74 results about "Cost–benefit analysis" patented technology

The present invention relates to a system (10) and methodology (170, 173, 180, 400, 600, 1000) to enable a variety of information associated with one or more notification sources (26-28) to be directed to one or more notification sinks (36-38) via a notification platform architecture (10). The architecture (10) includes a context analyzer (22) for determining a user's state such as location and attentional focus, wherein the user's state is employed by a notification manager (24) to make decisions regarding what, when and how information generated by the notification sources (26-28) should be forwarded to the notification sinks (36-38), for example. These decisions can include a cost benefit analysis wherein considerations are given as to whether the benefits of notifying the user are outweighed by the costs of disrupting the user. Decision-theoretic policies (177, 180) and/or somewhat less formal heuristic policies (177) can be employed to enable the decision-making process within the notification manager (24).

The present invention relates to a system and methodology providing a user interface that can be employed by contactors and contactees in conjunction with a communications architecture for identifying and establishing an optimal communication based on preferences, capabilities, contexts and goals of the parties to engage in the communication. The user interface can include a graphical display having a plurality of display objects and associated input fields operable by one or more parties to a communication in order to facilitate convenient access, control, personalization and communications via the communications architecture. For example, configuration capabilities are provided in the user interface to enable operational adjustments to one or more operating parameters, communications groupings, policies and/or context preferences relating to a preferred modality of communication and to potential parties of communication between the contactors and contactees. User interface controls are also provided for defining deterministic policies and for encoding preferences for cost-benefit analyses.

The present invention relates to utilizing identity and context-sensitive decision-making for handling communications, including, channel selection, routing, and rescheduling operations. The systems and methods provide a service that allows users to assess preferences regarding real-time call handling and performs dynamic decision-making about the best timing and channel for interpersonal communication. This service can be based on various cost-benefit analyses (e.g., basic and extended) that consider cost of interruption and preferences of contactors and contactees to guide communications, and/or on decision-making under uncertainty. Statistical models that are learned from data are joined with user preferences to generate expected costs of interruption for office activity and over time, based on a user's activities, locations, calendar information and preference assessments. In addition, statistical forecasting provides presence and availability predictions. The foregoing can provide an enhanced interpersonal communication system that can maximize the value and minimize the cost of communication among people.

The present invention relates to a system and methodology to facilitate extraction of information from a large unstructured corpora such as from the World Wide Web and/or other unstructured sources. Information in the form of answers to questions can be automatically composed from such sources via probabilistic models and cost-benefit analyses to guide resource-intensive information-extraction procedures employed by a knowledge-based question answering system. The analyses can leverage predictions of the ultimate quality of answers generated by the system provided by Bayesian or other statistical models. Such predictions, when coupled with a utility model can provide the system with the ability to make decisions about the number of queries issued to a search engine (or engines), given the cost of queries and the expected value of query results in refining an ultimate answer. Given a preference model, information extraction actions can be taken with the highest expected utility. In this manner, the accuracy of answers to questions can be balanced with the cost of information extraction and analysis to compose the answers.

The present invention relates to a system and methodology to enable a variety of information associated with one or more notification sources to be directed to one or more notification sinks via a notification platform architecture. The architecture includes a context analyzer for determining a user's state such as location and attentional focus, wherein the user's state is employed by a notification manager to make decisions regarding what, when and how information generated by the notification sources should be forwarded to the notification sinks, for example. These decisions can include a cost benefit analysis wherein considerations are given as to whether the benefits of notifying the user are outweighed by the costs of disrupting the user. Decision-theoretic policies and/or somewhat less formal heuristic policies can be employed to enable the decision-making process within the notification manager.

A system and method for avoiding accessing a remote database twice, once during query execution and again to retrieve objects identified by the query, when an application requires objects on which to operate. During query plan generation in response to a request for database objects from an application, a query optimizer inserts cache operators into the candidate plans, and then a cost-benefit analysis is undertaken to identify the best plan. The best plan is then used to execute the query, with the cache operators causing objects identified during query execution to be cached locally to the requesting application as the query is being executed, thereby avoiding requiring the application to access the database after query execution.

A proactive adaptive radio methodology for the opportunistic allocation of radio spectrum is described. The methods can be used to allocate radio spectrum resources by employing machine learning to learn models, via accruing data over time, that have the ability to predict the context-sensitive durations of the availability of channels. The predictive models are combined with decision-theoretic cost-benefit analyses to minimize disruptions of service or quality that can be associated with reactive allocation policies. Rather than reacting to losses of channel, the proactive policies seek switches in advance of the loss of a channel. Beyond determining durations of availability for one or more frequency bands statistical machine learning also be employed to generate price predictions in order to facilitate a sale or rental of the available frequencies, and these predictions can be employed in the switching analyses The methods can be employed in non-cooperating distributed models of allocation, in centralized allocation approaches, and in hybrid spectrum allocation scenarios.

