Financial globalization, convergence and growth

We provide evidence that the composition of foreign capital, measured by the ratio foreign direct investment over total liabilities, a.ects growth directly and through the speed of convergence. Developing countries benefit relatively more as their initial GDP is smaller. The dataset comprises the period 1970-2004 and 96 countries, and the results are robust to di.erent measures of the composition of foreign capital, restricted time period, developing countries, and alternative explanations of convergence and growth. These results are consistent with the neoclassical growth model with credit constraints presented in this paper, in which the composition of foreign capital a.ects the transition dynamics through a positive e.ect on the speed of convergence and steady state GDP.composition of foreign capital; speed of convergence; growth.

ne-Course for Learning Programming

Difficulties in learning programming are a constant concern in engineering courses. In many research studies involving the learning programming must of the solutions presented, from the beginning of the first programming languages, was to apply different type of problems analysis. Literature relating to the understanding of nature of learning programming skills has been focused explicitly on the teaching methodology and few of them focus on abilities, characteristics and knowledge acquired over the life cycle of learning programming in each student. Most of the students enrolled in engineering courses, where programming is a crucial competence, never had the opportunity to develop skills of computational thinking. In this paper, we focus our work on the learning programming developing and applying a set of exercises where students with more difficulties can express and develop their skills in computational thinking. In order to understand some programming students difficulties we have create a set of exercises, and apply it to a pre-programming course, that allows teachers to understand how students analyse and comprehend aspects such as visualization, spatial interpretation and physical manipulation. This paper also reports on results obtained from a class experiment where Memory Transfer Language was used by students to learn programming. All the exercises must be resolved without any type of technology, designed as a ne-course (no electronic course) for learning programming

ne-Course for Learning Programming

Difficulties in learning programming are a constant concern in engineering courses. In many research studies involving the learning programming must of the solutions presented, from the beginning of the first programming languages, was to apply different type of problems analysis. Literature relating to the understanding of nature of learning programming skills has been focused explicitly on the teaching methodology and few of them focus on abilities, characteristics and knowledge acquired over the life cycle of learning programming in each student. Most of the students enrolled in engineering courses, where programming is a crucial competence, never had the opportunity to develop skills of computational thinking. In this paper, we focus our work on the learning programming developing and applying a set of exercises where students with more difficulties can express and develop their skills in computational thinking. In order to understand some programming students difficulties we have create a set of exercises, and apply it to a pre-programming course, that allows teachers to understand how students analyse and comprehend aspects such as visualization, spatial interpretation and physical manipulation. This paper also reports on results obtained from a class experiment where Memory Transfer Language was used by students to learn programming. All the exercises must be resolved without any type of technology, designed as a ne-course (no electronic course) for learning programming

Visualizing test diversity to support test optimisation

Diversity has been used as an effective criteria to optimise test suites for cost-effective testing. Particularly, diversity-based (alternatively referred to as similarity-based) techniques have the benefit of being generic and applicable across different Systems Under Test (SUT), and have been used to automatically select or prioritise large sets of test cases. However, it is a challenge to feedback diversity information to developers and testers since results are typically many-dimensional. Furthermore, the generality of diversity-based approaches makes it harder to choose when and where to apply them. In this paper we address these challenges by investigating: i) what are the trade-off in using different sources of diversity (e.g., diversity of test requirements or test scripts) to optimise large test suites, and ii) how visualisation of test diversity data can assist testers for test optimisation and improvement. We perform a case study on three industrial projects and present quantitative results on the fault detection capabilities and redundancy levels of different sets of test cases. Our key result is that test similarity maps, based on pair-wise diversity calculations, helped industrial practitioners identify issues with their test repositories and decide on actions to improve. We conclude that the visualisation of diversity information can assist testers in their maintenance and optimisation activities

