It was a pleasure to provide an introduction to a new volume on user experience evaluation in games. The scope, depth, and diversity of the work here is amazing. It attests to the growing popularity of games and the increasing importance developing a range of theories, methods, and scales to evaluate them. This evolution is driven by the cost and complexity of games being developed today. It is also driven by the need to broaden the appeal of games. Many of the approaches described here are enabled by new tools and techniques. This book (along with a few others) represents a watershed in game evaluation and understanding. The eld of game evaluation has truly "come of age." The broader eld of HCI can begin to look toward game evaluation for fresh, critical, and sophisticated thi- ing about design evaluation and product development. They can also look to games for groundbreaking case studies of evaluation of products. I'll brie y summarize each chapter below and provide some commentary. In conclusion, I will mention a few common themes and offer some challenges. Discussion In Chapter 1, User Experience Evaluation in Entertainment, Bernhaupt gives an overview and presents a general framework on methods currently used for user experience evaluation. The methods presented in the following chapters are s- marized and thus allow the reader to quickly assess the right set of methods that will help to evaluate the game under development.

The book focusses on questions of individual and collective action, the emergence and dynamics of social norms and the feedback between individual behaviour and social phenomena. It discusses traditional modelling approaches to social norms and shows the usefulness of agent-based modelling for the study of these micro-macro interactions. Existing agent-based models of social norms are discussed and it is shown that so far too much priority has been given to parsimonious models and questions of the emergence of norms, with many aspects of social norms, such as norm-change, not being modelled. Juvenile delinquency, group radicalisation and moral decision making are used as case studies for agent-based models of collective action extending existing models by providing an embedding into social networks, social influence via argumentation and a causal action theory of moral decision making. The major contribution of the book is to highlight the multifaceted nature of the dynamics of social norms, consisting not only of emergence, and the importance of embedding of agent-based models into existing theory."

Recent trends have shown increasing privatization of standardization activities under various corporations, trade associations, and consortia, raising significant public policy issues about how the public interest may be represented. ""Standardization and Digital Enclosure: The Privatization of Standards, Knowledge, and Policy in the Age of Global Information Technology"" establishes a framework of analysis for public policy discussion and debate. Discussing topics such as social practices and political economic discourse, this book offers a truly interdisciplinary approach to standardization and privatization valuable to technical, economic, and political researchers and practitioners, as well as academicians involved in related fields.

The term "haptics" refers to the science of sensing and manipulation through touch. Multiple disciplines such as biomechanics, psychophysics, robotics, neuroscience, and software engineering converge to support haptics, and generally, haptic research is done by three communities: the robotics community, the human computer interface community, and the virtual reality community.

This book is different from any other book that has looked at haptics. The authors treat haptics as a new medium rather than just a domain within one of the above areas. They describe human haptic perception and interfaces and present fundamentals in haptic rendering and modeling in virtual environments. Diverse software architectures for standalone and networked haptic systems are explained, and the authors demonstrate the vast application spectrum of this emerging technology along with its accompanying trends. The primary objective is to provide a comprehensive overview and a practical understanding of haptic technologies. An appreciation of the close relationship between the wide range of disciplines that constitute a haptic system is a key principle towards being able to build successful collaborative haptic environments.

Structured as a reference to allow for fast accommodation of the issues concerned, this book is intended for researchers interested in studying touch and force feedback for use in technological multimedia systems in computer science, electrical engineering, or other related disciplines. With its novel approach, it paves the way for exploring research trends and challenges in such fields as interpersonal communication, games, or military applications.

