Equalized odds, also referred to as conditional procedure accuracy equality and disparate mistreatment, is a measure of fairness in machine learning. A classifier satisfies this definition if the subjects in the protected and unprotected groups have equal true positive rate and equal false positive rate, satisfying the formula: P ( R = + | Y = y , A = a ) = P ( R = + | Y = y , A = b ) y ∈ { + , − } ∀ a , b ∈ A {\displaystyle P(R=+|Y=y,A=a)=P(R=+|Y=y,A=b)\quad y\in \{+,-\}\quad \forall a,b\in A} For example, A {\displaystyle A} could be gender, race, or any other characteristics that we want to be free of bias, while Y {\displaystyle Y} would be whether the person is qualified for the degree, and the output R {\displaystyle R} would be the school's decision whether to offer the person to study for the degree. In this context, higher university enrollment rates of African Americans compared to whites with similar test scores might be necessary to fulfill the condition of equalized odds, if the "base rate" of Y {\displaystyle Y} differs between the groups. The concept was originally defined for binary-valued Y {\displaystyle Y} . In 2017, Woodworth et al. generalized the concept further for multiple classes.
MoFA Mitra
MoFA Mitra is a mobile application launched by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Nepal to provide digital consular services, emergency support, rescue coordination, and complaint registration facilities for Nepali citizens living and working abroad. The application allows Nepali migrant workers, students, tourists, and Non-Resident Nepalis (NRNs) to access embassy services, emergency help, and official information directly from their smartphones. == Background == The need for a centralized digital support platform for Nepalis abroad had been discussed for several years due to increasing complaints related to labor exploitation, rescue delays, documentation problems, and lack of communication with Nepali diplomatic missions. Media organizations and migrant rights advocates had continuously highlighted issues faced by Nepali workers abroad, including human trafficking, fraudulent recruitment, delayed repatriation, and difficulties in receiving emergency assistance. In response, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs developed the MoFA Mitra app to digitize complaint handling, improve communication between embassies and citizens, and make emergency response faster and more accessible. == Features == The app includes several services and features for Nepali citizens abroad, including complaint registration, rescue coordination, embassy communication, and digital consular support services. Features of the application include: Online complaint registration Emergency rescue request system Direct contact with Nepali embassies and consulates Digital consular information Passport and document-related assistance Labor and migration support information Emergency hotline access Real-time notifications and alerts Location-based embassy information Tracking and coordination support for stranded citizens According to reports, the application was designed to simplify access to diplomatic services and strengthen emergency response coordination for Nepalis abroad. == Launch == The application was officially launched by Nepal’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Kathmandu in May 2026. Government officials stated that the app would strengthen Nepal’s digital governance system and improve support mechanisms for Nepali citizens residing overseas. Officials said the platform would help improve communication between Nepali diplomatic missions and citizens during emergencies and rescue operations. == Reception == The launch of the app received positive coverage from Nepali and international media outlets. Commentators described the initiative as a significant step toward modernization of Nepal’s diplomatic and consular services and digital governance infrastructure. Some observers also emphasized the importance of effective implementation, rapid response mechanisms, and continuous monitoring to ensure practical benefits for migrant workers abroad.
Transaction data
Transaction data or transaction information is a category of data describing transactions. Transaction data/information gather variables generally referring to reference data or master data – e.g. dates, times, time zones, currencies. Typical transactions are: Financial transactions about orders, invoices, payments; Work transactions about plans, activity records; Logistic transactions about deliveries, storage records, travel records, etc.. == Management == Recording and storing transactions is called records management. The record of the transaction is stored in a place where the retention can be guaranteed and where data is archived or removed following a retention period. Formats of recorded transactions can be digital data in databases and spreadsheets, or handwritten texts in physical documents like former bankbooks. Transaction processing systems are application software that generate transactions and manage transaction data/information, e.g. SAP and Oracle Financials. == Data warehousing == Transaction data can be summarised in a data warehouse, which helps accessibility and analysis of the data.
