Contributions in Merlin

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Die Ausgangslage für Suchfunktionen auf Unternehmens-Websites stellt sich grundlegend anders dar als bei Internet-Suchdiensten. Nicht die möglichst breite Erschließung von Informationen vieler verschiedener Websites, sondern der erfolgreiche Dialog mit den Nutzern steht im Vordergrund. Das Gelingen dieser Kommunikation wird in diesem Beitrag untersucht. Von 56 Schweizer Unternehmen und Behörden wurde jeweils die Suchfunktion der Website untersucht. Dabei gruppierten sich die insgesamt 74 Einzeltests in die vier Hauptkriterien: Suchindex, Vergleich von Anfragen und Dokumenten, Benutzerinteraktion und Suchergebnisse. Die Resultate zeigen großes Potential für Verbesserungen. Dabei wurden kein Ranking der Websites und keine Auszeichnung im Rahmen der Studie beabsichtigt. Vielmehr wurde auf Basis der Ergebnisse eine Einteilung in gute, mittlere und schlechte Websites für die einzelnen Kriterien durchgeführt. Die Analyse zeigt, dass keine Website in sämtlichen getesteten Kriterien sehr gut abschneidet. Die Studie schließt mit verschiedenen Empfehlungen, die dazu führen können, die Qualität der Suchfunktion wesentlich zu verbessern. Hierbei wird unter anderem empfohlen, der Aktualität und Vollständigkeit des Suchindex besondere Beachtung zu schenken, Metadaten der Dokumentenbasis zu pflegen, bewährte Standards für die Benutzerinteraktion zu beachten und Trefferlisten sowie potenzielle Suchanfragen auch auf eine mögliche Nutzersicht hin zu optimieren.

We present a new method for the simulation of melting and solidification in a unified particle model. Our technique uses the Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) method for the simulation of liquids, deformable as well as rigid objects, which eliminates the need to define an interface for coupling different models. Using this approach, it is possible to simulate fluids and solids by only changing the attribute values of the underlying particles. We significantly changed a prior elastic particle model to achieve a flexible model for melting and solidification. By using an SPH approach and considering a new definition of a local reference shape, the simulation of merging and splitting of different objects, as may be caused by phase change processes, is made possible. In order to keep the system stable even in regions represented by a sparse set of particles we use a special kernel function for solidification processes. Additionally, we propose a surface reconstruction technique based on considering the movement of the center of mass to reduce rendering errors in concave regions. The results demonstrate new interaction effects concerning the melting and solidification of material, even while being surrounded by liquids.

In this paper, we propose novel GPU accelerated algorithms for interactive point-based rendering (PBR) and high-quality shading of transparent point surfaces. By introducing the concept of deferred blending we are able to formulate the smooth point interpolation problem as an image compositing post-processing task. Consequently, our new PBR algorithm does not suffer from an extra visibilitysplatting pre-render pass, for conservative e–z-buffer visibility culling, as this is eventually performed together with the smooth point interpolation during image compositing. Moreover, this new deferred blending concept enables hardware accelerated transparent PBR with combined effects of multi-layer transparency, refraction, specular reflection, and per-fragment shading. Deferred blending is based on a separation of the point data into not self-overlapping minimal independent groups, a multi-target rendering pass and an image compositing post-processing stage. We present different grouping algorithms for off-line and on-line processing. For basic opaque surface rendering and simple transparency effects, our novel algorithm only needs a single geometry rendering pass. For high-quality transparent image synthesis one extra rendering pass is sufficient. Besides transparency, per-fragment reflective and refractive multi-layer effects (e.g. environment mapping) are supported in our algorithm.

Embodied artificial intelligence is based on the notion that cognition and action emerge from interactions between brain, body and environment. This chapter sketches a set of foundational principles that might be useful for understanding the emergence (“discovery”) of intelligence in biological and artificial embodied systems. Special emphasis is placed on information as a crucial resource for organisms and on information theory as a promising descriptive and predictive framework linking morphology, perception, action and neural control.

Managers' information disclosure to firm's outsiders plays an essential role for mitigating information asymmetry and agency problems. The main objective of this thesis is to analyze the managers' reporting incentives in a broader context, while considering the preferences of behavioural investors and the active role of financial analysts as target setters in particular. Further, this thesis aims to study the optimal disclosure policy of different firms in the form of guidance and to analyze its influence on the efficiency of analysts’ earnings forecasts. Overall, this thesis contributes to the broad research on behavioural corporate finance studying the determinants and consequences of managers' decisions when managers and (or) investors suffer cognitive biases and (or) have behavioural preferences. The analysis focuses on the investors' preferences as described in the prospect theory of Kahneman and Tversky (1979) and neglects any cognitive biases that might lead to irrational decisions. The contribution of this thesis is threefold. First, this thesis contributes to the empirical literature on the relevance of thresholds by showing that reported performance, particularly around the zero target, influences the market value of a firm and in particular the investors' perception of the value generated by intangibles such as R&D investments. Second, the thesis extends the theoretical literature on earnings manipulation by analyzing the managers' reporting incentives in an inter-temporal strategic game with the analysts where the managers' payoff is determined by investors using the analysts' consensus forecast as a target when evaluating earnings reports. Finally, instead of adapting the view that agents suffer some cognitive limitations, this thesis contributes to the literature that seeks economic explanations for the analysts' underreaction by showing empirically that managerial guidance is capable to explain such inefficiencies in the analysts' forecasting behavior.