(Finančna) Avtonomija univerze

V slovenskem ustavnem redu je univerza ustavna kategorija. Temelj za obstoj in delovanje univerz zagotavljajo določbe 57., 58. in 59. člena Ustave. Država je dolžna predvsem zagotavljati financiranje univerz in učinkovito uresničevanje svobode znanosti ter pravice do šolanja in izobraževanja. Četudi je država dolžna zagotavljati financiranje univerz, politika financiranja ne sme krniti avtonomije univerz. Hkrati spremembe financiranja ne smejo biti stvarno neutemeljene, niti sprejete brez predhodne in prepričljive analize vplivov in posledic za izvajanje študijskih programov in razvoj univerz. Tudi ne smejo ustvarjati stvarno neutemeljenih razlik med posameznimi univerzami. Ogroženost študijskih programov zaradi sprememb financiranja ali celo njihovo onemogočenje hkrati pomeni poseg v pravico študentov do šolanja in izobraževanja. Zdi se, da bi bil ustavno pravilen le sistem en bloc (angl. lump-sum; celostnega) financiranja univerz. Ne gre spregledati niti dejstva, da je univerzitetna sfera v Sloveniji prenormirana, s čimer je avtonomija univerz znatno okrnjena.An autonomuos university is a unique environment of scientific exploration, critical discourse and intelectual development. Because of its autonomy the university has enjoyed great reputation and has been instrumental in defining the cultural, scientific, educational, social and political landscape.Today it seems that the fundations of university's autonomy are undermined. On the one hand, we see increased state interference with university's functioning. The state not only regulates funding, as is its constitutional obligation, but is also sistemically regulating university's organizational, research and human resources policies. Constitutionality of such regulatory policy is legitimately questioned.On the other hand, the autonomous status commits the university to act prudently, rationaly, unarbitrarily. Too often it seems that the university itself abuses its privileged status. Autonomy, of course, does not grant a bianco authorization for unconstitutional behaviour.The article deals primarily with the question of when and why state's funding policy, or its change, can constitute unconstitutional behaviour. The legal status of university as a public institute is also questioned.The Slovenian Constitution provides for autonomy of universities. Foremost this is a negative status right, allowing universities to decide freely on their organization and functioning. But it is also a positive status right, commiting the state to provide for universities basic organizational framework. State's primary constitutional obligation is to ensure universities’ formation as a legal entity. This obligation encompasses the duty to provide material conditions for the autonomous functioning of the university. The state is obliged not only to regulate what it must, but also what it can be reasonably expected of it. However, it seems that the status of universities as public institutions is unconstitutional, since it enables the state to directly influence their organization and functioning. The state may and must regulate university's functioning only insofar as it is necessary to protect basic constitutional principles, rights and the public interest.The Constitution provides that the manner of university's funding shall be regulated by statute. However, it also states that the manner in which human rights are exercised may be regulated by a statute where this is necessary due to the particular nature of an individual right. A strict and accurate control of state's funding policy must therefore be implemented. Even more so when funding is regulated by substatutory regulations. If these regulations determine rights and obligations anew, they may be regarded as unconstitutional. Also, if the state adopts such a policy of funding that without convincing and well-founded reasons discriminates one (or some) universities in comparison to others, such action may be considered as unconstitutional as well.The Constitutional provision establishing universities autonomy is perhaps the most unambiguous of them all. It clearly demands that the university be autonomous. Any statutory regulation of universities funding must be conducted within constitutionally permissible boundaries. Substatutory regulations may not limit or reduce constitutionally or statutory guaranteed rights nor may they expand or aggravate responsibilities. Constitutionally, it seems that 'lump-sum' funding would be most appropriate. Complete freedom of internal alocation of funds seems to be the cornerstone of universities autonomy.The basic premise for determining the relationship between the state and the university must be the realisation that it is an objective task of the state to provide for freedom of scientific endeavour. However, it is also clear that the constitution forbids for the question of university's autonomy to become one of positive law.The Constitutional Court has so far formulated additional and important principles of state's responsibility for financing of the universities. The Courts decision in U-I-68/98 stipulates that the state is required to prevent the endangerment of public schooling programs because of lack of funds. It must not itself create such a danger by changing the policy or the scope of public schooling funding. The state is also required to provide public funds in accordance with the principles of equality and nondiscrimination. Considering specific circumstances under which different universities function, it would also be unconstitutional if state's policy, without well-founded and convincing reasons, indirectly discriminated one or some of them. Such action may consequently infringe the constitutional right of education and schooling. Although the state is compelled to establish a single system of higher education, this may not be done in a way that improves or impairs the status of one or more universities. If the manner of university's state funding is suddenly, sistemically inadequately and uncompellingly altered to the extent that it signicifantly hardens or even disables its existence, such action may constitute an unfounded intervention into legitimate expectations of universities with regards to conservation and development of specific programs.The article also examines Constitutional Courts decision in which the Court, in assessing the state's obligation of funding the public radiotelevison company, created criteria that is indirectly applicable to the issue of university's autonomy, its right of public funding, freedom of scientific and artistic endeavour and the right of schooling. Statutory principles and criteria as determined by the legislator regarding the state's role in financing the public radiotelevision company, are even more valid when it comes to the state's role in financing universities. The state is obliged to provide for legal independence of the university and to enable it to freely and effectively exercise its social role and tasks

