Linux containers are gaining increasing traction in both individual and industrial use. As these containers get integrated into mission-critical systems, real-time detection of malicious cyber attacks becomes a critical operational requirement. However, a little research has been conducted in this area. This research introduces an anomaly-based intrusion detection and remediation system for container-based clouds. The introduced system monitors system calls between the container and the host server to passively detect malfeasance against applications running in cloud containers. We started by applying a basic memory-based machine learning technique to model the container behavior. The same technique was also extended to learn the behavior of a distributed application running in a number of cloud-based containers. In addition to monitoring the behavior of each container independently, the system used prior knowledge for a more informed detection system. We then studied the feasibility and effectiveness of applying a more sophisticated deep learning technique to the same problem. We used a recurrent neural network to model the container behavior. We evaluated the system using a typical web application hosted in two containers, one for the front-end web server, and one for the back-end database server. The system has shown promising results for both of the machine learning techniques used. Finally, we describe a number of incident handling and remediation techniques to be applied upon attack detection. / Ph. D. / Cloud computing plays an important role in our daily lives today. Most of the online services and applications we use are hosted in a cloud environment. Examples include email, cloud storage, online booking systems, and many websites. Typically, a cloud environment would host many of those applications on a single host to maximize efficiency and minimize overhead. To achieve that, cloud service providers, such as Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud Platform, rely on virtual encapsulation environments, such as virtual machines and containers, to encapsulate and isolate applications from other applications running in the cloud. One major concern usually raised when discussing cloud applications is the security of the application and the privacy of the data it handles, e.g. the files stored by the end users on their cloud storage. In addition to firewalls and traditional security measures that attempt to prevent an attack from affecting the application, intrusion detection systems (IDS) are usually used to detect when an application is affected by a successful attack that managed to escape the firewall. Many intrusion detection systems have been introduced to cloud applications using virtual machines, but almost none has been introduced to applications running in containers. In this dissertation, we introduce an intrusion detection system to be deployed by cloud service providers to container-based cloud environments. The system uses machine learning techniques to learn the behavior of the application running in the container and detect when the behavior changes as an indication for a potential attack. Upon detection of the attack, the system applies one of three defense mechanisms to restore the running application to a safe state.

Home gardening has historically been a subsistence or supplemental form of food procurement worldwide and promoted as a food security project in times of economic hardship. Qualitative research was used to investigate container gardening's potential to provide the impetus for further agricultural activities within low-income, low-food-access, rural Appalachian Virginia, thereby impacting community food security, food choices of individuals, and the local food system. Ethnography and phenomenology methodologies were used through the lens of community-engaged research, and the lived experiences of participants were recognized as valid representations of food insecurity. Semi-structured interviews with fourteen participating households revealed program involvement was deeply connected to previous food production experiences and fueled by existing interest in home gardening. Containers were valued as providing alternative modes to continue a meaningful practice, specifically mitigating challenges of limited mobility for the elderly. As rural areas are experiencing an outmigration of young people and struggling social services, container gardening could be utilized as a low-cost culturally appropriate mental- and nutritional-health service for the rural elderly. Similar initiatives should begin with appreciative inquiry into existing perceptions, values, assets, and potentials within a target community. Through preliminary investigation, needs and barriers can be acknowledged and community-identified solutions can be implemented through culturally sensitive program development. With the existing impetus for home gardening in the region, program expansion could potentially impact food security and the local food system. Overall, this case study serves to further endorse a public effort to support home food production in rural areas of the United States. / Master of Science

The lightweight, portable, and flexible nature of containers is driving their widespread adoption in cloud solutions. Data analysis and deep learning applications have especially benefited from containerized solutions. As such data analysis is also being utilized in the high performance computing (HPC) domain, the need for container support in HPC has become paramount. However, container adoption in HPC face crucial performance and I/O challenges. One obstacle is that while there have been container solutions for HPC, such solutions have not been thoroughly investigated, especially from the aspect of their impact on the crucial I/O throughput needs of HPC. To this end, this paper provides a first-of-its-kind empirical analysis of state-of-the-art representative container solutions (Docker, Podman, Singularity, and Charliecloud) in HPC environments, especially how containers interact with the HPC storage systems. We present the design of an analysis framework that is deployed on all nodes in an HPC environment, and captures aspects such as CPU, memory, network, and file I/O statistics from the nodes and the storage system. We are able to garner key insights from our analysis, e.g., Charliecloud