The objective of this monograph is to improve the performance of the sentiment analysis model by incorporating the semantic, syntactic and common-sense knowledge. This book proposes a novel semantic concept extraction approach that uses dependency relations between words to extract the features from the text. Proposed approach combines the semantic and common-sense knowledge for the better understanding of the text. In addition, the book aims to extract prominent features from the unstructured text by eliminating the noisy, irrelevant and redundant features. Readers will also discover a proposed method for efficient dimensionality reduction to alleviate the data sparseness problem being faced by machine learning model. Authors pay attention to the four main findings of the book : -Performance of the sentiment analysis can be improved by reducing the redundancy among the features. Experimental results show that minimum Redundancy Maximum Relevance (mRMR) feature selection technique improves the performance of the sentiment analysis by eliminating the redundant features. - Boolean Multinomial Naive Bayes (BMNB) machine learning algorithm with mRMR feature selection technique performs better than Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier for sentiment analysis. - The problem of data sparseness is alleviated by semantic clustering of features, which in turn improves the performance of the sentiment analysis. - Semantic relations among the words in the text have useful cues for sentiment analysis. Common-sense knowledge in form of ConceptNet ontology acquires knowledge, which provides a better understanding of the text that improves the performance of the sentiment analysis.

This book represents the compilation of papers presented at the IFIP Working Group 8. 2 conference entitled "Information Technology in the Service Economy: Challenges st and Possibilities for the 21 Century. " The conference took place at Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada, on August 10 13, 2008. Par ticipation in the conference spanned the continents from Asia to Europe with paper submissions global in focus as well. Conference submissions included complete d research papers and research in progress reports. Papers submitted to the conference went through a double blind review process in which the program co chairs, an associate editor, and reviewers provided assessments and recommendations. The editor ial efforts of the associate editors and reviewers in this process were outstanding. To foster high quality research publications in this field of study, authors of accepted pape rs were then invited to revise and resubmit their work. Through this rigorous review and revision process, 12 completed research papers and 11 research in progress reports were accepted for presentation and publica tion. Paper workshop sessions were also esta blished to provide authors of emergent work an opportunity to receive feedback fromthe IF IP 8. 2 community. Abstracts of these new projects are included in this volume. Four panels were presented at the conference to provide discussion forums for the varied aspect s of IT, service, and globalization. Panel abstracts are also included here.

In order to satisfy the needs of their customers, network utilities require specially developed maintenance management capabilities. Maintenance Management information systems are essential to ensure control, gain knowledge and improve-decision making in companies dealing with network infrastructure, such as distribution of gas, water, electricity and telecommunications. Maintenance Management in Network Utilities studies specified characteristics of maintenance management in this sector to offer a practical approach to defining and implementing the best management practices and suitable frameworks.
Divided into three major sections, Maintenance Management in Network Utilities defines a series of stages which can be followed to manage maintenance frameworks properly. Different case studies provide detailed descriptions which illustrate the experience in real company situations. An introduction to the concepts is followed by main sections including:

A Literature Review: covering the basic concepts and models needed for framework design, development and implementation.
Framework Design and Definition: developing the basic pillars of network utilities maintenance management framework.
Performance Evaluation & Maturity: focusing on the reliability concept and maturity models from different viewpoints.

By establishing basic foundations for creating and maintaining maintenance managements strategies, Maintenance Management in Network Utilities acts a practical handbook for all professionals in these companies and across areas such as network development, operations management and marketing.
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Researches and developers of simulation models state that the Java program ming language presents a unique and significant opportunity for important changes in the way we develop simulation models today. The most important characteristics of the Java language that are advantageous for simulation are its multi-threading capabilities, its facilities for executing programs across the Web, and its graphics facilities. It is feasible to develop compatible and reusable simulation components that will facilitate the construction of newer and more complex models. This is possible with Java development environments. Another important trend that begun very recently is web-based simulation, i.e., and the execution of simulation models using Internet browser software. This book introduces the application of the Java programming language in discrete-event simulation. In addition, the fundamental concepts and prac tical simulation techniques for modeling different types of systems to study their general behavior and their performance are introduced. The approaches applied are the process interaction approach to discrete-event simulation and object-oriented modeling. Java is used as the implementation language and UML as the modeling language. The first offers several advantages compared to C++, the most important being: thread handling, graphical user interfaces (QUI) and Web computing. The second language, UML (Unified Modeling Language) is the standard notation used today for modeling systems as a collection of classes, class relationships, objects, and object behavior."

