Comparison of machine learning approaches for classification of invoices

Machine learning has become one of the leading sciences governing modern world. Various disciplines specifically neural networks have recently gained a lot of attention due to its widespread applications. With the recent advances in the technology the resulting big data has augmented the need of bigger means of storage, analysis and henceforth utilization. This not only implies the efficient use of available techniques but suggests surge in the development of new algorithms and techniques. In this project, three different machine learning approaches were implemented utilizing the open source library of keras on TensorFlow as a proof of concept for the task of intelligent invoice automation. The performance of these approaches for improved business on data of invoices has been analysed using the data of two customers with two target attributes per customer as a dataset. The behaviour of neural network hyper-parameters using matplotlib and TensorBoard was empirically calculated and investigated. As part of the first approach, the standard way of implementing predictive algorithm using neural network was followed. Moreover, the hyper-parameters search space was fine-tuned, and the resulting model was studied by grid search on those hyper-parameters. This strategy of hyper-parameters was followed in the next two approaches as well. In the second approach, not only further possible improvement in prediction accuracy is achieved but also the dependency between the two target attributes by using multi-task learning was determined. As per the third implemented approach, the use of continual learning on invoices for postings was analysed. This investigation, that involves the comparison of varied machine learning approaches has broad significance in approving the currently available algorithms for handling such data and suggests means for improvement as well. It holds great prospects, including but not limited to future implementation of such approaches in the domain of finance towards improved customer experience, fraud detection and ease in the assessments of assets etc

Triumphant or Trapped Pakistani Women? A Feminist Critique of Mueenuddin’s “Nawabdin Electrician” and Haq’s Song “Chamkeeli”

In patriarchal societies, women are traditionally subjugated and suppressed in one way or another. Men are privileged and kept at the center. They speak, express, and dream while benefiting from the autonomy provided to them by the phallogocentric system. By contrast, women are marginalized. Patriarchal writers define women as weak, fragile, helpless, docile, submissive, and emotional. However, this paper reveals that in Daniyal Mueenuddin’s “Nawabdin Electrician” and Abrar-ul-Haq’s song “Chamkeeli,” regardless of a change in times and “gender performativity,” Pakistani male writers continue to stigmatize women. This study shows that although gender roles are changing, women remain subjugated. My paper claims that whereas women were previously portrayed as submissive, docile, suppressed, uncritical, and mindlessly silent, in these two more recent texts women are represented as uncontrollable, hypersexual, dangerous, mad, violent, hysterically dominating, and madly authoritative. I argue that these recent portrayals do not help or emancipate Pakistani women. In 2019, Advocate Rana Adnan Asghar filed a petition against Haq’s song in the Lahore Civil Court, declaring it a scurrilous attack on men’s integrity. My study, however, reveals that Haq has depicted incapacitated men in contrast to strong women, as a way to prove that women’s emancipation is a potential threat to patriarchy. Thus, rather than demeaning men, Haq’s depiction of a madly uncontrollable woman is more critical of women than of men. This implies that Pakistan’s dominant patriarchal familial and social structures suppress women more in order to protect men from disgrace. My study reveals that in the time between these texts (2009 to 2019), no significant change has occurred because gender discrimination persists in the works of Pakistani men. This article offers a dismantling of these recent prejudiced female stereotypes in order to achieve a more emancipatory future for women

Public private partnership in education : a case in Pakistan

textPakistan had a literacy rate of 54 percent in 2008. This was considerably lower than all of its neighbors. 43 million people in Pakistan live below the poverty line of a dollar a day, and receiving quality education remains a dream for most of them. The government spends less than 3 percent of its Gross Domestic Product on education, which means that little can be done to provide even basic education to all. While there is no conclusive evidence regarding the effectiveness of public private partnerships, they have been promoted as part of the national agenda on education since 2000. This report explores the effectiveness of such partnerships in the education sector in Pakistan, and analyzes the problems that these partnerships face. The focal point of the assessment is an in-depth analysis of various public private partnership programs in Pakistan, based on primary and secondary data. Primary data includes information gathered by visiting a school that was formed under one such partnership, and by conducting detailed interviews with key stake holders. Secondary data comprises of evaluation reports by donor agencies and the Ministry of Education. The primary aim of this report is to examine the effectiveness of such programs and the reasons for their success or failures. The secondary aim is to determine if active community involvement in education yields better results. Finally, this report offers guidelines to the government for designing successful public private partnerships. Findings reveal that such partnerships have varying results within Pakistan and these results depend greatly on the design of such partnerships. The author recommends that a national policy on public private partnerships be formed, and elements of accountability and performance measure be added to each contract to make the partnership more effective, sustainable and successful.Public Affair

