AI Driven Spreadsheet

AI Driven Spreadsheet — independent reviews, comparisons, pricing and step-by-step guides on Aizhi.

Software bot

A software bot is a type of software agent in the service of software project management and software engineering. A software bot has an identity and potentially personified aspects in order to serve their stakeholders. Software bots often compose software services and provide an alternative user interface, which is sometimes, but not necessarily conversational. Software bots are typically used to execute tasks, suggest actions, engage in dialogue, and promote social and cultural aspects of a software project. The term bot is derived from robot. However, robots act in the physical world and software bots act only in digital spaces. Some software bots are designed and behave as chatbots, but not all chatbots are software bots. Discussions about the past and future of software bots show that software bots have been adopted for many years. == Usage == Software bots are used to support development activities, such as communication among software developers and automation of repetitive tasks. Software bots have been adopted by several communities related to software development, such as open-source communities on GitHub and Stack Overflow. GitHub bots have user accounts and can open, close, or comment on pull requests and issues. GitHub bots have been used to assign reviewers, ask contributors to sign the Contributor License Agreement, report continuous integration failures, review code and pull requests, welcome newcomers, run automated tests, merge pull requests, fix bugs and vulnerabilities, etc. The Slack tool includes an API for developing software bots. There are slack bots for keeping track of todo lists, coordinating standup meetings, and managing support tickets. The ChatBot company products further simplify the process of creating a custom Slack bot. On Wikipedia, Wikipedia bots automate a variety of tasks, such as creating stub articles, consistently updating the format of multiple articles, and so on. Bots like ClueBot NG are capable of recognizing vandalism and automatically remove disruptive content. == Taxonomies and Classification Frameworks == Lebeuf et al. provide a faceted taxonomy to characterize bots based on a literature review. It is composed of 3 main facets: (i) properties of the environment that the bot was created in; (ii) intrinsic properties of the bot itself; and (iii) the bot's interactions within its environment. They further detail the facets into sets of sub-facets under each of the main facets. Paikari and van der Hoek defined a set of dimensions to enable comparison of software bots, applied specifically to chatbots. It resulted in six dimensions: Type: the main purpose of the bot (information, collaboration, or automation) Direction of the "conversation" (input, output, or bi-directional) Guidance (human-mediated, or autonomous) Predictability (deterministic, or evolving) Interaction style (dull, alternate vocabulary, relationship-builder, human-like) Communication channel (text, voice, or both) Erlenhov et al. raised the question of the difference between a bot and simple automation, since much research done in the name of software bots uses the term bot to describe various different tools and sometimes things are "just" plain old development tools. After interviewing and surveying over 100 developers the authors found that not one, but three definitions dominated the community. They created three personas based on these definitions and the difference between what the three personas see as being a bot is mainly the association with a different set of human-like traits. The chat bot persona (Charlie) primarily thinks of bots as tools that communicates with the developer through a natural language interface (typically voice or chat), and caring little about what tasks the bot is used for or how it actually implements these tasks. The autonomous bot persona (Alex) thinks of bots as tools that work on their own (without requiring much input from a developer) on a task that would normally be done by a human. The smart bot persona (Sam) separates bots and plain old development tools through how smart (technically sophisticated) a tool is. Sam cares less about how the tool communicates, but more about if it is unusually good or adaptive at executing a task. The authors recommends that people doing research or writing about bots try to put their work in the context of one of the personas since the personas have different expectations and problems with the tools. == Example of notable bots == Dependabot and Renovatebot update software dependencies and detect vulnerabilities. (https://dependabot.com/) Probot is an organization that create and maintain bots for GitHub. The example bots using Probot are the following. Auto Assign (https://probot.github.io/apps/auto-assign/) license bot (https://probot.github.io/) Sentiment bot (https://probot.github.io/apps/sentiment-bot/) Untrivializer bot (https://probot.github.io/apps/untrivializer/) Refactoring-Bot (Refactoring-Bot): provides refactoring based on static code analysis Looks good to me bot (LGTM) is a Semmle product that inspects pull requests on GitHub for code style and unsafe code practices. == Issues and threats == Software bots may not be well accepted by humans. A study from the University of Antwerp has compared how developers active on Stack Overflow perceive answers generated by software bots. They find that developers perceive the quality of software bot-generated answers to be significantly worse if the identity of the software bot is made apparent. By contrast, answers from software bots with human-like identity were better received. In practice, when software bots are used on platforms like GitHub or Wikipedia, their username makes it clear that they are bots, e.g., DependaBot, RenovateBot, DatBot, SineBot. Bots may be subject to special rules. For instance, the GitHub terms of service does not allow 'bots' but accepts 'machine account', where a 'machine account' has two properties: 1) a human takes full responsibility of the bot's actions 2) it cannot create other accounts.
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Buckeye Corpus

The Buckeye Corpus of conversational speech is a speech corpus created by a team of linguists and psychologists at Ohio State University led by Prof. Mark Pitt. It contains high-quality recordings from 40 speakers in Columbus, Ohio conversing freely with an interviewer. The interviewer's voice is heard only faintly in the background of these recordings. The sessions were conducted as Sociolinguistics interviews, and are essentially monologues. The speech has been orthographically transcribed and phonetically labeled. The audio and text files, together with time-aligned phonetic labels, are stored in a format for use with speech analysis software (Xwaves and Wavesurfer). Software for searching the transcription files is also available at the project web site. The corpus is available to researchers in academia and industry. The project was funded by the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders and the Office of Research at Ohio State University.
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Coolgorilla

