This volume describes and analyzes in a systematic way the great contributions of the philosopher Krister Segerberg to the study of real and doxastic actions. Following an introduction which functions as a roadmap to Segerberg's works on actions, the first part of the book covers relations between actions, intentions and routines, dynamic logic as a theory of action, agency, and deontic logics built upon the logics of actions. The second section explores belief revision and update, iterated and irrevocable beliefs change, dynamic doxastic logic and hypertheories. Segerberg has worked for more than thirty years to analyze the intricacies of real and doxastic actions using formal tools - mostly modal (dynamic) logic and its semantics. He has had such a significant impact on modal logic that "It is hard to roam for long in modal logic without finding Krister Segerberg's traces," as Johan van Benthem notes in his chapter of this book.

This indispensable text introduces the foundations of three-dimensional computer vision and describes recent contributions to the field. Fully revised and updated, this much-anticipated new edition reviews a range of triangulation-based methods, including linear and bundle adjustment based approaches to scene reconstruction and camera calibration, stereo vision, point cloud segmentation, and pose estimation of rigid, articulated, and flexible objects. Also covered are intensity-based techniques that evaluate the pixel grey values in the image to infer three-dimensional scene structure, and point spread function based approaches that exploit the effect of the optical system. The text shows how methods which integrate these concepts are able to increase reconstruction accuracy and robustness, describing applications in industrial quality inspection and metrology, human-robot interaction, and remote sensing.

The aim of this book is to present the mathematical theory and the know-how to make computer programs for the numerical approximation of Optimal Control of PDE's. The computer programs are presented in a straightforward generic language. As a consequence they are well structured, clearly explained and can be translated easily into any high level programming language. Applications and corresponding numerical tests are also given and discussed. To our knowledge, this is the first book to put together mathematics and computer programs for Optimal Control in order to bridge the gap between mathematical abstract algorithms and concrete numerical ones. The text is addressed to students and graduates in Mathematics, Mechanics, Applied Mathematics, Numerical Software, Information Technology and Engineering. It can also be used for Master and Ph.D. programs.

This book contains a selection of papers presented at the conference on High Performance Software for Nonlinear Optimization (HPSN097) which was held in Ischia, Italy, in June 1997. The rapid progress of computer technologies, including new parallel architec tures, has stimulated a large amount of research devoted to building software environments and defining algorithms able to fully exploit this new computa tional power. In some sense, numerical analysis has to conform itself to the new tools. The impact of parallel computing in nonlinear optimization, which had a slow start at the beginning, seems now to increase at a fast rate, and it is reasonable to expect an even greater acceleration in the future. As with the first HPSNO conference, the goal of the HPSN097 conference was to supply a broad overview of the more recent developments and trends in nonlinear optimization, emphasizing the algorithmic and high performance software aspects. Bringing together new computational methodologies with theoretical ad vances and new computer technologies is an exciting challenge that involves all scientists willing to develop high performance numerical software. This book contains several important contributions from different and com plementary standpoints. Obviously, the articles in the book do not cover all the areas of the conference topic or all the most recent developments, because of the large number of new theoretical and computational ideas of the last few years."

Formal Equivalence Checking and Design Debugging covers two major topics in design verification: logic equivalence checking and design debugging. The first part of the book reviews the design problems that require logic equivalence checking and describes the underlying technologies that are used to solve them. Some novel approaches to the problems of verifying design revisions after intensive sequential transformations such as retiming are described in detail. The second part of the book gives a thorough survey of previous and recent literature on design error diagnosis and design error correction. This part also provides an in-depth analysis of the algorithms used in two logic debugging software programs, ErrorTracer and AutoFix, developed by the authors. From the Foreword: With the adoption of the static sign-off approach to verifying circuit implementations the application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) industry will experience the first radical methodological revolution since the adoption of logic synthesis. Equivalence checking is one of the two critical elements of this methodological revolution. This book is timely for either the designer seeking to better understand the mechanics of equivalence checking or for the CAD researcher who wishes to investigate well-motivated research problems such as equivalence checking of retimed designs or error diagnosis in sequential circuits.' Kurt Keutzer, University of California, Berkeley

With 11 invited submissions from leading researchers and teams of researchers sharing one common characteristic ? all have worked with Dr. Judith Bishop during her long and continuing career as a leader in computer science education and research ? this book reflects on Dr Bishop's outstandingcontribution to computer science. Havingworked at three different universities she now holds a leadership position in the research division of a major software company.

