abstract, page ii