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Should you use Userbase for your next static site?

During the winter 2020 Pointless Weekend, we built TrailBuddy (working app coming soon). Our team consisted of four developers, two project managers, two front-end developers, a digital-analyst, a UXer, and a designer. In about 48 hours, we took an idea from Jeremy Field’s head to a (mostly) working app. We broke up the project in two parts:. First, a back-end that crunches trail, weather, and soil data. That data is exposed via a GraphQL API for a web app to consume.

While developers built the API, I built a static front end using Next.js. Famously, static front-ends don’t have a database, or a concept of “users.” A bit of functionality I wanted to add was saving favorite trails. I didn’t want to be hacky about it, I needed some way to add users and a database. I knew it’d be hard for the developers to set this up as part of the API, they had their hands full with all the #soil-soil-soil-soil-soil (a slack channel dedicated solely to figuring out our soil data problem—those were plentiful.) I had been looking for an excuse to use Userbase, and this seemed like as good a time as any.

A textbook Userbase use case

“When would I use it?” The Usebase site lists these reasons:

  • If you want to build a web app without writing any backend code.
  • If you never want to see your users' data.
  • If you're tired of dealing with databases.
  • If you want to radically simplify your GDPR compliance.
  • And if you want to keep things really simple.

This was a perfect fit for my problem. I didn’t want to write any more backend code for this. I didn’t want to see our user’s data, I don’t care to know anyone’s favorite trails.* A nice bonus to not having users in our backend was not having to worry about keeping their data safe. We don’t have their data at all, it’s end-to-end encrypted by Userbase. We can offer a reasonable amount of privacy for free (well for the price of using Userbase: $49 a year.) I am not tired of dealing with databases, but I’d rather not. I don’t think anyone doesn’t want to simplify their GDPR compliance. Finally, given our tight timeline I wanted nothing more than to keep things really simple.

A sign up form that I didn't have to write a back-end for

Using Userbase

Userbase can be tried for free, so I set aside thirty minutes or so to do a quick proof of concept to make sure this would work out for us. I made an account and followed their Quickstart. Userbase is a fundamentally easy tool to use, but their quickstart is everything I’d want out of a quickstart:

  • Written in the most vanilla way possible (just HTML and vanilla JS). This means I can adapt it to my needs, in this case React using Next.js
  • Easy to follow, it does the most barebones tour of the functionality you can expect to get out of the SDK (software development kit.) In other words it is quick and it is a start
  • It has a live demo and code samples you can download and run yourself

It didn’t take long after that to integrate Userbase into our app with more help from their great docs. I debated whether to add code samples of what we did here, and I didn’t because any reader would be better off using the great quickstart and docs Userbase provides—they are that clear, and that good. Depending on your use case you’ll need to adapt the examples to your needs, for us the trickiest things were creating a top level authentication context to manage users in the app, and a custom hook to encapsulate all the logic for setting, updating, and deleting favourite trails in the app. Userbase’s SDK worked seamlessly for us.

A log in form that I didn't have to write a back-end for

Is Userbase for you?

Maybe. I am definitely a fan, so much so that this blog post probably reads like an advert. Userbase saved me a ton of time in this project. It reminded me of “The All Powerful Front End Developer” talk by Chris Coyer. I don’t fully subscribe to all the ideas in that talk, but it is nice to have “serverless” tools like Userbase, and all the new JAMstacky things. There are limits to the Userbase serverless experience in terms of scale, and control. Obviously relying on a third party for something always carries some (probably small) risk—it’s worth noting Usebase includes a note on their pricing page that says “You can host it yourself always under your control, or we can run it for you for a full serverless experience”—Still, I wouldn’t hesitate this to use in future projects.

One of the great things about Viget and Pointless Weekend is the opportunity to try new things. For me that was Next.js and Userbase for Trailbuddy. It doesn’t always work out (in fact this is my first pointless weekend where a risk hasn’t blown up in my face) but it is always fun. Getting to try out Userbase and beginning to think about how we may use it in the future made the weekend worthwhile for me, and it made my job on this project much more enjoyable.

*I will write a future post about privacy conscious analytics in TrailBuddy when I’ve figured that out. I am looking into Fathom Analytics for that.



  • Code
  • Front-end Engineering

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Exploring Node.js Internals

Since the introduction of Node.js by Ryan Dahl at the European JSConf on 8 November 2009, it has seen wide usage across the tech industry. Companies such as Netflix, Uber, and LinkedIn give credibility to the claim that Node.js can withstand a high amount of traffic and concurrency. Armed with basic knowledge, beginner and intermediate developers of Node.js struggle with many things: “It’s just a runtime!” “It has event loops!




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Google Lens now copies handwritten text and pastes it straight to your computer

Are there still folks among you who, like me, prefer handwriting to typing? If you’re in this group, you’ll love this new feature on Google Lens. The app now lets you scan your handwritten notes, copy them, and paste them straight to your computer. I gave it a spin, and I bring you my impressions […]

The post Google Lens now copies handwritten text and pastes it straight to your computer appeared first on DIY Photography.




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Watch YouTube’s most informed sock puppet teach you how to shoot with manual exposure

For those who’ve never seen TheCrafsMan SteadyCraftin on YouTube, you’re in for a treat – even if you already understand everything contained within this 25-minute video. For those who have, you know exactly what to expect. I’ve been following this rather unconventional channel for a while now. It covers a lot of handy DIY and […]

The post Watch YouTube’s most informed sock puppet teach you how to shoot with manual exposure appeared first on DIY Photography.




