Analysis on the Possibility of RISC-V Adoption

As the interface between hardware and software, Instruction Set Architectures (ISAs) play a key role in the operation of computers. While both hardware and software have continued to evolve rapidly over time, ISAs have undergone minimal change. Since its release in 2010, RISC-V has begun to erode the industry aversion to ISA innovation. Established on the principals of the Reduced Instruction Set Computer (RISC), and as an open source ISA, RISC-V offers many benefits over popular ISAs like Intel’s x86 and Arm Holding’s Advanced RISC Machine (ARM). In this literature review I evaluate the literature discussing: What makes changing Instruction Set Architectures difficultWhy might the industry choose to implement RISC-V When researching this topic I visited the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers), INSPEC (Engineering Village), and ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) Digital Library databases. I used the search terms, “RISC-V”, “Instruction Set Architecture”, “RISC-V” AND “x86”, and “RISC-V” AND “Instruction Set Architecture”. This literature review evaluates 10 papers on implementation of RISC-V. As this paper was intended to cover recent developments in the field, publication dates were limited to from 2015 to present

CARE-PACT: a new paradigm of care for acutely unwell residents in aged care facilities

Describes the Comprehensive Aged Residents Emergency and Partners in Assessment, Care and Treatment (CARE-PACT) program: a hospital substitutive care and demand management project that aims to improve, in a fiscally efficient manner, the quality of care received by residents of aged care facilities. Background Ageing population trends create a strong imperative for healthcare systems to develop models of care that reduce dependence on hospital services. People living in residential aged care facilities (RACFs) currently have high rates of presentation to emergency departments. The care provided in these environments may not optimally satisfy the needs of frail older persons from RACFs.   Objective To describe the Comprehensive Aged Residents Emergency and Partners in Assessment, Care and Treatment (CARE-PACT) program: a hospital substitutive care and demand management project that aims to improve, in a fiscally efficient manner, the quality of care received by residents of aged care facilities when their acute healthcare needs exceed the scope of the aged care facility staff and general practitioners to manage independently of the hospital system.   Discussion The project delivers high-quality gerontic nursing and emergency specialist assessment, collaborative care planning, skills sharing across the care continuum and an individualised, resident-focused approach

Dynamic Data Structures for Document Collections and Graphs

In the dynamic indexing problem, we must maintain a changing collection of text documents so that we can efficiently support insertions, deletions, and pattern matching queries. We are especially interested in developing efficient data structures that store and query the documents in compressed form. All previous compressed solutions to this problem rely on answering rank and select queries on a dynamic sequence of symbols. Because of the lower bound in [Fredman and Saks, 1989], answering rank queries presents a bottleneck in compressed dynamic indexing. In this paper we show how this lower bound can be circumvented using our new framework. We demonstrate that the gap between static and dynamic variants of the indexing problem can be almost closed. Our method is based on a novel framework for adding dynamism to static compressed data structures. Our framework also applies more generally to dynamizing other problems. We show, for example, how our framework can be applied to develop compressed representations of dynamic graphs and binary relations

Oliver Stone's Nixon: Politics on the Edge of Darkness

In the introduction to his controversial book, The Ends of Power, former White House Chief of Staff, H.R. Haldeman describes Watergate as being an expression «of the dark side of President Nixon». Later in the book Haldeman cites former Special Counsel Charles Colson as a key man who «encouraged the dark impulses in Nixon's mind». Stephen Ambrose has written that Nixon «never abandoned his black impulses to lash out at the world...», while Henry Kissinger offered the view that «the thoughtful analytical side of Nixon was most in evidence during crises, while periods of calm seemed to unleash the darker passions of his nature». Christopher Wilkinson -talking directly about Oliver Stone's film-has focused on the movie's analogy of a «beast» that «also became a metaphor for the dark side of Nixon himself».In the introduction to his controversial book, The Ends of Power, former White House Chief of Staff, H.R. Haldeman describes Watergate as being an expression «of the dark side of President Nixon»1 . Later in the book Haldeman cites former Special Counsel Charles Colson as a key man who «encouraged the dark impulses in Nixon's mind»2 . Stephen Ambrose has written that Nixon «never abandoned his black impulses to lash out at the world...», while Henry Kissinger offered the view that «the thoughtful analytical side of Nixon was most in evidence during crises, while periods of calm seemed to unleash the darker passions of his nature»3 . Christopher Wilkinson -talking directly about Oliver Stone's film-has focused on the movie's analogy of a «beast» that «also became a metaphor for the dark side of Nixon himself

Towards an Agenda for SoTL in Africa?

Sub-Saharan Africa, a diverse, largely impoverished and troubled region, has a pressing need for economic and social development. Given the ever-increasing importance of advanced knowledge and skills in the contemporary world, the education systems in many African countries are a major concern. In particular, it is essential that the capacity of the region’s higher education systems to produce capable graduates should grow rapidly and strongly, in the interests of internal development and to avoid further widening of the North-South divide. This essay gives a brief account of the situation and some key issues in sub-Saharan African higher education, outlines aspects of South Africa’s experience that may prefigure developments elsewhere on the continent, and offers a view of what kind of role SoTL might play in developing-country contexts

Designing the South African Higher Education System for Student Success

South Africa’s higher education system is falling far short of producing the mix of competent graduates required to meet the country’s need for social and economic development. The problem of poor patterns of student success is longstanding, and is persisting despite the policy changes and many educationally sound interventions that have taken place in recent decades. This points to entrenched underlying obstacles, including but going beyond the legacy of apartheid, and indicates that they will not yield to supplementary or ad hoc improvement initiatives, however well-conceived individually. This paper is thus based on the proposition that there is a pressing need to design the South African university education system to focus unequivocally on student success and equity of outcomes. This implies, intentionally, that the current system is not designed around any clear commitment to student success.Correcting this must involve a re-prioritisation of goals in the higher education sector, aimed at ensuring that student success is accepted as the end goal of the educational mission of higher education. The paper argues that, if this is to be achieved, what is required is a sophisticated, realistic, coherent and comprehensive strategy for positive change. Given the nature of the higher education system, such a strategy must involve not only a clear vision of the scope of the changes and interventions needed to make a real difference to the performance patterns – in terms of equity as well as overall outcomes – but also an in-depth understanding of the responsibilities that must be taken by the key stakeholders and the underlying obstacles that must be addressed.The paper offers an outline of the major points of the argument, including the importance of applying design principles to any comprehensive response to the need to place student success at the heart of the higher education agenda