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  Cost-sensitive machine learning

  Cost-sensitive machine learning is an approach within machine learning that considers varying costs associated with different types of errors. This method diverges from traditional approaches by introducing a cost matrix, explicitly specifying the penalties or benefits for each type of prediction error. The inherent difficulty which cost-sensitive machine learning tackles is that minimizing different kinds of classification errors is a multi-objective optimization problem. == Overview == Cost-sensitive machine learning optimizes models based on the specific consequences of misclassifications, making it a valuable tool in various applications. It is especially useful in problems with a high imbalance in class distribution and a high imbalance in associated costs Cost-sensitive machine learning introduces a scalar cost function in order to find one (of multiple) Pareto optimal points in this multi-objective optimization problem (similar to the Weighted sum model) == Cost Matrix == The cost matrix is a crucial element within cost-sensitive modeling, explicitly defining the costs or benefits associated with different prediction errors in classification tasks. Represented as a table, the matrix aligns true and predicted classes, assigning a cost value to each combination. For instance, in binary classification, it may distinguish costs for false positives and false negatives. The utility of the cost matrix lies in its application to calculate the expected cost or loss. The formula, expressed as a double summation, utilizes joint probabilities: Expected Loss = ∑ i ∑ j P ( Actual i , Predicted j ) ⋅ Cost Actual i , Predicted j {\displaystyle {\text{Expected Loss}}=\sum _{i}\sum _{j}P({\text{Actual}}_{i},{\text{Predicted}}_{j})\cdot {\text{Cost}}_{{\text{Actual}}_{i},{\text{Predicted}}_{j}}} Here, P ( Actual i , Predicted j ) {\displaystyle P({\text{Actual}}_{i},{\text{Predicted}}_{j})} denotes the joint probability of actual class i {\displaystyle i} and predicted class j {\displaystyle j} , providing a nuanced measure that considers both the probabilities and associated costs. This approach allows practitioners to fine-tune models based on the specific consequences of misclassifications, adapting to scenarios where the impact of prediction errors varies across classes. == Applications == === Fraud Detection === In the realm of data science, particularly in finance, cost-sensitive machine learning is applied to fraud detection. By assigning different costs to false positives and false negatives, models can be fine-tuned to minimize the overall financial impact of misclassifications. === Medical Diagnostics === In healthcare, cost-sensitive machine learning plays a role in medical diagnostics. The approach allows for customization of models based on the potential harm associated with misdiagnoses, ensuring a more patient-centric application of machine learning algorithms. == Challenges == A typical challenge in cost-sensitive machine learning is the reliable determination of the cost matrix which may evolve over time. == Literature == Cost-Sensitive Machine Learning. USA, CRC Press, 2011. ISBN 9781439839287 Abhishek, K., Abdelaziz, D. M. (2023). Machine Learning for Imbalanced Data: Tackle Imbalanced Datasets Using Machine Learning and Deep Learning Techniques. (n.p.): Packt Publishing. ISBN 9781801070881

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  Directed-energy weapon wildfire conspiracy theories

  The directed-energy weapon wildfire conspiracy theories are claims circulating on social media and in fringe commentary that 2020s wildfires in places such as California, Hawaii and Texas were started or steered by directed-energy weapons or other lasers or directed-energy systems rather than by the documented ignition sources identified by investigators. Fact-checking organisations and newsrooms have repeatedly shown that widely shared images and clips said to depict “beams from the sky” are unrelated, miscaptioned or fabricated, and that official inquiries point to causes such as damaged or re-energised power lines, vegetation and extreme wind conditions. Coverage of the January 2025 Los Angeles fires described a resurgence of familiar hoaxes while local and federal agencies coordinated public rebuttals. == Background == Rumours linking directed-energy weapons to wildfire outbreaks appeared during earlier disaster seasons, then re-emerged at scale during the 2018 Camp Fire and again with the 2023 Maui wildfires and the 2025 Los Angeles fires. Journalists documented how large disasters reliably attract miscaptioned imagery and speculative narratives that portray official explanations as cover stories, while researchers and emergency managers noted that such claims tend to flourish during the information vacuum that accompanies fast-moving events. == Narratives and debunks == Recurring claims include assertions that videos show lasers igniting neighbourhoods, that “green” or “blue” items or roofs were spared because lasers cannot burn those colours, that trees remaining upright indicate precision targeting of houses, and that beams recorded over Hawaii or Texas came from secret platforms. Investigations show that a purported laser-strike video was actually an explosion at a Russian gas station recorded years earlier, that a photograph said to capture an “attack” was an Ohio gas flare from 2018, and that a separate video of green lights over Hawaii was captured months before the Maui fires by an astronomical camera and is unrelated. Fact-checks addressing colour myths have further explained that images of intact blue roofs were either misinterpreted or in at least one widely shared instance artificially generated, and that laser interaction with materials is not governed by such simplistic rules. == Investigations and identified causes == Authorities who examined specific incidents have published findings that contradict DEW narratives. A multi-agency investigation into the Maui disaster concluded that downed and later re-energised lines ignited an initial morning fire that re-kindled under extreme winds in the afternoon, with reports detailing the timeline and infrastructure context; summaries by national outlets echoed those conclusions. Investigators of the February 2024 Smokehouse Creek Fire in the Texas Panhandle reported that power lines ignited both the state’s largest wildfire and another major blaze, and the regional utility acknowledged its facilities appeared to have been involved; subsequent media coverage outlined the findings and regulatory follow-up. For the 2018 Camp Fire in Northern California, public reports from Butte County and subsequent proceedings identified PG&E transmission equipment as the source of ignition, with documentation of maintenance issues on the Caribou–Palermo line preceding the event. == Platform and agency responses == As major fires burned in and around Los Angeles in January 2025, officials from city agencies and national partners pursued a coordinated strategy to counter falsehoods by issuing timely updates, flagging fake imagery and directing residents to verified resources. Reporters described how federal emergency managers and local departments used social channels and briefings to rebut specific rumours, including claims about lasers and targeted ignition, and to clarify that early imagery often misleads during fast-moving disasters.

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  DBOS

  DBOS (Formerly Database-Oriented Operating System, now just DBOS) is an open source durable workflow execution software library written for the Python, TypeScript, Java, and Go programming languages. DBOS arose from a joint open source project from MIT and Stanford, after a discussion between Michael Stonebraker and Matei Zaharia on how to scale and improve scheduling and performance of millions of Apache Spark tasks. Today it is a commercial company that offers an open source system to add durable computing to any software, built on concepts derived from the joint research project. == History == === 2020: Academic R&D Project === DBOS originated in 2020 as a joint open source project between MIT, Stanford, and Carnegie Mellon. The project explored the idea of operating system services built atop a distributed database - a database-oriented operating system meant to simplify and improve the scalability, security and resilience of large-scale distributed applications. The basic concept was to run a multi-node multi-core, transactional, highly-available distributed database, such as VoltDB, as the only application for a microkernel, and then to implement scheduling, messaging, file systems and other operating system services on top of the database. The architectural philosophy is described by this quote from the abstract of their initial preprint: All operating system state should be represented uniformly as database tables, and operations on this state should be made via queries from otherwise stateless tasks. This design makes it easy to scale and evolve the OS without whole-system refactoring, inspect and debug system state, upgrade components without downtime, manage decisions using machine learning, and implement sophisticated security features. A prototype was built with competitive performance to existing systems. ==

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  Anti-social Media Bill (Nigeria)

