Create bulletproof, high-performance web apps and servers with Rust. In Rust Web Development you will learn: Handling the borrow checker in an asynchronous environment Creating web APIs and using JSON in Rust Graceful error handling Testing, tracing, logging, and debugging Deploying Rust applications Efficient database access Rust Web Development is a hands-on guide to building server-based web applications with Rust. If you've built web servers using Java, C#, or PHP, you'll instantly fall in love with the performance and development experience Rust delivers. This book shows you how to work efficiently using pure Rust, along with important Rust libraries such as tokio for async runtimes, warp for web servers and APIs, and reqwest to run external HTTP requests. about the technology Web development languages and libraries can be resource hungry, with poor safety for maintaining vital web services. Rust services perform better and guarantee better safety. Plus, Rust's awesome compiler gives you an amazing developer experience. You'll get the speed of low-level programming languages like C along with the ease-of-use you'd expect from high-level languages Python or Ruby, with a super strong compiler that automatically prevents common mistakes such as null pointers. about the book In Rust Web Development, you'll learn to build server-side web applications using the Rust language and its key libraries. If you know the basics of Rust, you'll quickly pick up some pro tips for setting up your projects and organizing your code. This book gets you hands-on fast, with numerous small and large examples. You'll get up to speed with how Rust streamlines backend development, implements authentication flows, and even makes it easier for your APIs to interact. As you go, you'll build a complete Q&A web service and iterate on your code chapter-by-chapter, just like a real development project. RETAIL SELLING POINTS * Handling the borrow checker in an asynchronous environment * Creating web APIs and using JSON in Rust * Graceful error handling * Testing, tracing, logging, and debugging * Deploying Rust applications * Efficient database access AUDIENCE For experienced web developers familiar with Java, Node, or Go, and the absolute basics of Rust

'Masterful . . . [Thompson] illuminates both the fascinating coders and the bewildering technological forces that are transforming the world in which we live.' - David Grann, author of The Lost City of Z. Facebook's algorithms shaping the news. Uber's cars flocking the streets. Revolution on Twitter and romance on Tinder. We live in a world constructed of computer code. Coders - software programmers - are the people who built it for us. And yet their worlds and minds are little known to outsiders. In Coders, Wired columnist Clive Thompson presents a brilliantly original anthropological reckoning with the most influential tribe in today's world, interrogating who they are, how they think, what they value, what qualifies as greatness in their world, and what should give us pause. One of the most prominent journalists writing on technology today, Clive Thompson takes us into the minds of coders, the most quietly influential people on the planet, in a journey into the heart of the machine - and the men and women who made it.

As the trend toward the increased miniaturization of devices continues, solder interconnects are becoming the limiting factor in the reliability of electronic packages. With the critical nature of these small electrical-mechanical interconnections, the question arises: Just how reliable are the solder joints in a modern electronic package? The authors will answer this question by addressing the materials and mechanics issues associated with solder joints in this state-of-the-art assessment. The reader will learn the basic metallurgy of solder alloys, the constitutive models available for modeling solder interconnects, computational simulations to predict solder joint geometry, and the application of mechanics models to through-hole and surface mount technologies. The Mechanics of Solder Alloy Interconnects is a resource to be used in developing a solder joint reliability assessment. Each chapter is written to be used as a "stand-alone" resource for a particular aspect of materials and modeling issues. With this gained understanding, the reader in search of a solution to a solder joint reliability problem knows where in the materials and modeling communities to go for the appropriate answer.

