Esta tese avalia como se dá a atuação da imprensa brasileira em relação a aspectos importantes para a qualidade de uma democracia, considerando o conceito de embedded democracy, segundo o qual democracias constitucionais são formadas por cinco regimes parciais: direitos civis; liberdade política; accountability horizontal; poder efetivo para governar; e regime eleitoral democrático, todos ligados a esferas externas responsáveis pela viabilização de condições para essas democracias, dentre elas, os media. Neste contexto, a imprensa teria algumas funções ser fórum de discussões; dar voz à opinião pública; servir de olhos e ouvidos dos cidadãos; fiscalizar e mostrar irregularidades , que podem ser prejudicadas pela mercantilização dos media e aspectos da produção da rotina jornalística. Para verificar isso, busco evidências empíricas da cobertura da imprensa escrita sobre a política nacional, especialmente sobre os dois principais atores, Legislativo e Executivo, por meio da análise de 1.768 notícias / This thesis evaluates how Brazilian press acts regarding important aspects to the quality of democracy, considering the concept of embedded democracy, according to which constitucional democracies are composed by five parcial regimes: civil rights; political freedom; horizontal accountability; effective power to govern; and democratic electoral sistem, all of them related to external spheres that garantee basic conditions to these democracies, such as the media. In this context, the press would have some main roles - like being a forum for discussions,giving voice for public opinion, being citizens eyes and ears, supervising and pointing out irregularities that can be damaged by media mercantilization and aspects of the journalistic routine. In order to check it out, I look for empirical evidences on writing press coverage about national politics, especially about its two main actors, Legislative and Executive branches, throught the analisys of 1.768 news.

Magister Educationis - Med / This is a reflective study of the factors that influenced the performance of learners in Physical Sciences National Senior Certificate examinations in four secondary schools in a district in Eastern Cape. The study considered factors that influenced the matric results for a period of five years in a district in the Eastern Cape (from 2010 to 2015) National Senior Certificate results. The study was conducted to identify the indicators that could positively influence physical sciences results after many years of underperformance in the subject. This study was underpinned by the theory of reflective practice. As part of an intervention strategy, learners completed an intensive programme of teaching during school hours, extra classes, practical work and assessment. The four school principals were purposively selected for interviews. Four Physical Sciences educators from the four senior secondary schools and 12 post-grade 12 learners from each senior secondary school were all interviewed. Post-grade 12 learners were randomly selected for interviews. The researcher used a reflective journal as a method of examining the reflections by the respondents. Teachers reflected on their teachings to improve their practices that make science learning more meaningful to both learners and teachers The findings indicate that extra classes provided sufficient time to complete the syllabus, to conduct experiments and to administer practical tests. Regular assessment in theory and practical work showed the improvement in attainment of good physical sciences results in all the four participating schools. Instructional supervision from the managers also assisted in developing teacher skills. It was recommended that the DoE should use experts in teacher training and professional development activities. School management systems should play an active role in teacher support and the supervision of instructional work.

abstract: Robotic technology is advancing to the point where it will soon be feasible to deploy massive populations, or swarms, of low-cost autonomous robots to collectively perform tasks over large domains and time scales. Many of these tasks will require the robots to allocate themselves around the boundaries of regions or features of interest and achieve target objectives that derive from their resulting spatial configurations, such as forming a connected communication network or acquiring sensor data around the entire boundary. We refer to this spatial allocation problem as boundary coverage. Possible swarm tasks that will involve boundary coverage include cooperative load manipulation for applications in construction, manufacturing, and disaster response. In this work, I address the challenges of controlling a swarm of resource-constrained robots to achieve boundary coverage, which I refer to as the problem of stochastic boundary coverage. I first examined an instance of this behavior in the biological phenomenon of group food retrieval by desert ants, and developed a hybrid dynamical system model of this process from experimental data. Subsequently, with the aid of collaborators, I used a continuum abstraction of swarm population dynamics, adapted from a modeling framework used in chemical kinetics, to derive stochastic robot control policies that drive a swarm to target steady-state allocations around multiple boundaries in a way that is robust to environmental variations. Next, I determined the statistical properties of the random graph that is formed by a group of robots, each with the same capabilities, that have attached to a boundary at random locations. I also computed the probability density functions (pdfs) of the robot positions and inter-robot distances for this case. I then extended this analysis to cases in which the robots have heterogeneous communication/sensing radii and attach to a boundary according to non-uniform, non-identical pdfs. I proved that these more general coverage strategies generate random graphs whose probability of connectivity is Sharp-P Hard to compute. Finally, I investigated possible approaches to validating our boundary coverage strategies in multi-robot simulations with realistic Wi-fi communication. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Computer Science 2016

