O Arquivo Castro/Nova Goa: construção de catálogo.

Dissertação apresentada para cumprimento dos requisitos necessários à obtenção do grau de Mestre em Ciências da Informação e da Documentação

Evaluation and optimization of a session-based middleware for data management

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Mestre em Engenharia Informática

Wireless triple play system

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Mestre em Engenharia Electrotécnica e Computadores

Bits, Atoms, and Information Sharing: new opportunities for participation

The particular characteristics and affordances of technologies play a significant role in human experience by defining the realm of possibilities available to individuals and societies. Some technological configurations, such as the Internet, facilitate peer-to-peer communication and participatory behaviors. Others, like television broadcasting, tend to encourage centralization of creative processes and unidirectional communication. In other instances still, the affordances of technologies can be further constrained by social practices. That is the case, for example, of radio which, although technically allowing peer-to-peer communication, has effectively been converted into a broadcast medium through the legislation of the airwaves. How technologies acquire particular properties, meanings and uses, and who is involved in those decisions are the broader questions explored here. Although a long line of thought maintains that technologies evolve according to the logic of scientific rationality, recent studies demonstrated that technologies are, in fact, primarily shaped by social forces in specific historical contexts. In this view, adopted here, there is no one best way to design a technological artifact or system; the selection between alternative designs—which determine the affordances of each technology—is made by social actors according to their particular values, assumptions and goals. Thus, the arrangement of technical elements in any technological artifact is configured to conform to the views and interests of those involved in its development. Understanding how technologies assume particular shapes, who is involved in these decisions and how, in turn, they propitiate particular behaviors and modes of organization but not others, requires understanding the contexts in which they are developed. It is argued here that, throughout the last century, two distinct approaches to the development and dissemination of technologies have coexisted. In each of these models, based on fundamentally different ethoi, technologies are developed through different processes and by different participants—and therefore tend to assume different shapes and offer different possibilities. In the first of these approaches, the dominant model in Western societies, technologies are typically developed by firms, manufactured in large factories, and subsequently disseminated to the rest of the population for consumption. In this centralized model, the role of users is limited to selecting from the alternatives presented by professional producers. Thus, according to this approach, the technologies that are now so deeply woven into human experience, are primarily shaped by a relatively small number of producers. In recent years, however, a group of three interconnected interest groups—the makers, hackerspaces, and open source hardware communities—have increasingly challenged this dominant model by enacting an alternative approach in which technologies are both individually transformed and collectively shaped. Through a in-depth analysis of these phenomena, their practices and ethos, it is argued here that the distributed approach practiced by these communities offers a practical path towards a democratization of the technosphere by: 1) demystifying technologies, 2) providing the public with the tools and knowledge necessary to understand and shape technologies, and 3) encouraging citizen participation in the development of technologies.

m-SportGIS

Information technologies (ITs), and sports resources and services aid the potential to transform governmental organizations, and play an important role in contributing to sustainable communities development, respectively. Spatial data is a crucial source to support sports planning and management. Low-cost mobile geospatial tools bring productive and accurate data collection, and their use combining a handy and customized graphical user interface (GUI) (forms, mapping, media support) is still in an early stage. Recognizing the benefits — efficiency, effectiveness, proximity to citizens — that Mozambican Minister of Youth and Sports (MJD) can achieve with information resulted from the employment of a low-cost data collection platform, this project presents the development of a mobile mapping application (app) — m-SportGIS — under Open Source (OS) technologies and a customized evolutionary software methodology. The app development embraced the combination of mobile web technologies and Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) (e.g. Sencha Touch (ST), Apache Cordova, OpenLayers) to deploy a native-to-the-device (Android operating system) product, taking advantage of device’s capabilities (e.g. File system, Geolocation, Camera). In addition to an integrated Web Map Service (WMS), was created a local and customized Tile Map Service (TMS) to serve up cached data, regarding the IT infrastructures limitations in several Mozambican regions. m-SportGIS is currently being exploited by Mozambican Government staff to inventory all kind of sports facilities, which resulted and stored data feeds a WebGIS platform to manage Mozambican sports resources.

Relating the spatial component and users interests to improve applications based on questions, petitions and participatory processes

Nowadays, participatory processes attending the need for real democracy and transparency in governments and collectives are more needed than ever. Immediate participation through channels like social networks enable people to give their opinion and become pro-active citizens, seeking applications to interact with each other. The application described in this dissertation is a hybrid channel of communication of questions, petitions and participatory processes based on Public Participation Geographic Information System (PPGIS), Participation Geographic Information System (PGIS) and ‘soft’ (subjective data) Geographic Information System (SoftGIS) methodologies. To achieve a new approach to an application, its entire design is focused on the spatial component related with user interests. The spatial component is treated as main feature of the system to develop all others depending on it, enabling new features never seen before in social actions (questions, petitions and participatory processes). Results prove that it is possible to develop a working application mainly using open source software, with the possibility of spatial and subject filtering, visualizing and free download of actions within application. The resulting application empowers society by releasing soft data and defines a new breaking approach, unseen so far.

