AI Detector Eraser

AI Detector Eraser — independent reviews, comparisons, pricing and step-by-step guides on Aizhi.

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  Controlled natural language

  Controlled natural languages (CNLs) are subsets of natural languages that are obtained by restricting the grammar and vocabulary in order to reduce or eliminate ambiguity and complexity. Traditionally, controlled languages fall into two major types: those that improve readability for human readers (e.g. non-native speakers), and those that enable reliable automatic semantic analysis of the language. The first type of languages (often called "simplified" or "technical" languages), for example ASD Simplified Technical English, Caterpillar Technical English, IBM's Easy English, are used in the industry to increase the quality of technical documentation, and possibly simplify the semi-automatic translation of the documentation. These languages restrict the writer by general rules such as "Keep sentences short", "Avoid the use of pronouns", "Only use dictionary-approved words", and "Use only the active voice". The second type of languages have a formal syntax and formal semantics, and can be mapped to an existing formal language, such as first-order logic. Thus, those languages can be used as knowledge representation languages, and writing of those languages is supported by fully automatic consistency and redundancy checks, query answering, etc. == Languages == Existing controlled natural languages include: == Encoding == IETF has reserved simple as a BCP 47 variant subtag for simplified versions of languages.

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  Digital art

  Digital art, or the digital arts, is artistic work that uses digital technology as part of the creative or presentational process. It can also refer to computational art that uses and engages with digital media. Since the 1960s, various names have been used to describe digital art, including computer art, electronic art, multimedia art, and new media art. Digital art includes pieces stored on physical media, such as with digital painting, as well as digital galleries on websites. Digital art also extends to the field of visual computing. == History == In the early 1960s, John Whitney developed the first computer-generated art using mathematical operations. In 1963, Ivan Sutherland invented the first user interactive computer-graphics interface known as Sketchpad. Between 1974 and 1977, Salvador Dalí created two big canvases of Gala Contemplating the Mediterranean Sea which at a distance of 20 meters is transformed into the portrait of Abraham Lincoln (Homage to Rothko) and prints of Lincoln in Dalivision based on a portrait of Abraham Lincoln processed on a computer by Leon Harmon published in "The Recognition of Faces". The technique is similar to what later became known as photographic mosaics. Andy Warhol created digital art using an Amiga where the computer was publicly introduced at the Lincoln Center in July 1985. An image of Debbie Harry was captured in monochrome from a video camera and digitized into a graphics program called ProPaint. Warhol manipulated the image by adding color using flood fills. == Art made for digital media == Artwork that is highly computational, presented through digital media, and explicitly engages with digital technologies are categorized as "art made for digital media". This differs from art using digital tools, which incorporate digital technology in the creation process but may exist outside the digital world. Digital art historian Christiane Paul writes that it "is highly problematic to classify all art that makes use of digital technologies somewhere in its production and dissemination process as digital art since it makes it almost impossible to arrive at any unifying statement about the art form". == Art that uses digital tools == Digital art can be purely computer-generated (such as fractals and algorithmic art) or taken from other sources, such as a scanned photograph or an image drawn using vector graphics software using a mouse or graphics tablet. Artworks are considered digital paintings when created similarly to non-digital paintings but using software on a computer platform and digitally outputting the resulting image as painted on canvas. Despite differing viewpoints on digital technology's impact on the arts, a consensus exists within the digital art community about its significant contribution to expanding the creative domain, i.e., that it has greatly broadened the creative opportunities available to professional and non-professional artists alike. == Art theorists and art historians == Notable art theorists and historians in this field include: Oliver Grau, Jon Ippolito, Christiane Paul, Frank Popper, Jasia Reichardt, Mario Costa, Christine Buci-Glucksmann, Dominique Moulon, Roy Ascott, Catherine Perret, Margot Lovejoy, Edmond Couchot, Tina Rivers Ryan, Fred Forest and Edward A. Shanken. === Digital painting === Digital painting is either a physical painting made with the use of digital electronics and spray paint robotics within the digital art fine art context or pictorial art imagery made with pixels on a computer screen that mimics artworks from the traditional histories of painting and illustration. === Artificial intelligence art === Artists have used artificial intelligence to create artwork since at least the 1960s. Since their design in 2014, some artists have created artwork using a generative adversarial network (GAN), which is a machine learning framework that allows two "algorithms" to compete with each other and iterate. It can be used to generate pictures that have visual effects similar to traditional fine art. The essential idea of image generators is that people can use text descriptions to let AI convert their text into visual picture content. Anyone can turn their language into a painting through a picture generator. == Digital art education == Digital art education has become more common with the advancement of digital hardware and software. From hardware such as graphics tablets, styluses, tablets, 3D scanners, virtual reality headsets, and digital cameras; to software such as digital art software, 3D modeling software, 3D rendering, digital sculpting, 2D graphics software, digital painting, 3D terrain generation, 2D animation software, 3D animation software, raster graphics editors, vector graphics editors, mathematical art software, and video editing software. == Scholarship and archives == In addition to the creation of original art, research methods that utilize AI have been generated to quantitatively analyze digital art collections. This has been made possible due to the large-scale digitization of artwork in the past few decades. Although the main goal of digitization was to allow for accessibility and exploration of these collections, the use of AI in analyzing them has brought about new research perspectives. Two computational methods, close reading and distant viewing, are the typical approaches used to analyze digitized art. Close reading focuses on specific visual aspects of one piece. Some tasks performed by machines in close reading methods include computational artist authentication and analysis of brushstrokes or texture properties. In contrast, through distant viewing methods, the similarity across an entire collection for a specific feature can be statistically visualized. Common tasks relating to this method include automatic classification, object detection, multimodal tasks, knowledge discovery in art history, and computational aesthetics. Whereas distant viewing includes the analysis of large collections, close reading involves one piece of artwork. Whilst 2D and 3D digital art is beneficial as it allows the preservation of history that would otherwise have been destroyed by events like natural disasters and war, there is the issue of who should own these 3D scans – i.e., who should own the digital copyrights. === Computer demos === Computer demos are based on computer programs, usually non-interactive. It produces audiovisual presentations. They are a novel form of art, which emerged as a consequence of the home computer revolution in the early 1980s. In the classification of digital art, they can be best described as real-time procedurally generated animated audio-visuals. This form of art does not concentrate only on the aesthetics of the final presentation, but also on the complexities and skills involved in creating the presentation. As such, it can be fully enjoyed only by persons with a relatively high knowledge level of relevant computer technologies. An example is that, as said by Hua Jin and Jie Yang, Using computer-aided design software to present the class content in art design teaching," is not to advocate computer-aided design instead of hand-drawn performance, but to make it serve the profession earlier through a more reasonable course arrangement." On the other hand, many of the created pieces of art are primarily aesthetic or amusing, and those can be enjoyed by the general public. === Digital installation art === Digital installation art constitutes a broad field of artistic practices and a variety of forms. Some resemble video installations, especially large-scale works involving projections and live video capture. By using projection techniques that enhance an audience's impression of sensory envelopment, many digital installations attempt to create immersive environments. While others go even further and attempt to facilitate a complete immersion in virtual realms. This type of installation is generally site-specific, scalable, and without fixed dimensionality, meaning it can be reconfigured to accommodate different presentation spaces. Scott Snibbe's "Boundary Functions" is an example of augmented reality digital installation art, which responds to people who enter the installation by drawing lines between people, indicating their personal space.Noah Wardrip-Fruin's "Screen"(2003) utilizes a Cave Automatic Virtual Environment (CAVE) to create an interactive, text-based digital experience that engages the viewer in a multi-sensory interaction. === Internet art and net.art === Internet art is digital art that uses the specific characteristics of the Internet and is exhibited on the Internet. The term "internet art" is included by "net art" for which artists assume that network will be refreshed through history. So the term "post-internet art" is used to exclude artworks outside of the internet media. A representative example is Protocols for Achievements, which is a digital photo frame that confronts the aestheti