The 2nd Workshop on Maritime Computer Vision (MaCVi) 2024

The 2nd Workshop on Maritime Computer Vision (MaCVi) 2024 addresses maritime computer vision for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) and Unmanned Surface Vehicles (USV). Three challenges categories are considered: (i) UAV-based Maritime Object Tracking with Re-identification, (ii) USV-based Maritime Obstacle Segmentation and Detection, (iii) USV-based Maritime Boat Tracking. The USV-based Maritime Obstacle Segmentation and Detection features three sub-challenges, including a new embedded challenge addressing efficicent inference on real-world embedded devices. This report offers a comprehensive overview of the findings from the challenges. We provide both statistical and qualitative analyses, evaluating trends from over 195 submissions. All datasets, evaluation code, and the leaderboard are available to the public at https://macvi.org/workshop/macvi24.Comment: Part of 2nd Workshop on Maritime Computer Vision (MaCVi) 2024 IEEE Xplore submission as part of WACV 202

Gručenje časovnih vrst meritev pametnih merilnih naprav

In this thesis we provide a compact review of 8 time series representations in combination with 2 clustering algorithms and 2 indices for internal clustering validation. We analyse time series measured by smart meter devices and check how their representations affect clustering. We conclude that no representation can be directly used for the task and that more focus should be put on preprocessing. Additionally, we compare representations and 4 similarity measures on simulated time series. We find out that similarity measures outperform representations in most cases and that a variational autoencoder-based representation works the best for simulated time series.V diplomskem delu povzamemo 8 predstavitev časovnih vrst v kombinaciji z 2 algoritmoma za gručenje in 2 indeksoma za interno validacijo gručenja. Eksperimentalno preverimo vpliv predstavitev časovnih vrst na gručenje podatkov, ki so jih izmerile pametne merilne naprave. Ugotovimo, da nobena izmed predstavitev ni takoj in neposredno uporabna, in da se je bolj pomembno osredotočiti na predprocesiranje. Uporabnost predstavitev časovnih vrst v gručenju preverimo tudi na umetnih podatkih. Rezultate primerjamo z gručenjem celih časovnih vrst, kjer uporabimo 4 različne mere podobnosti. Ugotovimo, da so mere podobnosti v večini primerov boljše, najbolje pa se obnese predstavitev, ki temelji na variacijskem avtokodirniku

Hitra detekcija vodnih ovir za avtonomna plovila z upoštevanjem omejitev strojne opreme