SDAR: a package for plotting and analyzing stratigraphy data in R

Stratigraphic Columns (SC) are the most useful and common ways to represent the eld descriptions (e.g., grain size, thickness of rock packages, and fossil and lithological components) of rock sequences and well logs. In these representations the width of SC vary according to the grain size (i.e., the wider the strata, the coarser the rocks (Miall 1990; Tucker 2011)), and the thickness of each layer is represented at the vertical axis of the diagram. Typically these representations are drawn 'manually' using vector graphic editors (e.g., Adobe Illustrator®, CorelDRAW®, Inskape). Nowadays there are various software which automatically plot SCs, but there are not versatile open-source tools and it is very di cult to both store and analyse stratigraphic information. This document presents Stratigraphic Data Analysis in R (SDAR), an analytical package1 designed for both plotting and facilitate the analysis of Stratigraphic Data in R (R Core Team 2014). SDAR, uses simple stratigraphic data and takes advantage of the exible plotting tools available in R to produce detailed SCs. The main bene ts of SDAR are: (i) used to generate accurate and complete SC plot including multiple features (e.g., sedimentary structures, samples, fossil content, color, structural data, contacts between beds), (ii) developed in a free software environment for statistical computing and graphics, (iii) run on a wide variety of platforms (i.e., UNIX, Windows, and MacOS), (iv) both plotting and analysing functions can be executed directly on R's command-line interface (CLI), consequently this feature enables users to integrate SDAR's functions with several others add-on packages available for R from The Comprehensive R Archive Network (CRAN).

Produção e facilitação da visualização on-line de uma carta de desporto de natureza

Os Sistemas de Informação Geográfica detêm um papel de crescente importância para a tomada de decisão ao nível do ordenamento do território, conforme o que a própria legislação evidencia. Existe uma carência de uniformização da informação para que possa existir um cruzamento eficiente e uma disponibilização mais facilitada à população e às diversas entidades. As instituições públicas, como é o caso do Instituto de Conservação e Florestas (ICNF I.P.), reconhecem esta necessidade, pelo que se propôs uma série de tarefas, para a concretização deste estágio, no sentido de a colmatar. Este instituto detém um papel de especial relevo na conservação do património natural assim como no ordenamento das áreas protegidas para que se possa usufruir das mesmas, sob um ponto de vista cada vez mais ecológico e promotor de desenvolvimento sustentável. A elaboração de um instrumento de gestão territorial, como se pode classificar a Carta de Desporto de Natureza (CDN), acarreta grande responsabilidade e exige um forte empenho, não apenas no envolvimento da população e das entidades que dele fruirão, mas no cumprimento da legislação existente quer para as atividades quer para o próprio território, no sentido da sua proteção, preservação e promoção de usos adequados. Neste trabalho procurou-se cumprir todas estas disposições sempre com o objetivo de, ao se construir normas de uniformização e ao se elaborar um exemplo de CDN para um território com tanto valor como é a Reserva Natural do Estuário do Tejo, tornar acessível a informação sobre esta área protegida. A intensão é também promover a motivação para a prática de um desporto natureza, saudável e em equilíbrio com o ambiente. O desafio não se ficou por aqui, havendo também a procura de utilização de Free Open Source Software, para que o processo de utilização e disponibilização informação SIG seja cada vez mais acessível e direta.

EFFECT – Efficient finite element code

The theme of this dissertation is the finite element method applied to mechanical structures. A new finite element program is developed that, besides executing different types of structural analysis, also allows the calculation of the derivatives of structural performances using the continuum method of design sensitivities analysis, with the purpose of allowing, in combination with the mathematical programming algorithms found in the commercial software MATLAB, to solve structural optimization problems. The program is called EFFECT – Efficient Finite Element Code. The object-oriented programming paradigm and specifically the C ++ programming language are used for program development. The main objective of this dissertation is to design EFFECT so that it can constitute, in this stage of development, the foundation for a program with analysis capacities similar to other open source finite element programs. In this first stage, 6 elements are implemented for linear analysis: 2-dimensional truss (Truss2D), 3-dimensional truss (Truss3D), 2-dimensional beam (Beam2D), 3-dimensional beam (Beam3D), triangular shell element (Shell3Node) and quadrilateral shell element (Shell4Node). The shell elements combine two distinct elements, one for simulating the membrane behavior and the other to simulate the plate bending behavior. The non-linear analysis capability is also developed, combining the corotational formulation with the Newton-Raphson iterative method, but at this stage is only avaiable to solve problems modeled with Beam2D elements subject to large displacements and rotations, called nonlinear geometric problems. The design sensitivity analysis capability is implemented in two elements, Truss2D and Beam2D, where are included the procedures and the analytic expressions for calculating derivatives of displacements, stress and volume performances with respect to 5 different design variables types. Finally, a set of test examples were created to validate the accuracy and consistency of the result obtained from EFFECT, by comparing them with results published in the literature or obtained with the ANSYS commercial finite element code.