Performance Management System of “The City School Bahawalpur”

The purpose of this research is to explore the various factors related to performance management system used by the school for teaching and non-teaching staff. This is an exploratory research where data has been collected from The City School of Bahawalpur. Questionnaires and semi structured face to face interviews had been conducted to collect the data. This study in quantitative in nature and percentage analysis was used to interpret the collected data. It is concluded that the majority of teachers in school are satisfied with the current performance management system. They are getting the benefits in the form of their personal and professional development. It is suggested that the problems faced by the new teachers should be overcome by proper orientation programs. They should get a chance to observe other branches of schools so that they can learn from them in every possible way. This study can play a vital role by successfully implementing performance management system. The results could be in the form of maximum output by employees, high level of employee motivation, job engagement and fully satisfied employees. Keywords: Performance Management System, Human Resource Management, Teachers, Performance Evaluation

A study of the efficacy of a reliability management system - with suggestions for improved data collection and decision making.

Master's thesis in Risk ManagementProduct reliability is very important especially in the perspective of new product development. Making highly reliable drilling and well equipment is expensive and time-consuming process. But ignoring the product reliability could prove even more costly. Thus the manufacturers need to decide on the best reliability performance that succeeds to create a proper balance between time, cost and reliability factors to ensure the desired results. A reliability management system is a tool that the manufacturers can use to manage this process to produce reliable equipment. However, if this system is not well structured and lacks some important features, it can affect the outcomes of reliability analysis and decision making. A lot of research has been done on creating a good reliability and maintenance database to improve systems reliability in the petroleum industry. Offshore & Onshore Reliability Data (OREDA) and ISO 12224 are part of such research projects. The main objective of this research is to analyze the existing reliability management system (RMS) in Petroleum Technology Company (PTC) in terms of its structure, features, functionality, and the quality of data being recorded in RMS and how it affects decision making. The research was motivated by following issues 1) Reliability Management System of PTC is not automated in terms of extracting data from other sources within company, 2) PTC is missing a specified platform for failure reporting of their equipment, 3) the activities related to data collection and management are not well-organized hence demanding more effort. To analyze these issues, a literature study is performed to review the existing standards in the industry. ISO14224 and OREDA define a very structured database to get easy access to reliability and maintenance data. OREDA database has well-defined taxonomy, boundaries and database structure. Also, it has a well-organized procedure in place to collect and store reliability data. Quality assessment of the data being collected is done through predefined procedures guideline. OREDA have a very consistent list of codes to store language in coding form in the reliability and maintenance database. By reviewing the existing standard in the industry, a few shortcomings have been identified both in the RMS and PTC failure reporting procedures. It is observed that data from the sources is collected by the responsible person but the collection method is usually not tested and planned. Data collection sources, methods and procedures within company or outside the company lack well-defined criteria and data quality assurance processes. Currently, the company is using Field Service Reports (FSR) and company’s other databases as data sources for RMS. A company cannot access client’s system that contains equipment utilization and process-related information. This can lead to missing information or ambiguous data because the data-entry responsible person needs to make assumptions sometimes to complete the missing operational and environmental data. The RMS database structure lacks well-defined taxonomy, design parameters, and adequate failure mode classification. The Failure modes is an important aspect of the high-quality database since it can help in identifying the need for changes to maintenance periodicities, or the need for additional checks. The Offshore & Onshore Reliability Data (OREDA) project participating companies e.g. Statoil can calculate failure rates for selected data populations of within well-defined boundaries of manufacturer, design and operational parameters. These features are missing in RMS database. It is recommended that PTC consider developing a failure reporting database to handle their failure event data in an organized way. For this purpose, failure reporting, analysis, and corrective action system (FRACAS) technique is suggested. FRACAS data from FRACAS database can be used effectively to verify failure modes and failure causes in the failure mode effect and criticality analysis (FMECA). Failure review board in the FRACAS process includes personnel from mix disciplines (design, manufacturing, systems, quality, and reliability engineering) as well as leadership (technical or managerial leads), to make sure that a well-rounded the discussion is performed for particular failure related issues. The Failure Review Board (FRB) analyzes the failures in terms of time, money required corrective actions. And finally, management makes the decisions on basis of identified corrective action. As data quality has a high impact on the outcomes of reliability analysis through reliability management system. To have a good data quality, data collecting procedures and process management should be well-organized. It is crucial to performed data quality assessment on collected data. A data mining technique is discussed as a part of suggestion to improve data quality in RMS database. Once data is stored in RMS database a data mining method; data quality mining can help to assess the quality of data in a database. This is done by applying a data mining (DM) tool to look at interesting patterns of data with the purpose of quality assessment. Various data mining model is available in the market but PTC needs to select DM model which suits best their business objectives. RMS database is hard-wired so it is difficult to change its features and database structure. However, if PTC emphasize on improving failure reporting procedures and data quality in data sources locating within the company, it will directly and positively affect the data quality in RMS and the results of data analysis in RMS. This, in turn, can improve their decision-making the process regarding new product development and redesigning the existing products

