It is rare to open a newspaper or read a government report without seeing some sort of reference to the performance of public sector organisations. The public have become used to judging schools, hospitals, local councils, and other public sector organisations, in terms of their performance rating. This has led to an explosion in the number and variety of league tables. League table position ca...

A number of automated shot-change detection methods for indexing a video sequence to facilitate browsing and retrieval have been proposed in recent years. Many of these methods use color histograms or features computed from block motion or compression parameters to compute frame differences. It is important to evaluate and characterize their performance so as to deliver a single set of algorith...

Cooperative banks play an important role in the European banking system. This paper presents an evaluation of the efficiency and performance of a European cooperative banks. For this purpose an integrated approach is employed using both data envelopment analysis as well as a multicriteria evaluation methodology. Through data envelopment analysis the efficiency of the banks is evaluated under bo...

Computer network virtualization and virtual network embedding (VNE) algorithms have gained significant attention in recent years. Performance evaluation of VNE algorithms mainly relies on discrete event simulations. However, modular and scalable VNE simulators are not available. In this paper, we describe newly developed simulator VNE-Sim that enables users to define and implement network eleme...

Transmedia is a set of techniques that use multiple media platforms (books, films, games, live performances, etc.) to create a single narrative. The thesis investigates how transmedia resources can be described and accessed within the conceptual framework provided by the FR family of data models and the FRBRoo ontology. Principal characteristics of transmedia compositions will be analysed in or...

Plant biomass is an important parameter for crop management and yield estimation. However, since biomass cannot be determined non-destructively, other plant parameters are used for estimations. In this study, plant height and hyperspectral data were used for barley biomass estimations with bivariate and multivariate models. During three consecutive growing seasons a terrestrial laser scanner wa...

We propose a model, which simultaneously allocates a data block request to the multiple sites, termed as co-allocation, to enable parallel data transfer in a grid environment. The model comprises of co-allocator, monitor and control mechanisms. The co-allocation scheme adapts well to the highly inconsistent network performances of the sites concerned. The scheme initially obtains the bandwidth ...

We describe the publication of a linked data set exposing metadata from the Internet Archive Live Music Archive. The dataset contains over 17,000,000 triples describing 100,000 performances by 4,000 artists. Links to other existing musical and geographical resources facilitate query of the collection along a number of axes. We describe both the methods used to annotate and layer the metadata—wi...

The evaluation of the formative process in the University system has been assuming an ever increasing importance in the European countries. Within this context the analysis of student performance and capabilities plays a fundamental role. In this work we propose a multivariate latent growth model for studying the performances of a cohort of students of the University of Bologna. The model propo...

SEMANTICALLY-SMART DISK SYSTEMS Muthian Sivathanu Robust and efficient storage of data is a prerequisite of current and future computer systems. To keep pace with both rapid changes in technology as well as increasing demands from applications and users alike, storage systems must evolve in new and interesting ways. Unfortunately, storage systems today have a problem: the range of functionality...