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Starting & Running Your Own Small Farm Business: Small-Farm Success Stories * Financial Assistance Sources * Marketing & Selling Ideas * Business Plan Forms & Documents
by Sarah Beth AubreyRunning your own small farm is demanding enough, but making it profitable presents a host of further challenges. In this business-savvy guide to farming on a small scale, Sarah Aubrey covers everything from financial plans and advertising budgets to web design and food service wholesalers. Learn how to isolate your target audience and craft artisanal products that will delight and amaze customers. With a solid business strategy in place, you can confidently turn your passion into a productive and profitable venture.
Starting Smart: Key Practices for Developing Scopes of Work for Facility Projects
by Michael P. Pappas. G. Edward GibsonInformation on Key Practices For Developing Scopes Of Work For Facility Projects
Starting Your Career as a Contractor: How to Build and Run a Construction Business (Starting Your Career)
by Claudiu FatuThis incisive, practical guide provides a thorough breakdown of the ins and outs everyone needs to know when turning contracting skills into a business. From summoning the motivation to start your own business to the intricacies of being your own boss, Claudiu Fatu artfully turns his personal experiences and those of other successful contractors into advice on every aspect of building a business. The chapters focus on: Developing a business structure, including bank accounts, tax registration, insurance, and branding Handling legal and accounting hurdles Managing employees and dealing with clients Using marketing systems to find and book work Estimating and bidding on jobs Writing contracts Creating invoices and a billing system Controlling costs, keeping records, and understanding profit margin Planning retirement and other benefits for the self-employed By teaching contractors to anticipate problems that can arise when dealing with clients, and to build a business plan that can support a contractor’s talents in the best way possible, Starting Your Career as a Contractor is the ultimate manual to getting the job done right!
Startup: A Silicon Valley Adventure
by Jerry KaplanThe classic account of the early days of tech, named one of the 10 best business books of the year by Business Week: &“Riveting, wry, and often wise.&”—The Washington Post Jerry Kaplan had a dream: he would redefine the known universe (and get very rich) by creating a new kind of computer. All he needed was sixty million dollars, a few hundred employees, and a maniacal belief in his ability to win the Silicon Valley startup game. Kaplan, a well-known figure in the computer industry, founded GO Corporation in 1987, and for several years it was one of the hottest new ventures in the Valley. Startup tells the story of Kaplan's wild ride: how he assembled a brilliant but fractious team of engineers, software designers, and investors; pioneered the emerging market for hand-held computers operated with a pen instead of a keyboard; and careened from crisis to crisis without ever losing his passion for his revolutionary idea. Along the way, Kaplan vividly recreates his encounters with eccentric employees, risk-addicted venture capitalists, and industry giants such as Bill Gates and John Sculley. And no one—including Kaplan himself—is spared his sharp wit. &“What separates Kaplan&’s tale from other start-up stories is the insight he provides about dealing with two of America's largest computer companies—IBM and Microsoft…Readers interested in entrepreneurial adventurism will find Kaplan&’s tale entertaining.&”—Publishers Weekly &“Kaplan tells it with novelistic style replete with races against the clock and sharp character sketches…An insider's well-written story of the death of a new machine.&”—Kirkus Reviews &“A winner.&”—Wired
Stasi: Shield and Sword of the Party (Studies in Intelligence)
by John Christian SchmeidelThis book is a fascinating new examination of one of the most feared and efficient secret services the world has ever known, the Stasi. The East German Stasi was a jewel among the communist secret services, the most trusted by its Russian mother organization the KGB, and even more efficient. In its attempt at ‘total coverage’ of civil society, the Ministry for State Security came close to realizing the totalitarian ideal of a political police force. Based on research in archival files unlocked just after the fall of the Berlin Wall and available to few German and Western readers, this volume details the Communist Party’s attempt to control all aspects of East German civil society, and sets out what is known of the regime’s support for international terrorism in the 1970s and 1980s. STASI will be of much interest to students of intelligence studies, German politics and international relations.
