PLOS ONE: [sortOrder=DATE_NEWEST_FIRST, sort=Date, newest first, q=subject:"Operating systems"]PLOShttps://journals.plos.org/plosone/webmaster@plos.orgaccelerating the publication of peer-reviewed sciencehttps://journals.plos.org/plosone/search/feed/atom?sortOrder=DATE_NEWEST_FIRST&unformattedQuery=subject:%22Operating+systems%22&sort=Date,+newest+firstAll PLOS articles are Open Access.https://journals.plos.org/plosone/resource/img/favicon.icohttps://journals.plos.org/plosone/resource/img/favicon.ico2024-03-28T13:35:31ZOptimizing bandwidth utilization and traffic control in ISP networks for enhanced smart agricultureEmad S. HassanAyman E. A. AbdelaalAhmed S. OshabaAtef El-EmaryMoawad I. DessoukyFathi E. Abd El-Samie10.1371/journal.pone.03006502024-03-25T14:00:00Z2024-03-25T14:00:00Z<p>by Emad S. Hassan, Ayman E. A. Abdelaal, Ahmed S. Oshaba, Atef El-Emary, Moawad I. Dessouky, Fathi E. Abd El-Samie</p>
As the demand for high-bandwidth Internet connections continues to surge, industries are exploring innovative ways to harness this connectivity, and smart agriculture stands at the forefront of this evolution. In this paper, we delve into the challenges faced by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in efficiently managing bandwidth and traffic within their networks. We propose a synergy between two pivotal technologies, Multi-Protocol Label Switching—Traffic Engineering (MPLS-TE) and Diffserv Quality of Service (Diffserv-QoS), which have implications beyond traditional networks and resonate strongly with the realm of smart agriculture. The increasing adoption of technology in agriculture relies heavily on real-time data, remote monitoring, and automated processes. This dynamic nature requires robust and reliable high-bandwidth connections to facilitate data flow between sensors, devices, and central management systems. By optimizing bandwidth utilization through MPLS-TE and implementing traffic control mechanisms with Diffserv-QoS, ISPs can create a resilient network foundation for smart agriculture applications. The integration of MPLS-TE and Diffserv-QoS has resulted in significant enhancements in throughput and a considerable reduction in Jitter. Employment of the IPv4 header has demonstrated impressive outcomes, achieving a throughput of 5.83 Mbps and reducing Jitter to 3 msec.Comparative assessment of the feasibility and validity of daily activity space in urban and non-urban settingsSarah M. KwiatekLiang CaiKathleen A. CagneyWilliam E. CopelandV. Joseph HotzRick H. Hoyle10.1371/journal.pone.02974922024-01-30T14:00:00Z2024-01-30T14:00:00Z<p>by Sarah M. Kwiatek, Liang Cai, Kathleen A. Cagney, William E. Copeland, V. Joseph Hotz, Rick H. Hoyle</p>
Activity space research explores the behavioral impact of the spaces people move through in daily life. This research has focused on urban settings, devoting little attention to non-urban settings. We examined the validity of the activity space method, comparing feasibility and data quality in urban and non-urban contexts. Overall, we found that the method is easily implemented in both settings. We also found location data quality was comparable across residential and activity space settings. The major differences in GPS (Global Positioning System) density and accuracy came from the operating system (iOS versus Android) of the device used. The GPS-derived locations showed high agreement with participants’ self-reported locations. We further validated GPS data by comparing at-home time allocation with the American Time Use Survey. This study suggests that it is possible to collect daily activity space data in non-urban settings that are of comparable quality to data from urban settings.Improved technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution method for identifying key terrain in cyberspace asset layerLonghui LiuYang ZhouQing XuQunshan ShiXiaofei Hu10.1371/journal.pone.02882932023-07-13T14:00:00Z2023-07-13T14:00:00Z<p>by Longhui Liu, Yang Zhou, Qing Xu, Qunshan Shi, Xiaofei Hu</p>