Resumo: Este trabalho investiga a gênese e a evolução de dois sistemas de solos e sua influência sobre o suposto processo de desertificação no Município de Irauçuba-CE. Este Município caracteriza-se por apresentar índice pluviométrico abaixo de 550 mm/ano, déficit hídrico acentuado, solos rasos e uma vegetação bastante degradada. Por apresentar tais características, Irauçuba é considerada como uma das principais áreas em processo de desertificação do semi-árido cearense, sendo a ação antrópica apontada como a principal causa da implantação deste processo. Nesta tese, trata-se com a hipótese de que a formação e a evolução da cobertura pedológica encontram-se aliadas à conjugação de outras variáveis naturais - geologia, clima, geomorfologia, vegetação - as quais representam as causas do aspecto seco ou "desertificado" da área. Este estudo foi desenvolvido à luz da metodologia da Análise Estrutural da Cobertura Pedológica, baseando-se no fato de que os solos, como organizações pedológicas, são organizados desde o nível do cristal dos minerais constituintes (escala microscópica) até o nível da paisagem (escala macroscópica). A projeção da cobertura pedológica sob o perfil topográfico e a descrição detalhada dessas organizações indicaram os locais ideais para a coleta de amostras. Os resultados das análises de campo foram complementados por análises micromorfológicas, mineralógicas, granulométricas e químicas sobre amostras móveis (friáveis) e indeformadas realizadas em laboratórios. O estudo das toposseqüências e as análises de laboratório permitiram a identificação de dois sistemas pedológicos: o sistema argissolo com nódulos ferruginosos e o de solos litodependentes. Os resultados no estudo de ambos os sistemas indicam que os processos de formação e evolução da cobertura pedológica, aliados à conjugação das condições...(Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: This research investigates the origin and evolution of two soil systems and their influence over the supposed process of desertification in the County of Irauçuba-Ceará. This County is characterized by the occurrence of a rainfall index lower than 550 mm/year, an accentuated hydric deficit, shallow soils and a vegetation well degraded. Because it presents these characteristics the region of Irauçuba is considered as one of the main areas in process of desertification in the semi-arid region of the state of Ceará, being the anthropic action pointed out as the main cause of the process. In this thesis, we deal with the hypothesis that the formation and evolution of the pedological coverage are associated with the conjugation of other natural variables - geology, climate, geomorphology , vegetation - which represent the causes of the dry or "desertified" aspect of the area. This study was developed based on the methodology of the Structural Analysis of the Pedological Coverage, considering the fact that soils, as pedological organizations, are organized from the crystal level of the mineral constituents (microscopic scale) up to the landscape level (macroscopic scale). The projection of the pedological coverage under the topographical profile and the detailed description of these organizations indicated the ideal sites for sample collection. The results of the field analysis were complemented by micromorphological, mineralogical, granulometric and chemical of mobile (friable) and non-deformed samples carried out in laboratory. The study of the toposequencies and the laboratory analysis allowed the identification of two pedological systems: the podzolic system with ferruginous nodules and the system of lythodependent soils . The results of the study of both systems indicate that the processes of formation and evolution of the pedological coverage, along with the conjugation of the geological...(Complete abstract click electronic access below) / Orientador: Joel Barbujiani Sigolo / Coorientador: Nádia Regina do Nascimento / Banca: Nelson Angeli / Banca: Miguel Cooper / Banca: Paulo César Fonseca Giannini / Banca: José Eduardo Zaine / Doutor

Esta tese avalia como se dá a atuação da imprensa brasileira em relação a aspectos importantes para a qualidade de uma democracia, considerando o conceito de embedded democracy, segundo o qual democracias constitucionais são formadas por cinco regimes parciais: direitos civis; liberdade política; accountability horizontal; poder efetivo para governar; e regime eleitoral democrático, todos ligados a esferas externas responsáveis pela viabilização de condições para essas democracias, dentre elas, os media. Neste contexto, a imprensa teria algumas funções ser fórum de discussões; dar voz à opinião pública; servir de olhos e ouvidos dos cidadãos; fiscalizar e mostrar irregularidades , que podem ser prejudicadas pela mercantilização dos media e aspectos da produção da rotina jornalística. Para verificar isso, busco evidências empíricas da cobertura da imprensa escrita sobre a política nacional, especialmente sobre os dois principais atores, Legislativo e Executivo, por meio da análise de 1.768 notícias / This thesis evaluates how Brazilian press acts regarding important aspects to the quality of democracy, considering the concept of embedded democracy, according to which constitucional democracies are composed by five parcial regimes: civil rights; political freedom; horizontal accountability; effective power to govern; and democratic electoral sistem, all of them related to external spheres that garantee basic conditions to these democracies, such as the media. In this context, the press would have some main roles - like being a forum for discussions,giving voice for public opinion, being citizens eyes and ears, supervising and pointing out irregularities that can be damaged by media mercantilization and aspects of the journalistic routine. In order to check it out, I look for empirical evidences on writing press coverage about national politics, especially about its two main actors, Legislative and Executive branches, throught the analisys of 1.768 news.