THE INFLUENCE OF SWIMMING VELOCITY ON THE KINEMATIC CHARACTERISTICS OF BACKSTROKE SWIMMING

Under standard workout conditions, swimmers spend most of their time swimming at rates significantly lower than racing speed. Specificity of training is not just a metabolic problem, but also a technical and a kinesiological one. The purpose of this study was to determine to what extent swimming the backstroke at different speeds implies a change in the stroke pattern and in the kinematics of the propulsive movements. We also studied the technical characteristics associated with performance in short distance efforts. A third aim of this study was to compare the intra-cycle velocity variation of the center of gravity of the body to the intra-cycle velocity variation of the hip point. Seven well-trained male swimmers participated in this study (age: 14.71±0.76 years, height: 1.74±0.39 m, body mass: 63.14±5.52 kg, %FAT: 15.40±1.81). Each subject performed 3 x 50 m backstroke repeats with 15 min of rest at a velocity corresponding to 90% (v90), 95% (v95) and 100% (vmax) of best performance in the 50 m backstroke. The swimmers were filmed on the sagittal plane, underwater and above the water, with synchronized cameras (60 Hz). Images were mixed and then digitized for further analysis using the APAS system. Peak mean horizontal velocities of the hand occurred during the upsweep at v90 and v95 and during the finish/exit at vmax. Total stroke duration decreased from v90 to v100 due to the shorter duration of the downsweep, the final downsweep and the finish/exit, but the relative duration of the phases did not show any significant changes. Increasing velocity caused an increase in the distance between point of entry into the water and point of exit of the hand from the water, but mean horizontal pulling length decreased. Swimming velocity at sub-maximal paces correlated well to mean body velocity at the upsweep, but at vmax, the highest association was to body velocity at the final downsweep. Maximal velocity in the 50 m backstroke was inversely correlated to the range of intra-cycle velocity variations of the body center of gravity. This parameter showed a poor individual correlation to the hip velocity variation (r=0.58 ± 0.18). The correlation between the coefficient of variation of the hip and the center of gravity intra-cycle velocities had, on the contrary, a high significance. Movement of temporal and spatial structures seem to vary little with velocity changes in swimmers who have attained a good stabilization of motor execution. In fast swimming, nevertheless, swimmers apparently achieve a greater anterioposterior stabilization of the hand, which may indicate more pronounced lift oriented sculling actions, and performance becomes more dependent on the final portion of the underwater path. The variation of the mean velocity of the hip cannot be used for quantification of the changes of body velocity from phase to phase, but a coefficient of variation (SD . mean-1 . 100) of intra-cycle hip velocity seems to be an adequate indicator of the intra-cycle velocity variation of the body center of gravity

O PRIMEIRO MESTRE-ESCOLA DO BRASIL

O PRIMEIRO MESTRE-ESCOLA DO BRASI

O modelo de negócio de um jornal gratuito municipal: o caso do jornal Palavra Palhocense

TCC (graduação) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina. Centro de Comunicação e Expressão. Jornalismo.Diante da possibilidade, cada vez mais anunciada, do fim do negócio do jornal impresso, este trabalho expõe a experiência do jornal Palavra Palhocense, do município de Palhoça, na Grande Florianópolis. O jornal em questão é gratuito, tem periodicidade semanal, possui tiragem de 8 mil exemplares e circula em todos os bairros da cidade. Com uma linha editorial que prioriza quase que exclusivamente notícias sobre Palhoça e grande produção de conteúdo próprio, o jornal se diferencia dos demais veículos existentes no município. Do ponto de vista comercial, uma grande variedade de anunciantes locais sustenta a publicação. O estudo, por meio de entrevista em profundidade e análise descritiva, identifica as características editoriais e comerciais do modelo de negócio desse semanário. O tripé jornal gratuito, periodicidade semanal e abrangência municipal torna o Palavra Palhocense singular no contexto da Grande Florianópolis. Se por um lado a cobertura jornalística de apenas uma cidade representa uma restrição no campo de atuação do veículo, por outro permite uma atenção maior aos assuntos de Palhoça e, consequentemente, uma cobertura mais intensa do município

A estética dissonante de Augusto dos Anjos

O traço mais saliente da poesia de Augusto dos Anjos é a dissonância fonossemântica, que se traduz, entre outros recursos, pela segmentação do estrato fônico, pelo uso de um léxico anticonvencional, “apoético”, e por uma imagística orquestrada no sentido de surpreender o leitor. Estas características são o reflexo de um conflito sobretudo moral, determinado pela melancolia conseqüente ao sentimento de culpa. O poema “Apóstrofe à carne” é um dos que melhor revelam o drama do eu lírico angelino, que vê na morte, ao mesmo tempo, o efeito da incriminação que atinge a espécie humana e a esperança de que, depurada a nossa culpa original, venha a surgir um homem novo

THE INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL AND THE CREATION OF VALUE IN RESEARCH UNITS LINKED TO THE BRAZILIAN MINISTRY OF SCIENCE TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION

The study investigated the understanding of the directors and managers of the Research Units (Unidades de Pesquisa – UP) linked to the Brazilian Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia & Inovac¸ão – MCTI) on the creation of value and innovations from Knowledge and Intellectual Capital management, analyzing their understanding of the theme and the way in which the intangible assets – mainly information and knowledge – are transformed by the UP. To develop the objective and research question, it was necessary to (i) characterize the organizational context of the UP, (ii) to discuss the applicability of the relevant conceptual framework to Knowledge Management, Intellectual Capital and Intangible Assets in order to follow the value created within the UP, (iii) demonstrate the recognition of the innovations achieved by the UP and the way they are viewed by the managers, and (iv) portray the understanding of the directors and managers about the Intellectual Capital within the unit in which they are inserted. A descriptive approach was adopted, with functionalist discussion and quantitative research to measure the relationship between the data and test hypotheses about the sample – the interdependence between value creation drivers and the differentiated perception about value creation via intangible drivers. The findings allow to affirm that there are distinct clusters of UP, with greater importance, in general, attributed to Relational Capital