This book reports on the development and validation of a generic defeasible logic programming framework for carrying out argumentative reasoning in Semantic Web applications (GF@SWA). The proposed methodology is unique in providing a solution for representing incomplete and/or contradictory information coming from different sources, and reasoning with it. GF@SWA is able to represent this type of information, perform argumentation-driven hybrid reasoning to resolve conflicts, and generate graphical representations of the integrated information, thus assisting decision makers in decision making processes. GF@SWA represents the first argumentative reasoning engine for carrying out automated reasoning in the Semantic Web context and is expected to have a significant impact on future business applications. The book provides the readers with a detailed and clear exposition of different argumentation-based reasoning techniques, and of their importance and use in Semantic Web applications. It addresses both academics and professionals, and will be of primary interest to researchers, students and practitioners in the area of Web-based intelligent decision support systems and their application in various domains.

This comprehensive text covers the use of SAS for epidemiology and public health research. Developed with students in mind and from their feedback, the text addresses this material in a straightforward manner with a multitude of examples. It is directly applicable to students and researchers in the fields of public health, biostatistics and epidemiology. Through a hands on approach to the use of SAS for a broad number of epidemiologic analyses, readers learn techniques for data entry and cleaning, categorical analysis, ANOVA, and linear regression and much more. Exercises utilizing real-world data sets are featured throughout the book. SAS screen shots demonstrate the steps for successful programming.

SAS (Statistical Analysis System) is an integrated system of software products provided by the SAS institute, which is headquartered in California. It provides programmers and statisticians the ability to engage in many sophisticated statistical analyses and data retrieval and mining exercises. SAS is widely used in the fields of epidemiology and public healthresearch, predominately due to its ability to reliably analyze very large administrative data sets, as well as more commonly encountered clinical trial and observational research data. "

This book provides a comprehensive and practically minded introduction into serious games for law enforcement agencies. Serious games offer wide ranging benefits for law enforcement with applications from professional trainings to command-level decision making to the preparation for crises events. This book explains the conceptual foundations of virtual and augmented reality, gamification and simulation. It further offers practical guidance on the process of serious games development from user requirements elicitation to evaluation. The chapters are intended to provide principles, as well as hands-on knowledge to plan, design, test and apply serious games successfully in a law enforcement environment. A diverse set of case studies showcases the enormous variety that is possible in serious game designs and application areas and offers insights into concrete design decisions, design processes, benefits and challenges. The book is meant for law enforcement professionals interested in commissioning their own serious games as well as game designers interested in collaborative pedagogy and serious games for the law enforcement and security sector.

We are extremely pleased to present a comprehensive book comprising a collection of research papers which is basically an outcome of the Second IFIP TC 13.6 Working Group conference on Human Work Interaction Design, HWID2009. The conference was held in Pune, India during October 7-8, 2009. It was hosted by the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing, India, and jointly organized with Copenhagen Business School, Denmark; Aarhus University, Denmark; and Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati, India. The theme of HWID2009 was Usability in Social, C- tural and Organizational Contexts. The conference was held under the auspices of IFIP TC 13 on Human-Computer Interaction. 1 Technical Committee TC13 on Human-Computer Interaction The committees under IFIP include the Technical Committee TC13 on Human-Computer Interaction within which the work of this volume has been conducted. TC13 on Human-Computer Interaction has as its aim to encourage theoretical and empirical human science research to promote the design and evaluation of human-oriented ICT. Within TC13 there are different working groups concerned with different aspects of human- computer interaction. The flagship event of TC13 is the bi-annual international conference called INTERACT at which both invited and contributed papers are presented. Contributed papers are rigorously refereed and the rejection rate is high.