  Anti-social Media Bill was introduced by the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria on 5 November 2019 to criminalise the use of the social media in peddling false or malicious information. The original title of the bill is Protection from Internet Falsehood and Manipulations Bill 2019. It was sponsored by Senator Mohammed Sani Musa from the largely conservative northern Nigeria. After the bill passed second reading on the floor of the Nigeria Senate and its details were made public, information emerged on the social media accusing the sponsor of the bill of plagiarising a similar law in Singapore which is at the bottom of global ranking in the freedom of speech and of the press. But the senator denied that he plagiarised Singaporean law. == Opposition to the bill == Angry reactions trailed the introduction of the bill, and a number of civil society organisations, human rights activists, and Nigerian citizens unanimously opposed the bill. International rights group, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch condemned the proposed legislation saying it is aimed at gagging freedom of speech which is a universal right in a country of over two hundred million people. Opposition political parties are very critical of the bill and accused the government of attempting to strip bare, Nigerian citizens of their rights to free speech and destroying same social media on whose power and influence the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC came to power in 2015. Nigeria Information Minister, Lai Mohammed has been at the center of public criticism because he is suspected to be the brain behind the proposed act. Lai was a former spokesman of then opposition All Progressives Congress. A "Stop the Social Media Bill! You can no longer take our rights from us" online petition campaign to force the Nigeria parliament to drop the bill received over 90,000 signatures within 24 hours. In November 2019, after the bill passed second reading in the senate, Akon Eyakenyi, a senator from Akwa Ibom State publicly said he would resist the bill. === Support for the bill === Those who support the proposed act especially Senators have often argued that the law would help curtail hate speech. President Muhammad Buhari who is seen as a beneficiary of the influence and power of the social media and free speech has been mute about it. But the president's senior aides and family members have publicly spoken in support of the bill. In November 2019, the wife of the president, Aisha Buhari, told a gathering at the Nigeria's National Mosque in the capital, Abuja that if China with over one billion people could regulate the social media, Nigeria should do same. But Nigerians reacted saying Nigeria is not a one-party communist state like China. Days later, a daughter to the president, Zahra Indimi told a gathering of young people in Abuja that social media had become a potent weapon for bullying those they thought were doing better than them in terms of social class and called for a critical regulation. == Key provisions of the bill == === Title === Protection from Internet Falsehoods, Manipulations and Other Related Matters Bill 2019. === Explanatory memorandum === This Act is to prevent Falsehoods and Manipulations in Internet transmission and correspondences in Nigeria. To suppress falsehoods and manipulations and counter the effects of such communications and transmissions and to sanction offenders with a view to encouraging and enhancing transparency by Social Media Platforms using the internet correspondences. === Objectives === One objective of the bill is to prevent the transmission of false statements or declaration of facts in Nigeria. Another objective of the bill is to end the financing of online mediums that transmit false statements. Measures will be taken to detect and control inauthentic behaviour and misuse of online accounts (parody accounts). When paid content is posted towards a political end, there will be measures to ensure the poster discloses such information. There will be sanction for offenders. === Transmission of false statement === According to the bill, a person must not: Transmit a statement that is false or, Transmit a statement that might: i. Affect the security or any part of Nigeria. ii. Affect public health, public safety or public finance. iii. Affect Nigeria's relationship with other countries. iv. influence the outcome of an election to any office in a general election. v. Cause enmity or hatred towards a person or group of persons. Anyone guilty of the above is liable to a fine of N300,000 or three years' imprisonment or both (for individual); and a fine not exceeding ten million naira (for corporate organisations). Same punishment applies for fake online accounts that transmit statements listed above. === Parody accounts === The bill says a person shall not open an account to transmit false statement. Anyone found guilty will be fined N200,000 or three years' imprisonment or both (for an individual) or five million naira (for corporate organisations). If such accounts transmit a statement that will affect security or influence the outcome of an election, such a person will be fined N300,000 or three years' imprisonment or both. If a person receives payment or reward to help another to transmit false statements knowingly, he/she is liable to a fine of N150,000 or three years' imprisonment or both. If a person receives payment or reward to help another to transmit a statement affects security or influence the outcome of an election, the fine is N300,000 or three years' imprisonment or both (for individual) and ten million naira for organisations. === Declaration === According to the bill, a law enforcement department can issue a "declaration" to offenders. And this declaration will be issued even if the "false statement" has been corrected or pulled down. The offender will be required to publish a "correction notice" in a specified newspaper, online location or other printed publication of Nigeria. Failure to comply, a person is liable to N200,000 or 12 months' imprisonment or both (for individual) and five million naira for organisations. === Access blocking order === The bill says the law enforcement department will also issue an access blocking order to offenders. The law enforcement department may direct the NCC to order the internet access service provider to disable access by users in Nigeria to the online location and the NCC must give the internet access service provider an access blocking order. An internet access service provider that does not comply with any access blocking order is liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding ten million naira for each day during any part of which that order is not fully complied with, up to a total of five million naira.

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  Secure environment

  In computing, a secure environment is any system which implements the controlled storage and use of information. In the event of computing data loss, a secure environment is used to protect personal or confidential data. It may also be known as a trusted execution environment (TEE). Often, secure environments employ cryptography as a means to protect information. This is typically used for processing confidential or restricted information. Some secure environments employ cryptographic hashing, simply to verify that the information has not been altered since it was last modified.

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  Content creation

  Content creation is the act of making and sharing media content, particularly in digital contexts. A content creator is the person or studio behind such content. According to Dictionary.com, content refers to "something that is to be expressed through some medium, as speech, writing or any of various arts" for self-expression, distribution, marketing and/or publication. Content creation encompasses various activities, including maintaining and updating web sites, blogging, article writing, photography, videography, online commentary, social media accounts, and editing and distribution of digital media. In a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center, the content thus created was defined as "the material people contribute to the online world". In addition to traditional forms of content creation, digital platforms face growing challenges related to privacy, copyright, misinformation, platform moderation policies, and the repercussions of violating community guidelines. == Content creators == Content creation is the process of producing and sharing various forms of content such as text, images, audio, and video, designed to engage and inform a specific audience. It plays a crucial role in digital marketing, branding, and online communication and brand awareness. Content can be created for a range of platforms, including social media, websites, blogs, and multimedia channels. Whether it's through written articles, compelling photography, or engaging videos, content creation helps businesses build a connection with their audience, increase visibility, and drive traffic. The process typically involves identifying the target audience, brainstorming ideas, creating the content, and distributing it across various channels. Successful content creation combines creativity with strategic planning, considering audience preferences, trends, and platform characteristics to achieve marketing and branding goals. === News organizations === News organizations, especially those with a large and global reach like The New York Times, NPR, and CNN, consistently create some of the most shared content on the Web, especially in relation to current events. In the words of a 2011 report from the Oxford School for the Study of Journalism and the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, "Mainstream media is the lifeblood of topical social media conversations in the UK." While the rise of digital media has disrupted traditional news outlets, many have adapted and have begun to produce content that is designed to function on the web and be shared on social media. The social media site Twitter is a major distributor and aggregator of breaking news from various sources, and the function and value of Twitter in the distribution of news is a frequent topic of discussion and research in journalism. User-generated content, social media blogging and citizen journalism have changed the nature of news content in recent years. The company Narrative Science is now using artificial intelligence to produce news articles and interpret data. === Colleges, universities, and think tanks === Academic institutions, such as colleges and universities, create content in the form of books, journal articles, white papers, and some forms of digital scholarship, such as blogs that are group edited by academics, class wikis, or video lectures that support a massive open online course (MOOC). Through an open data initiative, institutions may make raw data supporting their experiments or conclusions available on the Web. Academic content may be gathered and made accessible to other academics or the public through publications, databases, libraries, and digital libraries. Academic content may be closed source or open access (OA). Closed-source content is only available to authorized users or subscribers. For example, an important journal or a scholarly database may be a closed source, available only to students and faculty through the institution's library. Open-access articles are open to the public, with the publication and distribution costs shouldered by the institution publishing the content. === Companies === Corporate content includes advertising and public relations content, as well as other types of content produced for profit, including white papers and sponsored research. Advertising can also include auto-generated content, with blocks of content generated by programs or bots for search engine optimization. Companies also create annual reports which are part of their company's workings and a detailed review of their financial year. This gives the stakeholders of the company insight into the company's current and future prospects and direction. === Artists and writers === Cultural works, like music, movies, literature, and art, are also major forms of content. Examples include traditionally published books and e-books as well as self-published books, digital art, fanfiction, and fan art. Independent artists, including authors and musicians, have found commercial success by making their work available on the Internet. === Government === Through digitization, sunshine laws, open records laws and data collection, governments may make statistical, legal or regulatory information available on the Internet. National libraries and state archives turn historical documents, public records, and unique relics into online databases and exhibits. This has raised significant privacy issues. In 2012, The Journal News, a New York state paper, sparked an outcry when it published an interactive map of the state's gun owner locations using legally obtained public records. Governments also create online or digital propaganda or misinformation to support domestic and international goals. This can include astroturfing, or using media to create a false impression of mainstream belief or opinion. Governments can also use open content, such as public records and open data, in service of public health, educational and scientific goals, such as crowdsourcing solutions to complex policy problems. In 2013, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) joined the asteroid mining company Planetary Resources to crowdsource the hunt for near-Earth objects. Describing NASA's crowdsourcing work in an interview, technology transfer executive David Locke spoke of the "untapped cognitive surplus that exists in the world" which could be used to help develop NASA technology. In addition to making governments more participatory, open records and open data have the potential to make governments more transparent and less corrupt. === Users === The introduction of Web 2.0 made it possible for content consumers to be more involved in the generation and sharing of content. With the advent of digital media, the amount of user generated content, as well as the age and class range of users, has increased. 8% of Internet users are very active in content creation and consumption. Worldwide, about one in four Internet users are significant content creators, and users in emerging markets lead the world in engagement. Research has also found that young adults of a higher socioeconomic background tend to create more content than those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. 69% of American and European internet users are "spectators", who consume—but do not create—online and digital media. The ratio of content creators to the amount of content they generate is sometimes referred to as the 1% rule, a rule of thumb that suggests that only 1% of a forum's users create nearly all of its content. Motivations for creating new content may include the desire to gain new knowledge, the possibility of publicity, or simple altruism. Users may also create new content in order to bring about social reforms. However, researchers caution that in order to be effective, context must be considered, a diverse array of people must be included, and all users must participate throughout the process. According to a 2011 study, minorities create content in order to connect with their communities online. African-American users have been found to create content as a means of self-expression that was not previously available. Media portrayals of minorities are sometimes inaccurate and stereotypical which affects the general perception of these minorities. African-Americans respond to their portrayals digitally through the use of social media such as Twitter and Tumblr. The creation of Black Twitter has allowed a community to share their problems and ideas. ==== Teens ==== Younger users now have greater access to content, content creating applications, and the ability to publish to different types of media, such as Facebook, Blogger, Instagram, DeviantArt, or Tumblr. As of 2005, around 21 million teens used the internet and 57%, or 12 million teens, consider themselves content creators. This proportion of media creation and sharing is higher than that of adults. With the advent of the Internet, teens have had more access to tools for sharing an

