Les communications multimedia à forte contrainte de délai dominent de plus en plus l'Internet et supportent principalement des services interactifs et de diffusion de contenus multimedia. En raison de la prolifération des périphériques mobiles, les liaisons sans-fil prennent une part importante dans la transmission de ces données temps réel. Un certain nombre de questions doivent cependant être abordées afin d'obtenir une qualité de service acceptable pour ces communications dans ces environnements sans-fil. En outre, la disponibilité de multiples interfaces sans-fil sur les appareils mobiles offre une opportunité d'améliorer la communication tout en exacerbant encore les problèmes déjà présents sur les liaisons sans-fil simples. Pour faire face aux problèmes d'erreurs et de délai de ces liaisons, cette thèse propose deux améliorations possibles. Tout d'abord, une technique d'amélioration pour le protocole de transport multimedia Datagram Congestion Control Protocol (DCCP/CCID4) pour lien long délai (par exemple, lien satellite) qui améliore significativement les performances du transport de la voix sur IP (VoIP). En ce qui concerne les erreurs de lien et le multi-chemin, cette thèse propose et évalue un code à effacement adapté au protocole Stream Transport Control Protocol (CMT-SCTP). Enfin, un outil d'évaluation en ligne de streaming de qualité vidéo, implémentant une méthode cross-layer d'évaluation de la qualité vidéo en temps-réel pour encodeur H.264 est proposé à la communauté réseau en open-source. / Real time communications have, in the last decade, become a highly relevant component of Internet applications and services, with both interactive (voice and video) communications and streamed content being used by people in developed and developing countries alike. Due to the proliferation of mobile devices, wireless media is becoming the means of transmitting a large part of this increasingly important real time communications traffic. Wireless has also become an important technology in developing countries (and remote areas of developed countries), with satellite communications being increasingly deployed for traffic backhaul and ubiquitous connection to the Internet. A number of issues need to be addressed in order to have an acceptable service quality for real time communications in wireless environments. In addition to this, the availability of multiple wireless interfaces on mobile devices presents an opportunity to improve and further exacerbates the issues already present on single wireless links. Mitigation of link errors originating from the wireless media, addressing packet reordering, jitter, minimising the link and buffering (required to deal with reordering or jitter) delays, etc. all contribute to lowering user's quality of experience and perception of network quality and usability. Therefore in this thesis, we consider improvements to transport protocols for real time communications and streaming services to address these problems.

O presente trabalho é resultado de uma pesquisa de mestrado em poéticas visuais. Nele exponho depoimentos do processo de construção plástica e reflexiva, que se apoiam na busca por fotografias vernaculares para a elaboração de desenhos. Estabelecendo relações entre as duas linguagens, busquei tramar ambas de forma que constituíssem um pensar sobre a memória e seus caminhos narrativos através do ato de apagar, fazer e desfazer linhas traçadas pelo grafite. / The present work is a result of a master degree in visual arts. In which I bring up my testimonials about my reflective and plastic construction process, that supports itself in the search for vernacular photographs that will generate drawings. Setting relations between the two mediuns, I try to plot them in a way that would constitute a reflexion about memory and its narrative paths through the act of erasing, making and unmaking drawn lines by graphite.

O presente trabalho é resultado de uma pesquisa de mestrado em poéticas visuais. Nele exponho depoimentos do processo de construção plástica e reflexiva, que se apoiam na busca por fotografias vernaculares para a elaboração de desenhos. Estabelecendo relações entre as duas linguagens, busquei tramar ambas de forma que constituíssem um pensar sobre a memória e seus caminhos narrativos através do ato de apagar, fazer e desfazer linhas traçadas pelo grafite. / The present work is a result of a master degree in visual arts. In which I bring up my testimonials about my reflective and plastic construction process, that supports itself in the search for vernacular photographs that will generate drawings. Setting relations between the two mediuns, I try to plot them in a way that would constitute a reflexion about memory and its narrative paths through the act of erasing, making and unmaking drawn lines by graphite.

