Author archives

Paper – Miniature finger mounted camera assists blind to read printed text

Via the University of Maryland, ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing, DOI: 10.1145/2914793 – “The recent miniaturization of cameras has enabled finger-based reading approaches that provide blind and visually impaired readers with access to printed materials. Compared to handheld text scanners such as mobile phone applications, mounting a tiny camera on the user’s own finger has the …

Subjects: Knowledge Management

Strategy and Additional Actions Needed to Help Ensure Agencies Use the Do Not Pay Working System as Intended

Improper Payments: Strategy and Additional Actions Needed to Help Ensure Agencies Use the Do Not Pay Working System as Intended, GAO-17-15: Published: Oct 14, 2016. Publicly Released: Nov 14, 2016. “The Office of Management and Budget (OMB), in coordination with the Department of the Treasury (Treasury), developed the Do Not Pay (DNP) working system as …

Subjects: Congress, Government Documents, Legislation

Economic Effects of Canceling Scheduled Changes to Overtime Regulations

“The federal Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA) requires employers to provide certain workers with overtime pay when they work more than 40 hours in a week. That overtime pay must be at least 150 percent of the worker’s usual hourly wage. The Department of Labor has issued a rule—set to take effect on …

Subjects: Congress, Economy, Financial System, Government Documents

“one-stop-shop” of data sources useful to anyone wishing to analyze fracking data

Fracking Data – Fracking data, chemicals, toxicities, source code [searchable] Khepry Quixote  – “This site will grow, especially in the domain of “blended” data, for example, the blending of fracking chemical disclosure data with each chemical’s recognized or suspected toxicity.  It is my intent to evolve the various fracking datasets into spatially-oriented datasets and blend …

Subjects: Energy, Environmental Law, Government Documents, Knowledge Management

Additional Historical Statutes at Large Added to Law.gov

Library of Congress Blog – in Custodia Legis. November 8, 2016.Jennifer González – “Two years ago we added historical Statutes at Large to our Digitized Material page. Years 1789-1950 have been available there in a large PDF download, but we have been working steadily to add more functionality to the website. We continue to add details …

Subjects: Congress, E-Government, Government Documents, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Libraries

Paper – Biosharing project addresses searchable portal, linked registries and metadata standards

BioSharing: curated and crowd-sourced metadata standards, databases and data policies in the life sciences – Database, 2016, 1–8 doi: 10.1093/database/baw075 “BioSharing (http://www.biosharing.org) is a manually curated, searchable portal of three linked registries. These resources cover standards (terminologies, formats and models, and reporting guidelines), databases, and data policies in the life sciences, broadly encompassing the biological, …

Subjects: Internet, Knowledge Management, Libraries

Paper – Challenge Restraints and the Scope of the Patent

Hovenkamp, Erik, Challenge Restraints and the Scope of the Patent (November 8, 2016). Available for download at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2866630 “Patent rights are not the only important legal entitlements conferred by the Patent Act. It also vests “challenge rights” in third parties, permitting them to challenge granted patents as invalid or uninfringed, and potentially clearing a …

Subjects: Intellectual Property, Legal Research, Patent and Trademark

Introduction: The Institutional Problem in Modern International Law

Collins, Richard, Introduction: The Institutional Problem in Modern International Law (November 7, 2016). Available for download at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2865716 “Modern international law is widely understood as an autonomous system of binding legal rules. Nevertheless, this claim to autonomy is far from uncontroversial. International lawyers have faced recurrent scepticism as to both the reality and efficacy …

Subjects: Government Documents, Legal Research

Microsoft Academic Scholar Search Adds Neuroscience

Engadget – “Semantic Scholar went live in November 2015 with a focus on computer science papers. Today, the service expanded to include neuroscience, bringing the search engine’s database to more than 10 million papers. Semantic Scholar is pitched as a sophisticated alternative to Google Scholar, and it uses AI systems and natural language processing algorithms …

Subjects: Internet, Knowledge Management, Libraries, Microsoft, Search Engines

OMB Issues Policies for Federal Agency Public Websites and Digital Services

November 8, 2016 memorandum – OMB – “Federal Agency public websites and digital services are the primary means by which the public receives information from and interacts with the Federal Government. These websites and services help the public apply for benefits, search for jobs, comply with Federal rules, obtain authoritative information, and much more. Federal websites and digital …

Subjects: E-Government, Government Documents, Internet, Knowledge Management, Web Site Accessibility and Usability