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  Interference (communication)

  In telecommunications, an interference is that which modifies a signal in a disruptive manner, as it travels along a communication channel between its source and receiver. The term is often used to refer to the addition of unwanted signals to a useful signal. Common examples include: Electromagnetic interference (EMI) Co-channel interference (CCI), also known as crosstalk Adjacent-channel interference (ACI) Intersymbol interference (ISI) Inter-carrier interference (ICI), caused by doppler shift in OFDM modulation (multitone modulation). Common-mode interference (CMI) Conducted interference Noise is a form of interference but not all interference is noise. Radio resource management aims at reducing and controlling the co-channel and adjacent-channel interference. == Interference alignment == A solution to interference problems in wireless communication networks is interference alignment, which was crystallized by Syed Ali Jafar at the University of California, Irvine. A specialized application was previously studied by Yitzhak Birk and Tomer Kol for an index coding problem in 1998. For interference management in wireless communication, interference alignment was originally introduced by Mohammad Ali Maddah-Ali, Abolfazl S. Motahari, and Amir Keyvan Khandani, at the University of Waterloo, for communication over wireless X channels. Interference alignment was eventually established as a general principle by Jafar and Viveck R. Cadambe in 2008, when they introduced "a mechanism to align an arbitrarily large number of interferers, leading to the surprising conclusion that wireless networks are not essentially interference limited." This led to the adoption of interference alignment in the design of wireless networks. Jafar explained: My research group crystallized the concept of interference alignment and showed that through interference alignment, it is possible for everyone to access half of the total bandwidth free from interference. Initially this result was shown under a number of idealized assumptions that are typical in theoretical studies. We have since continued to work on peeling off these idealizations one at a time, to bring the theory closer to practice. Along the way we have made numerous discoveries through the lens of interference alignment, which reveal new and powerful signaling schemes. According to New York University senior researcher Paul Horn: Syed Jafar revolutionized our understanding of the capacity limits of wireless networks. He demonstrated the astounding result that each user in a wireless network can access half of the spectrum without interference from other users, regardless of how many users are sharing the spectrum. This is a truly remarkable result that has a tremendous impact on both information theory and the design of wireless networks.

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  ISO/IEC 11801

  International standard ISO/IEC 11801 Information technology — Generic cabling for customer premises specifies general-purpose telecommunication cabling systems (structured cabling) that are suitable for a wide range of applications (analog and ISDN telephony, various data communication standards, building control systems, factory automation). It is published by ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 25/WG 3 of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC). It covers both balanced copper cabling and optical fibre cabling. The standard was designed for use within commercial premises that may consist of either a single building or of multiple buildings on a campus. It was optimized for premises that span up to 3 km, up to 1 km2 office space, with between 50 and 50,000 persons, but can also be applied for installations outside this range. A major revision was released in November 2017, unifying requirements for commercial, home and industrial networks. == Classes and categories == The standard defines several link/channel classes and cabling categories of twisted-pair copper interconnects, which differ in the maximum frequency for which a certain channel performance is required: Class A: Up to 100 kHz using Category 1 cable and connectors Class B: Up to 1 MHz using Category 2 cable and connectors Class C: Up to 16 MHz using Category 3 cable and connectors Class D: Up to 100 MHz using Category 5e cable and connectors Class E: Up to 250 MHz using Category 6 cable and connectors Class EA: Up to 500 MHz using category 6A cable and connectors (Amendments 1 and 2 to ISO/IEC 11801, 2nd Ed.) Class F: Up to 600 MHz using Category 7 cable and connectors Class FA: Up to 1 GHz (1000 MHz) using Category 7A cable and connectors (Amendments 1 and 2 to ISO/IEC 11801, 2nd Ed.) Class BCT-B: Up to 1 GHz (1000 MHz) using with coaxial cabling for BCT applications. (ISO/IEC 11801-1, Edition 1.0 2017-11) Class I: Up to 2 GHz (2000 MHz) using Category 8.1 cable and connectors (ISO/IEC 11801-1, Edition 1.0 2017-11) Class II: Up to 2 GHz (2000 MHz) using Category 8.2 cable and connectors (ISO/IEC 11801-1, Edition 1.0 2017-11) The standard link impedance is 100 Ω. (The older 1995 version of the standard also permitted 120 Ω and 150 Ω in Classes A−C, but this was removed from the 2002 edition.) The standard defines several classes of optical fiber interconnect: OM1: Multimode, 62.5 μm core; minimum modal bandwidth of 200 MHz·km at 850 nm OM2: Multimode, 50 μm core; minimum modal bandwidth of 500 MHz·km at 850 nm OM3: Multimode, 50 μm core; minimum modal bandwidth of 2000 MHz·km at 850 nm OM4: Multimode, 50 μm core; minimum modal bandwidth of 4700 MHz·km at 850 nm OM5: Multimode, 50 μm core; minimum modal bandwidth of 4700 MHz·km at 850 nm and 2470 MHz·km at 953 nm OS1: Single-mode, maximum attenuation 1 dB/km at 1310 and 1550 nm OS1a: Single-mode, maximum attenuation 1 dB/km at 1310, 1383, and 1550 nm OS2: Single-mode, maximum attenuation 0.4 dB/km at 1310, 1383, and 1550 nm Grandfathered === OM5 === OM5 fiber is designed for wideband applications using SWDM multiplexing of 4–16 carriers (40G=4λ×10G, 100G=4λ×25G, 400G=4×4λ×25G) in the 850–953 nm range. === Category 7 === Class F channel and Category 7 cable are backward compatible with Class D/Category 5e and Class E/Category 6. Class F features even stricter specifications for crosstalk and system noise than Class E. To achieve this, shielding was added for individual wire pairs and the cable as a whole. Unshielded cables rely on the quality of the twists to protect from EMI. This involves a tight twist and carefully controlled design. Cables with individual shielding per pair such as Category 7 rely mostly on the shield and therefore have pairs with longer twists. The Category 7 cable standard was ratified in 2002, and primarily introduced to support 10 gigabit Ethernet over 100 m of copper cabling. Like the earlier standards, it contains four twisted copper wire pairs rated for transmission frequencies of up to 600 MHz. However, in 2006, Category 6A was ratified for Ethernet to allow 10 Gbit/s while still using the conventional 8P8C connector. Care is required to avoid signal degradation by mixing cable and connectors not designed for that use, however similar. Most manufacturers of active equipment and network cards have chosen to support the 8P8C for their 10 gigabit Ethernet products on copper and not GG45, ARJ45, or TERA connectors as Class F would have originally called for. Therefore, the Category 6 specification was revised to Category 6A to permit this use; products therefore require a Class EA channel (ie, Cat 6A). As of 2019, some equipment has been introduced which has connectors supporting the Class F (Category 7) channel. Note, however, that Category 7 is not recognized by the TIA/EIA. === Category 7A === Class FA (Class F Augmented) channels and Category 7A cables, introduced by ISO 11801 Edition 2 Amendment 2 (2010), are defined at frequencies up to 1000 MHz. The intent of the Class FA was to possibly support the future 40 gigabit Ethernet: 40GBASE-T. Simulation results have shown that 40 gigabit Ethernet may be possible at 50 meters and 100 gigabit Ethernet at 15 meters. In 2007, researchers at Pennsylvania State University predicted that either 32 nm or 22 nm circuits would allow for 100 gigabit Ethernet at 100 meters. However, in 2016, the IEEE 802.3bq working group ratified the amendment 3 which defines 25GBASE-T and 40GBASE-T on Category 8 cabling specified to 2000 MHz. The Class FA therefore does not support 40G Ethernet. As of 2025, there is no equipment that has connectors supporting the Class FA (Category 7A) channel. Category 7A is not recognized in TIA/EIA. === Category 8 === Category 8 was ratified by the TR43 working group under ANSI/TIA 568-C.2-1. It is defined up to 2000 MHz and only for distances up to 30 m or 36 m, depending on the patch cords used. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 25/WG 3 developed the equivalent standard ISO/IEC 11801-1:2017/COR 1:2018, with two options: Class I channel (Category 8.1 cable): minimum cable design U/FTP or F/UTP, fully backward compatible and interoperable with Class EA (Category 6A) using 8P8C connectors; Class II channel (Category 8.2 cable): F/FTP or S/FTP minimum, interoperable with Class FA (Category 7A) using TERA or GG45. == Abbreviations for twisted pairs == Annex E, Acronyms for balanced cables, provides a system to specify the exact construction for both unshielded and shielded balanced twisted pair cables. It uses three letters—U for unshielded, S for braided shielding, and F for foil shielding—to form a two-part abbreviation in the form of xx/xTP, where the first part specifies the type of overall cable shielding, and the second part specifies shielding for individual cable elements. Common cable types include U/UTP (unshielded cable); U/FTP (individual pair shielding without the overall screen); F/UTP, S/UTP, or SF/UTP (overall screen without individual shielding); and F/FTP, S/FTP, or SF/FTP (overall screen with individual foil shielding). == 2017 edition == In November 2017, a new edition was released by ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 25 "Interconnection of information technology equipment" subcommittee. It is a major revision of the standard which has unified several prior standards for commercial, home, and industrial networks, as well as data centers, and defines requirements for generic cabling and distributed building networks. The new series of standards replaces the former 11801 standard and includes six parts: == Versions == ISO/IEC 11801:1995 (Ed. 1) ISO/IEC 11801:2000 (Ed. 1.1) – Edition 1, Amendment 1 ISO/IEC 11801:2002 (Ed. 2) ISO/IEC 11801:2008 (Ed. 2.1) – Edition 2, Amendment 1 ISO/IEC 11801:2010 (Ed. 2.2) – Edition 2, Amendment 2 ISO/IEC 11801-1:2017, -1:2017/Cor 1:2018, -2:2017, -3:2017, -3:2017/Amd 1:2021, -3:2017/Cor 1:2018, -4:2017, -4:2017/Cor 1:2018, -5:2017, -5:2017/Cor 1:2018, -6:2017, -6:2017/Cor 1:2018 (As of September 2023, this set is current.)