The book presents a conceptually novel oscillations based paradigm, the Oscillation-Based Multi-Agent System (OSIMAS), aimed at the modelling of agents and their systems as coherent, stylized, neurodynamic processes. This paradigm links emerging research domains via coherent neurodynamic oscillation based representations of the individual human mind and society (as a coherent collective mind) states. Thus, this multidisciplinary paradigm delivers an empirical and simulation research framework that provides a new way of modelling the complex dynamics of individual and collective mind states. This book addresses a conceptual problem - the lack of a multidisciplinary, connecting paradigm, which could link fragmented research in the fields of neuroscience, artificial intelligence (AI), multi-agent system (MAS) and the social network domains. The need for a common multidisciplinary research framework essentially arises because these fields share a common object of investigation and simulation, i.e., individual and collective human behavior. Although the fields of research mentioned above all approach this from different perspectives, their common object of investigation unites them. By putting the various pathways of research as they are interrelated into perspective, this book provides a philosophical underpinning, experimental background and modelling tools that the author anticipates will reveal new frontiers in multidisciplinary research. Fundamental investigation of the implicit oscillatory nature of agents' mind states and social mediums in general can reveal some new ways of understanding the periodic and nonperiodic fluctuations taking place in real life. For example, via agent states-related diffusion properties, we could investigate complex economic phenomena like the spread of stock market crashes, currency crises, speculative oscillations (bubbles and crashes), social unrest, recessionary effects, sovereign defaults, etc. All these effects are closely associated with social fragility, which follows and is affected by cycles such as production, political, business and financial. Thus, the multidisciplinary OSIMAS paradigm can yield new knowledge and research perspectives, allowing for a better understanding of social agents and their social organization principles.

This monograph book is focused on the recent advances in smart, multimedia and computer gaming technologies. The Contributions include: *Smart Gamification and Smart Serious Games. *Fusion of secure IPsec-based Virtual Private Network, mobile computing and rich multimedia technology. *Teaching and Promoting Smart Internet of Things Solutions Using the Serious-game Approach. *Evaluation of Student Knowledge using an e-Learning Framework. *The iTEC Eduteka. *3D Virtual Worlds as a Fusion of Immersing, Visualizing, Recording, and Replaying Technologies. *Fusion of multimedia and mobile technology in audio guides for Museums and Exhibitions: from Bluetooth Push to Web Pull. The book is directed to researchers, students and software developers working in the areas of education and information technologies.

Many emerging technologies such as video conferencing, video-on-demand, and digital libraries require the efficient delivery of compressed video streams. For applications that require the delivery of compressed stored multimedia streams, the a priori knowledge available about these compressed streams can aid in the allocation of server and network resources. By using a client-side buffer, the resource requirements from the server and network can be minimized. Buffering Techniques for Delivery of Compressed Video in Video-on-Demand Systems presents a comprehensive description of buffering techniques for the delivery of compressed, prerecorded multimedia data. While these techniques can be applied to any compressed data streams, this book focusses primarily on the delivery of video streams because of the large resource requirements that they can consume. The book first describes buffering techniques for the continuous playback of stored video sources. In particular, several bandwidth smoothing (or buffering) algorithms that are provably optimal under certain conditions are presented. To provide a well-rounded discussion, the book then describes extensions that aid in the ability to provide interactive delivery of video across networks. Specifically, reservation techniques that take into account interactive functions such as fast-forward and rewind are described. In addition, extensions to the bandwidth smoothing algorithms presented in the first few chapters are described. These algorithms are designed with interactive, continuous playback of stored video in mind and are also provably optimal under certain constraints. Buffering Techniques for Delivery of Compressed Video in Video-on-Demand Systems serves as an excellent resource for multimedia systems, networking and video-on-demand designers, and may be used as a text for advanced courses on the topic.