Coolgorilla was one of the earliest software developers that created 3rd party native applications for Apple iPod devices. Coolgorilla was an early adopter of using a sponsorship business model to enable mobile applications to be given away freely. Coolgorilla developed a series of Talking Phrasebooks for iPods in 2006. They partnered with online travel company lastminute.com who sponsored the applications enabling them to be made available to download completely free of charge. As mobile devices became more sophisticated, Coolgorilla developed the Talking Phrasebooks for Sony Ericsson and Nokia Mobile Devices which at the time were considerably noteworthy since the applications used real voice audio translations. With Apple's introduction of the iPhone in 2007, Coolgorilla developed a Web App before having four of the iPhone Talking Phrasebooks available to download from Apple's App Store on the day it opened in 2008. == Almanac in Chronological Order == On 23 December 2005, CoolGorilla, a new start-up, launched a trivia game for the iPod. It was titled "Rock and Pop Quiz". It was a quiz game that tested users' knowledge on bands such as U2, Metallica, Beyonce, and the Beatles. The quiz contained twenty megabytes of audible trivia questions. The free game was compatible with 3rd, 4th and 5th generation iPods, iPod mini and nano. In March 2006, Coolgorilla released "Movie Quiz for iPods" with a price of $5. It was an audio game narrated by New York's DJ Thomas, a radio and television host, voice over artist and event Master of Ceremonies. There were questions on Star Wars, Spiderman, The Godfather, Pulp Fiction, The Matrix, James Bond, and others. The user could keep track of their score. The game included a secret code for players who answered all questions correctly which enabled users to enter their name on the Coolgorilla Hall of Fame. In May 2006, Coolgorilla launched a World Cup Encyclopedia which was released prior to the 2006 FIFA World Cup. It had information on the World Cup schedule, details of every player from every team, every score from every world cup game ever played, stadium details, and manager profiles. It was a free download. In June 2006, Coolgorilla released a series of iPod Phrasebooks in German, Greek, French and Spanish. They were sponsored by lastminute.com and were free. The phrasebooks included common words and phrases for tourists with 750 sound files. They were accessed through the iPod's Notes feature. In April 2007, Coolgorilla released a downloadable version of the Talking Phrasebooks for Nokia and Sony Ericsson mobile devices. French, Spanish, German, Greek, Italian, and Portuguese were produced. The application provided real voice translations. They initially sold for £3 but 3 months later were offered for free. The branding was lastminute.com branding. Apple's iPhone was released at the end of June 2007. Soon after, Coolgorilla released an online all-in-one version of their Talking Phrasebooks for iPhone (Web App). The Phrasebooks were made available online in the form of a web app as iPhone did not yet allow for the download of additional apps. The app provided both text and audio translations in French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, German, and Greek. The iPhone translated the phrases using the recordings of real, native voice-over artists. A text translation on screen was also displayed. Apple's App Store opened in July 2008 with approximately 500 native apps available. Four of these Apps were Coolgorilla's Talking Phrasebooks for iPhone (Native Apps). There was French, German, Italian, and Spanish. These Apps carried lastminute.com branding and were available for free download. In the first three weeks following their release, the phrasebooks had over 350,000 downloads. Subsequently, Dutch, Arabic, Mandarin and Cantonese were also released. In October 2008, Coolgorilla released an iPhone London Travel Guide. Coolgorilla featured on NBC News in August 2009. In 2010, FIAT used the Italian Phrasebook to help promote the release of their FIAT 500 in the US. There has been no further activity since.
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VueScan

VueScan is a computer program for image scanning, especially of photographs, including negatives. It supports optical character recognition (OCR) of text documents. The software can be downloaded and used free of charge, but adds a watermark on scans until a license is purchased. == Purpose == VueScan is intended to work with a large number of image scanners, excluding specialised professional scanners such as drum scanners, on many computer operating systems (OS), even if drivers for the scanner are not available for the OS. These scanners are supplied with device drivers and software to operate them, included in their price. A 2014 review considered that the reasons to purchase VueScan are to allow older scanners not supported by drivers for newer operating systems to be used in more up-to-date systems and for better scanning and processing of photographs (prints; also slides and negatives when supported by scanners) than is afforded by manufacturers' software. The review did not report any advantages to VueScan's processing of documents over other software. The reviewer considered VueScan comparable to SilverFast, a similar program, with support for some specific scanners better in one or the other. Vuescan supports more scanners, with a single purchase giving access to the full range of both film and flatbed scanners, and costs less. The VueScan program can be used with its own drivers or with drivers supplied by the scanner manufacturer, if supported by the operating system. VueScan drivers can also be used without the VueScan program by application software that supports scanning directly, such as Adobe Photoshop, again enabling the use of scanners without current manufacturers' drivers. In 2019 when Apple released macOS Catalina, they removed support for running 32-bit programs, including 32-bit drivers for scanning equipment. In response, Hamrick released VueScan 9.7, effectively saving thousands of scanners from being rendered obsolete. == Overview == VueScan enables the user to modify and fine-tune the scanning parameters. The program uses its own independent method to interface with scanner hardware, and can support many older scanners under computer operating systems for which drivers are not available, allowing old scanners to be used with newer platforms that do not otherwise support them. VueScan supports an increasing number of scanners and digital cameras; 2,400 on Windows, 2,100 on Mac OS X and 1,900 on Linux in 2018. VueScan is supplied as one downloadable file for each operating system, which supports the full range of scanners. Without the purchase of a license, the program runs in fully functional demonstration mode, identical to Professional mode, except that watermarks are superimposed on saved and printed images. Purchase of a license removes the watermark. A standard license allows updates for one year; a professional license allows unlimited updates and provides some additional features. VueScan supports optical character recognition (OCR), with English included, and 32 additional language packages available on its website. In September 2011, VueScan co-developer Ed Hamrick said that he was selling US$3 million per year of VueScan licenses.
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Autonomous logistics