System of record
A system of record (SOR) or source system of record (SSoR) is a data management term for an information storage system (commonly implemented on a computer system running a database management system) that is the authoritative data source for a given data element or piece of information, like for example a row (or record) in a table. In data vault it is referred to as the record source. == Background == The need to identify systems of record can become acute in organizations where management information systems have been built by taking output data from multiple source systems, re-processing this data, and then re-presenting the result for a new business use. In these cases, multiple information systems may disagree about the same piece of information. These disagreements may stem from semantic differences, differences in opinion, use of different sources, differences in the timing of the extract, transform, load processes that create the data they report against, or may simply be the result of bugs. == Use == The integrity and validity of any data set is open to question when there is no traceable connection to a good source, and listing a source system of record is a solution to this. Where the integrity of the data is vital, if there is an agreed system of record, the data element must either be linked to, or extracted directly from it. In other cases, the provenance and estimated data quality should be documented. The "system of record" approach is a good fit for environments where both: there is a single authority over all data consumers, and all consumers have similar needs == Trade-offs == In diverse environments, one instead needs to support the presence of multiple opinions. Consumers may accept different authorities or may differ on what constitutes an authoritative source—researchers may prefer carefully vetted data, while tactical military systems may require the most recent credible report.
Time Warp Edit Distance
In the data analysis of time series, Time Warp Edit Distance (TWED) is a measure of similarity (or dissimilarity) between pairs of discrete time series, controlling the relative distortion of the time units of the two series using the physical notion of elasticity. In comparison to other distance measures, (e.g. DTW (dynamic time warping) or LCS (longest common subsequence problem)), TWED is a metric. Its computational time complexity is O ( n 2 ) {\displaystyle O(n^{2})} , but can be drastically reduced in some specific situations by using a corridor to reduce the search space. Its memory space complexity can be reduced to O ( n ) {\displaystyle O(n)} . It was first proposed in 2009 by P.-F. Marteau. == Definition == δ λ , ν ( A 1 p , B 1 q ) = M i n { δ λ , ν ( A 1 p − 1 , B 1 q ) + Γ ( a p ′ → Λ ) d e l e t e i n A δ λ , ν ( A 1 p − 1 , B 1 q − 1 ) + Γ ( a p ′ → b q ′ ) m a t c h o r s u b s t i t u t i o n δ λ , ν ( A 1 p , B 1 q − 1 ) + Γ ( Λ → b q ′ ) d e l e t e i n B {\displaystyle \delta _{\lambda ,\nu }(A_{1}^{p},B_{1}^{q})=Min{\begin{cases}\delta _{\lambda ,\nu }(A_{1}^{p-1},B_{1}^{q})+\Gamma (a_{p}^{'}\to \Lambda )&{\rm {delete\ in\ A}}\\\delta _{\lambda ,\nu }(A_{1}^{p-1},B_{1}^{q-1})+\Gamma (a_{p}^{'}\to b_{q}^{'})&{\rm {match\ or\ substitution}}\\\delta _{\lambda ,\nu }(A_{1}^{p},B_{1}^{q-1})+\Gamma (\Lambda \to b_{q}^{'})&{\rm {delete\ in\ B}}\end{cases}}} whereas Γ ( α p ′ → Λ ) = d L P ( a p ′ , a p − 1 ′ ) + ν ⋅ ( t a p − t a p − 1 ) + λ {\displaystyle \Gamma (\alpha _{p}^{'}\to \Lambda )=d_{LP}(a_{p}^{'},a_{p-1}^{'})+\nu \cdot (t_{a_{p}}-t_{a_{p-1}})+\lambda } Γ ( α p ′ → b q ′ ) = d L P ( a p ′ , b q ′ ) + d L P ( a p − 1 ′ , b q − 1 ′ ) + ν ⋅ ( | t a p − t b q | + | t a p − 1 − t b q − 1 | ) {\displaystyle \Gamma (\alpha _{p}^{'}\to b_{q}^{'})=d_{LP}(a_{p}^{'},b_{q}^{'})+d_{LP}(a_{p-1}^{'},b_{q-1}^{'})+\nu \cdot (|t_{a_{p}}-t_{b_{q}}|+|t_{a_{p-1}}-t_{b_{q-1}}|)} Γ ( Λ → b q ′ ) = d L P ( b p ′ , b p − 1 ′ ) + ν ⋅ ( t b q − t b q − 1 ) + λ {\displaystyle \Gamma (\Lambda \to b_{q}^{'})=d_{LP}(b_{p}^{'},b_{p-1}^{'})+\nu \cdot (t_{b_{q}}-t_{b_{q-1}})+\lambda } Whereas the recursion δ λ , ν {\displaystyle \delta _{\lambda ,\nu }} is initialized as: δ λ , ν ( A 1 0 , B 1 0 ) = 0 , {\displaystyle \delta _{\lambda ,\nu }(A_{1}^{0},B_{1}^{0})=0,} δ λ , ν ( A 1 0 , B 1 j ) = ∞ f o r j ≥ 1 {\displaystyle \delta _{\lambda ,\nu }(A_{1}^{0},B_{1}^{j})=\infty \ {\rm {{for\ }j\geq 1}}} δ λ , ν ( A 1 i , B 1 0 ) = ∞ f o r i ≥ 1 {\displaystyle \delta _{\lambda ,\nu }(A_{1}^{i},B_{1}^{0})=\infty \ {\rm {{for\ }i\geq 1}}} with a 0 ′ = b 0 ′ = 0 {\displaystyle a'_{0}=b'_{0}=0} === Implementations === An implementation of the TWED algorithm in C with a Python wrapper is available at TWED is also implemented into the Time Series Subsequence Search Python package (TSSEARCH for short) available at [1]. An R implementation of TWED has been integrated into the TraMineR, a R package for mining, describing and visualizing sequences of states or events, and more generally discrete sequence data. Additionally, cuTWED is a CUDA- accelerated implementation of TWED which uses an improved algorithm due to G. Wright (2020). This method is linear in memory and massively parallelized. cuTWED is written in CUDA C/C++, comes with Python bindings, and also includes Python bindings for Marteau's reference C implementation. ==== Python ==== Backtracking, to find the most cost-efficient path: ==== MATLAB ==== Backtracking, to find the most cost-efficient path:
Alipay
Alipay (simplified Chinese: 支付宝; traditional Chinese: 支付寶; pinyin: zhīfùbǎo) is a third-party mobile and online payment platform, established in Hangzhou, China, in February 2004 by Alibaba Group and its founder Jack Ma. In 2015, Alipay moved its headquarters to Pudong, Shanghai, although its parent company Ant Financial remains Hangzhou-based. Alipay overtook PayPal as the world's largest mobile (digital) payment platform in 2013. As of June 2020, Alipay serves over 1.3 billion users and 80 million merchants. According to the statistics of the fourth quarter of 2018, Alipay has a 55.32% share of the third-party payment market in mainland China, and it continues to grow. Along with WeChat, Alipay has been described to be China's super-app with a wide range of functionalities including ridesharing, travel booking and medical appointments. == History == The service was first launched in 2003, by Taobao. The People's Bank of China, China's central bank, issued licensing regulations in June 2010 for third-party payment providers. It also issued separate guidelines for foreign-funded payment institutions. Because of this, Alipay, which accounted for half of China's non-bank online payment market, was restructured as a domestic company controlled by Alibaba CEO Jack Ma in order to facilitate the regulatory approval for the license. The 2010 transfer of Alipay's ownership was controversial, with media reports in 2011 that Yahoo! and Softbank (Alibaba Group's controlling shareholders) were not informed of the sale for nominal value. Chinese business publication Century Weekly criticised Ma, who stated that Alibaba Group's board of directors was aware of the transaction. The incident was criticised in foreign and Chinese media as harming foreign trust in making Chinese investments. The ownership dispute was resolved by Alibaba Group, Yahoo!, and Softbank in July 2011. In 2013, Alipay launched a financial product platform called Yu'e Bao. Alipay partnered with Tianhong Asset Management to launch the it. Yu'e Bao offers an online money market account in which Alipay customers can deposit money and receive a higher interest rate than that available from banks. It soon became China's largest online money market fund and prompted competitors like Baidu and Tencent to introduce alternatives. Alibaba (the parent company of Alipay) reported having 152 million Yu'e Bao users in mid-2016, with 810 billion RMB (US$117 billion) in funds under management. In 2015, Alipay's parent company was re-branded as Ant Financial Services Group. In 2017, Alipay unveiled their facial recognition payment service. In 2020, Alipay upgraded from a payment financial instrument to an open platform for digital life. In 2021, the mandate by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) to open up the "walled garden" ecosystems of the major tech companies has led to the introduction of interoperability of payment QR codes of Alipay and competing WeChat Pay and UnionPay's Cloud QuickPass platforms. In response to the increase in Alipay's payment volume due to use on Alibaba's e-commerce sites and others, Chinese regulators introduced new rules in 2020. The new rules focused on Alipay because the payment volume exploded due to its use on Alibaba's e-commerce sites and other platforms. By the second quarter in 2020, Alipay held 55.6% of China's third party mobile payment market. The People's Bank of China made rules that required payment firms to place money with regulators and anti-monopoly reviews would be triggered if the amount exceeded 50% market share. The rules included that the People's Bank of China mandate an online-payment clearing route through the NetsUnion Clearing Corporation, a centralized, state-overseen clearing body, and that unused consumer funds be held by a third-party payment provider in a non-interest-bearing account. These measures increased transparency and reduced systemic risk. When Alipay operates outside of China, it must comply with local financial regulations, which may treat specific functions such as money-market funds or investment-linked products. In Singapore, such services may require prior authorization from securities or financial-services regulators before they can be offered to residents. == Services == Alipay states that it operates with more than 65 financial institutions including Visa and MasterCard to provide payment services for Taobao and Tmall as well as more than 460,000 online and local Chinese businesses. Alipay is used in smartphones with their Alipay Wallet app. QR code payment codes are used for local in-store payments. The Alipay app also provides features such as