The topics covered reflect some of the transitions in her career. The dominant theme is programming languages, with chapters on object oriented programming, real-time programming, component programming and design patterns. Another major and related topic is compilers, with contributions on dataflow analysis, tree rewriting and keyword recognition. Finally, there are some additional chapters on other varied but highly interesting topics including smart homes, mobile systems and teaching computer science."

This unique book examines up-to-the-minute uses of technology in financial markets and then explains how you can profit from that knowledge. To participate in mainstream .NET development, you must address the changes in financial markets by using the most sophisticated tools available, Microsoft .NET technology.

Software developers and architects, IT pros, and tech-savvy business users alike will find this book comprehensive and relevant. Each chapter presents problems and solutions that cover business aspects and relevant .NET features. Each aspect of .NET is analyzed in its proper context, so you'll understand why it is relevant and applicable in a real-life business case.

Evolutionary Algorithms and Agricultural Systems deals with the practical application of evolutionary algorithms to the study and management of agricultural systems. The rationale of systems research methodology is introduced, and examples listed of real-world applications. It is the integration of these agricultural systems models with optimization techniques, primarily genetic algorithms, which forms the focus of this book. The advantages are outlined, with examples of agricultural models ranging from national and industry-wide studies down to the within-farm scale. The potential problems of this approach are also discussed, along with practical methods of resolving these problems. Agricultural applications using alternate optimization techniques (gradient and direct-search methods, simulated annealing and quenching, and the tabu search strategy) are also listed and discussed. The particular problems and methodologies of these algorithms, including advantageous features that may benefit a hybrid approach or be usefully incorporated into evolutionary algorithms, are outlined. From consideration of this and the published examples, it is concluded that evolutionary algorithms are the superior method for the practical optimization of models of agricultural and natural systems. General recommendations on robust options and parameter settings for evolutionary algorithms are given for use in future studies. Evolutionary Algorithms and Agricultural Systems will prove useful to practitioners and researchers applying these methods to the optimization of agricultural or natural systems, and would also be suited as a text for systems management, applied modeling, or operations research.

Basics of Game Design is for anyone wanting to become a professional game designer. Focusing on creating the game mechanics for data-driven games, it covers role-playing, real-time strategy, first-person shooter, simulation, and other games. Written by a 25-year veteran of the game industry, the guide offers detailed explanations of how to design the data sets used to resolve game play for moving, combat, solving puzzles, interacting with NPCs, managing inventory, and much more. Advice on developing stories for games, building maps and levels, and designing the graphical user interface is also included.

Real-Time Systems Engineering and Applications is a well-structured collection of chapters pertaining to present and future developments in real-time systems engineering. After an overview of real-time processing, theoretical foundations are presented. The book then introduces useful modeling concepts and tools. This is followed by concentration on the more practical aspects of real-time engineering with a thorough overview of the present state of the art, both in hardware and software, including related concepts in robotics. Examples are given of novel real-time applications which illustrate the present state of the art. The book concludes with a focus on future developments, giving direction for new research activities and an educational curriculum covering the subject. This book can be used as a source for academic and industrial researchers as well as a textbook for computing and engineering courses covering the topic of real-time systems engineering.