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The entropy of holomorphic correspondences: exact computations and rational semigroups. (arXiv:2004.13691v1 [math.DS] CROSS LISTED)

We study two notions of topological entropy of correspondences introduced by Friedland and Dinh-Sibony. Upper bounds are known for both. We identify a class of holomorphic correspondences whose entropy in the sense of Dinh-Sibony equals the known upper bound. This provides an exact computation of the entropy for rational semigroups. We also explore a connection between these two notions of entropy.




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Resonances as Viscosity Limits for Exponentially Decaying Potentials. (arXiv:2005.01257v2 [math.SP] UPDATED)

We show that the complex absorbing potential (CAP) method for computing scattering resonances applies to the case of exponentially decaying potentials. That means that the eigenvalues of $-Delta + V - iepsilon x^2$, $|V(x)|leq e^{-2gamma |x|}$ converge, as $ epsilon o 0+ $, to the poles of the meromorphic continuation of $ ( -Delta + V -lambda^2 )^{-1} $ uniformly on compact subsets of $ extrm{Re},lambda>0$, $ extrm{Im},lambda>-gamma$, $arglambda > pi/8$.




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On the exterior Dirichlet problem for a class of fully nonlinear elliptic equations. (arXiv:2004.12660v3 [math.AP] UPDATED)

In this paper, we mainly establish the existence and uniqueness theorem for solutions of the exterior Dirichlet problem for a class of fully nonlinear second-order elliptic equations related to the eigenvalues of the Hessian, with prescribed generalized symmetric asymptotic behavior at infinity. Moreover, we give some new results for the Hessian equations, Hessian quotient equations and the special Lagrangian equations, which have been studied previously.




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Differentiating through Log-Log Convex Programs. (arXiv:2004.12553v2 [math.OC] UPDATED)

We show how to efficiently compute the derivative (when it exists) of the solution map of log-log convex programs (LLCPs). These are nonconvex, nonsmooth optimization problems with positive variables that become convex when the variables, objective functions, and constraint functions are replaced with their logs. We focus specifically on LLCPs generated by disciplined geometric programming, a grammar consisting of a set of atomic functions with known log-log curvature and a composition rule for combining them. We represent a parametrized LLCP as the composition of a smooth transformation of parameters, a convex optimization problem, and an exponential transformation of the convex optimization problem's solution. The derivative of this composition can be computed efficiently, using recently developed methods for differentiating through convex optimization problems. We implement our method in CVXPY, a Python-embedded modeling language and rewriting system for convex optimization. In just a few lines of code, a user can specify a parametrized LLCP, solve it, and evaluate the derivative or its adjoint at a vector. This makes it possible to conduct sensitivity analyses of solutions, given perturbations to the parameters, and to compute the gradient of a function of the solution with respect to the parameters. We use the adjoint of the derivative to implement differentiable log-log convex optimization layers in PyTorch and TensorFlow. Finally, we present applications to designing queuing systems and fitting structured prediction models.




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Hessian quotient equations on exterior domains. (arXiv:2004.06908v2 [math.AP] UPDATED)

It is well-known that a celebrated J"{o}rgens-Calabi-Pogorelov theorem for Monge-Amp`ere equations states that any classical (viscosity) convex solution of $det(D^2u)=1$ in $mathbb{R}^n$ must be a quadratic polynomial. Therefore, it is an interesting topic to study the existence and uniqueness theorem of such fully nonlinear partial differential equations' Dirichlet problems on exterior domains with suitable asymptotic conditions at infinity. As a continuation of the works of Caffarelli-Li for Monge-Amp`ere equation and of Bao-Li-Li for $k$-Hessian equations, this paper is devoted to the solvability of the exterior Dirichlet problem of Hessian quotient equations $sigma_k(lambda(D^2u))/sigma_l(lambda(D^2u))=1$ for any $1leq l<kleq n$ in all dimensions $ngeq 2$. By introducing the concept of generalized symmetric subsolutions and then using the Perron's method, we establish the existence theorem for viscosity solutions, with prescribed asymptotic behavior which is close to some quadratic polynomial at infinity.




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On the Asymptotic $u_0$-Expected Flooding Time of Stationary Edge-Markovian Graphs. (arXiv:2004.03660v4 [math.PR] UPDATED)

Consider that $u_0$ nodes are aware of some piece of data $d_0$. This note derives the expected time required for the data $d_0$ to be disseminated through-out a network of $n$ nodes, when communication between nodes evolves according to a graphical Markov model $overline{ mathcal{G}}_{n,hat{p}}$ with probability parameter $hat{p}$. In this model, an edge between two nodes exists at discrete time $k in mathbb{N}^+$ with probability $hat{p}$ if this edge existed at $k-1$, and with probability $(1-hat{p})$ if this edge did not exist at $k-1$. Each edge is interpreted as a bidirectional communication link over which data between neighbors is shared. The initial communication graph is assumed to be an Erdos-Renyi random graph with parameters $(n,hat{p})$, hence we consider a emph{stationary} Markov model $overline{mathcal{G}}_{n,hat{p}}$. The asymptotic "$u_0$-expected flooding time" of $overline{mathcal{G}}_{n,hat{p}}$ is defined as the expected number of iterations required to transmit the data $d_0$ from $u_0$ nodes to $n$ nodes, in the limit as $n$ approaches infinity. Although most previous results on the asymptotic flooding time in graphical Markov models are either emph{almost sure} or emph{with high probability}, the bounds obtained here are emph{in expectation}. However, our bounds are tighter and can be more complete than previous results.




