Databases and Information Systems Commons^™

Economic Culture And Trading Behaviors In Information Markets, Khalid Nasser Alhayyan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

There are four main components for influencing traders' behaviors in an information market context: trader characteristics, organizational characteristics, market design, and external information. This dissertation focuses on investigating the impact of individual trader characteristics on trading behaviors. Two newly-developed constructs, highly relevant to information market contexts, were identified to increase our understanding about trading behaviors: trader's economic culture and trader independence. The theory of planned behavior is used as the theoretical basis to postulate hypotheses for empirical testing. Data collected from subjects through a series of web-based experiments shows that trader participation can be fostered through recruiting individuals who are …

The Application Of A Visual Data Mining Framework To Determine Soil, Climate And Land-Use Relationships, Yunous Vagh

Research outputs 2012

In this research study, the methodology of action research dynamics and a case study was employed in constructing a visual data mining framework for the processing and analysis of geographic land-use data in an agricultural context. The geographic data was made up of a digital elevation model (DEM), soil and land use profiles that were juxtaposed with previously captured climatic data from fixed weather stations in Australia. In this pilot study, monthly rainfall profiles for a selected study area were used to identify areas of soil variability. The rainfall was sampled for the beginning (April) of the rainy season for …

Wikis: Transactive Memory Systems In Digital Form, Paul Jackson

Research outputs 2012

Wikis embed information about authors, tags, hyperlinks and other metadata into the information they create. Wiki functions use this metadata to provide pointers which allow users to track down, or be informed of, the information they need. In this paper we provide a firm theoretical conceptualization for this type of activity by showing how this metadata provides a digital foundation for a Transactive Memory System (TMS). TMS is a construct from group psychology which defines directory-based knowledge sharing processes to explain the phenomenon of "group mind". We analyzed the functions and data of two leading Wiki products to understand where …

A Perspective On Resource Synchronization, Herbert Van De Sompel, Robert Sanderson, Martin Klein, Michael L. Nelson, Bernhard Haslhofer, Simeon Warner, Carl Lagoze

Computer Science Faculty Publications

Web applications frequently leverage resources made available by remote web servers. As resources are created, updated, deleted, or moved, these applications face challenges to remain in lockstep with changes on the server. Several approaches exist to help meet this challenge for use cases where "good enough" synchronization is acceptable. But when strict resource coverage or low synchronization latency is required, commonly accepted Web-based solutions remain illusive. This paper provides a perspective on the resource synchronization problem that results from inspiration gained from prior work, and initial insights resulting from the recently launched NISO/OAI ResourceSync effort.

Mining Diversity On Social Media Networks, Lu Liu, Feida Zhu, Meng Jiang, Jiawei Han, Lifeng Sun, Shiqiang Yang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The fast development of multimedia technology and increasing availability of network bandwidth has given rise to an abundance of network data as a result of all the ever-booming social media and social websites in recent years, e.g., Flickr, Youtube, MySpace, Facebook, etc. Social network analysis has therefore become a critical problem attracting enthusiasm from both academia and industry. However, an important measure that captures a participant’s diversity in the network has been largely neglected in previous studies. Namely, diversity characterizes how diverse a given node connects with its peers. In this paper, we give a comprehensive study of this concept. …

Evaluating The Use Of A Mobile Annotation System For Geography Education, Dion Hoe-Lian Goh, Khasfariyati Razikin, Chei Sian Lee, Ee Peng Lim, Kalyani Chatterjea, Chew-Hung Chang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Mobile devices used in educational settings are usually employed within a collaborative learning activity in which learning takes place in the form of social interactions between team members while performing a shared task. The authors aim to introduce MobiTOP (Mobile Tagging of Objects and People), a mobile annotation system that allows users to contribute and share geospatial multimedia annotations via mobile devices. Field observations and interviews were conducted. A group of trainee teachers involved in a geography field study were instructed to identify rock formations by collaborating with each other using the MobiTOP system. The trainee teachers who were in …

Who Is Retweeting The Tweeters? Modeling, Originating, And Promoting Behaviors In The Twitter Network, Achananuparp Palakorn, Ee Peng Lim, Jing Jiang, Tuan Anh Hoang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Real-time microblogging systems such as Twitter offer users an easy and lightweight means to exchange information. Instead of writing formal and lengthy messages, microbloggers prefer to frequently broadcast several short messages to be read by other users. Only when messages are interesting, are they propagated further by the readers. In this article, we examine user behavior relevant to information propagation through microblogging. We specifically use retweeting activities among Twitter users to define and model originating and promoting behavior. We propose a basic model for measuring the two behaviors, a mutual dependency model, which considers the mutual relationships between the two …

