Thesis (Ph.D)--Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2010. / Committee Chair: Braun, Robert; Committee Member: Clarke, John-Paul; Committee Member: Russell, Ryan; Committee Member: Sims, Jon; Committee Member: Tsiotras, Panagiotis. Part of the SMARTech Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Collection.

When two computer systems communicate, for example over a network, they must agree on the ordering of bytes within numbers. This ordering is called endianess. Often one of the systems has to swap the order of bytes to the agreed standard. Results of this work help programmers to find places in their program where they forgot to swap the bytes. We have developed a dynamic data-flow analysis built upon the popular Valgrind tool. Compared to the static analysis currently used by the Linux kernel developers, our approach does not require annotation of variables with their endianess. Typically only few places in the program source code will need to be annotated. The analysis can also detect potential bugs that would only manifest if the program was run on computer with opposite endianess. Our approach has been validated on an existing program known to contain yet unfixed endianess problems (RadeonSI OpenGL driver). It has identified all endianess-related bugs and provided useful diagnostic messages together with their location.

This thesis will explore how customers and bartenders accomplish the service encounter in a public house, or bar. Whilst there is a body of existing literature on service encounters, this mainly investigates customer satisfaction and ignores the mundane activities that comprise the service encounter itself. In an attempt to fill this gap, I will examine how the activities unfold sequentially by examining the spoken and embodied conduct of the participants, over the course of the encounter. The data comprise audio -and video- recorded, dyadic and multi-party interactions between customer(s) and bartender(s), occurring at the bar counter. The data were analyzed using conversation analysis (CA) to investigate the talk and embodied conduct of participants, as these unfold sequentially. The first analytic chapter investigates how interactions between customers and bartenders are opened. The analysis reveals practices for communicating availability to enter into a service encounter; with customers being found to do this primarily through embodied conduct, and bartenders primarily through spoken turns. The second analytic chapter investigates the role of objects in the ordering sequence. Specifically, the analysis reveals how the Cash Till and the seating tables in the bar are mobilized by participants to accomplish action. In the third analytic chapter, multi-party interactions are investigated, focusing on the organization of turn-taking when two or more customers interact with one or more bartenders. Here, customers are found to engage in activities where they align as a unit, with a lead speaker, who interacts with the bartender on behalf of the party. In the final analytic chapter, the payment sequence of the service encounter is explored to investigate at what sequential position in the interaction payment, as an action, is oriented to. Analysis reveals that a wallet, purse, or bag, may be displayed and money or a payment card retrieved, in a variety of sequential slots, with each contributing differentially to the efficiency of the interaction. I also find that payment may be prematurely proffered due to the preference for efficiency. Overall, the thesis makes innovative contributions to our understanding of customer and bartender practices for accomplishing core activities in what members come to recognize as a service encounter It also contributes substantially to basic conversation analytic research on openings , which has traditionally been founded on telephone interactions, as well as the action of requesting. I enhance our knowledge of face-to-face opening practices, by revealing that the canonical opening sequence (see Schegloff, 1968; 1979; 1986) is not present, at least in this context. From the findings, I also develop our understanding of how objects constrain, or further, progressivity in interaction; while arguing for the importance of analysing the participants semiotic field in aggregate with talk and embodied conduct. The thesis also contributes to existing literature on multi-party interactions, identifying a new turn-taking practice with a directional flow that works effectively to accomplish ordering. Finally, I contribute to knowledge on the provision of payment, an under-researched yet prominent action in the service encounter. This thesis will show the applicability of CA to service providers; by analysing the talk and embodied conduct in aggregate, effective practices for accomplishing a successful service encounter are revealed.

Thesis (MScEng)--Stellenbosch University, 2003. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: AP230 of STEP is an application protocol for structural steel-framed buildings. Product data relating to steel structures is represented in a model that captures analysis, design and manufacturing views. The information requirements described in AP230 were analysed with the purpose of identifying a subset of entities that are essential for the description of simple industrial steel frames with the view to being able to describe the structural concept, and to perform the structural analysis and design of such structures. Having identified the essential entities, a relational database model for these entities was developed. Planning, analysis and design applications will use the database to collaboratively exchange data relating to the structure. The comprehensiveness of the database model was investigated by mapping a simple industrial frame to the database model. Access to the database is provided by a set of classes called the database representative classes. The data-representatives are instances that have the same selection identifiers and attributes as corresponding information units in the database. The datarepresentatives' primary tasks are to store themselves in the database and to retrieve their state from the database. A graphical user interface application, programmed in Java, used for the description of the structural concept with the capacity of storing the concept in the database and retrieving it again through the use of the database representative classes was also created as part of this project. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: AP230 van STEP is 'n toepassingsprotokol wat staal raamwerke beskryf. Die produkdata ter beskrywing van staal strukture word saamgevat in 'n model wat analise, ontwerp en vervaardigings oogmerke in aanmerking neem. Die informasie vereistes, soos beskryf in AP230, is geanaliseer om 'n subset van entiteite te identifiseer wat noodsaaklik is vir die beskrywing van 'n eenvoudige nywerheidsstruktuur om die strukturele konsep te beskryf en om die struktuur te analiseer en te ontwerp. Nadat die essensiële entiteite geïdentifiseer is, is 'n relasionele databasismodel van die entiteite geskep. Beplanning, analise en ontwerptoepassings maak van die databasis gebruik om kollaboratief data oor strukture uit te ruil. Die omvattenheid van die databasis-model is ondersoek deur 'n eenvoudige nywerheidsstruktuur daarop afte beeld. Toegang tot die databasis word verskaf deur 'n groep Java klasse wat bekend staan as die verteenwoordigende databasis klasse. Hierdie databasis-verteenwoordigers is instansies met dieselfde identifikasie eienskappe as die ooreenkomstige informasie eenhede in die databasis. Die hoofdoel van die databasis-verteenwoordigers is om hulself in die databasis te stoor asook om hul rang weer vanuit die databasis te verkry. 'n Grafiese gebruikerskoppelvlak, geprogrammeer in Java, is ontwikkel. Die koppelvlak word gebruik om die strukturele konsep te beskryf, dit te stoor na die databasis en om dit weer, met behulp van die databasis-verteenwoordigers, uit die databasis te haal.