Implementation of integral viscoelastic constitutive models in OpenFOAM® computational library

This work reports the implementation and verification of a new so lver in OpenFOAM® open source computational library, able to cope with integral viscoelastic models based on the integral upper-convected Maxwell model. The code is verified through the comparison of its predictions with analytical solutions and numerical results obtained with the differential upper-convected Maxwell model

Weld lines in extrusion: Understanding the role of the flow conditions

This work reports the implemen tation and verification of a new so lver in OpenFOAM® open source computational library, able to cope w ith integral viscoelastic models based on the integral upper-convected Maxwell model. The code is verified through the comparison of its predictions with anal ytical solutions and numerical results obtained with the differential upper-convected Maxwell model

Development of an integral viscoelastic flow solver in OpenFOAM®

The usual high cost of commercial codes, and some technical limitations, clearly limits the employment of numerical modelling tools in both industry and academia. Consequently, the number of companies that use numerical code is limited and there a lot of effort put on the development and maintenance of in-house academic based codes. Having in mind the potential of using numerical modelling tools as a design aid, of both products and processes, different research teams have been contributing to the development of open source codes/libraries. In this framework, any individual can take advantage of the available code capabilities and/or implement additional features based on his specific needs. These type of codes are usually developed by large communities, which provide improvements and new features in their specific fields of research, thus increasing significantly the code development process. Among others, OpenFOAM® multi-physics computational library, developed by a very large and dynamic community, nowadays comprises several features usually only available in their commercial counterparts; e.g. dynamic meshes, large diversity of complex physical models, parallelization, multiphase models, to name just a few. This computational library is developed in C++ and makes use of most of all language capabilities to facilitate the implementation of new functionalities. Concerning the field of computational rheology, OpenFOAM® solvers were recently developed to deal with the most relevant differential viscoelastic rheological models, and stabilization techniques are currently being verified. This work describes the implementation of a new solver in OpenFOAM® library, able to cope with integral viscoelastic models based on the deformation field method. The implemented solver is verified through the comparison of the predicted results with analytical solutions, results published in the literature and by using the Method of Manufactured Solutions.

A new integral viscoelastic flow solver in OpenFOAM®

The usual high cost of commercial codes, and some technical limitations, clearly limits the employment of numerical modelling tools in both industry and academia. Consequently, the number of companies that use numerical code is limited and there a lot of effort put on the development and maintenance of in-house academic based codes . Having in mind the potential of using numerical modelling tools as a design aid, of both products and processes, different research teams have been contributing to the development of open source codes/libraries. In this framework, any individual can take advantage of the available code capabilities and/or implement additional features based on his specific needs. These type of codes are usually developed by large communities, which provide improvements and new features in their specific fields of research, thus increasing significantly the code development process. Among others, OpenFOAM® multi-physics computational library, developed by a very large and dynamic community, nowadays comprises several features usually only available in their commercial counterparts; e.g. dynamic meshes, large diversity of complex physical models, parallelization, multiphase models, to name just a few. This computational library is developed in C++ and makes use of most of all language capabilities to facilitate the implementation of new functionalities. Concerning the field of computational rheology, OpenFOAM® solvers were recently developed to deal with the most relevant differential viscoelastic rheological models, and stabilization techniques are currently being verified. This work describes the implementation of a new solver in OpenFOAM® library, able to cope with integral viscoelastic models based on the deformation field method. The implemented solver is verified through the comparison of the predicted results with analytical solutions, results published in the literature and by using the Method of Manufactured Solutions

An algorithmic approach to estimating the minimal number of periodic points for smooth self-maps of simply-connected manifolds

For a given self-map f of M, a closed smooth connected and simply-connected manifold of dimension m ≥ 4, we provide an algorithm for estimating the values of the topological invariant Dm r [f], which equals the minimal number of r-periodic points in the smooth homotopy class of f. Our results are based on the combinatorial scheme for computing Dm r [f] introduced by G. Graff and J. Jezierski [J. Fixed Point Theory Appl. 13 (2013), 63–84]. An open-source implementation of the algorithm programmed in C++ is publicly available at http://www.pawelpilarczyk.com/combtop/.

Racionalização e redução de custos das TIC na Administração Pública: o caso da PSP

Dissertação de mestrado integrado em Engenharia e Gestão de Sistemas de Informação