O presente trabalho é resultado de uma pesquisa de mestrado em poéticas visuais. Nele exponho depoimentos do processo de construção plástica e reflexiva, que se apoiam na busca por fotografias vernaculares para a elaboração de desenhos. Estabelecendo relações entre as duas linguagens, busquei tramar ambas de forma que constituíssem um pensar sobre a memória e seus caminhos narrativos através do ato de apagar, fazer e desfazer linhas traçadas pelo grafite. / The present work is a result of a master degree in visual arts. In which I bring up my testimonials about my reflective and plastic construction process, that supports itself in the search for vernacular photographs that will generate drawings. Setting relations between the two mediuns, I try to plot them in a way that would constitute a reflexion about memory and its narrative paths through the act of erasing, making and unmaking drawn lines by graphite.

How She Sleeps at Night is a collection of lyric poetry constellated around experiences of disability, trauma, and womanhood. A critical essay introduces the collection by elucidating the experiences and theoretical underpinnings that shaped the body of these poems. The introductory essay distills the principles that informed my cardinal poetic goals as I wrote: to create poems that can be read again and again over a lifetime, which connect with readers' common humanity, and which acknowledge the nuances and complexities of being alive.

In a field such as social work, where anti-oppressive practice is preached, it is expected that educators and the academy alike work to challenge xenophobic and Islamophobic discourse. However, this may not be the case. Using a Critical Social Science frameworks, this study explores the experience of Muslim women in social work education through a qualitative methodology. A focus group was conducted with current social work students and recent graduates to explore their experience in social work education. What emerged from the data are the signs of an academy that does not embody the values and ethics it purports to teach. Through a thematic analysis of the data, three main themes emerged: the tensions and challenges between and within social work education and Islamic knowledge and Muslim identity; the marginalization and erasure of Muslim women’s voices in social work education; and the ways that Muslim women students navigate these issues. The findings bring light to the challenges Muslim women face as a result of an academy that continuously tells them that they do not belong. Implications for theorists, educators, administrators and students are explored and recommendations are given regarding the importance of the inclusion of Muslim voices in the discourse, creating safe and inclusive spaces for Muslim students, and working collectively to address the tensions and challenges that Muslim women face in social work education. / Thesis / Master of Social Work (MSW)

This thesis investigates the interference potential of microwave ovens to Bluetooth data communication. Interference experiments are conducted in the CWT's Bluetooth lab, using CSR™ (Cambridge Silicone Radio) Bluetooth radios and a Tektronics™ Protocol Analyzer to record packet transmissions between the master and slave units. A novel, "quasi-real time" spectral measurement concept is developed to take radio frequency measurements. A LabView program enables a spectrum analyzer to download oven spectral data onto a computer via the instrument's serial port. From this data, three-dimensional plots of microwave radiated power levels versus ISM band frequencies over time periods are produced for different microwave ovens. These plots are compared with the results of interference experiments to explain Bluetooth packet errors. In addition to causing packet errors, emitted oven power levels at certain frequencies are sometimes strong enough to cause data packets to be lost (dropped) as they are transmitted over the air. This is a major problem since the Protocol Analyzer does not "see" these packets and cannot record the transmissions during an experiment. These lost packets can be accounted for if the frequency hopping scheme of the communicating Bluetooth devices is know prior to data transmission. Bluetooth's Frequency Hop Scheme is coded in Matlab for the purpose of predicting a data transmission's hopping sequence. The lost packets on each Bluetooth channel are counted by subtracting the Analyzer's recorded number of data transmissions per channel from the total number of transmissions per channel predicted by Matlab. A method is devised to calibrate the Bluetooth receiver and the spectrum analyzer is used to measure the received power level of Bluetooth signals on a particular frequency (channel). The number of packet errors on a channel is determined from the channel's C/I (carrier-to-interference ratio). If a channel's C/I level falls below the calculated C/I threshold at any instant of time due to oven operation, the packet transmitted at that instant is likely in error. A Matlab program estimates the number of packet errors per channel by counting the number of times the C/I of a channel falls below it's threshold value. The predicted number of packet errors is compared with the measured packet errors from experiments to yield extremely good results. Various oven-interference experiments are conducted in a small building, a large office environment and outdoors. For each experiment, the number of occurrences of transmitted data is plotted for each Bluetooth channel. Composite Excel bar graphs, created from this data, are compared with the oven spectral plots to describe an oven's effect on Bluetooth transmission. It is determined that different ovens cause packet errors on specifically different channels, in addition to channels 52-54 around the oven's 2450 MHz center operating frequency. The interference experiments suggest that placing an oven a radius of 10 m away from Class I (devices in a piconet will not affect data transmission). / Master of Science