Reinforcing weak cyberspace assets is an urgent requirement to defend national cybersecurity. Cyberspace key terrain (CKT) is a theory recently proposed for sensing cyberspace posture. Identifying CKT in the asset layer is essential for supporting cyberspace defense decisions. Existing methods ignore the influence of the multi-attribute correlation of cyberspace nodes and cyber attack mission (CAM) diversity, which restricts the recognition accuracy of CKT. To improve the accuracy of CKT identification and explore the relationship between CKT and CAM, we propose an improved cosine similarity technique for order of preference by similarity to the ideal solution (CosS-TOPSIS) method to model CKT and construct a CAM based on the MITRE adversarial tactics, techniques, and common knowledge (ATT&CK) framework to examine the influence of different weighted CAM on modeling CKT. Based on the vulnerability value calculation method of the cyber system in the common vulnerability scoring system version 3.1 (CVSS 3.1), we evaluated the effectiveness of CosS-TOPSIS in identifying CKT using three metrics: correlation coefficient, root mean square error, and mean absolute error. Our experiments showed that, in comparison with the TOPSIS method, the accuracy of the proposed method for identifying CKT improved by 8.9%, and the root mean square error reduced by 16%; simultaneously, CAM was proven to be an essential factor in identifying CKT. The feasibility and reliability of CosS-TOPSIS in identifying CKT and the close relationship between CAM and CKT identification were demonstrated experimentally. In our work, we utilized cosine similarity and FAHP to improve the baseline method. We also introduced three indicators to evaluate the method’s reliability. Drawing from ATT&CK, we recommend CAM as a tool for sensing changes in the cyberspace environment and explore its relationship with CKT. Our work has great application potential for identifying cyberspace vulnerabilities, supporting cyberspace defense, and securing national cyberspace facilities.rang: Reconstructing reproducible R computational environmentsChung-hong ChanDavid Schoch10.1371/journal.pone.02867612023-06-08T14:00:00Z2023-06-08T14:00:00Z<p>by Chung-hong Chan, David Schoch</p>
A complete declarative description of the computational environment is usually missing when researchers share their materials. Without such description, software obsolescence and missing system components can jeopardize computational reproducibility in the future, even when data and computer code are available. The R package rang is a complete solution for generating the declarative description for other researchers to automatically reconstruct the computational environment at a specific time point. The reconstruction process, based on Docker, has been tested for R code as old as 2001. The declarative description generated by rang satisfies the definition of a reproducible research compendium and can be shared as such. In this contribution, we show how rang can be used to make otherwise unexecutable code, spanning fields such as computational social science and bioinformatics, executable again. We also provide instructions on how to use rang to construct reproducible and shareable research compendia of current research. The package is currently available from CRAN (https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/rang/index.html) and GitHub (https://github.com/chainsawriot/rang).Film dance creation practice supported by Cyber Physical SystemZhiqun LinYulin Zhang10.1371/journal.pone.02844782023-04-28T14:00:00Z2023-04-28T14:00:00Z<p>by Zhiqun Lin, Yulin Zhang</p>
The traditional eight arts include film and dance. Dance is often included in the creation of films. With the progress of the times, dance has shown unprecedented vitality in film. This also puts forward higher requirements for shooting technology in film creation. To solve the contradiction between high performance of equipment and energy sensing, a new energy aware scheduling framework is proposed based on Cyber Physical System, which utilizes the balance between performance and energy consumption optimization, and uses allocation technology and list scheduling to ensure energy constraints. Besides, a highly energy-efficient and stable scheduling algorithm for film creation is constructed. The algorithm problems are mainly divided into functional safety requirements, verification problems, and energy consumption optimization problems under functional safety. The experimental results show that the system can obtain better schedulability at a lower time complexity and reasonably reflect the dynamic and static energy constraints ratio. The basic framework system based on dynamic step size also achieves better time performance than other step sizes. According to the experiment’s findings, the energy consumption of all scheduling components is relatively low and can be maintained within a specific range. The research and analysis of this study can provide a theoretical reference for the equipment algorithm of film dance creation practice, promote interaction with technical practice, and assist in promoting the development process of film dance creation.Surfing in the streets: How problematic smartphone use, fear of missing out, and antisocial personality traits are linked to driving behaviorMatthias F. C. HudecekSimon LemsterPeter FischerJulia CecilDieter FreySusanne GaubeEva Lermer10.1371/journal.pone.02849842023-04-27T14:00:00Z2023-04-27T14:00:00Z<p>by Matthias F. C. Hudecek, Simon Lemster, Peter Fischer, Julia Cecil, Dieter Frey, Susanne Gaube, Eva Lermer</p>
