Users In Process Research Articles

A new gas circulation RIE

A new gas circulation RIE has been developed. It pumps the exhausted gas still containing usable process gas into the RIE process chamber to be reused. This new gas circulation RIE showed performances of etch rate, selectivity, etching profile, and uniformity in C/sub 4/F/sub 8//CO/Ar SiO/sub 2/ etching process comparable to those for the conventional process with 50% less C/sub 4/F/sub 8/ and 80% less CO and Ar of the original input gas flow rates. It also decreased PFC emission by two thirds less in CO/sub 2/ conversion. This new gas circulation RIE is effective for the suppression of the greenhouse effect and etching process cost.

Trends in progressing cavity pumping

Satisfying customers' needs for effective fluids handling solutions requires a balanced offering of product innovations and value-added service support programs. Moyno Industrial Products uses a package of advanced products and support programs to optimize the end user's process efficiency and productivity, extend pump life and provide low total cost of ownership.

Optical Proximity Correction Methodology to Counteract Mask Error Effects in Sub-0.25 µm Lithography Generations

A new methodology for optical proximity correction design is required for sub-0.25 µm device generation, to predict and counteract mask error effects. We applied a new concept of virtual mask technology to design an optical proximity correction (OPC), which involves adding a small dummy mask pattern on a simulation mask layout, to realize mask error effect. The aerial image simulation results for the new methodology suggested a totally different type of OPC. Experimental results were more accurately predicted by the new methodology than the old methodology. For 0.25 µm features hammerhead OPC shows much improved results of intra-field CD uniformity of 20 nm, of 3 sigma, and wide usable process window of 14% exposure latitude and 0.8 µm depth of focus, compared with serif OPC that was selected by the old methodology. This new methodology with virtual mask technology will be applied to sub-0.25 µm generations.

Social and cognitive effects of professional communication on software usability

We designed and piloted a technical communication course for software engineering majors to take concurrently with their capstone project course in software design. In the pilot, one third of the capstone design course students jointly enrolled in the writing class. One goal of the collaborative courses was to use writing to improve the usability of students’ software. We studied the effects of writing on students’ user‐centered beliefs and design practices and on the usability of their product, using surveys, document analyses, expert reviews, and user test results. When possible, we compared the usability processes and products of teams who did and did not take the writing class. Our findings suggest that the synergy of this interdisciplinary approach effectively sensitized students to user‐centered design, instilled in them a commitment to it, and helped them develop usable products.

USABILITY ASSESSMENTS FOR HYDROLOGIC FORECASTING DSS1

ABSTRACT: Usability assessments were used to obtain feedback on the development of a flood forecasting decision support system. The feedback was used to guide design of system functionality, interface, training, implementation, and operations. The usability process was user focused and was dependent upon implementation of a prototype system in an operational setting. This paper describes concepts and methods applied to collect reflective and objective data on DSS components and information outputs. The general structure of the usability assessments is discussed and results of assessments are summarized.

Structural Interpretation of a Sedimentary Basin Using High-Resolution Magnetic and Gravity Data

The Ravva oil and gas field is located offshore eastern India in the Krishna-Godavari Basin. Command Petroleum (India) Pty. Limited was granted operatorship of the field in October 1994 by the government of India, on behalf of a Joint Venture consortium that includes Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) Ltd, the Indian national oil company; Videocon Petroleum Ltd; and Ravva Oil Ltd (Marubeni).One of the first geophysical projects to be initiated in the development plan was reprocessing of the Ravva 3-D seismic dataset, acquired in early 1990 using a single streamer/single source configuration. The geography of the coastline and the shallow water depths in the area (<20 m) required a shooting direction that was predominantly in the strike direction but somewhat oblique to the main structural elements of the field.This reprocessing project was initiated to achieve an optimum dataset for siting of the development/exploration wells over the next two to three years. Recent developments in computer hardware and the applications to 3-D seismic data processing have allowed the implementation of 3-D prestack migration to develop into a usable process for the practising explorationist.The reprocessing project is described, with particular emphasis on the testing and analyses that led to use of 3-D prestack time migration to image the data volume. Examples show the improvements in stacking velocity definition and seismic imaging that have been achieved using 3-D seismic processing techniques that were not practicably available when the dataset was initially processed in 1990.