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  BabyCenter

  BabyCenter is an online media company based in San Francisco, New York City, Chicago, and Los Angeles that provides information on conception, pregnancy, birth, and early childhood development for parents and expecting parents. BabyCenter operates 8 country and region specific properties including websites, apps, emails, print publications, and an online community where parents can connect on a variety of topics. The visitors of website and the users of the app can sign up for free weekly email newsletters that guide them through pregnancy and their child's development. In addition to publishing detailed, medically reviewed information about pregnancy and parenting, BabyCenter, under its Mission Motherhood initiative, ran numerous social programs and has participated in public health initiatives in partnership with hospitals, healthcare agencies, nonprofits, NGOs, and government agencies to provide pregnancy and parenting advice. It also annually publishes the most popular baby names. BabyCenter LLC is part of the Everyday Health Group, a division of Ziff Davis. == History == BabyCenter was founded in October 1997 by Stanford University MBA graduates Matt Glickman and Mark Selcow, who recognized a need for information about pregnancy and parenting on the internet. BabyCenter was initially funded through $13.5 million in startup capital funding from venture capital firms, including Bessemer Venture Partners, Intel, and Trinity Ventures. The funds were used to open the BabyCenter Store in October 1998. In the early years of its operation, BabyCenter offered multiple resources and services for parents, including a website that provided medically reviewed information and guidance to new and expectant parents on such topics as fertility, labor, and childcare; a weekly email for pregnant women tailored to their week of pregnancy (based on their pregnancy due date); and community groups and chat rooms for pregnant couples and parents to discuss pregnancy and child-rearing strategies. The site grew quickly, and by early 1999 had 175 employees and an annual revenue of $35 million. In April of that year, the two founders sold BabyCenter to another website, eToys.com, for $190 million in stock. Twenty-three months later, in 2001, shortly before declaring bankruptcy, eToys sold the site to Johnson & Johnson for $10 million. During the eToys ownership, BabyCenter launched its first international E-commerce site in the UK during the spring of 2000. Starting in 2005, BabyCenter launched an expansion plan, extending its global network to Australia, Canada and other countries, staffing each outpost with local editors. In 2007, BabyCenter debuted a Mandarin-language site in China, initiated operations in India, launched a Spanish language website, and introduced its first mobile site. BabyCenter released My Pregnancy Today, its first mobile app, to Apple's App Store in August 2010 and to the Android market in April 2011. The app provided daily information, nutrition tips, advice relevant to the user's week of pregnancy, and 3-D animated videos showcasing a baby's development in utero. The My Pregnancy app was joined by a My Baby Today app in October 2011. In 2015, BabyCenter released Mom Feed, its first mobile app for parents of toddlers and older children (ages 1 to 8). Mom Feed offered personalized, stage-based information as well as content from the BabyCenter Community and Blog in a real-time stream. In 2016, BabyCenter launched its web-based Baby Names Finder. In 2018, Mom Feed was discontinued and BabyCenter replaced that experience with a separate Child Health content area on its website. Also in 2018, BabyCenter launched its mobile baby name generator, the Baby Names app, which, like the web-based Baby Names Finder, leverages data from hundreds of thousands of parents that culminates in its annual most popular Baby Names Report. In 2019, Johnson & Johnson sold Baby Center to Everyday Health Group, a division of New York-based parent company of Ziff Davis, Inc. Neither side disclosed terms of the deal. == Popular research == BabyCenter's most popular baby names is released annually and often cited by the media. In March 2024, BabyCenter did a review of the app Temu and said that the website has found products that have been recalled, could be counterfeit or circumvent U.S. safety standards and features that are important in preventing issues like choking. In 2025, BabyCenter released a report about the cost of raising a newborn baby in the first year. == Content and products == === Websites === BabyCenter has 8 country and region-specific websites around the world, including sites for the United States, Canada, Australia, Brazil, India, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Latin America. Users can find parenting and pregnancy advice in seven languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic, French, German, and Hindi BabyCenter content for each country- or region-specific site is written by an editorial team based in that country or region. Medical and health content for each site is reviewed by a medical advisory board based there and adheres to that country or region's medical standards. For example, the U.S. site works with and follows the recommendations of such U.S. medical authorities as the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Congress of Obstetrics & Gynecology and the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine. BabyCenter regularly conducts research and provides thought leadership on pregnancy and parenting topics, popularly cited by major media outlets including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, The Washington Post, BuzzFeed, Insider, MarketWatch, Axios. === Community, blogs and social === From its earliest days, BabyCenter has had a community area that allows people to join a group of parents with children born in the same month, known as a Birth Club. BabyCenter launched a blog called Momformation in 2007. Eventually, the name was changed to BabyCenter Blog. In April 2021, the BabyCenter Community was identified in a research article within the journal PLOS Computational Biology as facilitating "unobstructed communication" between parents, which avoids the "strong echo chamber phenomena" that can foster and perpetuate vaccine misinformation. === My Pregnancy and Baby Today App === The app is available in six languages, although not all features are supported for every market. Initially the apps only featured pregnancy articles that could be found on the BabyCenter website, but over the years the feature set has expanded to include a growing list of app-specific tools such as weekly fetal development information, a kick tracker, a birth plan worksheet, a contraction timer, a baby growth tracker, a photo journal for pregnant women to record their pregnancy bellies, and a photo journal for documenting a baby's first year. === Mission Motherhood™ === BabyCenter was a cofounder of the Mobile Alliance for Maternal Action (MAMA), a public-private partnership between USAID, Johnson & Johnson, the UN Foundation, and BabyCenter from 2011 to-to 2015. The MAMA program sparked the creation of MomConnect, an initiative of the South African Department of Health for which BabyCenter developed SMS messages with health information about pregnancy and a child's first year of life. BabyCenter helped develop similar messages for mMitra, a voice messaging program in India. A research article in the Maternal and Child Health Journal stated the mMitra program offered strong evidence "that tailored mobile phone voice messages can improve key infant care knowledge and practices that lead to improved infant health outcomes in low-resource settings. BabyCenter's Mission Motherhood Messages were available to qualifying organizations on the BabyCenter website. BabyCenter contributed websites for Free Basics. These websites featured age and stage-based pregnancy and baby articles targeted to low-income, lower-education women who would not otherwise have access to health information. Content developed for this program was also used to support a UNICEF SMS program during the 2016 Zika outbreak. == Awards and recognition == In 1998, BabyCenter won a Webby Award for Best Home Site. Since then, it has been nominated for a Webby Award 19 times and won either a Webby or a People's Choice Webby Award 12 times – including a People's Voice win in 2021 for Lifestyle websites and mobile sites. In 2002, it won Service Journalism award from Online Journalism Awards (OJA). In 2015, BabyCenter won five Digital Health Awards for content about autism in children. In 2016, BabyCenter won seven Digital Health Awards: four for videos about the aches and pains of pregnancy, baby sleep, and the walking milestone in child development; two for articles about baby sleep training and sleep apnea in babies; and one for the BabyCenter mobile app My Pregnancy & Baby Today. In 2021, Forbes Health chose My Pregnancy & Baby Today as the best pregnancy app of 2021, and Women's Health identified it

