text:
May 2019 edition of the TCCN Newsletter launched
(Download the newsletter here)
Since December 2015, this Newsletter has presented and discussed some emerging topics related to the TCCN areas of interest. More specifically, it has covered a broad range of applications and techniques, for instance, non-orthogonal multiple access, ultra-reliable low-latency communications (URLLC), millimeter wave communications, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) communications, and massive machine-type communications (mMTC). We have interviewed over a dozen experts in these fields, included several interesting position papers, and provided state-of-the-art reviews. My sincere thanks to all the previous directors for their
contributions and help which have made this Newsletter a great success.
From my side, I have contributed in two previous TCCN Newsletter editions as Feature Editor, and this TCCN Newsletter issue is the first one that I am acting as Director. It has been a great pleasure and honor for me, and I am excited to cover two areas that will likely have impact in 5G and beyond: a) Blockchain and b) Internet of Things (IoT). In the Blockchain area, we have interviewed Prof. Dusit Niyato, from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, and Dr. Bhaskar Krichnamachari, from USC, who are leading experts in this area. We have also had the pleasure to get a position paper from Dr. BhaskarKrichnamachari. Within the context of IoT, we have interviewed Prof. Luiz A. da Silva, from Trinity College Dublin, Dr. Samir Perlaza, from INRIA, France, and Prof. Sergey Andreev, fromTampere University, Finland, who provided uswith their outlook on the opportunities and challenges of IoT. Finally, Prof. Giancarlo Fortino and Dr. Claudio Savaglio, from Università della Calabria, Italy, provided a position paper that presents ACOSO-Meth (Agent-based Cooperating Smart Objects Methodology), the first agent-based methodology that specifically and seamlessly supports the main phases of engineering of IoT ecosystems and related services.
Finally, I would like to thank our two feature topic editors: Prof. Walid Saad, from Virginia Tech – USA, and Prof. Pedro H. J. Nardelli, from Lappeenranta University of Technology – Finland, for their efforts in arranging the content of this Newsletter. Moreover, we want to thank all authors and interviewees for sharing with us their experience and time. I would finally like to acknowledge the gracious support from the TCCN chair, Dr. Yue Gao and all TCCN officers. If you have any suggestion, feel free to contact me at: email@example.com. We hope that you enjoy the material of this Newsletter!
Daniel Benevides da Costa
Director, IEEE ComSoc TCCN Newsletter
Federal University of Ceará, Brazil
Dec 2018 edition of the TCCN Newsletter launched
(Download the newsletter here)
Over the past couple of years, we have strived to reshape this newsletter to expose some of the more emerging topics related to the TCCN areas of interest. In this regard, we have covered a broad range of applications and techniques, ranging from ultra-reliable low latency communications (URLLC) to the Internet of Things. We have interviewed over a dozen experts in these fields, and included several interesting position papers and reviews of the state-of-the-art.
In this final TCCN Newsletter for which I will be the director, I am excited to cover two areas that will likely have impact in 5G and beyond: a) Communications with unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and b) massive machine type communications (mMTC). In the UAVs area, we have reviewed two key papers from recent works. We have also had the pleasure to interview Dr. Christian Bettstetter from the University of Klagenfurt, Austria, is a leading expert in this area.
Moreover, Dr. Halim Yanikomeroglu from Carelton University, who initiated much of the research on UAV communications, has also provided us with an exciting position paper in this domain. Within the context of mMTC, we have interviewed Dr. Giuseppe Durisi from Chalmers University, Sweden, Dr. Zaher Dawy from the American University of Beirut, Lebanon, and Dr. Toktam Mahmoodi from King's College, UK, who provided us with their outlook on the opportunities and challenges of mMTC. Finally, Dr. Ekram Hossain from the University of Manitoba, Canada, provided a position paper that outlines the role of NOMA in machine type communications.
Finally, I would like to thank our two feature topic editors: Dr. Daniel Benevides da Costa from UFC – Brazil and Dr. Omid Semiari from Georgia Southern University, USA, for their efforts in arranging the content of this Newsletter. Moreover, we want to thank all interviewees for sharing with us their experience and time. I would finally like to acknowledge the gracious support from the TCCN chair, Dr. Jianwei Huang and all TCCN officers over the past two years. I look forward to seeing future TCCN newsletters with more exciting research insights and discussions.
Dr. Walid Saad
Vice Chair, IEEE ComSoc TCCN
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Virginia Tech, USA
May 2018 edition of the TCCN Newsletter launched
(Download the newsletter here)
For decades, the wireless network evolution has been driven by a strive for higher data rates. Indeed, the whole premise of 4G networks had been on delivering higher rate and high network capacity. However, the advent of the Internet of Things and associated services, such as autonomous vehicles and virtual reality, has radically changed the wireless landscape. In particular, we are witnessing a major shift from data rate-centric wireless networks, to networks that require very low latency and high reliability. In this new latency-centric landscape, cognitive networking approaches will inevitably play a key role. In this regard, this TCCN Newsletter will delve into two key emerging technologies that pertain to the paradigm of highly reliable, low latency communications: a) ultra reliable low latency communication (URLLC) and b) mobile edge computing (MEC). Both URLLC and MEC will be critical components of emerging 5G networks and major contributors for the shift from rate-centric systems to latency-centric systems. Consequently, exposing their challenges and opportunities is essential. In order to do so, this first issue of the TCCN Newsletter of 2018 will bring together two feature topics on URLLC and MEC. Within each feature topic, we review the state of the art and provide an in-depth exposition of some of the recent research contributions. For URLLC, we also provide two expert interviews with Drs. Mehdi Bennis and Marios Kountouris, that provide the academic and industrial perspectives on URLLC. In the context of MEC, beyond also reviewing key papers, we provide two expert interviews with Drs. Kaibin Huang and Yang Yang.
That said, we would like to thank our two feature topic editors: Dr. Daniel Benevides da Costa from UFC – Brazil and Dr. Jie Xu, from Guangdong University of Technology, for their efforts in arranging the paper reviews and expert opinion. Moreover, we want to thank all interviewees for sharing with us their useful experience and future outlook on the discussed areas. I would finally like to acknowledge the gracious support from the TCCN chair, Dr. Jianwei Huang and all TCCN officers. As always, if you have any suggestions, feel free to contact me at: email@example.com. We hope that you enjoy the material provided here!
Dr. Walid Saad
Vice Chair, IEEE ComSoc TCCN
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Virginia Tech, USA
November 2017 edition of the TCCN Newsletter launched
(Download the newsletter here)
Dynamic spectrum access and spectrum sharing lie at the heart of cognitive radio networks. As such, developing new multiple access techniques along with exploiting unconventional frequency bands are necessary steps needed to ensure the wide-scale deployment of cognitive radio networks. In this regard, this TCCN Newsletter will delve into two key emerging technologies in this regard: a) non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) and b) Millimeter wave communications (mmWave). Both NOMA and mmWave are considered as major components of emerging 5G networks and, as such, exposing their challenges and opportunities is essential. In order to do so, this second issue of the TCCN Newsletter of 2017 will bring together two feature topics on NOMA and mmWave. Within each feature topic, we review the state of the art and provide an in-depth exposition of some of the recent research contributions. For NOMA, we also provide a position paper from Dr. Zhiguo Ding's group who has been the driving force behind many of the key contributions in NOMA. In addition to these two feature topics, we discuss the theme of "Spectrum Scarcity", which has been driving much of the research in wireless networks, in general, and cognitive radio networking, in particular, over the past few years. Within the context of this theme, we get expert opinions from Drs. Akbar Sayeed and Mérouane Debbah along with two position papers from the groups of Dr. Danijela Cabric and Dr. George K. Karagiannidis, that expose various research challenges within this theme.
That said, we would like to thank our two feature topic editors: Dr. Daniel Benevides da Costa from UFC – Brazil and Dr. Omid Semiari, from Georgia Southern University, for their efforts in arranging the paper reviews, positions papers, and expert opinion. Moreover, we want to thank all authors and interviewees for contributing their significant research works to the two feature topics and sharing with us their useful experience and future outlook on the area. I would finally like to acknowledge the gracious support from the TCCN chair, Dr. Jianwei Huang and all TCCN officers. As always, if you have any suggestions, feel free to contact me at: email@example.com. We hope that you enjoy the material provided here!
Dr. Walid Saad
Vice Chair, IEEE ComSoc TCCN
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Virginia Tech, USA
Call for nominations – TCCN Recognition Award and TCCN Publication Award – 2017
IEEE ComSoc Technical Committee on Cognitive Networks (TCCN) sponsors the IEEE ComSoc TCCN Recognitions Award and IEEE ComSoc TCCN Publication Award. See the call for nominations for the TCCN Recognition Award and TCCN Publication Award. The awards procedures and process can be downloaded here.
Third Edition of the TCCN Newsletter launched
Cognitive radio networks are at the cusp of a major revolution. What started as a paradigm for spectrum sharing and dynamic spectrum access, grew into a major wireless communications field that weaves together multiple disciplines ranging from communication theory to machine learning, network science, and network science. As such, the concept of a cognitive network is rapidly evolving from a traditional, spectrum-centric perspective to a broader, network-wide perspective, in which cognition should no longer be restricted to spectrum access but must instead span the entire panoply of network functions.
This need for large-scale, intelligent cognition in wireless networks coupled with the ongoing 5G revolution, is also ushering in numerous innovative applications for cognitive radio networks that range from smart transportation to broad Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystems. In order to accompany this major change in cognitive networking paradigm, this first issue of the TCCN Newsletter of 2017 will primarily focus on new analytics and wireless applications which are expected to be central to tomorrow's cognitive radio networks. In particular, this newsletter will feature two key cognitive radio networking topic: a) The Internet of Things and b) Machine Learning. For each topic, we have gathered a review on innovative new results that have appeared in the recent literature. Then, we had some stimulating discussions with leaders in the fields, in order to provide an in-depth discussion on the major technical challenges and opportunities in these two central areas of cognitive radio networking.
That said, we would like to thank our two feature topic editors: Dr. Nguyen Tran from Kyung Hee University and Dr. Muhammad Zeeshan Shakir from the University of West Scotland, for their efforts in arranging the paper reviews and expert interviews. Moreover, we want to thank all interviewees for contributing their significant research works to the two feature topics and sharing with us their useful experience and future outlook on the area. I would finally like to acknowledge the gracious support from the TCCN chair, Dr. Jianwei Huang and all TCCN officers. As always, if you have any suggestions, feel free to contact me. We hope that you enjoy the material provided here!
Dr. Walid Saad
Vice Chair, IEEE ComSoc TCCN
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Virginia Tech, USA
Secure Cognitive Radio Networks with Multi-Phase Smart Relaying and Cooperative Jamming
Originally posted in Sec-IG blog (link to the original post)
Pin-Hsun Lin and Eduard A. Jorswieck
Dresden University of Technology, Germany
Due to the broadcast nature of wireless networks, communications are potentially subject to attacks, such as passive eavesdropping or active jamming. Instead of using the traditional cryptographic approaches [2] to combat the malicious users, we consider the information-theoretic secrecy. Note that the information-theoretic secrecy approach, initiated by Shannon [3] and developed by Wyner [4], can exploit the randomness of the wireless channels to ensure the secrecy of the transmitted messages while there is no assumption on the computation capabilities at the malicious users. As a performance measure for communication systems with secrecy constraints, a secrecy rate is defined as a rate at which the message can be transmitted reliably and securely between the legitimate nodes. However, similar to communication networks without secrecy constraints, the overall performance is limited by the relative channel qualities to guarantee secure communications. Many signal processing and multi-user techniques have therefore been proposed to overcome this limitation such as the use of multiple antennas.
Recently, there has been a substantial interest in the secrecy of multi-user systems [5], with a particular emphasis on potential cooperation between users to enhance the secrecy of communications. Cooperation in communication networks is an emerging technique to improve the reliability of wireless communication systems, and it involves multiple parties assisting each other in the transmission of messages, see e.g., [6]. Assuming that the cooperative node(s) can be trusted and that they aim at increasing the secrecy of the original transmission in the presence of a possible external eavesdropper, several cooperative strategies have been proposed. As one kind of cooperative communications schemes, cognitive radio technology has been proposed by Mitola in [7] as an efficient way to enhance the spectrum efficiency which has considerable development over the last few decades. The concept of cooperation for secrecy, and the corresponding cooperative techniques can naturally be applied to the cognitive radio network.
In this article, we consider a cognitive radio (CR) network including four single-antenna half-duplex nodes, where the CR receiver is treated as a potential eavesdropper with respect to the primary transmission [1]. In exchange for cooperation from the CR user to improve/maintain his own secrecy rate, the primary user allows the CR user to share part of the spectrum. Compared to some important literature in this research line, e.g., [8], [9], and [10], etc., we additionally consider the following secure coexistence conditions:
(i) the transmission of CR transmitter does not degrade the primary user's secrecy rate, and
(ii) the encoder and decoder at the primary transmitter and receiver, respectively, are left intact whether CR transmits or not.
The reasons to consider the secure coexistence conditions are twofold. First, to utilize the time-frequency slot in the overlay sense, cognitive radio systems are obligated not to interfere the primary systems, which is common in cognitive radio systems design. Second, with the condition (ii), cognitive radios are backward compatible with the legacy systems, which cannot sense and adapt to the environment agilely. This conditions make the cognitive radio capable of operating in broader usage scenarios. One of the possible practical scenarios of the considered model is that, the primary users belong to a licensed system, who sells rights of the spectrum usage to a femtocell system. Here we can let the CR transmitter and receiver be the femtocell base station and users, respectively. However, the femtocell operator may not be able to guarantee that the femtocell users are malicious or not. Thus, to provide a secrecy transmission to the primary users, not only the primary base station needs to use the wiretap coding, but also the femtocell base station needs to help to maintain the secrecy transmission for the primary system.
We analyze the achievable secrecy rate with weak secrecy of the cognitive user in the cognitive radio network under the secure coexistence conditions. In addition, we derive the rate constraints to guarantee that the primary user's weak secrecy is unchanged as well, which requires different analysis compared to [8], [9], [10]. For example, the relation between channels observed by the primary transmitter before and after the cognitive transmitter is active should investigated for proper relay and jamming design. Otherwise, either the reliability of the cognitive user or the secrecy of the primary user will be violated. In Fig. 1 we show two improper system designs, where the black rectangular denotes the wiretap code used by the primary user, i.e., the row and column of it are indexed by the secure and confusion messages, respectively and each entry is a codeword. The height and width of the blue rectangular denote the capacity of the channels between the primary transmitter to the primary receiver and that between the primary transmitter to the CR receiver, respectively, after CR transmitter starts to transmit. Fig. 1 (a) shows that, both reliability and secrecy are fulfilled. However, the cognitive transmitter may overdesign the relay power for the primary user's signal such that the capacity is too large, which is inefficient for the CR user. In particular, that means CR transmitter wastes power on constructing a too good channel for the primary user., while the remained power for CR's own transmission is reduced. In contrast, Fig. 1 (b) shows that, the relay is efficient, i.e., the new channel is efficient for the transmission of the secure message. However, the confusion rate is not high enough for the new channel, which causes that the secrecy is violated. Therefore, the analysis of the aforementioned rate constraints is important. In addition, we also derive a capacity upper bound for the CR user under both discrete memoryless and additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channels to evaluate the performance of the achievable scheme.
