La virtualisation de réseau permet de créer des réseaux logiques, dits virtuels sur un réseau physique partagé dit substrat. Pour ce faire, le problème d’allocation des ressources aux réseaux virtuels doit être résolu efficacement. Appelé VNE (Virtual Network Embedding), ce problème consiste à faire correspondre à chaque nœud virtuel un nœud substrat d’un côté, et de l’autre, à tout lien virtuel un ou plusieurs chemins substrat, de manière à optimiser un objectif tout en satisfaisant un ensemble de contraintes. Les ressources de calcul des nœuds et les ressources de bande passante des liens sont souvent optimisées dans un seul réseau substrat. Dans le contexte multi-domaine où la connaissance de l’information de routage est incomplète, l’optimisation des ressources de nœuds et de liens est difficile et souvent impossible à atteindre. Par ailleurs, pour assurer la continuité de service même après une panne, le VNE doit être réalisé de manière à faire face aux pannes. Dans cette thèse, nous étudions le problème d’allocation de ressources (VNE) sous diverses exigences. Pour offrir la virtualisation dans le contexte de réseau substrat multi-domaines, nous proposons une méthode de mappage conjoint des liens inter-domaines et intra-domaines. Avec une information réduite et limitées annoncées par les domaines, notre méthode est capable de mapper simultanément les liens intra-domaines et les liens inter-domaines afin d’optimiser les ressources. De plus, pour améliorer la robustesse des réseaux virtuels, nous proposons un algorithme d’évitement des pannes qui minimise la probabilité de panne des réseaux virtuels. Des solutions exactes et heuristiques sont proposées et détaillées pour des liens à bande passante infinie ou limitée. En outre, nous combinons l’algorithme d’évitement des pannes avec la protection pour proposer un VNE robuste et résistant aux pannes. Avec cette nouvelle approche, les liens protégeables puis les liens les moins vulnérables sont prioritairement sélectionnés pour le mappage des liens. Pour déterminer les liens protégeables, nous proposons une heuristique qui utilise l’algorithme du maxflow afin de vérifier etdedéterminerlesliensprotégeablesàl’étapedumappagedesliensprimaires. Encasd’insuffisance de ressources pour protéger tous les liens primaires, notre approche sélectionne les liens réduisant la probabilité de panne. / Network virtualization allows to create logical or virtual networks on top of a shared physical or substrate network. The resource allocation problem is an important issue in network virtualization. It corresponds to a well known problem called virtual network embedding (VNE). VNE consists in mapping each virtual node to one substrate node and each virtual link to one or several substrate paths in a way that the objective is optimized and the constraints verified. The objective often corresponds to the optimization of the node computational resources and link bandwidth whereas the constraints generally include geographic location of nodes, CPU, bandwidth, etc. In the multi-domain context where the knowledge of routing information is incomplete, the optimization of node and link resources are difficult and often impossible to achieve. Moreover, to ensure service continuity even upon failure, VNE should cope with failures by selecting the best and resilient mappings. Inthisthesis,westudytheVNEresourceallocationproblemunderdifferentrequirements. To embed a virtual network on multi-domain substrate network, we propose a joint peering and intra domain link mapping method. With reduced and limited information disclosed by the domains, our downsizing algorithm maps the intra domain and peering links in the same stage so that the resource utilization is optimized. To enhance the reliability of virtual networks, we propose a failure avoidance approach that minimizes the failure probability of virtual networks. Exact and heuristic solutions are proposed and detailed for the infinite and limited bandwidth link models. Moreover, we combine the failure avoidance with the failure protection in our novel protection-level-aware survivable VNE in order to improve the reliability. With this last approach, the protectable then the less vulnerable links are first selected for link mapping. To determine the protectable links, we propose a maxflow based heuristic that checks for the existence of backup paths during the primary mapping stage. In case of insufficient backup resources, the failure probability is reduced.