State Estimation and Control for Low-cost Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
by Chingiz Hajiyev Halil Ersin Soken Sıtkı Yenal VuralThis book discusses state estimation and control procedures for a low-cost unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The authors consider the use of robust adaptive Kalman filter algorithms and demonstrate their advantages over the optimal Kalman filter in the context of the difficult and varied environments in which UAVs may be employed. Fault detection and isolation (FDI) and data fusion for UAV air-data systems are also investigated, and control algorithms, including the classical, optimal, and fuzzy controllers, are given for the UAV. The performance of different control methods is investigated and the results compared. State Estimation and Control of Low-Cost Unmanned Aerial Vehicles covers all the important issues for designing a guidance, navigation and control (GNC) system of a low-cost UAV. It proposes significant new approaches that can be exploited by GNC system designers in the future and also reviews the current literature. The state estimation, control and FDI methods are illustrated by examples and MATLAB® simulations. State Estimation and Control of Low-Cost Unmanned Aerial Vehicles will be of interest to both researchers in academia and professional engineers in the aerospace industry. Graduate students may also find it useful, and some sections are suitable for an undergraduate readership.
State Estimation and Fault Diagnosis under Imperfect Measurements
by Yang Liu Zidong Wang Donghua ZhouThe objective of this book is to present the up-to-date research developments and novel methodologies on state estimation and fault diagnosis (FD) techniques for a class of complex systems subject to closed-loop control, nonlinearities, and stochastic phenomena. It covers state estimation design methodologies and FD unit design methodologies including framework of optimal filter and FD unit design, robust filter and FD unit design, stability, and performance analysis for the considered systems subject to various kinds of complex factors. Features: Reviews latest research results on the state estimation and fault diagnosis issues. Presents comprehensive framework constituted for systems under imperfect measurements. Includes quantitative performance analyses to solve problems in practical situations. Provides simulation examples extracted from practical engineering scenarios. Discusses proper and novel techniques such as the Carleman approximation and completing the square method is employed to solve the mathematical problems. This book aims at Graduate students, Professionals and Researchers in Control Science and Application, Stochastic Process, Fault Diagnosis, and Instrumentation and Measurement.
State Estimation and Stabilization of Nonlinear Systems: Theory and Applications (Studies in Systems, Decision and Control #491)
by Abdellatif Ben Makhlouf Mohamed Ali Hammami Omar NaifarThis book presents the separation principle which is also known as the principle of separation of estimation and control and states that, under certain assumptions, the problem of designing an optimal feedback controller for a stochastic system can be solved by designing an optimal observer for the system's state, which feeds into an optimal deterministic controller for the system. Thus, the problem may be divided into two halves, which simplifies its design. In the context of deterministic linear systems, the first instance of this principle is that if a stable observer and stable state feedback are built for a linear time-invariant system (LTI system hereafter), then the combined observer and feedback are stable. The separation principle does not true for nonlinear systems in general. Another instance of the separation principle occurs in the context of linear stochastic systems, namely that an optimum state feedback controller intended to minimize a quadratic cost is optimal for the stochastic control problem with output measurements. The ideal solution consists of a Kalman filter and a linear-quadratic regulator when both process and observation noise are Gaussian. The term for this is linear-quadratic-Gaussian control. More generally, given acceptable conditions and when the noise is a martingale (with potential leaps), a separation principle, also known as the separation principle in stochastic control, applies when the noise is a martingale (with possible jumps).