We then propose a multi-phase transmission scheme, which considers the following additional phases. First, to accommodate the operations of practical systems, we take into account the first additional phase for listening to/decoding the primary's signal at the CR transmitter. Note that the primary user's signal is commonly assumed non-causally known at CR transmitter. Second, we introduce another additional phase as the third one to endow the cognitive system an extra degree of freedom for utilizing different transmission schemes. For AWGN channels, this degree of freedom improves the performance by exploiting pure relaying and jamming but not simultaneously transmitting cognitive user's own signal.
Finally, we illustrate our results through one numerical example as shown in Fig. 2 based on a geometrical setup, which highlights the impact of the node geometry on the achievable rates and on the optimal power allocation and time splitting of the CR transmitter. Note that we fix the locations of the primary transmitter and receiver at the coordinates (0,0) and (1,0), respectively. The CR receiver is fixed at (1,-1). We assume a path-loss model with path-loss exponent. The power constraints at the primary and CR transmitters are 10 dB and 20 dB, respectively. Note that we also include the power control as a possible design parameter for the CR transmitter, i.e., the transmission power utilized is not necessarily fixed to its maximum. The unit of rate results is bit per channel use. Further numerical results in [1] show that 1) the proposed 3-phase clean relaying scheme indeed improves the cognitive user's rate; 2) the proposed achievable scheme is close to capacity when the CR transmitter/receiver is far/close enough to the primary receiver/transmitter, respectively.
[1] P. -H LIn, F. Gabry, R. Thobaben, E. A. Jorswieck and M. Skoglund, "Multi-Phase Smart Relaying and Cooperative Jamming in Secure Cognitive Radio Networks", IEEE Transactions on Cognitive Communications and Networking, Vol. 2, No 1 pp. 38-52, Mar. 2016
[2] A. J. Menezes, P. C. van Oorschot, and S. A. Vanstone, Handbook of Applied Cryptography. Boca Raton, FL, USA: CRC Press, 1996.
[3] C. E. Shannon, "Communication theory of secrecy systems", Bell Syst. Tech. J., vol. 28, no 4, pp. 656-715, Oct. 1949.
[4] A. D. Wyner, "The wire-tap channel", Bell Syst. Tech. J., vol. 54, no 8, pp. 1355-1387, Oct. 1975.
[5] Y. Liang, A. Somekh-Baruch, H. V. Poor, S. S. Shamai, and S. Verdú, "Capacity of cognitive interference channels with and without secrecy," IEEE Trans. Inf. Theory, vol. 55, no. 2, pp. 604–619, Feb. 2009.
[6] H. G. Bafghi, S. Salimi, B. Seyfe, and M. R. Aref, "Cognitive interference channel with two confidential messages," in Proc. IEEE Int. Symp. Inf. Theory Appl. (ISITA), Taichung, Taiwan, 2010, pp. 952–956.
[7] R. K. Farsani and R. Ebrahimpour, "Capacity theorems for the cognitive radio channel with confidential messages," in Proc. IEEE Int. Symp. Inf. Theory (ISIT), Honolulu, HI, USA, 2014, pp. 1416–1420.
CFP: Cognitive Radio and Networks Symposium at IEEE GLOBECOM 2017
Scope and Motivation: Emerging cognitive radio communications and networking technologies potentially provide a promising solution to the spectrum underutilization problem in wireless access, improving the interoperability and coexistence among different wireless/mobile communications systems and making the future-generation radio devices/systems autonomous and selfreconfigurable. The goal of this symposium is to bring together and disseminate state of the art research contributions that address various aspects of analysis, design, optimization, implementation, standardization, and application of cognitive radio communications and networking technologies. The scope of this symposium includes (but is not limited to) the topics below.
Main Topics of Interest: The Cognitive Radio and Networks Symposium seeks original contributions in, but not limited to, the following topical areas:
● Challenges and issues in designing cognitive radios and cognitive radio networks
● Architectures and building blocks of cognitive radio networks
● Spectrum sensing, measurements and statistical modeling of spectrum usage
● Waveform design, modulation, and interference aggregation for cognitive radio
● Distributed cooperative spectrum sensing and multi-user access
● Cognitive medium access control, interference management and modeling
● Dynamic spectrum sharing
● Handoff and routing protocols
● Resource allocation for multi-antenna based cognitive radio communications
● Energy-efficient cognitive radio communications and networking
● Self-configuration, interoperability and co-existence issues
● Distributed adaptation and optimization methods
● Machine learning techniques for cognitive radio systems
● Architecture and implementation of database-based cognitive radio networks
● Cooperative and coordinated communications
● Economic aspects of spectrum sharing in cognitive radio networks
● Regulatory policies and their interactions with communications and networking
● Privacy and security of cognitive spectrum-agile networks
● Attack modeling, prevention, mitigation, and defense in cognitive radio systems
● Physical-layer secrecy in cognitive networks
● Modeling and performance evaluation
● Quality of service provisioning in cognitive radio networks
● Spectrum sensing and sharing for Internet of Things
● Spectrum sensing and sharing for mm-wave
● Applications and services (e.g., cognitive networking in TV whitespace, adaptation with LTE networks such as LTE-unlicensed, and integration with other merging techniques such as massive MIMO and full-duplex)
● Cognitive radio standards, test-beds, simulation tools, and hardware prototypes. The authors of selected papers from this symposium will be invited to submit an extended version of their work for fast-track review in the IEEE Transactions on Cognitive Communications and Networking.
How to Submit a Paper:
The submission is through EDAS. Please check IEEE Globecom 2017 website for full instructions. This CFP can also be found at: http://globecom2017.ieee-globecom.org/content/call-symposium-papers
Symposium Co-Chairs:
● Jianwei Huang (The Chinese University of Hong Kong)
● K.P. Subbalakshmi (Stevens Institute of Technology)
● Yue Gao (Queen Mary University of London)
Jianwei Huang is an Associate Professor and Director of the Network Communications and Economics Lab (ncel.ie.cuhk.edu.hk), in the Department of Information Engineering at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He received the Ph.D. degree from Northwestern University in 2005, and worked as a Postdoc Research Associate at Princeton University during 2005-2007. He is the co-recipient of 8 international Best Paper Awards, including IEEE Marconi Prize Paper Award in Wireless Communications in 2011. He has co-authored five books: "Wireless Network Pricing," "Monotonic Optimization in Communication and Networking Systems," "Cognitive Mobile Virtual Network Operator Games," "Social Cognitive Radio Networks", and "Economics of Database-Assisted Spectrum Sharing". He has served as a Founding Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Cognitive Communications and Networking, an Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications, and a Founding Associate Editor of IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications – Cognitive Radio Series. He is the Vice Chair of IEEE ComSoc Cognitive Network Technical Committee and the Past Chair of IEEE ComSoc Multimedia Communications Technical Committee. He has served as a Distinguished Lecturer of IEEE Communications Society since 2015. At the age of 37, he was elevated to IEEE Fellow for his contributions to resource allocation in wireless cellular and cognitive radio systems, and his seminal work on the economics based analysis and design of modern wireless communication systems.
K.P. Subbalakshmi is a Professor, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology. Her research interests are in Cognitive Radio Networking, Cognitive Cloud Computing, Dynamic Spectrum Access security, Social Media Analysis and Forensics and their applications to smart cities and connected communities. She was named a Jefferson Science Fellow in 2016. As a JSF she worked at the US Department of State, on technology and policy issues in 5G networks, IoT and Smart and Connected Communities during the Academic Year 2016-2017. She is also a Co-Founder of two technology start-ups that commercialize her work on cognitive radio networks and text analytics. She served as a Subject Matter Expert for the National Spectrum Consortium in 2015. She is a Founding Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Cognitive Communications and Networking. She is the Founding Chair of the Special Interest Group on Security, IEEE COMSOC's Technical Committee on Cognitive Networks. She is a recipient of the New Jersey Inventors Hall of Fame, Innovator Award.
Yue Gao is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) and Director of Whitespace Machine Communication Lab (wmc.eecs.qmul.ac.uk) in the School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science at Queen Mary University of London in United Kingdom. He worked as Research Assistant and Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in the School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science at QMUL. He received his Bachelor degree from Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications in China in 2002, and his MSc and PhD degrees in telecommunications and microwave antennas from QMUL in 2003 and 2007, respectively. He has authored and coauthored over 100 peer-reviewed journal and conference papers, 2 best paper awards, 2 patents and 2 licensed works to companies, and one book chapter. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE and has served as the Signal Processing for Communications Symposium Co-Chair for IEEE ICCC 2016, and is serving Publicity Co- Chair for GLOBECOM 2016, and the General Co-Chair of the IEEE WoWMoM 2017.
Artificial Intelligence as an Enabler for Cognitive Self-Organizing Future Networks
Originally posted in Sec-IG blog (link to the original post)
Siddique Latif¹, Farrukh Pervez¹, Muhammad Usama², Junaid Qadir²
¹National University of Science and Technology, Islamabad
²Information Technology University (ITU), Lahore
The explosive increase in number of smart devices hosting sophisticated applications is rapidly affecting the landscape of information communication technology industry. Mobile subscriptions, expected to reach 8.9 billion by 2022 [1], would drastically increase the demand of extra capacity with aggregate throughput anticipated to be enhanced by a factor of 1000 [2]. In an already crowded radio spectrum, it becomes increasingly difficult to meet ever growing application demands of wireless bandwidth. It has been shown that the allocated spectrum is seldom utilized by the primary users and hence contains spectrum holes that may be exploited by the unlicensed users for their communication. As we enter the Internet Of Things (IoT) era in which appliances of common use will become smart digital devices with rigid performance requirements (such as low latency, energy efficiency, etc.), current networks face the vexing problem of how to create sufficient capacity for such applications. The fifth generation of cellular networks (5G) envisioned to address these challenges are thus required to incorporate cognition and intelligence to resolve the aforementioned issues. Cognitive radios (CRs) and self-organizing wireless networks are two major technologies that are envisaged to meet the future needs of such next generation wireless networks.
CRs are intelligent and fully programmable radios that can dynamically adapt according to their prevalent environment. In other words, they sense the spectrum and dynamically select the clearer frequency bands for better communication in the most prevailing conditions. In this way, CRs can adaptively tune their internal parameters to optimize the spectrum usage, transmission waveform, channel access methods and modulation schemes with enhanced coverage. However, it is due to the recent advancements in machine learning, software defined radio (SDR) that CR is able to emerge from simulation environment to the real-time applications [3].
The overwhelming traffic growth coupled with the greedy approach towards high quality of service (QoS) has been a major challenge for current wireless systems in terms of network resources and QoS. A new paradigm for wireless communication called 5G has been envisioned to address these challenges. The major component of the envisioned 5G scheme is Self-Organizing Network (SON). SON is a relatively new concept in perspective of wireless cellular networks, it refers to an intelligent network that learns from its immediate environment, while autonomously adapting accordingly to ensure reliable communication. In fact, SON underlines new aspect for automation of future networks in 5G era.
The sensing, learning and reasoning behavior of both CRs and SON is achieved by extensively using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine-learning techniques. The CRs are an evolved form of SDRs, realized by the embodiment of cognitive engine (CE) that exploits the AI techniques for the cognitive behavior to decide optimally.
The CR network (CRN) follows the cognitive cycle, for unparalleled resource management and better network performance. Cognitive cycle, as illustrated in figure 1, begins with sensing of dynamic radio environment parameters, subsequently observing and learning recursively the sensed values for reconfiguration of the critical parameters in order to achieve the desired objectives.
Fig. 1: Learning process in cognitive radios
Cognitive cycle is elaborated in figure 2, which highlights the parameters that CR needs to quantify in order to utilize the available spectrum without affecting primary user's performance. The sensed parameters are treated as stimuli for achieving different performance objectives, for instance, minimizing the bit error rate or minimizing the power consumption etc. [4]. To achieve the aforementioned objectives, CR adaptively learns deciding optimal values for various significant variables such as power control, frequency band allocation, etc. [4].
Fig. 2: The cognitive cycle of CR
CR incorporates machine learning techniques for dynamic spectrum access (DSA) and capacity maximization. AI-based techniques for decision making such as optimization theory, Markov decision processes (MDPs), and game theory is used to encompass a wide range of applications [3]. The popular learning techniques used in cognitive cycle are support vector machine (SVM), artificial neural networks (ANNs), metaheuristic algorithms, fuzzy logic, genetic algorithms, hidden Markov models (HMMs), Bayesian learning, reinforcement learning, multi-agent systems. Fuzzy logic theory has been used for effective bandwidth, resource allocation, interference and power management [3], [5]–[7]. Genetic algorithms (GAs) have been employed for CRs spectrum and parameters optimization [8]–[10]. ANNs have been incorporated to improve the spectrum sensing and adaptively learn complex environments, without substantial overhead [11], [12]. Game theory enables CRNs to learn from its history, scrutinize the performance of other CRNs, and adjust their own behavior accordingly [13], [14]. In multi-agent domain, reinforcement learning (RL) a reward-penalty based technique, which reinforces immediate rewards to maximize long term goals has been employed for efficient spectrum utilization [15], minimum power consumption [16] and filling the spectrum holes dynamically [17]. SVM, a supervised classification model, is being utilized for channel selection [18], adaptation of transmission parameters [19] and beam-forming design [20]. In CRNs, HMMs have been widely used to identify spectrum holes detection [21], spectrum handoff [22], and competitive spectrum access [23]. The range of AI-based techniques are not limited to the above mentioned applications, other applications of AI in CRNs are expressed in [3], [4]. By combining increasing spectrum agility, context aware adaptability of CR and AI techniques, CR has become an increasingly important feature of wireless systems. IEEE 802.16h has recommended CR as one of its key features and a lot of efforts are being made to introduce CR features in 3GPP LTE-Advance.
The rapid proliferation of multi-radio access technology-disparate smart devices has resulted in complicated heterogeneous mobile networks thus making configuration, management and maintenance cumbersome and error-prone. 5G, expected to handle diverse devices at a massive scale, is foreseen as one of the most complicated networks and hence extensive efforts are being carried out for its standardization. In the recent years, SONs, as depicted in figure 3, have gained significant attention regarding self-configuration, self-optimization and self-healing of such complex networks. The idea behind SONs is to automate network planning, configuration and optimization jointly in a single process in order to minimize human involvement. The planning phase, which includes ascertaining cells locations, inter-cell connecting links and other associated network devices as well as parameters, precedes the configuration phase [24]. Self-configuration means that a newly deployed cell is able to automatically configure, test and authenticate itself and adjust its parameters such as transmission power, inter-cell interference etc. in a plug and play fashion [24]. Self-healing allows trouble-free maintenance and enables networks to recover from failures in an autonomous fashion. In addition, it also helps in routine upgrades of the equipments in order to remove legacy bugs. Self-optimization is the ability of the network to keep improving its performance with respect to various aspects including link quality, coverage, mobility and handoff with an objective to achieve network level goals [24]. Since AI-based techniques are capable to handle complex problems in large systems intrinsically, these techniques are now being proposed to achieve Self Organization (SO) in 5G.
Fig. 3: Illustration of AI-based self-organization in the networks
