Lam, Chung, Gu and Sun (2003) proposed a lightweight security mechanism for mobile commerce transactions to meet the security needs in the face of the resource constraints of mobile devices. End-to-end security between the mobile device and the mobile commerce provider is established. However, its security builds on the assumption that customers can confirm every mobile commerce provider's public key by themselves before each transaction. Moreover, the mechanism still produces high overhead on the mobile device. This paper elucidates the causes of these drawbacks, and an enhanced mechanism is also proposed to protect mobile commerce transactions more effectively and efficiently.

In this paper, we propose a robust statistical framework for extracting scenes from a baseball broadcast video. We apply multi-stream hidden Markov models (HMMs) to control the weights among different features. To achieve a large robustness against new scenes, we used a common simple structure for all the HMMs. In addition, scene segmentation and unsupervised adaptation were applied to achieve greater robustness against differences in environmental conditions among games. The F-measure of scene-extracting experiments for eight types of scene from 4.5 hours of digest data was 77.4% and was increased to 78.7% by applying scene segmentation. Furthermore, the unsupervised adaptation method improved precision by 2.7 points to 81.4%. These results confirm the effectiveness of our framework.

We demonstrate a fast shutdown and resumption of a logic circuit applied a nonvolatile latch having SrBi2(Ta,Nb)2O9 (SBT) capacitors without a higher drive voltage than a logic voltage of 1.8 V. By assigning an individual drive circuit of the SBT capacitors to the nonvolatile latch not sharing a drive circuit with multiple nonvolatile latches, the fast shutdown and resumption of a logic circuit were completed in 7.5 ns at a drive voltage of 1.3 V. The fast shutdown and resumption without an addition of a high drive voltage to a logic circuit meets a requirement from power-saving applications of system LSIs fabricated in CMOS technologies at 90-nm and below.

Eigenvalue equations and expressions of EM fields for volume modes in an anisotropic single-negative slab with tensor material parameters is presented. By the comparison with the eigenvalue equation of surface modes along single-negative slab with negative scalar permeability, the validity of the present study is confirmed. We have also made clear which elements of the material parameter tensors affect existence of TE and TM modes in the slab. Taking the dispersion of material parameters into consideration, we demonstrate in detail that TE modes propagate in a slab with one negative element of the permeability tensor numerically. These TE modes turn out to be the magnetostatic waves (MSWs), which is the first demonstration of the MSW in a nonmagnetic material.

Internet Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) across geographically distributed users' networks are ideal for ad-hoc group activities, such as online gaming, over the Internet. However, users find it difficult to determine and set the configurations of the VPN routers and hosts rapidly enough for ad-hoc usage, due to the need for consistency of such configurations over the users' networks. Moreover, the number of operators is insufficient to help all users. Hence, the automatic determination and setting of such configurations from the management server is desirable. Existing auto-configuration methods are insufficient for ad-hoc usage because they cannot rapidly determine and set the hosts' configurations to be consistent with the VPN and user's network they are joining. To enable ad-hoc creation of and joining to a VPN by the users themselves, we propose a new method that utilizes the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), which can automatically set the configurations of many existing hosts. The DHCP server's and relay agents' configurations are automatically determined and set by the VPN management server, based on the user request, so that the hosts can be auto-configured to be consistent with the VPN and the user's network they are joining, from the DHCP server via the autoconfigured DHCP relay agents. To evaluate the time overhead of our proposed method, we implemented a test bed, including 10 VPN routers, a VPN management server, and a DHCP server. In this evaluation, the DHCP server is auto-configured for each new VPN in less than 1 second, and the DHCP relay agents on the VPN routers are auto-configured in less than 5 percent of the total time for configuring the VPN routers, regardless of the total number of the VPN routers in a VPN. These results show that the proposed method can auto-configure the VPN routers and hosts simultaneously with the DHCP, while ensuring sufficient rapidity of the entire auto-configuration operation for ad-hoc usage.

A novel approach of robust adaptive beamforming (RABF) is presented in this paper, aiming at robustness against both finite-sample effects and steering vector mismatches. It belongs to the class of diagonal loading approaches with the loading level determined based on worst-case performance optimization. The proposed approach, however, is distinguished by two points. (1) It takes finite-sample effects into account and applies worst-case performance optimization to not only the constraints, but also the objective of the constrained quadratic equation, for which it is referred to as joint worst-case RABF (JW-RABF). (2) It suggests a simple closed-form solution to the optimal loading after some approximations, revealing how different factors affect the loading. Compared with many existing methods in this field, the proposed one achieves better robustness in the case of small sample data size as well as steering vector mismatches. Moreover, it is less computationally demanding for presenting a simple closed-form solution to the optimal loading. Numerical examples confirm the effectiveness of the proposed approach.