This volume contains the Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Intelligent Interactive Multimedia Systems and Services (IIMSS-2011). IIMSS-2011 comes as a sequel to IIMSS-2008 (Piraeus-Athens, Greece, July 9, 10 and 11, 2008), IIMSS-2009 (Mogliano Veneto (near Venice), Italy, July 15, 16 and 17, 2009) and IIMSS-2010 (Baltimore, USA, July 28, 29, and 30, 2010). This fourth edition of the IIMSS Conference was organized jointly by the Department of Informatics of the University of Piraeus, Greece and the School of Electrical and Information Engineering of the University of South Australia, in conjunction with KES International. At a time when computers are more widespread than ever and computer users range from highly qualified scientists to non-computer-expert professionals and may include people with special needs, interactivity, personalization and adaptivity have become a necessity in modern multimedia systems. Modern intelligent multimedia systems need to be interactive not only through classical modes of interaction where the user inputs information through a keyboard or mouse. They must also support other modes of interaction, such as visual or lingual computer-user interfaces, which render them more attractive, user friendlier, more human-like and more informative. IIMSS is a new series of international scientific conferences aimed at presenting novel research in the fields of intelligent multimedia systems relevant to the development of a new generation of interactive, user-centric services.

This book treats computational modeling of structures in which strong nonlinearities are present. It is therefore a work in mechanics and engineering, although the discussion centers on methods that are considered parts of applied mathematics. The task is to simulate numerically the behavior of a structure under various imposed excitations, forces, and displacements, and then to determine the resulting damage to the structure, and ultimately to optimize it so as to minimize the damage, subject to various constraints. The method used is iterative: at each stage an approximation to the displacements, strains, and stresses throughout the structure is computated and over all times in the interval of interest. This method leads to a general approach for understanding structural models and the necessary approximations.

The book covers the various approaches to modeling the in-cylinder processes such as mixture formation, combustion and formation of exhaust emissions in diesel and gasoline engines. Due to their complexity, emphasis is put on multi-dimensional spray, combustion and emission formation models. However, phenomenological as well as zero-dimensional thermodynamic models, which are still widely used in engine development because of their computational efficiency, are addressed as well. Example calculations of each model type are compared with corresponding experimental data – represented in diagrams as well as in images resulting from modern optical measuring techniques – in order to discuss the capabilities of today's simulation models and the shortcomings that still exist either because of oversimplifying assumptions or insufficient knowledge. Readers achieve an overview of the most important simulation models describing the in-cylinder processes of internal combustion engines and gain insights into which modeling approach is appropriate for a specific problem.

The book Model-Based Reasoning in Scientific Discovery, aims to explain how specific modeling practices employed by scientists are productive methods of creative changes in science. The study of diagnostic, visual, spatial, analogical, and temporal reasoning has demonstrated that there are many ways of performing intelligent and creative reasoning which cannot be described by classical logic alone. The study of these high-level methods of reasoning is situated at the crossroads of philosophy, artificial intelligence, cognitive psychology, and logic: at the heart of cognitive science. Model based reasoning promotes conceptual change because it is effective in abstracting, generating, and integrating constraints in ways that produce novel results. There are several key ingredients common to the various forms of model-based reasoning to be considered in this presentation. The models are intended as interpretations of target physical systems, processes, phenomena, or situations. The models are retrieved or constructed on the basis of potentially satisfying salient constraints of the target domain. In the modeling process, various forms of abstraction, such as limiting case, idealization, generalization, and generic modeling are utilized. Evaluation and adaptation take place in the light of structural of structural, causal, and/or functional constraint satisfaction and enhanced understanding of the target problem is obtained through the modeling process. Simulation can be used to produce new states and enable evaluation of behaviors, constraint satisfaction, and other factors. The book also addresses some of the main aspects of the concept of abduction, connecting it to the centralepistemological question of hypothesis withdrawal in science and model-based reasoning, where abductive interferences exhibit their most appealing cognitive virtues. The most recent results and achievements in the above areas are illustrated in detail by the various contributors to the work, who are among the most respected researchers in philosophy, artificial intelligence and cognitive science.