Self-configuration, in cellular networks, refers to the automatic configuration of initial parameters—neighbouring cells list, IP Addresses and radio access parameters—by a node itself. AI techniques like Dynamic Programming (DP), RL and Transfer Learning (TL) may be employed in 5G to automatically configure a series of parameters to render best services. RL, as opposed to DP which initially builds the environment model to operate, is a model free learning technique that iterates through to reach optimal strategy and may yield superior results in dynamically changing radio conditions [25]. Self-healing is about automatic fault detection, its classification and initiating necessary actions for recovery. Irregularities and anomalies in network may be timely spotted to further restore the system by leveraging different AI based sensing techniques like Logistic Regression (LR), SVM and HMM [25]. Self-optimization includes continuous optimization of parameters to achieve system-level objectives such as load balancing, coverage extension, and interference avoidance. AI techniques that may be exploited to optimize provisioning of QoS to various services mainly belong to the class of unsupervised learning. Besides Gradient Boosting Decision Tree (a supervised learning technique), Spectral Clustering, One-class SVM and Recurrent Neural Networks are few examples in this regard [25]. Figure 4 summarizes the AI algorithms that can be utilized to enhance cellular networks performance.
AI techniques may also exploit network traffic patterns to predict future events and help pre-allocate network resources to avoid network overloading. Furthermore, user-centric QoS-provisioning across tiers of heterogeneous cells may also be granted using AI [25]. Similarly, GAs are employed for cell planning and optimization of coverage with power adjustment [26]. GAs are also suited for the problem of finding the shortest path routing in a large scale dynamic networks [27]. Wenjing et al. in [28] proposed an autonomic particle swarm compensation algorithm for cell outage compensation. The study in [29] introduces the self-optimization technique for the transmission power and antenna configuration by exploiting the fuzzy neural network optimization method. It integrates fuzzy neural network with cooperative reinforcement learning to jointly optimize coverage and capacity by intelligently adjusting power and antenna tilt settings [29]. It adopts a hybrid approach in which cells individually optimize respective radio frequency parameters through reinforcement learning in a distributed manner, while a central entity manages to cooperate amongst individual cells by sharing their optimization experience on a network level [29]. Cells iteratively learn to achieve a trade-off between coverage and capacity through optimization, since increase in coverage leads to reduction in capacity, while additionally improving energy efficiency of the network [29]. ANNs can also be effectively utilized for the estimation of link quality [30]. Mobile devices in an indoor environment have also been localized through the use of ANNs [31]. In fact, AI-based techniques enable network entities to automatically configure their initial parameters before becoming operational [24], adaptively learn radio environment parameters to provide optimal services [25], autonomously perform routine maintenance and upgrades and recover from network failures [24],[25].
In view of the continued proliferation of smart devices, we anticipate that CRs and SON will soon become the basic building blocks of future wireless networks. These technologies will transform future networks into an intelligent network that would encompass user preferences alongside network priorities/constraints. AI, being the basis of both these technologies, will continue to drive ongoing 5G standardization efforts and therefore be the cause of a major paradigm shift. AI techniques will continue to intervene future networks finding their usage in from radio resource management to management and orchestration of networks. In fact, we anticipate that future wireless networks would be completely dominated by AI.
[1] P. Cerwall, "Ericsson mobility report, mobile world congress edition," 2016.
[2] J. G. Andrews, S. Buzzi, W. Choi, S. V. Hanly, A. Lozano, A. C. Soong, and J. C. Zhang, "What will 5G be?" IEEE Journal on selected areas in communications, vol. 32, no. 6, pp. 1065–1082, 2014.
[3] J. Qadir, "Artificial intelligence based cognitive routing for cognitive radio networks," Artificial Intelligence Review, vol. 45, no. 1, pp. 25–96, 2016.
[4] N. Abbas, Y. Nasser, and K. El Ahmad, "Recent advances on artificial intelligence and learning techniques in cognitive radio networks," EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking, vol. 2015, no. 1, p. 174, 2015.
[5] P. Kaur, M. Uddin, and A. Khosla, "Fuzzy based adaptive bandwidth allocation scheme in cognitive radio networks," in Knowledge Engineering, 2010 8th International Conference on ICT and. IEEE, 2010, pp. 41–45.
[6] S. R. Aryal, H. Dhungana, and K. Paudyal, "Novel approach for interference management in cognitive radio," in Internet (AH-ICI), 2012 Third Asian Himalayas International Conference on. IEEE, 2012, pp. 1–5.
[7] M. Matinmikko, J. Del Ser, T. Rauma, and M. Mustonen, "Fuzzy-logic based framework for spectrum availability assessment in cognitive radio systems, IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications, vol. 31, no. 11, pp. 2173–2184, 2013.
[8] H. Qin, L. Zhu, and D. Li, "Artificial mapping for dynamic resource management of cognitive radio networks," in Wireless Communications, Networking and Mobile Computing (WiCOM), 2012 8th International Conference on. IEEE, 2012, pp. 1–4.
[9] S. Chen, T. R. Newman, J. B. Evans, and A. M. Wyglinski, "Genetic algorithm-based optimization for cognitive radio networks," in Sarnoff Symposium, 2010 IEEE. IEEE, 2010, pp. 1–6.
[10] M. R. Moghal, M. A. Khan, and H. A. Bhatti, "Spectrum optimization in cognitive radios using elitism in genetic algorithms," in Emerging Technologies (ICET), 2010 6th International Conference on. IEEE, 2010, pp. 49–54.
[11] X. Tan, H. Huang, and L. Ma, "Frequency allocation with artificial neural networks in cognitive radio system," in TENCON Spring Conference, 2013 IEEE. IEEE, 2013, pp. 366–370.
[12] T. Zhang, M. Wu, and C. Liu, "Cooperative spectrum sensing based on artificial neural network for cognitive radio systems," in Wireless Communications, Networking and Mobile Computing (WiCOM), 2012 8th International Conference on. IEEE, 2012, pp. 1–5.
[13] Z. Han, Game theory in wireless and communication networks: theory, models, and applications. Cambridge University Press, 2012.
[14] D. Bellhouse, "The problem of waldegrave," Electronic Journal for the History of Probability and Statistics, vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 1–12, 2007.
[15] S. S. Barve and P. Kulkarni, "Dynamic channel selection and routing through reinforcement learning in cognitive radio networks," in Computational Intelligence & Computing Research (ICCIC), 2012 IEEE International Conference on. IEEE, 2012, pp. 1–7.
[16] P. Zhou, Y. Chang, and J. A. Copeland, "Reinforcement learning for repeated power control game in cognitive radio networks," IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications, vol. 30, no. 1, pp. 54–69, 2012.
[17] S. Arunthavanathan, S. Kandeepan, and R. J. Evans, "Reinforcement learning based secondary user transmissions in cognitive radio networks," in 2013 IEEE Globecom Workshops (GC Wkshps). IEEE, 2013, pp. 374–379.
[18] Y. Huang, H. Jiang, H. Hu, and Y. Yao, "Design of learning engine based on support vector machine in cognitive radio," in Computational Intelligence and Software Engineering, 2009. CiSE 2009. International Conference on. IEEE, 2009, pp. 1–4.
[19] S. Hu, Y.-d. Yao, and Z. Yang, "Mac protocol identification using support vector machines for cognitive radio networks," IEEE Wireless Communications, vol. 21, no. 1, pp. 52–60, 2014.
[20] M. Lin, J. Ouyang, and W.-P. Zhu, "BF design in cognitive relay networks via support vector machines," in 2013 IEEE Global Communications Conference (GLOBECOM). IEEE, 2013, pp. 3247–3252.
[21] A. Mukherjee, S. Maiti, and A. Datta, "Spectrum sensing for cognitive radio using blind source separation and hidden markov model," in 2014 Fourth International Conference on Advanced Computing & Communication Technologies. IEEE, 2014, pp. 409–414.
[22] C. Pham, N. H. Tran, C. T. Do, S. I. Moon, and C. S. Hong, "Spectrum handoff model based on hidden markov model in cognitive radio networks," in The International Conference on Information Networking 2014 (ICOIN2014). IEEE, 2014, pp. 406–411.
[23] X. Li and C. Xiong, "Markov model bank for heterogenous cognitive radio networks with multiple dissimilar users and channels," in International Conference on Computing, Networking and Communications (ICNC), Honolulu, HI, 2014. IEEE, 2014, pp. 93–97.
[24] X. Wang, X. Li, and V. C. Leung, "Artificial intelligence-based techniques for emerging heterogeneous network: State of the arts, opportunities, and challenges," IEEE Access, vol. 3, pp. 1379–1391, 2015.
[25] R. Li, Z. Zhao, X. Zhou, G. Ding, Y. Chen, Z. Wang, and H. Zhang, "Intelligent 5G: When cellular networks meet artificial intelligence."
[26] L. T. Ho, I. Ashraf, and H. Claussen, "Evolving femtocell coverage optimization algorithms using genetic programming," in 2009 IEEE 20th International Symposium on Personal, Indoor and Mobile Radio Communications. IEEE, 2009, pp. 2132–2136.
[27] U. Mehboob, J. Qadir, S. Ali, and A. Vasilakos, "Genetic algorithms in wireless networking: techniques, applications, and issues," Soft Computing, vol. 20, no. 6, pp. 2467–2501, 2016.
[28] L. Wenjing, Y. Peng, J. Zhengxin, and L. Zifan, "Centralized management mechanism for cell outage compensation in lte networks," International Journal of Distributed Sensor Networks, 2012.
[29] S. Fan, H. Tian, and C. Sengul, "Self-optimization of coverage and capacity based on a fuzzy neural network with cooperative reinforcement learning," EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking, vol. 2014, no. 1, pp. 1–14, 2014.
[30] M. Caleffi and L. Paura, "Bio-inspired link quality estimation for wireless mesh networks," in IEEE International Symposium on a World of Wireless, Mobile and Multimedia Networks & Workshops, 2009. WoWMoM 2009. IEEE, 2009, pp. 1–6.
[31] N. Ahad, J. Qadir, and N. Ahsan, "Neural networks in wireless networks: Techniques, applications and guidelines," Journal of Network and Computer Applications, vol. 68, pp. 1–27, 2016.
Performance Analysis of Cognitive Radio Systems with Imperfect Channel Knowledge
Originally posted in Sec-IG blog (link to the original post)
Ankit Kaushik, Friedrich Jondral
Communications Engineering Lab, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany
Contact Information: email@example.com
Over the last decade, wireless communication is witnessing a tremendous growth in the data traffic due to ever-increasing number of connected devices. According to the recent surveys on mobile traffic by prominent market leaders Cisco [1] and Ericsson [2], the existing mobile traffic is expected to increase 11-fold by 2021. Certainly, in future, the state-of-the-art standards (fourth-Generation (4G) – LTE, WiMAX) are incapable of sustaining the substantial amount of data traffic, originating from these devices. It is being visualized that a major portion of this requirement can be satisfied through an additional spectrum. Due to exclusive usage, the spectrum below 6 GHz is not able to meet this demand of additional spectrum, leading to its scarcity. To this end, Cognitive Radio (CR), along with millimeter-wave technology [3] and visible-light communication [4], is envisaged as an alternative source of spectrum. The latter techniques are limited to a point-to-point communication, by which mobility is compromised. In contrast, a CR system aims at an efficient utilization of the spectrum below 6 GHz – suitable for mobile communications – by enabling a secondary access to the licensed spectrum while ensuring a sufficient protection to the licensed users (also referred as a primary system).
Despite the fact that an extensive amount of literature – including [5]-[7] – has been dedicated to the field of CR, its performance analysis has been dealt inadequately from a deployment perspective. Therefore, making it difficult to understand the extent of vulnerability caused to the primary system. In this context, it is essential to establish a deployment-centric viewpoint for analyzing the performance of a CR system. Following this viewpoint, it has been identified that the involved channels' knowledge at the secondary transmitter is pivotal for the realization of cognitive techniques. However, the aspect of channel knowledge in context to CR systems, particularly its impact on the performance, has not been clearly understood. With the purpose of curtailing this gap, the research carried out at Communications Engineering Lab (CEL), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) proposes a successful integration of this knowledge – by carrying out channel estimation – in reference to different CR systems, namely interweave, underlay and hybrid systems. More specifically, our work outlines the following aspects corresponding to the aforementioned CR systems, employing different cognitive techniques such as spectrum sensing, power control and their combination.
Analytical Framework
First, an analytical framework is established to characterize the effects such as time allocation and variation, arising due to the incorporation of imperfect channel knowledge, that are detrimental to the performance of the CR systems [8,9].
In order to satisfy the low complexity and the versatility towards unknown primary user signal requirements, which are necessary for the deployment of the CR systems, a received power-based channel estimation is included in the proposed framework. In this regard, an effort has been made to facilitate a direct incorporation of the estimated parameter (received power) to the performance characterization of the CR systems.
Besides, a stochastic approach is followed for characterizing the variations in the system. In particular, these variations cause uncertainty in the interference power received at the primary system, which may completely disrupt the operation of the CR systems. In order to maintain this uncertainty below a desired level, new interference constraints are proposed.
Performance Tradeoffs
Second, as a major observation, it has been identified that the estimation time is closely associated with the performance of the CR systems. On one side, it is related to the variations incurred in the system, through which the level of uncertainty in the interference can be effectively controlled, ultimately affecting the performance in terms of throughput at secondary receiver, defined as secondary throughput. While on the other side, the time resource allocated for channel estimation directly influences the secondary throughput. In our work, this kind of dual dependency of the secondary throughput on the estimation time has been investigated in the form of performance tradeoffs, namely estimation-sensing-throughput tradeoff for the interweave system and the hybrid system, and estimation-throughput tradeoff for the underlay system, cf. Figure 1.
Figure 1. An illustration of a) estimation-sensing-throughput and b) estimation-throughput tradeoff for interweave system and underlay systems, respectively. The performance tradeoff depicts the achievable throughput at secondary receiver.
These tradeoffs present a useful tool for visualizing the response of a CR system to different choices of the estimation time so that the performance degradation introduced due to the channel estimation can be precisely regulated. In other words, a system designer can utilize these tradeoffs to preclude situations under which the performance degradation becomes intolerable. Conversely, from a theoretical perspective, these tradeoffs can be used to determine a suitable estimation time that yields the maximum achievable secondary throughput while obeying the interference constraints.
Hardware Deployment
Third, using a software defined radio platform, hardware implementations are carried out to validate the feasibility of the analysis proposed [10]-[12]. In addition to this, hardware demonstrators are deployed, which in a way present the operation of CR systems in more practical conditions.
[1] Cisco, "Cisco Visual Networking Index: Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast Update, 2013 – 2018," White Paper, Feb. 2014.
[2] Ericsson,"Ericsson Mobility Report," Tech. Rep., Nov. 2015. [Online]. Available: http://www.ericsson.com/res/docs/2015/mobility-report/ericsson-mobility-report-nov-2015.pdf
[3] T. S. Rappaport, S. Sun, R. Mayzus, H. Zhao, Y. Azar, K. Wang, G. N. Wong, J. K. Schulz, M. Samimi, and F. Gutierrez, "Millimeter Wave Mobile Communications for 5G Cellular: It Will Work!" IEEE Access, vol. 1, pp. 335–349, 2013.
[4] S. Wu, H. Wang, and C. H. Youn, "Visible light communications for 5G wireless networking systems: from fixed to mobile communications," IEEE Netw., vol. 28, no. 6, pp. 41–45, Nov. 2014.
[5] Y.-C. Liang, Y. Zeng, E. C. Y. Peh, and A. T. Hoang, "Sensing-Throughput Tradeoff for Cognitive Radio Networks," IEEE Trans. Wireless Commun., vol. 7, no. 4, pp. 1326–1337, Apr. 2008.
[6] X. Kang, Y. C. Liang, A. Nallanathan, H. K. Garg, and R. Zhang, "Optimal power allocation for fading channels in cognitive radio networks: Ergodic capacity and outage capacity," IEEE Trans. Wireless Commun., vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 940–950, Feb. 2009.
[7] X. Kang, Y.-C. Liang, H. K. Garg, and L. Zhang, "Sensing-Based Spectrum Sharing in Cognitive Radio Networks," IEEE Trans. Veh. Technol., vol. 58, no. 8, pp. 4649–4654, Oct. 2009.
[8] A. Kaushik, S. K. Sharma, S. Chatzinotas, B. Ottersten, and F. K. Jondral, "Sensing-Throughput Tradeoff for Interweave Cognitive Radio System: A Deployment-Centric Viewpoint," IEEE Trans. Wireless Commun., vol. 15, no. 5, pp. 3690–3702, May 2016.
[9] A. Kaushik, S. K. Sharma, S. Chatzinotas, B. Ottersten, and F. K. Jondral, "On the Performance Analysis of Underlay Cognitive Radio Systems: A Deployment Perspective," IEEE Trans. on Cogn. Commun. Netw., vol. 2, no. 3, pp. 273–287, Sep. 2016.
[10] A. Kaushik, M. Mueller, and F. K. Jondral, "Cognitive Relay: Detecting Spectrum Holes in a Dynamic Scenario," in Tenth International Symposium on Wireless Communication Systems (ISWCS), 2013, pp. 1–2.
[11] A. Kaushik, F. Wunsch, A. Sagainov, N. Cuervo, J. Demel, S. Koslowski, H. J ̈ kel, and F. Jondral, "Spectrum sharing a for 5G wireless systems (Spectrum sharing challenge)," in IEEE International Symposium on Dynamic Spectrum Access Networks (DySPAN), Sep. 2015, pp. 1–2.
[12] H. Becker, A. Kaushik, S. K. Sharma, S. Chatzinotas, and F. K. Jondral, "Experimental Study of an Underlay Cognitive Radio System: Model Validation and Demonstration," in 11th International Conference on Cognitive Radio Oriented Wireless Networks and Communications (CROWNCOM), May-Jun. 2016, pp. 511–523.