outperforms other container solutions in terms of container start-up time, while Singularity and Charliecloud are equivalent in I/O throughput. But this comes at a cost, as Charliecloud invokes the most metadata and I/O operations on the underlying Lustre file system. By identifying such optimization opportunities, we can enhance performance of containers atop HPC and help the aforementioned applications. / Master of Science / Containers are a technology that allow for applications to be packaged along with its ideal environment, all the way down to its preferred operating system. This allows an application to run anywhere that can support containers without a huge hit to the application performance. Hence containers have seen wide adoption for use in the cloud. These qualities have also made it very appealing for use in the world of scientific research in national labs. Modern research heavily relies on the power of computing in order to model, simulate, and test the behavior of real world entities, often making use of large amounts of data and utilizing machine learning and deep learning. Doing this often requires the high performance computing power found in supercomputers. In most cases, scientists just want to be able to write their code and expect it to just work. Their applications might depend on other source code that form part of their standard toolkit and would expect to also be installed in the supercomputing environment. This may not always be the case, taking the scientist's focus away from their work in order ensure their requirements are set up in the supercomputing environment which might require extensive cooperation with the operations team responsible for the supercomputers. Containers easily solve this problem because it can package everything together. However, the use of containers in these environments have not been extensively tested, especially for applications that are very heavy on the analysis of large quantities of data. To fill this gap, this work analyzes the performance of several state-of-the-art container technologies (Docker, Podman, Singularity, Charliecloud), with a particular focus on its interaction with the Lustre data storage systems widely used in supercomputing environments. As part of this work, we design an analysis setup that captures the behavior of various aspects of the high performance computing environment like CPU, memory, network usage and data movement while using containers to run data heavy applications. We garner important insights about their performance that can help inform the best choice of container technology given an environment and the kind of application that needs to be run.

In the healthcare system when a patient is waiting for a donated heart, the choice of the transportation method is critical. Thus, the efficiency of this procedure relies on the traveling time, which could affect the ischemic time, which is the time that heart can be discharged outside the human body. For best patient outcome, the heart has to be transplanted within four hours from the donor to the recipient. By transporting the donated heart via Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV, or drone), both the time and the cost required for the heart transportation will be minimized. This thesis intends to explore the specifications needed for the design and manufacture of a heart container and pick-up system for a drone, which will be able to transport a donated heart between hospitals.

This study was performed in order to acquire key market information and information on raw material usage for the wood pallet and container industry in 2016. Historical trends in the wood pallet market were also analyzed between 1991-2016 using the results of previous Virginia Tech and U.S. Forest Service pallet surveys. Paper mail questionnaires and online questionnaires were sent to 2,520 companies that manufactured or wholesaled wood pallets and crates in the United States to obtain these data. The wooden pallet and container industry produced an estimated 508 million new wood pallets in 2016, which is a 22% increase since 2011. Approximately 35% of this was 48” x 40” pallets, which continues to be the dominant standardized pallet size. Approximately 39% of new wood pallets were custom sizes which is a significant decrease from the 60% share found in 2011. Stringer class pallets remained the dominant pallet class with 76% share while block pallets and skids only accounted for 21% and 3% of the market, respectively. Approximately, 38% of these new wood pallets were heat treated. Furthermore, an estimated 341 million pallets were recovered and sold as recycled/repaired or remanufactured pallets in 2016. The most common size of the recycled or remanufactured pallets was 48” x 40”, accounting for 69% of the recycled market. Ninety-one percent of recycled or remanufactured pallets were stringer class pallets while block class pallets made up the remaining 9%. Wood byproduct usage has changed since 2011. The conversion of broken pallets and wood waste to landscape mulch (37.5%) and animal bedding (4.2%) have declined with a proportional increase in other uses (28.3%). Biofuel conversion has remained steady since 2006 at 30%. / Master of Science / This study was performed in order to acquire key market information and information on raw material usage for the wood pallet and container industry in 2016. Historical trends in the wood pallet market were also analyzed between 1991-2016 using the results of previous Virginia Tech and U.S. Forest Service pallet surveys. Paper mail questionnaires and online questionnaires were sent to 2,520 companies that manufactured or wholesaled wood pallets and crates in the United States to obtain this data. As a whole, the wooden pallet and container industry has shown growth. The industry produced an estimated 508 million new wood pallets in 2016, which is a 22% increase since 2011. Furthermore, an estimated 341 million pallets were recovered and sold as recycled/repaired or remanufactured pallets in 2016. This is a small increase in the recycled/repaired or remanufactured pallet market. Wood byproduct usage has changed since 2011. The conversion of broken pallets and wood waste to landscape mulch (37.5%) and animal bedding (4.2%) have declined with a proportional increase in other uses (28.3%). Biofuel conversion has remained steady at 30%.

