Reinterpreting ‘generic structure’: evolution, application and limitations of a concept

This paper traces the evolution of thegeneric structure concept in system dynamics and discusses the different practical uses to which they have been put. A review of previous work leads to the identification of three different views of what a ‘generic structure’ is and, hence, what transferability means. These different views are distinguishable in application as well as in theory. Examination of these interpretations shows that the assumptions behind them are quite distinct. From this analysis it is argued that it is no longer useful to treat ‘generic structure’ as a single concept since the unity it implies is only superficial. The conclusion is that the concept needs unbundling so that different assumptions about transferability of structure can be made explicit, and the role of generic structures as generalisable theories of dynamic behaviour in system dynamics theory and practice can be debated and clarified more effectively.

Reinterpreting 'generic structure': evolution, application and limitations of a concept

This paper traces the evolution of the generic structure concept in system dynamics and discusses the different practical uses to which they have been put. A review of previous work leads to the identification of three different views of what a generic structure is and, hence, what transferability means. These different views are distinguishable in application as well as in theory. Examination of these interpretations shows that the assumptions behind them are quite distinct. From this analysis it is argued that it is no longer useful to treat generic structure as a single concept since the unity it implies is only superficial. The conclusion is that the concept needs unbundling so that different assumptions about transferability of structure can be made explicit, and the role of generic structures as generalisable theories of dynamic behaviour in system dynamics theory and practice can be debated and clarified more effectively.

The interaction of generic structure and interpersonal relations in two-party e-chat discourse

On the basis of a corpus of e-chat IRC exchanges (approximately 10,000 words in total) between Greek- and English-speaking speakers, the paper establishes a typical generic structure for two-party IRC exchanges, by focusing on how participants are oriented towards an ideal schema of phases and acts, as well as on how their interpersonal concerns contribute to the shaping of this schema. It is found that IRC interlocutors are primarily concerned with establishing contact with each other, while the (ideational) development of topic seems to be a less pressing need. The signaling of interpersonal relations is pervasive throughout e-chat discourse, as seen both in the range of devices developed and the two free elements of the generic schema, that is conversation play and channel check. It is also found that the accomplishment of the generic schema in each IRC exchange crucially depends on the acts of negotiation performed by the initiator and the responder.

An Array Recursive Least-Squares Algorithm With Generic Nonfading Regularization Matrix

We present a novel array RLS algorithm with forgetting factor that circumvents the problem of fading regularization, inherent to the standard exponentially-weighted RLS, by allowing for time-varying regularization matrices with generic structure. Simulations in finite precision show the algorithm`s superiority as compared to alternative algorithms in the context of adaptive beamforming.

Can we have confidence in generic structures?

The system dynamics concept of `generic structure' is dividable into three sub-types. This paper analyses the validity of these three, using both practical and theoretical perspectives. Firstly, a new set of measures is developed for generating validity-`confidence'-amongst a group using generic structures in a practical modelling situation. It is concluded that different confidence criteria are implicitly employed; there is an argument for trading-off model precision and analytical quality for simplicity and ease of use and future research is needed to combine these `process' and `content' aspects of confidence. From a theoretical stance it is shown that with two of the sub-types a scientific notion of confidence is achievable whereas the third (`archetypes') involves merely metaphorical thinking. It is concluded that the theoretical status of archetypes requires further development, whilst ensuring that its benefits are retained.

The METAFOR project: preserving data through metadata standards for climate models and simulations

Climate modeling is a complex process, requiring accurate and complete metadata in order to identify, assess and use climate data stored in digital repositories. The preservation of such data is increasingly important given the development of ever-increasingly complex models to predict the effects of global climate change. The EU METAFOR project has developed a Common Information Model (CIM) to describe climate data and the models and modelling environments that produce this data. There is a wide degree of variability between different climate models and modelling groups. To accommodate this, the CIM has been designed to be highly generic and flexible, with extensibility built in. METAFOR describes the climate modelling process simply as "an activity undertaken using software on computers to produce data." This process has been described as separate UML packages (and, ultimately, XML schemas). This fairly generic structure canbe paired with more specific "controlled vocabularies" in order to restrict the range of valid CIM instances. The CIM will aid digital preservation of climate models as it will provide an accepted standard structure for the model metadata. Tools to write and manage CIM instances, and to allow convenient and powerful searches of CIM databases,. Are also under development. Community buy-in of the CIM has been achieved through a continual process of consultation with the climate modelling community, and through the METAFOR team’s development of a questionnaire that will be used to collect the metadata for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) model runs.

