Practical Discrete Mathematics. Discover math principles that fuel algorithms for computer science and machine learning with Python

Ryan T. White, Archana Tikayat Ray

Discrete mathematics deals with studying countable, distinct elements, and its principles are widely used in building algorithms for computer science and data science. The knowledge of discrete math concepts will help you understand the algorithms, binary, and general mathematics that sit at the core of data-driven tasks.Practical Discrete Mathematics is a comprehensive introduction for those who are new to the mathematics of countable objects. This book will help you get up to speed with using discrete math principles to take your computer science skills to a more advanced level.As you learn the language of discrete mathematics, you’ll also cover methods crucial to studying and describing computer science and machine learning objects and algorithms. The chapters that follow will guide you through how memory and CPUs work. In addition to this, you’ll understand how to analyze data for useful patterns, before finally exploring how to apply math concepts in network routing, web searching, and data science.By the end of this book, you’ll have a deeper understanding of discrete math and its applications in computer science, and be ready to work on real-world algorithm development and machine learning.

Practical Finite Element Simulations with SOLIDWORKS 2022. An illustrated guide to performing static analysis with SOLIDWORKS Simulation

Khameel B. Mustapha

SOLIDWORKS is a dominant computer-aided design (CAD) software for the 3D modeling, designing, and analysis of components. This book helps you get to grips with SOLIDWORKS Simulation, which is a remarkable and integral part of SOLIDWORKS predominantly deployed for advanced product performance assessment and virtual prototyping.With this book, you'll take a hands-on approach to learning SOLIDWORKS Simulation with the help of step-by-step guidelines on various aspects of the simulation workflow. You'll begin by learning about the requirements for effective simulation of parts and components, along with the idealization of physical components and their representation with finite element models. As you progress through the book, you'll find exercises at the end of each chapter, and you'll be able to download the geometry models used in all the chapters from GitHub. Finally, you’ll discover how to set up finite element simulations for the static analysis of components under various types of loads, and with different types of materials, from simple isotropic to composite, and different boundary conditions.By the end of this SOLIDWORKS 2022 book, you'll be able to conduct basic and advanced static analyses with SOLIDWORKS Simulation and have practical knowledge of how to best use the family of elements in the SOLIDWORKS Simulation library.

Practical Game AI Programming. Unleash the power of Artificial Intelligence to your game

Micael DaGraça

The book starts with the basics examples of AI for different game genres and directly jumps into defining the probabilities and possibilities of the AI character to determine character movement. Next, you’ll learn how AI characters should behave within the environment created.Moving on, you’ll explore how to work with animations. You’ll also plan and create pruning strategies, and create Theta algorithms to find short and realistic looking game paths. Next, you’ll learn how the AI should behave when there is a lot of characters in the same scene.You'll explore which methods and algorithms, such as possibility maps, Forward Chaining Plan, Rete Algorithm, Pruning Strategies, Wall Distances, and Map Preprocess Implementation should be used on different occasions. You’ll discover how to overcome some limitations, and how to deliver a better experience to the player. By the end of the book, you think differently about AI.

Practical Game Design. A modern and comprehensive guide to video game design - Second Edition

Adam Kramarzewski, Ennio De Nucci

If you’re in search of a cutting-edge actionable guide to game design, your quest ends here! Immerse yourself in the fundamentals of game design with expert guidance from veterans with decades of game design experience across a variety of genres and platforms.The second edition of this book remains dedicated to its original goal of helping you master the fundamentals of game design in a practical manner with the addition of some of the latest trends in game design and a whole lot of fresh, real-world examples from games of the current generation. This update brings a new chapter on games as a service, explaining the evolving role of the game designer and diving deeper into the design of games that are meant to be played forever. From conceptualizing a game idea, you’ll gradually move on to devising a design plan and adapting solutions from existing games, exploring the craft of producing original game mechanics, and eliminating anticipated design risks through testing. You’ll then be introduced to level design, interactive storytelling, user experience and accessibility.By the end of this game design book, you’ll have learned how to wrap up a game ahead of its release date, work through the challenges of designing free-to-play games and games as a service, and significantly improve their quality through iteration, playtesting, and polishing.

