Environment and Sustainability in the Third World
W. M. Adams,University of Cambridge, UK
Since the first edition of Green Development was published, sustainable development has become a vital part of government policy and a key issue in corporate boardrooms around the world. This new edition has been completely re-written, but it retains the clear and powerful argument which so characterised the original. It gives a valuable analysis of the theory and practice of sustainable development and suggests that at the start of the new millennium we should think radically about the challenge of sustainability.
This fully revised edition discusses:
● the roots of sustainable development thinking and its evolution in the last three decades of the twentieth century;
● the dominant ideas within mainstream sustainable development (Ecological Modernisation, Market Environmentalism and Environmental Economics);
● the nature and diversity of alternative ideas about sustainability (for example, ecosocialism, ecofeminism and Deep Ecology);
● the problems of environmental degradation and the environmental impacts of development;
● strategies for building sustainability in development from above and below.
“Green Development” is unique in offering a synthesis of the distinctly theoretical ideas on sustainability based on the industrialised economies of the North and the practical, applied ideas in the South which tend to ignore ‘First World’ theory. It gives a clear discussion of theory and extensive practical insights drawn from Africa, Latin America and Asia. It now has further reading and chapter outlines and summaries for the student reader.
(Geography 2003-4, Environment, Tourism, Development, Urban
Studies. London:Tailor and Francis Group)
4.Yourdon systems method: model-driven systems development
Yourdon Press, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1993, 682 pp. [Yourdon Press computing *. series.]
As the title implies, this book describes the Yourdon systems method (YSM) and how it can be used. Intended as a reference work, the book is organized into five chapters plus appendices.
Chapter I, “Introduction”, recounts the history and evolution of system development methodologies, starting with first-generation structured programming and its constructs and finishing with third-generation enterprise modeling techniques. Some nice perspectives on the differences among these three generations are included. At only 34 pages, the introduction is tidy yet functional because it sets the stage and tone for the remainder of the book.
Chapter 2, “Modeling Tools”, describes and discusses different tools used to represent models and views into a model. Graphic, or diagrammatic, tools include entity-relationship, entity state transition, and dataflow diagrams. Tabular and frame tools include entity-event tables. Textual tools include entity, associative, and relationship specifications. The description and discussion include definitions of terms, examples, and “when-to-use” tips. Additionally, this chapter is where the YSM first incorporates modeling features that have been previously known by the industry, namely abstract data types and entity life cycles.
Chapter 3 presents “The Enterprise Essential Model”. The YSM is mainly concerned with information that is shared among the enterprise functions and serves to model those enterprise requirements. In this chapter, the YSM uses enterprise modeling techniques that allow the potential impact on other systems to be visualized, enable information shared across systems to be defined in a consistent manner, identify events that affect several systems, and model interfaces between different systems. The modeling techniques employed are those identified in chapter 2, so this chapter is primarily a “how to”, a nice progression from chapter 2’s “when to”.
Chapter 4, “The Relationship Between Systems and the Enterprise”, is essentially an introduction and bridge to the next chapter. Only 12 pages long, it defines the system and how systems fit into the enterprise.
Chapter 5 presents “The System Essential Model”, which serves as both documentation of user requirements for the system and organization of these requirements for reference by people building or maintaining the system. The key messages delivered are that all modeled views of a system relate to one of three major viewpoints of a system (function, time, and information), and that all modeled systems must have views of all three of these major viewpoints.
The appendices are extensive and provide reference material to support the main chapters (chapters 2, 3, and 5). Material is presented that further defines the YSM constructs in the context of generally accepted industry constructs in the arena of modeling – set theory, abstract data types, and state-event diagrams.
As a reference work, this book will serve its readers well. The book defines different modeling techniques, explain when these techniques are to be used, and then shows how to use them. The main chapters stay focused on this “when to” and “how to” and refer the reader to appendices or cited references for the basics or more in-depth treatments of subjects. It should be noted that readers using this work as a reference might struggle with two aspects of it. The most current cited reference is from 1985. This might imply that the book contains little, if any, new material. Also, definitions of standard terms are scattered throughout the book rather than centralized in an appendix. Overall, however, these points are minor. This book is well written from the standpoint of both content and presentation.
Computing Reviews, February, 1994)
5.Robust parallel computation in floating-point and SLI arithmetic
Lozier, D.W., and Turner, P.R. Computing 48, 3-4 (1992), 239-257.
