A computational grid is a hardware and software infrastructure that provides dependable, consistent, pervasive, and inexpensive access to high-end computational capabilities. In the presence of grid users who are autonomous, rational, and intelligent, there is an overall degradation of the total efficiency of the computational grid in comparison to what can be achieved when the participating users are centrally coordinated . This loss in efficiency might arise due to an unwillingness on the part of some of the grid resource providers to either not perform completely or not perform to the fullest capability, the computational jobs of other users in the grid. In this thesis, our attention is focused on designing grid resource procurement mechanisms which a grid user can use for procuring resources in a computational grid based on bids submitted by autonomous, rational, and intelligent resource providers. Specifically, we follow a game theoretic and mechanism design approach to design three elegant, different incentive compatible procurement mechanisms for this purpose: G-DSIC (Grid-Dominant Strategy Incentive Compatible) mechanism which guarantees that truthful bidding is a best response for each resource provider, irrespective of what the other resource providers bid G-BIC (Grid-Bayesian Nash Incentive Compatible) mechanism which only guarantees that truthful bidding is a best response for each resource provider whenever all other resource providers also bid truthfully G-OPT (Grid-Optimal) mechanism which minimizes the cost to the grid user, satisfying at the same time, (1) Bayesian Incentive Compatibility (which guarantees that truthful bidding is a best response for each resource provider whenever all other resource providers also bid truthfully) and (2) Individual Rationality (which guarantees that the resource providers have non-negative payoffs if they participate in the bidding process). We evaluate the relative merits and demerits of the above three mechanisms using game theoretical analysis and numerical experiments. The mechanisms developed in this thesis are in the context of parameter sweep type of jobs, which consist of multiple homogeneous and independent tasks. We believe the use of the mechanisms proposed transcends beyond parameter sweep type of jobs and in general, the proposed mechanisms could be extended to provide a robust way of procuring resources in a computational grid where the resource providers exhibit rational and strategic behavior.

From the Proceedings of the 1972 Meetings of the Arizona Section - American Water Resources Assn. and the Hydrology Section - Arizona Academy of Science - May 5-6, 1972, Prescott, Arizona / The distribution of transmissivity within the Tucson basin aquifer, as determined by pumping tests and reviewed in the construction of a digital model of the aquifer, was not totally random in space. Data tended to be distributed normally or log-normally for biased samples of developed wells. A frequency distribution of transmissivity derived from a calibrated digital model is more nearly representative of the real world because the aquifer sample is without bias as the sample constitutes the entire aquifer. Geohydrologic setting, electric analog, and digital models of the basin are discussed. The theory of transmissivity distribution in an arid land alluvial aquifer is developed from Horton's laws of exponential relationship between stream order and drainage network parameters. It is hypothesized that there is an exponential relationship between transmissivity of an alluvial aquifer. A statistical study was made of values derived from the digital model to test the probability density function hypothesized for transmissivity. The mean value is a function of climate and drainage area. These hypotheses require further validation.

From the Proceedings of the 1972 Meetings of the Arizona Section - American Water Resources Assn. and the Hydrology Section - Arizona Academy of Science - May 5-6, 1972, Prescott, Arizona / Mathematical models, requiring substantial data, of hydrologic and water resources systems are under intensive investigation. The processes of data analysis and model building are interrelated so that models may be used to forecast for scientific reasons or decision making. Examples are drawn from research on modeling aquifers, watersheds, streamflow and precipitation in Arizona. Classes of problems include model choice, parameter estimates, initial condition, input identification, forecasting, valuation, control, presence of multiple objectives, and uncertainty. Classes of data analysis include correlation methods, system identification, stationarity, independence or randomness, seasonality, event based approach, fitting of probability distributions, and analysis for runs, range and crossing levels. Time series, event based and regression methods are reviewed. The issues discussed are applied to tree-ring analyses, streamflow gaging stations, and digital modeling of small watersheds and the Tucson aquifers.

Essa pesquisa teve por objetivo central analisar a formação de programadores de software do Arranjo Produtivo Local (APL) de Tecnologia da Informação (TI), da região sudoeste do Paraná. Considerando a emergência desse setor a partir da década de 1990 no Brasil e, posteriormente, seu fortalecimento na região sudoeste desse Estado na última década, esforços foram empreendidos na constituição de processos formativos para o atendimento das demandas de qualificação da força de trabalho no setor. Atrelada à existência do APL, a oferta de cursos de graduação em instituições públicas e privadas da região nos levaram a considerar os processos formativos na área de Tecnologia da Informação um objeto a ser explorado, especialmente a partir de uma perspectiva dos estudos de trabalho e educação, perpassando os estudos de Ciência, Tecnologia e Sociedade. Diante disso, buscamos entender como é realizada a formação e qualificação para o trabalho na área, tanto nos cursos de graduação como na própria prática produtiva, analisando a aderência ou não das Instituições de Ensino Superior (IES) às demandas do setor produtivo. Destacamos, ainda, os processos de autoqualificação pelos quais passam os programadores de software, entendidos por nós como ampliação da exploração dessa força de trabalho. Pautados na orientação teórico-metodológica do materialismo histórico e dialético, realizamos análise de referências sobre a temática, de documentos orientadores para os cursos de graduação e dos dados obtidos na pesquisa de campo, que contou com questionários e entrevistas com programadores de software da região e entrevistas com coordenadores de cursos de graduação da área de TI. Diante disso, entre tantas questões, pudemos concluir a existência de um tríplice e constante processo de formação desses trabalhadores, composto pela educação formal, a aprendizagem na prática produtiva e a autoqualificação. Esses processos, permeados ideologicamente pelos discursos de empreendedorismo, são naturalizados levando à intensificação do trabalho e da aprendizagem. Dessa maneira, há uma ampliação da exploração de sua força de trabalho, que, ao qualificar-se constantemente, implica diretamente na produção de mais-valia relativa. / The main objective of this research was to analyze the training of software programmers from the Local Productive Arrangement (APL) of Information Technology (IT), in the southwestern region of Paraná. Considering the emergence of this sector from the 1990s in Brazil and later its strengthening in the southwestern region of the State of Paraná in the last decade, efforts were made in the constitution of formative processes to meet the demands of qualification of the workforce in the sector. Linked to the existence of APL, the offer of undergraduate courses in public and private institutions in the region led us to consider the training processes in the area of Information Technology an object to be explored, especially from a perspective of work and education studies , passing through the studies of Science, Technology and Society. Therefore, we seek to understand how the training and qualification for the work in the area is carried out, both in the undergraduate courses and in the productive practice itself, analyzing the adherence or not of Higher Education Institutions (IES) to the demands of the productive sector. We also highlight the self-qualification processes through which software programmers, understood by us as an expansion of the exploitation of this workforce, pass. Guided by the theoretical-methodological orientation of the dialectical historical materialism, we carried out an analysis of references on the subject, of guiding documents for the undergraduate courses and of the data obtained in the field research, which included questionnaires and interviews with software programmers from the region and interviews with coordinators of undergraduate IT courses. Faced with this, among many questions, we could conclude the existence of a threefold and constant process of training these workers, composed of formal education, learning in productive practice and self-qualification. These processes, permeated ideologically by the discourses of entrepreneurship, are naturalized leading to the intensification of work and learning. In this way, there is an expansion of the exploitation of its workforce, which, by constantly qualifying, directly implies the production of relative surplus value.