Autonomous logistics describes systems that provide unmanned, autonomous transfer of equipment, baggage, people, information or resources from point-to-point with minimal human intervention. Autonomous logistics is a new area being researched and currently there are few papers on the topic, with even fewer systems developed or deployed. With web enabled cloud software there are companies focused on developing and deploying such systems which will begin coming online in 2018. == Autonomous logistics vehicles == There are several subclasses of autonomous logistics vehicles: Ground autonomous logistics Based on Unmanned ground vehicle technology, a large autonomous logistics tracked carrier, which can be deployed in a tropical forest for day and night, has been developed. Another example is the TerraMax autonomous truck based on Oshkosh's Medium Tactical Vehicle Replacement (MTVR) military truck platform. Most recently, TerraMax competed in the 2007 Darpa Urban Challenge. The MTVR was designed for the U.S. Marine Corps with a 70% off-road mission profile. TerraMax's unmanned ground vehicle kit does not interfere with the conventional operation of the vehicle. A robust sensor suite allows for 360-degree situational awareness around TerraMax. Elements of the autonomous navigation kit could be used to enhance driver awareness. The complete kit could be used in applications such as snow removal on airport runways. Aerial autonomous logistics Based on unmanned aerial vehicle technology, aerial autonomous logistics (or logistics UAVs) provides transfer of resources and equipment in disaster relief situations, replenishment operations, reconnaissance operations where information is gathered, and general parcel or package delivery. Space autonomous logistics Describes the ability to provide logistics to and from space, be that orbital, lunar or beyond. Current space logistics vehicle examples are the Progress spacecraft, Russian expendable freighter uncrewed resupply spacecraft and the Automated Transfer Vehicle, expendable uncrewed resupply spacecraft developed by the European Space Agency. Above Water autonomous logistics Based on unmanned surface vehicle technology, this class of vehicles provides a range of surface fleet replenishment and equipment transfer capabilities. Subsea autonomous logistics Using autonomous underwater vehicle technology, these vehicles provide re-supply to underwater facilities, reconnaissance of underwater structures, emergency recovery capability, and so on. == Agent-based logistics == Shipping containers handle most of today's intercontinental transport of packaged goods. Managing them in terms of planning and scheduling is a challenging task due to the complexity and dynamics of the involved processes. Hence, recent developments show an increasing trend towards autonomous control with software agents acting on behalf of the logistic objects. Despite the high degree of autonomy it is still necessary to cooperate in order to achieve certain goals. The current trends and recent changes in logistics lead to new, complex and partially conflicting requirements for logistic planning and control systems. Due to the distributed nature of logistics, the usage of agent technology is promising. Due to the mobile nature of logistics, the usage of mobile agent technology is promising as well. Scenarios of usage of mobile agents in logistics has been envisioned.
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Buckeye Corpus

The Buckeye Corpus of conversational speech is a speech corpus created by a team of linguists and psychologists at Ohio State University led by Prof. Mark Pitt. It contains high-quality recordings from 40 speakers in Columbus, Ohio conversing freely with an interviewer. The interviewer's voice is heard only faintly in the background of these recordings. The sessions were conducted as Sociolinguistics interviews, and are essentially monologues. The speech has been orthographically transcribed and phonetically labeled. The audio and text files, together with time-aligned phonetic labels, are stored in a format for use with speech analysis software (Xwaves and Wavesurfer). Software for searching the transcription files is also available at the project web site. The corpus is available to researchers in academia and industry. The project was funded by the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders and the Office of Research at Ohio State University.
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LENA Foundation

The LENA Foundation is an American nonprofit organisation which provides tools for measuring children's language acquisition and exposure. Specifically, the LENA system consists of a digital language processor which is worn by a child and records and analyses their auditory environment, using propriety software. It then presents a summary of child-adult conversation, such as conversation turns and word counts. The purpose of the LENA system is to encourage interactive talk between children (between the age of two to forty-eight months) and their caretakers. The LENA system is also used for research; while useful for researchers who wish to save transcription costs or observe the child in its natural state, the accuracy of this system, while often quite high, varies between contexts, for example notably in the case of hard of hearing children. Because of this, several researchers recommend caution in using only the LENA system on its own for the purposes of scientific research. == History == The LENA Foundation was established in 2009 by Terrance and Judith Paul, founders of Renaissance Learning, Inc., with the purpose of aiding children with disabilities and assisting with early learning. They were inspired by the book "Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Experience of American Children" by Dr. Betty Hart and Dr. Todd Risley. A pilot version of the LENA system was launched in February 2006. The LENA Research Foundation was registered as a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit in September 2010. The organisation was renamed simply LENA in 2018 and adopted the tagline "Building brains through early talk." LENA has been used for parental feedback, linguistics or paediatrics research, and for specific clinical cases. == Scientific background == In 2018, research using the LENA system showed that there was a link between children's conversational turns and activation of Broca's area (a part of the brain responsible, although not necessarily essential, for language processing). The LENA foundation cites research by its own employees as evidence for the scientific basis of its technology. Said research claims that verbal interaction with young children has an effect on language acquisition, including verbal comprehension skills during adolescence. == LENA System == The LENA software analyses a child's natural language environment, such as verbal exposure, and provides several metrics, such as adult and child speech time, television/recorded audio time, word count, or conversation turn count. The LENA hardware is a recorder that is usually placed into a child's specially-designed vest. The software was trained on over 65,000 hours of manually annotated American English audio recordings. It splits the audio into segments which are categorised as "key child", "other child", "male adult", "noise", etc. The advantages of LENA as opposed to manual transcription are its speed and ease of use; the disadvantages are its potential inaccuracies and lack of transcription capability (which LENA does not profess to attempt). The LENA system has also been criticised for prioritising quantity of speaking over quality (i.e., mastery of the language, as opposed to babble). == Product lines == === LENA Start === LENA Start is a program for parents that utilises feedback from the LENA System in conjunction with weekly group sessions in order to address the home language environment. It was introduced in 2015 and implemented across several U.S. states. In October 2020, during the restrictions of the COVID-19 pandemic, Read Aloud Delaware began a virtual LENA Start program with families statewide, where parents received feedback and participated in one-hour Zoom workshops each week during the 10-week program. === LENA Grow === LENA Grow is a professional development program for teachers in early childhood classrooms. Before launching at sites around the country, the program was first piloted in Escambia County, Florida. === LENA Home === LENA Home is a supplement to existing parent coaching curricula. Typically, home visitors facilitate the use of the LENA System to help parents track their progress towards increasing interactive talk in their homes. === Developmental Snapshot === The LENA Developmental Snapshot, based on a 52-question parent survey, assesses both expressive and receptive language skills and provides an estimate of a child's developmental age from 2 months to 36 months.
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Gapo