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  EditDV

  EditDV was a video editing software released by Radius, Inc. in late 1997 as an evolution of their earlier Radius Edit product. EditDV was one of the first products providing professional-quality editing of the then new DV format at a relatively affordable cost ($999 including Radius FireWire capture card) and was named "The Best Video Tool of 1998". Originally EditDV was available for Macintosh only but in February 2000 EditDV 2.0 for Windows was released. With version 3.0 EditDV's name was changed to CineStream. == Features == Originally bundled with a FireWire card, EditDV 1.5 got updated into a less expensive software only package for use with the newer PowerMac G3 that came with a FireWire interface. Later, a scaled down version named EditDV 1.6.1 Unplugged was released as a freeware version next to EditDV 2.0. Unlike many other applications at the time which transcoded video to M-JPEG for editing, EditDV provided lossless native editing of the DV format. Only transitions (such as dissolves or wipes), effects (such as rotating or scaling the video, adjusting the audio level, or adding titles) and filters (such as changing the brightness or color balance) needed to be rendered. This also had the disadvantage to not work with analogue video capture. EditDV was built on top of QuickTime and supported QuickTime filters as well as its own built-in effects and transitions. Effects could be animated using keyframes. EditDV 2.0 worked natively with Quicktime MOV format. For Microsoft Windows users, where the standard was AVI, this required the use of a provided external conversion tool afterwards when AVI was wanted. The user interface had a Project window for organising clips into bins, a Sequence window with a multi-track timeline for arranging clips into a program using three-point editing, and Source and Program monitor windows. A finished program could either be exported as a QuickTime movie or written back to DV tape using the "print to video" command. Version 3.0, then renamed CineStream, shifted towards web designers who wanted to add video streaming interactivity to a website. The new feature called EventStream allowed setting clickable hot spots to link to another location, either to another page with a URL or to another video. This feature distinguished CineStream from the rest of the competition. == Products == The EditDV product family included a number of related products, all sharing a similar name: EditDV Video editing software (Mac and Windows) SoftDV A QuickTime software codec for playing DV media, included as part of EditDV (Mac and Windows) MotoDV PCI-based FireWire interface with DV capture software (Mac and Windows) PhotoDV Software to capture high-quality stills from a DV tape using MotoDV hardware (Mac and Windows) RotoDV Software for rotoscoping (painting over video), released in Sept 1999 (Macintosh only) == Name changes and eventual demise == In 1999, the company Radius Inc. changed its name to Digital Origin. In 2000, Digital Origin Inc (and EditDV) was bought by Media 100. In early 2001, Media 100 released an updated version of EditDV under the new name CineStream 3.0. Later that year (October 2001) Media 100 was bought by Autodesk's Discreet Division. CineStream for Macintosh required classic Mac OS. It was never ported to Mac OS X and faced increasing competition on that platform from Apple's own Final Cut Pro application. Development of EditDV/Cinestream was officially discontinued in 2002.

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  Fully probabilistic design

  Decision making (DM) can be seen as a purposeful choice of action sequences. It also covers control, a purposeful choice of input sequences. As a rule, it runs under randomness, uncertainty and incomplete knowledge. A range of prescriptive theories have been proposed how to make optimal decisions under these conditions. They optimise sequence of decision rules, mappings of the available knowledge on possible actions. This sequence is called strategy or policy. Among various theories, Bayesian DM is broadly accepted axiomatically based theory that solves the design of optimal decision strategy. It describes random, uncertain or incompletely known quantities as random variables, i.e. by their joint probability expressing belief in their possible values. The strategy that minimises expected loss (or equivalently maximises expected reward) expressing decision-maker's goals is then taken as the optimal strategy. While the probabilistic description of beliefs is uniquely and deductively driven by rules for joint probabilities, the composition and decomposition of the loss function have no such universally applicable formal machinery. Fully probabilistic design (of decision strategies or control, FPD) removes the mentioned drawback and expresses also the DM goals of by the "ideal" probability, which assigns high (small) values to desired (undesired) behaviours of the closed DM loop formed by the influenced world part and by the used strategy. FPD has axiomatic basis and has Bayesian DM as its restricted subpart. FPD has a range of theoretical consequences , and, importantly, has been successfully used to quite diverse application domains.

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  Mathematical morphology

  Mathematical morphology (MM) is a theory and technique for analyzing and processing geometrical structures. It's based on set theory, lattice theory, topology, and random functions. MM is most commonly applied to digital images, but it can be employed as well on graphs, surface meshes, solids, and many other spatial structures. Topological and geometrical continuous-space concepts such as size, shape, convexity, connectivity, and geodesic distance, were introduced by MM on both continuous and discrete spaces. MM is also the foundation of morphological image processing, which consists of a set of operators that transform images according to the above characterizations. The basic morphological operators are erosion, dilation, opening and closing. MM was originally developed for binary images, and was later extended to grayscale functions and images. The subsequent generalization to complete lattices is widely accepted today as MM's theoretical foundation. == History == Mathematical Morphology was developed in 1964 by the collaborative work of Georges Matheron and Jean Serra, at the École des Mines de Paris, France. Matheron supervised the PhD thesis of Serra, devoted to the quantification of mineral characteristics from thin cross sections, and this work resulted in a novel practical approach, as well as theoretical advancements in integral geometry and topology. In 1968, the Centre de Morphologie Mathématique was founded by the École des Mines de Paris in Fontainebleau, France, led by Matheron and Serra. During the rest of the 1960s and most of the 1970s, MM dealt essentially with binary images, treated as sets, and generated a large number of binary operators and techniques: Hit-or-miss transform, dilation, erosion, opening, closing, granulometry, thinning, skeletonization, ultimate erosion, conditional bisector, and others. A random approach was also developed, based on novel image models. Most of the work in that period was developed in Fontainebleau. From the mid-1970s to mid-1980s, MM was generalized to grayscale functions and images as well. Besides extending the main concepts (such as dilation, erosion, etc.) to functions, this generalization yielded new operators, such as morphological gradients, top-hat transform and the Watershed (MM's main segmentation approach). In the 1980s and 1990s, MM gained a wider recognition, as research centers in several countries began to adopt and investigate the method. MM started to be applied to a large number of imaging problems and applications, especially in the field of non-linear filtering of noisy images. In 1986, Serra further generalized MM, this time to a theoretical framework based on complete lattices. This generalization brought flexibility to the theory, enabling its application to a much larger number of structures, including color images, video, graphs, meshes, etc. At the same time, Matheron and Serra also formulated a theory for morphological filtering, based on the new lattice framework. The 1990s and 2000s also saw further theoretical advancements, including the concepts of connections and levelings. In 1993, the first International Symposium on Mathematical Morphology (ISMM) took place in Barcelona, Spain. Since then, ISMMs are organized every 2–3 years: Fontainebleau, France (1994); Atlanta, USA (1996); Amsterdam, Netherlands (1998); Palo Alto, CA, USA (2000); Sydney, Australia (2002); Paris, France (2005); Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2007); Groningen, Netherlands (2009); Intra (Verbania), Italy (2011); Uppsala, Sweden (2013); Reykjavík, Iceland (2015); Fontainebleau, France (2017); and Saarbrücken, Germany (2019). =