Multilevel decision theory arises to resolve the contradiction between increasing requirements towards the process of design, synthesis, control and management of complex systems and the limitation of the power of technical, control, computer and other executive devices, which have to perform actions and to satisfy requirements in real time. This theory rises suggestions how to replace the centralised management of the system by hierarchical co-ordination of sub-processes. All sub-processes have lower dimensions, which support easier management and decision making. But the sub-processes are interconnected and they influence each other. Multilevel systems theory supports two main methodological tools: decomposition and co-ordination. Both have been developed, and implemented in practical applications concerning design, control and management of complex systems. In general, it is always beneficial to find the best or optimal solution in processes of system design, control and management. The real tendency towards the best (optimal) decision requires to present all activities in the form of a definition and then the solution of an appropriate optimization problem. Every optimization process needs the mathematical definition and solution of a well stated optimization problem. These problems belong to two classes: static optimization and dynamic optimization. Static optimization problems are solved applying methods of mathematical programming: conditional and unconditional optimization. Dynamic optimization problems are solved by methods of variation calculus: Euler Lagrange method; maximum principle; dynamical programming."

In Computer Graphics, the use of intelligent techniques started more recently than in other research areas. However, during these last two decades, the use of intelligent Computer Graphics techniques is growing up year after year and more and more interesting techniques are presented in this area. The purpose of this volume is to present current work of the Intelligent Computer Graphics community, a community growing up year after year. This volume is a kind of continuation of the previously published Springer volumes "Artificial Intelligence Techniques for Computer Graphics" (2008), "Intelligent Computer Graphics 2009" (2009), "Intelligent Computer Graphics 2010" (2010) and "Intelligent Computer Graphics 2011" (2011). Usually, this kind of volume contains, every year, selected extended papers from the corresponding 3IA Conference of the year. However, the current volume is made from directly reviewed and selected papers, submitted for publication in the volume "Intelligent Computer Graphics 2012". This year papers are particularly exciting and concern areas like plant modelling, text-to-scene systems, information visualization, computer-aided geometric design, artificial life, computer games, realistic rendering and many other very important themes.

The volume, devoted to variational analysis and its applications, collects selected and refereed contributions, which provide an outline of the field. The meeting of the title "Equilibrium Problems and Variational Models," which was held in Erice (Sicily) in the period June 23 - July 2 2000, was the occasion of the presentation of some of these papers; other results are a consequence of a fruitful and constructive atmosphere created during the meeting. New results, which enlarge the field of application of variational analysis, are presented in the book; they deal with the vectorial analysis, time dependent variational analysis, exact penalization, high order deriva tives, geometric aspects, distance functions and log-quadratic proximal methodology. The new theoretical results allow one to improve in a remarkable way the study of significant problems arising from the applied sciences, as continuum model of transportation, unilateral problems, multicriteria spatial price models, network equilibrium problems and many others. As noted in the previous book "Equilibrium Problems: Nonsmooth Optimization and Variational Inequality Models," edited by F. Giannessi, A. Maugeri and P.M. Pardalos, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Vol. 58 (2001), the progress obtained by variational analysis has permitted to han dle problems whose equilibrium conditions are not obtained by the mini mization of a functional. These problems obey a more realistic equilibrium condition expressed by a generalized orthogonality (complementarity) con dition, which enriches our knowledge of the equilibrium behaviour. Also this volume presents important examples of this formulation."

This edited volume comprises invited chapters that cover five areas of the current and the future development of intelligent systems and information sciences. Half of the chapters were presented as invited talks at the Workshop "Future Directions for Intelligent Systems and Information Sciences" held in Dunedin, New Zealand, 22-23 November 1999 after the International Conference on Neuro-Information Processing (lCONIPI ANZIISI ANNES '99) held in Perth, Australia. In order to make this volume useful for researchers and academics in the broad area of information sciences I invited prominent researchers to submit materials and present their view about future paradigms, future trends and directions. Part I contains chapters on adaptive, evolving, learning systems. These are systems that learn in a life-long, on-line mode and in a changing environment. The first chapter, written by the editor, presents briefly the paradigm of Evolving Connectionist Systems (ECOS) and some of their applications. The chapter by Sung-Bae Cho presents the paradigms of artificial life and evolutionary programming in the context of several applications (mobile robots, adaptive agents of the WWW). The following three chapters written by R.Duro, J.Santos and J.A.Becerra (chapter 3), GCoghill . (chapter 4), Y.Maeda (chapter 5) introduce new techniques for building adaptive, learning robots.