A mobile application has been developed to be used for assistance in crisis scenarios. To assure the application is dependable enough to be used in such scenarios, the application was put under test. This thesis investigates different approaches to functional testing and security testing. Five common methods of generating test cases for functional testing have been identified and four were applied on the application. The coverage achieved for each method was measured and compared. For this specific application under test, test cases from a method called decision table-testing scored the highest code coverage. 9 bugs related to functionality were identified. Fuzz testing is a simple security testing technique for efficiently finding security flaws, and was applied for security testing of our application. During the fuzz test, system security properties were breached. An unauthorized user could read and alter asset data, and it also affected the system's availability. Our overall conclusion was that with more time, creating functional tests for smaller components of the application might have been more effective in finding faults and achieving coverage.

Thorough testing of software is necessary to assure the quality of a product before it is released. The testing process requires substantial resources in software development. Model-based software development provides new possibilities to automate parts of the testing process. By automating tests, valuable time can be saved. This thesis focuses on different ways to utilize models for automatic generation of test vectors and how test coverage analysis can be used to assure the quality of a test suite or to find "dead code" in a model. Different test-automation techniques have been investigated and applied to a model of an adaptive cruise control system (ACC) used at Scania. Source code has been generated automatically from the model, model coverage and code coverage has therefore been compared. The work with this thesis resulted in a new method to create test vectors for models based on a combinatorial test technique.

A tecnologia da aplicação tem papel fundamental na agricultura, pois proporciona uma correta aplicação do produto biologicamente ativo no alvo, ocasionando um melhor aproveitamento dos agrotóxicos. O objetivo do trabalho foi avaliar a influência de diferentes pontas e pressões na qualidade da pulverização na cultura do tomate por meio da quantificação do depósito e da cobertura foliar. Foram estudadas as pontas GA 11002 (jato plano com indução de ar), TTJ 60-11002 (jato plano duplo) e TT 11002 (jato plano padrão), todas nas pressões de 200, 350 e 500 kPa. Para todos os tratamentos a taxa de aplicação foi de 180 L ha-1. O percentual de cobertura foliar foi quantificado por meio da análise de imagens que detectaram o traçador fluorescente LRM 100 com o auxílio de luz ultravioleta. As imagens foram capturadas por uma câmera digital e processadas pelo software QUANT. O depósito foi quantificado pela extração e quantificação do traçador azul brilhante FD&C N°1 por meio de espectrofotometria. Para ambos os parâmetros foram analisadas amostras do estrato superior e inferior da planta. Houve diferença estatística somente para a cobertura foliar, sendo que na parte superior da planta a ponta de jato plano duplo apresentou menor cobertura na menor pressão. Nas maiores pressões houve um aumento da cobertura foliar favorecido pela formação de gotas médias e finas pelas pontas avaliadas. No estrato inferior a eficiência na cobertura foliar da ponta de jato plano diminui com o aumento da pressão. O depósito de pulverização foi favorecido pelo aumento da cobertura foliar. / The application technology plays a key role in agriculture as it provides a correct application of the product biologically active in the target, causing a better use of pesticides. The aim of this study was to evaluate the influence of different nozzles and spray pressures acting on tomato by quantifying the deposit and leaf coverage. Were studied the nozzles GA 11002 (flat fan air induction), TTJ 60-11002 (twin flat fan) and TT 11002 (standard flat fan), all pressures of 200, 350 and 500 kPa. For all treatments, the application rate was 180 L h-1. The percentage of leaf coverage was quantified by image analysis to detect the fluorescent tracer LRM 100 with the aid of ultraviolet light. The images were captured by a digital camera and processed by software QUANT. The deposit was quantified by extraction and quantification of tracer bright blue FD&C N° 1 by spectrophotometry. For both parameters were analyzed samples of top and bottom of the parts plant. Statistical difference only for leaf coverage, and at the top of the plant to twin flat fan nozzles showed lower coverage in less pressure. In the higher pressures there was an increase of leaf coverage favored by the formation of fine droplets medium and evaluated nozzles. In the bottom part plant coverage efficiency of foliar flat fan nozzles decreases with increasing pressure. The spray deposit was favored by increased leaf coverage.