3-D Prestack Time Migration – an Application to the Ravva 3-D Dataset, Offshore India

The Ravva oil and gas field is located offshore eastern India in the Krishna-Godavari Basin. Command Petroleum (India) Pty. Limited was granted operatorship of the field in October 1994 by the government of India, on behalf of a Joint Venture consortium that includes Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) Ltd, the Indian national oil company; Videocon Petroleum Ltd; and Ravva Oil Ltd (Marubeni).One of the first geophysical projects to be initiated in the development plan was reprocessing of the Ravva 3-D seismic dataset, acquired in early 1990 using a single streamer/single source configuration. The geography of the coastline and the shallow water depths in the area (<20 m) required a shooting direction that was predominantly in the strike direction but somewhat oblique to the main structural elements of the field.This reprocessing project was initiated to achieve an optimum dataset for siting of the development/exploration wells over the next two to three years. Recent developments in computer hardware and the applications to 3-D seismic data processing have allowed the implementation of 3-D prestack migration to develop into a usable process for the practising explorationist.The reprocessing project is described, with particular emphasis on the testing and analyses that led to use of 3-D prestack time migration to image the data volume. Examples show the improvements in stacking velocity definition and seismic imaging that have been achieved using 3-D seismic processing techniques that were not practicably available when the dataset was initially processed in 1990.

UPA and CHI surveys on usability processes

UPA and CHI surveys on usability processes

Assuring quality of the human–computer interface

The issue of human–computer interface quality has been brought currently into focus due to (a) a change in the character of users who dominate the computer market, (b) the availability of expertise in design for usability and its assurance, and (c) the finally recognized business benefits for vendors of user friendly equipment. Because the underlying human factors expertise belongs to the category of enabling generic quality assurance technologies, the quality management and engineering communities must master this new issue, and related knowledge and methods. The objective of this review article is to aid the quality professionals to respond successfully to this challenge by presenting the fundamentals of human factors engineering, its role in the design for usability process, and the associated methods of assuring quality of the human–computer interface.

Room for scientific thought?

Simultaneous studies of the effect of working memory space and field‐dependence on science performance at secondary and tertiary levels give insight into the way that students process new information. The idea of potential and usable processing space is explored and consequent teaching strategies are discussed.

A run time support system for multiprocessor machines

We report on the design and development of a Run Time Support System (RTS) which overcomes known disadvantages of other existing systems. The RTS is independent of the configuration - if the system is reconfigured there is no need to change user's processes. It supports both synchronous and asynchronous communication. A system based on the same design philosophy with this RTS is actually implemented for messages of arbitrary length in the prototype of the PADMAVATI machine, being developed within ESPRIT Project 1219 (967). Experiments were conducted in this environment and performance measurements were obtained and are reported here.