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  Super app

  A super app or super-app (also known as an everything app) is a mobile or web application that can provide multiple services including payment and instant messaging services, effectively becoming an all-encompassing, self-contained, commerce and communication online platform that embraces many aspects of personal and commercial life. Notable examples of super apps include Tencent's WeChat in China, Tata Neu in India, Grab in Southeast Asia and Max in Russia. For end users, a super app is an application that provides a set of core features while also giving access to independently developed miniapps. For app developers, a super app is an application integrated with the capabilities of platforms and ecosystems that allows third-parties to develop and publish miniapps. == History == The super app term was first used to describe WeChat when it combined the instant messaging service with the digital wallet function. Recognition of WeChat as a super app stems from its combination of messaging, payments, e-commerce, and much more within a single application, making it indispensable for many users. WeChat's establishment of the super app model has led companies like Meta to try to build similar applications outside of China. In India, Tata Group has announced that it is currently developing a super app named Tata Neu. Major Indian companies like Paytm, PhonePe, and ITC Maars also have apps in development that might constitute super apps. In Southeast Asia, Grab and Gojek lay claim to the super app classification despite lacking many of the features offered by WeChat. Accordingly, growth-stage companies like Shopee, Traveloka, and AirAsia have also expanded the range of services offered by their respective applications. == Notable examples == === Alipay === Alipay is a third-party mobile and online payment platform established in Hangzhou, China in February 2004 by Alibaba Group and its founder Jack Ma. It operates in association with Ant Group, an affiliate company of the Chinese Alibaba Group. === Gojek === Gojek is an Indonesian on-demand multiservice digital platform and fintech payment super app. Established in Jakarta in 2010, as a call center to connect consumers to courier delivery and two-wheeled ride-hailing services, it launched its mobile app in 2015 with four services: GoRide, GoSend, GoShop, and GoFood, which has since expanded to offer over 20 services. In 2021, it merged with another Indonesian unicorn, Tokopedia, forming the decacorn GoTo Gojek Tokopedia. === Grab === Grab is a Southeast Asian technology company headquartered in Singapore and Indonesia. Founded in 2012 as the MyTeksi app in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, it expanded the following year as GrabTaxi, before moving its headquarters to Singapore in 2014 and rebranding officially as Grab. In addition to ride-hailing and transportation services, the company's mobile app also offers food delivery and digital payment services. === Max === Max is a messenger from the Russian company VK, positioned as a super app. The application combines messaging, calls, and channels features with the integration of additional services: payments, miniapps, taxi ordering, deliveries, and other everyday services are available within a single interface. The goal is to unite communication and routine tasks in a unified ecosystem. === Tata Neu === Tata Neu is a multipurpose super app, developed in India by the Tata Group. It is the country's first super app. The app was launched to coincide with the start of a 2022 Indian Premier League cricket match. === WeChat === WeChat is a Chinese multipurpose instant messaging, social media and mobile payment app. First released in 2011, it became the world's largest standalone mobile app in 2018, with over 1 billion monthly active users. WeChat provides text messaging, hold-to-talk voice messaging, broadcast (one-to-many) messaging, video conferencing, video games, the sharing of photographs and videos and location sharing. === X === X is an American social network, originally known as Twitter from its launch through 2023. Prior to his acquisition of the service, new owner Elon Musk stated that he planned for Twitter to become an "everything app" known as "X"; in 2023, the service added an AI chatbot known as "Grok" as well as integrated job search tools known as "X Hiring". In January 2025, X announced its intent to offer a digital wallet service in the future. Later in the year, X revamped its direct messaging system as "Chat". == Criticism == Although apps that fit the super app classification can offer users a wider variety of services in comparison to single-purpose alternatives, internet regulators in regions such as the US and Europe have become more concerned about the overall power of the technology industry and have become more critical of companies developing such apps. In China, WeChat and other local firms have been ordered to open up their platforms to rivals by local regulators. There are also reports that suggest it might be difficult to replicate WeChat's super app model. This stems partly from the peaking of smartphone penetration rates in many regions worldwide, which has led to overcrowded app stores and tighter restrictions on targeted advertising as regulators assert more control over the companies. From a technical viewpoint, single-purpose apps are comparatively faster, more responsive and easier to navigate than super apps, which helps improve the overall user experience. Super-apps are also likelier to store larger amounts of personal data to facilitate the delivery of their services, so users run a greater risk of becoming victims of severe data breaches. In 2020, this unfolded with Tokopedia, which had the data of 91 million of its users stolen and shared by crackers. It has also been noted that a user who loses access to their account or is banned from a super app generally loses access to multiple real-life services and digital applications; the Chinese government has used this approach to penalize people who shared the photos of the Sitong Bridge protest.

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  Face Swap Live

  Face Swap Live is a mobile app created by Laan Labs that enables users to swap faces with another person in real-time using the device's camera. It was released on December 14, 2015. In addition to swapping faces with another person, the app enables users to create videos using a set of bundled live filters. The app is available on iOS and Android devices. Face Swap Live was named Apple's #2 best-selling paid app in 2016.

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  PhotoLine

  PhotoLine is a general purpose bitmap and vector graphics editor developed and published by Computerinsel GmbH for Windows, macOS, and Linux/Wine. It was originally created in 1995 by Gerhard Huber and Martin Huber. The program combines bitmap and vector graphics editing in one seamless working application unlike most graphics software which tend to focus on either bitmap or vector editing and output. PhotoLine is considered as a market competitor to Adobe Photoshop. == Features == PhotoLine edits and composes multi-layer raster and vector images with deep support for masking and alpha compositing and with full color management. Editing and color management in PhotoLine is mostly non-destructive. Image data in layers is preserved without loss of information regardless of the document's image mode or layer transformation. color depth, image resolution, color model, and ICC profile are preserved for each individual layer or group of layers. Layers can be cloned and reused anywhere in the layer stack, including repurposed as layer masks. Layer blending and compositing in PhotoLine supports common blend modes, and features a layer blend range of -200 to +200 percent. It is also possible to control which channels are blended for each layer, adjustment layer, and layer mask or group of layers. Filters, adjustment layers, and brushes have access to Lab and HIS color modes (HIS is a variant of HSL), separately of the color model of the underlying image layer. In Addition to raster and vector editing, PhotoLine can be used for small desktop publishing projects. Multi-page documents with page spreads and text flow between text frames and pages are supported. Character and paragraph styles can be defined. Spot colors, bleed settings, a baseline grid, a table of contents generator, and PDF/X support help with these projects. PhotoLine is however much more limited when compared to dedicated publishing software such as Adobe InDesign or QuarkXPress. PhotoLine incorporates the Open-source software library LibRaw to read raw images from digital cameras for import. Developing these files is non-destructive with a choice of embedding the RAW image data either in the PhotoLine document or link to the external RAW image file. PhotoLine can open raw files as linear unmodified and non color managed source images. Photoshop PSD files can be imported and exported. Core functionality of PhotoLine can be extended through standard Photoshop filter plugins, the G'MIC digital image processing framework, and PSP tubes. External programs can be linked for a seamless round-trip workflow and files can be sent directly for processing in third-party design applications. Custom functionality is further supported through scripting and macro recording. == Early history == Developed by two brothers, Gerhard Huber and Martin Huber, PhotoLine was first released in January 1996 on the Atari ST line of personal computers from Atari Corporation. Previously, Gerhard and Martin had worked on making graphics cards for Atari computers and writing drivers for image scanners. Atari's market share was declining, and the brothers considered developing a video game to expand the business. This led them to search for image editing software that would run on Atari computers and fit their game project. Only an image editor called tms Cranach came close to what Gerhard and Martin had in mind. tms Cranach was a Raster graphics editor running on Atari's MegaST/STe, TT030, and Falcon030 systems. However, Cranach turned out to be expensive software and complicated to use. The brothers contacted tms (Cranach's developers) and this resulted in an offer from tms to purchase Cranach and its source code, as tms intended to exit the Atari software market. After the purchase of Cranach and its source code Gerhard and Martin initially continued to sell Cranach, but sales were low. In 1995 the two decided to start developing a new graphics editor called "PhotoLine". PhotoLine was developed from scratch and written in C++. It nevertheless contained a lot of know-how from Cranach (which was written in C). PhotoLine first release was launched one year later in 1996. With the growing popularity of Microsoft Windows, the release of Windows 95, and the limiting graphics hardware on the Atari platforms, the developers switched development platforms and continued development of PhotoLine for Windows only. The first Windows version (PhotoLine 2.2) was released in the middle of 1997. Shortly after, the Atari version was discontinued and saw its final release as PhotoLine 2.30. The Huber brothers released this final Atari version into the public domain in 2012. The first Classic Mac OS version of PhotoLine 6 appeared in 1999 after many ex-Atari users who had switched to Mac OS pressured the PhotoLine developers to release an Apple port. == Linux Support == PhotoLine runs natively under Windows and MacOS. While a native Linux version of PhotoLine is not available, running PhotoLine under Wine is actively supported and maintained by the developers. Running PhotoLine under Linux/Wine PhotoLine enables the user to allow Little CMS to fully support color management under Linux instead of the native OS CMS. == File format == Native PhotoLine files have the extension .PLD, which is an abbreviation of "PhotoLine Document". It can contain embedded JPEG, PNG, or camera raw images. It contains a preview image in JPEG or PNG format, which is used by the operating system or third-party applications to display a thumbnail of its contents. Thumbnails are natively supported on MacOS X. During installation on Windows the user is presented with an option to install a PLD thumbnail preview driver which enables thumbnails of PLD content in Windows Explorer. Alternatively, the FastPictureViewer Standalone Codec Pack provides the ability to display PLD thumbnails in Windows Explorer. == Version History == PhotoLine was first developed for the Atari ST computer. Version 2 was the first version for Windows, and since version 6 PhotoLine is also available for MacOS.