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$5$-rank of ambiguous class groups of quintic Kummer extensions. (arXiv:2003.00761v2 [math.NT] UPDATED)

Let $k ,=, mathbb{Q}(sqrt[5]{n},zeta_5)$, where $n$ is a positive integer, $5^{th}$ power-free, whose $5-$class group is isomorphic to $mathbb{Z}/5mathbb{Z} imesmathbb{Z}/5mathbb{Z}$. Let $k_0,=,mathbb{Q}(zeta_5)$ be the cyclotomic field containing a primitive $5^{th}$ root of unity $zeta_5$. Let $C_{k,5}^{(sigma)}$ the group of the ambiguous classes under the action of $Gal(k/k_0)$ = $<sigma>$. The aim of this paper is to determine all integers $n$ such that the group of ambiguous classes $C_{k,5}^{(sigma)}$ has rank $1$ or $2$.




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Willems' Fundamental Lemma for State-space Systems and its Extension to Multiple Datasets. (arXiv:2002.01023v2 [math.OC] UPDATED)

Willems et al.'s fundamental lemma asserts that all trajectories of a linear system can be obtained from a single given one, assuming that a persistency of excitation condition holds. This result has profound implications for system identification and data-driven control, and has seen a revival over the last few years. The purpose of this paper is to extend Willems' lemma to the situation where multiple (possibly short) system trajectories are given instead of a single long one. To this end, we introduce a notion of collective persistency of excitation. We will then show that all trajectories of a linear system can be obtained from a given finite number of trajectories, as long as these are collectively persistently exciting. We will demonstrate that this result enables the identification of linear systems from data sets with missing data samples. Additionally, we show that the result is of practical significance in data-driven control of unstable systems.




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Linear Convergence of First- and Zeroth-Order Primal-Dual Algorithms for Distributed Nonconvex Optimization. (arXiv:1912.12110v2 [math.OC] UPDATED)

This paper considers the distributed nonconvex optimization problem of minimizing a global cost function formed by a sum of local cost functions by using local information exchange. We first propose a distributed first-order primal-dual algorithm. We show that it converges sublinearly to the stationary point if each local cost function is smooth and linearly to the global optimum under an additional condition that the global cost function satisfies the Polyak-{L}ojasiewicz condition. This condition is weaker than strong convexity, which is a standard condition for proving the linear convergence of distributed optimization algorithms, and the global minimizer is not necessarily unique or finite. Motivated by the situations where the gradients are unavailable, we then propose a distributed zeroth-order algorithm, derived from the proposed distributed first-order algorithm by using a deterministic gradient estimator, and show that it has the same convergence properties as the proposed first-order algorithm under the same conditions. The theoretical results are illustrated by numerical simulations.




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Regularized vortex approximation for 2D Euler equations with transport noise. (arXiv:1912.07233v2 [math.PR] UPDATED)

We study a mean field approximation for the 2D Euler vorticity equation driven by a transport noise. We prove that the Euler equations can be approximated by interacting point vortices driven by a regularized Biot-Savart kernel and the same common noise. The approximation happens by sending the number of particles $N$ to infinity and the regularization $epsilon$ in the Biot-Savart kernel to $0$, as a suitable function of $N$.




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Locally equivalent Floer complexes and unoriented link cobordisms. (arXiv:1911.03659v4 [math.GT] UPDATED)

We show that the local equivalence class of the collapsed link Floer complex $cCFL^infty(L)$, together with many $Upsilon$-type invariants extracted from this group, is a concordance invariant of links. In particular, we define a version of the invariants $Upsilon_L(t)$ and $ u^+(L)$ when $L$ is a link and we prove that they give a lower bound for the slice genus $g_4(L)$. Furthermore, in the last section of the paper we study the homology group $HFL'(L)$ and its behaviour under unoriented cobordisms. We obtain that a normalized version of the $upsilon$-set, introduced by Ozsv'ath, Stipsicz and Szab'o, produces a lower bound for the 4-dimensional smooth crosscap number $gamma_4(L)$.




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A one-loop exact quantization of Chern-Simons theory. (arXiv:1910.05230v2 [math-ph] UPDATED)

We examine Chern-Simons theory as a deformation of a 3-dimensional BF theory that is partially holomorphic and partially topological. In particular, we introduce a novel gauge that leads naturally to a one-loop exact quantization of this BF theory and Chern-Simons theory. This approach illuminates several important features of Chern-Simons theory, notably the bulk-boundary correspondence of Chern-Simons theory with chiral WZW theory. In addition to rigorously constructing the theory, we also explain how it applies to a large class of closely related 3-dimensional theories and some of the consequences for factorization algebras of observables.




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Convolutions on the complex torus. (arXiv:1908.11815v3 [math.RA] UPDATED)

"Quasi-elliptic" functions can be given a ring structure in two different ways, using either ordinary multiplication, or convolution. The map between the corresponding standard bases is calculated and given by Eisenstein series. A related structure has appeared recently in the computation of Feynman integrals. The two approaches are related by a sequence of polynomials with interlacing zeroes.