Gapo is a Vietnamese social networking service based in Hanoi, Vietnam. Users are able to create a personal profile and share text, photos and videos with others on the platform. Users can also use Gapo for live streaming, instant messaging, blogging, and online payments. Gapo was launched in July 2019 by Hà Trung Kiên and Duong Vi Khoa. == History == Gapo was founded in response to calls for Vietnam's Communist-led government to produce a domestic alternative to social media giants like Facebook and Google. Gapo officially launched on July 23, 2019 at an event in Hanoi. The company received 500 billion đồng (US$22 million) in funding from technology corporation G-Group to be utilized in the first phase of development. They also partnered with Sony Music Entertainment to provide music content to its services. == Features == Gapo features a news feed for posting content, livestreaming, instant messaging, and blogging. It also allows users to pay online and access public services. == Reception == Within two days of launch, Gapo received about 200,000 registrations. By September 2019, the user base increased to one million. Upon launch, Gapo experienced significant technical difficulties. Users complained about the inability to sign up for a new account and said that certain functions were not available for use at launch. This issue caused Gapo to temporarily suspend their services in order to perform upgrades and bug fixes. Gapo relaunched the next day, though many users reported that the access speed decreased. The mobile app also received mixed reviews from users in both the App Store and the Google Play Store, with an average rating of 3.1 and 3.5, respectively. Most users found the app to be a knockoff of Facebook, although some users praised the app for being locally developed. === Expert opinions on platform viability === Le Hong Hiep of the ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute was doubtful that a Vietnamese-owned social network service could be as powerful as a foreign-based service, stating that Vietnam might not be able to develop a viable social media network to compete with the likes of Facebook or Google. Others, like blogger Ann Chi, said that, due to local players complying with local censorship policy, there is a chance that locals might not trust Gapo and other local services in light of possible surveillance. Regarding the targeted user base figure for the end of 2019 and 2021, experts cautioned that the company might need an additional trillion đồng of funding to reach its planned user base targets. In response, the company stated that Gapo was never meant to compete with Facebook, but instead noted that the main difference between Gapo and Facebook is that Gapo provides a personalized user experience through customization. == Censorship == Gapo has the right to censor posts and news that are deemed offensive and inaccurate by users or not approved by the censorship curators.
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Automated restaurant