Practical Game Design. Learn the art of game design through applicable skills and cutting-edge insights

Adam Kramarzewski, Ennio De Nucci

If you are looking for an up-to-date and highly applicable guide to game design, then you have come to the right place! Immerse yourself in the fundamentals of game design with this book, written by two highly experienced industry professionals to share their profound insights as well as give valuable advice on creating games across genres and development platforms.This book covers the basics of game design one piece at a time. Starting with learning how to conceptualize a game idea and present it to the development team, you will gradually move on to devising a design plan for the whole project and adapting solutions from other games. You will also discover how to produce original game mechanics without relying on existing reference material, and test and eliminate anticipated design risks. You will then design elements that compose the playtime of a game, followed by making game mechanics, content, and interface accessible to all players. You will also find out how to simultaneously ensure that the gameplay mechanics and content are working as intended.As the book reaches its final chapters, you will learn to wrap up a game ahead of its release date, work through the different challenges of designing free-to-play games, and understand how to significantly improve their quality through iteration, polishing and playtesting.

Practical Generative AI with ChatGPT. Unleash your prompt engineering potential with OpenAI technologies for productivity and creativity - Second Edition

Valentina Alto

Practical Generative AI with ChatGPT is your hands-on guide to unlocking the full potential of ChatGPT. From building AI assistants and mastering prompt engineering to analyzing documents and images and even generating code, this book equips you with the skills to integrate generative AI into your workflow.Written by a technical architect specializing in AI and intelligent applications, this book provides the tools and knowledge you need to streamline tasks, enhance productivity, and create intelligent solutions. You’ll learn how to craft precise prompts, leverage ChatGPT for daily efficiency, and develop custom AI assistants tailored to your needs.The chapters show you how to use ChatGPT’s multimodal capabilities to generate images with DALL·E and even transform images into code. This ChatGPT book goes beyond basic interactions by showing you how to design custom GPTs and integrate OpenAI’s APIs into your applications. You’ll explore how businesses use OpenAI models, from building AI applications, including semantic search, to creating an AI roadmap. Each chapter is packed with practical examples, ensuring you can apply the techniques right away.By the end of this book, you’ll be well equipped to leverage OpenAI's technology for competitive advantage.

Practical GIS. Learn novice to advanced topics such as QGIS, Spatial data analysis, and more

Gábor Farkas

The most commonly used GIS tools automate tasks that were historically done manually—compiling new maps by overlaying one on top of the other or physically cutting maps into pieces representing specific study areas, changing their projection, and getting meaningful results from the various layers by applying mathematical functions and operations. This book is an easy-to-follow guide to use the most matured open source GIS tools for these tasks.We’ll start by setting up the environment for the tools we use in the book. Then you will learn how to work with QGIS in order to generate useful spatial data. You will get to know the basics of queries, data management, and geoprocessing.After that, you will start to practice your knowledge on real-world examples. We will solve various types of geospatial analyses with various methods. We will start with basic GIS problems by imitating the work of an enthusiastic real estate agent, and continue with more advanced, but typical tasks by solving a decision problem. Finally, you will find out how to publish your data (and results) on the web. We will publish our data with QGIS Server and GeoServer, and create a basic web map with the API of the lightweight Leaflet web mapping library.

Practical gRPC. Build highly-connected systems with a framework that can run on any platform

Joshua B. Humphries, David Konsumer, David Muto, Robert Ross, ...

While building systems that contain several components, you need a framework that is fast and has minimal network overhead. gRPC is one such open-source tool that is quickly becoming popular and gaining popularity with programmers.Practical gRPC introduces you to gRPC and explains how it compares and contrasts with similar technologies. You’ll be introduced to key technologies such as Protocol Buffers, and work your way up from basic gRPC usage, all the way through to its more advanced capabilities. You’ll learn the best practices for defining and evolving your gRPC APIs, and discover how different tools can be leveraged to get the most out of gRPC and even extend it.By the end of this book, you'll have all the information you need to get started building systems with gRPC.