The objective of this work was to determine if summer dormancy of boxwood could be removed either through nutritional or hormonal means. Buxus sempervirens L. "Suffruticosa", B. sempervirens "Vardar Valley", and B sinica var. insularis (Nakai) "Justin Brouwers" were used for these studies. In the nutrition study, experiments were conducted to examine the effects of various levels of Osmocote 15-9-12 and liquid 10-4-6 on growth of boxwood. Optimal shoot dry weight was achieved at applications of 12 to 16 g Osmocote and 100 – 150 ppm N liquid fertilizer. Leachate EC corresponding to optimal shoot dry weight ranged from 0.5 to 0.7 dS/m for Osmocote and from 0.7 to 1.5 dS/m for liquid fertilizer. While the fertilizer requirements for boxwood optimal dry weight accumulation were determined, additional flushes of growth subsequent to the initial spring flush did not occur for "Vardar Valley" and English boxwood. In the phytohormone study, experiments were conducted that examined the effects of pruning, Promalin (GA4+7 and BA), and defoliation on the growth of three boxwood species. While Promalin applied alone or in conjunction with pruning shows promise of increasing new shoot growth, its response was not consistent from experiment to experiment. In fact, when it was applied in conjunction with defoliation, it dramatically decreased number of new shoots and actually resulted in some shoot mortality. Pruning was also erratic in its promotion of new shoots. Defoliation increased new shoot number dramatically and shows the most promise in overcoming summer dormancy. / Master of Science

Studies were conducted to evaluate the effect of pre-irrigation media moisture deficit, irrigation application rate, and intermittent irrigation on irrigation efficiency [(amount applied - amount leached) amount applied' 100] of spray stake-irrigated, container-grown plants. In the first experiment, pine bark-filled containers were irrigated to replace moisture deficits of 600, 1200, or 1800 ml. Deficits were returned in single, continuous applications at application rates of 148, 220, and 270 ml/min. Application rate did not affect irrigation efficiency. Efficiency decreased with increased medium moisture deficit. In the second experiment, containers, at 600 ml media moisture deficits, were irrigated with 400 or 600 ml (65% and 100% water replacement, respectively). Irrigation volumes were returned in a single, continuous application or in 100ml applications with 30 min intervals between irrigations (intermittent). Irrigation efficiency was greater with intermittent irrigation, 95 % and 84 % for 400 and 600 ml replacement, respectively, than with continuous irrigation, 84% and 67% for 400 and 600 ml replacement, respectively. When applied intermittently, most water loss from containers occurred after 400 ml were applied. In the third experiment, containers were irrigated with 600 ml (100% water replacement) in 50, 100, or 150 ml applications with 20, 40, or 60 min intelVals between applications. A control was included in which 600 ml was applied in a single, continuous application. Irrigation efficiency increased with decreasing application volume and increasing length of interval between applications. The greatest efficiency (86%) was produced with an irrigation regimen of 50 ml applications with at least 40 min between applications. The control treatment (continuous) produced an irrigation efficiency of 62%. When applied intermittently, most water loss from containers occurred after a total of 300 ml were applied. / Master of Science