Game Sound Technology and Player Interaction: Concepts and Developments researches both how game sound affects a player psychologically, emotionally, and physiologically, and how this relationship itself impacts the design of computer game sound and the development of technology. This compilation also applies beyond the realm of video games to other types of immersive sound, such as soundscape design, gambling machines, emotive and fantastical sound to name a few. The application for this research is wide-ranging, interdisciplinary, and of primary importance for academics and practitioners searching for the right sounds.

Semi-infinite optimization is a vivid field of active research. Recently semi infinite optimization in a general form has attracted a lot of attention, not only because of its surprising structural aspects, but also due to the large number of applications which can be formulated as general semi-infinite programs. The aim of this book is to highlight structural aspects of general semi-infinite programming, to formulate optimality conditions which take this structure into account, and to give a conceptually new solution method. In fact, under certain assumptions general semi-infinite programs can be solved efficiently when their bi-Ievel structure is exploited appropriately. After a brief introduction with some historical background in Chapter 1 we be gin our presentation by a motivation for the appearance of standard and general semi-infinite optimization problems in applications. Chapter 2 lists a number of problems from engineering and economics which give rise to semi-infinite models, including (reverse) Chebyshev approximation, minimax problems, ro bust optimization, design centering, defect minimization problems for operator equations, and disjunctive programming."

Both Java and .NET use the idea of a virtual machine (VM) rather than a true executable. While very useful for some purposes, VMs make your source code and hence your intellectual property (IP) inherently less secure because the process can be reversed or decompiled. This book is useful because you must understand how decompilation works in order to properly protect your IP. Anyone interested in protecting Java code from prying eyes will want to buy this one of a kind book as it separates fact from fiction about just how ineffective obfuscators are at protecting your corporate secrets.While it is very easy for anyone to decompile Java code and almost as easy to run it through an obfuscation protection tool, there is very little information on just what happens when you do this. How secure is your code after you run an obfuscator, for example? bytecodes and the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) than in any book yet published. This book redresses the imbalance by providing insights into the features and limitations of todays decompilers and obfuscators, as well as offering a detailed look at what JVMs actually do.Virtual machine is the computer science term used when (most often in an attempt to gain greater portability) you create an abstract virtual processor and write code for it instead of having your compiler generate actual machine language for a chip like the Pentium 4. want the code to run. This translates the virtual machine language to the real machine language of your processor. The intermediary code for the virtual machine is what can more easily be decompiled, although with a loss of security, since in order for the code to be converted to real machine language it must be relatively transparent and not just a sequence of 0s and 1s

Experience gained during a ten-year long involvement in modelling, program ming and application in nonlinear optimization helped me to arrive at the conclusion that in the interest of having successful applications and efficient software production, knowing the structure of the problem to be solved is in dispensable. This is the reason why I have chosen the field in question as the sphere of my research. Since in applications, mainly from among the nonconvex optimization models, the differentiable ones proved to be the most efficient in modelling, especially in solving them with computers, I started to deal with the structure of smooth optimization problems. The book, which is a result of more than a decade of research, can be equally useful for researchers and stu dents showing interest in the domain, since the elementary notions necessary for understanding the book constitute a part of the university curriculum. I in tended dealing with the key questions of optimization theory, which endeavour, obviously, cannot bear all the marks of completeness. What I consider the most crucial point is the uniform, differential geometric treatment of various questions, which provides the reader with opportunities for learning the structure in the wide range, within optimization problems. I am grateful to my family for affording me tranquil, productive circumstances. I express my gratitude to F."