This thesis examines trans women's contemporary writing in relation to a theory of the excessive object, sublimity, transmisogyny and minor literature. In doing so, this text is influenced by Susan Stryker's work on monstrosity, abjection and transgender rage in the article “My Words to Victor Frankenstein Above the Village of Chamounix: Performing Transgender Rage” (1994). The excessive object refers to a concept coined in this thesis to describe sublimity from another perspective than that of the tradition following from Immanuel Kant's A Critique of Judgment, building on feminist scholarship on the aesthetic of the sublime. Of particular relevance are critiques of the patriarchal dynamics of sublimity and the idea of the feminine sublime as it is explored with reference to literature by Barbara Freeman in The Feminine Sublime: Gender and Excess in Women's Fiction (1995). Following from the feminist critique of sublimity, trans women's writing is explored as minor literature through a re-reading of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari's work on Franz Kafka in Kafka. Toward a Minor Literature (1986), with attention to the importance that conditions of impossibility, marginality and unintelligibility holds for the political possibilities of minor literature. These readings form the basis for an analysis of four literary texts by two contemporary authors, Elena Rose, also known as little light, and Sybil Lamb, in addition to a deeper re-engagement with Stryker's work. In so doing, this thesis also touches on topics of power, erasure, trauma, self-sacrifice, appropriation and unrepresentability.

Nous traitons la question d’un rapport entre écriture et voix dans la clinique des psychoses. A l’appui des témoignages de sujets psychotiques, sujets disant écrire ce qui survient sous forme de voix, nous interrogeons les ressorts et les enjeux de ce passage à la lettre. Revenant sur la clinique de l’hallucination, nous détaillons ce que les sujets psychotiques nous enseignent sur les mécanismes impliqués dans l’instant de la voix hallucinée. Suivant ce fil, nous mettons en valeur la dimension de jouissance inhérente à la voix. Dans un second temps, nous nous penchons plus spécifiquement sur les pratiques d’écriture des sujets rencontrés, pratiques où il s’agit de noter, d’arrimer sur papier ce que les voix font entendre. Suivant les pistes annoncées par nos patients, nous questionnons la fonction régulatrice d’une pratique de la lettre. Pour ce faire, nous reprenons les conceptions lacaniennes de la lettre comme « littoral » ou comme « godet ». De même, les propos de nos patients nous mènent à interroger en quoi l’écriture pourrait permettre de « faire partir » la voix, en quoi elle ferait le moyen d’un détachement. Les œuvres et les témoignages d’écrivains nous donnent l’occasion de pousser plus avant notre questionnement, d’arpenter les domaines où, toujours, l’artiste précède le clinicien. Ainsi, nous revenons sur les travaux de James Joyce, de Louis Wolfson et, surtout, de Samuel Beckett. Nous nous penchons sur les indications qu’ils nous livrent au sujet d’un nouage entre écriture et voix. L’objet de notre recherche est de mettre à l’épreuve l’hypothèse selon laquelle, dans la clinique des psychoses, le recours à l’écrit peut relever d’un traitement de la voix. / We examine the issue of a link between voice and writing in psychosis. Relying on psychotic subjects who say they write what they hear through voices, we study the nature of this shifting from voice to letter. As a first step, we specify what we mean by voice. We detail what psychotic subjects teach us about the mechanisms involved in the moment of the hallucinated voice. By doing so, we point out the part of jouissance involved in voice.As a second step, we focus on their writing practices, the moment when they take note, when they put down on paper what they hear through voices. We endeavour to elucidate the issues of this movement. We are led to examine the regulating function of writing. Therefore, we refer to the lacanian concept of letter as « littoral » or « godet ». Moreover, patients’ words led us to specify how writing could be a way to make the voice “go away”, a way to separate. The works and the testimonies of writers lead us to go on exploring a field where the artist always precedes the clinician. We refer to James Joyce, to Louis Wolfson, and especially, to Samuel Beckett’s works. We try to grasp the indications they give about a link between voice and writing. The purpose is to test the hypothesis which states that, in psychosis, the use of writing can be a way to treat the voice.