O presente trabalho propõe um processo para auxiliar a tarefa de implantação de controles de Cadeia Logística Segura para a importação e exportação de cargas conteinerizadas, transportadas pelo modal rodoviário. Está em consonância com a legislação brasileira atual, no que se refere à Receita Federal do Brasil e demais Órgãos Anuentes. Além disso, inclui, também, as novas diretrizes do Programa Brasileiro de Operador Econômico Autorizado que teve seu início na primeira quinzena de Dezembro de 2014, bem como os aspectos principais do quadro SAFE, da Organização Mundial das Aduanas (OMA) e do programa americano Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT). O processo proposto no trabalho contempla a instrumentação dos controles e seus principais pontos de integração de dados, estágio em que grande parte dos operadores econômicos atuais se encontra. A proposta justifica-se pela complexidade dos processos de cadeias logísticas, sua importância para o comércio exterior e, portanto, para a economia do país, que exigem um aperfeiçoamento constante para atender à competitividade crescente dos mercados, controlar e gerenciar riscos e incertezas dos tempos da globalização. A metodologia do trabalho de pesquisa constou de estudos sobre o significado de cadeia logística segura, legislações e normatizações existentes, principais tecnologias utilizadas no Brasil e no mundo e suas estratégias de integração de sistemas, com enfoque em alguns projetos de gestão já existentes no país. O porto de Santos foi tomado como campo principal de pesquisa. O trabalho evidenciou a importância da presença de três características fundamentais em um processo de cadeia logística segura: ser instrumentado, integrado e inteligente. Considera-se que, a partir do processo proposto, será possível aumentar o grau de inteligência de uma cadeia logística, de forma a gerenciar e mitigar os potenciais riscos de forma mais racional. / This assay proposes a process to assist the task of implantation of controls of Secure Supply Chain to importation and exportation of containerized cargo, transported by road. It is pursuant to the current Brazilian laws, as it concerns Receita Federal do Brasil and other consenting authorities. In addition, it also includes the new guidelines of the Brazilian Authorized Economic Operator Program, which began on the first fortnight of December 2014, as well as the main aspects of the SAFE Framework, from the World Customs Organization (WCO) and the C-TPAT program (Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism). The proposal is justified by the complexity of the supply chain processes, their importance to the foreign trade and therefore, to the countrys economy, which require constant improvement in order to meet the growing competitiveness within markets and to control and manage risks and uncertainties of globalization times. The methodology of this assay consists of studies on the meaning of secure supply chain, existing laws and standards, main technologies used in Brazil and throughout the world and their strategies of system integration, focusing on some management projects already existing in the country. The Port of Santos was taken as main research field. This assay provides evidence of the importance of three fundamental characteristics in a secure supply chain process: to be instrumented, integrated and intelligent. The proposed methodology contemplates instrumentation of the processes and their key points of integration, a stage in which great part of the existing economic operators can be found currently. From this point on, it will be possible to increase its degree of intelligence in such a way as to manage and mitigate risks more rationally.