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  Static web page

  A static web page, sometimes called a flat page or a stationary page, is a web page that is delivered to a web browser exactly as stored, in contrast to dynamic web pages which are generated by a web application. Consequently, a static web page displays the same information for all users, from all contexts, subject to modern capabilities of a web server to negotiate content-type or language of the document where such versions are available and the server is configured to do so. However, a webpage's JavaScript can introduce dynamic functionality which may make the static web page dynamic. == Overview == Static web pages are often HTML documents, stored as files in the file system and made available by the web server over HTTP (nevertheless URLs ending with ".html" are not always static). However, loose interpretations of the term could include web pages stored in a database, and could even include pages formatted using a template and served through an application server, as long as the page served is unchanging and presented essentially as stored. The content of static web pages remains stationary irrespective of the number of times it is viewed. Such web pages are suitable for the contents that rarely need to be updated, though modern web template systems are changing this. Maintaining large numbers of static pages as files can be impractical without automated tools, such as static site generators. Any personalization or interactivity has to run client-side, which is restricting. Cloud-based website builders, including Wix, Weebly, and Duda, offer no-code platforms for creating static and dynamic web pages through graphical interfaces, without requiring programming expertise. === Advantages === Provide improved security over dynamic websites (dynamic websites are at risk to web shell attacks if a vulnerability is present) Improved performance for end users compared to dynamic websites Fewer or no dependencies on systems such as databases or other application servers Cost savings from utilizing cloud storage, as opposed to a hosted environment Security configurations are easy to set up, which makes it more secure Static files can be cached by content delivery networks (CDNs) and other intermediate caches, which both reduces page load times at the user and also reduces load on the origin server. Static websites can have improved uptime, since they are still available through any available CDN exit node even when other CDN nodes or the origin webserver are temporarily offline. === Disadvantages === Dynamic functionality must be performed on the client side. After each update of a static website, some or all users may see old, stale, outdated previous versions instead of the latest version until the old version is flushed from CDNs and other caches. == Static site generators == Static site generators are applications that compile static websites - typically populating HTML templates in a predefined folder and file structure, with content supplied in a format such as Markdown or AsciiDoc. === Implementations === Jekyll (powers GitHub Pages) Middleman Hugo Next.js Astro.build Pelican Franklin

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  GPU switching

  GPU switching is a mechanism used on computers with multiple graphic controllers. This mechanism allows the user to either maximize the graphic performance or prolong battery life by switching between the graphic cards. It is mostly used on gaming laptops which usually have an integrated graphic device and a discrete video card. == Basic components == Most computers using this feature contain integrated graphics processors and dedicated graphics cards that applies to the following categories. === Integrated graphics === Also known as: Integrated graphics, shared graphics solutions, integrated graphics processors (IGP) or unified memory architecture (UMA). This kind of graphics processors usually have much fewer processing units and share the same memory with the CPU. Sometimes the graphics processors are integrated onto a motherboard. It is commonly known as: on-board graphics. A motherboard with on-board graphics processors doesn't require a discrete graphics card or a CPU with graphics processors to operate. === Dedicated graphics cards === Also known as: discrete graphics cards. Unlike integrated graphics, dedicated graphics cards have much more processing units and have its own RAM with much higher memory bandwidth. In some cases, a dedicated graphics chip can be integrated onto the motherboards, B150-GP104 for example. Regardless of the fact that the graphics chip is integrated, it is still counted as a dedicated graphics cards system because the graphics chip is integrated with its own memory. == Theory == Most Personal Computers have a motherboard that uses a Southbridge and Northbridge structure. === Northbridge control === The Northbridge is one of the core logic chipset that handles communications between the CPU, GPU, RAM and the Southbridge. The discrete graphics card is usually installed onto the graphics card slot such as PCI-Express and the integrated graphics is integrated onto the CPU itself or occasionally onto the Northbridge. The Northbridge is the most responsible for switching between GPUs. The way how it works usually has the following process (refer to the Figure 1. on the right): The Northbridge receives input from Southbridge through the internal bus. The Northbridge signals to CPU through the Front-side bus. The CPU runs the task assignment application (usually the graphics card driver) to determine which GPU core to use. The CPU passes down the command to the Northbridge. The Northbridge passes down the command to the according GPU core. The GPU core processes the command and returns the rendered data back to the Northbridge. The Northbridge sends the rendered data back to Southbridge. === Southbridge control === The Southbridge is a set of integrated circuits such Intel's I/O Controller Hub (ICH). It handles all of a computer's I/O functions, such as receiving the keyboard input and outputting the data onto the screen. The way how it usually works usually has two steps: Take in the user input and pass it down to the Northbridge. (Optional) Receive the rendered data from the Northbridge and output it. The reason why the second step can be optional is that sometimes the rendered the data is outputted directly from the discrete graphics card which is located on the graphics card slot so there is no need to output the data through the Southbridge. == Main purpose == GPU switching is mostly used for saving energy by switching between graphic cards. The dedicated graphics cards consume much more power than integrated graphics but also provides higher 3D performances, which is needed for a better gaming and CAD experience. Following is a list of the TDPs of the most popular CPU with integrated graphics and dedicated graphics cards. The dedicated graphics cards exhibit much higher power consumption than the integrated graphics on both platforms. Disabling them when no heavy graphics processing is needed can significantly lower the power consumption. == Technologies == === Nvidia Optimus === Nvidia Optimus™ is a computer GPU switching technology created by Nvidia that can dynamically and seamlessly switch between two graphic cards based on running programs. === AMD Enduro === AMD Enduro™ is a collective brand developed by AMD that features many new technologies that can significantly save power. It was previously named as: PowerXpress and Dynamic Switchable Graphics (DSG). This technology implements a sophisticated system to predict the potential usage need for graphics cards and switch between graphics cards based on predicted need. This technology also introduces a new power control plan that allows the discrete graphics cards consume no energy when idling. == Manufacturers == === Integrated graphics === In personal computers, the IGP (integrated graphics processors) are mostly manufactured by Intel and AMD and are integrated onto their CPUs. They are commonly known as: Intel HD and Iris Graphics - also called HD series and Iris series AMD Accelerated Processing Unit (APU) - also formerly known as: fusion === Dedicated graphics cards === The most popular dedicated graphics cards are manufactured by AMD and Nvidia. They are commonly known as: AMD Radeon Nvidia GeForce == Drivers and OS support == Most common operating systems have built-in support for this feature. However, the users may download the updated drivers from Nvidia or AMD for better experience. === Windows support === Windows 7 has built-in support for this feature. The system automatically switches between GPUs depending on the program that's running. However, the user may switch the GPUs manually through device manager or power manager. === Linux === Modern Linux systems handle hybrid graphics in two parts: power/control for the inactive GPU, and optional render offloading for individual applications. vga_switcheroo (in the kernel since 2.6.34) coordinates power and mux control on systems with multiple GPUs. It was designed primarily for muxed designs (hardware display switch), and on muxless laptops it is typically used only for power control. A display server restart is no longer required for offloading on muxless systems. DRI PRIME (Mesa) enables per-process render offload on muxless systems: an app renders on the discrete GPU and the integrated GPU presents the result. Users can opt in via the DRI_PRIME environment variable (e.g., DRI_PRIME=1) or desktop integration. On GNOME, the switcheroo-control service exposes the discrete GPU to the shell, adding a “Launch using Discrete Graphics Card” entry to app menus on supported systems (Wayland or Xorg), which invokes render offload under the hood. With the proprietary Nvidia driver, render offload is provided as PRIME Render Offload (supported since driver 435.xx). Distributions commonly ship a helper like prime-run or desktop menu entries that set the required environment for offloading. ==== Notes and limitations (Linux) ==== On muxless systems the internal display is hard-wired to the integrated GPU; the discrete GPU cannot directly drive that panel and instead renders offscreen for composition by the iGPU. External displays connected to the dGPU may allow direct output depending on the laptop’s wiring. Power-saving behavior varies by driver and distro defaults. Some setups need explicit configuration to power down the inactive GPU when idle. Desktop integrations (e.g., GNOME's menu item) simply opt an app into offload; they do not "auto-switch" the whole session. Users can still launch apps on either GPU as needed.

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  Festival of International Virtual & Augmented Reality Stories