The objective of this publication is to comprehensively discuss the possibilities of producing steels with pre-determined attributes, demanded by the customer to fit exacting specifications. The information presented in the book has been designed to indicate the reasons for the expenses and to aid in the process of overcoming the difficulties and reducing the costs.

In nine detailed chapters, the authors cover topics including: steel as a major contributor to the economic wealth of a country in terms of its capabilities and production current concerns of major steel producers phenomena contributing to the quality of the product information concerning the boundary conditions of the rolling process and initial conditions, put to use by mathematical models the solid state incremental approach and flow formulation parameters and variables - most of which make use of the exponential nature of phenomena that are activated by thermal energy the application of three dimensional analysis to shape rolling the evaluation of parameters by a form of inverse analysis to the flat rolling process knowledge based modeling, using artificial intelligence, expert systems and neural networks

They conclude that when either mathematical or physical modeling of the rolling process is considered and the aim is to satisfy the demands for customers, it is possible to produce what the customer wants, exactly.
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"The Definitive Guide to SQLite" is the perfect book about SQLite. It covers everything needed to start working with SQLite including installation, using the SQLite shell, and programming with SQLite using six different language extensions. -- Joe Topjian, Adminspotting

Traditional relational databases and embedded databases both have shortcomings that can leave a developer perplexed. So for many people, the solution resides in SQLite, an open source embeddable database with an amazingly small footprint (less than 250 kilobytes). SQLite packs a powerful array of features and can handle databases as large as 2 terabytes. It offers a flexible set of datatypes and the ability to perform transactions, and it is supported by languages like C, PHP, Perl, and Python. And because SQLite's databases are completely file based, privileges are granted at the operating system level, allowing for easy and fast user management.

"The Definitive Guide to SQLite" is the first book to devote complete coverage to the latest version of this powerful database. It offers you a thorough overview of SQLite capabilities and APIs, while remaining cognizant of newcomers who may be making their first foray into a database environment with SQLite. This book serves as both a first-time tutorial and future reference guide." Youll learn about SQLite extensions available for C, Java, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, and Tcl. The book thoroughly covers SQLite internals to help you take full advantage of its features while minimally impacting resource consumption. Author Mike Owens is the original creator of Pysqlite, the popular Python extension for SQLite.

Automatic Graph Drawing is concerned with the layout of relational structures as they occur in Computer Science (Data Base Design, Data Mining, Web Mining), Bioinformatics (Metabolic Networks), Businessinformatics (Organization Diagrams, Event Driven Process Chains), or the Social Sciences (Social Networks). In mathematical terms, such relational structures are modeled as graphs or more general objects such as hypergraphs, clustered graphs, or compound graphs. A variety of layout algorithms that are based on graph theoretical foundations have been developed in the last two decades and implemented in software systems. After an introduction to the subject area and a concise treatment of the technical foundations for the subsequent chapters, this book features 14 chapters on state-of-the-art graph drawing software systems, ranging from general "tool boxes'' to customized software for various applications. These chapters are written by leading experts, they follow a uniform scheme and can be read independently from each other.

Explore one of the most exciting 3D tools on the market, modo, with Real-World modo - the Luxology approved, concept and principle- driven guide. Learn to apply the revolutionary, artist-friendly modo toolset with its powerful 3D rendering engine to your project workflows. In a clear, motivating, and entertaining style, Luxology insider, Wes McDermott, provides captivating 3D imagery, real world observations, and valuable tips and tricks all in one place - an invaluable resource for any digital artist. Explore 3D techniques and principles with chapters on modelling, UV mapping, texturing, animation, lighting and rendering. Learn to leverage the technical elements of the modo rendering engine including Antialaising, Shading Rate and Irradiance Caching from an artist's perspective. Integrate modo with other 3D applications such as Maya and Mudbox and learn to properly setup a linear rendering workflow within modo. For practical, hands-on techniques, you can visit www.wesmcdermott.com for video walk-throughs that further enhance the coverage in the book.