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  Diia

  Diia (Ukrainian: Дія [ˈd⁽ʲ⁾ijɐ] , lit. 'Action'; also an acronym for Держава і Я, Derzhava i Ya, IPA: [derˈʒɑwɐ i ˈjɑ], lit. 'State and Me') is a mobile app, a web portal and a brand of e-governance in Ukraine. Launched in 2020, the Diia app allows Ukrainian citizens to use digital documents on their smartphones instead of physical ones for identification and sharing purposes. The Diia portal allows access to over 130 government services. Eventually, the government plans to make all kinds of state-person interactions available through Diia. Diia was built in partnership with the United States and is poised to be shared with other countries. On the sidelines of the 2023 World Economic Forum in Davos, USAID Administrator Samantha Power said the US hopes to replicate the success of Diia in other countries. == History == Diia was first presented on September 27, 2019, by the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine as a brand of the State in a Smartphone project. Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov announced the creation of a mobile app and a web portal that would unite in a single place all the services provided by the state to citizens and businesses. On February 6, 2020, the mobile app Diia was officially launched. During the presentation, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that 9 million Ukrainians now have access to their driver's license and car registration documents on their phones, while Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk called the implementation of the State in a Smartphone project a priority for the government. In April 2020, the Ukrainian government approved a resolution for experimental usage of digital ID-cards and passports which would be issued to all Ukrainians via the Diia. On October 5, 2020, during the Diia Summit, the government presented a first major update of the app and web portal branded "Diia 2.0". More types of documents were added to the app as well as the ability to share documents with others via a single tap on a push-message. The web portal in turn expanded the number of available services to 27, including the ability to register a private limited company in half an hour. President Zelensky who opened the summit, announced that in 2021 Ukraine will enter the "paper less" mode by prohibiting civil servants from demanding paper documents. By the end of 2020, the app had more than six million users, while the portal had 50 available services. In March 2021, the Ukrainian parliament adopted a bill equating digital identity documents with their physical analogues. Starting on August 23, Ukrainian citizens can use digital ID-cards and passports for all purposes while in Ukraine. According to Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine will become the first country in the world where digital identity documents are considered legally equivalent to ordinary ones. In September 2024, Diia launched an online marriage registration service, which can be beneficial especially for military personnel who spend much time on the frontline separated from their partners. In October 2024, Diia's online marriage service appeared in Time's Inventions of the 2024 list. In the first month of its operations over 1.1 million Ukrainians tried to make proposals using the technology, and 435 couples got married. == Benefits and challenges == The first and most obvious benefit is the convenience of such a platform. Citizens can have many documents on their smartphones at once, without concern about losing or damaging them. Whenever needed, they can just open an app on their smartphones and show/check the document they need. The idea is that Diia will help cut the bureaucracy associated with public services, which in turn will help fight corruption and increase government savings. Fewer people are needed to be employed in the public sector and fewer human to human interactions are supposed to happen. With the start of the program, already 10% of government employees were reduced, which contributes to hundreds of millions of dollars in savings, but besides this, the initiative also improves the speed, efficiency, and transparency of government services. In addition, the digitalization of the government sector helps to develop the whole IT industry in the country, people become more digitally aware and educated, this affects other sectors as well, increasing the spread of digital infrastructure and expediting the speed of overall digitalization. The UN E-government Development Index, which assesses the capabilities of governments to integrate its functions electronically, such as the use of internet and mobile devices, ranked Ukraine 69th in 193 countries surveyed in 2020. Despite its low ranking in the e-government development index, Ukraine made a big jump on the e-participation index, which they ranked 43rd out of 193 countries from 0.66 in 2018 to 0.81 in 2020 (un.org, 2020), suggesting that the government and its citizens are adapting the IT-based government functions. The main goal of e-government according to Perez-Morote et.al. (2020) is to have accountability and transparency among the countries involved. But to do so, there are several challenges that a country should assess first prior to implementing e-government. In the research written by Heeks (2001), the author identified 2 main challenges that countries face in the development of e-government, first is the strategic challenge which involves the preparedness (e-readiness) of the entire government system for electronic transformation, and second challenge is the tactical challenge where the government must design (e-governance design) a system where it can be understood by every user, it's important that the information that needs to be communicated to the consumers is received clearly. For the first challenge (e-readiness), Ukraine had an internet penetration rate of 76% in 2020 and is expected to grow to 82%, it is important that consumers have the internet access for it to enable the consumers to utilize the service. Another factor is the readiness of its institutional infrastructure, which means that the government has its own organization which is solely focused on implementing the e-government project. In the case of Ukraine, the e-governance team is led by Oleksandr Ryzhenko, and the country's e-governance initiative is even further strengthened by ensuring that the data and legal infrastructure are already prepared. Ukraine has done this by modernizing their legislation that is more appropriate in the digital service, and the data exchange solution used by Ukraine is called Trembita. The human infrastructure is also being updated, as competent individuals must be the one doing the task, hence, EGOV4UKRAINE was launched, this aims to get IT developers for developing a system for administrative services. These efforts by the Ukrainian government did not go unnoticed, and they received an award from the e-Governance Academy as "partner of the year 2017". For the second challenge, which deals with the system design, the success of Ukraine can be seen on the latest data of UNDP, where it shows a high increase in the E-participation index. In 2018, Ukraine ranked 75th it ranked 46th in 2020 (un.org, 2020). Despite visible success, the implementation of the e-government was accompanied by problems. Data leakage became the main one. In May 2020, the data of 26 million driver's licenses appeared in the public domain on the Internet. The Ukrainian government said the Diia app was not linked to a data breach, but it is impossible to say for certain. Any storage of official documents in electronic format is associated with the risk of their leakage. In addition, the Diia application still has data protection issues, as the required protection system has not been implemented. This is also compounded by the country's weak data protection legal regime. In addition, since 2023, Ukrainians are able to register their cars with this app. Issued license plates are not using regional codes, but they are using special codes starting with DI or PD. == Diia City == In May 2020, the government presented Diia City headed by Oleksandr Borniakov, a large-scale project which would establish a virtual model of a free economic zone for representatives of the creative economy. It would provide for special digital residency with a particular taxation regime, intellectual property protection and simplified regulations. Diia City concurrently imposes certain constraints on contracts involving individual entrepreneurs (FOPs). It also offers the benefit of tax rebates. Diia City garners endorsement from the Ukrainian government, believing it will support the country's position in the IT market. As of July 30, 2023, the program had more than 600 residents, including companies like iGama, Avenga, SBRobotiks, and Intellectsoft.