  Festival of International Virtual & Augmented Reality Stories (FIVARS) is a Canadian media festival for story-driven works using extended reality (XR) and immersive media, including virtual reality, augmented reality, WebXR, live VR performance, projection mapping and spatialized audio. Founded in Toronto in 2015, it has been described as Canada's first dedicated virtual and augmented reality stories festival, the first Canadian festival of its kind, and Canada's original festival dedicated to immersive storytelling. FIVARS has described itself as "the original and longest-running festival wholly dedicated to Virtual and Augmented Reality Stories", while third-party XR coverage has called it one of the longest-running events dedicated to immersive content. FIVARS is produced by Constant Change Media Group, Inc., with its partner event VRTO. == History == FIVARS began in 2015, with preview screenings at the Camp Wavelength music festival on Toronto Island and an inaugural festival held in Toronto in September 2015. Contemporary coverage described the first edition as a virtual reality film festival held at UG3 Live in Toronto. The festival continued with a second edition in 2016. L'Express described the 2016 festival as presenting Canadian and international interactive works in virtual and augmented reality narrative forms. FIVARS's 2016 festival was also listed in a York University Future Cinema course page as a public event students could attend. In 2017, the third annual FIVARS festival was held at the House of VR in Toronto. In 2018, the festival was held at the Matador Ballroom, which NOW Magazine reported was reopening for FIVARS from September 14 to 16. The festival's own history states that the 2018 edition included 36 works from 12 countries and that Stephanie Greenall took over as co-producer that year. In 2019, FIVARS moved to the Toronto Media Arts Centre for its fifth anniversary and listed official selections in passive and interactive immersive-experience categories. The festival also held talks and panels at the Toronto Media Arts Centre. During the COVID-19 pandemic, FIVARS moved part of its programming online. In 2020, Voices of VR reported that Malicki-Sanchez and WebXR developer James Baicoianu used JanusXR code to create a platform for presenting 360-degree video through the web. The festival's history states that its 2020 online festival included 39 selections from 16 countries and was produced by Malicki-Sanchez and Greenall. In 2021, FIVARS introduced a dual-event structure with FIVARS in FEB and FIVARS in FALL. The fall 2021 edition used a hybrid format, with an in-person component in West Hollywood from October 15 to 17 and an online WebXR component from October 22 to November 2. In 2022, FIVARS held hybrid programming with pop-up viewing locations in Los Angeles and Toronto. The fall 2022 edition was listed by blogTO as the festival's tenth edition, with an in-person component at Stackt - an outdoor arts park built from shipping containers in Toronto and online programming. The 2023 festival was presented as a hybrid exhibition of 65 immersive stories, with an in-person Toronto component and an online component. The FIVARS Online Festival was later listed among the Innovator of the Year nominees for the 2024 Poly Awards. FIVARS stated that the nominees for that recognition were producer and designer Keram Malicki-Sanchez and developer James Baicoianu. The 2024 edition was listed as FIVARS 2024 (Toronto + Online), with an in-person Toronto event from October 3 to 8 and an online component beginning October 10. The festival also published a 2024 official selections list covering virtual reality, augmented reality, spherical video, spatial web and related immersive formats. In 2025, FIVARS and VRTO were held together at OCAD University. The 2026 edition is scheduled for June 15 to 19, 2026, at OCAD University in Toronto, with OCAD University as presenting sponsor and first-time venue host. FIVARS has featured official selections from more than forty countries across six continents. == Organization == FIVARS was founded in 2015 by Keram Malicki-Sánchez. Joseph Ellsworth was the festival's original technical director and helped operate FIVARS during its early years. Malicki-Sánchez remains executive director and festival director. Jessy Blaze joined Malicki-Sánchez as co-producer in 2016 and served until Stephanie Greenall took over the role in 2018. Greenall served as co-producer and associate producer from 2018 to 2022. Aimee Reynolds took over from Greenall in 2022 and has served as associate producer of FIVARS and VRTO since 2022. == Immersive Media Awards == FIVARS presents People's Choice awards for interactive works and immersive video or passive immersive works. Juried award categories have included the Grand Jury Prize, Impact Award, Technical Achievement, Excellence in Experience Design, Excellence in Visual Design, Excellence in Sound Design, and Outstanding Performance. === 2015 === On Monday, September 21, the festival announced People's Choice awards for two categories at the Cadillac Lounge, a music venue and restaurant in Toronto. People's Choice Best Interactive Experience: Apollo 11 Best Immersive Video: SONAR === 2016 === People's Choice Best Interactive Experience: Pearl (Patrick Osborne) Best Immersive Video: Help (Justin Lin) Juried Grand Jury Award: Real (Connor Hair and Alex Meader) === 2017 === People's Choice Best Interactive: Alteration Best Immersive (Passive): Guardian of the Guge Kingdom Juried Impact Award: Priya's Shakti / Priya's Mirror (Dan Goldman) Grand Jury Prize: Manifest 99 === 2018 === People's Choice Best Interactive: Museum of Symmetry (Paloma Dawkins) Best Immersive (Passive): Going Home (David Beier) Juried Impact Award: The Hidden (Annie Lukowski, BJ Schwartz) Grand Jury Prize: Battlescar (Nico Casavecchia, Martin Allais) === 2019 === People's Choice Best Interactive: After Dan Graham (David Han/Friend Generator) Best Immersive (Passive): 2nd Step (Joerg Courtial) Juried Technical Achievement: tx-reverse Excellence in Experience Design: Battlescar (Nico Casavecchia, Martin Allais) Excellence in Sound Design: Unheard (Zhechuan Zhang) Excellence in Visual Design: Ex Anima (Pierre Zandrowicz) Impact Award: State Power (Jeff Stanzler) Grand Jury Prize: The Industry (Mirka Duijn) === 2020 === People's Choice Best Interactive: Gravity VR (Fabito Rychter, Amir Admoni) Best Immersive (Passive): Warsaw Rising (Tomasz Dobosz) Juried Technical Achievement: The Cosmic Laughter of Cucci Binaca (Jonathan Sims) Excellence in Experience Design: Sleeping Eyes (Sojung Bahng, Sungeun Lee) Excellence in Sound Design: Symphony of Noise VR (Michaela Pnacekova) Excellence in Visual Design: Hominidae (Brian Andrews) Impact Award: Indirect Actions (Maranatha Hay) Grand Jury Prize: Minimum Mass (Raqi Syed, Areito Echevarria) === 2021 === FIVARS in FEB – People's Choice Best Interactive: CLAWS (created by Evan Neiden; directed by John Ertman) Best Immersive (Passive): Inside COVID 19 (Gary Yost, Adam Loften) FIVARS in FALL – People's Choice Best Interactive: Samsara (director: Hsin-Chien Huang) Best Immersive (Passive): The Invasion of Normandy Omaha Beach (director: Uli Futschik) Juried Technical Achievement: Dark Threads (director: Jonathon Corbiere) Excellence in Experience Design: Andy's World (director: Liquan Liu) Excellence in Sound Design: Symphony (director: Igor Cortadellas) Excellence in Visual Design: Mind VR Exploration (director: Deng Zuyun) Outstanding Performance: Lori Kovachevich, Lena's Journey (director: Wes Evans) Impact Award: Om Devi: Sheroes Revolution (director: Claudio Casale) Grand Jury Prize: Montegelato (director: Davide Rapp) === 2022 === FIVARS in FEB – People's Choice Best Interactive: Severance Theory: Welcome to Respite (Lyndsie Scoggin, United States) Best Immersive (Passive): Beescapes (Alan Nguyen, Australia) FIVARS in FALL – People's Choice Best Interactive: Namuanki (Kevin Mack, United States) Best Immersive (Passive): Reimagined Vol. 1: Nyssa (Julie Cavaliere, United States) Juried (Whole Year) Technical Achievement: Namuanki (Kevin Mack, United States) Excellence in Experience Design: Unframed: Hand Puppets, Paul Klee (Martin Charrière, Switzerland) Excellence in Visual Design: The Last Dance (Toshiaki Hanzaki, Japan) Excellence in Sound Design: Kingdom of Plants with David Attenborough (Iona McEwan, UK and USA) Outstanding Performance: Ari Tarr, OffRail (Ari Tarr, United States) Impact Award: Tearless (Gina Kim, South Korea) Grand Jury Prize: Klaxon. My dear sweet Friend (Nikita Shokhov, United States) === 2023 === People's Choice Best Interactive: PULSAR Best Immersive (Passive): Behind the Dish Juried Technical Achievement: VFC Excellence in Experience Design: Broken Spectre Excellence in Visual Design: Night Creatures Excellence in Sound Design: VFC Outstanding Performance: Origins Impact Award: LOU Grand Jury Prize: Stay Alive, My Son === 2024 ==