This tutorial-based book allows readers to create a first-person game from start to finish using industry-standard (and free to student) tools of Unity, Substance Painter, and Maya. The first half of the book lays out the basics of using Maya and Substance Painter to create game-ready assets. This includes polygonal modeling, UV layout, and custom texture painting. The book then covers rigging and animation solutions to create assets to be placed in the game, including animated first-person assets and motion-captured NPC animations. Finally, readers can put it all together and build interactivity that allows the player to create a finished game using the assets built and animated earlier in the book. * Written by industry professionals with real-world experience in building assets and games * Build a complete game from start to finish * Learn what the pros use: construct all assets using the tools used at game studios across the world * All software used are free to students * When complete, students will have a playable version of an FPS game Jingtian Li is a graduate of China's Central Academy of Fine Arts and New York's School of Visual Arts, where he earned an MFA in Computer Art. He currently is an Assistant Professor of 3D Animation & Game Design at the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio, Texas. Adam Watkins is a 20-year veteran of 3D education. He holds an MFA in 3D Animation and a BFA in Theatre Arts from Utah State University. He currently is the Coordinator and Professor of the 3D Animation & Game Department at the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio, Texas. Kassandra Arevalo is an instructor of 3D Animation & Game Design at the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio, Texas. She previously worked as an animator at Immersed Games. Matt Tovar is an industry veteran animator. He has worked at Naughty Dog, Infinity Ward, and Sony Interactive on such games as The Last of Us, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, and most recently Marvel's Avengers with Crystal Dynamics. He is an Assistant Professor of 3D Animation at the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio, Texas.

Get the latest coverage of the newest features in C#9 and .NET 5 In Professional C# and .NET: 2021 Edition, Microsoft MVP for Visual Studio and Development Technologies and veteran developer, Christian Nagel, delivers a comprehensive tour of the new features and capabilities of C#9 and .NET 5. Experienced programmers making the transition to C# will benefit from the author's in-depth explorations to create Web- and Windows applications using ASP.NET Core, Blazor, and WinUI using modern application patterns and new features offered by .NET including Microservices deployed to Docker images, GRPC, localization, asynchronous streaming, and much more. The book also offers: Discussions of the extension of .NET to non-Microsoft platforms like OSX and Linux Explanations of the newest features in C#9, including support for record types, and enhanced support for tuples, pattern matching, and nullable reference types Integrating .NET applications with Microsoft Azure services such as Azure App Configuration, Azure Key Vault, Azure Functions, the Azure Active Directory, and others Downloadable code examples from wrox.com and github.com with online updates for C# 10 and .NET 6 Perfect for programmers with a background in C#, Visual Basic, Java, or C/C++, Professional C# and .NET: 2021 Edition will also earn a place in the libraries of software architects seeking an up-to-date and fulsome treatment of the latest C# and .NET releases.

Artificial Intelligence Techniques in IoT Sensor Networks is a technical book which can be read by researchers, academicians, students and professionals interested in artificial intelligence (AI), sensor networks and Internet of Things (IoT). This book is intended to develop a shared understanding of applications of AI techniques in the present and near term. The book maps the technical impacts of AI technologies, applications and their implications on the design of solutions for sensor networks. This text introduces researchers and aspiring academicians to the latest developments and trends in AI applications for sensor networks in a clear and well-organized manner. It is mainly useful for research scholars in sensor networks and AI techniques. In addition, professionals and practitioners working on the design of real-time applications for sensor networks may benefit directly from this book. Moreover, graduate and master's students of any departments related to AI, IoT and sensor networks can find this book fascinating for developing expert systems or real-time applications. This book is written in a simple and easy language, discussing the fundamentals, which relieves the requirement of having early backgrounds in the field. From this expectation and experience, many libraries will be interested in owning copies of this work.

This book serves three basic purposes: (1) a tutorial-type reference for complex systems engineering (CSE) concepts and associated terminology, (2) a recommendation of a proposed methodology showing how the evolving practice of CSE can lead to a more unified theory, and (3) a complex systems (CSs) initiative for organizations to invest some of their resources toward helping to make the world a better place. A wide variety of technical practitioners-e.g., developers of new or improved systems (particularly systems engineers), program and project managers, associated staff/workers, funders and overseers, government executives, military officers, systems acquisition personnel, contract specialists, owners of large and small businesses, professional society members, and CS researchers-may be interested in further exploring these topics. Readers will learn more about CS characteristics and behaviors and CSE principles and will therefore be able to focus on techniques that will better serve them in their everyday work environments in dealing with complexity. The fundamental observation is that many systems inherently involve a deeper complexity because stakeholders are engaged in the enterprise. This means that such CSs are more difficult to invent, create, or improve upon because no one can be in total control since people cannot be completely controlled. Therefore, one needs to concentrate on trying to influence progress, then wait a suitable amount of time to see what happens, iterating as necessary. With just three chapters in this book, it seems to make sense to provide a tutorial introduction that readers can peruse only as necessary, considering their background and understanding, then a chapter laying out the suggested artifacts and methodology, followed by a chapter emphasizing worthwhile areas of application.