No description available.

This research develops an equipment failure prognostics model to predict the equipment’s chance of survival, using LAD. LAD benefits from not relying on any statistical theory, which enables it to overcome the problems concerning the statistical properties of the datasets. Its main advantage is its straightforward process and self-explanatory results. Herein, our main objective is to develop models to calculate equipment’s survival probability at a certain future moment, using LAD. We employ the LAD’s pattern generation procedure. Then, we introduce a guideline to employ generated patterns to estimate the equipment’s survival probability. The models are applied on a condition monitoring dataset. Performance analysis reveals that they provide comprehensible results that are greatly beneficial to maintenance practitioners. Results are compared with PHM’s results. The comparison reveals that the LAD models compare favorably to the PHM. Since they are at their beginning phase, some future directions are presented to improve their performances.

No description available.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) patients are stratified by the Tumour, Node and Metastasis (TNM) staging system for clinical decision making. Additional genomic markers have a limited utility in some cases where precise targeted therapy may be available. Thus, classical clinical pathological staging remains the mainstay of the assessment of this disease. Surgical resection is generally considered curative for Stage II patients, however 20-30% of these patients experience disease recurrence and disease specific death. It is imperative to identify these high risk patients in order to assess if further treatment or detailed follow up could be beneficial to their overall survival. The aim of the thesis was to categorise Stage II CRC patients into high and low risk of disease specific death through novel image based analysis algorithms. Firstly, an image analysis algorithm was developed to quantify and assess the prognostic value of three histopathological features through immuno-fluorescence: lymphatic vessel density (LVD), lymphatic vessel invasion (LVI) and tumour budding (TB). Image analysis provides the ability to standardise their quantification and negates observer variability. All three histopathological features were found to be predictors of CRC specific death within the training set (n=50); TB (HR =5.7; 95% CI, 2.38-13.8), LVD (HR =5.1; 95% CI, 2.04-12.99) and LVI (HR =9.9; 95% CI, 3.57- 27.98). Only TB (HR=2.49; 95% CI, 1.03-5.99) and LVI (HR =2.46; 95%CI, 1 - 6.05), however, were significant predictors of disease specific death in the validation set (n=134). Image analysis was further employed to characterise TB and quantify intra-tumoural heterogeneity. Tumour subpopulations within CRC tissue sections were segmented for the quantification of differential biomarker expression associated with epithelial mesenchymal transition and aggressive disease. Secondly, a novel histopathological feature ‘Sum Area Large Tumour Bud’ (ALTB) was identified through immunofluorescence coupled to a novel tissue phenomics approach. The tissue phenomics approach created a complex phenotypic fingerprint consisting of multiple parameters extracted from the unbiased segmentation of all objects within a digitised image. Data mining was employed to identify the significant parameters within the phenotypic fingerprint. ALTB was found to be a more significant predictor of disease specific death than LVI or TB in both the training set (HR = 20.2; 95% CI, 4.6 – 87.9) and the validation set (HR = 4; 95% CI, 1.5 – 11.1). Finally, ALTB was combined with two parameters, ‘differentiation’ and ‘pT stage’, which were exported from the original patient pathology report to form an integrative pathology score. The integrative pathology score was highly significant at predicting disease specific death within the validation set (HR = 7.5; 95% CI, 3 – 18.5). In conclusion, image analysis allows the standardised quantification of set histopathological features and the heterogeneous expression of biomarkers. A novel image based histopathological feature combined with classical pathology allows the highly significant stratification of Stage II CRC patients into high and low risk of disease specific death.

This thesis describes the survival analysis, exactly Kaplan-Meier estimate. A main part of the thesis deals with the problem of censored data, which is typical for survival analysis. The empirical part describes lenght of PhD studies at the Faculty of Informatics and Statistics and their "survival" in studies by Kaplan-Meier curves. First are analyzed uncensored data and then the whole data set (censored and uncensored data).

No description available.