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  Condensation algorithm

  The condensation algorithm (Conditional Density Propagation) is a computer vision algorithm. The principal application is to detect and track the contour of objects moving in a cluttered environment. Object tracking is one of the more basic and difficult aspects of computer vision and is generally a prerequisite to object recognition. Being able to identify which pixels in an image make up the contour of an object is a non-trivial problem. Condensation is a probabilistic algorithm that attempts to solve this problem. The algorithm itself is described in detail by Isard and Blake in a publication in the International Journal of Computer Vision in 1998. One of the most interesting facets of the algorithm is that it does not compute on every pixel of the image. Rather, pixels to process are chosen at random, and only a subset of the pixels end up being processed. Multiple hypotheses about what is moving are supported naturally by the probabilistic nature of the approach. The evaluation functions come largely from previous work in the area and include many standard statistical approaches. The original part of this work is the application of particle filter estimation techniques. The algorithm's creation was inspired by the inability of Kalman filtering to perform object tracking well in the presence of significant background clutter. The presence of clutter tends to produce probability distributions for the object state which are multi-modal and therefore poorly modeled by the Kalman filter. The condensation algorithm in its most general form requires no assumptions about the probability distributions of the object or measurements. == Algorithm overview == The condensation algorithm seeks to solve the problem of estimating the conformation of an object described by a vector x t {\displaystyle \mathbf {x_{t}} } at time t {\displaystyle t} , given observations z 1 , . . . , z t {\displaystyle \mathbf {z_{1},...,z_{t}} } of the detected features in the images up to and including the current time. The algorithm outputs an estimate to the state conditional probability density p ( x t | z 1 , . . . , z t ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {z_{1},...,z_{t}} )} by applying a nonlinear filter based on factored sampling and can be thought of as a development of a Monte-Carlo method. p ( x t | z 1 , . . . , z t ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {z_{1},...,z_{t}} )} is a representation of the probability of possible conformations for the objects based on previous conformations and measurements. The condensation algorithm is a generative model since it models the joint distribution of the object and the observer. The conditional density of the object at the current time p ( x t | z 1 , . . . , z t ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {z_{1},...,z_{t}} )} is estimated as a weighted, time-indexed sample set { s t ( n ) , n = 1 , . . . , N } {\displaystyle \{s_{t}^{(n)},n=1,...,N\}} with weights π t ( n ) {\displaystyle \pi _{t}^{(n)}} . N is a parameter determining the number of sample sets chosen. A realization of p ( x t | z 1 , . . . , z t ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {z_{1},...,z_{t}} )} is obtained by sampling with replacement from the set s t {\displaystyle s_{t}} with probability equal to the corresponding element of π t {\displaystyle \pi _{t}} . The assumptions that object dynamics form a temporal Markov chain and that observations are independent of each other and the dynamics facilitate the implementation of the condensation algorithm. The first assumption allows the dynamics of the object to be entirely determined by the conditional density p ( x t | x t − 1 ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {x_{t-1}} )} . The model of the system dynamics determined by p ( x t | x t − 1 ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {x_{t-1}} )} must also be selected for the algorithm, and generally includes both deterministic and stochastic dynamics. The algorithm can be summarized by initialization at time t = 0 {\displaystyle t=0} and three steps at each time t: === Initialization === Form the initial sample set and weights by sampling according to the prior distribution. For example, specify as Gaussian and set the weights equal to each other. === Iterative procedure === Sample with replacement N {\displaystyle N} times from the set { s 0 ( n ) , n = 1 , . . . , N } {\displaystyle \{s_{0}^{(n)},n=1,...,N\}} with probability { π 0 ( n ) , n = 1 , . . . , N } {\displaystyle \{\pi _{0}^{(n)},n=1,...,N\}} to generate a realization of p ( x t | z 1 , . . . , z t ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {z_{1},...,z_{t}} )} . Apply the learned dynamics p ( x t | x t − 1 ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {x_{t-1}} )} to each element of this new set, to generate a new set { s t ( n ) } {\displaystyle \{s_{t}^{(n)}\}} . To take into account the current observation z t {\displaystyle \mathbf {z_{t}} } , set π t ( n ) = p ( z t | s ( n ) ) ∑ j = 1 N p ( z t | s ( j ) ) {\displaystyle \pi _{t}^{(n)}={\frac {p(\mathbf {z_{t}} |s^{(n)})}{\sum _{j=1}^{N}p(\mathbf {z_{t}} |s^{(j)})}}} for each element { s t ( n ) } {\displaystyle \{s_{t}^{(n)}\}} . This algorithm outputs the probability distribution p ( x t | z 1 , . . . , z t ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {z_{1},...,z_{t}} )} which can be directly used to calculate the mean position of the tracked object, as well as the other moments of the tracked object. Cumulative weights can instead be used to achieve a more efficient sampling. == Implementation considerations == Since object-tracking can be a real-time objective, consideration of algorithm efficiency becomes important. The condensation algorithm is relatively simple when compared to the computational intensity of the Ricatti equation required for Kalman filtering. The parameter N {\displaystyle N} , which determines the number of samples in the sample set, will clearly hold a trade-off in efficiency versus performance. One way to increase efficiency of the algorithm is by selecting a low degree of freedom model for representing the shape of the object. The model used by Isard 1998 is a linear parameterization of B-splines in which the splines are limited to certain configurations. Suitable configurations were found by analytically determining combinations of contours from multiple views, of the object in different poses, and through principal component analysis (PCA) on the deforming object. Isard and Blake model the object dynamics p ( x t | x t − 1 ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {x_{t-1}} )} as a second order difference equation with deterministic and stochastic components: p ( x t | x t − 1 ) ∝ e − 1 2 | | B − 1 ( ( x t − x ¯ ) − A ( x t − 1 − x ¯ ) ) | | 2 ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {x_{t}} |\mathbf {x_{t-1}} )\propto e^{-{\frac {1}{2}}||B^{-1}((\mathbf {x_{t}} -\mathbf {\bar {x}} )-A(\mathbf {x_{t-1}} -\mathbf {\bar {x}} ))||^{2})}} where x ¯ {\displaystyle \mathbf {\bar {x}} } is the mean value of the state, and A {\displaystyle A} , B {\displaystyle B} are matrices representing the deterministic and stochastic components of the dynamical model respectively. A {\displaystyle A} , B {\displaystyle B} , and x ¯ {\displaystyle \mathbf {\bar {x}} } are estimated via Maximum Likelihood Estimation while the object performs typical movements. The observation model p ( z | x ) {\displaystyle p(\mathbf {z} |\mathbf {x} )} cannot be directly estimated from the data, requiring assumptions to be made in order to estimate it. Isard 1998 assumes that the clutter which may make the object not visible is a Poisson random process with spatial density λ {\displaystyle \lambda } and that any true target measurement is unbiased and normally distributed with standard deviation σ {\displaystyle \sigma } . The basic condensation algorithm is used to track a single object in time. It is possible to extend the condensation algorithm using a single probability distribution to describe the likely states of multiple objects to track multiple objects in a scene at the same time. Since clutter can cause the object probability distribution to split into multiple peaks, each peak represents a hypothesis about the object configuration. Smoothing is a statistical technique of conditioning the distribution based on both past and future measurements once the tracking is complete in order to reduce the effects of multiple peaks. Smoothing cannot be directly done in real-time since it requires information of future measurements. == Applications == The algorithm can be used for vision-based robot localization of mobile robots. Instead of tracking the position of an object in the scene, however, the position of the camera platform is tracked. This allows the camera platform to be globally localized given a visual map of the environment. Extensions of the condensation algorithm have also been used to recognize human gestures in image sequences. This application of the condensation algorithm impacts the ran