This unique textbook, in contrast to a standard logic text, provides the reader with a logic that actually can be used in practice to express and reason about mathematical ideas.The book is an introduction to simple type theory, a classical higher-order version of predicate logic that extends first-order logic. It presents a practice-oriented logic called Alonzo that is based on Alonzo Church's formulation of simple type theory known as Church's type theory. Unlike traditional predicate logics, Alonzo admits undefined expressions. The book illustrates, using Alonzo, how simple type theory is suited ideally for reasoning about mathematical structures and constructing libraries of mathematical knowledge. Topics and features: Offers the first book-length introduction to simple type theory as a predicate logic Provides the reader with a logic that is close to mathematical practice Presents the tools needed to build libraries of mathematical knowledge Employs two semantics, one for mathematics and one for logic Emphasizes the model-theoretic view of predicate logic Includes several important topics, such as definite description and theory morphisms, not usually found in standard logic textbooks Aimed at students of computing and mathematics at the graduate or upper-undergraduate level, this book is also well-suited for mathematicians, computing professionals, engineers, and scientists who need a practical logic for expressing and reasoning about mathematical ideas. William M. Farmer is a Professor in the Department of Computing and Software at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.

This book teaches beginners and aspiring game developers how to develop 2D games with Unity. Thousands of commercial games have been built with Unity. The reader will learn the complete process of 2D game development, step by step. The theory behind each step is fully explained. This book contains numerous color illustrations and access to all source code and companion videos. Key Features: Fully detailed game projects from scratch. Beginners can do the steps and create games right away. No coding experience is necessary. Numerous examples take a raw beginner toward professional coding proficiency in C# and Unity. Includes a thorough introduction to Unity 2020, including 2D game development, prefabs, cameras, animation, character controllers, lighting, and sound. Includes a step-by-step introduction to Unity 2019.3. Extensive coverage of GIMP, Audacity, and MuseScore for the creation of 2D graphics, sound effects, and music. All required software is free to use for any purpose including commercial applications and games. Franz Lanzinger is the owner and chief game developer of Lanzinger Studio, an independent game development and music studio in Sunnyvale, California. He started his career in game programming in 1982 at Atari Games, Inc., where he designed and programmed the classic arcade game Crystal Castles. In 1989, he joined Tengen, where he was a programmer and designer for Ms. Pac-Man and Toobin' on the NES. He co-founded Bitmasters, where he designed and coded games including Rampart and Championship Pool for the NES and SNES, and NCAA Final Four Basketball for the SNES and Sega Genesis. In 1996, he founded Actual Entertainment, publisher and developer of the Gubble video game series. He has a B.Sc. in mathematics from the University of Notre Dame and attended graduate school in mathematics at the University of California at Berkeley. He is a former world record holder on Centipede and Burgertime. He is a professional author, game developer, accompanist, and piano teacher. He is currently working on remaking the original Gubble game in Unity and Blender.

This student-friendly book provides an accessible overview of the primary debates about the effects of video games. It expands on the original The Video Game Debate to address the new technologies that have emerged within the field of game studies over the last few years. Debates about the negative effects of video game play have been evident since their introduction in the 1970s, but the advent of online and mobile gaming has revived these concerns, reinvigorating old debates and generating brand new ones. The Video Game Debate 2 draws from the latest research findings from the top scholars of digital games research to address these concerns. The book explores key developments such as virtual and augmented reality, the use of micro-transactions, the integration of loot boxes, and the growth of mobile gaming and games for change (serious games). Furthermore, several new chapters explore contemporary debates around e-sports, gamification, sex and gender discrimination in games, and the use of games in therapy. This book offers students and scholars of games studies and digital media, as well as policymakers, the essential information they need to participate in the debate.