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  Corel VideoStudio

  Corel VideoStudio (formerly Ulead VideoStudio) is a video editing software package for Microsoft Windows. == Features == === Basic editing === The software allows storyboard and timeline-oriented editing. Various formats are supported for source clips, and the resulting video can be exported to a video file. DVD and AVCHD DVD authoring capabilities are included, and Blu-ray authoring is available via a plug-in. VideoStudio supports direct DV and HDV capture and burning. === Overlay === Users can overlay videos, images, and text. Using the overlay track, up to 50 clips can be displayed simultaneously. It can handle videos in MOV and AVI formats, including alpha channel, and images in PSP, PSD, PNG, and GIF formats. Clips that do not contain an alpha channel can have specific colours removed from the overlay video so that the required background or image is displayed in the foreground. === Proxy video files === VideoStudio supports high-definition video. Proxy files are smaller versions of the video source that stand in for the full-resolution source during editing to improve performance. === Plug-ins/bundles === VideoStudio supports VFX-type plug-ins from providers, including NewBlue and proDAD. proDAD plug-ins Roto-Pen, Script, Vitascene, and Mercalli-Stabilizer are bundled with X4 and later Ultimate Editions. == Version history == Ulead VideoStudio 4 (1999) Ulead VideoStudio 5 (2001) Ulead VideoStudio 6 (2002) Ulead VideoStudio 7 (2003) Ulead VideoStudio 8 (2004) Ulead VideoStudio 9 (2005) Ulead VideoStudio 10 plus. (2006) Corel Ulead VideoStudio 11 plus. (2007) Corel VideoStudio Pro X2 (v12, 2008) Corel VideoStudio Pro X3 (v13, 2010) 2011: Corel VideoStudio Pro X4 (v14, 2011) Adds support for stop motion animation, time-lapse mode photography, 3D movies, and 2nd generation Intel Core. Corel VideoStudio Pro X5 (v15, March 9, 2012): Adds HTML5 export (Comparison of HTML5 and Flash). Corel VideoStudio Pro X6 (v16, April 25, 2013): Windows 8 compatible. Adds UHD 4K support. Corel VideoStudio Pro X7 (v17, March 5, 2014): Software becomes 64-bit. Corel VideoStudio Pro X8 (v18, May 8, 2015): Several improvements. Corel VideoStudio Pro X9 (v19, February 16, 2016): Windows 10 compatible. Adds H.265 support, Multi-Camera Editor, and Match moving. Corel VideoStudio Pro X10 (v20, February 15, 2017): Adds Mask Creator, Track Transparency, and 360-degree video support. Corel VideoStudio Pro 2018 (v21, February 13, 2018): Adds split screen Video, Lens Correction, and 3D Title Editor. Corel VideoStudio Pro 2019 (v22, February 12, 2019): Adds Color Grading, Morph Transitions, and MultiCam Capture Lite. Corel VideoStudio Pro 2020 (v23, February 25, 2020). Corel VideoStudio Pro 2021 (v24, March 26, 2021): Adds Instant Project Templates, AR Stickers, and performance improvements (particularly regarding hardware acceleration). Corel VideoStudio Pro 2022 (v25, March 6, 2022): Adds face effects, GIF Creator, transitions for Camera Movements, a speech to text converter, and ProRes Smart Proxy.

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  Multiple buffering

  In computer science, multiple buffering is the use of more than one buffer to hold a block of data, so that a "reader" will see a complete (though perhaps old) version of the data instead of a partially updated version of the data being created by a "writer". It is very commonly used for computer display images. It is also used to avoid the need to use dual-ported RAM (DPRAM) when the readers and writers are different devices. == Description == === Double buffering Petri net === The Petri net in the illustration shows double buffering. Transitions W1 and W2 represent writing to buffer 1 and 2 respectively while R1 and R2 represent reading from buffer 1 and 2 respectively. At the beginning, only the transition W1 is enabled. After W1 fires, R1 and W2 are both enabled and can proceed in parallel. When they finish, R2 and W1 proceed in parallel and so on. After the initial transient where W1 fires alone, this system is periodic and the transitions are enabled – always in pairs (R1 with W2 and R2 with W1 respectively). == Double buffering in computer graphics == In computer graphics, double buffering is a technique for drawing graphics that shows less stutter, tearing, and other artifacts. It is difficult for a program to draw a display so that pixels do not change more than once. For instance, when updating a page of text, it is much easier to clear the entire page and then draw the letters than to somehow erase only the pixels that are used in old letters but not in new ones. However, this intermediate image is seen by the user as flickering. In addition, computer monitors constantly redraw the visible video page (traditionally at around 60 times a second), so even a perfect update may be visible momentarily as a horizontal divider between the "new" image and the un-redrawn "old" image, known as tearing. === Software double buffering === A software implementation of double buffering has all drawing operations store their results in some region of system RAM; any such region is often called a "back buffer". When all drawing operations are considered complete, the whole region (or only the changed portion) is copied into the video RAM (the "front buffer"); this copying is usually synchronized with the monitor's raster beam in order to avoid tearing. Software implementations of double buffering necessarily require more memory and CPU time than single buffering because of the system memory allocated for the back buffer, the time for the copy operation, and the time waiting for synchronization. Compositing window managers often combine the "copying" operation with "compositing" used to position windows, transform them with scale or warping effects, and make portions transparent. Thus, the "front buffer" may contain only the composite image seen on the screen, while there is a different "back buffer" for every window containing the non-composited image of the entire window contents. === Page flipping === In the page-flip method, instead of copying the data, both buffers are capable of being displayed. At any one time, one buffer is actively being displayed by the monitor, while the other, background buffer is being drawn. When the background buffer is complete, the roles of the two are switched. The page-flip is typically accomplished by modifying a hardware register in the video display controller—the value of a pointer to the beginning of the display data in the video memory. The page-flip is much faster than copying the data and can guarantee that tearing will not be seen as long as the pages are switched over during the monitor's vertical blanking interval—the blank period when no video data is being drawn. The currently active and visible buffer is called the front buffer, while the background page is called the back buffer. == Triple buffering == In computer graphics, triple buffering is similar to double buffering but can provide improved performance. In double buffering, the program must wait until the finished drawing is copied or swapped before starting the next drawing. This waiting period could be several milliseconds during which neither buffer can be touched. In triple buffering, the program has two back buffers and can immediately start drawing in the one that is not involved in such copying. The third buffer, the front buffer, is read by the graphics card to display the image on the monitor. Once the image has been sent to the monitor, the front buffer is flipped with (or copied from) the back buffer holding the most recent complete image. Since one of the back buffers is always complete, the graphics card never has to wait for the software to complete. Consequently, the software and the graphics card are completely independent and can run at their own pace. Finally, the displayed image was started without waiting for synchronization and thus with minimum lag. Due to the software algorithm not polling the graphics hardware for monitor refresh events, the algorithm may continuously draw additional frames as fast as the hardware can render them. For frames that are completed much faster than interval between refreshes, it is possible to replace a back buffers' frames with newer iterations multiple times before copying. This means frames may be written to the back buffer that are never used at all before being overwritten by successive frames. Nvidia has implemented this method under the name "Fast Sync". An alternative method sometimes referred to as triple buffering is a swap chain three buffers long. After the program has drawn both back buffers, it waits until the first one is placed on the screen, before drawing another back buffer (i.e. it is a 3-long first in, first out queue). Most Windows games seem to refer to this method when enabling triple buffering. == Quad buffering == The term quad buffering is the use of double buffering for each of the left and right eye images in stereoscopic implementations, thus four buffers total (if triple buffering was used then there would be six buffers). The command to swap or copy the buffer typically applies to both pairs at once, so at no time does one eye see an older image than the other eye. Quad buffering requires special support in the graphics card drivers which is disabled for most consumer cards. AMD's Radeon HD 6000 Series and newer support it. 3D standards like OpenGL and Direct3D support quad buffering. == Double buffering for DMA == The term double buffering is used for copying data between two buffers for direct memory access (DMA) transfers, not for enhancing performance, but to meet specific addressing requirements of a device (particularly 32-bit devices on systems with wider addressing provided via Physical Address Extension). Windows device drivers are a place where the term "double buffering" is likely to be used. Linux and BSD source code calls these "bounce buffers". Some programmers try to avoid this kind of double buffering with zero-copy techniques. == Other uses == Double buffering is also used as a technique to facilitate interlacing or deinterlacing of video signals.