Information Extraction From Text, Jing Jiang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Information extraction is the task of finding structured information from unstructured or semi-structured text. It is an important task in text mining and has been extensively studied in various research communities including natural language processing, information retrieval and Web mining. It has a wide range of applications in domains such as biomedical literature mining and business intelligence. Two fundamental tasks of information extraction are named entity recognition and relation extraction. The former refers to finding names of entities such as people, organizations and locations. The latter refers to finding the semantic relations such as FounderOf and HeadquarteredIn between entities. In …

Modeling And Compressing 3-D Facial Expressions Using Geometry Videos, Jiazhi Xia, Dao T. P. Quynh, Ying He, Xiaoming Chen, Steven C. H. Hoi

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In this paper, we present a novel geometry video (GV) framework to model and compress 3-D facial expressions. GV bridges the gap of 3-D motion data and 2-D video, and provides a natural way to apply the well-studied video processing techniques to motion data processing. Our framework includes a set of algorithms to construct GVs, such as hole filling, geodesic-based face segmentation, expression-invariant parameterization (EIP), and GV compression. Our EIP algorithm can guarantee the exact correspondence of the salient features (eyes, mouth, and nose) in different frames, which leads to GVs with better spatial and temporal coherence than that of …

Systems And Methods For Transaction Account Offerings, Clinton Allen, Michael Digregorio, Glade Erikson, Deepinder Gulati, Jacob Plammoottil Jacob, Sanjiv Khosla, Seema Chokshi

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

A method for receiving a user input for providing offerings is disclosed. Fields may be populated for creating a database query for matching a selection of offerings to a population of customers. Data may be received from the database, in response to interactively building the query and/or executing the query. Multiple rank ordered results may be produced for comparison, wherein the producing uses preprogrammed analytics, data from the database and user input, and wherein the results include customer lists linked to a distinct offering and a preferred delivery channel of the offering to a customer. A transaction account may be …

Structural Analysis In Multi-Relational Social Networks, Bingtian Dai, Freddy Chua, Ee Peng Lim

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Modern social networks often consist of multiple relations among individuals. Understanding the structure of such multi-relational network is essential. In sociology, one way of structural analysis is to identify different positions and roles using blockmodels. In this paper, we generalize stochastic blockmodels to Generalized Stochastic Blockmodels (GSBM) for performing positional and role analysis on multi-relational networks. Our GSBM generalizes many different kinds of Multivariate Probability Distribution Function (MVPDF) to model different kinds of multirelational networks. In particular, we propose to use multivariate Poisson distribution for multi-relational social networks.

Tweets And Votes: A Study Of The 2011 Singapore General Election, Marko M. Skoric, Nathaniel D. Poor, Palakorn Achananuparp, Ee Peng Lim, Jing Jiang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This study focuses on the uses of Twitter during the elections, examining whether the messages posted online are reflective of the climate of public opinion. Using Twitter data obtained during the official campaign period of the 2011 Singapore General Election, we test the predictive power of tweets in forecasting the election results. In line with some previous studies, we find that during the elections the Twitter sphere represents a rich source of data for gauging public opinion and that the frequency of tweets mentioning names of political parties, political candidates and contested constituencies could be used to make predictions about …

Topic Based Query Suggestions For Video Search, Kong-Wah Wan, Ah-Hwee Tan, Joo-Hwee Lim, Liang-Tien Chia

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Query suggestion is an assistive technology mechanism commonly used in search engines to enable a user to formulate their search queries by predicting or completing the next few query words that the user is likely to type. In most implementations, the suggestions are mined from query log and use some simple measure of query similarity such as query frequency or lexicographical matching. In this paper, we propose an alternative method of presenting query suggestions by their thematic topics. Our method adopts a document-centric approach to mine topics in the corpus, and does not require the availability of a query log. …

Preface: Trends In Natural And Machine Intelligence, Jonathan H. Chan, Ah-Hwee Tan

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Trends in natural and machine intelligence are increasingly reflecting a convergence in these two well-established fields of study. The Third International Neural Network Society Winter Conference (INNS-WC 2012) was held in Bangkok, Thailand, on October 3-5, 2012. INNS-WC2012, with an aim to bring together scientists, practitioners, and students worldwide, to discuss the past, present, and future challenges and trends in the area of natural and machine intelligence. This event has been a bi-annual conference of the International Neural Network Society (INNS) to provide a forum for international researchers to exchange latest ideas and advances on neural networks and related discipline.