Smartphone use while driving (SUWD) is a major cause of accidents and fatal crashes. This serious problem is still too little understood to be solved. Therefore, the current research aimed to contribute to a better understanding of SUWD by examining factors that have received little or no attention in this context: problematic smartphone use (PSU), fear of missing out (FOMO), and Dark Triad. In the first step, we conducted a systematic literature review to map the current state of research on these factors. In the second step, we conducted a cross-sectional study and collected data from 989 German car drivers. A clear majority (61%) admitted to using the smartphone while driving at least occasionally. Further, the results showed that FOMO is positively linked to PSU and that both are positively associated with SUWD. Additionally, we found that Dark Triad traits are relevant predictors of SUWD and other problematic driving behaviors––in particular, psychopathy is associated with committed traffic offenses. Thus, results indicate that PSU, FOMO, and Dark Triad are relevant factors to explain SUWD. We hope to contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of this dangerous phenomenon with these findings.Ten simple rules for working with other people’s codeCharlie PilgrimPaul KentKasra HosseiniEd Chalstrey10.1371/journal.pcbi.10110312023-04-20T14:00:00Z2023-04-20T14:00:00Z<p>by Charlie Pilgrim, Paul Kent, Kasra Hosseini, Ed Chalstrey</p>Population processes in cyber system variabilityMarc MangelAlan Brown10.1371/journal.pone.02791002022-12-27T14:00:00Z2022-12-27T14:00:00Z<p>by Marc Mangel, Alan Brown</p>
Variability is inherent to cyber systems. Here, we introduce ideas from stochastic population biology to describe the properties of two broad kinds of cyber systems. First, we assume that each of <i>N</i><sub>0</sub> components can be in only one of two states: functional or nonfunctional. We model this situation as a Markov process that describes the transitions between functional and nonfunctional states. We derive an equation for the probability that an individual cyber component is functional and use stochastic simulation to develop intuition about the dynamics of individual cyber components. We introduce a metric of performance of the system of <i>N</i><sub>0</sub> components that depends on the numbers of functional and nonfunctional components. We numerically solve the forward Kolmogorov (or Fokker–Planck) equation for the number of functional components at time <i>t</i>, given the initial number of functional components. We derive a Gaussian approximation for the solution of the forward equation so that the properties of the system with many components can be determined from the transition probabilities of an individual component, allowing scaling to very large systems. Second, we consider the situation in which the operating system (OS) of cyber components is updated in time. We motivate the question of OS in use as a function of the most recent OS release with data from a network of desktop computers. We begin the analysis by specifying a temporal schedule of OS updates and the probability of transitioning from the current OS to a more recent one. We use a stochastic simulation to capture the pattern of the motivating data, and derive the forward equation for the OS of an individual computer at any time. We then include compromise of OSs to compute that a cyber component has an unexploited OS at any time. We conclude that an interdisciplinary approach to the variability of cyber systems can shed new light on the properties of those systems and offers new and exciting ways to understand them.Ten simple rules and a template for creating workflows-as-applicationsMichael J. RoachN. Tessa Pierce-WardRadoslaw SucheckiVijini MallawaarachchiBhavya PapudeshiScott A. HandleyC. Titus BrownNathan S. Watson-HaighRobert A. Edwards10.1371/journal.pcbi.10107052022-12-15T14:00:00Z2022-12-15T14:00:00Z<p>by Michael J. Roach, N. Tessa Pierce-Ward, Radoslaw Suchecki, Vijini Mallawaarachchi, Bhavya Papudeshi, Scott A. Handley, C. Titus Brown, Nathan S. Watson-Haigh, Robert A. Edwards</p>Large-scale digital forensic investigation for Windows registry on Apache SparkJun-Ha LeeHyuk-Yoon Kwon10.1371/journal.pone.02674112022-12-07T14:00:00Z2022-12-07T14:00:00Z<p>by Jun-Ha Lee, Hyuk-Yoon Kwon</p>