text:
May 3 FRRACS Meeting Recap/
Tonight we welcomed over 100 people - our biggest meeting yet! Thank you for coming out and sharing your thoughts and asking great questions. We had a packed agenda with updates about upcoming events this month. If you couldn't make it, you can access all of the handouts from tonight's meeting below.
Action Alert: We also announced an action for this Saturday, May 7. Governor Baker will be in town for an event and we will be there to tell him "No Compressor" and "No Pipeline Tax." We will be meeting at Abigail Adams Middle School at 1:30PM then walking over to Legion Field for the event that begins at 2pm (during tonight's meeting we said the rally was at 1PM, which was incorrect). Invite your friends and neighbors!
If you would like a No Compressor sign for your yard, send us an email and we can bring you one; signs are $5. email@example.com
EFSB Meeting - Commenting Guide
FERC Scoping Meeting - Commenting Guide
ConCom Meeting - Commenting Guide
Civil Disobedience film and discussion

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Lancashire Encounter Festival promises to be packed with performances, workshops and quirky installations.
The event is due to start on Friday, September 23, 2016 and will run until Sunday, September 25, 2016.
Here a quick event guide to Lancashire Encounter 2016:
Friday 23 September - 7pm-10pm
'Light Migrations'
'On the Edge Of A Rising Tide'
CHUTNEY in the Street
Red Rose
Travellers Tales
Preston Creative Partnership
The Theatre Ballads
Saturday 24 September - 11am-10pm
Circus Zyair
An Alien Robot Stole my iPig
Gold Thread Bobbins Screen Printing Workshops
The Freak Show feat Crystal Vision
LOL Moments
The Marvellous Imaginary Menagerie
DJ and Music
Forest Bazzaar
Core (part 1)
Artfull's Paper Extravaganza
'Puppet Improv'
'Signed Voices'
'On the Edge of A Rising Tide'
Blaze Lounge
Pass by Hawk Dance
The South Asian Arts
The Wheelhouse
September Theatre Club
'In Skrikers Footsteps 2'
Light and Dark
Red Rose
The Theatre Ballads
Wooley Thinking
Brace Yourself
Procession of Light
Sunday 25 September - 9am-5pm
Circus Zyair
Gold Thread Bobbins Screen Printing Workshops
Combat-a-thon - CANCELLED
The Marvellous Imaginary Menagerie
Community Expo
Forest Bazzaar
'Puppet Improv'
Artfull's Paper Extravaganza
'Signed Voices'
Blaze Lounge
Pass by Hawk Dance
South Asian Arts
The Wheelhouse
'September' Theatre Club
Run Preston
"In Skriker's Footsteps 2"
Light and Dark
Red Rose
Short story slam
Once Around the Sun
The Curious Sole of Luna Cobbler
Wooley Thinking
"History of the Music Halls"
Boylesque Workshop
Brohemia- "The World Within"
For more information on this event visit http://www.prestonguildcity.co.uk/assets/files/3154/Lancashire-Encounter-Programme-2016.pdf
Road Closures
Here are all the road closure from Friday 23 September until Sunday 25 September 2016. Original information can be found on the Preston City Council website.
Lancaster Road
From Thursday 22 September (12.01am) to Tuesday 27 September (03.00am) from its junction with Lord Street to its junction with Church Street
Birley Street
From Thursday 22 September (12.01am) to Tuesday 27 September (03.00am)
Jacson Stree
tFrom Thursday 22 September (12.01am) to Tuesday 27 September (03.00am)
Cannon Street
From Thursday 22 September (12.01am) to Tuesday 27 September (03.00am)
Guild Hall Street
From Thursday 22 September (12.01am) to Tuesday 27 September (03.00am)
Surgeons Court
From Thursday 22 September (12.01am) to Tuesday 27 September (03.00am)
From its junction with Fox Street to its junction with Lune Street
Short duration road closures
There will also be a number of shorter duration road closures during this weekend's events.
Cheapside will be closed during the following days and times:
Friday 23 September 2016 - 6.00pm - 9.30pm
Saturday 24 September 2016 - 10.00am – 11.59pm
Sunday 25 September 8.00am – 6.00pm
The closure of Cheapside will have a knock on affect on access to:
Market Street
Earl Street
Orchard Street
Anchor Court
Friargate - from its junction with Cheapside to its junction with Ringway
A closure will also be in place along Fishergate firstly to facilitate a performance and secondly to ensure that traffic congestion doesn't become a problem in this area due to the increased number of people expected to travel into the City Centre for the festival.
This closure will be in place during the following times:
Friday 23 September - 6.00pm - 9.30pm
Saturday 24 September - 4.00pm - 11.59pm
Sunday 25 September - 4.00pm - 7.00pm
Delivery issues
We are aware that some of the closures are for an extended period of time and will likely have an impact on the delivery schedule for businesses located on the affected roads.
In the first instance we would ask businesses to look at the feasibility of delivery vehicles parking outside of the affected area and carrying any deliveries to the business. However this may not be practical depending on the goods being delivered, in these instances please contact Richard Baxter on 01772 903663 and we will look into the possibility of scheduling delivery access. (no later than Wednesday 21 September)
Procession of Light road closures
As part of the Lancashire Encounter festival a procession of light will take place Saturday 24 September 2016.
Preston City Council is working closely with partners to ensure an uninterrupted journey for the Procession and the safety of spectators and participants. To facilitate the Procession additional road closures will be in place on Saturday evening.


