The need for redesigning existing business processes to improve their efficiency makes it essential to adequately represent, study, and automate them. The WFMC defines "workflow" as computerized facilitation or automation of a business process in whole or part. It is actually a representation of the given process, which is made up of well-defined collection of activities called tasks. Modeling and specification of a workflow involves the following steps: 1) Provide formalism for modeling and specification of workflow 2) specify the tasks together with the associated information and 3) enter the applicable business rules in form of inter-task dependencies. Earlier attempts at modeling of workflows are based on a centralized control approach, has limited applicability for modeling and control of real life workflow due to computational complexity. In this thesis, a distributed supervisory control approach is described and shown to be computationally tractable. The application of such an approach is demonstrated with a case study.

Suburban Americans suffer from homes built with: a low standard of craftsmanship, poor efficiency of construction, excessive use of material resources and a disregard for their site. Architectural diversity is at a low, driven by a consolidation of homebuilders and fewer floor plans. The current home production workflow from commission to build pales in comparison to the automotive industries solutions. Influenced by heavy machinery and hot swappable computers, ideas are born for a better way to build houses. These ides evolve though understanding the principles of several successful vehicles, analyzing census data, and studying floor plans. The flexible autonomous systems house (FASH), involves a 900mm x 900mm framework and a kit of parts that engages our industrial ability and maintains architectural values of space, form, materiality and site specificity. FASH is about bringing a logic and simplification of technique to building that allows quality and reuse to become reality.

This study assessed the dilemmas associated with apprentice assessment systems in the New Apprenticeship Training and Assessment System (NATAS), (State based system), and the Modular system (National system) in Western Australia. Although both were described as competency-based systems these different schemes showed the variations that existed under this general description of training and assessment. The Modular system was a competency-based system which emphasised outcomes rather than the process of training.The emphasis on the process of training was what sustained decades of traditional apprenticeship training. The competency-based approach, discussed in detail later, was a performance-based methodology. Conceptually the apprentice either could perform a given task or task element as set by a specific performance criterion, or s/he could not. The person was judged, based upon the performance outcome to be either competent or incompetent. The basic assumption was that the person could not be partially competent.The competencies approach was a cornerstone of the Australian National training provision. It was administered by the National Training Board through an Australian Standards Framework. The key target group in this assessment of the competency area and the focus of this study was the young apprentice who would become a skilled tradesperson in a relatively short period of four years.Supporting the apprentices in the NATAS system were monitors, lecturers, and employer's members of these groups, who together with apprentices were used to gain insights into the new training initiatives.A previous study Williamson, Lowe and Boyd (1990) had looked at the Western Australian New Apprenticeship and Training System (NATAS). The intention was to develop ideas further and in greater depth using qualitative methodology in the area of effectiveness of the training and ++ / assessment system. The research also had critically assessed the Modular system (National) which in most cases progressively replaced NATAS during the period of the research.

The present study investigates the role of attachment in a time-limited marital therapy. The study explores Brief Contextual Modular Psychotherapy (BCMT). This approach to practice provides a model that integrates principles and techniques from the major psychotherapies. BCMT can be distinguished from other brief therapies by its theoretical integration, its six-session time limit, its specific clinical focus, and its techniques for dealing with dissatisfaction and distress. The therapy sets out practice modules—six-session treatment plans—for a diverse range of presenting issues such as the anxiety disorders, depression, trauma, loss and grief, marriage and the phobias. BCMT emphasises the collaboration of the therapist and the client. A community-based psychological counselling centre has practised BCMT for over ten years, applying it in cases of wide diversity and maladjustment. Prior to this research, a comprehensive analysis of the theory underlying the BCMT model or the theory of change it endorses had not been carried out. The study provides a detailed description of the conceptual and treatment elements of the marital module developed in the treatment manual for BCMT. The study explores how the construct of attachment provides an organising framework or metaperspective for theory construction and therapeutic intervention in the clinical application of this time-limited marital therapy. To achieve this objective, one de-facto and four married couples participated in the time-limited therapy. They completed a questionnaire on adult attachment and also a self-report questionnaire to assess the effectiveness of the therapy. Narrative analysis was used to assess the praxis or the experience of participating in the therapy. The results show that the integrated model provided a treatment method for differing expressions of marital disturbance and psychopathology. Three of the five couples and eight of the ten participants reported positive treatment outcomes. The research sample included the paraphilias, a major depressive episode with postpartum psychosis, the narcissistic borderline syndrome and childhood sexual abuse. The study supports the association between the role of adult attachment styles and intrapsychic responses in conflicted intimate relationships. From the point of view of clinical applications of attachment theory, the research highlights how theoretical ideas can be integrated, specific clinical methods can be incorporated and certain treatment perspectives can be derived from one another. Several implications for the treatment process flow from this integration. The integration of attachment theory in BCMT demonstrates how the therapeutic process progressed through three separate yet interrelated stages: past, present and future. In addition, it led to the identification of three stage-related mourning processes associated with the time-limited therapeutic process: protest, despair and detachment. From a clinical perspective, the research finds that the theoretical and treatment model does not need to be restricted to marital therapy. The findings suggest that the integrated model could be applied across a wide range of presenting issues. By defining the theory of personality and psychopathology and the therapeutic change processes associated with it, the integration of attachment theory results in BCMT taking its place in the literature as a theory of psychotherapy.