Practical Guide to Applied Conformal Prediction in Python. Learn and apply the best uncertainty frameworks to your industry applications

Valery Manokhin, Agus Sudjianto

In the rapidly evolving landscape of machine learning, the ability to accurately quantify uncertainty is pivotal. Practical Guide to Applied Conformal Prediction in Python addresses this need by offering an in-depth exploration of Conformal Prediction, a cutting-edge framework set to revolutionize uncertainty management in various ML applications.Embark on a comprehensive journey through Conformal Prediction, exploring its fundamentals and practical applications in binary classification, regression, time series forecasting, imbalanced data, computer vision, and NLP. Each chapter delves into specific aspects, offering hands-on insights and best practices for enhancing prediction reliability. The book concludes with a focus on multi-class classification nuances, providing expert-level proficiency to seamlessly integrate Conformal Prediction into diverse industries. Practical examples in Python using real-world datasets reinforce intuitive explanations, ensuring you acquire a robust understanding of this modern framework for uncertainty quantification.This guide is a beacon for mastering Conformal Prediction in Python, providing a blend of theory and practical application. It serves as a comprehensive toolkit to enhance machine learning skills, catering to professionals from data scientists to ML engineers.

Practical Guide to Azure Cognitive Services. Leverage the power of Azure OpenAI to optimize operations, reduce costs, and deliver cutting-edge AI solutions

Chris Seferlis, Christopher Nellis, Andy Roberts

Azure Cognitive Services and OpenAI are a set of pre-built artificial intelligence (AI) solution APIs that can be leveraged from existing applications, allowing customers to take advantage of Microsoft’s award-winning Vision, Speech, Text, Decision, and GPT-4 AI capabilities.With Practical Guide to Azure Cognitive Services, you’ll work through industry-specific examples of implementations to get a head-start in your production journey. You’ll begin with an overview of the categorization of Azure Cognitive Services and the benefits of embracing AI solutions for practical business applications. After that, you’ll explore the benefits of using Azure Cognitive Services to optimize efficiency and improve predictive capabilities. Then, you’ll learn how to leverage Vision capabilities for quality control, Form Recognizer to streamline supply chain nuances, language understanding to improve customer service, and Cognitive Search for next-generation knowledge-mining solutions.By the end of this book, you’ll be able to implement various Cognitive Services solutions that will help you enhance efficiency, reduce costs, and improve the customer experience at your organization. You’ll also be well equipped to automate mundane tasks by reaping the full potential of OpenAI.

Practical Hardware Pentesting. A guide to attacking embedded systems and protecting them against the most common hardware attacks

Jean-Georges Valle

If you’re looking for hands-on introduction to pentesting that delivers, then Practical Hardware Pentesting is for you. This book will help you plan attacks, hack your embedded devices, and secure the hardware infrastructure.Throughout the book, you will see how a specific device works, explore the functional and security aspects, and learn how a system senses and communicates with the outside world. You’ll set up a lab from scratch and then gradually work towards an advanced hardware lab—but you’ll still be able to follow along with a basic setup. As you progress, you’ll get to grips with the global architecture of an embedded system and sniff on-board traffic, learn how to identify and formalize threats to the embedded system, and understand its relationship with its ecosystem. You’ll discover how to analyze your hardware and locate its possible system vulnerabilities before going on to explore firmware dumping, analysis, and exploitation. The reverse engineering chapter will get you thinking from an attacker point of view; you’ll understand how devices are attacked, how they are compromised, and how you can harden a device against the most common hardware attack vectors. By the end of this book, you will be well-versed with security best practices and understand how they can be implemented to secure your hardware.

Practical Hardware Pentesting. Learn attack and defense techniques for embedded systems in IoT and other devices - Second Edition

Jean-Georges Valle

Practical Hardware Pentesting, Second Edition, is an example-driven guide that will help you plan attacks, hack your embedded devices, and secure the hardware infrastructure.Throughout the book, you’ll explore the functional and security aspects of a device and learn how a system senses and communicates with the outside world. You’ll set up a lab from scratch and gradually work towards an advanced hardware lab.The first part of this book will get you attacking the software of an embedded device. This will get you thinking from an attacker point of view; you’ll understand how devices are attacked, compromised, and how you can harden a device against the most common hardware attack vectors. As you progress, you’ll get to grips with the global architecture of an embedded system and sniff on-board traffic, learn how to identify and formalize threats to the embedded system, and understand its relationship with its ecosystem. This 2nd Edition covers real-world examples featuring various devices like smart TVs, baby monitors, or pacemakers, you’ll discover how to analyze hardware and locate its possible vulnerabilities before going on to explore firmware dumping, analysis, and exploitation.By the end of this book, you’ll and understand how to implement best practices to secure your hardware.