An automated restaurant or robotic restaurant is a restaurant that uses robots to do tasks such as delivering food and drink to the tables or cooking the food. Restaurant automation means the use of a restaurant management system to automate some or occasionally all of the major operations of a restaurant establishment. More recently, restaurants are opening that have completely or partially automated their services. These may include: taking orders, preparing food, serving, and billing. A few fully automated restaurants operate without any human intervention whatsoever. Robots are designed to help and sometimes replace human labour (such as waiters and chefs). The automation of restaurants may also allow for the option for greater customization of an order. == History == === Vending machines === In the late 19th and early 20th century a number of restaurants served food solely through vending machines. These restaurants were called automats or, in Japan, shokkenki. Customers ordered their food directly through the machines. === Sushi conveyors === Yoshiaki Shiraishi is a Japanese innovator who is known for the creation of conveyor belt sushi. He had the idea following difficulty staffing his small sushi restaurant and managing the restaurant on his own. He was inspired seeing beer bottles on a conveyor belt in an Asahi brewery. Yoshiaki's restaurants are an early example of restaurant automation; they used a conveyor belt to distribute dishes around the restaurant, eliminating the need for waiters. This example of automation dates back to the Japanese economic miracle; the first of Yoshiaki's conveyor belt sushi restaurants was opened under the name Mawaru Genroku Sushi in 1958, in Osaka. === Partial automation === As of 2011, across Europe, McDonald's had already begun implementing 7,000 touch screen kiosks that could handle cashiering duties. From 2015 to 2020, Zume had an automated pizza parlor. Later companies would try to produce smaller, less ambitious devices, with one robotics company producing a machine that could automate the slowest and most repetitive parts of assembling a pizza, such as spreading pizza sauce or placing slices of pepperoni, while leaving other customizations to employees. In 2020, a restaurant in the Netherlands began trialling the use of a robot to serve guests. In September 2021, Karakuri's 'Semblr' food service robot served personalised lunches for the 4,000 employees of grocery technology solutions provider ocado Group's head offices in Hatfield, UK. 2,700 different combinations of dishes were on offer. Customers could specify in grams what hot and cold items, proteins, sauces and fresh toppings they wanted. In 2021, Columbia University School of Engineering and Applied Science engineers developed a method of cooking 3D printed chicken with software-controlled robotic lasers. The “Digital Food” team exposed raw 3D printed chicken structures to both blue and infrared light. They then assessed the cooking depth, colour development, moisture retention and flavour differences of the laser-cooked 3D printed samples in comparison to stove-cooked meat. In June 2022 a California nonprofit chain of residential communities, Front Porch, experimented with robots in dining rooms at two locations to supplement wait staff by carrying plated food and drink to tables, and removing dishes. 65% of residents found the robots helpful, with 51% saying they let the staff spend more quality time with diners. 51% of staff were "excited" and 58% said they enabled more quality time with diners. The chain has 19 senior living communities (and 35 affordable housing communities), so it has potential to expand robots to more dining rooms. It is shifting to memory care, which may affect plans. == Rationales == === Advantages === Efficiency: Automated restaurants can significantly enhance operational efficiency by minimizing human error and reducing service time. With automated ordering, payment, and food preparation systems, customers can enjoy faster service and reduced waiting times. Cost savings: By reducing the need for human staff, automated restaurants can potentially lower labor costs. This can be particularly beneficial in areas with high labor expenses, as it allows for better resource allocation and cost management. Consistency: Automation ensures consistency in food quality and presentation. With precise portion control and standardized cooking methods, customers can expect the same quality and taste in their meals every time they visit. Enhanced customer experience: Self-service kiosks and automated systems provide customers with control and convenience. They can customize their orders, browse through menu options, and pay seamlessly, creating a more interactive and satisfying dining experience. === Disadvantages === Lack of personal touch: Automated restaurants may lack the personal interaction and warmth that traditional restaurants provide. Some customers prefer the human touch, personalized recommendations, and the social aspect of dining out. Technical issues: Reliance on technology means that technical glitches and malfunctions can occur, resulting in service disruptions or delays. Maintenance and technical support become critical in ensuring smooth operations. Limited menu complexity: The automation process may be better suited for standardized menu items rather than complex or customized dishes. The ability to cater to unique dietary preferences or accommodate special requests may be limited. Employment implications: Automated restaurants may result in job losses for traditional restaurant staff, potentially impacting the local workforce. It is important to consider the social and economic implications of adopting such technology. == Locations == Automated restaurants have been opening in many countries. Examples include: Nala Restaurant in Naperville, Illinois Fritz's Railroad Restaurant in Kansas City, Kansas Výtopna, a Railway Restaurant using model trains: franchise of various restaurants and coffeehouses in the Czech Republic Bagger's Restaurant in Nuremberg, Germany FuA-Men Restaurant, a ramen restaurant located in Nagoya, Japan Fōster Nutrition in Buenos Aires, Argentina Dalu Robot Restaurant in Jinan, China Haohai Robot Restaurant in Harbin, China Robot Kitchen Restaurant in Hong Kong Robo-Chef restaurant in Tehran, Iran, started in 2017, is the first robotic and "waiterless" restaurant of the Middle East. MIT graduates opened Spyce Kitchens in downtown Boston, Massachusetts, in 2018 Foodom, under Country Garden Holdings, opened January 12, 2020, in Guangzhou, China Robot Chacha, the first robot restaurant of India, is planning to open in the capital city of New Delhi. Kura Revolving Sushi Bar, with a number of locations in the United States, uses a tablets at tables for ordering, a conveyor belt to deliver food, and robots to deliver drinks and condiments. Chipotle Mexican Grill is beginning to deploy the Hyphen Makeline, which assembles up to 350 bowls and salads automatically per hour, and Chippy, an automatic tortilla chip fryer made by Miso Robotics. Serious Dumplings in Boca Raton, Florida
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CineAsset

CineAsset was a complete mastering software suite by Doremi Labs that could create and playback encrypted (Pro version) and unencrypted DCI compliant packages from virtually any source. CineAsset included a separate "Editor" application for generating Digital Cinema Packages (DCPs). CineAsset Pro added the ability to generate encrypted DCPs and Key Delivery Messages (KDMs) for any encrypted content in the database. It has since been discontinued, along with CineAsset Player. == Features == == Supported formats == === Input === Source: ==== Containers ==== AVI MOV MXF MPG TS WMV M2TS MTS MP4 MKV ==== Video Codecs ==== JPEG2000 ProRes 422 DNxHD® YUV Uncompressed 8-10 bits DIVX® XVID® MPEG4 AVC / H-264 VC-1 MPEG2 ==== Image Sequences ==== BMP TIFF TGA DPX JPG J2C ==== Audio Files ==== WAV MP3 WMA MP2 === Output === Source: ==== JPEG2000 ==== 2D and 3D at up to 4K resolution Bit Rate: 50–250 Mbit/s (500 Mbit/s for frame rates above 30 fps) Speed: Faster than real-time processing when using optional render nodes ==== MPEG2 ==== I-Only or Long GOP 1080p up to 80 Mbit/s ==== H264 ==== 1080p up to 50 Mbit/s ==== VC1 ==== DCP wrapping only (no transcode)
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Amaq News Agency