Cette thèse CIFRE s’inscrit dans le cadre d’une collaboration entre Acta-Mobilier, fabricant de façades laquées haut de gamme, et le Centre de Recherche en Automatique Nancy. L’idée est de tirer parti du concept de Système Contrôlé par le Produit dans un environnement industriel perturbé par de nombreuses boucles de production et par un taux de reprises (non-qualités) non négligeable engendrant des pertes de pièces, le non-respect des délais, des charges de travail instables, etc… le lien impossible entre le produit et un identifiant infotronique rendant en plus la traçabilité difficile. Les travaux sur l’ordonnancement et son optimisation sont freinés par ces perturbations sur la chaîne de production qui rendent les plannings intenables. Le traitement prioritaire des pièces défectueuses permet d’assurer un taux de service qui reste remarquable au regard du pourcentage de pièces à réparer. Mais cela engendre aussi des pertes de pièces qui empêchent la livraison complète de la commande. La problématique scientifique s’articule autour du pilotage des flux dans un contexte de production perturbé par les reprises et de la maîtrise de la qualité en évaluant son impact sur l’engorgement. L’enjeu de maîtrise de la qualité a été abordé à l’aide de réseaux de neurones capables de prévoir l’apparition du défaut auquel ils sont dédiés en fonction des paramètres de production et environnementaux. Cette anticipation permet de proposer une alternative de programme à utiliser ou à reporter la planification de la tâche. L’adaptation du modèle de prévision aux dérives du modèle physique au comportement considéré comme nerveux est réalisée « en-ligne » à l’aide de cartes de contrôle qui permettent de détecter la dérive et sa date de début. Malgré cette simplification des flux, le pilotage reste complexe en raison des boucles normales de production et des non qualités résiduelles. Il existe différents états de saturation du système pour lesquels la règle de pilotage la plus adaptée n’est pas toujours la même. Cette analyse est présentée sous forme de cartographie en deux dimensions dont chacun des axes présente un indicateur clé du taux de non-qualité et/ou de la perturbation des flux. Même si, contrairement aux algorithmes, la règle de pilotage la mieux adaptée ne sera pas toujours mise en évidence, cette cartographie présente d’autres avantages tels que la simplification du pilotage, la possibilité pour tous les utilisateurs d’avoir l’information importante sur l’état de l’atelier en un coup d’oeil, ou encore la nécessité d’homogénéisation sur la globalité de l’unité de production. Dans ce contexte, le container intelligent offre des perspectives intéressantes avec la volonté de tracer un groupe de produits ayant la même gamme de fabrication plutôt que des produits un à un, de partager des informations telles que sa date de livraison, son degré d’urgence, de connaître quels chemins ils doivent emprunter dans l’atelier et quelles sont les alternatives possibles ou encore de communiquer avec les machines et les autres systèmes dont celui de prévision de la qualité et retenir des informations au fil de la fabrication des produits. Le système proposé est donc interactif ou le conteneur est au coeur de la décision. Il signale sa présence au système d’ordonnancement seulement si les conditions qualité sont réunies, permettant ainsi de simplifier son travail autorisant alors un simple algorithme traditionnel de programmation linéaire à réaliser cette tâche particulièrement compliquée au premier abord. C’est en revanche à la charge de l’ordonnanceur de s’assurer de la règle de pilotage à utiliser et de demander les informations correspondantes aux lots disponibles. La contribution de cette thèse est donc une méthodologie de simplification de problèmes complexes par une répartition des tâches entre différents sous-systèmes acteurs appliquée au cas d’une entreprise de fabrication de façades de cuisine laquées haut de gamme / Centre de Recherche en Automatique de Nancy. The idea is to take advantage of Product Driven System in an industrial environment disturbed by many loops and a rework rate (non quality) causing significant loss of products, non-compliance deadlines, unstable workloads, etc ... impossible link between the product and identifying infotronic lead to more difficult traceability. Work on scheduling and optimization are hampered by these disturbances on the production line that make them untenable schedules. Priority processing on defective products ensures a service rate that remains outstanding compared to the percentage of products to repair. But it also leads to loss of products that prevent the full delivery of the order. The scientific problem revolves around the control of flow in a production context disturbed by the loops and the quality level by assessing its impact on congestion. The quality-control issue has been addressed by using neural networks that can predict the occurrence of the defect to which they are dedicated from production and environmental parameters. This anticipation allows us to offer a program alternative to use or to plan to postpone the task. The adaptation of the forecasting model to the drift of the physical model with a behavior regarded as nervous is made "on line" using control charts that detect drift and its start date. Despite this simplification of flows, the flow control remains complex due to normal production loops and residual