In this study, we investigate large-scale digital forensic investigation on Apache Spark using a Windows registry. Because the Windows registry depends on the system on which it operates, the existing forensic methods on the Windows registry have been targeted on the Windows registry in a single system. However, it is a critical issue to analyze large-scale registry data collected from several Windows systems because it allows us to detect suspiciously changed data by comparing the Windows registry in multiple systems. To this end, we devise distributed algorithms to analyze large-scale registry data collected from multiple Windows systems on the Apache Spark framework. First, we define three main scenarios in which we classify the existing registry forensic studies into them. Second, we propose an algorithm to load the Windows registry into the Hadoop distributed file system (HDFS) for subsequent forensics. Third, we propose a distributed algorithm for each defined forensic scenario using Apache Spark operations. Through extensive experiments using eight nodes in an actual distributed environment, we demonstrate that the proposed method can perform forensics efficiently on large-scale registry data. Specifically, we perform forensics on 1.52 GB of Windows registry data collected from four computers and show that the proposed algorithms can reduce the processing time by up to approximately 3.31 times, as we increase the number of CPUs from 1 to 8 and the number of worker nodes from 2 to 8. Because the distributed algorithms on Apache Spark require the inherent network and MapReduce overheads, this improvement of the processing performance verifies the efficiency and scalability of the proposed algorithms.Academic Tracker: Software for tracking and reporting publications associated with authors and grantsP. Travis ThompsonChristian D. PowellHunter N. B. Moseley10.1371/journal.pone.02778342022-11-18T14:00:00Z2022-11-18T14:00:00Z<p>by P. Travis Thompson, Christian D. Powell, Hunter N. B. Moseley</p>
In recent years, United States federal funding agencies, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF), have implemented public access policies to make research supported by funding from these federal agencies freely available to the public. Enforcement is primarily through annual and final reports submitted to these funding agencies, where all peer-reviewed publications must be registered through the appropriate mechanism as required by the specific federal funding agency. Unreported and/or incorrectly reported papers can result in delayed acceptance of annual and final reports and even funding delays for current and new research grants. So, it’s important to make sure every peer-reviewed publication is reported properly and in a timely manner. For large collaborative research efforts, the tracking and proper registration of peer-reviewed publications along with generation of accurate annual and final reports can create a large administrative burden. With large collaborative teams, it is easy for these administrative tasks to be overlooked, forgotten, or lost in the shuffle. In order to help with this reporting burden, we have developed the Academic Tracker software package, implemented in the Python 3 programming language and supporting Linux, Windows, and Mac operating systems. Academic Tracker helps with publication tracking and reporting by comprehensively searching major peer-reviewed publication tracking web portals, including PubMed, Crossref, ORCID, and Google Scholar, given a list of authors. Academic Tracker provides highly customizable reporting templates so information about the resulting publications is easily transformed into appropriate formats for tracking and reporting purposes. The source code and extensive documentation is hosted on GitHub (https://moseleybioinformaticslab.github.io/academic_tracker/) and is also available on the Python Package Index (https://pypi.org/project/academic_tracker) for easy installation.Ten simple rules for reporting a bugBenjamin C. Haller10.1371/journal.pcbi.10105402022-10-13T14:00:00Z2022-10-13T14:00:00Z<p>by Benjamin C. Haller</p>Characterization and calibration of multiple 2D laser scannersSyed Riaz un Nabi JafriSheraz ShamimSadia Muniza FarazAsif AhmedSyed Muhammad YasirJamshed Iqbal10.1371/journal.pone.02720632022-07-28T14:00:00Z2022-07-28T14:00:00Z<p>by Syed Riaz un Nabi Jafri, Sheraz Shamim, Sadia Muniza Faraz, Asif Ahmed, Syed Muhammad Yasir, Jamshed Iqbal</p>