Amaq News Agency (Arabic: وكالة أعماق الإخبارية, romanized: Wakālat Aʻmāq al-Ikhbārīyah) is a news outlet linked to the Islamic State (IS). Amaq is often the "first point of publication for claims of responsibility" for terrorist attacks in Western countries by the Islamic State. In March 2019, Amaq News Agency was designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the United States Department of State. == History == Among the founders of Amaq was Syrian journalist Baraa Kadek, who joined IS in late 2013, Abu Muhammad al-Furqan, and seven others who originally worked for Halab News Network. According to The New York Times, it has a direct connection with IS, from which it "gets tips". Its name was taken from Amik Valley in Hatay Province, which is mentioned in a hadith as the site of an "apocalyptic victory over non-believers". Amaq News Agency was first noticed by SITE during the Siege of Kobanî (Syria) in 2014, when its updates were shared among IS fighters. It became more widely known after it began reporting claims of responsibility for terrorist attacks in Western countries, such as the 2015 San Bernardino attack, for which IS officially claimed responsibility the next day. An Amaq cameraman shot the first footage of the capture of Palmyra in 2015. Amaq launched an official mobile app in 2015 and has warned against unofficial versions that reportedly have been used to spy on its users. It also uses a Telegram account. It had a WordPress-based blog, but it was removed without explanation in April 2016. On 12 June 2016, IS claimed responsibility for the Pulse nightclub shooting through Amaq, without prior knowledge of the attack. The shooter, Omar Mateen had later pledged allegiance to IS via a phone call with emergency services. On 31 May 2017, a Facebook post announced Amaq's founder, Baraa Kadek AKA Rayan Meshaal, had been killed with his daughter by an American airstrike on Mayadin. The post was reportedly made by his younger brother. Reuters could not immediately verify this account. On 27 July 2017, the US confirmed that Kadek had been killed by a coalition airstrike near Mayadin between 25 and 27 May 2017. In June 2017, German police arrested a 23-year-old Syrian man identified only as Mohammed G., accusing him of communicating with the alleged perpetrator of the 2016 Malmö Muslim community centre arson in order to report to Amaq. On 21 March 2019, the U.S. Department of State officially deemed Amaq an alias of IS, and thus a Foreign Terrorist Organization. On 22 March 2024, the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the Crocus City Hall attack through Amaq, U.S. officials confirmed the claim shortly after. A day after the attack, Amaq published a video of the attack, filmed by one of the attackers. It showed the attackers shooting victims and slitting the throat of another, while the filming attacker praises Allah and speaks against infidels. == Character == Amaq publishes a stream of short news reports, both text and video, on the mobile app Telegram. The reports take on the trappings of mainstream journalism, with "Breaking News" headings, and embedded reporters at the scenes of IS battles. The reports try to appear neutral, toning down the jihadist language and sectarian slurs IS uses in its official releases. Charlie Winter of the Transcultural Conflict and Violence Initiative at Georgia State University, and Rita Katz of SITE Intelligence Group in Washington say Amaq functions much like the state-owned news agency of IS, though the group does not acknowledge it as such. Katz said it behaves "like a state media". Amaq appears to have been allowed to develop by IS as a way to have a news outlet that is controlled by the group but is somewhat removed from it, giving IS more of the appearance of legitimacy. == Reliability == According to Rukmini Callimachi in The New York Times: "Despite a widespread view that the Islamic State opportunistically claims attacks with which it has little genuine connection, its track record—minus a handful of exceptions—suggests a more rigorous protocol. At times, the Islamic State has got details wrong, or inflated casualty figures, but the gist of its claims is typically correct." According to Callimachi, the group considers itself responsible for acts carried out by people who were inspired by its propaganda, as well as acts carried out by its own personnel and in some instances, had claimed attacks before the identities of the killers were known. Graeme Wood writing in The Atlantic in October 2017, wrote "The idea that the Islamic State simply scans the news in search of mass killings, then sends out press releases in hope of stealing glory, is false. Amaq may learn details of the attacks from mainstream media ... but its claim of credit typically flows from an Amaq-specific source." An October 2017 article in The Hill, points to two false claims made in the summer of 2017, the Resorts World Manila attack and a false claim that bombs had been planted at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris. Also, a claimed IS connection to the 2017 Las Vegas shooting proved to be false. According to Rita Katz on the SITE Intelligence Group website, calling a terrorist a "soldier of the caliphate (warrior from the caliphate)" in a statement issued by Amaq, was the usual way in which IS indicated that it inspired an attack. Centrally coordinated attacks were usually described as "executed by a detachment belonging to the Islamic State", and were often announced by both Amaq and by IS' central media command. == Online presence == In November 2019, Belgian police said they had carried out a successful cyberattack on Amaq, thus leaving IS without an operational communication channel. However, Amaq has since regained online presence, primarily on dark web platforms to make it harder for law enforcement to take them down without physical access to the server hosting the specific platform.
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Multiple satellite imaging

Multiple satellite imaging is the process of using multiple satellites to gather more information than a single satellite so that a better estimate of the desired source is possible. Something that cannot be resolved with one telescope might be visible with two or more telescopes. == Background == Interferometry is the process of combining waves in such a way that they constructively interfere. When two or more independent sources detect a signal at the same given frequency those signals can be combined and the result is better than each one individually. An overview of Astronomical interferometers and a History of astronomical interferometry can be referenced from their respective pages. The NASA Origins Program was created in the 1990s to ultimately search for the origin of the universe. The theory that the Origins Program is based on is: since light travels at a constant speed until it is absorbed by something; there is still light that was part of the first light ever created traveling about the universe and ultimately some of that light is coming in the general direction of Earth. So a satellite system capable of collecting light from the beginning of the universe would be able to tell us more about where we came from. There is also the constant search for life in other worlds. A satellite system using the interferometric technologies mentioned above would be able to have a much higher resolution than any of the current deep space imaging systems. == Future == NASA is currently focused on the Vision for Space Exploration and has reduced current funding for scientific unmanned space exploration in favor of human exploration. These budget cuts have slowed the multiple satellite imaging development and relevant scientific missions as Project Prometheus and Terrestrial Planet Finder have ended as well but research continues.
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Sentence embedding