nonqualities. There are different system saturation states for which the most suitable control rule is not always the same. This analysis is presented in a two-dimensional mapping which each axis has a key indicator on non-quality rate and / or disruption of flows. Although, unlike algorithms, the most suitable control rule will not always be highlighted, this mapping has other advantages such as the simplification of the control, the ability for all users to have important information about the workshop state, or the need for homogenization of the global state of the production unit. In this context, the intelligent container offers interesting perspectives with the will to trace a group of products with the same rooting sheet rather than products one by one, to share information such as its delivery date, the urgency degree, to know what paths they should take and what are the possible alternatives or to communicate with other machines and systems including the quality forecasting system and retain information over the manufacture of the products. The proposed system is so interactive where container is at the heart of the decision. It reported his presence to scheduling system only if the quality system requirements are met, and simplify this work while allowing a traditional linear algorithm to achieve this task seen as particularly complicated at first. It is however the responsibility of the scheduler to ensure the pilot rule to use and request the relevant information available to the lots. The contribution of this thesis is a methodology to simplify complex problems by a division of work between different subsystems actors applied to the case of a manufacturer of high-finished lacquered panels

O presente trabalho propõe um processo para auxiliar a tarefa de implantação de controles de Cadeia Logística Segura para a importação e exportação de cargas conteinerizadas, transportadas pelo modal rodoviário. Está em consonância com a legislação brasileira atual, no que se refere à Receita Federal do Brasil e demais Órgãos Anuentes. Além disso, inclui, também, as novas diretrizes do Programa Brasileiro de Operador Econômico Autorizado que teve seu início na primeira quinzena de Dezembro de 2014, bem como os aspectos principais do quadro SAFE, da Organização Mundial das Aduanas (OMA) e do programa americano Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT). O processo proposto no trabalho contempla a instrumentação dos controles e seus principais pontos de integração de dados, estágio em que grande parte dos operadores econômicos atuais se encontra. A proposta justifica-se pela complexidade dos processos de cadeias logísticas, sua importância para o comércio exterior e, portanto, para a economia do país, que exigem um aperfeiçoamento constante para atender à competitividade crescente dos mercados, controlar e gerenciar riscos e incertezas dos tempos da globalização. A metodologia do trabalho de pesquisa constou de estudos sobre o significado de cadeia logística segura, legislações e normatizações existentes, principais tecnologias utilizadas no Brasil e no mundo e suas estratégias de integração de sistemas, com enfoque em alguns projetos de gestão já existentes no país. O porto de Santos foi tomado como campo principal de pesquisa. O trabalho evidenciou a importância da presença de três características fundamentais em um processo de cadeia logística segura: ser instrumentado, integrado e inteligente. Considera-se que, a partir do processo proposto, será possível aumentar o grau de inteligência de uma cadeia logística, de forma a gerenciar e mitigar os potenciais riscos de forma mais racional. / This assay proposes a process to assist the task of implantation of controls of Secure Supply Chain to importation and exportation of containerized cargo, transported by road. It is pursuant to the current Brazilian laws, as it concerns Receita Federal do Brasil and other consenting authorities. In addition, it also includes the new guidelines of the Brazilian Authorized Economic Operator Program, which began on the first fortnight of December 2014, as well as the main aspects of the SAFE Framework, from the World Customs Organization (WCO) and the C-TPAT program (Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism). The proposal is justified by the complexity of the supply chain processes, their importance to the foreign trade and therefore, to the countrys economy, which require constant improvement in order to meet the growing competitiveness within markets and to control and manage risks and uncertainties of globalization times. The methodology of this assay consists of studies on the meaning of secure supply chain, existing laws and standards, main technologies used in Brazil and throughout the world and their strategies of system integration, focusing on some management projects already existing in the country. The Port of Santos was taken as main research field. This assay provides evidence of the importance of three fundamental characteristics in a secure supply chain process: to be instrumented, integrated and intelligent. The proposed methodology contemplates instrumentation of the processes and their key points of integration, a stage in which great part of the existing economic operators can be found currently. From this point on, it will be possible to increase its degree of intelligence in such a way as to manage and mitigate risks more rationally.