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Integrability of moduli and regularity of Denjoy counterexamples. (arXiv:1908.06568v4 [math.DS] UPDATED)

We study the regularity of exceptional actions of groups by $C^{1,alpha}$ diffeomorphisms on the circle, i.e. ones which admit exceptional minimal sets, and whose elements have first derivatives that are continuous with concave modulus of continuity $alpha$. Let $G$ be a finitely generated group admitting a $C^{1,alpha}$ action $ ho$ with a free orbit on the circle, and such that the logarithms of derivatives of group elements are uniformly bounded at some point of the circle. We prove that if $G$ has spherical growth bounded by $c n^{d-1}$ and if the function $1/alpha^d$ is integrable near zero, then under some mild technical assumptions on $alpha$, there is a sequence of exceptional $C^{1,alpha}$ actions of $G$ which converge to $ ho$ in the $C^1$ topology. As a consequence for a single diffeomorphism, we obtain that if the function $1/alpha$ is integrable near zero, then there exists a $C^{1,alpha}$ exceptional diffeomorphism of the circle. This corollary accounts for all previously known moduli of continuity for derivatives of exceptional diffeomorphisms. We also obtain a partial converse to our main result. For finitely generated free abelian groups, the existence of an exceptional action, together with some natural hypotheses on the derivatives of group elements, puts integrability restrictions on the modulus $alpha$. These results are related to a long-standing question of D. McDuff concerning the length spectrum of exceptional $C^1$ diffeomorphisms of the circle.




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Nonlinear stability of explicit self-similar solutions for the timelike extremal hypersurfaces in R^{1+3}. (arXiv:1907.01126v2 [math.AP] UPDATED)

This paper is devoted to the study of the singularity phenomenon of timelike extremal hypersurfaces in Minkowski spacetime $mathbb{R}^{1+3}$. We find that there are two explicit lightlike self-similar solutions to a graph representation of timelike extremal hypersurfaces in Minkowski spacetime $mathbb{R}^{1+3}$, the geometry of them are two spheres. The linear mode unstable of those lightlike self-similar solutions for the radially symmetric membranes equation is given. After that, we show those self-similar solutions of the radially symmetric membranes equation are nonlinearly stable inside a strictly proper subset of the backward lightcone. This means that the dynamical behavior of those two spheres is as attractors. Meanwhile, we overcome the double roots case (the theorem of Poincar'{e} can't be used) in solving the difference equation by construction of a Newton's polygon when we carry out the analysis of spectrum for the linear operator.




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Decentralized and Parallelized Primal and Dual Accelerated Methods for Stochastic Convex Programming Problems. (arXiv:1904.09015v10 [math.OC] UPDATED)

We introduce primal and dual stochastic gradient oracle methods for decentralized convex optimization problems. Both for primal and dual oracles the proposed methods are optimal in terms of the number of communication steps. However, for all classes of the objective, the optimality in terms of the number of oracle calls per node in the class of methods with optimal number of communication steps takes place only up to a logarithmic factor and the notion of smoothness. By using mini-batching technique we show that all proposed methods with stochastic oracle can be additionally parallelized at each node.




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On $p$-groups with automorphism groups related to the exceptional Chevalley groups. (arXiv:1810.08365v3 [math.GR] UPDATED)

Let $hat G$ be the finite simply connected version of an exceptional Chevalley group, and let $V$ be a nontrivial irreducible module, of minimal dimension, for $hat G$ over its field of definition. We explore the overgroup structure of $hat G$ in $mathrm{GL}(V)$, and the submodule structure of the exterior square (and sometimes the third Lie power) of $V$. When $hat G$ is defined over a field of odd prime order $p$, this allows us to construct the smallest (with respect to certain properties) $p$-groups $P$ such that the group induced by $mathrm{Aut}(P)$ on $P/Phi(P)$ is either $hat G$ or its normaliser in $mathrm{GL}(V)$.




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Exotic Springer fibers for orbits corresponding to one-row bipartitions. (arXiv:1810.03731v2 [math.RT] UPDATED)

We study the geometry and topology of exotic Springer fibers for orbits corresponding to one-row bipartitions from an explicit, combinatorial point of view. This includes a detailed analysis of the structure of the irreducible components and their intersections as well as the construction of an explicit affine paving. Moreover, we compute the ring structure of cohomology by constructing a CW-complex homotopy equivalent to the exotic Springer fiber. This homotopy equivalent space admits an action of the type C Weyl group inducing Kato's original exotic Springer representation on cohomology. Our results are described in terms of the diagrammatics of the one-boundary Temperley-Lieb algebra (also known as the blob algebra). This provides a first step in generalizing the geometric versions of Khovanov's arc algebra to the exotic setting.




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Twisted Sequences of Extensions. (arXiv:1808.07936v3 [math.RT] UPDATED)

Gabber and Joseph introduced a ladder diagram between two natural sequences of extensions. Their diagram is used to produce a 'twisted' sequence that is applied to old and new results on extension groups in category $mathcal{O}$.




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On the Total Curvature and Betti Numbers of Complex Projective Manifolds. (arXiv:1807.11625v2 [math.DG] UPDATED)

We prove an inequality between the sum of the Betti numbers of a complex projective manifold and its total curvature, and we characterize the complex projective manifolds whose total curvature is minimal. These results extend the classical theorems of Chern and Lashof to complex projective space.




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Extremal values of the Sackin balance index for rooted binary trees. (arXiv:1801.10418v5 [q-bio.PE] UPDATED)

Tree balance plays an important role in different research areas like theoretical computer science and mathematical phylogenetics. For example, it has long been known that under the Yule model, a pure birth process, imbalanced trees are more likely than balanced ones. Therefore, different methods to measure the balance of trees were introduced. The Sackin index is one of the most frequently used measures for this purpose. In many contexts, statements about the minimal and maximal values of this index have been discussed, but formal proofs have never been provided. Moreover, while the number of trees with maximal Sackin index as well as the number of trees with minimal Sackin index when the number of leaves is a power of 2 are relatively easy to understand, the number of trees with minimal Sackin index for all other numbers of leaves was completely unknown. In this manuscript, we fully characterize trees with minimal and maximal Sackin index and also provide formulas to explicitly calculate the number of such trees.