State Estimation for Nonlinear Continuous–Discrete Stochastic Systems: Numerical Aspects and Implementation Issues (Studies in Systems, Decision and Control #539)
by Gennady Yu. Kulikov Maria V. KulikovaThis book addresses the problem of accurate state estimation in nonlinear continuous-time stochastic models with additive noise and discrete measurements. Its main focus is on numerical aspects of computation of the expectation and covariance in Kalman-like filters rather than on statistical properties determining a model of the system state. Nevertheless, it provides the sound theoretical background and covers all contemporary state estimation techniques beginning at the celebrated Kalman filter, including its versions extended to nonlinear stochastic models, and till the most advanced universal Gaussian filters with deterministically sampled mean and covariance. In particular, the authors demonstrate that, when applying such filtering procedures to stochastic models with strong nonlinearities, the use of adaptive ordinary differential equation solvers with automatic local and global error control facilities allows the discretization error—and consequently the state estimation error—to be reduced considerably. For achieving that, the variable-stepsize methods with automatic error regulation and stepsize selection mechanisms are applied to treating moment differential equations arisen. The implemented discretization error reduction makes the self-adaptive nonlinear Gaussian filtering algorithms more suitable for application and leads to the novel notion of accurate state estimation. The book also discusses accurate state estimation in mathematical models with sparse measurements. Of special interest in this regard, it provides a means for treating stiff stochastic systems, which often encountered in applied science and engineering, being exemplified by the Van der Pol oscillator in electrical engineering and the Oregonator model of chemical kinetics. Square-root implementations of all Kalman-like filters considered and explored in this book for state estimation in Ill-conditioned continuous–discrete stochastic systems attract the authors’ particular attention. This book covers both theoretical and applied aspects of numerical integration methods, including the concepts of approximation, convergence, stiffness as well as of local and global errors, suitably for applied scientists and engineers. Such methods serve as a basis for the development of accurate continuous–discrete extended, unscented, cubature and many other Kalman filtering algorithms, including the universal Gaussian methods with deterministically sampled expectation and covariance as well as their mixed-type versions. The state estimation procedures in this book are presented in the fashion of complete pseudo-codes, which are ready for implementation and use in MATLAB® or in any other computation platform. These are examined numerically and shown to outperform traditional variants of the Kalman-like filters in practical prediction/filtering tasks, including state estimations of stiff and/or ill-conditioned continuous–discrete nonlinear stochastic systems.
State Estimation for Robotics
by Timothy D. BarfootA key aspect of robotics today is estimating the state, such as position and orientation, of a robot as it moves through the world. Most robots and autonomous vehicles depend on noisy data from sensors such as cameras or laser rangefinders to navigate in a three-dimensional world. This book presents common sensor models and practical advice on how to carry out state estimation for rotations and other state variables. It covers both classical state estimation methods such as the Kalman filter, as well as important modern topics such as batch estimation, the Bayes filter, sigmapoint and particle filters, robust estimation for outlier rejection, and continuous-time trajectory estimation and its connection to Gaussian-process regression. The methods are demonstrated in the context of important applications such as point-cloud alignment, pose-graph relaxation, bundle adjustment, and simultaneous localization and mapping. Students and practitioners of robotics alike will find this a valuable resource.
State-Level Changes in Energy Intensity and Their National Implications
by Mark A. Bernstein Sam Loeb David S. Loughran Katya FonkychThe 2001 National Energy Policy calls for continued reductions in energy intensity (energy consumption per dollar of gross economic output). This study was part of an effort to identify state-level factors that may contribute to efficient energy use nationwide. The authors examined changes in energy intensity in 48 states and in the states' energy-consuming sectors from 1977 through 1999. Some factors that may explain differences in states' energy intensity are energy prices, new construction, capacity utilization, population, climate, tech innovations, and government energy policies.
State Machines using VHDL: FPGA Implementation of Serial Communication and Display Protocols
by Orhan Gazi A.Çağrı ArlıThis textbook teaches students techniques for the design of advanced digital systems using Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs). The authors focus on communication between FPGAs and peripheral devices (such as EEPROM, analog-to-digital converters, sensors, digital-to-analog converters, displays etc.) and in particular state machines and timed state machines for the implementation of serial communication protocols, such as UART, SPI, I²C, and display protocols, such as VGA, HDMI. VHDL is used as the programming language and all topics are covered in a structured, step-by-step manner.
State of Bound Water: Measurement and Significance in Food Processing
by Mehedi Hasan Masud Monjur Mourshed Mohammad U.H. JoardderThis book presents a comprehensive review of the characteristics of bound water and its use in food processing. The significance of bound water in food is discussed in terms of quality, energy consumption and cost. Also included is a thorough discussion on the emerging and appropriate measuring techniques of bound water in food materials. The challenges involved with bound water measurement and strategies for bound water removal during processing are covered in order to establish the appropriate conditions for food preservation. This work presents researchers with a clear, up-to-date concept of bound water and its significance in food processing and preservation. Despite the importance of bound water in food processing, there are limited resources for researchers seeking an in-depth understanding of bound water in food materials. This is the first reference work dedicated to discussing the details of bound water in food materials and its significance in food processes and preservation, from its special characteristics to its energy consumption to its measurement and techniques. State of Bound Water: Measurement and significance in food processing is a singular work in the field of food preservation and processing arena.
