Analysis of a benchmark suite to evaluate mixed numeric and symbolic processing

The suite of programs that formed the benchmark for a proposed advanced computer is described and analyzed. The features of the processor and its operating system that are tested by the benchmark are discussed. The computer codes and the supporting data for the analysis are given as appendices

Mind mapping management

A mind map is a diagram used to represent words, ideas, tasks, or other items linked to and arranged around a central key word or idea. Mind maps are used to generate, visualize, structure, and classify ideas, and as an aid to studying and organizing information, solving problems, making decisions, and writing. The fundamentals of mind map are arranged naturally according to the importance of the concepts, and are classified into groupings, branches, or areas, with the goal of representing semantic or other connections between portions of information. Mind maps may also aid recall of existing memories. The ideas are documented in a mind map radiate from the center of diagram, similar the branches or root system of a tree. The colors are important because they provide an extra dimension of information to help your brain interpret the data more effectively. The mind mapping technique can be used as a authoritative, creative and dynamic way to administer projects, structure and classify multifaceted information, and provide motivating reports that grasp people’s attention. By minimizing words and focusing on associations, mind maps allow project managers and team members to rapidly see dependencies and problems, saving time and money. Using mind maps can notably improve a project team’s productivity.Mind mapping management

The management learning tool: Andragogy

The name andragogy was first used by a German grammar school teacher named Alexander Kapp in 1833 to portray the educational theory of the Greek philosopher Plato. He used it to refer to the normal process by which adults engage in continuing education. The first use of the term "andragogy" to catch the extensive attention of adult educators was in 1968, when Knowles, then a professor of adult education at Boston University, introduced the term (then spelled "andragogy") through a journal article. Andragogy is an educational theory that utilizes the adult’s life experiences to teach and aid in learning rather than using someone else’s experience in an attempt to teach. Since this is a way of teaching and learning, the principles lend andragogy to be accepted as a theory. Andragogy applies to any form of adult learning and has been used extensively in the design of organizational training programs (especially for "soft skill" domains such as management development). Andragogical methods are best when they can be applied are in community situation and industry/corporate situations that are supportive of a self-directed learner. Human Resource departments should also consider andragogical principals when designing their employee development programs, providing the organization whose management style is one that is represented by McGregor’s Theory Y. By placing a value on training and development, employees will be motivated to learn new skills to help them in their career development.Andragogy, Management learning tool

Biofuels – An Eco-Friendly Energy Source

Biofuels are liquids that derive from bio mass, both from plant materials and animal fat. Biofuels are products that can be processed in to liquid fuels for either transport or heating purposes. The most popular forms of biofuel are bioethanol, biodiesel and methanol. Bio ethanol is an alcohol derived from sugar or starch crops by fermentation. A second generation of bio ethanol-lignocelluloses includes a range of forestry products such as forestry coppices and energy grasses. Bio ethanol can be used in pure from or blended with gasoline. Bio ethanol is produced from agricultural products including starchy and cereal crops such as sugarcane, corn, beets, wheat and sorghum. Bio diesel is derived from vegetable oils by reaction of the oil with methanol. A second generation of bio diesel technologies synthesizes diesel fuel from wood and straw to a gasification stage. Biodiesel can be used in pure form or blended with automotive diesel. Biodiesel is made from oil or tree seeds such as rapeseed, sunflower, soya, palm, Pongamapinnata, Andiroba(Carporaguianensis), Babassu(Orbigniasp), barley, Camelina(Camelina sativa) coconut(copra), Jatropha curcas, Cumary (Dipterus odorata),groundnut, mustard, peanut, fishoil, and animal fat. Biodiesel derived from green algae and cyanobacteria biomass has the potential for high volume and cost effective production. It is carbon neutral. In recent years, bioenergy has drawn attention as a sustainable energy resource that may help cope with rising energy prices, but also provides income to poor farmers and rural communities around the globe. Developing countries with tropical climate have a comparative advantage in growing energy with biomass. Advantages of using bio fuel are renewable fuel, low toxicity, biodegradable, lower emissions of contaminants, lower health risk, no sulfur dioxide emissions and higher flash point and also decreases the country’s dependence on imported petroleum. Biofuels represent important opportunities and challenges for sustainable development, both globally and domestically. Bio fuels can help to tackle climate change and improve rural employment and livelihood. Their reduced carbon emissions compared to conventional fuels and their positive impacts on rural development, together with the current high oil prices are key elements behind their market development. Thus bio diesel is a potential replacement for petroleum based liquid fuels. Biomass for fuel production is gaining importance in terms of its productivity, practicality and innovative potential to create a cost competitive, environment friendly and renewable source of liquid fuel

