Soft-Ware 2002: Computing in an Imperfect World [electronic resource] : First International Conference, Soft-Ware 2002 Belfast, Northern Ireland, April 8-10, 2002 Proceedings /

Technical Session 1 -- Overview of Fuzzy-RED in Diff-Serv Networks -- An Architecture for Agent-Enhanced Network Service Provisioning through SLA Negotiation -- Facing Fault Management as It Is, Aiming for What You Would Like It to Be -- Enabling Multimedia QoS Control with Black-Box Modelling -- Technical Session 2 -- Using Markov Chains for Link Prediction in Adaptive Web Sites -- Classification of Customer Call Data in the Presence of Concept Drift and Noise -- A Learning System for Decision Support in Telecommunications -- Adaptive User Modelling in an Intelligent Telephone Assistant -- Technical Session 3 -- A Query-Driven Anytime Algorithm for Argumentative and Abductive Reasoning -- Proof Length as an Uncertainty Factor in ILP -- Paraconsistency in Object-Oriented Databases -- Decision Support with Imprecise Data for Consumers -- Genetic Programming: A Parallel Approach -- Software Uncertainty -- Technical Session 4 -- Temporal Probabilistic Concepts from Heterogeneous Data Sequences -- Handling Uncertainty in a Medical Study of Dietary Intake during Pregnancy -- Sequential Diagnosis in the Independence Bayesian Framework -- Static Field Approach for Pattern Classification -- Inferring Knowledge from Frequent Patterns -- Anytime Possibilistic Propagation Algorithm -- Technical Session 5 -- Macro Analysis of Techniques to Deal with Uncertainty in Information Systems Development: Mapping Representational Framing Influences -- The Role of Emotion, Values, and Beliefs in the Construction of Innovative Work Realities -- Managing Evolving Requirements Using eXtreme Programming -- Text Summarization in Data Mining -- Invited Speakers -- Industrial Applications of Intelligent Systems at BTexact -- Intelligent Control of Wireless and Fixed Telecom Networks -- Assertions in Programming: From Scientific Theory to Engineering Practice -- Hybrid Soft Computing for Classification and Prediction Applications -- Why Users Cannot ‘Get What They Want’ -- Systems Design with the Reverend Bayes -- Formalism and Informality in Software Development -- Industrial Panel -- An Industrial Perspective on Soft Issues: Successes, Opportunities and Challenges.

This was the ?rst conference of a new series devoted to the e?ective handling of soft issues in the design, development, and operation of computing systems. The conference brought together contributors from a range of relevant disciplines, including arti?cial intelligence, information systems, software engineering, and systems engineering. The keynote speakers, Piero Bonissone, Ray Paul, Sir Tony Hoare, Michael Jackson, and Derek McAuley have interests and experience that collectively span all of these ?elds. Soft issues involve information or knowledge that is uncertain, incomplete, or contradictory. Examples of where such issues arise include: – requirements management and software quality control in software engine- ing, – con?ict or multiple sources information management in information systems, – decision making/prediction in business management systems, – quality control in networks and user services in telecommunications, – traditional human rationality modeling in arti?cial intelligence, – data analysis in machine learning and data mining, – control management in engineering. The concept of dealing with uncertainty became prominent in the arti?cial intel- gence community nearly 20 years ago, when researchers realized that addressing uncertainty was an essential part of representing and reasoning about human knowledge in intelligent systems. The main methodologies that have emerged in this area are soft computing and computational intelligence.