State of Fear
by Michael CrichtonIn Paris, a physicist dies after performing a laboratory experiment for a beautiful visitor. In the jungles of Malaysia, a mysterious buyer purchases deadly cavitation technology, built to his specifications. <P><P>In Vancouver, a small research submarine is leased for use in the waters off New Guinea.And in Tokyo, an intelligence agent tries to understand what it all means. <P><P>Thus begins Michael Crichton's exciting and provocative technothriller, State of Fear. Only Michael Crichton's unique ability to blend science fact and pulse-pounding fiction could bring such disparate elements to a heart-stopping conclusion. This is Michael Crichton's most wide-ranging thriller. <P><P>State of Fear takes the reader from the glaciers of Iceland to the volcanoes of Antarctica, from the Arizona desert to the deadly jungles of the Solomon Islands, from the streets of Paris to the beaches of Los Angeles. The novel races forward, taking the reader on a rollercoaster thrill ride, all the while keeping the brain in high gear. Gripping and thought-provoking, State of Fear is Michael Crichton at his very best.
The State of Fire: Why California Burns
by null Obi KaufmannHow do we live with fire? From the creator of The California Field Atlas, a book of stewardship, resilience, and hope.Fire is an essential part of California's ecology. Humans have been using it to shape the California landscape for thousands of years. But today many Californians' relationship to fire is one of fear. Obi Kaufmann, author of the best-selling California Field Atlas, now asks: How do we live with fire? What makes fire essential to a healthy and biodiverse Golden State, and how do we benefit from its teachings? With the same solution-minded ethic as his much-admired The State of Water: Understanding California's Most Precious Resource, Kaufmann presents fire as a force of regeneration rather than apocalypse. He considers the long history of ecological burns, the varied ways fire behaves across the state, and the lessons we can learn from California's largest fires of recent decades.Packed with Kaufmann's signature watercolor maps and paintings, The State of Fire confronts one of California's most pressing social and ecological challenges. From this maelstrom Kaufmann emerges to share a deepened love for the natural world—and a refreshingly hopeful vision of California's future.
The State of Global Education: Learning with the World and its People (Citizenship, Character and Values Education)
by Brad Maguth Jeremy HilburnA battle is being waged in classrooms and capitals around the world over the goals and objectives of the future of global education. While there is growing research in the area of global education, much remains to be uncovered, challenged, and learned through sound empirical research and conceptual explorations. What type of global citizens will schools promote? What types of policies, programs and instructional practices best promote effective global citizenship? Will global education curricula advance an unwavering loyalty to neoliberal ideologies and interests over the strengthening of human rights and the environmental health of our planet? This volume presents a series of research studies and innovative instructional practices centered on advancing global learning opportunities and literacies. The authors in this volume initiate a much needed conversation on ways students in multiple contexts can and should learn with the world and its people. Part I addresses global education in theory, with a particular focus on development, intercultural competence, and global citizenship. Part II addresses educational programs and practices that foster global learning and action to help build a better future for all citizens of our planet – including experiential education, university initiatives, and conceptual approaches to teaching and learning. This scholarship spans four continents in a multitude of educational contexts – primary, secondary, and tertiary - each with a focus on a different dimension of the possibilities and pitfalls in teaching about and with the world and its people.