Precise detection of obstacles is needed for the successful navigation of autonomous vessels. Recent approaches use semantic segmentation to better generalize to unknown scenarios. However, the majority do not consider computational complexity and constraints, which makes proposed architectures undeployable on edge VPUs. In this thesis, we develop a novel architecture based on state-of-the-art water segmentation and refinement network WaSR. We explore various encoders and decoder modifications to propose a novel architecture. Based on WaSR, TopFormer, designed for mobile semantic segmentation, and an abstracted transformer architecture MetaFormer, for which we propose previously unused token mixers, we introduce WaSRFormer. It uses a TopFormer-like decoder with MetaFormers for speedup and good practices from WaSR to deal with diverse water features. On challenging MODS benchmark, WaSRFormer achieves 92.98% and 86.27% F1 score overall and inside the danger zone, respectively, with only 0.51% and 0.25% drop in F1 score compared to WaSR. On a modern laptop GPU it runs more than 10x faster (115.45 FPS) than WaSR (10.94 FPS). To emphasize the practical contribution, we deploy WaSRFormer on the embedded low-power hardware OAK-D. While WaSR cannot even fit into this hardware, WaSRFormer comfortably runs at 5.45 FPS.Natačna detekcija ovir je pomembna za uspešno navigacijo avtonomnih plovil. Nedavna dela uporabljajo semantično segmentacijo za boljšo generalizacijo na še ne videnih primerih. Vendar večina predlaganih metod ne upošteva računskih zahtevnosti in omejitev, zaradi česar je modele nemogoče pognati na robnih napravah z vgrajenim VPU. V tem delu razvijemo novo arhitekturo osnovano na najsodobnješi arhitekturi za segmentacijo vodnih ovir, WaSR, in dodatno raziščemo številne kodirnike in modifikacije dekodirnikov. Na podlagi WaSR, TopFormerja, narejenega za hitro semantično segmentacijo, in abstrakcije transformerjev MetaFormerja, za katerega predlagamo še neuporabljene mešalnike žetonov, predstavimo WaSRFormer. Le-ta uporablja dekodirnik osnovan na TopFormerju, v katerega za pospešitev vgradimo MetaFormerje, dodatno pa uporabimo dobre prakse iz WaSR za obdelovanje raznolikih značilk vode. Na zahtevni množici MODS, WaSRFormer doseže 92.98% in 86.27% F1 gledano v celoti in znotraj nevarnega območja. V primerjavi z WaSR je to le 0.51% in 0.25% slabši F1. Na modernem GPU je WaSRFormer več kot 10x hitrejši (115.45 FPS) kot WaSR (10.94 FPS). Da poudarimo praktični prispevek, WaSRFormer poženemo na robni napravi OAK-D z nizko porabo energije. Medtem ko WaSR sploh ni mogoče pognati, WaSRFormer doseže 5.45 FPS

eWaSR—An Embedded-Compute-Ready Maritime Obstacle Detection Network

Maritime obstacle detection is critical for safe navigation of autonomous surface vehicles (ASVs). While the accuracy of image-based detection methods has advanced substantially, their computational and memory requirements prohibit deployment on embedded devices. In this paper, we analyze the current best-performing maritime obstacle detection network, WaSR. Based on the analysis, we then propose replacements for the most computationally intensive stages and propose its embedded-compute-ready variant, eWaSR. In particular, the new design follows the most recent advancements of transformer-based lightweight networks. eWaSR achieves comparable detection results to state-of-the-art WaSR with only a 0.52% F1 score performance drop and outperforms other state-of-the-art embedded-ready architectures by over 9.74% in F1 score. On a standard GPU, eWaSR runs 10× faster than the original WaSR (115 FPS vs. 11 FPS). Tests on a real embedded sensor OAK-D show that, while WaSR cannot run due to memory restrictions, eWaSR runs comfortably at 5.5 FPS. This makes eWaSR the first practical embedded-compute-ready maritime obstacle detection network. The source code and trained eWaSR models are publicly available

Razlaganje in uklonljivost pravnih norm

V tej številki so obavljeni članki in razprave v slovenščini, nemščini, italijanščini in francoščini. Prispevali so jih avtorji iz Nemčije, Italije in Francije ter avtorji in prevajalci iz Slovenije. In dieser Ausgabe gibt es Artikel in Slowenisch, Deutsch, Italienisch und Französisch. In questo numero vi sono contribuzioni in sloveno, tedesco, italiano e francese. Ce numéro accueille des contributions en slovène, allemand, italien et français, écrits par des auteurs slovènes, allemands, italien et français. Les articles disposent tous d'une version slovène. In this issue, there are papers in Slovenian, German, Italian and French, written by authors from Germany, Italy and France, as well as by authors and translators from Slovenia