In natural language processing, a sentence embedding is a representation of a sentence as a vector of numbers which encodes meaningful semantic information. State of the art embeddings are based on the learned hidden layer representation of dedicated sentence transformer models. BERT pioneered an approach involving the use of a dedicated [CLS] token prepended to the beginning of each sentence inputted into the model; the final hidden state vector of this token encodes information about the sentence and can be fine-tuned for use in sentence classification tasks. In practice however, BERT's sentence embedding with the [CLS] token achieves poor performance, often worse than simply averaging non-contextual word embeddings. SBERT later achieved superior sentence embedding performance by fine tuning BERT's [CLS] token embeddings through the usage of a siamese neural network architecture on the SNLI dataset. Other approaches are loosely based on the idea of distributional semantics applied to sentences. Skip-Thought trains an encoder-decoder structure for the task of neighboring sentences predictions; this has been shown to achieve worse performance than approaches such as InferSent or SBERT. An alternative direction is to aggregate word embeddings, such as those returned by Word2vec, into sentence embeddings. The most straightforward approach is to simply compute the average of word vectors, known as continuous bag-of-words (CBOW). However, more elaborate solutions based on word vector quantization have also been proposed. One such approach is the vector of locally aggregated word embeddings (VLAWE), which demonstrated performance improvements in downstream text classification tasks. == Applications == In recent years, sentence embedding has seen a growing level of interest due to its applications in natural language queryable knowledge bases through the usage of vector indexing for semantic search. LangChain for instance utilizes sentence transformers for purposes of indexing documents. In particular, an indexing is generated by generating embeddings for chunks of documents and storing (document chunk, embedding) tuples. Then given a query in natural language, the embedding for the query can be generated. A top k similarity search algorithm is then used between the query embedding and the document chunk embeddings to retrieve the most relevant document chunks as context information for question answering tasks. This approach is also known formally as retrieval-augmented generation. Though not as predominant as BERTScore, sentence embeddings are commonly used for sentence similarity evaluation which sees common use for the task of optimizing a Large language model's generation parameters is often performed via comparing candidate sentences against reference sentences. By using the cosine-similarity of the sentence embeddings of candidate and reference sentences as the evaluation function, a grid-search algorithm can be utilized to automate hyperparameter optimization. == Evaluation == A way of testing sentence encodings is to apply them on Sentences Involving Compositional Knowledge (SICK) corpus for both entailment (SICK-E) and relatedness (SICK-R). In the best results are obtained using a BiLSTM network trained on the Stanford Natural Language Inference (SNLI) Corpus. The Pearson correlation coefficient for SICK-R is 0.885 and the result for SICK-E is 86.3. A slight improvement over previous scores is presented in: SICK-R: 0.888 and SICK-E: 87.8 using a concatenation of bidirectional Gated recurrent unit.
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Parasolid

Parasolid is a geometric modeling kernel originally developed by Shape Data Limited, now owned and developed by Siemens Digital Industries Software. It can be licensed by other companies for use in their 3D computer graphics software products. Parasolid's abilities include model creation and editing utilities such as Boolean modeling operators, feature modeling support, advanced surfacing, thickening and hollowing, blending and filleting, and sheet modeling. It also incorporates modeling with mesh surfaces and lattices. Parasolid also includes tools for direct model editing, including tapering, offsetting, geometry replacement and removing feature details with automated regeneration of surrounding data. Parasolid also provides wide-ranging graphical and rendering support, including hidden-line, wireframe and drafting, tessellation, and model data inquiries. To use Parasolid effectively, software developers need knowledge of CAD in general, computational geometry, and topology. Parasolid is available for Windows (32-bit, 64-bit and AArch64), Linux (64-bit and AArch64), macOS (Apple silicon and Intel), iOS, and Android. == Parasolid XT format == Parasolid parts are normally saved in XT format, which usually has the file extension .X_T. The format is documented and open. There is also a binary version of the format, usually with an .X_B extension, which is somewhat more compact. Both .X_T and .X_B are used for parts files. == Applications == It is used in many computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided manufacturing (CAM), computer-aided engineering (CAE), product visualization, and CAD data exchange packages. Notable uses include:
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Kuwahara filter