To provide application-oriented network services, a variety of overlay networks are deployed over physical IP networks. Since they share and compete for the same physical network resources, their selfish behaviors affect each other and, as a result, their performance deteriorates. Our research group considers a model of overlay network symbiosis, where overlay networks coexist and cooperate to improve their application-level quality of service (QoS) while sustaining influences from the physical network and other overlay networks. In this paper, we especially focus on Peer-to-Peer (P2P) networks among various overlay networks. We propose a mechanism for pure P2P networks of file-sharing applications to cooperate with each other. In our proposal, cooperative peers establish logical links among two or more P2P networks, and messages and files are exchanged among cooperative P2P networks through these logical links. For efficient and effective cooperation, we also propose an algorithm for selection of cooperative peers and a caching mechanism to avoid putting too much load on cooperative peers and cooperating networks. Simulation results show that our proposed mechanism improves the search efficiency of P2P file-sharing applications and reduces the load in P2P networks.

We obtain an upper bound for the maximum aperiodic and odd correlations of the recently derived p-ary sequences from Galois rings [1]. We use the upper bound on hybrid sums over Galois rings [5], the Vinogradov method [4] and the methods of [5] and [6].

Large sets of matrices with good auto and cross-correlation are rare. We present two such constructions, a method of extending family size by column multiplication and a method of extending physical size by interlacing. These matrices can be applied to digital watermarking of images.

The optical ZCZ code is a set of pairs of binary and bi-phase sequences with zero correlation zone. An optical M-ary direct sequence spread spectrum (M-ary/DS-SS) system using this code can detect a desired sequence without interference of undesired sequences. However, the bank of matched filters in a receiver circuit may fall into large scale. In this paper, we propose the compact construction of a bank of matched filters for an M-ary/DS-SS system using an optical ZCZ code. This filter bank can decrease the number of 2-input adders from O(N2) to O(N) and delay circuits from O(N2) to O(Nlog 2 N), respectively, and is implemented on a field programmable gate array (FPGA) corresponding to 400,000 logic gates.

How to mitigate the influence of unfair testimonies remains an open issue in the research of rating systems. Methods have been proposed to filter the unfair testimonies in order to mitigate the influence of unfair testimonies. However, existing methods depend on assumptions that ratings follow a particular distribution to carry out the testimony filtering. This constrains them in specific rating systems and hinders their applications in other reputation systems. Moreover, existing methods do not scale well with the increase of testimony number due to their iterative nature. In this paper, a novel entropy-based method is proposed to measure the testimony quality, based on which unfair testimonies are further filtered. The proposed method does not require the assumption regarding the rating distribution. Moreover, it scales linearly with the increase of the testimony number. Experimental results show that the proposed method is effective in mitigating the influence of various types of unfair testimonies.

Design of optimal controllers satisfying performance criteria of minimum tracking error and disturbance level for an interval system using a multi-objective evolutionary approach is proposed in this paper. Based on a worst-case design philosophy, the design problem is formulated as a minimax optimization problem, subsequently solved by a proposed two-phase multi-objective genetic algorithm (MOGA). By using two sets of interactive genetic algorithms where the first one determines the maximum (worst-case) cost function values for a given set of controller parameters while the other one minimizes the maximum cost function values passed from the first genetic algorithm, the proposed approach evolutionarily derives the optimal controllers for the interval system. To suitably assess chromosomes for their fitness in a population, root locations of the 32 generalized Kharitonov polynomials will be used to establish a constraints handling mechanism, based on which a fitness function can be constructed for effective evaluation of the chromosomes. Because of the time-consuming process that genetic algorithms generally exhibit, particularly the problem nature of minimax optimization, a parallel computation scheme for the evolutionary approach in the MATLAB-based working environment is also proposed to accelerate the design process.

Several research fields have to deal with very large classification problems, e.g. handwritten character recognition and speech recognition. Many works have proposed methods to address problems with large number of samples, but few works have been done concerning problems with large numbers of classes. CombNET-II was one of the first methods proposed for such a kind of task. It consists of a sequential clustering VQ based gating network (stem network) and several Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) based expert classifiers (branch networks). With the objectives of increasing the classification accuracy and providing a more flexible model, this paper proposes a new model based on the CombNET-II structure, the CombNET-III. The new model, intended for, but not limited to, problems with large number of classes, replaces the branch networks MLP with multiclass Support Vector Machines (SVM). It also introduces a new probabilistic framework that outputs posterior class probabilities, enabling the model to be applied in different scenarios (e.g. together with Hidden Markov Models). These changes permit the use of a larger number of smaller clusters, which reduce the complexity of the final classifiers. Moreover, the use of binary SVM with probabilistic outputs and a probabilistic decoding scheme permit the use of a pairwise output encoding on the branch networks, which reduces the computational complexity of the training stage. The experimental results show that the proposed model outperforms both the previous model CombNET-II and a single multiclass SVM, while presenting considerably smaller complexity than the latter. It is also confirmed that CombNET-III classification accuracy scales better with the increasing number of clusters, in comparison with CombNET-II.

