Towards a Formal Notion of Interaction Pattern

Proceedings of: IEEE Symposium on Visual Languages and Human-Centric Computing (VL/HCC 2010). Leganés-Madrid, Spain 21-25 Septemeber 2010.While interaction patterns are becoming widespread in the field of interface design, their definitions do not enjoy a common standard yet, as is for software patterns. Moreover, patterns are developed for diverse design aspects, reflecting the complexity of the field. As a consequence, research on formalization of interaction patterns is not developed, and few attempts have been made to extend techniques developed for design pattern formalization. We show here how an extension to our recent approach to pattern formalization can be usefully employed to formalize some classes of interaction patterns, to express relations among them, and to detect conflicts.Work funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through mobility grants JC2009-00015 and PR2009-0019, project TIN2008-02081 (METEORIC) and the R&D programme of the Madrid Community, project S2009/TIC-1650 (e-Madrid).Publicad

Action patterns for the incremental specification of the execution semantics of visual languages

Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works. P. Bottoni, J. de Lara, and E. Guerra, "Action Patterns for the Incremental Specification of the Execution Semantics of Visual Languages", IEEE Symposium on Visual Languages and Human-Centric Computing, 2007. VL/HCC 2007,Coeur d'Alene, ID, 2007, pp. 163-170We present a new approach - based on graph transformation - to incremental specification of the operational (execution) semantics of visual languages. The approach combines editing rules with two meta-models: one to define the concrete syntax and one for the static semantics. We introduce the notion of action patterns, defining basic actions (e.g. consuming or producing a token in transition-based semantics), in a way similar to graph transformation rules. The application of action patterns to a static semantics editing rule produces a meta-rule, to be paired with the firing of the corresponding syntactic rule to incrementally build an execution rule. An execution rule is thus tailored to any active element (e.g. a transition in a Petri net model) in the model. Examples from Petri nets, state automata and workflow languages illustrate these ideas.Work sponsored by the EC with contract HPRN-CT-2002-00275, SegraVis, and the Spanish Ministry of Science and Education, projects MD2 (TIC200303654) and MOSAIC (TSI2005-08225-C07-06

Action patterns for the incremental specification of the execution semantics of visual languages

Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works. P. Bottoni, J. de Lara, and E. Guerra, "Action Patterns for the Incremental Specification of the Execution Semantics of Visual Languages", IEEE Symposium on Visual Languages and Human-Centric Computing, 2007. VL/HCC 2007,Coeur d'Alene, ID, 2007, pp. 163-170We present a new approach - based on graph transformation - to incremental specification of the operational (execution) semantics of visual languages. The approach combines editing rules with two meta-models: one to define the concrete syntax and one for the static semantics. We introduce the notion of action patterns, defining basic actions (e.g. consuming or producing a token in transition-based semantics), in a way similar to graph transformation rules. The application of action patterns to a static semantics editing rule produces a meta-rule, to be paired with the firing of the corresponding syntactic rule to incrementally build an execution rule. An execution rule is thus tailored to any active element (e.g. a transition in a Petri net model) in the model. Examples from Petri nets, state automata and workflow languages illustrate these ideas.Work sponsored by the EC with contract HPRN-CT-2002-00275, SegraVis, and the Spanish Ministry of Science and Education, projects MD2 (TIC200303654) and MOSAIC (TSI2005-08225-C07-06

Evolution of constrained layer damping using a cellular automaton algorithm

Constrained layer damping (CLD) is a highly effective passive vibration control strategy if optimized adequately. Factors controlling CLD performance are well documented for the flexural modes of beams but not for more complicated mode shapes or structures. The current paper introduces an approach that is suitable for locating CLD on any type of structure. It follows the cellular automaton (CA) principle and relies on the use of finite element models to describe the vibration properties of the structure. The ability of the algorithm to reach the best solution is demonstrated by applying it to the bending and torsion modes of a plate. Configurations that give the most weight-efficient coverage for each type of mode are first obtained by adapting the existing 'optimum length' principle used for treated beams. Next, a CA algorithm is developed, which grows CLD patches one at a time on the surface of the plate according to a simple set of rules. The effectiveness of the algorithm is then assessed by comparing the generated configurations with the known optimum ones

Field Dependence of the Superconducting Basal Plane Anisotropy of TmNi2B2C

The superconductor TmNi2B2C possesses a significant four-fold basal plane anisotropy, leading to a square Vortex Lattice (VL) at intermediate fields. However, unlike other members of the borocarbide superconductors, the anisotropy in TmNi2B2C appears to decrease with increasing field, evident by a reentrance of the square VL phase. We have used Small Angle Neutron Scattering measurements of the VL to study the field dependence of the anisotropy. Our results provide a direct, quantitative measurement of the decreasing anisotropy. We attribute this reduction of the basal plane anisotropy to the strong Pauli paramagnetic effects observed in TmNi2B2C and the resulting expansion of vortex cores near Hc2.Comment: 8 pages, 6 figures, 1 tabl

L-systems in Geometric Modeling

We show that parametric context-sensitive L-systems with affine geometry interpretation provide a succinct description of some of the most fundamental algorithms of geometric modeling of curves. Examples include the Lane-Riesenfeld algorithm for generating B-splines, the de Casteljau algorithm for generating Bezier curves, and their extensions to rational curves. Our results generalize the previously reported geometric-modeling applications of L-systems, which were limited to subdivision curves.Comment: In Proceedings DCFS 2010, arXiv:1008.127

Asymptotic properties of entanglement polytopes for large number of qubits

Entanglement polytopes have been recently proposed as the way of witnessing the SLOCC multipartite entanglement classes using single particle information. We present first asymptotic results concerning feasibility of this approach for large number of qubits. In particular we show that entanglement polytopes of $L$-qubit system accumulate in the distance $\frac{1}{2\sqrt{L}}$ from the point corresponding to the maximally mixed reduced one-qubit density matrices. This implies existence of a possibly large region where many entanglement polytopes overlap, i.e where the witnessing power of entanglement polytopes is weak. Moreover, the witnessing power cannot be strengthened by any entanglement distillation protocol as for large $L$ the required purity is above current capability.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure