Online Paging with a Vanishing Regret

This paper considers a variant of the online paging problem, where the online algorithm has access to multiple predictors, each producing a sequence of predictions for the page arrival times. The predictors may have occasional prediction errors and it is assumed that at least one of them makes a sublinear number of prediction errors in total. Our main result states that this assumption suffices for the design of a randomized online algorithm whose time-average regret with respect to the optimal offline algorithm tends to zero as the time tends to infinity. This holds (with different regret bounds) for both the full information access model, where in each round, the online algorithm gets the predictions of all predictors, and the bandit access model, where in each round, the online algorithm queries a single predictor. While online algorithms that exploit inaccurate predictions have been a topic of growing interest in the last few years, to the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper that studies this topic in the context of multiple predictors for an online problem with unbounded request sequences. Moreover, to the best of our knowledge, this is also the first paper that aims for (and achieves) online algorithms with a vanishing regret for a classic online problem under reasonable assumptions

Toward an Interactive Directory for Norfolk, Nebraska: 1899-1900

We describe steps toward an interactive directory for the town of Norfolk, Nebraska for the years 1899 and 1900. This directory would extend the traditional city directory by including a wider range of entities being described, much richer information about the entities mentioned and linkages to mentions of the entities in material such as digitized historical newspapers. Such a directory would be useful to readers who browse the historical newspapers by providing structured summaries of the entities mentioned. We describe the occurrence of entities in two years of the Norfolk Weekly News, focusing on several individuals to better understand the types of information which can be gleaned from historical newspapers and other historical materials. We also describe a prototype program which coordinates information about entities from the traditional city directories, the federal census, and from newspapers. We discuss the structured coding for these entities, noting that richer coding would increasingly include descriptions of events and scenarios. We propose that rich content about individuals and communities could eventually be modeled with agents and woven into historical narratives

Consumers' Preferences for GM Food and Voluntary Information Acquisition: A Simultaneous Choice Analysis

Previous research studies directed at the influence of information on consumers' preferences and choices of food in the context of genetically modified (GM) food assume that information is exogenous, in that this is provided to consumers from external sources. Information made available to consumers is also typically treated as being received and processed. Other literature and observation suggests that these two features tend not to apply in practice. Using data from a choice experiment on consumers' choices for genetically modified food in which respondents were able to voluntarily access information, this study allows information to be endogenous; consumers' product choices and information access decisions are examined within a simultaneous choice framework. We find that these two types of decisions are related, but not entirely as might be expected from the existing agricultural economics literature since those with more negative attitudes toward GM food were most likely to access information made available. Our results are consistent with research findings in the social psychology literature. There is heterogeneity across consumers in the relationship between information access and consumer choices which may reflect differentiation in attitudes to GM food.Genetically modified food, information search, multinomial logit models, simultaneous modeling., Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies, Q13, Q18, C8,

Environmental Information: Issues of Access, Policy and Information Resources Management

This thesis investigates access to information and presents a summative evaluation of a government information access policy. The primary aim of this research is to build upon the theoretical approaches already employed within the field of information policy, to develop a new analytical model that can be used in the analysis of information access policies. This model will then be employed to examine the case study chosen for this research, which is the register for Integrated Pollution Control (IPC), which was set up by the UK government to give the public greater access to environmental information. This thesis is divided into three sections. The first examines both the background to access to environmental information and the particular case study employed in this research. It investigates the history of access to environmental information in the UK, charting the moves that have been made from secrecy towards greater openness. It then examines the Environmental Protection Act, 1990, which established the IPC registers, and investigates a number of issues which have effected the way in which environmental information is made available through the registers. In particular, it identifies policy implementation and information resources management (IRM) as having a dramatic effect on the success of this information access policy. Having identified an important link between information access, policy implementation and IRM in relation to the case study, the second section of this thesis then examines these relationships in greater detail. This second section is divided into two parts. The first examines the relationship between information access, policy implementation and IRM through a review of the literature, and goes onto develop an ‘information access model’, which can be used in the examination of information access policies. This model is then used to drive the case study analysis which is carried out in second part of this section. This case study analysis examines the implementation of the EPC registers firstly, by local authorities, where it identifies the existence of an underlying structure in the data set and secondly, by the Environment Agency, where the IPC registers can be seen to have been implemented in a far more uniform way. In part three of this thesis, the local authority and Environment Agency case study findings are then examined in light of the ‘information access model’. This analysis enables a number of different management styles to be identified and highlights four key areas, which could be seen to have resulted in the development of successful registers. These were the approach to the policy problem, the use of planning, the development of set procedures and control over the policy. Finally, the validity of the ‘information access model’, as a research framework, is examined. The ‘information access model’ is analysed in light of the empirical evidence gathered as part of this research and it is concluded, that this can be seen both as a useful investigative and evaluative tool for information policy research

Factors associated with cancer family history communication between African American men and their relatives

http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/117265/1/Cancer family history communicaton 2013 JMS.pdfDescription of Cancer family history communicaton 2013 JMS.pdf : Main articl

Vers une modélisation des pratiques d'accès à l'information

This study concerns information seeking and use models for professionals and their evolutions essentially, i.e. Information Access Practices. Coming from Anglo-Saxon literature, this new research trend evolves with the development of information science paradigms. So different information seeking and use models emerge in order to explain how professionals seek information and what can be done in order to help them. Two main categories can be distinguished: information seeking and use models versus the information retrieval models. So we will present today these models' diversity and we will evaluate them in order to see if a convergence is possible with the same vocabulary and procedures.Cette étude s'intéresse aux différents modèles de pratiques d'accès à l'information des professionnels, c'est-à-dire des pratiques de recherche et d'utilisation de l'information. Issus principalement de la littérature anglo-saxonne, ce courant de recherche a évolué au gré des paradigmes, et plusieurs modèles se sont développés progressivement pour expliquer les " pratiques informationnelles " des professionnels. Deux catégories de modèles sont ainsi apparues : les modèles " de pratiques d'accès " et les modèles de " recherche documentaire ". C'est cette diversité que nous allons présenter dans un premier temps, avant de les évaluer et de parler d'une convergence possible entre ces modèles d'accès à l'information, avec la présence d'un vocabulaire commun et des principes d'actions identiques

Evidence-Based Practice for Public Health Project: Final Report

There are numerous clinically based models for finding the “best evidence” for the diagnosis and treatment of disease. This process is called evidence-based medicine or EBM, which has been defined as the conscientious, explicit, and judicious use of current best evidence in making decisions about the care of individual patients. The practice of evidence-based medicine means integrating individual clinical expertise with the best available external clinical evidence from systematic research”.1 The need for improved access to high quality public health information has been echoed in various forums involving public health professionals, librarians, and information specialists since the mid 1990s.2-6 The information needs of the public health workforce have become all the more urgent with the increasing frequency of emergence of new infectious diseases such as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and avian influenza, as well as the increasing concern about acts of bioterrorism, such as spreading anthrax spores via the US Postal Service in 2001. A major difficulty in meeting these needs is the great breadth of the public health discipline that makes it difficult to identify and collect a body of evidence-based literature to address the growing multitude of specific public health information needs. The public health workforce may be more diverse than any other group of health professionals7 and includes professionals trained in dozens of disciplines,4, 6 ranging from environmental health to veterinary medicine, from sanitary engineering to epidemiology. Access to evidence-based public health information has become a growing concern for medical librarians. In 1997, the National Library of Medicine (NLM) along with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO), the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO), and other public health organizations formed the Partners in Information Access for the Public Health Workforce.8 The mission of Partners is to help the public health workforce find and use information effectively to improve and protect the public\u27s health. The Evidence-Based Practice for Public Health Project at the Lamar Soutter Library, University of Massachusetts Medical School, was initiated in 2001. At the start of this project there was little attention paid to best practices for population-based public health. The overall purpose of this project was to address the need for access to quality evidence-based public health information. In an effort to improve access to resources for evidence-based public health practice, the project has identified the knowledge domains of public health, public health journals and bibliographic databases, and evidence-based resources for public health practice. The project compared existing resources for locating, summarizing, synthesizing, and disseminating evidence-based information available to clinical medical practitioners with resources available to public health practitioners. We found that there were many more types of resources focused on clinical medical practice than on public health practice. The clinical medical resources were based on several different models of information search, summary, synthesis, and delivery, and some of most promising models had little or no presence in the public health arena. To explore and address this gap, the project sought to examine and classify the features of the clinical evidence-based medicine models, to assess their potential for improving access to evidence-based public health information, and to develop new models that could effectively address the unique needs of public health professionals. The project team undertook a qualitative study to determine the information needs of public health practitioners and to develop strategies to improve access to credible and relevant information. The study combined three objectives that previous investigators had generally pursued individually: (1) the characterization of information needs of public health practitioners, (2) the assessment of barriers to information access, and (3) the identification of typical information seeking behaviors. We have used the insights gained from the study to inform the construction of an extended classification of the types of information needed by public health professionals and of an information system model that could meet their needs for access to diverse credible sources

Deployment of Ahmadu Bello University Zaria, Nigeria Institutional Digital Repository

The paper discussed the concept of open access initiative and its relevance to the development of digital repositories. It primarily focused on the  institutional digital repository project of the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria. The University library administration setup, policy, equipment and facilities including software for the project were highlighted. The digitisation process, test running, training, system installation and the workflow developed by the institution were discussed. The successes recorded and challenges faced by the project were equally presented. The paper concluded that repositories are very important to universities in helping them showcase, manage and capture their intellectual assets as a part of their information service strategy and contribution to universal access to knowledge and information

Non-affiliated Users\u27 Access in Tennessee Academic Libraries

This survey was designed to ascertain how Tennessee public four-year academic libraries were addressing unaffiliated user access to services and resources and related security issues. At one point in time, resources and services were basically limited to the material on the shelf and the personnel employed by the library. Security issues were concerned with student pranks and vandalism and, depending upon location, the issue of vagrants and/or latchkey kids. Access to the building usually meant people had access to all of the material the library had on the shelf and the only question was whether an unaffiliated user could borrow materials