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  Friending and following

  Friending is the act of adding someone to a list of "friends" on a social networking service. The notion does not necessarily involve the concept of friendship. It is also distinct from the idea of a "fan"—as employed on the WWW sites of businesses, bands, artists, and others—since it is more than a one-way relationship. A "fan" only receives things. A "friend" can communicate back to the person friending. The act of "friending" someone usually grants that person special privileges (on the service) with respect to oneself. On Facebook, for example, one's "friends" have the privilege of viewing and posting to one's "timeline". Following is a similar concept on other social network services, such as Twitter and Instagram, where a person (follower) chooses to add content from a person or page to their newsfeed. Unlike friending, following is not necessarily mutual, and a person can unfollow (stop following) or block another user at any time without affecting that user's following status. The first scholarly definition and examination of friending and defriending (the act of removing someone from one's friend list, also called unfriending) was David Fono and Kate Raynes-Goldie's "Hyperfriendship and beyond: Friends and Social Norms on LiveJournal" from 2005, which identified the use of the term as both a noun and a verb by users of early social network site and blogging platform LiveJournal, which was originally launched in 1999. == Friend/follower count, friend collecting, and multiple accounts == The addition of people to a friend list without regard to whether one actually is their friend is sometimes known as friend whoring. Matt Jones of Dopplr went so far as to coin the expression "friending considered harmful" to describe the problem of focusing upon the friending of more and more people at the expense of actually making any use of a social network. Friend collecting is the adding of hundreds or thousands of friends/followers, a not uncommon order of magnitude on some social sites. As a result, many teen users feel pressured to heavily curate their posts, posting only carefully posed and edited photographs with well-thought-out captions. Some Instagram users will create a second account, known as a Finsta (short for "Fake Instagram"). A Finsta is typically private, and the owner only allows close friends to follow it. Since the follower count is kept down, the posts can be more candid and silly in nature. Users may also create multiple accounts based on their interests. Someone with a personal social media account might be a photographer and maintain a separate account for that. There is risk associated with following large numbers of people: scholars say that social anxiety could be an effect of managing a large social media network, as users can feel jealous and have a "fear of missing out". == Unfriending and unfollowing == Unfriending is the act of removing someone from a friends list. On Facebook, this means the action is unilateral, meaning, the friendship is terminated on both sides. The act of unfriending is often used when one user was flirting and made the other uncomfortable. Unfollowing is a little different. When a user unfollows someone on Instagram or Twitter, it continues a one-sided relationship. Often, the unfollowed user doesn't realize they were unfollowed, so they continue the following. == Social network friending and friendship == There are distinct groups of "friends" that one can friend on a social networking service. The notion of a social network friend does not necessarily embody the concept of friendship. Although terminology has not yet evolved to distinguish the different types of social networking friends, they can be broken into the following three categories. friends who are actually known These are people that may be one's friends or family in real life, with whom one has regular interaction either on-line or off-line. organizational friends These are companies and other organizations who maintain a "friending" relationship as a contacts list. complete strangers These are social networking "friends" with whom one has no relationship at all. Within these categories "friends" can be made up of strong ties, weak existing ties, weak latent ties, and parasocial ties. Strong ties can be made up of close family members and friends where self-disclosure, intimacy and frequent content occur. Weak existing ties can be made up of acquaintances, co-workers and distance relatives with whom the user has inconsistent contact. Weak latent ties can be made up of people within a similar geographical location or profession that can be used as a potential future bridge to other connections. Parasocial ties can be made up of celebrities, public figures and media personas. Human nature is to reciprocate a friending, marking someone as a friend who has marked oneself as a friend. This is a social norm for social networking services. However, this leads to mixing up who is an actual friend, and who is a contact. Tagging someone as a "contact" who has marked one as a "friend" can be perceived as impolite. Other concerns about this issue are treated in Sherry Turkle's Alone Together which analyses many behavioral dynamics in social media friendships. Turkle defines herself as "cautiously optimistic", but expresses concern that distance communications may undermine genuine face-to-face spoken discourses, lessening people's expectations of one another. One social networking service, FriendFeed, allows one to friend someone as a "fake" friend. The person "fake" friended receives the usual notifications for friending, but that person's updates are not received. Gavin Bell, author of Building Social Web Applications, describes this mechanism as "ludicrous". Results from a 2007 survey the Center for the Digital Future stated that only 23% of internet users have at least one virtual friend whom they have only met online. Ideally the number of virtual friends is directly proportional to the use of the Internet, but the same survey showed 20% of heavy-users (more than 3 hours/day) who claimed an average of 8.7% online friends, reported at least one relationship that started virtually and migrated to in-person contact. This results and other concerning issues are included in the book Networked: The New Social Operating System co-written by Lee Rainie and Barry Wellman in 2012. == Ethical considerations == The act of "friending" someone on a social networking service has particular ethical implications for judges in the United States. Judicial codes of conducts in the various states generally incorporate some form of provision that judges should avoid even the appearance of impropriety. Whether this regulates and even prohibits judges "friending" attorneys that appear before them, and law enforcement personnel, has been the subject of some analysis by the judicial ethics panels of the various states. They haven't all agreed on the guidance that they have given to judges: The New York state Judicial Ethics committee in 2009 simply advised judges to employ caution, noting that the issue of "friending" someone on a social networking service is a publicly observable act that has little difference from other public behavior concerns judges already face. The Florida Judicial Ethics Advisory committee in 2009 noted that, judges being normal human beings, it was unavoidable for judges to form friendships without the responsibilities of their job. It prohibited judges from friending any attorneys that appeared before them, whilst allowing friending of those who do not, on the grounds that it may give the appearance to the general public (even if the substance is otherwise) that those attorneys who are friended hold special sway with the judge. A minority opinion of the committee asserted that there is a substantive difference between "friending" on a social networking service and actual friendship, and that the general public, being aware of the norms of social networking services, was capable of drawing this distinction and would not reasonably conclude either a special degree of influence or a violation of the code of judicial conduct. This minority opinion was outnumbered twice in 2009, both in the Judicial Ethics Advisory and in the Florida Supreme Court Judicial Ethics Advisory committee. The South Carolina judicial conduct committee in 2009 permitted judges to friend attorneys and law enforcement personnel, with the proviso that no judicial business should be conducted upon nor discussed via the social networking service. "... a judge should not become isolated from the community in which the judge lives.", the committee stated. The Kentucky Judicial Ethics committee in 2010 took the same position as the minority opinion in Florida. It urged judges to exercise caution, but recognized that the act of friending "does not, in and of itself, indicate the degree or intensity of a judge's relationship with the person who is the 'friend'

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  Bootstrap (front-end framework)

  Bootstrap (formerly Twitter Bootstrap) is a free and open-source CSS framework directed at responsive, mobile-first front-end web development. It contains HTML, CSS and (optionally) JavaScript-based design templates for typography, forms, buttons, navigation, and other interface components. As of May 2023, Bootstrap is the 17th most starred project (4th most starred library) on GitHub, with over 164,000 stars. According to W3Techs, Bootstrap is used by 19.2% of all websites. == Features == Bootstrap is an HTML, CSS and JS library that focuses on simplifying the development of informative web pages (as opposed to web applications). The primary purpose of adding it to a web project is to apply Bootstrap's choices of color, size, font and layout to that project. As such, the primary factor is whether the developers in charge find those choices to their liking. Once added to a project, Bootstrap provides basic style definitions for all HTML elements. The result is a uniform appearance for prose, tables and form elements across web browsers. In addition, developers can take advantage of CSS classes defined in Bootstrap to further customize the appearance of their contents. For example, Bootstrap has provisioned for light- and dark-colored tables, page headings, more prominent pull quotes, and text with a highlight. Bootstrap also comes with several JavaScript components which do not require other libraries like jQuery. They provide additional user interface elements such as dialog boxes, tooltips, progress bars, navigation drop-downs, and carousels. Each Bootstrap component consists of an HTML structure, CSS declarations, and in some cases accompanying JavaScript code. They also extend the functionality of some existing interface elements, including for example an auto-complete function for input fields. The most prominent components of Bootstrap are its layout components, as they affect an entire web page. The basic layout component is called "Container", as every other element in the page is placed in it. Developers can choose between a fixed-width container and a fluid-width container. While the latter always fills the width with the web page, the former uses one of the five predefined fixed widths, depending on the size of the screen showing the page: Smaller than 576 pixels 576–768 pixels 768–992 pixels 992–1200 pixels 1200–1400 pixels Larger than 1400 pixels Once a container is in place, other Bootstrap layout components implement a CSS Flexbox layout through defining rows and columns. A precompiled version of Bootstrap is available in the form of one CSS file and three JavaScript files that can be readily added to any project. The raw form of Bootstrap, however, enables developers to implement further customization and size optimizations. This raw form is modular, meaning that the developer can remove unneeded components, apply a theme and modify the uncompiled Sass files. == History == === Early beginnings === Bootstrap, originally named Twitter Blueprint, was developed by Mark Otto and Jacob Thornton at Twitter in 2010 as a framework to encourage consistency across internal tools. Before Bootstrap, various libraries were used for interface development, which led to inconsistencies and a high maintenance burden. According to Otto: A super small group of developers and I got together to design and build a new internal tool and saw an opportunity to do something more. Through that process, we saw ourselves build something much more substantial than another internal tool. Months later, we ended up with an early version of Bootstrap as a way to document and share common design patterns and assets within the company. After a few months of development by a small group, many developers at Twitter began to contribute to the project as a part of Hack Week, a hackathon-style week for the Twitter development team. It was renamed from Twitter Blueprint to Twitter Bootstrap and released as an open-source project on August 19, 2011. It has continued to be maintained by Otto, Thornton, a small group of core developers, and a large community of contributors. === Bootstrap 2 === On January 31, 2012, Bootstrap 2 was released, which added built-in support for Glyphicons, several new components, as well as changes to many of the existing components. This version supports responsive web design, meaning the layout of web pages adjusts dynamically, taking into account the characteristics of the device used (whether desktop, tablet, mobile phone). Shortly before the release of Bootstrap 2.1.2, Otto and Thornton left Twitter, but committed to continue to work on Bootstrap as an independent project. === Bootstrap 3 === On August 19, 2013, Bootstrap 3 was released. It redesigned components to use flat design and a mobile first approach. Bootstrap 3 features new plugin system with namespaced events. Bootstrap 3 dropped Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox 3.6 support, but there is an optional polyfill for these browsers. Bootstrap 3 was also the first version released under the twbs organization on GitHub instead of the Twitter one. === Bootstrap 4 === Otto announced Bootstrap 4 on October 29, 2014. The first alpha version of Bootstrap 4 was released on August 19, 2015. The first beta version was released on August 10, 2017. Otto suspended work on Bootstrap 3 on September 6, 2016, to free up time to work on Bootstrap 4. Bootstrap 4 was finalized on January 18, 2018. Significant changes include: Major rewrite of the code Replacing Less with Sass Addition of Reboot, a collection of element-specific CSS changes in a single file, based on Normalize Dropping support for IE8, IE9, and iOS 6 CSS Flexible Box support Adding navigation customization options Adding responsive spacing and sizing utilities Switching from the pixels unit in CSS to root ems Increasing global font size from 14px to 16px for enhanced readability Dropping the panel, thumbnail, pager, and well components Dropping the Glyphicons icon font Huge number of utility classes Improved form styling, buttons, drop-down menus, media objects and image classes Bootstrap 4 supports the latest versions of Google Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera, and Safari (except on Windows). It additionally supports back to IE10 and the latest Firefox Extended Support Release (ESR). === Bootstrap 5 === Bootstrap 5 was officially released on May 5, 2021. Major changes include: New offcanvas menu component Removing dependence on jQuery in favor of vanilla JavaScript Rewriting the grid to support responsive gutters and columns placed outside of rows Migrating the documentation from Jekyll to Hugo Dropping support for Internet Explorer Moving testing infrastructure from QUnit to Jasmine Adding custom set of SVG icons Adding CSS custom properties Improved API Enhanced grid system Improved customizing docs Updated forms RTL support Built in darkmode support

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