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The Rockefeller Foundation shipped two Apple II computers with VisiCalc to the Tunisian Ministry of Agriculture to address a grain shortage in the early 1980s. The foundation believed that VisiCalc would enable the speedy and complex analytical modeling necessary to improve the management and, consequently, the production of grain resources. The foundation also argued that VisiCalc would empower individuals in the Ministry of Agriculture, improving their own analytical thinking as they became more familiar with the modeling capabilities of the software. Even with the use of VisiCalc, Tunisia experienced violent riots due to high bread prices after the government's removal of grain subsidies. This paper explores the narratives and uses of VisiCalc in the Tunisian Ministry of Agriculture in addressing this food crisis both before and after the riots. The work here contributes to computing history through an analysis of the historical relationships among governing bodies, nongovernment organizations, technology, and the global financial economy. It argues that the uses of VisiCalc in Tunisia were connected with financial austerity firmly aligned with Western interests. In doing so, this paper shows how a focus on postcolonial Africa can enrich the international history of computing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large dam projects (i.e., those exceeding 15 m) often make headlines for their poor performance and their negative social and environmental impacts. The world register characterizes dams by height, purpose (e.g., irrigation), and type (e.g., rock-fill). Thus, large dams differ in many technical ways, but because practitioners still lack a framework to sort them into different types for management purposes, they tend to manage them in a one-size-fits-all manner. Shenhar and Dvir's NTCP (novelty, technology, complexity, and pace) model (2007) may be a good fit as large dams experience high unforeseen technological uncertainty. In this paper, through observations, a case study, a qualitative analysis of 42 interviews with project managers, and a quantitative analysis, we examined 30 large dam projects in Africa and sorted them into different categories according to the NTCP model. Going beyond the rather static NTCP, we identified their underlying NTCP characteristics and the variety of roles that their project managers played throughout the lifecycle, and highlighted the dynamic fit between the roles and NTCP characteristics. Since different characteristics and project manager's roles are prominent at different phases, project managers should sort dams into different types based on the NTCP model at different phases, and tailor their roles accordingly for more success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When a significant event occurs, many news articles from different newsagents often report it. Moreover, these newsagents also provide platforms for their readers to write comments expressing their views or understanding. Through digesting these reader comments, we can gain insights into the reactions, suggestions, personal experiences, or public opinions with respect to the emerging event. However, these reader comments from different sources are often rapidly accumulated resulting in an enormous volume. It becomes difficult to manually analyze these comments. In this paper, we propose a framework that can digest reader comments automatically through latent event facets and news specificity. An event facet refers to the aspect of the event concerned by many readers. Specifically, some of the reader comments, despite coming from different sources, discuss a certain facet of the event. Such facets provide an effective means for organizing news comments in a global manner. On the other hand, some comments discuss the specific topic of the corresponding news article. These specific topics demonstrate the specific focus of readers on the piece of news locally. Such reader comment digest in different granularities facilitates readers deeper understanding of these enormous comments. To achieve the above desirable goal of digesting reader comments, we propose an unsupervised model called EFNS which is capable of capturing the intricate fine-grained associations among events, news, and comments. We also develop a multiplicative-update method to infer the parameters and prove the convergence of our algorithm. Our framework can also visualize reader comments according to the relationship with latent event facets and the degree of news specificity. Experimental results show that our proposed EFNS model can provide an effective way to digest news reader comments and outperform the state-of-the-art method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Low-voltage, low-power solar photovoltaic (PV) based dc microgrids are becoming very popular in nonelectrified regions of developing countries due to lower upfront costs compared to utility grid alternatives and limited power needs of rural occupants. The optimal planning of distribution architecture along with sizing of various system components such as solar panels, batteries, and distribution conductors is essential for minimizing the system cost and enhance its utilization. In this paper, we develop a framework for optimal planning and design of low-power low-voltage dc microgrids for minimum upfront cost. The analysis is based on region-specific irradiance and temperature profiles; constraints in storage and distributions; distribution loss analysis; and optimum component sizing (storage, conductor, and PV panel) requirements based upon an energy balance model for a 24-h operation. We further analyze the merits of tailoring distribution architecture for maximizing the system utility in the planning of future microgrid deployments. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]