Urban Fathers Asset Building – Final Report

The Urban Fathers Asset Building (UFAB) project demonstrated the potential benefits, as well as limitations, of an innovative nexus between the child support system, fatherhood programs, and the Assets for Independence (AFI) grant-funded services. UFAB was a collaborative initiative of the Texas Office of the Attorney General (OAG), Baylor College of Medicine’s Teen Health Clinic, Covenant Community Capital Corporation (the local AFI grantee), and RAISE Texas, the statewide association of AFI grantees. This Final Report summarizes UFAB’s operational features and outcomes; depicts the demonstration’s challenges and innovative responses; reviews the accomplishments of the ancillary projects supported by BAFF funds; and assesses the prospects for sustaining demonstration practices in the Houston area, as well as extending promising practices to other areas of the state.Texas Office of the Attorney GeneralRay Marshall Center for the Study of Human Resource

The Flow - Performance Relationship: Evidence from Pakistani Mutual Funds

we use the novel sample of Pakistani mutual funds to examine the flow performance relationship.  We apply linear regression model with fixed effect on unbalanced panel data for the period of 2012 to 2018. Consistence with the existence literature  using sample of US and other developed countries ,we find positive flow- performance relationship , but the prior performance do not have larger impact on subsequent fund flows.  Our results also exhibit that the shape of the relationship is not linear; it’s convex like other developed countries. In other words, the past high performing funds attracts larger inflow in the next periods whereas the past low performing fund suffer from minimal out flow in the next period

Sociability Moderates the Negative Association Between COVID-Related Disruptions and Life Satisfaction

Disruptions in individuals’ lives during the COVID-19 pandemic have been associated with increased mental health problems and decreases in life satisfaction, although recent research indicates that these effects are not uniform across individuals. The purpose of the present study was to examine the role of sociability in moderating the association between COVID-related disruptions and life satisfaction in a sample of adults. Using data from an online survey given to N = 166 adults, COVID-19 disruptions related to conflicts with household members or roommates and disruptions in care during the pandemic were negatively associated with life satisfaction. Sociability was found to moderate the associations between COVID-related disruptions in social interactions and life satisfaction; specifically, high sociability was found to possibly intensify the negative association between disruptions and life satisfaction. The findings of this study indicate that sociability may have been a liability during the pandemic, serving to worsen the potential negative effects of social distancing. Although future research is needed to better understand the mechanisms to explain these effects, the findings from the present study can be used to inform future interventions to help individuals better navigate social disruptions

Conceptual Content Analysis: Policy Documentation for the Quality of Higher Education in Pakistan

We are living in the age of quality competition, in marketing term, everything in the time is only alive until sustains its quality.  If something elapsing its quality is meant to ending its existence from the world gradually. The leading aim of the existing paper was to analyses the content related to quality and quality assurance process of higher education in Pakistan. The paradigm of the research was interpretive paradigm and content analysis with its conceptual design was used to conduct the study. Through purposive sampling, three documents were used as a sample of the study. This investigation was conducted under a developmental approach and various policy document along with the concerned bodies ‘were used to support the theme of this paper. Multiple sources were used for data analysis, membership categorization analysis for interviews data and keywords in context analysis for document analysis. It was concluded that quality means meeting the predetermined standards and six themes were noted during qualitative analysis