Developing a successful game in today's market is a challenging endeavor. Thousands of titles are published yearly, all competing for players' time and attention. Game analytics has emerged in the past few years as one of the main resources for ensuring game quality, maximizing success, understanding player behavior and enhancing the quality of the player experience. It has led to a paradigm shift in the development and design strategies of digital games, bringing data-driven intelligence practices into the fray for informing decision making at operational, tactical and strategic levels. Game Analytics - Maximizing the Value of Player Data is the first book on the topic of game analytics; the process of discovering and communicating patterns in data towards evaluating and driving action, improving performance and solving problems in game development and game research. Written by over 50 international experts from industry and research, it covers a comprehensive range of topics across more than 30 chapters, providing an in-depth discussion of game analytics and its practical applications. Topics covered include monetization strategies, design of telemetry systems, analytics for iterative production, game data mining and big data in game development, spatial analytics, visualization and reporting of analysis, player behavior analysis, quantitative user testing and game user research. This state-of-the-art volume is an essential source of reference for game developers and researchers. Key takeaways include: Thorough introduction to game analytics; covering analytics applied to data on players, processes and performance throughout the game lifecycle. In-depth coverage and advice on setting up analytics systems and developing good practices for integrating analytics in game-development and -management. Contributions by leading researchers and experienced professionals from the industry, including Ubisoft, Sony, EA, Bioware, Square Enix, THQ, Volition, and PlayableGames. Interviews with experienced industry professionals on how they use analytics to create hit games.

Programmable logic controllers (PLCs) have been used extensively and are offered in terms of functions, program memories, and the number of inputs/outputs (I/Os), ranging from a few to thousands. With a focus on how to design and implement a PLC, this volume explains hardware and associated basic concepts of PLC. Authors have used PIC16F1847 microcontroller with: 8192 words of Flash program memory, 1024 bytes of SRAM data memory, 256 bytes of EEPROM data memory, the maximum operating speed of 32 MHz, 16-level deep hardware stack, an enhanced instruction set consisting of 49 single-word instructions. Flowcharts are provided to help the understanding of macros (instructions). Aimed at researchers and graduate students in electrical engineering, power electronics, robotics and automation, sensors, this book: Explains how to design and use a PIC16F1847 microcontroller-based PLC. Provides easy to use software structures written by using the PIC Assembly programming language. Describes a PLC from a designer's perspective. Explains the basic hardware and basic software structures of the PIC16F1847 based PLC. Focuses on concepts like Contact and Relay Based Macros, Flip-Flop Macros, Timer Macros, Counter Macros and Comparison Macros.

The volume focusses on intermediate concepts of the PIC16F1847-Based PLC project, and covers arithmetical operation ability of PLCs, logical function performers and operations like AND, NAND, OR, NOR. Further, it explains shift and rotate macros moving bits in a register to right or left, and selection macros enabling one value to be selected from several given values according to certain criteria. Demultiplexer circuit is illustrated, which is used to send a signal to one of many devices. Finally, it explains decoder, priority encoder and conversion macros. All the concepts are supported using flowcharts. Aimed at researchers and graduate students in electrical engineering, power electronics, robotics and automation, sensors, this book: Presents arithmetical and logical macros to carry out arithmetical and logical operations to be used for 8-bit or 16-bit variables and/or constant values. Provides shift and rotate macros to do arithmetical or logical shift and rotate operations to be used for 8-bit or 16-bit variables. Proposes selection macros to enable the user to do 8-bit or 16-bit move, load, selection, maximum, minimum, limiting, multiplexing and byte multiplexing operations. Develops demultiplexer macros, decoder macros and priority encoder macros to be used as combinational circuits. Presents conversion macros to provide functions to convert given data from one format to another one.