Continuous supply chain collaboration : Road to achieve operational excellence

Supply chain management (SCM) is becoming critical as firms recognize that competition is shifting from company versus company to supply chain versus supply chain. In the present competitive scenario, the fierce competition has driven most companies to seek means of enhancing performance beyond their four wall boundaries. The firm’s ability in collaborating with its upstream and downstream partners determines its success in attaining better performance with supply chain collaboration; a firm is able to serve fragmented markets in which end customers require more product varieties and availability with shorter product life cycle and at the same time lower supply chain costs. Hence, this paper introduces the framework of continuous supply chain collaboration (CSCC), which extends the traditional frame of reference in strategic sourcing from a supplier centric to a supply-chain-scope as continuous improvement efforts to enhance the customer satisfaction. CSCC practices are rather exceptional, yet CSCC is believed to be the single most comprehensive framework for attaining operational excellence.Continuous supply chain collaboration (CSCC); Supply chain management: Continuous improvement; Operational excellence; Supply Chain Management

A study on occupational health hazards among women beedi rollers in Tamilnadu, India.

The beedi industry occupies a prominent place in rural development in terms of its capacity to offer potential employment opportunities to a large number of people. For the beedi industry Tamilnadu is one of the major hub in India. It is estimated that around one million workers mostly woman and children are employed in Beedi making. It is an ardu¬ous, labour intensive task because each beedi is rolled individually. Beedi industry is almost an unorganized sector hence even the government officials finding it difficult to enforce the various legal requirements. Apart from the other legal implications the health hazards which the women employees who are rolling the beedis are enormous. This study aims to explore the level of health hazards experienced by the woman beedi rollers in Tamilnadu. A total of 388 usable responses obtained from women beedi rollers comprising from the beedi rollers concentrated districts i.e., Tirunelveli, Tuticorin, Tiruchirappalli & Vellore are used for this study. The study found that more than 70% of the beedi rollers suffered from eye, gastrointestinal and nervous problems while more than 50% of the respondents suffered from respiratory problems, mostly throat burning and cough. More than 75% of the respon¬dents faced osteological problems. From the study is it understood that the health hazards level is very high. This study proposes a framework to be implemented with the Government agencies, NGOs and Welfare organizations for the welfare of the beedi rollers.Beedi rollers, Health Hazards, Welfare measures, Tamilnadu.

Fast Dictionary Learning for Sparse Representations of Speech Signals

For dictionary-based decompositions of certain types, it has been observed that there might be a link between sparsity in the dictionary and sparsity in the decomposition. Sparsity in the dictionary has also been associated with the derivation of fast and efficient dictionary learning algorithms. Therefore, in this paper we present a greedy adaptive dictionary learning algorithm that sets out to find sparse atoms for speech signals. The algorithm learns the dictionary atoms on data frames taken from a speech signal. It iteratively extracts the data frame with minimum sparsity index, and adds this to the dictionary matrix. The contribution of this atom to the data frames is then removed, and the process is repeated. The algorithm is found to yield a sparse signal decomposition, supporting the hypothesis of a link between sparsity in the decomposition and dictionary. The algorithm is applied to the problem of speech representation and speech denoising, and its performance is compared to other existing methods

G x E Interaction and path analysis for yield and its attributing traits in advanced genotypes of pigeonpea [Cajanus cajan (L.) Millsp.]

The present investigation was carried out during kharif-2012, 2013 and 2014 under rain fed condition at the Agricultural Research Station, Kalaburagi located in north eastern dry zone (Zone 2) of Karnataka, to know the stability and path analysis of the twenty genotypes of pigeonpea including check WRP-1. Highly significant differences among genotypes were observed for all the characters except primary branches. Environmental + (Genotype × Environment) interaction was significant for days to maturity, primary branch, pod bearing length, and seed yield per plant. The variance due to pooled deviation was highly significant for all the characters except for primary branches, pod length and number of seeds per pod which reflect the presence of sufficient genetic variability in the material. Out of 20 genotypes studied, RVK-275 (X=38.713, bi=1.7 and S2di = -9.67) and AKT-9913 (X =43.397, bi=2.86 and S2di= -7.42) were found to be a stable for seed yield and test weight, across the environments with good stability under rain fed conditions compared to local check. Path analysis revealed that days to flower initiation (3.942 and 1.123), days to maturity (1.493 and 0.960), primary branches (0.667 and 0.045), pod bearing length (1.153 and 0.394), number of pods per plant (0.661 and 0.463) and 100 seed weight (0.352 and 0.426) had the highest positive direct effect on grain yield both at genotypic and phenotypic level. For maximizing the grain yield per plant emphasis should be given in selection of such characters for further improvement in pigeonpea