Kaleidoscope: a cooperative menu-guided query interface

Querying databases to obtain information requires the user's knowledge of query language and underlying data. However, because the knowledge in human long-term memory is imprecise, incomplete, and often incorrect, user queries are subject to various types of failure. These may include spelling mistakes, the violation of the syntax and semantics of a query language, and the misconception of the entities and relationships in a database. Kaleidoscope is a cooperative query interface whose knowledge guides users to avoid most failure during query creation. We call this type of cooperative behavior intraquery guidance . To enable this early, active engagement in the user's process of query creation, Kaleidoscope reduces the granularity of user-system interaction via a context-sensitive menu. The system generates valid query constituents as menu choices step-by-step by interpreting a language grammar, and the user creates a query following this menu guidance[2]. For instance, it takes four steps to create the following query [Q1] Who/ 1 authored/ 2 'Al'/ 3 journal papers/ (3+) in 'Postquery COOP'/ 4 At each of such steps, as the user selects one of menu choices, the system updates its partial query status window. If a choice is unique as in (3+) , it is taken automatically. To guide the user's entry of values, the system provides a pop-up menu for each value domain. With Kaleidoscope's process of choice generation tightly controlled by the system's knowledge of query language and underlying data, users need not remember the query language and the underlying database structure but merely recognize or identify the constituents coming one after another that match their intended query. The system provides additional guidance for users to avoid creating semantically inconsistent queries. It informs the user of any derived predicates on the completion of a user-selected predicate. To illustrate this, consider a partially constructed SQL query [Q2] SELECT * FROM professor p#1 WHERE p#1 dept = 'CS' AND p#1 salary &lt; 40000 Suppose that the system has an integrity constraint [IC] FROM professor p IF p dept = 'CS' AND p salary &lt; 45000 THEN p rank = 'Assistant' This rules states that a CS professor whose salary is less than 45000 is an assistant professor. With the replacement of rule variable p in IC by Q2's range variable p#1, IC's leading two predicates subsume Q2's query condition, producing p#1 rank = 'Assistant'. Because this derived predicate is not subsumed by Q2's query condition, the system suspects that the user may not know of it and presents it to the user. Derived predicates, together with user-selected ones, constrain the user's further conjunctive extension of the partial query condition. For example, the system prunes the field rank (as well as the field dept) in the conjunctive extension of Q2, because the derived condition restricts the value of this field to a constant. As shown in examples, we apply Kaleidoscope's approach to two linear-syntax languages in different levels of abstraction SQL[1] and a query language whose syntax and semantics cover a subset of wh -queries. To implement the intraquery guidance, we extend context-free grammar by associating context variables with each grammar symbol and attaching several types of procedural decorations to grammar rules. This extension enables the system to capture the semantic constraints and its user-guiding actions in a domain-independent grammar. As the grammar is interpreted, the database-specific information is fed from the system's lexicon and knowledge base. The current implementation of Kaleidoscope runs on a XEROX-1186 LISP machine with a SUN server configured with a relational DBMS. The approach of Kaleidoscope is based on the normative system assumption. The system presents its capability transparently to the user in a context-dependent manner during the user's query creation. This makes the system usable even with a small amount of stored knowledge.

Image Processing Expert System with Knowledge—Generative Function—Application to Footprint Image Understanding

AbstractThis paper describes a footprint image processing expert system. In footprint image processing, the most difficult issue is to carry through the complex processing sequence brought by the variety of pickup places, pickup methods, footprint patterns, and so on. To cope with this issue, an expert system with the knowledge‐generative function, which is indispensable for dealing with some unknown images, is implemented. A usable processing sequence for various footprint images is constructed through the simulation over 37 footprint images and the usefulness of the expert system is ascertained experimentally.

The usability process: working with iterative design principles

A discussion of the real-world environment of usability testing in the computer industry leads into a discussion of how the real world constrains the usability process and how the usability specialist can cope with the constraints. The focus is on two major constraints that result from the need to get information to the interface designers early enough so that they can use it: the need to work with incomplete materials, and the short amount of time usually allotted for a usability test iteration. The design of a new documentation model at Microsoft is considered as an example. >

Making childhood asthma management education happen in the community: translating health behavioral research into local programs.

The public health benefits of research can be realized only if proven new techniques are translated into readily usable processes and materials and widely adopted by professionals and patients alike. To accomplish this, a systematic technology transfer process is needed. One recent outcome of health behavior research has been identification of the skills needed by children and parents to effectively manage childhood asthma. Methods for teaching these skills were tested on hundreds of families in a variety of health care settings. They were then packaged in program manuals that guide health professionals through the teaching process and provide all necessary materials for conducting sessions. The resulting four programs teach attack prevention and control skills. They also emphasize coping skills and help families come to terms with the behavioral factors that impinge on asthma management and affect compliance with medical advice. A technology transfer project for getting initial community adoption of these programs is described. The evolution of the project, including the development of the programs themselves, packaging considerations, establishment of a unique partnership for dissemination, development of a model workshop for stimulating health professionals, implementation of programs, and follow up and evaluation, is described. Successful elements are identified at each step.