A temporal error concealment algorithm for the block-based video coder has been proposed. The concept of block overlapping is adopted to conceal the erroneous blocks, and the recovered pixels are estimated by the weighted sum from the overlapping. The overlapping weighting matrix has been carefully selected in order to fully exploit the spatial-temporal correlation between boundary blocks and the lost block. Furthermore, the motion vector for the lost block has been recovered by considering the best results for the overlapping. The experimental results are shown by integrating our algorithm into the H.263+ coder.

Quasi-orthogonal Space Time Block Code (STBC) was designed to provide full transmission rate when using more than two antennas. However, it cannot have a full diversity gain because of the interference resulted from its quasi orthogonality property. In order to achieve full diversity from quasi-orthogonal STBC, the interference can be removed by a Simple Correlation Canceling (SCC) algorithm which improves a system performance significantly. However, the SCC algorithm has a disadvantage that produces noise enhancement, thereby resulting in performance degradation. Accordingly, without increasing an extra system complexity, an unequal power allocation scheme in a transmitter is proposed to achieve a better system performance than the conventional STBC system using the SCC algorithm. Also, the unequal power allocation scheme enables a receiver to use a simple decoding procedure that does not produce noise enhancement.

This paper presents constructions of two kinds of sets of sequences with a zero correlation zone, called ZCZ code, which can reach the upper bound of the member size of the sequence set. One is a ZCZ code which can be constructed by a unitary matrix and a perfect sequence. Especially, a ternary perfect sequence with elements 1 and zero can be used to construct the proposed ZCZ code. The other is a ZCZ code of pairs of ternary sequences and binary sequences which can be constructed by an orthogonal matrix that includes a Hadamard matrix and an orthogonal sequence pair. As a special case, an orthogonal sequence pair, which consists of a ternary sequence and a binary sequence, can be used to construct the proposed ZCZ code. These codes can provide CDMA systems without co-channel interference.

Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) are overlay networks established on top of a public network backbone with the goal of providing a service comparable to Private Networks (PNs). The recently proposed VPN hose-model provides customers with flexible and convenient ways to specify their bandwidth requirements. To meet the specified bandwidth requirements, the Network Service Provider (NSP) must reserve sufficient bandwidth on the data transmission paths between each pair of endpoints in a VPN. In addition, the reliability of a VPN depends on the reliability of the data transmission paths. Italiano et al. proposed an algorithm that finds a set of backup paths for a given VPN (VPN tree) under the single-link failure model [1]. When a link failure is detected on a VPN tree, a backup path corresponding to the failed link can be activated to restore the disconnected VPN tree into a new one, thereby ensuring the reliability of the VPN. However, Italiano's algorithm cannot guarantee that the specified bandwidth requirement of the given VPN under the single-link failure model will be met. To address this issue, we propose a new backup path set selection algorithm called BANGUAD in this paper. In addition, the problem of establishing multiple bandwidth-guaranteed hose-model VPNs under the single-link failure model has not been investigated previously. However in this problem, bandwidth-sharing algorithms have the potential to improve the performance of a provisioning algorithm significantly. Therefore, we also propose a bandwidth sharing algorithm and three provisioning algorithms for establishing multiple bandwidth-guaranteed hose-model VPNs under the single-link failure model. Simulations that compare the performance of the proposed algorithms are reported.

A plane drawing of a plane graph is called a rectangular drawing if every face including the outer face is a rectangle. A based rectangular drawing is a rectangular drawing with a designated base line segment on the outer face. An algorithm to generate all based rectangular drawings having exactly n faces is known. The algorithm generates each based rectangular drawing having exactly n faces in constant time "on average." In this paper, we give another simple algorithm to generate all based rectangular drawings having exactly n faces. Our algorithm generates each based rectangular drawing having exactly n faces in constant time "in the worst case." Our algorithm generates each based rectangular drawing so that it can be obtained from the preceding one by at most three operations and does not output entire drawings but the difference from the preceding one. Therefore the derived sequence of based rectangular drawings is a kind of combinatorial Gray code for based rectangular drawings.

Barker sequences have been used in many existing communications and ranging systems. Unfortunately, the longest known biphase and quadriphase Barker sequences are of lengths 13 and 15, respectively. In this paper, we introduce the so-called quasi-Barker sequences which achieve the minimum peak sidelobe level one within a certain window centered at the mainlobe. As our key results, all the best biphase and quadriphase quasi-Barker sequences of lengths up to 36 and 21, respectively, were obtained by an efficient computer search. These sequences may provide better multipath resistance and tracking accuracy in ranging applications.

A Huffman sequence has a zero-sidelobe aperiodic autocorrelation function except at both shift ends. This paper presents orthogonal sets of the zero correlation zone (ZCZ) Huffman sequences and the application to a quasi-synchronous CDMA system with interferences suppressed. The sequences with low or large peak values are constructed on the basis of sequence spectra corresponding to multiple convolution of elementary sequences, and include the ZCZ sequences. The CDMA system is constructed from the ZCZ sequences, and suppresses intersymbol and interchannel interferences.