O Macrogênero drama Norte-Riograndense: uma análise de gênero e de discurso sob a perspectiva da linguística sistêmico-funcional

The focus of this qualiquantitative research is the phenomenon we are denominating Drama-of-Rio-Grande-do-Norte, which contemplates short verse texts from the oral tradition, sung and presented on stage by women in communities on the south coast of the northeastern Brazilian State, Rio Grande do Norte. This tradition harkens to the medieval romance of the Iberian Peninsula (CASCUDO, 2001; GURGEL, 1999; GALVÃO, 1993; MAGALHÃES, 1973; ROMERO,1977). The objective of this research is to: identify what characterizes the genre Drama of Rio Grande do Norte; situate this genre within a systemization of genres from the oral tradition in Rio Grande do Norte; investigate the interpersonal relationships of power and solidarity through the role of the women in the discourse, how they see themselves and others, pointing out which elements of the world they evaluate and to identify representations of the feminine in the discourse. The theory of Genre and Register of Martin and Rose (2008) and Generic Structure Potential of Hasan (1989, 1996), which has as a base the Systemic Functional Linguistics of Halliday and Matthiessen (2004), Eggins (1994) among others, offers a theoretical framework for the characterization of the genre through the identification of stages and phases configuring its typology the individual schematic structure and its topology its relation to other phenomena in the oral tradition. Other groupings were mapped of the ‗Macrogenre , from the model of Martin and Rose (2008) as a continuum on two axis: between the poles of how the genre circulates orally x in writing, and recited/individually x staged/collectively; as well as mapping the samples with relation to power using the same model, but with the poles of individual voice x collective voice on an axis between increased power and diminished power. Eleven texts described as Narratives and one Anecdote were selected for the analysis of Attitudes, and Negotiations of power. Through the quantification of semantic discursive resources in the discourse systems of Appraisal (MARTIN; WHITE, 2005) and of Negotiation (MARTIN; ROSE, 2007), as well as reflections about humor (EGGINS; SLADE, 1997) we identified the Attitudes and the Negotiations of interpersonal roles. The quantification is based on the theories of Corpus Linguistics (BERBER SARDINHA, 2010), using WordSmith Tools 5.0 (SCOTT, 2010). Our results show that the Drama-of-Rio-Grande-do-Norte is characterized as a Macrogenre in the Community of Oral Stories, in the Family of Street Theatre/Games, composed of five genre types: Narratives, Praise, Complaints, Anecdotes, and Exemplum. The Macrogenre is characterized by its being circulated orally, staged collectively and the texts analyzed configure in differing degrees of power between men and woman. In synthesis we observe that through humor, the Drama-of-Rio-Grande-do-Norte functions to offer a space for women to voice, comment, judge and orient about social conditions in their communities, such as alcoholism, domestic violence, inequalities before the law etc., as well as circulating positive appreciations of rural/coastal culture and judgments about the behavior of members of the speech community, the role of women being to establish and reinforce norms. We anticipate possible benefits of the addition of the genre analyzed in literacy projects in the schools of Rio Grande do Norte

Análise da estrutura genérica das instruções na fala do professor de inglês: contribuições para o teste oral do Epple

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Apresentação de métodos para implementação de plataformas colaborativas de Sistemas Automatizados de Produção

Automated Production Systems Development involves aspects concerning the integration of technological components that exist on the market, such as: Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC), robot manipulators, various sensors and actuators, image processing systems, communication networks and collaborative supervisory systems; all integrated into a single application. This paper proposes an automated platform for experimentation, implemented through typical architecture for Automated Production Systems, which integrates the technological components described above, in order to allow researchers and students to carry out practical laboratory activities. These activities will complement the theoretical knowledge acquired by the students in the classroom, thus improving their training and professional skills. A platform designed using this generic structure will allow users to work within an educational environment that reflects most aspects found in Industrial Automated Manufacturing Systems, such as technology integration, communication networks, process control and production management. In addition, this platform offers the possibility complete automated process of control and supervision via remote connection through the internet (WebLab), enabling knowledge sharing between different teaching and research groups.

