Engineering optimization needs easy-to-use and efficient optimization tools that can be employed for practical purposes. In this context, stochastic search techniques have good reputation and wide acceptability as being powerful tools for solving complex engineering optimization problems. However, increased complexity of some metaheuristic algorithms sometimes makes it difficult for engineers t...

Steve Jobs, one of the greatest visionaries of our time was quoted in 1996 saying “a lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them”[38] indicating he advocated products to be developed based on human intuition rather than research. With the advancements of mobile devices, social networks and the Internet of Things (IoT) enormous amounts of complex data, both structure...

The ability of now-casting and eventuality is the most crucial and vital achievement of big data analytics in the area of policy-making. To recognize the trends and to render a real image of the current condition and alarming immediate indicators, the significance and the specific positions of big data in policy-making are undeniable. Moreover, the requirement for policy-making institutions to ...

Among the different lateral force resisting systems, shear walls are of appropriate stiffness and hence are extensively employed in the design of high-rise structures. The architectural concerns regarding the safety of these structures have further widened the application of coupled shear walls. The present study investigated the optimal dimensional design of coupled shear walls based on the im...

In ancient texts, 40 was a magic number. It meant a “lot” or “a long time.” 40 years represented the time it took for a new generation to arise. A look back at 40 years of VLDB suggests that this applies to database researchers as well – the young researchers of the early VLDBs are now the old folks of the database world, and a new generation is creating afresh. Over this period many plateaus o...