text:
2017 Business School PhD Scholarships At University Of Nottingham, UK
The University of Nottingham invites applications from International students who wants to undergo a PhD program at the Institution.
This scholarship program cover full tuition fees as well as a tax-free stipend of £14,553 which will be provided to successful applicants.
- Applicants must be International students
- Applicants must have an excellent academic background (especially in the dissertation) and a strong research proposal
- Applicants must have completed their Masters and Bachelors degree program
- Applicants must have applied to University of Nottingham, UK
- Applicants must be proficient in English Language.
Application Process
Interested applicants should indicate on their PhD application form if they want to be considered for a scholarship. There is no separate scholarship application form to complete.
Click here to apply for a PhD program
Application Deadline
The application deadline for this scholarship program is on 9th June 2017
For More Information Visit The Scholarship Webpage
To see more local & international scholarships that you can easily qualify and apply for, click here


text:
Snow falls in Boise overnight; wind advisory for SW Idaho
Boise residents woke to white front yards and cars after a system dropped almost a half inch of snow overnight.
A wind advisory is in effect until 6 p.m. Monday for most of Southwest Idaho, according to the National Weather Service.
Winds will be 30 mph, with gusts up to 45 mph. That could make travel hazardous for trucks traveling north and south on Idaho highways.
About .4 inches of snow was measured at the Boise Airport. The ground was not frozen, so most of that is likely to be melted by noon Monday.
The west side of the Treasure Valley didn't get any snow, a National Weather Service meteorologist said.
Bogus Basin received about 2 inches, bringing the season total for the ski area to 14 inches. The stake at Bogus was showing 5 inches Monday morning.
Boise could see snow flurries late Monday and Tuesday morning but that's expected to turn to rain with rising temperatures. Other than that, there's no other snow expected this week.
Highs this week will be in the upper 40s and low 50s.
Katy Moeller: 208-377-6413, @KatyMoeller