State-of-the-Art and Future Directions of Smart Learning
by Nian-Shing Chen Kinshuk Ronghuai Huang Elvira Popescu Milos Kravcik Maiga Chang Yanyan LiThis book provides an archival forum for researchers, academics, practitioners and industry professionals interested and/or engaged in reforming teaching and learning methods by transforming today's learning environments into smart learning environments. It will facilitate opportunities for discussions and constructive dialogue between various stakeholders on the limitations of current learning environments, the need for reform, innovative uses of emerging pedagogical approaches and technologies, and sharing and promoting best practices, which will lead to the evolution, design and implementation of smart learning environments. The focus of the contributions is on the interplay and fusion of pedagogy and technology to create these new environments. The components of this interplay include but are not limited to: Pedagogy: learning paradigms, assessment paradigms, social factors, policy Technology: emerging technologies, innovative uses of mature technologies, adoption, usability, standards, and emerging/new technological paradigms (open educational resources, cloud computing, etc. ) Fusion of pedagogy and technology: transformation of curricula, transformation of teaching behavior, transformation of administration, best practices of infusion, piloting of new ideas.
State-of-the-Art and Innovations in Mechanism and Machine Science: A Tribute to Carlos López-Cajún (Mechanisms and Machine Science #150)
by Marco Ceccarelli Juan Carlos Jauregui-CorreaThis book gathers invited contributions as survey and research reports in mechanism and machine science (MMS) ranging across the entire field, related in most instances to the works of late Prof. Carlos López Cajún, one of the field's most prominent scholars. The book provides state-of-the-art information and showcases the latest achievements and challenges of MMS. The book is an accessible avenue to understanding ideas and solutions by leading international scientists who offer much-needed historical insights into the MMS field with future perspectives.
State of the Art in Deep Geothermal Energy in Europe: With Focus on Direct Heating (SpringerBriefs in Earth System Sciences)
by Johanna Fink Elisa Heim Norbert KlitzschSince nearly 50 % of Europe's energy demand is in the heating and cooling sector, it is expected that geothermal energy will play an important role in the transition to a decarbonized energy system. However, deep geothermal energy is currently harvested mainly from areas with very favorable geothermal conditions. As these areas are geographically limited, the use of geothermal energy in less favorable regions is essential for unleashing the full potential of geothermal energy, since they make up the majority of the total geothermal potential in Central Europe. Motivated by the growing interest in deep geothermal energy among, e.g., energy companies and communities, this text reviews the state of the art in deep geothermal energy with focus on direct heating in geothermally less favorable regions. It provides an overview of technologies used to generate heat from the deep underground and discusses main technical and non-technical risks associated with deep geothermal projects. The text addresses readers with an interest in geothermal energy but does not require a background in geoscience or engineering sciences. It is suitable as textbook for Geothermal Energy courses for undergraduate students from different disciplines.
State-of-the-Art in Skin Grafting (Biomedical Materials for Multi-functional Applications)
by Vivek Gupta Arnab Chanda Shubham GuptaThis book discusses the different skin grafting methods, latest trends in graft designing, and its relationship with the burn injuries. An introduction to several conventional and modern skin grafting methods and how crucial the innovation is for recovery of large burns will be presented. The technologies involved in the development of skin grafts incisions, and study of their effect on the mechanical properties and systematically modified skin graft patterns, will be covered at length. The development of skin grafts using conventional, auxetic, and hierarchical patterns through computational and experimental frameworks will be discussed in detail. Also, the role of skin graft patterns on the mechanical stresses, expansion ratio or meshing ratio, will be presented. Additionally, the role of degree of burn, size of burn, and region of burn will be discussed, and its generalizability will be covered in detail. Finally, the challenges with the existing skin graft meshers and latest development in this niche area will be highlighted. This book is anticipated to serve as a key reference for medical and research professionals working in the skin grafting domain as well as the product manufacturing industries. For example, skin grafting plays an important role to cure the serious burn injuries. Current innovative skin graft patterns which cover higher area compared to traditional skin graft patterns are anticipated to help in surgery and faster recovery of larger burnt areas. Also, the current skin graft mesher, which is used to develop traditional skin grafts, cannot produce claimed expansions clinically. This book helps design novel mesher devices to reduce the difference between actual and claimed expansions clinically and increase the skin graft coverage area to recover burn sites with lesser available skin. This book is equally useful for students of medical practices, manufacturing engineering, and design engineering.