Adolescence marks a vulnerable developmental period for health behavior, and research demonstrates that social context and interpersonal relationships impact the health behavior choices of adolescents. In addition, theories of adolescent development suggest a bidirectional relationship between environmental factors, including social relationships, and health. Friendships are one of the most salient relationships during adolescence, and new methods from the field of social network analysis allow researchers to explicitly examine the mechanisms through which friends influence health behavior, and simultaneously, how health and health behavior impacts the formation of friendships. Importantly, social network methods (e.g., stochastic actor-based models, exponential random graph models) overcome statistical limitations of alternative methodology. For example, methods from social network analysis incorporate interdependencies between individuals in a social network (e.g., adolescents within a school) into the statistical modeling framework, and are capable of simultaneously estimating social and behavioral outcomes. Through a sequence of three distinct studies, this project applies rigorous methods from social network analysis to investigate: (1) the differential impact of adolescent friendships on health-risk (e.g., alcohol use) and health-protective (e.g., physical activity) behaviors; (2) the role of perceived social acceptability and peer influence in shaping adolescent cigarette use; and (3) the social consequences, including social withdrawal and social marginalization, of adolescents with chronic illness.

Using multi-agent systems to execute a variety of missions such as environmental monitoring and target tracking has been made possible by the advances in control techniques and computational capabilities. Communication abilities between agents allow them to coact and execute several coordinated missions, among which there is optimal coverage. The optimal coverage problem has several applications in engineering theory and practice, as for example in environmental monitoring, which belongs to the broad class of resource allocation problems, in which a finite number of mobile agents have to be deployed in a given spatial region with the assignment of a sub-region to each agents with respect to a suitable coverage metric. The coverage metric encodes the sensing performance of individual agent with respect to points inside the domain of interest, and a distribution of risk density. Usually the risk density function measures the relative importance assigned to inner regions. The optimal coverage problem in which the risk density is time-invariant has been widely studied in previous research. The solution to this class of problems is centroidal Voronoi tessellation, in which each agent is located on the centroid of the related Voronoi cell. However, there are many scenarios that require to be modelled by time-varying risk density rather than time-invariant one, as for example in area coverage problems where the environment evolves independently of the evolution for the robotic agents deployed to cover the area. In this work, the changing environment is modeled by a time-varying density function which is governed by a convection-diffusion equation. Mixed boundary conditions are considered to model a scenario in which a diffusive substance (e.g., oil from a leaking event or radioactive material from a nuclear accident) enters the area with convective component from the boundary. A non-autonomous feed- back law is employed whose generated trajectories maximize the coverage metric. The asymptotic stability of the multi-agent system is proven by using Barbalat’s lemma, and then theoretical predictions are illustrated by several simulations that represent idealized scenarios.

PBNM systems have been proposed as a feasible techology for managing massive scale applications including telecommunication service management. What is not known is how this class of system performs under carrier-scale traffic loads. This research investigates this open question and concludes, subject to the considerations herein, this technology can provide services to large scale applications. An in depth examination of several inferencing algorithms is made using experimental methods. The inferencing operation has been implicated as the major source of performance problems in rule based systems and we examine this. Moreover, these algorithms are of central importance to current and future context-aware, pervasive, mobile services. A novel algorithm, JukeBox, is proposed that is a correct, general and pure bindspace conjunctive match algorithm. It is compared to the current state of the art algorithm - Rete. We find that Rete is the superior algorithm when implemented using the hashed-equality variant. We also conclude that IO is an important cause of PBNM system performace limitations and is perhaps of more significance than the implicated inferencing operations. However, inferencing can be a bottleneck to performance and we document the factors associated with this. We describe a generally useful policy system benchmarking procedure that provides a visible, repeatable and measurable process for establishing a policy server's service rate characteristics. The service rate statistics, namely (mu) and (sigma), establish the limitations to policy system throughput. Combined with the offered traffic load to the server, using the statistic (lambda), we can provide a complete characterisation of system performance using the Pollaczek-Khinchine function. This characterisation allows us to make simple design and dimensioning heuristics that can be used to rate the policy system as a whole.

Thesis (M.S.)--Oregon Graduate Center, 1988.

