The paper presents two useful extensions of the incremental SVM in the context of online learning. An online support vector data description algorithm enables application of the online paradigm to unsupervised learning. Furthermore, online learning can be used in the large-scale classification problems to limit the memory requirements for storage of the kernel matrix. The proposed algorithms ar...

Utmost care of human related issues are essentially required for sustainable growth of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) of India, as these MSMEs are contributing enormously to socio-economic development of country. In this research, aspects related to human factors and functioning of MSMEs of India were studied. The investigation, based on a survey of 84 MSMEs of India cited that the...

This paper considers a variant of the vehicle routing problem where vehicles are allowed to take more than one route during the working day. A restricted fleet size is used in order to serve customers’ demand. Therefore, vehicles could exceed the time horizon. The objective is to optimize both maximum overtime and routing cost. A mathematical model has been proposed for the VRPM. A memetic algo...

A survey of 887 employees in a German government agency assessed the antecedents and consequences of idiosyncratic arrangements individual workers negotiated with their supervisors. Work arrangements promoting the individualization of employment conditions, such as part-time work and telecommuting, were positively related to the negotiation of idiosyncratic deals ("i-deals"). Worker personal in...

In this paper, I focus on a domain in which the conflict between freedom and equality is at stake: the world of work. Current U.S. laws impose many negative liberty restraints on employers with respect to employees. They may not discriminate by race, gender, religion, or age. They must pay minimum wages to most employees, and pay overtime to those working more than 40 hours per week. They must ...

Operating rooms are important assets for hospitals as they generate the largest revenue and, at the same time, produce the largest cost for hospitals. The model presented in this paper helps make capacity planning decisions on the combination of open operating rooms (ORs) and estimated overtime to satisfy the allocated OR time to each specialty. The model combines both decisions on determining ...

Recently two of my friends developed cancer, and one of my patients was diagnosed with oral cancer. The devastating news shocked me and evoked sympathy for the plight of modern workers. They often face unreasonable expectations from supervisors, and can become overstressed from the desire to perform flawlessly at their job. Moreover, some are forced to work many overtime hours. This overwhelmin...

The assistance provided by the Mobile Emergency Service (SAMU) may result in changes in the health of the workers. This is a cross-sectional epidemiological study which aimed to evaluate the sociodemographic, health and lifestyle characteristics and the working conditions among professionals of the SAMU in Campinas, SP, Brazil. A questionnaire was used to collect sociodemographic, lifestyle, he...

In an National Football League overtime, a coin is tossed to determine which team will receive the kick off. In the sudden death format starting on offense has a significantly higher chance of winning. We examine two proposals to improve the ex post fairness: auctions and divide-and-choose. We find the auction to provide a better outcome than the divide-and-choose rule in general when the teams...