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Expansion of Iterated Stratonovich Stochastic Integrals of Arbitrary Multiplicity Based on Generalized Iterated Fourier Series Converging Pointwise. (arXiv:1801.00784v9 [math.PR] UPDATED)

The article is devoted to the expansion of iterated Stratonovich stochastic integrals of arbitrary multiplicity $k$ $(kinmathbb{N})$ based on the generalized iterated Fourier series. The case of Fourier-Legendre series as well as the case of trigonotemric Fourier series are considered in details. The obtained expansion provides a possibility to represent the iterated Stratonovich stochastic integral in the form of iterated series of products of standard Gaussian random variables. Convergence in the mean of degree $2n$ $(nin mathbb{N})$ of the expansion is proved. Some modifications of the mentioned expansion were derived for the case $k=2$. One of them is based of multiple trigonomentric Fourier series converging almost everywhere in the square $[t, T]^2$. The results of the article can be applied to the numerical solution of Ito stochastic differential equations.




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High dimensional expanders and coset geometries. (arXiv:1710.05304v3 [math.CO] UPDATED)

High dimensional expanders is a vibrant emerging field of study. Nevertheless, the only known construction of bounded degree high dimensional expanders is based on Ramanujan complexes, whereas one dimensional bounded degree expanders are abundant.

In this work, we construct new families of bounded degree high dimensional expanders obeying the local spectral expansion property. This property has a number of important consequences, including geometric overlapping, fast mixing of high dimensional random walks, agreement testing and agreement expansion. Our construction also yields new families of expander graphs which are close to the Ramanujan bound, i.e., their spectral gap is close to optimal.

The construction is quite elementary and it is presented in a self contained manner; This is in contrary to the highly involved previously known construction of the Ramanujan complexes. The construction is also very symmetric (such symmetry properties are not known for Ramanujan complexes) ; The symmetry of the construction could be used, for example, in order to obtain good symmetric LDPC codes that were previously based on Ramanujan graphs.

The main tool that we use for is the theory of coset geometries. Coset geometries arose as a tool for studying finite simple groups. Here, we show that coset geometries arise in a very natural manner for groups of elementary matrices over any finitely generated algebra over a commutative unital ring. In other words, we show that such groups act simply transitively on the top dimensional face of a pure, partite, clique complex.




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Surjective endomorphisms of projective surfaces -- the existence of infinitely many dense orbits. (arXiv:2005.03628v1 [math.AG])

Let $f colon X o X$ be a surjective endomorphism of a normal projective surface. When $operatorname{deg} f geq 2$, applying an (iteration of) $f$-equivariant minimal model program (EMMP), we determine the geometric structure of $X$. Using this, we extend the second author's result to singular surfaces to the extent that either $X$ has an $f$-invariant non-constant rational function, or $f$ has infinitely many Zariski-dense forward orbits; this result is also extended to Adelic topology (which is finer than Zariski topology).




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Phase Transitions for one-dimensional Lorenz-like expanding Maps. (arXiv:2005.03558v1 [math.DS])

Given an one-dimensional Lorenz-like expanding map we prove that the conditionlinebreak $P_{top}(phi,partial mathcal{P},ell)<P_{top}(phi,ell)$ (see, subsection 2.4 for definition), introduced by Buzzi and Sarig in [1] is satisfied for all continuous potentials $phi:[0,1]longrightarrow mathbb{R}$. We apply this to prove that quasi-H"older-continuous potentials (see, subsection 2.2 for definition) have at most one equilibrium measure and we construct a family of continuous but not H"older and neither weak H"older continuous potentials for which we observe phase transitions. Indeed, this class includes all H"older and weak-H"older continuous potentials and form an open and [2].




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On completion of unimodular rows over polynomial extension of finitely generated rings over $mathbb{Z}$. (arXiv:2005.03485v1 [math.AC])

In this article, we prove that if $R$ is a finitely generated ring over $mathbb{Z}$ of dimension $d, dgeq2, frac{1}{d!}in R$, then any unimodular row over $R[X]$ of length $d+1$ can be mapped to a factorial row by elementary transformations.




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Derivatives of normal Jacobi operator on real hypersurfaces in the complex quadric. (arXiv:2005.03483v1 [math.DG])

In cite{S 2017}, Suh gave a non-existence theorem for Hopf real hypersurfaces in the complex quadric with parallel normal Jacobi operator. Motivated by this result, in this paper, we introduce some generalized conditions named $mathcal C$-parallel or Reeb parallel normal Jacobi operators. By using such weaker parallelisms of normal Jacobi operator, first we can assert a non-existence theorem of Hopf real hypersurfaces with $mathcal C$-parallel normal Jacobi operator in the complex quadric $Q^{m}$, $m geq 3$. Next, we prove that a Hopf real hypersurface has Reeb parallel normal Jacobi operator if and only if it has an $mathfrak A$-isotropic singular normal vector field.




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A note on Penner's cocycle on the fatgraph complex. (arXiv:2005.03414v1 [math.GT])

We study a 1-cocycle on the fatgraph complex of a punctured surface introduced by Penner. We present an explicit cobounding cochain for this cocycle, whose formula involves a summation over trivalent vertices of a trivalent fatgraph spine. In a similar fashion, we express the symplectic form of the underlying surface of a given fatgraph spine.




