Michael A. Smith

Deep Springs College is the most unusual college in America. Arguably, it is also the best. It is located in such a remote place in the high desert in eastern California that its mailing address is in Nevada. There are up to twenty-six students who hire and fire the faculty, design the curriculum, select the incoming students, do all of the work on the colleges organic farm and ranch, cook the meals, work in the office, and generally maintain the school. Academically, Deep Springs is virtually unrivalled. Internationally acclaimed photographer Michael A Smith discovered Deep Springs College quite by chance after photographing in Californias remote White Mountains. He eventually went back to Deep Springs to teach for a term. While in residence he created a superb photographic portrait of the college. To accompany their portraits, the students contributed autobiographical notes as well as writings about their experiences at the school. Collectively, these writings give the reader a vivid sense of the Deep Springs College experience.

Multimodal Video Characterization and Summarization is a valuable research tool for both professionals and academicians working in the video field. This book describes the methodology for using multimodal audio, image, and text technology to characterize video content. This new and groundbreaking science has led to many advances in video understanding, such as the development of a video summary. Applications and methodology for creating video summaries are described, as well as user-studies for evaluation and testing.

Asking how we can discover what representation is, Michael A. Smith focuses on what it is in practice, rather than in theory. Based on interviews and observation of 12 US state representatives, he categorizes their approaches and assesses the nature of representation.

The book is designed for those readers who have had previous experience of a high-level block-structured programming language; that is, all undergraduate and Higher National students who have studied the basic programming unit on any computing, engineering or science course. It is assumed that the student knows the principles or programming and the use of basic programming constructs and data types and the book concentrates on the structure of object-oriented software and the use of C++ facilities. The text approaches C++ as a language in its own right, rather than as a development of C. The text concentrates on the object-oriented features of the language and utilizes the mechanisms of C++ which allow the user to avoid having to use low-level features. Where such features are used they are encapsulated in a class to hide the complexity from the user. There are many examples and cases to illustrate the techniques of object-oriented design methods. Also, the book deals with a number of C++ compilers and the software has been tested on all of them.

In this classic murder mystery set in the late 1970s, ex-Chicago cop Jack Olsen and his new girlfriend, Kate Carter, try to prevent the Mob from building a resort complex that would bring drugs, gambling and prostitution to the pristine Lake of the Ozarks region in Central Missouri. At the onset, a suspicious "boating accident" witnessed by Olsen kills Geoff Gentry, a local millionaire and environmentalist. Beth Lacy, the dead man's friend and companion, hires Jack to find Gentry's killers. Olsen turns to local legal sage, Roy Cousins, to help him identify suspects-which eventually includes the widow Lacy. Also, there's drug-addled Alan Gentry, the grandson, and his ne'er-do-well sidekick, Spider. The granddaughter, Barbara Gentry, is a Barbie doll wired with dynamite who uses her bodybuilder boyfriend, Hank Loomis, to get what she wants. Butch Banuchi is a "businessman" from Chicago. Business for him meant danger for everyone else. His lieutenant, Aldo Rinaldi, turns up anywhere there's a drug deal or an unexplained shooting. Melvin Davis is a sheriff on the take, who answers first to Banuchi, and then to the voters. Tom Wallace is a local farmer who stands to make a fortune from a land sale opposed by the murdered man. And, he's Kate's former boyfriend, which eventually causes Jack to consider her a suspect. It's an interesting group - but killers are always fascinating

Frank Montgomery and his family love their life in the placid suburb of Lake View. Members of the seven households surrounding the lake form an extended family. They occasionally play practical jokes on each other. However, the harmless pranks suddenly turn ugly, and very personal. Feelings are hurt, alliances form, and fingers are pointed. Then, the suspected perpetrator, Vernon Richey, is brutally murdered. While investigating the crime for the local newspaper, Frank discovers that many of his neighbors harbor secrets that, if revealed, would damage their reputations or incriminate them. Did someone kill Vernon to protect a secret he had uncovered? Or, is there a puppet master in the neighborhood, attempting to implicate the others while hiding his or her own motive? How long will the killer tolerate Frank