A list scheduler in a compiler can select from a plurality of alternative instruction sequences for one or more computation performed within an application. A scheduler can initially identify and track one or more computations for which multiple alternative instruction sequences exist. An available instruction list can be populated with the alternative instruction sequences. The list scheduler can access the available instruction list during scheduling of the application. The list scheduler can perform a cost analysis while scheduling the instructions by performing a look ahead. The list scheduler may select alternate instruction sequences for similar computations occurring in different portions of the application based on the cost benefit analysis.

The invention relates to a cost benefit analysis method of a renewable energy source distributed generation operation mode. The method comprises the following steps: determining all operation modes of the renewable energy source distributed generation; performing match analysis on the distributed contribution and a load curve, and determining different types of electric quantity; determining property right demarcation points, boundary conditions and calculation parameters of the distributed generation under different operation modes; determining the expense composition and income composition of the distributed generation in the whole life cycle under different operation modes; determining the total expense present value, annual average expense present value, total income present value and annual average income present value of the distributed generation in the whole life cycle under different operation modes; determining the benefit/cost value PI of the distributed generation in the whole life cycle under different operation modes; and selecting the scheme with the greatest benefit/cost value, and determining the optimal operation mode of the distributed generation. The method provided by the invention lays a firm theoretical foundation for making supporting policies for the renewable energy source distributed generation and distribution network.

A query processing method intersects two or more unsorted lists based on a conjunction of predicates. Each list comprises a union of multiple sorted segments. The method performs lazy segment merging and an adaptive n-ary intersecting process. The lazy segment merging comprises starting with each list being a union of completely unmerged segments, such that lookups into a given list involve separate lookups into each segment of the given list. The method intersects the lists according to the predicates while performing the lazy segment merging, such that the lazy segment merging reads in only those portions of each segment that are needed for the intersecting. As the intersecting proceeds and the lookups are performed, the intersecting selectively merges the segments together, based on a cost-benefit analysis of the cost of merging compared to the benefit produced by reducing a number of lookups.

Briefly, in accordance with one embodiment of the invention, the computer implemented method evaluates the sustainability of land development plan. The computer implemented method applies sustainability data to the land planning and engineering design elements of a land development plan to generate sustainability measures. These sustainability measures may include environmental impacts such as carbon footprints, energy consumption, and increased storm water runoff. In addition, the computer implemented method estimates the costs involved in investing in sustainable land development and construction, provides a cost benefit analysis, compares the sustainability of numerous land development plans, and calculates the near and long term effects of sustainable land development on a land site. This real time analysis will allow developers, municipalities, and residents to quantify land planning decisions without expending significant time and money in a cumbersome land planning process.

The invention relates to a power distribution network energy storage system configuration method based on active management and cost-benefit analysis, and the method comprises the following steps: S1, an active management system is established for actively managing a power distribution network, and a cost-benefit analysis system is also established and comprises an energy storage configuration model; S2, a power distribution system module reads time series data of annual load and photovoltaic power generation output, records a real-time SVR/OLTC running state and transmits to the cost-benefit analysis system and an EMS control module; S3, the EMS module compares the present voltage level data with a set voltage index and transmits charge-discharge power information to an energy storage system module to control the present voltage level in a normal range; and S4, the cost-benefit analysis system performs cost-benefit calculation on the energy storage system and optimizes the energy storage capacity configuration. According to the invention, the power distribution network active management system is established to perform the active management of the power distribution network; and the energy storage cost-benefit analysis system can accurately describe the energy storage configuration model.

Disclosed are embodiments of an adaptive enterprise service bus (ESB) runtime system and an associated method, which build, at a restart, only the most advantageous path configuration between composable units (e.g., between applications and/or between primitives within a single application). Specifically, during the execution of instantiations of modeled paths and branches thereof, metrics (e.g., the number of times each flow and each branch are activated, the CPU usage associated with building each flow and each branch, etc.) are collected. Then, at a restart of the runtime system, a cost-benefit analysis is performed on the collected metrics and, based on the results of this cost-benefit analysis, only selected ones of the paths and the branches thereof are built (e.g., paths and branches for which operational usefulness outweighs building costs). Other paths and branches are built only as required, during running of the runtime system.

Apparatus and method for assessing financial loss posed by cyber threats capable of affecting at least one computer network in which a plurality of systems operate based on statistical modelling of cyber threat events to determine predicted threat activity, to determine expected downtime of each system in dependence upon said predicted cyber threat activity, to determine financial loss for each of a plurality of operational processes dependent upon the downtimes of the systems, to add financial losses for the plurality of processes so as to obtain a combined financial loss arising from the cyber threat activity, to determine pricing of insurance, to determine cost benefit analysis of computer network security upgrades.