<p>As parallel and distributed systems scale to hundreds of thousands of cores and beyond, fault tolerance becomes increasingly important -- particularly on systems with limited I/O capacity and bandwidth. Error correcting codes (ECCs) are used in communication systems where errors arise when bits are corrupted silently in a message. Error correcting codes can detect and correct erroneous bits. Erasure codes, an instance of error correcting codes that deal with data erasures, are widely used in storage systems. An erasure code addsredundancy to the data to tolerate erasures. </p> <p><br> </p> <p>In this thesis, erasure coded computations are proposed as a novel approach to dealing with processor faults in parallel and distributed systems. We first give a brief review of traditional fault tolerance methods, error correcting codes, and erasure coded storage. The benefits and challenges of erasure coded computations with respect to coding scheme, fault models and system support are also presented.</p> <p><br> </p> <p>In the first part of my thesis, I demonstrate the novel concept of erasure coded computations for linear system solvers. Erasure coding augments a given problem instance with redundant data. This augmented problem is executed in a fault oblivious manner in a faulty parallel environment. In the event of faults, we show how we can compute the true solution from potentially fault-prone solutions using a computationally inexpensive procedure. The results on diverse linear systems show that our technique has several important advantages: (i) as the hardware platform scales in size and in number of faults, our scheme yields increasing improvement in resource utilization, compared to traditional schemes; (ii) the proposed scheme is easy to code as the core algorithm remains the same; (iii) the general scheme is flexible to accommodate a range of computation and communication trade-offs. </p> <p><br> </p> <p>We propose a new coding scheme for augmenting the input matrix that satisfies the recovery equations of erasure coding with high probability in the event of random failures. This coding scheme also minimizes fill (non-zero elements introduced by the coding block), while being amenable to efficient partitioning across processing nodes. Our experimental results show that the scheme adds minimal overhead for fault tolerance, yields excellent parallel efficiency and scalability, and is robust to different fault arrival models and fault rates.</p> <p><br> </p> <p>Building on these results, we show how we can minimize, to optimality, the overhead associated with our problem augmentation techniques for linear system solvers. Specifically, we present a technique that adaptively augments the problem only when faults are detected. At any point during execution, we only solve a system with the same size as the original input system. This has several advantages in terms of maintaining the size and conditioning of the system, as well as in only adding the minimal amount of computation needed to tolerate the observed faults. We present, in details, the augmentation process, the parallel formulation, and the performance of our method. Specifically, we show that the proposed adaptive fault tolerance mechanism has minimal overhead in terms of FLOP counts with respect to the original solver executing in a non-faulty environment, has good convergence properties, and yields excellent parallel performance.</p> <p><br> </p> <p>Based on the promising results for linear system solvers, we apply the concept of erasure coded computation to eigenvalue problems, which arise in many applications including machine learning and scientific simulations. Erasure coded computation is used to design a fault tolerant eigenvalue solver. The original eigenvalue problem is reformulated into a generalized eigenvalue problem defined on appropriate augmented matrices. We present the augmentation scheme, the necessary conditions for augmentation blocks, and the proofs of equivalence of the original eigenvalue problem and the reformulated generalized eigenvalue problem. Finally, we show how the eigenvalues can be derived from the augmented system in the event of faults. </p> <p><br> </p> <p>We present detailed experiments, which demonstrate the excellent convergence properties of our fault tolerant TraceMin eigensolver in the average case. In the worst case where the row-column pairs that have the most impact on eigenvalues are erased, we present a novel scheme that computes the augmentation blocks as the computation proceeds, using the estimates of leverage scores of row-column pairs as they are computed by the iterative process. We demonstrate low overhead, excellent scalability in terms of the number of faults, and the robustness to different fault arrival models and fault rates for our method.</p> <p><br> </p> <p>In summary, this thesis presents a novel approach to fault tolerance based on erasure coded computations, demonstrates it in the context of important linear algebra kernels, and validates its performance on a diverse set of problems on scalable parallel computing platforms. As parallel systems scale to hundreds of thousands of processing cores and beyond, these techniques present the most scalable fault tolerant mechanisms currently available.</p><br>