The PIC16F1847-Based PLC project supports up to 4 analog inputs and 1 analog output, 1 High Speed Counter, 2 PWM (pulse width modulation) outputs, 1 Drum Sequencer Instruction with up to 16 steps, the implementation of Sequential Function Charts (SFCs) with up to 24 steps. This volume presents advanced concepts of the PIC16F1847-Based PLC project and consists of topics like program control, high speed counter and PWM macros. It further explains memory related drum sequencer instruction, sequential functional charts, and analog input and output modules. Aimed at researchers and graduate students in electrical engineering, power electronics, robotics and automation, sensors, this book: Presents program control macros to enable or disable a block of PLC program or to move execution of a program from one place to another. Proposes a High-Speed Counter and four PWM Macros for high speed counting and PWM operations. Develops memory related macros to enable the user to do memory read/write operations. Provides a Drum Sequencer instruction with up to 16 steps and 16 outputs on each step. Discusses the implementation of Sequential Function Chart (SFC) elements with up to 24 steps.

Improve Every Retrospective! Real Solutions for Every Team Leader, Facilitator, and Participant ". . . Aino has shared a robust, curated list of antipatterns and how to avoid them. . . . And she has shared so much more than tips and techniques. You will find a gold mine--with precious nuggets, including her personal experiences, effective facilitation resources, and pointers for extracting yourself and your team when you're stuck." --From the Foreword by Diana Larsen, co-author, Agile Retrospectives: Making Good Teams Great Retrospectives are indispensable for continuous learning and improvement in Lean, Agile, DevOps, and other contexts, but most of us have suffered through at least one retrospective that was a waste of time, or worse. Now, leading agile coach Aino Vonge Corry identifies 24 reasons that retrospectives fail and shows how to overcome each of them. Using the familiar "patterns" approach, Retrospectives Antipatterns introduces antipatterns related to structure, planning, people, distributed teams, and more. Corry shares traps she's encountered and mistakes she's made over more than a decade of leading retrospectives and then presents proven solutions. With her insights and guidance, you can run enjoyable retrospectives that deliver concrete improvements and real value--or at the very least recognize when you are making the same mistake as the author! Create a common language, actionable solutions, and proven plans for solving the retrospective problems you'll encounter most often Recognize symptoms, assess tradeoffs, and refactor your current situation into something better Plan more effectively: decide who should attend and facilitate, when to schedule your retrospective, and how much time to set aside Handle "people" problems: deal with negativity, silence, distrust, disillusionment, loudmouths, and cultural differences Facilitate better "virtual" retrospectives, with tips for online retrospectives included in each antipattern Register your book for convenient access to downloads, updates, and/or corrections as they become available. See inside book for details.

Over time, basic research tends to lead to specialization - increasingly narrow t- ics are addressed by increasingly focussed communities, publishing in increasingly con ned workshops and conferences, discussing increasingly incremental contri- tions. Already the community of programming languages is split into various s- communities addressing different aspects and paradigms (functional, imperative, relational, and object-oriented). Only a few people manage to maintain a broader view, and even fewer step back in order to gain an understanding about the basic principles, their interrelation, and their impact in a larger context. The pattern calculus is the result of a profound re-examination of a 50-year - velopment. It attempts to provide a unifying approach, bridging the gaps between different programming styles and paradigms according to a new slogan - compu- tion is pattern matching. It is the contribution of this book to systematically and elegantly present and evaluate the power of pattern matching as the guiding paradigm of programming. Patterns are dynamically generated, discovered, passed, applied, and automatically adapted, based on pattern matching and rewriting technology, which allows one to elegantly relate things as disparate as functions and data structures. Of course, pattern matching is not new. It underlies term rewriting - it is, for example, inc- porated in, typically functional, programming languages, like Standard ML - but it has never been pursued as the basis of a unifying framework for programming.