Reading this paper reminded me of Ris et al.’s paper “When Floating Point Addition Is Not Commutative” [1], which I recommend. Ris et al. quote “Knuth’s Maxim” from “The art of computer programming” [2]:“Numerical subroutines should deliver results which satisfy simple useful mathematical laws whenever possible … A regularity property … makes a great deal of difference between whether mathematical analysis of computational algorithms is worth doing or worth avoiding! Without any underlying symmetry properties, the job of proving interesting results becomes extremely unpleasant”. In this paper, Lozier and Turner say “the main purpose of this paper ... is to suggest that floating-point arithmetic (FLP) may not be the optimal computer arithmetic for scientific computing applications”. With that I can agree, but they go on, “We propose to replace FLP with the symmetric-level index (SLI) system … .The most important property for the present paper is its absolute immunity to overflow and underflow. ...” I must confess to having spent an embarrassingly large number of years involved with scientific computing applications, and I have never found floating point overflow or underflow to be a significant difficulty to computational scientists who knew enough about what they were doing to set up their computations appropriately. To give reason to go on, however, I will temporarily suspend my disbelief in the importance of this problem.
The authors go on, “Because SLI is fundamentally different from FLP its error analysis is different from relative error analysis”. This sentence sent up my mental warning flags for reasons related to Knuth’s Maxim and concerns about doing error analyses on SLI systems. Rigorous, a priori error analyses are already difficult enough with floating point arithmetic, and it appears to me that SLI error analyses would be even more difficult and worth avoiding. …
Third, procedures involving the evaluation of exponential and logarithmic functions to the base e are notorious for their slowness. Can SLI be speed competitive with floating point arithmetic? Fourth, in designing systems to represent numbers on digital computers, a primary goal is to place as many as possible of the representable numbers (which are finite in number) where they can be used most efficaciously. It is not clear that SLI achieves this goal. Table 1 in the paper presents relative error comparisons for 48 cases. As far as I can tell from Table 1, in only 5 cases is the SLI error strictly less than the floating point error; in 7 cases the floating point error is strictly less than the SLI error; and in 36 cases the errors are equal.
Although the material that is explicitly presented in this paper is well written, my four caveats are not addressed sufficiently. I am not convinced that SLI is an improvement over floating point arithmetic.
(Computing Reviews, February, 1994)
6.Encyclopedia of Geology
Edited by Roger Smith
The “Encyclopedia of Geology” provides essential reference information structured as an overview of the basics of earth science. Covering 83 core topics in geochemistry, geomorphology, geophysics, glacial geology, mineralogy, paleontology and earth history, petroleum geology and engineering, sedimentology, stratigraphy, structural geology, tectonics, and volcanology.
(Geography 2003-4, Environment, Tourism, Development, Urban Studies. London:Tailor and Francis Group)
7. GIS Basics
Stephen Wise,University of Sheffield, UK
Geographical Information Systems (GIS) are computer systems for storing, displaying and analyzing spatial data. The past twenty years have seen a rapid growth in their use in government, commerce and academia, and they can be used for managing a network of utilities, from handling census data through to planning the location of a new supermarket.
But how do they work? Stephen Wise has been a regular contributor to “GeoEurope”and his ‘Back to Basics’ articles have provided a clear and simple introduction to the inner workings of GIS for a non-specialist audience. He now presents the original articles with new material and provides a new coverage of both major types of GIS – vector and raster systems.
Undergraduates and professionals who wish to improve their knowledge of GIS should get a better understanding of how GIS operate in the way that they do, such as how spatial data is stored on a computer, how the different methods affect the capabilities of the GIS, how basic operations are performed and how the choice of algorithm used affects the speed of the system.
(Geography 2003-4, Environment, Tourism, Development, Urban Studies. London:Tailor and Francis Group)
8.Web Cartography
Menno-jan Kraak and Allan Brown,both at ITC, The Netherlands
Maps and atlases are created as soon as information on our geography has been clarified. They are used to find directions or to get insight into spatial relations. They are produced and used both on paper as well as on-screen. The web is the new medium for spreading and using maps. This book explains the benefits of this medium from the perspective of the user, and the map provider. Opportunities and pitfalls are illustrated by a set of case-studies. A website accompanies the book and provides a dynamic environment for demonstrating many of the principles set out in the text, including access to a basic course in Internet cartography as well as links to other interesting places on the Web.
(Geography 2003-4, Environment, Tourism, Development, Urban Studies. London:Tailor and Francis Group)
9. Remotely-Sensed Cities
Edited by Victor Mesev, University of Ul:
New urban applications are emerging for remote sensing, in particular with the use of high-resolution data for measuring, monitoring and analysis. This comes through the use of high spatial resolution imaging, such as for precision mapping of cities; new techniques for population mapping; extracting urban land use features, and evaluating the city energy patterns; and through the use of night-time imager for determining populations and economic activity, particularly on a global scale. This book helps to redress the balance with sensing books, most of which are dedicateв to the physical environment. It is designed for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students, along with research scientists and brings together a good deal of topical work applying remote sensing to the understanding of urban features, their behaviour and growth.
(Geography 2003-4, Environment, Tourism, Development, Urban Studies. London:Tailor and Francis Group)
10.The Environment