In this edition, the scope and character of the monograph did not change with respect to the first edition. Taking into account the rapid development of the field, we have, however, considerably enlarged its contents. Chapter 4 includes two additional sections 4.4 and 4.6 on theory and algorithms of D.C. Programming. Chapter 7, on Decomposition Algorithms in Nonconvex Optimization, is completely new. Besides this, we added several exercises and corrected errors and misprints in the first edition. We are grateful for valuable suggestions and comments that we received from several colleagues. R. Horst, P.M. Pardalos and N.V. Thoai March 2000 Preface to the First Edition Many recent advances in science, economics and engineering rely on nu merical techniques for computing globally optimal solutions to corresponding optimization problems. Global optimization problems are extraordinarily di verse and they include economic modeling, fixed charges, finance, networks and transportation, databases and chip design, image processing, nuclear and mechanical design, chemical engineering design and control, molecular biology, and environment al engineering. Due to the existence of multiple local optima that differ from the global solution all these problems cannot be solved by classical nonlinear programming techniques. During the past three decades, however, many new theoretical, algorith mic, and computational contributions have helped to solve globally multi extreme problems arising from important practical applications."

Complementarity theory is a new domain in applied mathematics and is concerned with the study of complementarity problems. These problems represent a wide class of mathematical models related to optimization, game theory, economic engineering, mechanics, fluid mechanics, stochastic optimal control etc. The book is dedicated to the study of nonlinear complementarity problems by topological methods. Audience: Mathematicians, engineers, economists, specialists working in operations research and anybody interested in applied mathematics or in mathematical modeling.

This textbook provides a comprehensive modeling, reformulation and optimization approach for solving production planning and supply chain planning problems, covering topics from a basic introduction to planning systems, mixed integer programming (MIP) models and algorithms through the advanced description of mathematical results in polyhedral combinatorics required to solve these problems. Based on twenty years worth of research in which the authors have played a significant role, the book addresses real life industrial production planning problems (involving complex production structures with multiple production stages) using MIP modeling and reformulation approach. The book provides an introduction to MIP modeling and to planning systems, a unique collection of reformulation results, and an easy to use problem-solving library. This approach is demonstrated through a series of real life case studies, exercises and detailed illustrations. Review by Jakub Marecek (Computer Journal) The emphasis put on mixed integer rounding and mixing sets, heuristics in-built in general purpose integer programming solvers, as well as on decompositions and heuristics using integer programming should be praised... There is no doubt that this volume offers the present best introduction to integer programming formulations of lotsizing problems, encountered in production planning. (2007)

The quadratic assignment problem (QAP) was introduced in 1957 by Koopmans and Beckmann to model a plant location problem. Since then the QAP has been object of numerous investigations by mathematicians, computers scientists, ope- tions researchers and practitioners. Nowadays the QAP is widely considered as a classical combinatorial optimization problem which is (still) attractive from many points of view. In our opinion there are at last three main reasons which make the QAP a popular problem in combinatorial optimization. First, the number of re- life problems which are mathematically modeled by QAPs has been continuously increasing and the variety of the fields they belong to is astonishing. To recall just a restricted number among the applications of the QAP let us mention placement problems, scheduling, manufacturing, VLSI design, statistical data analysis, and parallel and distributed computing. Secondly, a number of other well known c- binatorial optimization problems can be formulated as QAPs. Typical examples are the traveling salesman problem and a large number of optimization problems in graphs such as the maximum clique problem, the graph partitioning problem and the minimum feedback arc set problem. Finally, from a computational point of view the QAP is a very difficult problem. The QAP is not only NP-hard and - hard to approximate, but it is also practically intractable: it is generally considered as impossible to solve (to optimality) QAP instances of size larger than 20 within reasonable time limits.