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  Kernel-phase

  Kernel-phases are observable quantities used in high resolution astronomical imaging used for superresolution image creation. It can be seen as a generalization of closure phases for redundant arrays. For this reason, when the wavefront quality requirement are met, it is an alternative to aperture masking interferometry that can be executed without a mask while retaining phase error rejection properties. The observables are computed through linear algebra from the Fourier transform of direct images. They can then be used for statistical testing, model fitting, or image reconstruction. == Prerequisites == In order to extract kernel-phases from an image, some requirements must be met: Images are nyquist-sampled (at least 2 pixels per resolution element ( λ D {\displaystyle {\frac {\lambda }{D}}} )) Images are taken in near monochromatic light Exposure time is shorter than the timescale of aberrations Strehl ratio is high (good adaptive optics) Linearity of the pixel response (i.e. no saturation) Deviations from these requirements are known to be acceptable, but lead to observational bias that should be corrected by the observation of calibrators. == Definition == The method relies on a discrete model of the instrument's pupil plane and the corresponding list of baselines to provide corresponding vectors φ {\displaystyle \varphi } of pupil plane errors and Φ {\displaystyle \Phi } of image plane Fourier Phases. When the wavefront error in the pupil plane is small enough (i.e. when the Strehl ratio of the imaging system is sufficiently high), the complex amplitude associated to the instrumental phase in one point of the pupil φ k {\displaystyle \varphi _{k}} , can be approximated by e i φ k ≈ 1 + i φ k {\displaystyle e^{i\varphi _{k}}\approx 1+{\mathit {i}}\varphi _{k}} . This permits the expression of the pupil-plane phase aberrations φ {\displaystyle \varphi } to the image plane Fourier phase as a linear transformation described by the matrix A {\displaystyle A} : Φ = Φ 0 + A ⋅ φ {\displaystyle \Phi =\Phi _{0}+A\cdot \varphi } Where Φ 0 {\displaystyle \Phi _{0}} is the theoretical Fourier phase vector of the object. In this formalism, singular value decomposition can be used to find a matrix K {\displaystyle K} satisfying K ⋅ A = 0 {\displaystyle K\cdot A=0} . The rows of K {\displaystyle K} constitute a basis of the kernel of A T {\displaystyle A^{T}} . K ⋅ Φ = K ⋅ Φ 0 + K ⋅ A ⋅ φ {\displaystyle K\cdot \Phi =K\cdot \Phi _{0}+{\cancel {K\cdot A\cdot \varphi }}} The vector K . Φ {\displaystyle K.\Phi } is called the kernel-phase vector of observables. This equation can be used for model-fitting as it represents the interpretation of a sub-space of the Fourier phase that is immune to the instrumental phase errors to the first order. == Applications == The technique was first used in the re-analysis of archival images from the Hubble Space Telescope where it enabled the discovery of a number of brown dwarf in close binary systems. The technique is used as an alternative to aperture masking interferometry, especially for fainter stars because it does not require the use of masks that typically block 90% of the light, and therefore allows higher throughput. It is also considered to be an alternative to coronagraphy for direct detection of exoplanets at very small separations (below 2 λ D {\displaystyle 2{\frac {\lambda }{D}}} ) where coronagraphs are limited by the wavefront errors of adaptive optics. The same framework can be used for wavefront sensing. In the case of an asymmetric aperture, a pseudo-inverse of A {\displaystyle A} can be used to reconstruct the wavefront errors directly from the image. A Python library called xara is available on GitHub and maintained by Frantz Martinache to facilitate the extraction and interpretation of kernel-phases. The KERNEL project, has received funding from the European Research Council to explore the potential of these observables for a number of use-cases, including direct detection of exoplanets, image reconstruction, and image plane wavefront sensing for adaptive optics.