Substructuring approache in state space models for dynamic system parameters identification

In the recent decade, the request for structural health monitoring expertise increased exponentially in the United States. The aging issues that most of the transportation structures are experiencing can put in serious jeopardy the economic system of a region as well as of a country. At the same time, the monitoring of structures is a central topic of discussion in Europe, where the preservation of historical buildings has been addressed over the last four centuries. More recently, various concerns arose about security performance of civil structures after tragic events such the 9/11 or the 2011 Japan earthquake: engineers looks for a design able to resist exceptional loadings due to earthquakes, hurricanes and terrorist attacks. After events of such a kind, the assessment of the remaining life of the structure is at least as important as the initial performance design. Consequently, it appears very clear that the introduction of reliable and accessible damage assessment techniques is crucial for the localization of issues and for a correct and immediate rehabilitation. The System Identification is a branch of the more general Control Theory. In Civil Engineering, this field addresses the techniques needed to find mechanical characteristics as the stiffness or the mass starting from the signals captured by sensors. The objective of the Dynamic Structural Identification (DSI) is to define, starting from experimental measurements, the modal fundamental parameters of a generic structure in order to characterize, via a mathematical model, the dynamic behavior. The knowledge of these parameters is helpful in the Model Updating procedure, that permits to define corrected theoretical models through experimental validation. The main aim of this technique is to minimize the differences between the theoretical model results and in situ measurements of dynamic data. Therefore, the new model becomes a very effective control practice when it comes to rehabilitation of structures or damage assessment. The instrumentation of a whole structure is an unfeasible procedure sometimes because of the high cost involved or, sometimes, because it’s not possible to physically reach each point of the structure. Therefore, numerous scholars have been trying to address this problem. In general two are the main involved methods. Since the limited number of sensors, in a first case, it’s possible to gather time histories only for some locations, then to move the instruments to another location and replay the procedure. Otherwise, if the number of sensors is enough and the structure does not present a complicate geometry, it’s usually sufficient to detect only the principal first modes. This two problems are well presented in the works of Balsamo [1] for the application to a simple system and Jun [2] for the analysis of system with a limited number of sensors. Once the system identification has been carried, it is possible to access the actual system characteristics. A frequent practice is to create an updated FEM model and assess whether the structure fulfills or not the requested functions. Once again the objective of this work is to present a general methodology to analyze big structure using a limited number of instrumentation and at the same time, obtaining the most information about an identified structure without recalling methodologies of difficult interpretation. A general framework of the state space identification procedure via OKID/ERA algorithm is developed and implemented in Matlab. Then, some simple examples are proposed to highlight the principal characteristics and advantage of this methodology. A new algebraic manipulation for a prolific use of substructuring results is developed and implemented.

Aspekte der Modellbildung: Konzepte und Anwendung in der Atmungsphysiologie

Im ersten Teil 'Analyse der Grundlagen' der Dissertation 'Aspekte der Modellbildung: Konzepte und Anwendung in der Atmungsphysiologie' werden die Grundlagen zur Verfügung gestellt. Ausgehend von der Definition der modularer dynamischer Systeme im Kapitel 1 werden Grundbegriffe zu Modellen, Simulation und Modellentwicklung (Kapitel 2) dargelegt und schließlich folgt ein Kapitel über Netzmodelle. Im zweiten Teil wird 'der Prozess der Operationalisierung' untersucht. Im Kapitel 4 wird mit 'dem Koordinatensystem der Modellbildung' ein allgemeiner Lebenszyklus zur Modellbildung vorgestellt. Das Kapitel 5 zur 'Modellentwicklung' steht im Zentrum der Arbeit, wo eine generische Struktur für modulare Level-Raten-Modelle entwickelt wird. Das Kapitel endet mit einem Konzept zur Kalibrierung von Modellen, das auf Data Mining von Modelldaten basiert. Der Prozess der Operationalisierung endet mit der Validierung im sechsten Kapitel. 'Die Validierung am Beispiel der Atmungsphysiologie' im dritten Teil stellt die Anwendung der in beiden Teilen zuvor entwickelten Theorie dar. Zunächst wird das Projekt 'Evita-Weaning-System' vorgestellt, in dem die Arbeit entstanden ist. Ferner werden die notwendigen medizinischen Grundlagen der Atmungsphysiologie analysiert (Kapitel 7). Eine detaillierte Beschreibung des Modells der Atmungsphysiologie und der dabei entwickelten Algorithmen folgt im achten Kapitel. Die Arbeit schließt mit einem Kapitel zur Validierung des physiologischen Modells.

