A phrase often used when writing about the human ability to become immersed in fantasy is “the willing suspension of disbelief” which Samuel Taylor Coleridge first coined in the early 19th Century as an argument for the fantastical in prosody and poetry. What is a computer game? At base, it is nothing more than a cheap plastic...

The origin of this volume came while planning the 2009 International Conference on Decision Support Systems. The theme of that 2-day conference was “Assessing Today and Envisioning Tomorrow.” We wanted to summarize where the field had been and generate ideas regarding where it was going. The meeting brought together...

Microsoft Enterprise Library is a collection of reusable software components (also known as Application Blocks) that are designed to assist developers with common enterprise development challenges. Before using an Application block, you should have a good understanding of your application requirements and of the scenarios that the Application...

Designing for the web is di!erent than designing for any other medium. The breadth of skills required is sometimes daunting. The depth of experience required, seemingly unobtainable. Yet, the medium attracts designers from all spheres of design practice: from engineering and architecture, to product and graphic design. This chapter aims to...

The Newnes Know It All Series takes the best of what our authors have written to create hard-working desk references that will be an engineer's first port of call for key information, design techniques and rules of thumb. Guaranteed not to gather dust on a shelf!

Embedded software is present everywhere - from a garage...

Discrete optimization problems are everywhere, from traditional operations research planning problems, such as scheduling, facility location, and network design; to computer science problems in databases; to advertising issues in viral marketing. Yet most such problems are NP-hard. Thus unless P = NP, there are no efficient algorithms to find...

If you want to learn how to build killer user interfaces for Windows and the web, then this book is for you. It arms you with the tools and code you'll need to effectively utilize the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF). From creating appealing graphics and animated structures to enhancing...

Pro JavaScript with MooTools is unlike any other JavaScript book on the market today. While similar books focus on either JavaScript as a language of the browser or how to use JavaScript Frameworks, Pro JavaScript with MooTools fills the gap between these topics and moves beyond—exploring the advanced features of...

Oracle WebCenter is the leading-edge product for developing nextgeneration enterprise portals and composite applications with Web 2.0 in mind. This book introduces you to the aspects of developing WebCenter applications and enriching those applications with social computing services, including discussions, documents, blogs, wikis, tags, and...

Written by a JavaFX engineer and developer, this book is one of the...

Complete, Hands-On Guide to Building Advanced Distributed Applications...