The acclaimed metaphysical epic that binds together the cosmological phenomena of our time, ranging from crop circles to quantum theory to the resurgence of psychedelic drugs, to support the contention of the Mayan calendar that the year 2012 portends a global shift-in consciousness, culture, and way of living-of unprecedented...

This second book in the BEST series explores the fundamental generators and contextual issues - philosophical, physical and political - that influence built environments. It draws on international examples to show how societies and cultures in different parts of the world react to similar problems. It contrasts dramatically different types of...

For Web services to succeed as part of SOA, they require balanced, effective technical contracts that enable services to be evolved and repeatedly reused for years to come....

Consumer electronics (CE) devices, providing multimedia entertainment and enabling communication, have become ubiquitous in daily life. However, consumer interaction with such equipment currently requires the use of devices such as remote controls and keyboards, which are often inconvenient, ambiguous and non-interactive. An important...

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Biometric Technologies and Verification Systems is organized into nine parts composed of 30 chapters, including an extensive glossary of biometric terms and acronyms. It discusses the current state-of-the-art in biometric verification/authentication, identification and system design principles. It also provides a step-by-step...

Network and System Security provides focused coverage of network and system security technologies. Explores practical solutions to a wide range of network and systems security issues. Chapters are authored by leading experts in the field and address the immediate and long term challenges in the authors' respective areas of expertise....

Revitalize your architectural visualizations by bringing new levels of realism to them with an enhanced command of the mental ray toolset in 3ds Max. Full-color step-by-step tutorials give you a firm understanding of the processes and techniques needed to create impressive interior and exterior visualizations. You'll learn how to prepare...

Humans perceive the three-dimensional structure of the world with apparent ease. However, despite all of the recent advances in computer vision research, the dream of having a computer interpret an image at the same level as a two-year old remains elusive. Why is computer vision such a challenging problem and what is the current state of the...

A crucial step during the design and engineering of communication systems is the estimation of their performance and behavior; especially for mathematically complex or highly dynamic systems network simulation is particularly useful. This book focuses on tools, modeling principles and state-of-the art models for discrete-event based network...