Un estudio sistémico-funcional de la relación participante-proceso de resúmenes en español a partir de noticias periodísticas en inglés

El objetivo de este trabajo es analizar la interpretación léxico-gramatical de la relación participante-proceso en textos en inglés y evaluar su incidencia en la efectividad de los resúmenes de dichos textos en español. Utilizando el marco de la Lingüística Sistémico-Funcional (Halliday, 1985, 1994, 2004), se realizó un análisis tripartito de diez resúmenes en español de una noticia periodística en inglés sobre deportes, escritos por alumnos de la carrera de Profesorado de Educación Física de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata en una instancia de evaluación final de la asignatura Capacitación en Inglés-Nivel II. En base a la Teoría del Registro y el Género (Martin y Eggins, 1997), se evaluó la incidencia de las relaciones lingüísticas a nivel de Contexto de Situación (Registro) y Contexto de Cultura (Género). También se solicitó la colaboración de un grupo de colegas para que dieran una opinión adicional sobre la efectividad de los resúmenes. A partir del análisis de los textos meta se pudo observar que aquellos escritores que muestran más dificultades para identificar la relación participante-proceso construyen resúmenes menos efectivos. Este menor grado de efectividad aparece como consecuencia de determinadas selecciones léxico-gramaticales. Por otro lado, la identificación de la relación participante proceso en el texto fuente parece incidir directamente en la construcción de la adecuada estructura genérica del texto meta. En conclusión, la identificación de la relación participante-proceso en textos en inglés puede considerarse central para la construcción de resúmenes efectivos en español

Un estudio sistémico-funcional de la relación participante-proceso de resúmenes en español a partir de noticias periodísticas en inglés

El objetivo de este trabajo es analizar la interpretación léxico-gramatical de la relación participante-proceso en textos en inglés y evaluar su incidencia en la efectividad de los resúmenes de dichos textos en español. Utilizando el marco de la Lingüística Sistémico-Funcional (Halliday, 1985, 1994, 2004), se realizó un análisis tripartito de diez resúmenes en español de una noticia periodística en inglés sobre deportes, escritos por alumnos de la carrera de Profesorado de Educación Física de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata en una instancia de evaluación final de la asignatura Capacitación en Inglés-Nivel II. En base a la Teoría del Registro y el Género (Martin y Eggins, 1997), se evaluó la incidencia de las relaciones lingüísticas a nivel de Contexto de Situación (Registro) y Contexto de Cultura (Género). También se solicitó la colaboración de un grupo de colegas para que dieran una opinión adicional sobre la efectividad de los resúmenes. A partir del análisis de los textos meta se pudo observar que aquellos escritores que muestran más dificultades para identificar la relación participante-proceso construyen resúmenes menos efectivos. Este menor grado de efectividad aparece como consecuencia de determinadas selecciones léxico-gramaticales. Por otro lado, la identificación de la relación participante proceso en el texto fuente parece incidir directamente en la construcción de la adecuada estructura genérica del texto meta. En conclusión, la identificación de la relación participante-proceso en textos en inglés puede considerarse central para la construcción de resúmenes efectivos en español

Un estudio sistémico-funcional de la relación participante-proceso de resúmenes en español a partir de noticias periodísticas en inglés

El objetivo de este trabajo es analizar la interpretación léxico-gramatical de la relación participante-proceso en textos en inglés y evaluar su incidencia en la efectividad de los resúmenes de dichos textos en español. Utilizando el marco de la Lingüística Sistémico-Funcional (Halliday, 1985, 1994, 2004), se realizó un análisis tripartito de diez resúmenes en español de una noticia periodística en inglés sobre deportes, escritos por alumnos de la carrera de Profesorado de Educación Física de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata en una instancia de evaluación final de la asignatura Capacitación en Inglés-Nivel II. En base a la Teoría del Registro y el Género (Martin y Eggins, 1997), se evaluó la incidencia de las relaciones lingüísticas a nivel de Contexto de Situación (Registro) y Contexto de Cultura (Género). También se solicitó la colaboración de un grupo de colegas para que dieran una opinión adicional sobre la efectividad de los resúmenes. A partir del análisis de los textos meta se pudo observar que aquellos escritores que muestran más dificultades para identificar la relación participante-proceso construyen resúmenes menos efectivos. Este menor grado de efectividad aparece como consecuencia de determinadas selecciones léxico-gramaticales. Por otro lado, la identificación de la relación participante proceso en el texto fuente parece incidir directamente en la construcción de la adecuada estructura genérica del texto meta. En conclusión, la identificación de la relación participante-proceso en textos en inglés puede considerarse central para la construcción de resúmenes efectivos en español

Applications of the behavioural homogeneity evaluation framework: the predictive ability of consumer involvement for international food market segmentation

This article proposes a framework of alternative international marketing strategies, based on the evaluation of intra- and inter-cultural behavioural homogeneity for market segmentation. The framework developed in this study provides a generic structure to behavioural homogeneity, proposing consumer involvement as a construct with unique predictive ability for international marketing strategy decisions. A model-based segmentation process, using structural equation models, is implemented to illustrate the application of the framework.