Adding Syntax Parameters to the Sweet.JS Macro Library for JavaScript

Lisp and Scheme have demonstrated the power of macros to enable programmers to evolve and craft languages. A macro is a rule or pattern that specifies how a certain input sequence should be mapped to an output sequence according to some defined procedure. Using a macro system a programmer can introduce new syntactic elements to the programming language. Macros found in a program are expanded by a macro expander and allow a programmer to enable code reuse. Mozilla Sweet.JS provides a way for developers to enrich their JavaScript code by adding new syntax to the language through the use of macros. Sweet.JS provides the possibility to define hygienic macros inspired by Scheme. “In this paper, I present the implementation of a “syntax parameter” feature for the Sweet.JS library. A syntax parameter is a mechanism for rebinding a macro defi- nition within the dynamic context of a macro expansions thereby introducing implicit identifiers in a hygienic fashion. Some time hygienic macro bindings are insufficient such as with “anaphoric conditionals where the value of the tested expression is avail- able as an it binding. With syntax parameters, instead of introducing the binding unhygienically each time, we instead create one binding for the keyword, which we can then adjust later when we want the keyword to have a different meaning. As no new bindings are introduced hygiene is preserved

Hybrid Similarity Function for Big Data Entity Matching with R-Swoosh

Entity Matching (EM) is the problem of determining if two entities in a data set refer to the same real-world object. For example, it decides if two given mentions in the data, such as “Helen Hunt” and “H. M. Hunt”, refer to the same real-world entity by using different similarity functions. This problem plays a key role in information integration, natural language understanding, information processing on the World-Wide Web, and on the emerging Semantic Web. This project deals with the similarity functions and thresholds utilized in them to determine the similarity of the entities. The work contains two major parts: implementation of a hybrid similarity function, which contains three different similarity functions to determine the similarity of entities, and an efficient method to determine the optimum threshold value for similarity functions to get accurate results

Household responses to adverse income shocks: Pensioner out-migration and mortality in South Africa

How do poor households respond to the cessation of cash transfers in developing countries? South Africa's generous social pension system results in most of the poor elderly being the primary 'breadwinner' in the household. I estimate the magnitude of the changes in household composition and labour force activity amongst the resident members of the household, that correlate with a pensioner leaving the household. I use nationally representative matched panel data from several waves of the South African Labour Force Surveys. Compositional changes include the out-migration of school-aged children, and in-migration of middle aged females and older adults of either gender. More than 1 in 4 losing households get an additional older adult. For people who maintain their residency status across waves, I nd large and statistically signi cant increases in employment rates for middle aged females and males (9.3 and 8.1 percentage points in each case), as well as for older adult females and males (10.3 percentage points in each case). For middle aged adults, this is not accompanied by a corresponding increase in labour supply.

Subjective Experiences of Space and Time: Self, Sensation, and Phenomenal Time

The investigation of subjective experiences (SEs) of space and time is at the core of consciousness research. The term ‘space’ includes the subject and objects. The SE of subject, I-ness, is defined as ‘Self’. The SEs of objects, subject’s external body, and subject’s internal states such as feelings, thoughts, and so on can be investigated using the proto-experience (PE)-SE framework. The SE of time is defined as ‘phenomenal time’ (which includes past, present and future) and the SE of space as ‘phenomenal space’. The three non-experiential materialistic models are as follows: (I) The quantum-dissipation model [25] can connect the discrete neural signals to classical electromagnetic field to ‘quantum field theory and chaos theory’ for explaining memory. (II) The soliton-catalytic model [8] hypothesizes that all living processes including micro- and macro-processes can be explained by catalysis process. (III) The ‘sensation from evolution of action’ model [13] proposes that SEs are internalized during evolution. All these models can address to some extent the function of structures, such as perception. They cannot address explanatory gap. The complementary experiential PE-SE framework [37] addresses this psycho-physical gap and elucidates the SEs of space and time

Eight Things you should Know about Open Source Integrated Library Systems.

Open source library management systems are free alternative to costly commercial library systems. It helps to automate library functions and give a tremendous savings on library automation expenses. User ’s participation in all stages of software project ensures the development of the features that the library really wants. Lack of awareness and knowledge in open source technology among library professionals restrict wide adoption of open source library management system. This article gives an insight into the use and maintenance of open source library management systems

On The Economics oF Organized Crime

The core function of organized crime is the selling of protection. Protection can be real, against third-party crime, or manufactured by the organized crime groups themselves. Mafias and gangs emerge in areas of weak state control, because of prohibition and geographic, ethnic, or social isolation. Although competition is considered good in economics, in the case of organized crime the predatory competition that is more likely to take place is harmful. The costs of organized crime include the resources expended on the activity, more ordinary productive and investment distortions, as well as other dynamic effects on occupational choice.Law and economics; Property rights; Governance

Measuring the impact of Educational Interventions on the Academic Performance of Academic Development Students in Second-Year Microeconomics

This paper analyses the impact of educational interventions made in the first- and second-year microeconomics courses on academic development students’ final mark in the second-year course. It also addresses issues of methodology, specification, and statistical analysis with respect to other studies in the field. The results suggest that the educational interventions in the first-year had a positive impact on the academic performance of the academic development cohort, relative to the mainstream cohort for the first period (2000-2002). The results also suggest that the educational interventions introduced in the second period (2003-2005), in the form of voluntary workshops for the academic development cohort, also improved the academic performance of this cohort relative to that of mainstream students.