text:
Lucidpress documents come equipped with collaborative tools that make working together easier. This tutorial will teach you how to use real-time collaboration, comments, and chat so you don't have to work on documents all by your lonesome self.
If you'd like to invite others to work on a document with you, you'll simply need to send them a link or an emailed invitation.
- In the Lucidpress editor, click on the blue "Share" button on the top right corner of your page. Click "With collaborators".
- Send an invite to an individual user, a group on your team, or your entire team by typing the email address or name of the individual or group you want to invite. Select their level of access from the drop-down before clicking "Share".
- If you want your recipients to be able to pass the document to others, click "Access Link". Before generating a link, make sure to select "multi-use link" (so it doesn't ever expire) as well as the level of access you'd like to allow.
Once you've invited others to collaborate on your document, you'll be able to edit the same document at the same time. Changes made by one account will automatically reflect on screens of other users. Call it magic, or call it the power of designing on the cloud.
Think the unicorn image your co-worker inserted into your business proposal is a bit tacky? Lucidpress allows you to leave comments on any images or text boxes that need extra attention and collaboration. Simply:
- Right-click on any specific element in your document (e.g. shape, text box, text selection, image, gallery, or video) and select "Add Comment". You can also select an object then add a comment from the "Insert" drop-down in the Menu bar.
- Type in your comment in the field that appears. To tag specific team members, type @ + their name and select the user's email address from the prompt.
- Comments left on a document are indicated by the icon of orange quotation marks.
- Reply to a comment by clicking on the comment icon (see above). Type your reply and press "Enter".
- Once a comment thread is complete and collaboration is no longer needed on the selected element, hit "Resolve".
To quickly communicate with collaborators who are in a document at the same time, use the chat box — found on the lower-left side of the editor.
If any other collaborators are logged in, you'll see their icons appear in this box.
To start a chat, simply click on the "Chat" box, type your message, and press "Enter" to send. You can hide the box by hitting the minimize icon on the top right corner of the box. When a collaborator messages you, the chat box will automatically open again.


text:
Latest News
GV bullies Modesto
MODESTO -- Matt Raggio never saw it coming. As soon as Golden Valley coach Jon Betschart finished his postgame speech, Raggio found himself on the bottom of a dogpile.
Raggio didn't mind.
The Golden Valley defensive lineman put the finishing touches on GV's 28-14 victory over Modesto on Thursday night when he picked up a fumble and huffed 20 yards for a touchdown late in the fourth quarter.
"I just saw the ball, scooped it up and ran," Raggio said.
"I couldn't believe it. What an awesome feeling."
It only seemed fitting the Golden Valley defense delivered the knockout blow on a night that it forced nine turnovers.
If you were wearing a Golden Valley uniform and didn't intercept a pass, you just weren't trying. GV finished with six interceptions.
"We were working hard tonight," said GV safety J.J. Terry, who snagged three interceptions. "In that loss against Sonora last week,
we didn't feel we earned our paychecks. We wanted to double our paychecks tonight."
Modesto quarterback Chad Bradley completed 14 of 34 passes for 148 yards before being pulled after throwing his fifth interception late in the third quarter.
Golden Valley's offense struggled to capitalize on any of the turnovers. GV turned the ball over three times itself and had two field goal attempts blocked.
"We had a new quarterback, Sergio (Gutierrez), who played hard," Betschart said. "There's still a learning curve for us offensively. We need to tighten it up this week."
Golden Valley had success moving the ball in the first half.
GV racked up 257 yards of total offense in the first two quarters on its way to building a 21-7 lead at the half.
Lee Xiong scored on a 24-yard run and Gutierrez scored on a 1-yard quarterback sneak to give Golden Valley a 14-7 lead at the end of the first quarter.
Matt Montiel added a 3-yard touchdown run in the second quarter and finished with a team high 70 yards on eight carries.
When the Golden Valley offense sputtered in the second half, the defense shut down Modesto's spread offense.
Terry stopped Modesto's first two second-half drives himself with interceptions No. 2 and 3.
"I basically just read the quarterback," Terry said.
"I looked at his eyes to see where he was going."
Modesto receiver Bryan Johnson cut the lead to 21-14 when he hauled in a 7-yard touchdown from back-up quarterback Trevor Hindman on the final play of the third quarter.
Johnson finished with 11 catches for 136 yards.
Golden Valley finally put the game away when defensive lineman Javier Rodriguez sacked Hindman and forced a fumble that set up Raggio's touchdown.
That one gave GV a 28-14 lead with 3:31 left in the game.
"We'll take it," Betschart said. "What a moment for Matt Raggio. That was fun."
Shawn Jansen is a Sun-Star sports reporter. He can be reached at 385-2462 or via e-mail at email@example.com.


text:
Don't Have an Account? Sign Up to Save Favorite Listings, Save Searches & More...
Small, separate, private office space in quiet Old Town location with shared kitchenette. A few blocks from King Street and one block from Founders Park and the waterfront. Spaces available in the Dalton Wharf Office Complex up to 1,804 sf. 2 hour free guest parking
The listing content relating to real estate for sale on this web site is courtesy of MRIS. Listing information comes from various brokers who participate in the MRIS IDX. Properties listed with brokerage firms other than COMPASS are marked with the MRIS Logo and detailed information about them includes the name of the listing brokers. The properties displayed may not be all the properties available. All information provided is deemed reliable but is not guaranteed and should be independently verified. All listing information copyright MRIS 2019.
Listing information last updated on November 22nd, 2019 at 7:45am EST.


text:
With less than a week until Dark Souls 3 is available to play worldwide, gamers are getting excited to jump into FromSoftware's unforgiving world. However, it seems that the game is having a few performance issues at the moment, something that will need to be fixed soon or else it'll risk upsetting the Western world.
Yesterday saw the reveal of a game-crashing bug that will trigger when a player walks over a certain number of summon signs, but that's not all that needs to be fixed in Dark Souls 3. According to thisgengaming, the game also experiences serious inconsistencies in its frame rate. So far, several reviews have mentioned the frame-rate issues but thisgengaming has been able to detail the area where the slowdowns are more prominent.
Reportedly, the area named "Halfway Fortress" is one that will cause serious frame rate issues. The area features a huge swamp filled with crab enemies to fight, and as a result causes slowdowns when there are too many of these enemies on-screen at one time. The frames will also begin to drop when the player character is running, or when multiple enemies attack at once. These issues are seen in other areas of the game as well, though they are not nearly as severe as in "Halfway Fortress." Hopefully we'll see a patch to fix the frame-rate problems, just as FromSoftware has promised for the crashing bug.
Regardless of any issues, Dark Souls 3 is still going to be the cause of a lot of excitement when it releases in a few days. Available now to those in Japan, or those who cheat the system, many people have already begun their death-filled adventures. One determined gamer has beaten the first boss using only their fists, whereas another has impressively cleared the full game in under 2 hours. These players are just a couple of examples of the sort of dedicated fans that the Dark Souls franchise attracts. It's only a matter of time now before people are coming up with all sorts of crazy and unusual ways to beat the game at an even higher level of difficulty than the title normally provides.
As of this week, a team of blacksmiths were so devoted to the Dark Souls franchise that they have forged a real sword, based after the iconic Greatsword of Artorias. With fans like the ones that this series has, we're sure to only hear more impressive feats as the new game releases and the world of Dark Souls 3 is explored.