This paper presents the comparative evaluation of multiple compact and lightweight 2D laser scanners for their possible backpack based scanning and mapping applications. These scanners include Hokuyo URG-04LX, Slamtec RPLidar A1-M8 and Hokuyo UTM-30LX-EW scanners. Since the technical datasheets provide general information and limited working details, this research presents a thorough study on the performance of each scanner related explicitly to indoor mapping operations. A series of scanning experiments have been performed for the characterization of each scanner using statistical analysis. During the testing, all the scanning data has been recorded using Robot Operating System (ROS) and then computed in offline processing. In initial tests, each scanner’s drift effect on range measurements has been tested and presented in the relevant section of the paper. In continuation, the effect of various scanning distances on measurement accuracy has been evaluated and discussed. Later the impact of various materials typically found in indoor vicinities and their respective properties of color and smoothness have been tested and provided in the paper. Finally, a Kalman Filtering based mathematical formulation has been utilized to calibrate each scanner and to reduce the measuring uncertainties as observed in various tests for each scanner.A concatenated LDPC-marker code for channels with correlated insertion and deletion errors in bit-patterned media recording systemTianbo Xue10.1371/journal.pone.02702472022-07-08T14:00:00Z2022-07-08T14:00:00Z<p>by Tianbo Xue</p>
Most synchronization error correction codes deal with random independent insertion and deletion errors without correlation. In this paper, we propose a probabilistic channel model with correlated insertion and deletion (CID) errors to capture the data dependence applicable to the bit-patterned media recording (BPMR) system. We also investigate the error performance and decoding complexity of a concatenated LDPC-marker code over the CID channel. Furthermore, we modify the forward backward decoding algorithm to make it suitable for the CID channel, and elaborate it based on a two-dimensional state transition diagram. Compared with the conventional marker coding scheme dealing with random errors, the concatenated LDPC-marker code takes into account the dependence between synchronization errors, improves the error performance, and reduces the decoding complexity. The BER performance of the concatenated LDPC-marker code is improved by more than 50% on average, and the decoding time is reduced by nearly 35% when the LDPC code (<i>n</i> = 4521, <i>k</i> = 3552) and the marker code (<i>N</i><sub>m</sub> = 2, <i>N</i><sub>c</sub> = 30) are used over the CID channel.The EBS-A* algorithm: An improved A* algorithm for path planningHuanwei WangShangjie LouJing JingYisen WangWei LiuTieming Liu10.1371/journal.pone.02638412022-02-17T14:00:00Z2022-02-17T14:00:00Z<p>by Huanwei Wang, Shangjie Lou, Jing Jing, Yisen Wang, Wei Liu, Tieming Liu</p>
Path planning plays an essential role in mobile robot navigation, and the A* algorithm is one of the best-known path planning algorithms. However, the traditional A* algorithm has some limitations, such as slow planning speed, close to obstacles. In this paper, we propose an improved A*-based algorithm, called the EBS-A* algorithm, that introduces expansion distance, bidirectional search, and smoothing into path planning. The expansion distance means keeping an extra space from obstacles to improve path reliability by avoiding collisions. Bidirectional search is a strategy searching path from the start node and the goal node simultaneously. Smoothing improves path robustness by reducing the number of right-angle turns. In addition, simulation tests for the EBS-A* algorithm are performed, and the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm is verified by transferring it to a robot operating system (ROS). The experimental results show that compared with the traditional A* algorithm, the proposed algorithm improves the path planning efficiency by 278% and reduces the number of critical nodes by 91.89% and the number of right-angle turns by 100%.