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  Deluxe Paint

  Deluxe Paint, often referred to as DPaint, is a bitmap graphics editor created by Dan Silva for Electronic Arts and published for the then-new Amiga 1000 in November 1985. A series of updated versions followed, some of which were ported to other platforms. An MS-DOS release with support for the 256 color VGA standard became popular for creating pixel graphics in video games in the 1990s. Author Dan Silva previously worked on the Cut & Paste word processor (1984), also from Electronic Arts. == History == Deluxe Paint began as an in-house art development tool called Prism. As author Dan Silva added features to Prism, it was developed as a showcase product to coincide with the Amiga's debut in 1985. Upon release, it was quickly embraced by the Amiga community and became the de facto graphics (and later animation) editor for the platform. Amiga manufacturer Commodore International later commissioned EA to create version 4.5 AGA to bundle with the new Advanced Graphics Architecture chipset (A1200, A4000) capable Amigas. Version 5 was the last release after Commodore's bankruptcy in 1994. Early versions of Deluxe Paint were available in protected and non copy-protected versions, the latter retailing for a slightly higher price. The copy protection scheme was later dropped. Deluxe Paint was first in a series of products from the Electronic Arts Tools group—then later moved to the ICE (for Interactivity, Creativity, and Education) group—which included such Amiga programs as Deluxe Music Construction Set (preceded by Music Construction Set for the Apple II), Deluxe Video, and the Studio series of paint programs for the Mac. With the development of Deluxe Paint, EA introduced the ILBM and ANIM file format standards for graphics. While widely used on the Amiga, these formats never gained widespread end user acceptance on other platforms, but were heavily used by game development companies. Deluxe Paint was used by LucasArts to make graphics for their adventure games such as The Secret of Monkey Island, and the name of a particular filename used to store the main protagonist Guybrush Threepwood was probably at the origin of his peculiar name. One of the main artist developer of the game, Mark Ferrari, in an interview for The Making of Monkey Island 30th Anniversary Documentary remembers that "there was a pulldown menu in DPaint called brushes, so character sprites were referred to as brushes", and the male protagonist was simply "the guy.brush" until the artist Steve Purcell suggested to take the very name "Guybrush". The author Ron Gilbert remembers that the PC DOS version of the file was named "guybrush.bbm". == Versions == === Amiga === Deluxe Paint I was released in 1985. A major feature was animation by using color cycling. The Amiga natively supports indexed color, where a pixel's color value does not carry any RGB hue information but instead is an index to a color palette (a collection of unique color values). By adjusting the color value in the palette, all pixels with that palette value change simultaneously in the image or animation, creating cyclic movement in the image. In the Christmas demo files on the Deluxe Paint I disk, this kind of animation (which is toggled by pressing the tab key) is used to depict falling snowflakes, a blinking Christmas tree, and a roaring fire in the fireplace. In 1986, Deluxe Paint II was introduced, which added many convenient features such as pattern and gradient fill, which could be selected by right-clicking on a fill tool. An effects menu with e.g. perspective transformation was also added. The screen format could now be changed from a dedicated selection page. Deluxe Paint III appeared in 1989 and added support for Extra Halfbrite. New editing modes allowed one to stencil certain colors to protect them, so it is possible to e.g. paint a landscape from front to back, with the foreground protected by a stencil. A major new feature of Deluxe Paint III was the ability to create cel-like animation, and animbrushes (1MB of RAM is needed for animation). These let the user pick up a section of an animation as an "animbrush", which can then be placed onto the canvas while it animates. Deluxe Paint III was one of the first paint programs to support animbrushes. This is similar to copy and paste, except one can pick up more than one image. Deluxe Paint IV (introduced in 1991), which did not include Silva as the lead programmer, offered significant new features like non-bitplane-indexed Hold-and-Modify support for creating images with up to 4,096 colors. Animation support was improved by adding a light table, i.e. onion skinning, and AnimBrush morphing. The color mixer was now a HAM region at the bottom of the screen (instead of a floating window as before) and allowed mixing adjacent colors similar to a real palette. Deluxe Paint 4.5 AGA appeared the following year, addressing the stability issues and providing support for the new A1200 and A4000 AGA machines and a revamped screen mode interface. It appeared in both standalone and Commodore-bundled versions. The final release, Deluxe Paint V, in 1995, supported true 24-bit RGB images. However, using only the AGA native chipset, the 24-bit RGB color was only held in computer memory, the on-screen image was displayed in HAM8 (18-bit color). === Apple IIGS === DeluxePaint II for the Apple IIGS was developed by Brent Iverson and released in 1987. === MS-DOS === Deluxe Paint II for MS-DOS was released in 1988, It required MS-DOS 2.0 and 640 kB of RAM. It supports CGA, EGA, MCGA, VGA, Hercules and Tandy IBM PC-compatible graphic cards. Deluxe Paint II Enhanced was released in 1989, requiring MS-DOS 2.11 and 640 kB of RAM. It supports resolutions up to 800x600 pixels with 256 colors. Deluxe Paint II Enhanced 2.0, released in 1994, was the most successful MS-DOS version, and was compatible with PC Paintbrush PCX image files. The MS-DOS conversion was done by Brent Iverson with the enhanced features by Steve Shaw. It supports CGA, EGA, MCGA, VGA, Hercules, Tandy, and Amstrad video cards, as well as early Super VGA video cards enabling it to support up to 800 × 600 with 256 (from 262,144) colors and 1024 × 768 with 16 colors. The sister product Deluxe Paint Animation (only for 320×200 pixels and 256 colors) was widely used, especially in video game development. === Atari ST === Deluxe Paint ST was developed by ArtisTech Development, published by Electronic Arts, and was released in 1990. It supports the Atari STE 4096 color palette and animated graphics. Features advertised for the Atari ST version include 3D perspective, design your own fonts, mirror symmetry, multi-color airbrushing & animations, printing up to poster size, split-screen magnification with variable zoom, and working on animations (including multiple animations). == Workflow == "[" and "]" hotkeys step through the indexed palette, turning indexed-pixel-painting into a fast two-handed mouse+keys process, and the right mouse button paints with the background color. For example, transparency is obtained as simply as selecting a background color index (a single right click on the palette GUI to change). colors could be locked from editing by use of a stencil (a list of color indices whose pixels should not be altered in the image data) and simple color-cycling animations could be created using contiguous entries in the palette. This was easy to change the hue and tone of a section of the image by altering the corresponding colors in the palette. (The specific section needed to use a dedicated part of the palette for this technique to work.) Brushes can be cut from the background by using the box, freehand, or polygon selection tools. They can then be used in the same manner as any other brush or pen. This functionality is simpler to use than the "stamp" tool of Photoshop or Alpha Channels as provided in later programs. Brushes can be rotated and scaled, even in 3D. After a brush is selected, it appears attached to the mouse cursor, providing an exact preview of what will be drawn. This allows precise pixel positioning of brushes. Animations stored in IFF ANIM format are delta compressed making animations both smaller and faster to playback. == Reception == Compute! criticized the documentation of the first release of DeluxePaint as inadequate, but stated that "DeluxePaint is a visual arts program of immense scope and flexibility". In later versions the documentation was much improved; for instance DeluxePaint IV came with a 300-page manual. Deluxe Paint was a hit for EA. The main line of the series, particularly installments one to three, has won a total of at least nine awards from independent publications and organizations, including three Amiga-specific awards. Deluxe Paint III also won Commodore International's Enterprise and Vision award in 1990, becoming the first software to win the award, for what the company's judges believed to be best utilizing the Amiga's graphical capabilities. Deluxe Pai

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  Are You Dead?