Thesis (M. A.)--University of Hong Kong, 2007. / Title proper from title frame. Also available in printed format.

<p><strong>Date: </strong>23^rd November, 2009</p><p> </p><p><strong>Level: </strong>Master Thesis in International Business and Entrepreneurship (EFO705), 15 credits</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Authors: </strong>Karakawat Sarasalin (830117-T255)    Thitiporn Watthanachai (831031-T124)</p><p>ksn08001@student.mdh.se                       twi08001@student.mdh.se</p><p>Title: The internationalization process of Red Bull from the perspectives of global expansion</p><p><strong>Supervisor: </strong>Jean-Charles Languilaire</p><p><strong>Problem</strong><strong> </strong><strong>Statement</strong><strong>: </strong>How did RED BULL manage to be as an important central international market player?</p><p><strong>Purpose: </strong>The purpose of this research is to describe the internationalization process of Red Bull; how Red Bull created, sustained and developed?</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Method: </strong>We mainly use secondary data and the qualitative data. Qualitative data in the form of interview questions through e-mailing. But we also use quantitative method based on documental research from books and internet.</p><p> </p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>Red Bull does not follow the standard pattern of establishment chain presented in the Uppsala model. Its establishment chain is composed of three stages: licensing ,wholly owned sales subsidiaries and jointed venture. Red Bull has developed strong market within the beverage industry network and strong bonds with its external suppliers. The expansion decisions of Red Bull have been influenced by the factors. Red Bull developed in the European market, we found that it careful consideration about both internal and external factors, Red Bull usually prefers to conquer a new market with a relevant low risk entry mode.</p><p><strong>Keywords: </strong>Red Bull, internationalization, network, factors</p>

<p>Due to the globalization trend, the internationalization of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) has become a common practice in the last decades. The previous literature suggested that there are many different determinants of the internationalization process. However, in this research study, we focused on only three determinants – institutions, networks, and entrepreneur and their influence on the internationalization process. More specifically, we identified the significance of the three determinants and tested their influence on the internationalization process and compared the similarities and differences between the SMEs in Sweden and China. </p><p>A qualitative study was carried out to help determine the purpose of the paper, where data was collected through four case studies – two from each country, within the toy industry. The primary data was collected through personal phone-interviews with the CEOs of the four toy companies, complemented with secondary data collected from the companies’ web sites. </p><p>The empirical findings and analysis brought some interesting conclusions. The three determinants – institutions, networks and entrepreneur influence the internationalization process in one way or another. Firstly, institutions influence both networks and entrepreneur, but there is no evidence showing that networks and entrepreneur influence institutions. The institutions are also the key determinants of the internationalization process of Chinese SMEs. Secondly, networks and entrepreneur are interrelated to each other and play a key role in the internationalization process of Swedish SMEs, and somewhat influence the Chinese SMEs as well. </p><p>Thus, these three determinants are extremely important for the internationalization process and they have to be taken into consideration during the international expansion.</p>

This paper discusses current network technologies and protocols and presents a simulation study of the most common networking protocol used today, TCP/IP. The TCP/IP protocol stack has many inherent problems that will be shown through this simulation study. Using the SimpleScalar Toolset, the significance of the data copying and checksumming performed in TCP/IP will be shown along with the architecture needed to support the processing of TCP/IP. Solutions for these TCP/IP pitfalls including a zero-copy protocol and a design for an intelligent network interface card will also be presented. / Graduation date: 2000

Poggio and Vetter (1992) showed that learning one view of a bilaterally symmetric object could be sufficient for its recognition, if this view allows the computation of a symmetric, "virtual," view. Faces are roughly bilaterally symmetric objects. Learning a side-view--which always has a symmetric view--should allow for better generalization performances than learning the frontal view. Two psychophysical experiments tested these predictions. Stimuli were views of shaded 3D models of laser-scanned faces. The first experiment tested whether a particular view of a face was canonical. The second experiment tested which single views of a face give rise to best generalization performances. The results were compatible with the symmetry hypothesis: Learning a side view allowed better generalization performances than learning the frontal view.