The System Usability Process for Network Management Products

This paper presents an overview of a process for system usability. The process is a systematic series of activities and procedures designed to improve the usability of software network management products. The elements of the process are given and future directions for evaluating usability described.

Network management software usability test design and implementation

The approach used at one of IBM's development sites for usability testing is somewhat different from methods used elsewhere. The approach was developed specifically for testing of software communications products as one aspect of the System Usability Process. The test design and implementation are described.

Technical new feature

AbstractA continuous process for the commercial production of isopropenyl stearate (IPS) from triple pressed stearic acid and a stabilized form of propyne has been developed. Cost estimates, including capital costs, operating costs, and profitability, for commercial scale plant production which show the process to be economically feasible are presented. This potentially profitable process offers the advantages of reliable raw material sources, minimal external thermal requirements, and usable process waste streams. For a plant producing 5 million pounds of IPS per year, the selling price range is 80 to 107 cents/lb IPS, corresponding to a raw material cost range of 27 to 54 cents/lb of IPS. For a 20 million pound per year plant, the selling price range is 58 to 85 cents/lb IPS. The selling prices include a 20% annual return on fixed capital investment. Fixed capital requirement ranges from 2.7 to 10.9 million dollars (3rd quarter, 1975) for plants ranging in size from 5 to 50 million pounds of IPS per year, respectively.

A Data Gathering and Processing System To Optimize Producing Operations

This computerized system, which collects, processes, and stores data on and analyzes and reports the performance of production equipment and operations, is one step closer to the optimum profitability of producing properties. It is designed primarily to be used by the production man properties. It is designed primarily to be used by the production man directly responsible for day-to-day economic decisions. Introduction In any attempt at optimizing operations by means, for example, of a failure-control program, basic information is required for defining the nature and magnitude of the problems involved and for estimating the economic stakes. The information determines whether or not one should try to solve a particular problem; and if more than one solution is possible, it aids in deciding on the most profitable one. In short, the basic information makes it possible to set economic priorities to the solution of problems. Methods of obtaining basic information related to equipment performance have been the subject of much work. Many oil-producing companies have created and now operate data gathering and processing systems, all of which have two things in common: they obtain accurate and timely information and process and condense it into an easily usable and process and condense it into an easily usable and digestible form; and they use computers to process and report data. Atlantic Richfield has created a system for data gathering and handling that has been in use throughout its Continental U. S. and Canadian operations since late 1969. This system, known as the Equipment Performance Reporting System, relies heavily on the use of computers. It was developed as a cooperative effort with field personnel to the point that it is now part of the Company procedures. By late 1971 the system had more than 34,000 records in its data banks. Since its inception, the original concept of a data gathering and processing system for use by production personnel has been expanded according to needs production personnel has been expanded according to needs discovered as a result of using the system. These needs are: (1) to set better specifications for subsurface and surface equipment, (2) to predict future performance of equipment, and (3) to follow closely performance of equipment, and (3) to follow closely the economic impact of remedial action such as area-wide corrosion treating programs. The Equipment Performance Report System-Part One The Equipment Performance Report System consists of four parts. The following discussion will be limited to Part One, which is concerned with subsurface failures, and to Part Three, which handles well inhibition. Parts Two and Four will be described later. As early as 1964, Fincher and Nunn defined a usable data gathering and processing system as one that contains1. A simple report form,2. Complete data about each reported event,3. Computer processing for rapid data handling, and4. Output in the form of orderly and concise data summaries for easy review. JPT p. 185