This innovative text bridges media theory, psychology, and interpersonal communication by describing how our relationships with media emulate the relationships we develop with friends and romantic partners through their ability to replicate intimacy, regularity, and reciprocity. In research-rich, conversational chapters, the author applies psychological principles to understand how nine influential media technologies-theatrical film, recorded music, consumer market cameras, radio, network and cable television, tape cassettes, video gaming, and dial-up internet service providers-irreversibly changed the communication environment, culture, and psychological expectations that we then apply to future media technologies. With special attention to mediums absent from the traditional literature, including recorded music, cable television, and magnetic tape, this book encourages readers to critically reflect on their own past relationships with media and consider the present environment and the future of media given their own personal habits. 20th Century Media and the American Psyche is ideal for media studies, communication, and psychology students, scholars, and industry professionals, as well as anyone interested in a greater understanding of the psychological significance of media technology, usage, and adoption across the past 150 years.

This innovative text bridges media theory, psychology, and interpersonal communication by describing how our relationships with media emulate the relationships we develop with friends and romantic partners through their ability to replicate intimacy, regularity, and reciprocity. In research-rich, conversational chapters, the author applies psychological principles to understand how nine influential media technologies-theatrical film, recorded music, consumer market cameras, radio, network and cable television, tape cassettes, video gaming, and dial-up internet service providers-irreversibly changed the communication environment, culture, and psychological expectations that we then apply to future media technologies. With special attention to mediums absent from the traditional literature, including recorded music, cable television, and magnetic tape, this book encourages readers to critically reflect on their own past relationships with media and consider the present environment and the future of media given their own personal habits. 20th Century Media and the American Psyche is ideal for media studies, communication, and psychology students, scholars, and industry professionals, as well as anyone interested in a greater understanding of the psychological significance of media technology, usage, and adoption across the past 150 years.

This book offers critical perspectives on the digital 'iconic', exploring how the notion of the iconic is re-appropriated and re-made online, and the consequences for humanity and society. Examining cross-cultural case studies of iconic images in digital spaces, the author offers original and critical analyses, theories and perspectives on the notion of the 'iconic', and on its movement, re-appropriation and meaning making on digital platforms. A carefully curated selection of case studies illustrates topics such as phantom memory; martyrdom; denigration and pornographic recoding; digital games as simulacra; and memes as 'artification'. Situating the notion of the iconic firmly within contemporary cultures, the author takes a thematic approach to investigate the iconic as an unstable and unfinished phenomenon online as it travels through platforms temporally and spatially. The book will be an important resource for academics and students in the areas of media and communications, digital culture, cultural studies, visual communication, visual culture, journalism studies and digital humanities.

Welcome to Game Audio Programming: Principles and Practices! This book is the first of its kind: an entire book dedicated to the art of game audio programming. With over fifteen chapters written by some of the top game audio programmers and sound designers in the industry, this book contains more knowledge and wisdom about game audio programming than any other volume in history. One of the goals of this book is to raise the general level of game audio programming expertise, so it is written in a manner that is accessible to beginners, while still providing valuable content for more advanced game audio programmers. Each chapter contains techniques that the authors have used in shipping games, with plenty of code examples and diagrams. There are chapters on the fundamentals of audio representation and perception; advanced usage of several different audio middleware platforms (Audiokinetic Wwise, CRI ADX2, and FMOD Studio); advanced topics including Open Sound Control, Vector-Based Amplitude Panning, and Dynamic Game Data; and more! Whether you're an audio programmer looking for new techniques, an up-and-coming game developer looking for an area to focus on, or just the one who got saddled with the audio code, this book has something for you. Cutting-edge advanced game audio programming concepts, with examples from real games and audio engines Includes perspectives of both audio programmers and sound designers on working and communicating together Coverage not just on game audio engine design, but also on implementing audio tools and working with sound designers providing a comprehensive perspective on being an audio programmer

