Integrating Naming and Addressing of Persistent data in Programming Language and Operating System Contexts

There exist a number of desirable transparencies in distributed computing, viz., name transparency: having a uniform way of naming entities in the system, regardless of their type or physical make up; location transparency: having a uniform way of addressing entities, regardless of their physical location; representation transparency: having a uniform way of representing data, which simplifies sharing data between applications written in different highlevel languages and running on different hardware architectures (interoperability) and finally invocation transparency: having a uniform way of invoking operations on entities. The advent of persistency in programming language contexts has created a need for the integration of these four important concepts, viz., naming, addressing, representation and manipulation of data in programming language and operating system contexts. This paper attempts to address the first three transparencies, postponing the fourth to a later paper. First, we make up a list of things that are needed to construct a persistent programming environment and relate this list to existing persistent object models, revealing their inadequacies. We then describe a new model which merges programming language and operating system naming contexts into a global name space which, while enforcing uniformity through the use of globally unique names, still allows the application of personal nicknames. Furthermore, we explain how persistent data is stored and retrieved using a client/server model of interaction, and how it could be acted upon correctly, through the concept of typed data. We conclude by checking how well our model scores on the wish list, listing the current status and future directions for research

Garuda 5 (khyung lnga): Ecologies of Potency and the Poison-Medicine Spectrum of Sowa Rigpa’s Renowned ‘Black Aconite’ Formula

This article focuses on ethnographic work conducted at the Men-Tsee-Khang (Dharamsala, India) on Garuda 5 (khyung lnga), a commonly prescribed Tibetan medical formula. This medicine’s efficacy as a painkiller and activity against infection and inflammation is largely due to a particularly powerful plant, known as ‘virulent poison’ (btsan dug) as well as ‘the great medicine’ (sman chen), and identified as a subset of Aconitum species. Its effects, however, are potentially dangerous or even deadly. How can these poisonous plants be used in medicine and, conversely, when does a medicine become a poison? How can ostensibly the same substance be both harmful and helpful? The explanation requires a more nuanced picture than mere dose dependency. Attending to the broader ‘ecologies of potency’ in which these substances are locally enmeshed, in line with Sienna Craig’s Efficacy and the Social Ecologies of Tibetan Medicine (2012), provides fertile ground to better understand the effects of Garuda 5 and how potency is developed and directed in practice. I aim to unpack the spectrum between sman (medicine) and dug (poison) in Sowa Rigpa by elucidating some of the multiple dimensions which determine the activity of Garuda 5 as it is formulated and prescribed in India. I thus embrace the full spectrum of potency— the ‘good’ and the ‘bad,’ the ‘wanted’ and the ‘unwanted’—without presuming the universal validity of biomedical notions of toxicity and side effects

Introduction | Approaching Potent Substances in Medicine and Ritual across Asia

Introduction to themed research articles on Approaching Potent Substances in Medicine and Ritual across Asia

The Cultural Landscape & Heritage Paradox; Protection and Development of the Dutch Archeological-Historical Landscape and its European Dimension

To what extent can we know past and mainly invisible landscapes, and how we can use this still hidden knowledge for actual sustainable management of landscape’s cultural and historical values. It has also been acknowledged that heritage management is increasingly about ‘the management of future change rather than simply protection’. This presents us with a paradox: to preserve our historic environment, we have to collaborate with those who wish to transform it and, in order to apply our expert knowledge, we have to make it suitable for policy and society. The answer presented by the Protection and Development of the Dutch Archaeological-Historical Landscape programme (pdl/bbo) is an integrative landscape approach which applies inter- and transdisciplinarity, establishing links between archaeological-historical heritage and planning, and between research and policy. This is supported by two unifying concepts: ‘biography of landscape’ and ‘action research’. This approach focuses upon the interaction between knowledge, policy and an imagination centered on the public. The European perspective makes us aware of the resourcefulness of the diversity of landscapes, of social and institutional structures, of various sorts of problems, approaches and ways forward. In addition, two related issues stand out: the management of knowledge creation for landscape research and management, and the prospects for the near future. Underlying them is the imperative that we learn from the past ‘through landscape’

Telemonitoring of daily activity and symptom behavior in patients with COPD

Objectives. This study investigated the activity behavior of patients with COPD in detail compared to asymptomatic controls, and the relationship between subjective and objective activities (awareness), and readiness to change activity behavior. Methods. Thirty-nine patients with COPD (66.0 years; FEV(1)% predicted: 44.9%) and 21 healthy controls (57.0 years) participated. Objective daily activity was assessed by accelerometry and expressed as amount of activity in counts per minute (cpm). Patients' baseline subjective activity and stage of change were assessed prior to measurements. Results. Mean daily activity in COPD patients was significantly lower compared to the healthy controls (864 ± 277 cpm versus 1162 ± 282 cpm, P < 0.001). COPD patients showed a temporary decrease in objective activities in the early afternoon. Objective and subjective activities were significantly moderately related and most patients (55.3%) were in the maintenance phase of the stages of change. Conclusions. COPD patients show a distinctive activity decrease in the early afternoon. COPD patients are moderately aware of their daily activity but regard themselves as physically active. Therefore, future telemedicine interventions might consider creating awareness of an active lifestyle and provide feedback that aims to increase and balance activity levels

Macroscopic authentication of Chinese materia medica (CMM): A UK market study of seeds and fruits

This small-scale macroscopic and quantitative authentication study, the first of its kind in the UK and elsewhere, assesses the identity and purity (excluding pesticides and heavy metals) of a selection of Chinese materia medica (CMM) seeds and fruits on the UK market. 25 fruit and seed CMM were chosen based on their inclusion in the Chinese Pharmacopoeia (2010, referred hereafter as ‘official species’), maximum dimension of 10 mm, and regular use in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) practice in the UK according to UK practitioners. In 2012 samples were obtained from six TCM wholesale traders and eight retail dispensaries in southeast England. Macroscopic identity and purity testing was undertaken drawing on expertise at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and its collection of vouchered CMM reference drugs, herbarium specimens and published identification texts. Of the 25 CMM requested from suppliers, 23 were obtained, represented by 211 samples. 191 samples were identified as being sourced from the correct drug; 20 were identified as sourced from unofficial species. Of the 191 correct samples, 5 displayed major contamination by other plant material, stones, earth, etc. (defined as > 5% of sample volume), and 12 had minor contamination (2–5%). 95% of samples derived from medicinally cultivated plants were sourced from an official species, 5% were contaminated; in contrast, 78% of wild-sourced CMM samples were sourced from an official species, and 14% showed contamination. These results aim to guide the further development of good practice in TCM herbal drug quality control, for which suggestions are provided