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Maximum of Exponential Random Variables, Hurwitz's Zeta Function, and the Partition Function. (arXiv:2005.03392v1 [math.PR])

A natural problem in the context of the coupon collector's problem is the behavior of the maximum of independent geometrically distributed random variables (with distinct parameters). This question has been addressed by Brennan et al. (British J. of Math. & CS. 8 (2015), 330-336). Here we provide explicit asymptotic expressions for the moments of that maximum, as well as of the maximum of exponential random variables with corresponding parameters. We also deal with the probability of each of the variables being the maximal one.

The calculations lead to expressions involving Hurwitz's zeta function at certain special points. We find here explicitly the values of the function at these points. Also, the distribution function of the maximum we deal with is closely related to the generating function of the partition function. Thus, our results (and proofs) rely on classical results pertaining to the partition function.




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Filtered expansions in general relativity II. (arXiv:2005.03390v1 [math-ph])

This is the second of two papers in which we construct formal power series solutions in external parameters to the vacuum Einstein equations, implementing one bounce for the Belinskii-Khalatnikov-Lifshitz (BKL) proposal for spatially inhomogeneous spacetimes. Here we show that spatially inhomogeneous perturbations of spatially homogeneous elements are unobstructed. A spectral sequence for a filtered complex, and a homological contraction based on gauge-fixing, are used to do this.




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The conjecture of Erd"{o}s--Straus is true for every $nequiv 13 extrm{ mod }24$. (arXiv:2005.03273v1 [math.NT])

In this short note we give a proof of the famous conjecture of Erd"{o}s-Straus for the case $nequiv13 extrm{ mod } 24.$ The Erd"{o}s--Straus conjecture states that the equation $frac{4}{n}=frac{1}{x}+frac{1}{y}+frac{1}{z}$ has positive integer solutions $x,y,z$ for every $ngeq 2$. It is open for $nequiv 1 extrm{ mod } 12$. Indeed, in all of the other cases the solutions are always easy to find. We prove that the conjecture is true for every $nequiv 13 extrm{ mod } 24$. Therefore, to solve it completely, it remains to find solutions for every $nequiv 1 extrm{ mod } 24$.




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A Note on Cores and Quasi Relative Interiors in Partially Finite Convex Programming. (arXiv:2005.03265v1 [math.FA])

The problem of minimizing an entropy functional subject to linear constraints is a useful example of partially finite convex programming. In the 1990s, Borwein and Lewis provided broad and easy-to-verify conditions that guarantee strong duality for such problems. Their approach is to construct a function in the quasi-relative interior of the relevant infinite-dimensional set, which assures the existence of a point in the core of the relevant finite-dimensional set. We revisit this problem, and provide an alternative proof by directly appealing to the definition of the core, rather than by relying on any properties of the quasi-relative interior. Our approach admits a minor relaxation of the linear independence requirements in Borwein and Lewis' framework, which allows us to work with certain piecewise-defined moment functions precluded by their conditions. We provide such a computed example that illustrates how this relaxation may be used to tame observed Gibbs phenomenon when the underlying data is discontinuous. The relaxation illustrates the understanding we may gain by tackling partially-finite problems from both the finite-dimensional and infinite-dimensional sides. The comparison of these two approaches is informative, as both proofs are constructive.




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Non-relativity of K"ahler manifold and complex space forms. (arXiv:2005.03208v1 [math.CV])

We study the non-relativity for two real analytic K"ahler manifolds and complex space forms of three types. The first one is a K"ahler manifold whose polarization of local K"ahler potential is a Nash function in a local coordinate. The second one is the Hartogs domain equpped with two canonical metrics whose polarizations of the K"ahler potentials are the diastatic functions.




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Generalized Cauchy-Kovalevskaya extension and plane wave decompositions in superspace. (arXiv:2005.03160v1 [math-ph])

The aim of this paper is to obtain a generalized CK-extension theorem in superspace for the bi-axial Dirac operator. In the classical commuting case, this result can be written as a power series of Bessel type of certain differential operators acting on a single initial function. In the superspace setting, novel structures appear in the cases of negative even superdimensions. In these cases, the CK-extension depends on two initial functions on which two power series of differential operators act. These series are not only of Bessel type but they give rise to an additional structure in terms of Appell polynomials. This pattern also is present in the structure of the Pizzetti formula, which describes integration over the supersphere in terms of differential operators. We make this relation explicit by studying the decomposition of the generalized CK-extension into plane waves integrated over the supersphere. Moreover, these results are applied to obtain a decomposition of the Cauchy kernel in superspace into monogenic plane waves, which shall be useful for inverting the super Radon transform.