The Kuwahara filter is a non-linear smoothing filter used in image processing for adaptive noise reduction. Most filters that are used for image smoothing are linear low-pass filters that effectively reduce noise but also blur out the edges. However the Kuwahara filter is able to apply smoothing on the image while preserving the edges. It is named after Michiyoshi Kuwahara, Ph.D., who worked at Kyoto and Osaka Sangyo Universities in Japan, developing early medical imaging of dynamic heart muscle in the 1970s and 80s. == The Kuwahara operator == Suppose that I ( x , y ) {\displaystyle I(x,y)} is a grey scale image and that we take a square window of size 2 a + 1 {\displaystyle 2a+1} centered around a point ( x , y ) {\displaystyle (x,y)} in the image. This square can be divided into four smaller square regions Q i = 1 ⋯ 4 {\displaystyle Q_{i=1\cdots 4}} each of which will be Q i ( x , y ) = { [ x , x + a ] × [ y , y + a ] if i = 1 [ x − a , x ] × [ y , y + a ] if i = 2 [ x − a , x ] × [ y − a , y ] if i = 3 [ x , x + a ] × [ y − a , y ] if i = 4 {\displaystyle Q_{i}(x,y)={\begin{cases}\left[x,x+a\right]\times \left[y,y+a\right]&{\mbox{ if }}i=1\\\left[x-a,x\right]\times \left[y,y+a\right]&{\mbox{ if }}i=2\\\left[x-a,x\right]\times \left[y-a,y\right]&{\mbox{ if }}i=3\\\left[x,x+a\right]\times \left[y-a,y\right]&{\mbox{ if }}i=4\\\end{cases}}} where × {\displaystyle \times } is the cartesian product. Pixels located on the borders between two regions belong to both regions so there is a slight overlap between subregions. The arithmetic mean m i ( x , y ) {\displaystyle m_{i}(x,y)} and standard deviation σ i ( x , y ) {\displaystyle \sigma _{i}(x,y)} of the four regions centered around a pixel (x,y) are calculated and used to determine the value of the central pixel. The output of the Kuwahara filter Φ ( x , y ) {\displaystyle \Phi (x,y)} for any point ( x , y ) {\displaystyle (x,y)} is then given by Φ ( x , y ) = m i ( x , y ) {\textstyle \Phi (x,y)=m_{i}(x,y)} where i = a r g min j ⁡ σ j ( x , y ) {\displaystyle i=\operatorname {arg\min } _{j}\sigma _{j}(x,y)} . This means that the central pixel will take the mean value of the area that is most homogenous. The location of the pixel in relation to an edge plays a great role in determining which region will have the greater standard deviation. If for example the pixel is located on a dark side of an edge it will most probably take the mean value of the dark region. On the other hand, should the pixel be on the lighter side of an edge it will most probably take a light value. On the event that the pixel is located on the edge it will take the value of the more smooth, least textured region. The fact that the filter takes into account the homogeneity of the regions ensures that it will preserve the edges while using the mean creates the blurring effect. Similarly to the median filter, the Kuwahara filter uses a sliding window approach to access every pixel in the image. The size of the window is chosen in advance and may vary depending on the desired level of blur in the final image. Bigger windows typically result in the creation of more abstract images whereas small windows produce images that retain their detail. Typically windows are chosen to be square with sides that have an odd number of pixels for symmetry. However, there are variations of the Kuwahara filter that use rectangular windows. Additionally, the subregions do not need to overlap or have the same size as long as they cover all of the window. == Color images == For color images, the filter should not be performed by applying the filter to each RGB channel separately, and then recombining the three filtered color channels to form the filtered RGB image. The main problem with that is that the quadrants will have different standard deviations for each of the channels. For example, the upper left quadrant may have the lowest standard deviation in the red channel, but the lower right quadrant may have the lowest standard deviation in the green channel. This situation would result in the color of the central pixel to be determined by different regions, which might result in color artifacts or blurrier edges. To overcome this problem, for color images a slightly modified Kuwahara filter must be used. The image is first converted into another color space, the HSV color space. The modified filter then operates on only the "brightness" channel, the Value coordinate in the HSV model. The variance of the "brightness" of each quadrant is calculated to determine the quadrant from which the final filtered color should be taken from. The filter will produce an output for each channel which will correspond to the mean of that channel from the quadrant that had the lowest standard deviation in "brightness". This ensures that only one region will determine the RGB values of the central pixel. ImageMagick uses a similar approach, but using the Rec. 709 Luma as the brightness metric. === Julia Implementation === == Applications == Originally the Kuwahara filter was proposed for use in processing RI-angiocardiographic images of the cardiovascular system. The fact that any edges are preserved when smoothing makes it especially useful for feature extraction and segmentation and explains why it is used in medical imaging. The Kuwahara filter however also finds many applications in artistic imaging and fine-art photography due to its ability to remove textures and sharpen the edges of photographs. The level of abstraction helps create a desirable painting-like effect in artistic photographs especially in the case of the colored image version of the filter. These applications have known great success and have encouraged similar research in the field of image processing for the arts. Although the vast majority of applications have been in the field of image processing there have been cases that use modifications of the Kuwahara filter for machine learning tasks such as clustering. The Kuwahara filter has been implemented in CVIPtools. The Kuwahara filter is present as a shader node in Blender. == Drawbacks and restrictions == The Kuwahara filter despite its capabilities in edge preservation has certain drawbacks. At a first glance it is noticeable that the Kuwahara filter does not take into account the case where two regions have equal standard deviations. This is not often the case in real images since it is rather hard to find two regions with exactly the same standard deviation due to the noise that is always present. In cases where two regions have similar standard deviations the value of the center pixel could be decided at random by the noise in these regions. Again this would not be a problem if the regions had the same mean. However, it is not unusual for regions of very different means to have the same standard deviation. This makes the Kuwahara filter susceptible to noise. Different ways have been proposed for dealing with this issue, one of which is to set the value of the center pixel to ( m 1 + m 2 ) / 2 {\textstyle (m_{1}+m_{2})/2} in cases where the standard deviation of two regions do not differ more than a certain value D {\displaystyle D} . The Kuwahara filter is also known to create block artifacts in the images especially in regions of the image that are highly textured. These blocks disrupt the smoothness of the image and are considered to have a negative effect in the aesthetics of the image. This phenomenon occurs due to the division of the window into square regions. A way to overcome this effect is to take windows that are not rectangular(i.e. circular windows) and separate them into more non-rectangular regions. There have also been approaches where the filter adapts its window depending on the input image. == Extensions of the Kuwahara filter == The success of the Kuwahara filter has spurred an increase the development of edge-enhancing smoothing filters. Several variations have been proposed for similar use most of which attempt to deal with the drawbacks of the original Kuwahara filter. The "Generalized Kuwahara filter" proposed by P. Bakker considers several windows that contain a fixed pixel. Each window is then assigned an estimate and a confidence value. The value of the fixed pixel then takes the value of the estimate of the window with the highest confidence. This filter is not characterized by the same ambiguity in the presence of noise and manages to eliminate the block artifacts. The "Mean of Least Variance"(MLV) filter, proposed by M.A. Schulze also produces edge-enhancing smoothing results in images. Similarly to the Kuwahara filter it assumes a window of size 2 d − 1 × 2 d − 1 {\displaystyle 2d-1\times 2d-1} but instead of searching amongst four subregions of size d × d {\displaystyle d\times d} for the one with minimum variance it searches amongst all possible d × d {\displaystyle d\times d} subregions. This means the central pixel of the window will be assigned the mean of the one subregion out of a poss
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