State-of-the-Art of Millimeter-Wave Silicon Technology (Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering #945)
by Jaco du Preez Saurabh SinhaThis book examines the critical differences between current and next-generation Si technologies (CMOS, BiCMOS and SiC) and technology platforms (e.g. system-on-chip) in mm-wave wireless applications. We provide a basic overview of the two technologies from a technical standpoint, followed by a review of the state-of-the-art of several key building blocks in wireless systems. The influences of system requirements on the choice of semiconductor technology are vital to understanding the merits of CMOS and BiCMOS devices – e.g., output power, battery life, adjacent channel interference, cost restrictions, and so forth. These requirements, in turn, affect component-level design and performance metrics of oscillators, mixers, power and low-noise amplifiers, as well as phase-locked loops and data converters. Finally, the book offers a peek into the next generation of wireless technologies such as THz -band systems and future 6G applications.
State-of-the-Art Upcycling Research and Practice: Proceedings of the International Upcycling Symposium 2020 (Lecture Notes in Production Engineering)
by Kyungeun Sung Jagdeep Singh Ben BridgensThis book presents the proceedings of the first International Upcycling Symposium 2020, held on 4th September 2020 at De Montfort University (DMU) in Leicester, UK (online), as a joint effort between DMU, Lund University, Nottingham Trent University and Newcastle University. This book presents state of the art of research and practice in “upcycling” at the international level.The subject of this book, upcycling, is a term to describe the processes of creating or modifying a product from used or waste materials, components and products, which is of equal or higher quality or value than the compositional elements. This book describes new theories, approaches and scientific research findings related to upcycling and presents examples of upcycling practice, across multiple sectors, scales and contexts. Bringing together research from over 35 multidisciplinary experts, the book discusses state-of-the-art knowledge and practices on upcycling in different geographical, economic, socio-cultural and technological contexts at an international level. Readers will gain fundamental understanding of upcycling with its varied definitions and forms across sectors and scales, and to be informed of the latest upcycling research and practices including valuable ideas, theories, projects, experiences and insights by global experts.
State Tectonics (The Centenal Cycle #3)
by Malka OlderCampbell Award finalist Malka Older's State Tectonics concludes The Centenal Cycle, the cyberpunk poltical thriller series that began with Infomocracy.The future of democracy must evolve or die.The last time Information held an election, a global network outage, two counts of sabotage by major world governments, and a devastating earthquake almost shook micro-democracy apart. Five years later, it's time to vote again, and the system that has ensured global peace for 25 years is more vulnerable than ever. Unknown enemies are attacking Information's network infrastructure. Spies, former superpowers, and revolutionaries sharpen their knives in the shadows. And Information's best agents question whether the data monopoly they've served all their lives is worth saving, or whether it's time to burn the world down and start anew.The Centenal Cycle#1 Infomocracy#2 Null States#3 State TectonicsAt the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
States of Consciousness
by Irena Cosic Dean CvetkovicIn this accessible overview of current knowledge, an expert team of editors and authors describe experimental approaches to consciousness. These approaches are shedding light on some of the hitherto unknown aspects of the distinct states of human consciousness, including the waking state, different states of sleep and dreaming, meditation and more. The book presents the latest research studies by the contributing authors, whose specialities span neuroscience, neurology, biomedical engineering, clinical psychology and psychophysiology, psychosocial medicine and anthropology. Overall this anthology provides the reader with a clear picture of how different states of consciousness can be defined, experimentally measured and analysed. A future byproduct of this knowledge may be anticipated in the development of systematic corrective treatments for many disorders and pathological problems of consciousness.
States of Nature: Science, Agriculture, and Environment in the Spanish Caribbean, 1760-1940
by Stuart George MccookThe process of nation-building in Latin America transformed the relations between the state, the economy, and nature. <P><P>Between 1760 and 1940, the economies of most countries in the Spanish Caribbean came to depend heavily on the export of plant products, such as coffee, tobacco, and sugar. After the mid-nineteenth century, this model of export-led economic growth also became a central tenet of liberal projects of nation-building. As international competition grew and commodity prices fell over this period, Latin American growers strove to remain competitive by increasing agricultural production. By the turn of the twentieth century, their pursuit of export-led growth had generated severe environmental problems, including soil exhaustion, erosion, and epidemic outbreaks of crop diseases and pests.