Reinforcement Learning for Cyber-Physical Systems: with Cybersecurity Case Studies was inspired by recent developments in the fields of reinforcement learning (RL) and cyber-physical systems (CPSs). Rooted in behavioral psychology, RL is one of the primary strands of machine learning. Different from other machine learning algorithms, such as supervised learning and unsupervised learning, the key feature of RL is its unique learning paradigm, i.e., trial-and-error. Combined with the deep neural networks, deep RL become so powerful that many complicated systems can be automatically managed by AI agents at a superhuman level. On the other hand, CPSs are envisioned to revolutionize our society in the near future. Such examples include the emerging smart buildings, intelligent transportation, and electric grids. However, the conventional hand-programming controller in CPSs could neither handle the increasing complexity of the system, nor automatically adapt itself to new situations that it has never encountered before. The problem of how to apply the existing deep RL algorithms, or develop new RL algorithms to enable the real-time adaptive CPSs, remains open. This book aims to establish a linkage between the two domains by systematically introducing RL foundations and algorithms, each supported by one or a few state-of-the-art CPS examples to help readers understand the intuition and usefulness of RL techniques. Features Introduces reinforcement learning, including advanced topics in RL Applies reinforcement learning to cyber-physical systems and cybersecurity Contains state-of-the-art examples and exercises in each chapter Provides two cybersecurity case studies Reinforcement Learning for Cyber-Physical Systems with Cybersecurity Case Studies is an ideal text for graduate students or junior/senior undergraduates in the fields of science, engineering, computer science, or applied mathematics. It would also prove useful to researchers and engineers interested in cybersecurity, RL, and CPS. The only background knowledge required to appreciate the book is a basic knowledge of calculus and probability theory.

This book looks closely at the endings of narrative digital games, examining their ways of concluding the processes of both storytelling and play in order to gain insight into what endings are and how we identify them in different media. While narrative digital games share many representational strategies for signalling their upcoming end with more traditional narrative media - such as novels or movies - they also show many forms of endings that often radically differ from our conventional understanding of conclusion and closure. From vast game worlds that remain open for play after a story's finale, to multiple endings that are often hailed as a means for players to create their own stories, to the potentially tragic endings of failure and "game over", digital games question the traditional singularity and finality of endings. Using a broad range of examples, this book delves deeply into these and other forms and their functions, both to reveal the closural specificities of the ludonarrative hybrid that digital games are, as well as to find the core elements that characterise endings in any medium. It examines how endings make themselves known to players and raises the question of how well-established closural conventions blend with play and a player's effort to achieve a goal. As an interdisciplinary study that draws on game studies as much as on transmedial narratology, Forms and Functions of Endings in Narrative Digital Games is suited for scholars and students of digital games as well as for narratologists yet to become familiar with this medium.

Accurate, robust and fast image reconstruction is a critical task in many scientific, industrial and medical applications. Over the last decade, image reconstruction has been revolutionized by the rise of compressive imaging. It has fundamentally changed the way modern image reconstruction is performed. This in-depth treatment of the subject commences with a practical introduction to compressive imaging, supplemented with examples and downloadable code, intended for readers without extensive background in the subject. Next, it introduces core topics in compressive imaging - including compressed sensing, wavelets and optimization - in a concise yet rigorous way, before providing a detailed treatment of the mathematics of compressive imaging. The final part is devoted to recent trends in compressive imaging: deep learning and neural networks. With an eye to the next decade of imaging research, and using both empirical and mathematical insights, it examines the potential benefits and the pitfalls of these latest approaches.

"This book guides you in the journey of 3D modeling from the theory with elegant mathematics to applications with beautiful 3D model pictures. Written in a simple, straightforward, and concise manner, readers will learn the state of the art of 3D reconstruction and modeling." -Professor Takeo Kanade, Carnegie Mellon University The computer vision and graphics communities use different terminologies for the same ideas. This book provides a translation, enabling graphics researchers to apply vision concepts, and vice-versa, independence of chapters allows readers to directly jump into a specific chapter of interest, compared to other texts, gives more succinct treatment overall, and focuses primarily on vision geometry. Image-Based Modeling is for graduate students, researchers, and engineers working in the areas of computer vision, computer graphics, image processing, robotics, virtual reality, and photogrammetry.