text:
Back in the 1990s, an anonymous dentist from Nigeria made the music history in Sweden and all over the world, with his smashing dance hit: "Hello Africa! Tell Me How You're Doin'?" If you're a dance music addict, then you know I'm talking about Dr. Alban. I guess that the freelance Millennials have no other choice than to consult YouTube and Wikipedia to hear and learn more about this dance music legend.
Now, we need a new dentist or developer with the music ambitions, who will come from India. Well, according to an eye-opening article in the Guardian, we're witnessing one of the most significant changes the world has ever seen.
India – The Land of Young People
Almost a half of the entire India's population are young people, under 25 years old. Here's the mind-blowing math. We are talking about 600 million youngsters, give it or take. Now, I'm a bit lazy to Google my claim, and you're free to prove me wrong, but I believe that this impressive number can match the combined populations of the EU and the USA. Again, give it or take, a few hundred million people more or less. Honestly, who cares?
So, what's the first thought on every young mind? How and where to find a job. Am I right? Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not necessarily implying that all these young people should become freelancers. Most of them are probably freelancing as we speak, but the future of freelancing doesn't have a pause button. Ask Google, but a few years from now, freelancers will outnumber the traditional 9-to-5 working army. That's a fact. Where will all those Indian newbie freelancers sing up for work?
Look Who's Freelancing Now on Freelancer.com!
If you've already found Dr. Alban's "Hello Africa" on YouTube, my next suggestion is "Look Who's Talking Now." You ain't going to regret listening to this one too, that's for sure. Freelancer.com is going to hit 30 Million users pretty soon. I'm not going to be surprised if a few years from now, Freelancer celebrates the next historical milestone – the 100 Million new users. It's inevitable and it's good news for all those young guys in India looking for work.
Freelancer has been both natural and preferred choice for Indian freelancers from the early beginnings to this day. I expect that this partnership is very likely to further intensify and ensure a win-win scenario.
Happy 26th January India and Australia!
I sure hope that this article is going to make it on time to say: Happy 26th January to both Indian and Aussie freelancers! I didn't know that the 26th January is the nation's Republic Day in India and the National Day of Australia. One will say that this is a lucky coincidence, but for me, this one has a deeper more symbolic meaning. This is what happens when you listen too much to good old dance music. You become too emotional. So, hello India, tell me how you're doin'?


text: Known as adestination for dining in downtownSan Diego, Daisy's Bar & Bistro is conveniently located adjacent to the lobby of the Bristol Hotel. Open seven days a week for breakfast, lunch and dinner, this casual restaurant serves up savory California cuisine in a relaxed and cozy setting. Every meal features specialty items on the menu from the Banana Stuffed French Toast to the Spanish Noodle Paella Fideua and the Cilantro Lime Marinated Skirt Steak. Happy hour is always happening from 5 to 7 p.m. at Daisy's Bar, located adjacent to the restaurant and close to area attractions such as Spreckels Theatre and the San Diego Opera.


text:
In today's Gospel, Matthew introduces us to two types of characters: those who seek Jesus but do not know where to look and those who know where to find Jesus but fail to seek.
"When you look for me, you will find me" (Jer 29:13)
No one knows if the story of the magi is historically accurate, but Matthew's narrative has inspired Christian imagination from earliest days. Lavish Byzantine frescoes in Jerusalem and Ravenna depict them as high-ranking Persian dignitaries. Western Christians during the Middle Ages, inspired by Psalm 72, depicted them as kings, complete with crowns and warhorses. Separate traditions among Eastern and Western Christians claim that the magi later became Christians and died martyrs' deaths. Matthew gives us little information about the appearance or background of the magi but instead focuses on what their actions reveal about Jesus.
In Matthew's day, the word magi described many different occupations. The word could be used for learned scholars who studied natural phenomena, like the stars. It could also be used for charlatans in the marketplace who dealt in potions and amulets. English takes the word "magic" from the latter description, but Matthew almost certainly meant the former. The magi in today's Gospel were scholars who believed, as did many in the ancient world, that great events were foretold in the shifting patterns of stars and planets in the sky.
We do not know what phenomenon indicated to the magi that a new king of the Jews had been born. A number of astronomical events, including a return of Halley's Comet, occurred in the decades surrounding Jesus' birth, but there is no evidence that Matthew is referring to any of these phenomena in particular. What the Gospel emphasizes is not the star itself but the magi's response when they recognized what it meant. They gave no thought to expense or danger. They collected gifts for a king and set off, trusting the star to guide them to the goal they sought.
The members of Herod's court could not stand in greater contrast. The chief priests and scribes knew exactly where to look but showed no interest in finding the child themselves. Herod, meanwhile, suspected that the star heralded "the Christ," but he treated the newborn babe as a powerful enemy. He spoke to the magi in secret to learn about the star and then sent them, like spies, to bring back intelligence. Although Herod and his counselors knew where to look, in their indifference and fear, they failed to seek.
One of Matthew's original purposes was to confirm something the early church found a great mystery: that through Christ, God's covenant with Israel was now open to the Gentiles. This is also the mystery Paul explains in today's second reading. Matthew's lessons do not end there, however. The world is full of seekers. Some of these seekers are men and women at the end of their rope, desperate for a liberator, longing for deliverance from poverty, human trafficking, the sex trade, mental illness, war, violence, poverty or injustice. Some are seekers of a different sort, longing not for deliverance but for a life worth living, a life with meaning and depth, with purpose and love.
As Christians, we know that Christ can save every soul and satisfy every longing, and we know where to find him. Christ himself told us to seek him among the poor, to find him where two or more are gathered. We find him in Scripture and in the sacraments and in the Spirit he gives us at our baptism. It is too easy for us to be like the chief priests and scribes in today's Gospel, indifferent to knowledge that would change the life of another. It is also easy to be like Herod and feel threatened by the presence of Christ, who imperils our ego-driven senses of power, comfort, privilege or security. Today's Gospel challenges us to be both seekers and guides, to be disciples who seek and find Christ, and then to show others the way.


text:
The moment we thought that the technology equipment that our forefathers used have been dead and buried long ago, that is the time that you and I are being greeted with the news that a company known as Funai Corp somewhere in faraway Japan is still manufacturing and selling Video Cassette Recorders.
At the mention of video cassette recorder at this point, we are easily thrown into reminiscence as it makes us look back down the memory lane when we are all growing up as children and the time that VCR was a hit back to back in many homes.
And the popular inscription then on the VCR labels which still lingers in our memory is the VHS, which stands for Video Home System.
The VCR is the piece of technology that was developed in the 50's and came into limelight in the 70's and 80's but today it is surprising to hear that Funai Corp company is still manufacturing and selling VCR.
Must Read: http://profsmythe.blogspot.com /2014/07/lazy-man-technology-automatic.html" target="_blank">A lazy man's technology; automatic toothpaste dispenser!
If you think that nobody is buying the VCR again in this era you should think again, because last year, Funai Corp is said to have sold about 750,000 of VCR units worldwide, which though as expected is a massive decline from millions of sales that is used to be recorded in the far past.
But do you know what?
Funai Corp is the last standing company still doing that and it all seems that they are even tired of the technology as they gear up towards putting an end to the manufacture of VCRs by the end of this month in what they hinged at difficulty in obtaining parts.
Since the news was brought to us that a company still manufactures VCR in this era, let it not also be a surprise the day you will wake up and hear that a company out there is still retailing the gramophone!


text:
We've been shooting a commercial for big pharma company. Around the beautiful set we've build a complete "white box". Hot animation!
Andreas De Ridder animating our crazy character.
We will be able to show you the result soon!
Only two days ago we finished shooting the new leader for "Man Bijt Hond".
Just as last year David Toutevoix was our DOP.
Andreas and Ben animating until 1 in the morning AND dancing afrobeat J
Joeri Bollaert and Carole Pizzaferri preparing the last set for "Man Bijt Hond".
The show will start on (Flemish) television at the end of august. We'll show our international friends the result a little after.
And there is more to come!!!


text: I got this awhile back from a buddy. I am not normally a chai person,but I decided to give this a chance. I did not steep this a very long time but just strong enough. This does taste like chai but I taste abit of caramel and perhaps vanilla on the end. This tea Is pretty good.


text:
Timeline for all sports
Girls Softball and Boys Volleyball
- Tryouts will be the first week of school
Boys/Girls Flag Football
- No tryouts. Intramurals - 2 days a week practice/games
Wrestling and Cross Country
- No tryouts needed, practice starts September
Girls Basketball
- Tryouts late September
Boys Basketball
- Tryouts mid-December
- No tryouts, practice starts March
Boys Soccer, Girls Soccer, Girls Volleyball
- Tryouts prior to spring break
For All After-School Sports
- A permission slip is necessary to try out. Click the button below to download, print and sign.
- Return the signed permission slip to the coach.
- You cannot be on the non-activities list for discipline or grades.
- Student athletes are responsible to keep their grades above a 2.0 and have no more than 1 F or 1 U
- Students will be notified of all upcoming sports by daily bulletin/posters in 6th grade classrooms and announcements in 7th/8th grade PE classes
- Once your child has been officially offered a position on any team click the button below to download the student athlete packet. Please complete all forms and return to the coach prior to the 1st game to ensure participation. No play time will be awarded until this packet is completed and returned.
- If students are sent to ACL or are removed from their classroom for discipline, they may not participate in practice or games the day of the infraction. If there is no practice/game on that day, the student stays off the court/field the following practice/game day. Parents will be notified as soon as possible if this occurs.
- All student athletes must be picked up from games or practices, whether home or away, within 15 minutes of the event ending. If your student athlete cannot be picked up in the allotted time, he or she will be removed from the team.


text: May 25th, 2016 - We were having a regular night when frat brother Jessie knocked over our bong and spilled the water all over the floor. In our frat that means he gets fucked, but the little bitch wouldn\'t give in so we had to tape him up and pound him one by one. Once we all fucked him sideways and raw he hoovered all of our loads like the slutty little pig he is.


text:
In a number of these cases the defendant killed his wife, or wife and children, and then killed himself, or attempted to kill himself. And there are some cases where a woman killed her husband or her children, and then killed herself or attempted to kill herself.
We recommend you download the raw database files for comprehensive searching, but here's a sample of related cases:
|View video of Cynthia Grant Bowman, author of Wife Murder in Chicago: 1910-1930.
|View video of Michelle Oberman, author of Understanding Infanticide in Context: Mothers Who Kill, 1870-1930 and Today.
"I Loved Joe, but I Had to Shoot Him": Homicide by Women in Turn-of-the-Century Chicago by Jeffrey S. Adler
This set of records kept by the police does not include all suicides of the period, only those associated with homicides and a few other suicides. The records for all suicides during the period would be kept by the Cook County Coroner.
Patterns of murder followed by suicide in circumstances of domestic violence persist in the present.
Three of the researchers on this project have examined the patterns of murder/suicides in this data set: * Professor Jeffrey Adler has studied a number of the cases of murder/suicides reported in this data set in Jeffrey S. Adler, "'If We Can't Live in Peace, We Might as Well Die,' Homicide-Suicide in Chicago, 1875-1910," Journal of Urban History, Vol. 26, p. 3-21 (1999). * Professor Cynthia Bowman and Ben Altman also comment upon patterns exhibited in the murder-suicides in cases where husbands killed their wives. This article examines patterns in domestic violence killings in the historical period, in comparison with patterns exhibited in present times. * Professor Michelle Oberman's article in the Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology compares cases in which mothers kill their children from the historical cases with patterns in similar cases today.
There are many similarities between the historical cases involving murder/suicide in circumstances of intimate partner homicide, and the cases of domestic violence in today's society. In spite of the vast differences in technology, in the development of psychiatry, the greater availability of more specialized social services, the incidence and character of these patterns seems to have changed little since the beginning of the past century.