credit card bill payments, bank account managements, P2P transfer, prepay mobile phone top-up, bus and train ticket purchases, food orders, vehicles for hire, insurance selections and a digital identification document storage. Alipay also allows online check-out on most Chinese-based websites such as Taobao and Tmall. The Alipay app allows users to add their own services provided from different companies to create a more personalised experience. Since late 2008, Alipay has promoted public service payment services and has covered more than 300 cities nationwide, supporting more than 1,200 partner organizations. In addition to utility bills such as water and electricity, Alipay also extends their services to areas such as paying transportation fines, property fees, and cable television fees. Common online payment services also include hydropower coal payment, tuition payment and traffic fine. On 15 January 2009, Alipay launched a credit card repayment service, supporting 39 domestic bank-issued credit cards. It is currently the most popular third-party repayment platform. The main advantages are free credit card bills checking, repayments with no administrative fee, as well as automatic repayment, repayment reminders and other value-added services. In the first quarter of 2014, 76% of credit cards were also paid by Alipay Wallet. From December 2013, several chain convenience store companies, including Meiyijia, Hongqi Chain, and Qishiduo C-STORE and 7-Eleven, have successively supported Alipay payment; in December, Beijing taxi drivers began to accept Alipay to pay the fare. Subsequently, Wanda Cinema, Joy City, Wangfujing and other large-scale retail companies as well as movie theaters, KTV, and catering companies have access to Alipay. From 26 March 2019, the service fee will be charged for the payment of credit card through Alipay. Customers only pay the portion of the payment that exceeds 2,000 yuan at 0.1%. In addition to this, in 2019, Walgreens accepted Alipay as payment in 3,000 US stores. Walgreen's products are available to Chinese customers through Alibaba's Tmall online marketplace. The payment application can also be used on Alibaba.com's site and Taobao as a means of payment. A Nielsen report suggests that over 90% of Chinese tourists would be willing to use mobile payment overseas if given the option. Many Chinese tourists do not have international credit cards, and so Alipay is a payment option. Digital payments have become the norm in China as the government pushes a cashless system even in rural and village areas. In November 2019, Alipay introduced Tourpass, a service component that allows non-Chinese users to use its mobile payment feature by pre-loading Chinese Yuan equivalent foreign currency into the app. In 2020, Alipay used a QR code system to help in containing the COVID-19 outbreak. The health code system tags users one of three colors according to their location, basic health information and travel history. "Beauty filters" were included to Alipay's face-scan payment system in a new upgrade that was released in July 2019. The market has responded well to the "beauty filters," which make users seem better when they use the program to make payments. Alipay Tap is a payment function launched by Alipay in July 2024. Alipay+ NFC enables wallets to offer tap-to-pay acceptance across Mastercard's global contactless network, all within your existing wallet infrastructure. == Foreign expansion == Outside of China, more than 300 worldwide merchants use Alipay to sell directly to consumers in China. It currently supports transactions in 18 foreign currencies. Since the launch of Alipay in the Mainland China, Ant Financial introduced a series of expansion of the services to other countries. Other than expanding into individual countries, the system would also be integrated with online payment platform providers. Ant Group had acquired a majority stake into 2C2P, a Singapore-based provider used by merchants worldwide in April 2022, and would eventually integrate Alipay with 2C2P. === Asia === ==== Bangladesh ==== In 2018, Alipay bought 20% shares in Bangladeshi mobile financial service provider bKash Limited. ==== Hong Kong ==== In 2017, Ant Financial expanded to Hong Kong. In a joint venture with CK Hutchison, as Alipay Payment Ser
Run-to-completion scheduling
Run-to-completion scheduling or nonpreemptive scheduling is a scheduling model in which each task runs until it either finishes, or explicitly yields control back to the scheduler. Run-to-completion systems typically have an event queue which is serviced either in strict order of admission by an event loop, or by an admission scheduler which is capable of scheduling events out of order, based on other constraints such as deadlines. Some preemptive multitasking scheduling systems behave as run-to-completion schedulers in regard to scheduling tasks at one particular process priority level, at the same time as those processes still preempt other lower priority tasks and are themselves preempted by higher priority tasks.