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Functional convex order for the scaled McKean-Vlasov processes. (arXiv:2005.03154v1 [math.PR])

We establish the functional convex order results for two scaled McKean-Vlasov processes $X=(X_{t})_{tin[0, T]}$ and $Y=(Y_{t})_{tin[0, T]}$ defined by

[egin{cases} dX_{t}=(alpha X_{t}+eta)dt+sigma(t, X_{t}, mu_{t})dB_{t}, quad X_{0}in L^{p}(mathbb{P}),\ dY_{t}=(alpha Y_{t},+eta)dt+ heta(t, Y_{t}, u_{t})dB_{t}, quad Y_{0}in L^{p}(mathbb{P}). end{cases}] If we make the convexity and monotony assumption (only) on $sigma$ and if $sigmaleq heta$ with respect to the partial matrix order, the convex order for the initial random variable $X_0 leq Y_0$ can be propagated to the whole path of process $X$ and $Y$. That is, if we consider a convex functional $F$ with polynomial growth defined on the path space, we have $mathbb{E}F(X)leqmathbb{E}F(Y)$; for a convex functional $G$ defined on the product space involving the path space and its marginal distribution space, we have $mathbb{E},Gig(X, (mu_t)_{tin[0, T]}ig)leq mathbb{E},Gig(Y, ( u_t)_{tin[0, T]}ig)$ under appropriate conditions. The symmetric setting is also valid, that is, if $ heta leq sigma$ and $Y_0 leq X_0$ with respect to the convex order, then $mathbb{E},F(Y) leq mathbb{E},F(X)$ and $mathbb{E},Gig(Y, ( u_t)_{tin[0, T]}ig)leq mathbb{E},G(X, (mu_t)_{tin[0, T]})$. The proof is based on several forward and backward dynamic programming and the convergence of the Euler scheme of the McKean-Vlasov equation.




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Exponential decay for negative feedback loop with distributed delay. (arXiv:2005.03136v1 [math.DS])

We derive sufficient conditions for exponential decay of solutions of the delay negative feedback equation with distributed delay. The conditions are written in terms of exponential moments of the distribution. Our method only uses elementary tools of calculus and is robust towards possible extensions to more complex settings, in particular, systems of delay differential equations. We illustrate the applicability of the method to particular distributions - Dirac delta, Gamma distribution, uniform and truncated normal distributions.




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A Note on Approximations of Fixed Points for Nonexpansive Mappings in Norm-attainable Classes. (arXiv:2005.03069v1 [math.FA])

Let $H$ be an infinite dimensional, reflexive, separable Hilbert space and $NA(H)$ the class of all norm-attainble operators on $H.$ In this note, we study an implicit scheme for a canonical representation of nonexpansive contractions in norm-attainable classes.




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Optimal Adjacent Vertex-Distinguishing Edge-Colorings of Circulant Graphs. (arXiv:2004.12822v2 [cs.DM] UPDATED)

A k-proper edge-coloring of a graph G is called adjacent vertex-distinguishing if any two adjacent vertices are distinguished by the set of colors appearing in the edges incident to each vertex. The smallest value k for which G admits such coloring is denoted by $chi$'a (G). We prove that $chi$'a (G) = 2R + 1 for most circulant graphs Cn([[1, R]]).




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Decoding EEG Rhythms During Action Observation, Motor Imagery, and Execution for Standing and Sitting. (arXiv:2004.04107v2 [cs.HC] UPDATED)

Event-related desynchronization and synchronization (ERD/S) and movement-related cortical potential (MRCP) play an important role in brain-computer interfaces (BCI) for lower limb rehabilitation, particularly in standing and sitting. However, little is known about the differences in the cortical activation between standing and sitting, especially how the brain's intention modulates the pre-movement sensorimotor rhythm as they do for switching movements. In this study, we aim to investigate the decoding of continuous EEG rhythms during action observation (AO), motor imagery (MI), and motor execution (ME) for standing and sitting. We developed a behavioral task in which participants were instructed to perform both AO and MI/ME in regard to the actions of sit-to-stand and stand-to-sit. Our results demonstrated that the ERD was prominent during AO, whereas ERS was typical during MI at the alpha band across the sensorimotor area. A combination of the filter bank common spatial pattern (FBCSP) and support vector machine (SVM) for classification was used for both offline and pseudo-online analyses. The offline analysis indicated the classification of AO and MI providing the highest mean accuracy at 82.73$pm$2.38\% in stand-to-sit transition. By applying the pseudo-online analysis, we demonstrated the higher performance of decoding neural intentions from the MI paradigm in comparison to the ME paradigm. These observations led us to the promising aspect of using our developed tasks based on the integration of both AO and MI to build future exoskeleton-based rehabilitation systems.




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Improved RawNet with Feature Map Scaling for Text-independent Speaker Verification using Raw Waveforms. (arXiv:2004.00526v2 [eess.AS] UPDATED)

Recent advances in deep learning have facilitated the design of speaker verification systems that directly input raw waveforms. For example, RawNet extracts speaker embeddings from raw waveforms, which simplifies the process pipeline and demonstrates competitive performance. In this study, we improve RawNet by scaling feature maps using various methods. The proposed mechanism utilizes a scale vector that adopts a sigmoid non-linear function. It refers to a vector with dimensionality equal to the number of filters in a given feature map. Using a scale vector, we propose to scale the feature map multiplicatively, additively, or both. In addition, we investigate replacing the first convolution layer with the sinc-convolution layer of SincNet. Experiments performed on the VoxCeleb1 evaluation dataset demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methods, and the best performing system reduces the equal error rate by half compared to the original RawNet. Expanded evaluation results obtained using the VoxCeleb1-E and VoxCeleb-H protocols marginally outperform existing state-of-the-art systems.