Self‐Regulating Action Exploration In Reinforcement Learning, Teck-Hou Teng, Ah-Hwee Tan, Yuan-Sin Tan

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The basic tenet of a learning process is for an agent to learn for only as much and as long as it is necessary. With reinforcement learning, the learning process is divided between exploration and exploitation. Given the complexity of the problem domain and the randomness of the learning process, the exact duration of the reinforcement learning process can never be known with certainty. Using an inaccurate number of training iterations leads either to the non-convergence or the over-training of the learning agent. This work addresses such issues by proposing a technique to self-regulate the exploration rate and training duration …

An Improved K-Nearest-Neighbor Algorithm For Text Categorization, Shengyi Jiang, Guansong Pang, Meiling Wu, Limin Kuang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Text categorization is a significant tool to manage and organize the surging text data. Many text categorization algorithms have been explored in previous literatures, such as KNN, Naive Bayes and Support Vector Machine. KNN text categorization is an effective but less efficient classification method. In this paper, we propose an improved KNN algorithm for text categorization, which builds the classification model by combining constrained one pass clustering algorithm and KNN text categorization. Empirical results on three benchmark corpora show that our algorithm can reduce the text similarity computation substantially and outperform the-state-of-the-art KNN, Naive Bayes and Support Vector Machine classifiers. …

Networks - I: Pre-Coordination Mechanism For Self Configuration Of Neighborhood Cells In Mobile Wi-Max, Abdul Qadeer, Khalid Khan

International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies

WiMax broadband services successfully providing triple play (Voice, Video and Data) support with combating the challenges of better quality and interoperability. Support for smooth mobility in real time with no wired infrastructure and being surrounded by GSM waves demanding a comprehensive and powerful network. Covering large areas through number of base stations which not only require time to configure but also need resources for implementation with a recurring cost of functionality. Automation is everywhere and to provide novel wireless services it is necessary to come up with some distinct features like intelligent base stations which have the capability of doing …

User Choice Between Traditional And Computerized Methods: An Activity Perspective, Jun Sun

Information Systems Faculty Publications

Numerous computerized methods emerge to replace traditional methods in people’s personal, work and social lives, but many are hesitant to make the transition. This study examines the factors that influence human choice between different methods. According to Activity Theory, traditional and computerized methods are both tools that a person uses for a certain task. The situated experiences with various methods shape people’s attitude toward using them later in terms of tool readiness. The understanding leads to hypothesized relationships between user-, method- and task-specific factors and the dependent variable. The results from an empirical study support that method experiences have strong …

A Study Of Correlations Between The Definition And Application Of The Gene Ontology, Yuji Mo

Department of Computer Electronics and Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

When using the Gene Ontology (GO), nucleotide and amino acid sequences are annotated by terms in a structured and controlled vocabulary organized into relational graphs. The usage of the vocabulary (GO terms) in the annotation of these sequences may diverge from the relations defined in the ontology. We measure the consistency of the use of GO terms by comparing GO's defined structure to the terms' application. To do this, we first use synthetic data with different characteristics to understand how these characteristics influence the correlation values determined by various similarity measures. Using these results as a baseline, we found that …

Overview Of Contrast Data Mining As A Field And Preview Of An Upcoming Book, Guozhu Dong, James Bailey

Kno.e.sis Publications

This report provides an overview of the field of contrast data mining and its applications, and offers a preview of an upcoming book on the topic. The importance of contrasting is discussed and a brief survey is given covering the following topics: general definitions and terminology for contrast patterns, representative contrast pattern mining algorithms, applications of contrast mining for fundamental data mining tasks such as classification and clustering, applications of contrast mining in bioinformatics, medicine, blog analysis, image analysis and subgroup mining, results on contrast based dataset similarity measure, and on analyzing item interaction in contrast patterns, and open research …

Computing Inconsistency Measure Based On Paraconsistent Semantics, Pascal Hitzler, Yue Ma, Guilin Qi

Computer Science and Engineering Faculty Publications

Measuring inconsistency in knowledge bases has been recognized as an important problem in several research areas. Many methods have been proposed to solve this problem and a main class of them is based on some kind of paraconsistent semantics. However, existing methods suffer from two limitations: (i) they are mostly restricted to propositional knowledge bases; (ii) very few of them discuss computational aspects of computing inconsistency measures. In this article, we try to solve these two limitations by exploring algorithms for computing an inconsistency measure of first-order knowledge bases. After introducing a four-valued semantics for first-order logic, we define an …

Quantifying Computer Network Security, Ian Burchett

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Simplifying network security data to the point that it is readily accessible and usable by a wider audience is increasingly becoming important, as networks become larger and security conditions and threats become more dynamic and complex, requiring a broader and more varied security staff makeup. With the need for a simple metric to quantify the security level on a network, this thesis proposes: simplify a network’s security risk level into a simple metric. Methods for this simplification of an entire network’s security level are conducted on several characteristic networks. Identification of computer network port vulnerabilities from NIST’s Network Vulnerability Database …

Processj: A Process-Oriented Programming Language, Matthew Sowders

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Java is a general purpose object-oriented programming language that has been widely adopted. Because of its high adoption rate and its lineage as a C-style language, its syntax is familiar to many programmers. The downside is that Java is not natively concurrent. Volumes have been written about concurrent programming in Java; however, concurrent programming is difficult to reason about within an object-oriented paradigm and so is difficult to get right.