  Are You Dead? (Chinese: 死了么; pinyin: Sǐleme), also known by its English name Demumu, is a Chinese application designed for young people living alone. It requires setting up one emergency contact and sends automatic notifications if the user has not checked in via the app for consecutive days. The app was released on the App Store on 10 June 2025. In early January 2026, the application gained popularity due to its name and the issue of safety for people living alone, and ranked high on the list of paid applications in the Chinese region of the Apple App Store before being removed. The app's rise in popularity sparked discussions about taboos about death in China. == History == Are You Dead? was founded and operated independently by three people born in the 1990s, and developed in a way that involved remote collaboration in their spare time. According to the New Yellow River report, Guo, the product manager, said that the application was designed for young people and that the inspiration came from the discussion of netizens on social platforms about "an app that everyone must have and will definitely download" that he observed two or three years ago. The name was also "not their original creation". After realizing its potential demand and social significance, the team successfully registered the name and completed the product development in about a month. Regarding the development entity, the New Yellow River cited information from the Apple App Store that the application was developed by Yuejing (Zhengzhou) Technology Service Co., Ltd. According to Tianyancha information, the company was established in March 2025 with a registered capital of 100,000 yuan. === Rise in popularity === The app has been generating buzz on social media since 9 January 2026, due to its name and the topic of safety for people living alone. Around 10 January, it topped the Apple paid app chart. As of 10:00 a.m. on January 11, it ranked first in the App Store paid app chart. It also ranked highly in the utility app chart; it ranked first or second in the paid utility app charts in the United States, Singapore and Hong Kong, and first or fourth in Australia and Spain. The app was subsequently removed from the Apple App Store in China. In terms of functionality and usage, First Financial praised the product for its "simple interface and single function," but pointed out that the interface lacks a display of consecutive check-in days, and there is also the possibility that users may forget to check in, leading to the mistaken issuance of reminders. In addition, since the application mainly relies on email reminders and lacks SMS or telephone notifications, it does not conform to Chinese social habits; the untimely notifications also make the application more like a "death notification" tool, losing its early warning significance for emergency rescue. Hu Xijin, former editor-in-chief of the Global Times, commented on the application on Weibo that it is "really good and can help many lonely elderly people." The Beijing News Quick Review pointed out that the role of technical tools is limited and needs to be connected with real support such as community patrols and liaison mechanisms. Due to the price increase, there have also been questions about the motivation for the price increase. The app's rise in popularity sparked discussions about taboos about death in China. Regarding the popularity of the application, both Southern Metropolis Daily and The Beijing News commented that it reflects the public issue of the risks of living alone and reflects the general anxiety of the living alone group about dying alone. Shangguan News further pointed out that although such technology products provide a certain "low-cost sense of security", their "cold notifications" may not only cause false alarms, but also highlight the embarrassing reality that "there is no one to fill in the emergency contact". It also emphasized that algorithms or applications cannot bring true happiness and called on society to reconstruct a support network full of humanistic care while relying on technology. The name of the application has also sparked controversy. Most netizens believe that the name "Are You Dead?" is unlucky and makes it awkward to share the application. They suggest changing it to a milder name such as "Are You Alive?". Hu Xijin also said that the name change could "give the elderly who use it more psychological comfort" and "believe that the application will become more popular after the name change". Some people also believe that this straightforward name just points out the real dilemma faced by people living alone and has a special meaning. BBC News commented that the name "Are You Dead" is playing a word game with Ele.me (Chinese: 饿了么; pinyin: Èleme) and the pronunciation is also similar. Legal professionals believe that its name is highly similar to Ele.me and may cause confusion. They also raised the possibility of trademark infringement and unfair competition. However, the developers said that the application is developed for young people and death is not a sensitive topic. They will "consider launching a new application that is more suitable for middle-aged and elderly people". They have not yet received any name change requests from relevant departments. On the evening of 13 January 2026, the Are You Dead? team announced that it would change its name to the English brand name Demumu in the upcoming new version. On 11 January, the development team also issued a statement through its official Weibo account, stating that it would study the renaming suggestion and plan to enrich the SMS reminder function, consider adding the message function and explore the direction of age-friendly products; it also stated that it would launch an 8 yuan paid plan to cover the costs of SMS, servers, etc., and welcomed investors to discuss cooperation. In terms of financing and valuation, it plans to sell 10% of the company's shares for 1 million yuan and proposed a valuation of 10 million yuan. On the evening of January 15, the application was removed from the app store in mainland China. == Functions == The application does not require users to enter phone numbers or other information to register. After filling in their name and setting an emergency contact, users can click the sign-in button every day. If they fail to sign in for two consecutive days, the system will send an email reminder to the emergency contact the next day. In addition, users can also bind a smart bracelet to monitor physiological signs, pre-designate a hearse driver and funeral music, and trigger the "one-click body collection" function when no pulse is detected. The application was initially available for free download, but a one yuan paid download option was introduced at the end of 2025. In January 2026, the application team issued a statement saying that an 8 yuan paid option would be launched based on the costs of SMS, servers, etc.

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  The Triple Revolution

  "The Triple Revolution" was an open memorandum sent to U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson and other government figures on March 22, 1964. It concerned three megatrends of the time: increasing use of automation, the nuclear arms race, and advancements in human rights. Drafted under the auspices of the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions, it was signed by an array of noted social activists, professors, and technologists who identified themselves as the Ad Hoc Committee on the Triple Revolution. The chief initiator of the proposal was W. H. "Ping" Ferry, at that time a vice-president of CSDI, basing it in large part on the ideas of the futurist Robert Theobald. == Overview == The statement identified three revolutions underway in the world: the cybernation revolution of increasing automation; the weaponry revolution of mutually assured destruction; and the human rights revolution. It discussed primarily the cybernation revolution. The committee claimed that machines would usher in "a system of almost unlimited productive capacity" while continually reducing the number of manual laborers needed, and increasing the skill needed to work, thereby producing increasing levels of unemployment. It proposed that the government should ease this transformation through large-scale public works, low-cost housing, public transit, electrical power development, income redistribution, union representation for the unemployed, and government restraint on technology deployment. == Legacy == Martin Luther King Jr.'s final Sunday sermon, delivered six days before his April 1968 assassination, explicitly references the thesis of "The Triple Revolution": There can be no gainsaying of the fact that a great revolution is taking place in the world today. In a sense it is a triple revolution: that is, a technological revolution, with the impact of automation and cybernation; then there is a revolution in weaponry, with the emergence of atomic and nuclear weapons of warfare; then there is a human rights revolution, with the freedom explosion that is taking place all over the world. Yes, we do live in a period where changes are taking place. And there is still the voice crying through the vista of time saying, "Behold, I make all things new; former things are passed away." In Harlan Ellison's 1967 anthology Dangerous Visions, Philip José Farmer's story "Riders of the Purple Wage" uses the Triple Revolution document as the premise of a future society, in which the "purple wage" of the title is a guaranteed income dole on which most of the population lives. At the 1968 World Science Fiction Convention in San Francisco, Farmer delivered a lengthy Guest of Honor speech in which he called for the founding of a grassroots activist organization called REAP which would work for implementation of the Ad Hoc Committee's recommendations. Looking back on the proposal in his 2008 book, Daniel Bell wrote: "the cybernetic revolution quickly proved to be illusory. There were no spectacular jumps in productivity. ... Cybernation had proved to be one more instance of the penchant for overdramatizing a momentary innovation and blowing it up far out of proportion to its actuality. ... The image of a completely automated production economy—with an endless capacity to turn out goods—was simply a social-science fiction of the early 1960s. Paradoxically, the vision of Utopia was suddenly replaced by the spectre of Doomsday. In place of the early-sixties theme of endless plenty, the picture by the end of the decade was one of a fragile planet of limited resources whose finite stocks were being rapidly depleted, and whose wastes from soaring industrial production were polluting the air and waters." In his 2015 book Rise of the Robots, Martin Ford claims The Triple Revolution's predictions of steady decline in future employment were not wrong, but rather premature. He cites "Seven Deadly Trends" that began in the 1970s-1980s and by the mid-2010s appeared set to continue: Stagnation in real wages Decline in labor's share of national income in many countries (breakdown of Bowley's law), while corporate profits increased Declining labor force participation Diminishing job creation, lengthening jobless recoveries, and soaring long-term unemployment Rising inequality Declining incomes, and underemployment for recent college graduates Polarization and part-time jobs (middle-class jobs are disappearing, to be replaced by a small number of high-paying jobs and large number of low-paying jobs) According to Ford, the 1960s were part of what in retrospect seems like a golden age for labor in the United States, when productivity and wages rose together in near lockstep, and unemployment was low. But after about 1980, wages began stagnating while productivity continued to rise. Labor's share of the economic output began to decline. Ford describes the role that automation and information technology play in these trends, and how new technologies including narrow AI threaten to destroy jobs faster than displaced workers can be retrained for new jobs, before automation takes the new jobs as well. This includes many job categories, such as in transportation, that were never threatened by automation before. According to a 2013 study, about 47% of US jobs are susceptible to automation. == Signatories ==

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