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t-SS3: a text classifier with dynamic n-grams for early risk detection over text streams. (arXiv:1911.06147v2 [cs.CL] UPDATED)

A recently introduced classifier, called SS3, has shown to be well suited to deal with early risk detection (ERD) problems on text streams. It obtained state-of-the-art performance on early depression and anorexia detection on Reddit in the CLEF's eRisk open tasks. SS3 was created to deal with ERD problems naturally since: it supports incremental training and classification over text streams, and it can visually explain its rationale. However, SS3 processes the input using a bag-of-word model lacking the ability to recognize important word sequences. This aspect could negatively affect the classification performance and also reduces the descriptiveness of visual explanations. In the standard document classification field, it is very common to use word n-grams to try to overcome some of these limitations. Unfortunately, when working with text streams, using n-grams is not trivial since the system must learn and recognize which n-grams are important "on the fly". This paper introduces t-SS3, an extension of SS3 that allows it to recognize useful patterns over text streams dynamically. We evaluated our model in the eRisk 2017 and 2018 tasks on early depression and anorexia detection. Experimental results suggest that t-SS3 is able to improve both current results and the richness of visual explanations.




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Global Locality in Biomedical Relation and Event Extraction. (arXiv:1909.04822v2 [cs.CL] UPDATED)

Due to the exponential growth of biomedical literature, event and relation extraction are important tasks in biomedical text mining. Most work only focus on relation extraction, and detect a single entity pair mention on a short span of text, which is not ideal due to long sentences that appear in biomedical contexts. We propose an approach to both relation and event extraction, for simultaneously predicting relationships between all mention pairs in a text. We also perform an empirical study to discuss different network setups for this purpose. The best performing model includes a set of multi-head attentions and convolutions, an adaptation of the transformer architecture, which offers self-attention the ability to strengthen dependencies among related elements, and models the interaction between features extracted by multiple attention heads. Experiment results demonstrate that our approach outperforms the state of the art on a set of benchmark biomedical corpora including BioNLP 2009, 2011, 2013 and BioCreative 2017 shared tasks.




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Space-Efficient Vertex Separators for Treewidth. (arXiv:1907.00676v3 [cs.DS] UPDATED)

For $n$-vertex graphs with treewidth $k = O(n^{1/2-epsilon})$ and an arbitrary $epsilon>0$, we present a word-RAM algorithm to compute vertex separators using only $O(n)$ bits of working memory. As an application of our algorithm, we give an $O(1)$-approximation algorithm for tree decomposition. Our algorithm computes a tree decomposition in $c^k n (log log n) log^* n$ time using $O(n)$ bits for some constant $c > 0$.

We finally use the tree decomposition obtained by our algorithm to solve Vertex Cover, Independent Set, Dominating Set, MaxCut and $3$-Coloring by using $O(n)$ bits as long as the treewidth of the graph is smaller than $c' log n$ for some problem dependent constant $0 < c' < 1$.




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Asymptotic expansions of eigenvalues by both the Crouzeix-Raviart and enriched Crouzeix-Raviart elements. (arXiv:1902.09524v2 [math.NA] UPDATED)

Asymptotic expansions are derived for eigenvalues produced by both the Crouzeix-Raviart element and the enriched Crouzeix--Raviart element. The expansions are optimal in the sense that extrapolation eigenvalues based on them admit a fourth order convergence provided that exact eigenfunctions are smooth enough. The major challenge in establishing the expansions comes from the fact that the canonical interpolation of both nonconforming elements lacks a crucial superclose property, and the nonconformity of both elements. The main idea is to employ the relation between the lowest-order mixed Raviart--Thomas element and the two nonconforming elements, and consequently make use of the superclose property of the canonical interpolation of the lowest-order mixed Raviart--Thomas element. To overcome the difficulty caused by the nonconformity, the commuting property of the canonical interpolation operators of both nonconforming elements is further used, which turns the consistency error problem into an interpolation error problem. Then, a series of new results are obtained to show the final expansions.




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An improved exact algorithm and an NP-completeness proof for sparse matrix bipartitioning. (arXiv:1811.02043v2 [cs.DS] UPDATED)

We investigate sparse matrix bipartitioning -- a problem where we minimize the communication volume in parallel sparse matrix-vector multiplication. We prove, by reduction from graph bisection, that this problem is $mathcal{NP}$-complete in the case where each side of the bipartitioning must contain a linear fraction of the nonzeros.

We present an improved exact branch-and-bound algorithm which finds the minimum communication volume for a given matrix and maximum allowed imbalance. The algorithm is based on a maximum-flow bound and a packing bound, which extend previous matching and packing bounds.

We implemented the algorithm in a new program called MP (Matrix Partitioner), which solved 839 matrices from the SuiteSparse collection to optimality, each within 24 hours of CPU-time. Furthermore, MP solved the difficult problem of the matrix cage6 in about 3 days. The new program is on average more than ten times faster than the previous program MondriaanOpt.

Benchmark results using the set of 839 optimally solved matrices show that combining the medium-grain/iterative refinement methods of the Mondriaan package with the hypergraph bipartitioner of the PaToH package produces sparse matrix bipartitionings on average within 10% of the optimal solution.




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Identifying Compromised Accounts on Social Media Using Statistical Text Analysis. (arXiv:1804.07247v3 [cs.SI] UPDATED)

Compromised accounts on social networks are regular user accounts that have been taken over by an entity with malicious intent. Since the adversary exploits the already established trust of a compromised account, it is crucial to detect these accounts to limit the damage they can cause. We propose a novel general framework for discovering compromised accounts by semantic analysis of text messages coming out from an account. Our framework is built on the observation that normal users will use language that is measurably different from the language that an adversary would use when the account is compromised. We use our framework to develop specific algorithms that use the difference of language models of users and adversaries as features in a supervised learning setup. Evaluation results show that the proposed framework is effective for discovering compromised accounts on social networks and a KL-divergence-based language model feature works best.