occam -π is a general purpose process-oriented programming language. Concurrency is part of the theoretical underpinnings of the language. Concurrency is simple to reason about within an occam -π application …

Consolidated Study On Query Expansion, Abhishek Biruduraju

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

A typical day of million web users all over the world starts with a simple query. The quest for information on a particular topic drives them to search for it, and in the pursuit of their info the terms they supply for queries varies from person to person depending on the knowledge they have. With a vast collection of documents available on the web universe it is the onus of the retrieval system to return only those documents that are relevant and satisfy the user’s search requirements. The document mismatch problem is resolved by appending extra query terms to the …

Study Of Feature Selection Algorithms For Text-Categorization, Kandarp Dave

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This thesis will discuss feature selection algorithms for text-categorization. Feature selection algorithms are very important, as they can make-or-break a categorization engine. The feature selection algorithms that will be discussed in this thesis are Document Frequency, Information Gain, Chi Squared, Mutual Information, NGL (Ng-Goh-Low) coefficient, and GSS (Galavotti-Sebastiani-Simi) coefficient . The general idea of any feature selection algorithm is to determine importance of words using some measure that can keep informative words, and remove non-informative words, which can then help the text-categorization engine categorize a document, D , into some category, C . These feature selection methods are explained, implemented, …

The Valuation Of User-Generated Content: A Structural, Stylistic And Semantic Analysis Of Online Reviews, Noi Sian Koh

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

The ability and ease for users to create and publish content has provided vast amount of online product reviews. However, the amount of data is overwhelmingly large and unstructured, making information difficult to quantify. This creates challenge in understanding how online reviews affect consumers’ purchase decisions. In my dissertation, I explore the structural, stylistic and semantic content of online reviews. Firstly, I present a measurement that quantifies sentiments with respect to a multi-point scale and conduct a systematic study on the impact of online reviews on product sales. Using the sentiment metrics generated, I estimate the weight that customers place …

Contributions Of Financial Sector Reforms And Credit Supply To Nigerian Agricultural Sector (1978-2009), Anthony O. Onoja, M. E. Onu, S. Ajodo-Ohiemi

CBN Journal of Applied Statistics (JAS)

This study analyzed the trends and pattern of institutional credit supply to agriculture during pre- and post-financial reforms along with their determinants. It then compared the effects of reform policies on access to institutional credits in Nigerian agricultural sector before and after the reforms (1978 - 1985; and 1986 -2009). Relying mainly on time series data from CBN and NBS, it used ordinary least squares method (linear, semi-log and double log) to model the determinants of banking sector lending to the agricultural sector during the review period. The models were subjected to several econometric tests before accepting one. Chow test …

Determinants Of Foreign Reserves In Nigeria: An Autoregressive Distributed Lag Approach, David Irefin, Baba N. Yaaba

CBN Journal of Applied Statistics (JAS)

On global scale, central banks’ holdings of foreign reserves have escalated sharply in recent years. World international reserves holdings have risen significantly from US$1.2 trillion in 1995 to nearly US$10.0 trillion in June 2011. Dominant among these reserves are concentrated in the hands of few countries. Ten major holders of foreign reserves are mostly from Asia. Oil exporting countries in Africa and the Middle East are not left out in this trend. Nigeria’s foreign reserves rose from US$5.5 billion in 1999 to US$62.40 billion in July 2008, making Nigeria the twenty-fourth largest reserves holder in the world. This pace of …

Effects Of Exchange Rate Movements On Economic Growth In Nigeria, Eme O. Akpan, Johnson A. Atan

CBN Journal of Applied Statistics (JAS)

This study investigates the effect of exchange rate movements on real output growth in Nigeria. Based on quarterly series for the period 1986 to 2010, the paper examines the possible direct and indirect relationship between exchange rates and GDP growth. The relationship is derived in two ways using a simultaneous equations model within a fully specified (but small) macroeconomic model. A Generalised Method of Moments (GMM) technique was explored. The estimation results suggest that there is no evidence of a strong direct relationship between changes in exchange rate and output growth. Rather, Nigeria’s economic growth has been directly affected by …

Exchange Rate Volatility In Nigeria: Consistency, Persistency & Severity Analyses, Babatunde Adeoye, Akinwande A. Atanda

CBN Journal of Applied Statistics (JAS)

The adoption of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) in 1986 resulted in the transition from fixed exchange rate regime to floating exchange rate regime in Nigeria. Ever since, the exchange rate of naira vis-à-vis the U.S dollar has attained varying rates all through different time horizons. On this basis, this study examines the consistency, persistency, and severity (degree) of volatility in exchange rate of Nigerian currency (naira) vis-a-vis the United State dollar using monthly time series data from 1986 to 2008. The standard Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) model was used to analyze the long-run consistency of …