Nous démontrons une version pour la caractéristique p d'un cas spécial de la conjecture d'André-Oort. Plus précisement, soit Z le produit de n courbes modulaires de Drinfeld, et soit X une sous-variété algébrique irréductible de Z. Alors nous démontrons que X contient un ensemble Zariski-dense de points CM (c.a.d. points correspondant aux n-uples de A-modules de Drinfeld de rang 2 avec mulitplications complexes, où A=F_q[T], et q est une puissance d'un nombre prémier impair) si et seulement si X est une sous-variété dite modulaire. Notre approche répose sur une approche (en caractéristique 0) due à Edixhoven.

<p>This thesis makes a survey of converse theorems for Dirichlet series. A converse theo-rem gives sufficient conditions for a Dirichlet series to be the Dirichlet series attachedto a modular form. Such Dirichlet series have special properties, such as a functionalequation and an Euler product. Sometimes these properties characterize the modularform completely, i.e. they are sufficient to prove the proper transformation behaviourunder some discrete group. The problem dates back to Hecke and Weil, and has morerecently been treated by Conrey et.al. The articles surveyed are:</p><ul><li>"An extension of Hecke's converse theorem", by B. Conrey and D. Farmer</li><li>"Converse theorems assuming a partial Euler product", by D. Farmer and K.Wilson</li><li>"A converse theorem for ¡0(13)", by B. Conrey, D. Farmer, B. Odgers and N.Snaith</li></ul><p>The results and the proofs are described. The second article is found to contain anerror. Finally an alternative proof strategy is proposed.</p>

<p>Conformal field theories (CFT) constitute an interesting class of twodimensionalquantum field theories, with applications in string theoryas well as condensed matter physics. The symmetries of a CFT can beencoded in the mathematical structure of a conformal vertex algebra.The rational CFT’s are distinguished by the property that the categoryof representations of the vertex algebra is a modular tensor category.The solution of a rational CFT can be split off into two separate tasks, apurely complex analytic and a purely algebraic part.</p><p>The TFT-construction gives a solution to the second part of the problem.This construction gets its name from one of the crucial ingredients,a three-dimensional topological field theory (TFT). The correlators obtainedby the TFT-construction satisfy all consistency conditions of thetheory. Among them are the factorization constraints, whose implicationsfor boundary conditions are the main topic of this thesis.</p><p>The main result reviewed in this thesis is that the factorization constraintsgive rise to a semisimple commutative associative complex algebrawhose irreducible representations are the so-called reflection coefficients.The reflection coefficients capture essential information aboutboundary conditions, such as ground-state degeneracies and Ramond-Ramond charges of string compactifications. We also show that the annuluspartition function can be derived fromthis classifying algebra andits representation theory.</p>

Graduation date: 2003

We outline a multiprocessor architecture that uses modular arithmetic to implement numerical computation with 900 bits of intermediate precision. A proposed prototype, to be implemented with off-the-shelf parts, will perform high-precision arithmetic as fast as some workstations and mini- computers can perform IEEE double-precision arithmetic. We discuss how the structure of modular arithmetic conveniently maps into a simple, pipelined multiprocessor architecture. We present techniques we developed to overcome a few classical drawbacks of modular arithmetic. Our architecture is suitable to and essential for the study of chaotic dynamical systems.

The behavior of steel plate shear walls under the effects of lateral loads depends on the stiffness of the surrounding frame members. Previous research has quantified the minimum required stiffness of columns in the middle stories of steel plate shear wall systems. As the columns of the steel plate shear wall system are subjected to both large axial forces and bending moments, use of composite columns is a viable option in this system. Among the different types of composite columns, the recently developed partially encased composite columns with built-up steel sections have some advantages over other types of composite columns and thus their performance as columns in steel plate shear wall systems needs to be studied. In the first part of this research, a numerical and analytical study has developed a new design parameter and determined the minimum required stiffness of end beams in end panels of the steel plate shear wall system. The effect of the rigidity of the frame connections on the uniformity of the tension field has also been studied in this part. The second part of this research includes two large scale tests on steel plate shear walls with built-up partially encased composite (PEC) columns. One of the test specimens was modular and the other one used reduced beam sections in the frame. The results of the tests show that the columns were stiff enough to anchor the infill plate. The PEC columns in these tests performed in a ductile manner. The overall system behavior was ductile, stable and the specimens showed good seismic behavior and redundancy. Based on the results and observations of this research, design recommendations for PEC columns used as the vertical boundary members of steel plate shear walls are provided. / Structural Engineering