nÃo hà / Utilizando dados do IBGE, IPECE, IPEA e SEPLAG, este presente trabalho faz o Mapeamento da pobreza e da distribuiÃÃo dos recursos dos programas sociais FECOP - Fundo Estadual de Combate à Pobreza (Programa do Governo do Estado do CearÃ) e Programa Bolsa FamÃlia (Programa do Governo Federal) nos MunicÃpios Cearenses no ano de 2010. As relaÃÃes existentes entre os nÃveis de pobreza e as coberturas dos programas sociais sÃo analisadas a partir da construÃÃo e cÃlculo dos Ãndices de Cobertura Municipal destes programas, e de estatÃsticas globais de eficÃcia na distribuiÃÃo dos recursos. Com relaÃÃo ao primeiro, foi verificado por meio de mapeamento que a cobertura dos programas de combate à pobreza, e principalmente do Programa Bolsa FamÃlia, apresentaram um cluster a favor dos municÃpios localizados no litoral leste e regiÃo Jaguaribana. Na segunda anÃlise, foi possÃvel perceber que a distribuiÃÃo dos recursos do Programa Bolsa FamÃlia à realizada de forma mais eficiente que a do programa FECOP. Todavia, ao utilizar algumas variÃveis de controle foi observado que ambos os programas atuam com eficiÃncia equivalente. / Using data from the IBGE, IPECE, IPEA and SEPLAG, this study provides a profile of poverty mapping, the distribution of resources from social programs FECOP - State Fund to Combat Poverty Program (Program of the Government of the State of CearÃ) and Bolsa FamÃlia Program (Program of the Federal Government) in Cearà municipalities in 2010. The relationship between poverty levels and coverage of social programs are analyzed using Municipal Coverage Ratios and global statistics of efficiency in resource distribution of these programs. Regarding the first, by mapping the coverage of programs to combat poverty it was found the presence of a cluster in favor of the municipalities located on the east coast and region of Jaguaribana, especially for the Bolsa FamÃlia Program. The second analysis showed that the distribution of funds from Bolsa FamÃlia Program is performed more efficiently than the FECOP program. However, when using some control variables we observed that both programs work with equivalent efficiency.

A crescente demanda por produtos eletrônicos e a capacidade cada vez maior de integração criaram sistemas extremamente complexos em chips, conhecidos como Systemon-Chip ou SoC. Seguindo em sentido oposto a esta tendência, os prazos (time-to-market) para que estes sistemas sejam construídos vem continuamente sendo reduzidos, obrigando que muito mais funcionalidades sejam implementadas em períodos cada vez menores de tempo. A necessidade de um maior controle de qualidade do produto final demanda a atividade de Verificação Funcional que consiste em utilizar um conjuntos de técnicas para estimular o sistema em busca de falhas. Esta atividade é a extremamente dispendiosa e necessária, consumindo até cerca de 80% do custo final do produto. É neste contexto que se insere este trabalho, propondo uma metodologia de Verificação Funcional chamada IVM que irá fornecer todos os subsídios para garantir a entrega de sistemas de alta qualidade, e ainda atingindo as rígidas restrições temporais impostas pelo mercado. Sendo baseado em metodologias já bastante difundidas e acreditadas, como o OVM e o VeriSC, o IVM definiu uma organização arquitetural e um fluxo de atividades que incorporou as principais características de ambas as abordagens que antes estavam disjuntas. Esta integração de técnicas e conceitos resulta em um fluxo de verificação mais eficiente, permitindo que sistemas atinjam o custo, prazo e qualidade esperados._________________________________________________________________________________________ ABSTRACT: The growing demand for electronic devices and its even higher integration capability created extremely complex systems in chips, known as System-on-Chip or SoC. In a opposite way to this tendency, the time-to-market for these systems be built have been continually reduced, forcing much more functionalities be implemented in even shorten time periods. The final product quality control is assured by the Functional Verification activity that consists in a set of techniques to stimulate a system in order to find bugs. This activity is extremely expensive and necessary, responding to around 80% of final product cost. In this context this work is inserted on, proposing a Functional Verification methodology called IVM that will provide all conditions to deliver high quality systems, while keeping the hard time restrictions imposed by the market. Based in well known and trusted methodologies, as OVM and VeriSC, the IVM defined an architectural organization and an activity flow that incorporates features of both approaches that were separated from each other. This techniques and concepts integration resulted in a more efficient verification flow, allowing systems to meet the desired budget, schedule and quality.