text:
Estates Review discusses Concept™ from FSI, managing the day-to-day needs of tenants at Landflex
Landflex was launched in 2003 by one of the UK's leading blue chip property companies Land Securities, in a bid to capitalise on the growing trend for outsourcing cost-effective, prestige offices for a portfolio covering startups to multinationals.
Building on its parent company's extensive experience and in-depth research into the needs of modern businesses, Landflex - recognised as a pioneer in business outsourcing - provides an alternative to traditional office and institutional leases by offering new occupier solutions to today's businesses.
A key feature of the Landflex offer is that it enables customers to create a least profile to match their business plan. With options including leases of between one year and 15 years, clients are able to reserve space within the building if they feel they will need it in the future.
The portfolio of offices managed by Landflex includes landmark properties Empress State, 7 Soho Square, 40 Eastbourne Terrace and more recently 140 Aldersgate Street.
The Empress State estate complex provides around 40,000m2 of offices, complimented by a restaurant, fitness centre and meeting rooms. A spectacular feature is the revolving top floor which can be used as an informal meeting space or booked as a bar for presentations or corporate events.
At 7 Soho Square, 5,000m2 of office space is provided, with a fully-fitted suite of conference rooms, informal meeting rooms, video conferencing facilities and a coffee bar.
Offering greater cost control with a single accommodation charge, Landflex provides customers peace of mind from unexpected bills whilst offering assistance with expenditure planning. With the accommodation charge, Landflex provides customers peace of mind from unexpected bills whilst offering assistance with expenditure planning. With the accommodation charge including everything from rent, buildings insurance and maintenance to repair, operation and cleaning of all the building systems, structures, finishes, security and utilities; customers have the confidence to get on with their day jobs, making a success of business.
With over 11 tenants housing over 4,000 customers across the four buildings, it was necessary for Landflex to have a central system in place that could manage the day-to-day needs of tenants. From room booking facilities through to catering and Porterage, the chosen system would ultimately form the hub of the company that could be used as a proactive tool adapted to the individual requirements of the customers and the overall management process for Landflex.
The flexibility offered by Concept™ from CAFM developers FSI (FM Solutions) Ltd provides Landflex with a system that can be adapted to the many facets of its service offering. Not only is the single source system easy to manage including intuitive reporting and invoicing, but can also meet client expectations and contract nuances.
Paul Stafford, account services manager for Landflex, explains: "As Landflex develops and grows the huge flexibility of the FSI software package becomes more obvious. Accordingly, over time our portfolio of offices will grow and with that our tenants' requirements will inevitably become more diverse. Implementing Concept™ into a new building is, with the support of FSI, reassuringly straightforward - as is the manipulation of the system to accommodate the unique contracts for our individual clients.
"The Empress State building is a prime example when compared with Soho Square which is a multi-tenanted building/ The Empress State building has one major client and the invoicing and reporting is vastly different to that of Soho Square. With Concept™ the various idiosyncrasies of each contract are automated and this enables us to focus on the overall customer experience rather than the administration element.
"What is distinctive to the Concept™ solution is that the core element of the software remains the same, but we are then able to adapt that formula to the different clients making it a truly multi-faceted system."
FSI worked closely with Landflex to assess the many requirements of the company. With the eSQL module of the Concept™ system Landflex can now offer a complete browser-based solution to tenants enabling them to book rooms and log tasks themselves.
Calls and web requests are logged at a central helpdesk based in London Wall where they are then assigned to the correct service supplier. With eight people manning the helpdesk for all Landflex contracts it is a hive of industry.
The majority of calls are for soft services including catering, cleaning and security. The crystal reports provide detailed invoicing information each month, cutting both administration time and cost to Landflex.
"The reporting aspect of the system works on many levels," continues Paul. "Not only are we able to run reports comparing any combination of services we provide, but an audit trail is also produced. This helps to dramatically reduce the administration and resolution time of a problem or query should one occur."
Over 100 requests are logged into the Landflex system every day and with FSI's Workflow Lite™ module scheduled for implementation early 2006, Paul believes the Concept™ experience will become even more open to customers.
"At Landflex we have gone through many changes and Concept™ and FSI has accommodated and supported us through them all. Workflow Lite™ is a very useful tool for customers; with its automated messaging functionality it allows greater control and data presentation which will further enhance our tenants' experience with Landflex."


text:
—Chris and Brooke Atkins, Franchisees Since 2015
The franchise sales information on this site do not constitute an offer to sell a franchise by Wings Etc., Inc. or any party. The offer of a franchise can only be made through the delivery of a franchise disclosure document. Certain states require Wings Etc., Inc. to register the franchise disclosure document in those states. The communications on this web site are not directed by Wings Etc., Inc. to the residents of any of those states. Moreover, Wings Etc., Inc. will not offer or sell franchises in those states until we have registered the franchise (or obtained an applicable exemption from registration) and delivered the franchise disclosure document to the prospective franchisee in compliance with applicable law.


text: Alice, also known as @rudegirrl, is the perfect Minty Muse for our Simply Rude Tee. She's located in the beautiful tropical Island of Hawaii. She's fierce, fabulous, and fun! We adore her ever-changing pastel locks of cool shades of blue, grey, and purple. She also has an adorable pure white kitty that you can find popping up throughout her Instagram page every now and then ;) Don't forget to check out this adorable duo now!


text:
Satanic Warmaster- The Vampiric Tyrant
Tonight's late night of bloodshed is dedicated to a band who I just recently discovered thanks to a friend of mine. Being that I don't know much about Satanic Warmaster other than lone member Satanic Werewolf Tyrant's connection to the NS scene as well as his side project The True Werewolf. So, for now enjoy some catchy raw black metal in the vein of old Mayhem.


text:
Johnnie Walker Invisible in Sydney
Johnnie Walker Red, the Scotch whisky known for its tagline "Keep Walking", is being promoted in Australia with a television advertisement filmed in Kings Cross, a night spot in Sydney. The ad was launched on Boxing Day 2006 in association with the Australia/England Ashes cricket series, and was connected with the Johnnie Walker Red Label bar found at each of the Ashes venues.
The Johnnie Walker Invisible TV ad takes the perspective of an invisible character who is chauffer driven to meet friends for a night on the town. As he leaves his car and walks towards a night club he encounters similarly invisible characters. As he arrives at the bar, the Johnnie Walker Red Room, we discover that the character is Johnnie Walker himself. The ad finishes with the Striding Man logo. Click on the image below to play the video.
The Invisible campaign was developed for Diageo at Leo Burnett, Sydney, by creative director Mark Collis, art director Andrew Ostrom, copywriter Trent Christie and agency producer Simone O'Connor.
Filming was directed by Spencer Susser at Curious Film with director of photography Greig Fraser, producer John Rogers and co-producer Lucy Cooper. The ad was shot over three nights in Kings Cross, an infamous red light district in Sydney.
Post production was done at Fuel VFX, Sydney, by 35 artists and technicians under the leadership of Simon Maddison, VFX producer Dave Kelly, Lead Flame Artist Karen Fabling 3D Lead Mike Bain and 2D lead Chris Davies. 89 invisible people were created for the spot, along with CG and digital doubles used to populate scenes.
Sound was designed at Nylon Studios. The soundtrack to the clip, "Don't judge me by the clothes I wear, If you get to know me you know I won't care", was composed by Elliott Wheeler at Nylon Studios with words by Andrew Ostrom at Leo Burnett. Nylon Studios suggested adding a French translation to the recording. "Ne me juger pas par les vêtements que je porte…". The song was sung by Pip Branson and Melanie Horsnell.
Filed under: Commercials, Diageo, Johnnie Walker
Tagged: Curious Film, Elliott Wheeler, Fuel VFX, Greig Fraser, Leo Burnett, Leo Burnett Australia, Melanie Horsnell, Nylon Studios, Pip Branson, Spencer Susser
Location: Australia


text:
"The foreigners just can't get enough of our unconventional oil and gas plays," Cramer said on Monday's "Mad Money."
State-owned Korea National Oil on Monday signed a $1.55 billion deal with Anadarko Petroleum for one-third of its interest in the Eagle Ford shale in South Texas. Analysts pegged the value of the deal at about $13,000 to $16,000 per acre, representing some of the highest prices so far paid for acreage in that basin. The Eagle Ford is valued because it contains crude oil and natural gas that is rich in liquids that can be stripped out and sold at premium.


text:
Minecraft meets "The Hunger Games" at Anythink Libraries
Minecraft's increasing hold on popular culture is evident everywhere you look, from the stunning(ly insane) Minecraft recreations of "Game of Thrones" locales to its developers appearing on late night talk shows, as creator Notch will do tomorrow night on "The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson."
Locally, Thornton's innovative Anythink Libraries will use the virtual building-blocks game to host a networked Minecraft competition on Wednesday, Nov. 20 in which tween and teens are encouraged to break up into "Hunger Games" districts to create virtual worlds.
Anythink, it should be noted, is one of the first libraries in the country to maintain its own dedicated Minecraft server (via MCGamer) and has installed the game on all of its PCs district-wide.
A half dozen Anythink locations from Commerce City to Denver will be represented by a different fictional district from "The Hunger Games, and students from across Adams County will be able to create and interact with one another regardless of which location they visit.
Space is limited and interested players are encouraged to sign up online. Learn more about the two-hour event and register via Anythink's online calendar.
Here's the list of participating locations:
Anythink Bennett
495 7th St.
Bennett, 80102
Anythink Commerce City
7185 Monaco St.
Commerce City, 80022
Anythink Huron Street
9417 Huron St.
Thornton, 802260
Anythink Perl Mack
7611 Hilltop Cir.
Denver, 80221
Anythink Wright Farms
5877 E. 120th Ave.
Thornton, 80602
Anythink York Street
8990 York St.
Thornton, 80229