Practical HTML and CSS. Elevate your internet presence by creating modern and high-performance websites for the web - Second Edition

Brett Jephson, Lewis Coulson, Ana Carolina Silveira

In the ever-evolving landscape of web development, mastering HTML and CSS is crucial for building modern, responsive websites. This comprehensive guide equips you with the essential knowledge and skills you need to excel in web design and development.Starting with the foundational principles of HTML and CSS, the book swiftly advances to cover more complex topics, providing a thorough understanding of these vital technologies. You’ll learn how to build websites from scratch, create intuitive user input forms, and enhance web design by integrating multimedia elements like videos, animations, and themes. Emphasizing responsive web design principles, this book teaches you how to create layouts that flawlessly adapt to different devices using media queries. You’ll also get to grips with SEO essentials to optimize website visibility and search engine rankings. A dedicated section guides you through performance optimization techniques to ensure your websites deliver a smooth and lightning-fast user experience.By the end of this HTML and CSS book, you’ll have developed confidence in your web development skills, and you'll be well-equipped to build modern, visually appealing, and high-performing websites.

Practical Industrial Internet of Things Security. A practitioner's guide to securing connected industries

Sravani Bhattacharjee

Securing connected industries and autonomous systems is of primary concern to the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) community. Unlike cybersecurity, cyber-physical security directly ties to system reliability as well as human and environmental safety.This hands-on guide begins by establishing the foundational concepts of IIoT security with the help of real-world case studies, threat models, and reference architectures. You’ll work with practical tools to design risk-based security controls for industrial use cases and gain practical knowledge of multi-layered defense techniques, including identity and access management (IAM), endpoint security, and communication infrastructure. You’ll also understand how to secure IIoT lifecycle processes, standardization, and governance. In the concluding chapters, you’ll explore the design and implementation of resilient connected systems with emerging technologies such as blockchain, artificial intelligence, and machine learning.By the end of this book, you’ll be equipped with the all the knowledge required to design industry-standard IoT systems confidently.

Practical Internet of Things Security. Beat IoT security threats by strengthening your security strategy and posture against IoT vulnerabilities

Drew Van Duren, Brian Russell

With the advent of Internet of Things (IoT), businesses will be faced with defending against new types of threats. The business ecosystem now includes cloud computing infrastructure, mobile and fixed endpoints that open up new attack surfaces, a desire to share information with many stakeholders and a need to take action quickly based on large quantities of collected data. . It therefore becomes critical to ensure that cyber security threats are contained to a minimum when implementing new IoT services and solutions. . The interconnectivity of people, devices, and companies raises stakes to a new level as computing and action become even more mobile, everything becomes connected to the cloud, and infrastructure is strained to securely manage the billions of devices that will connect us all to the IoT. This book shows you how to implement cyber-security solutions, IoT design best practices and risk mitigation methodologies to address device and infrastructure threats to IoT solutions.This book will take readers on a journey that begins with understanding the IoT and how it can be applied in various industries, goes on to describe the security challenges associated with the IoT, and then provides a set of guidelines to architect and deploy a secure IoT in your Enterprise. The book will showcase how the IoT is implemented in early-adopting industries and describe how lessons can be learned and shared across diverse industries to support a secure IoT.

Practical Internet of Things Security. Design a security framework for an Internet connected ecosystem - Second Edition

Brian Russell, Drew Van Duren

With the advent of the Internet of Things (IoT), businesses have to defend against new types of threat. The business ecosystem now includes the cloud computing infrastructure, mobile and fixed endpoints that open up new attack surfaces. It therefore becomes critical to ensure that cybersecurity threats are contained to a minimum when implementing new IoT services and solutions.This book shows you how to implement cybersecurity solutions, IoT design best practices, and risk mitigation methodologies to address device and infrastructure threats to IoT solutions.In this second edition, you will go through some typical and unique vulnerabilities seen within various layers of the IoT technology stack and also learn new ways in which IT and physical threats interact. You will then explore the different engineering approaches a developer/manufacturer might take to securely design and deploy IoT devices. Furthermore, you will securely develop your own custom additions for an enterprise IoT implementation. You will also be provided with actionable guidance through setting up a cryptographic infrastructure for your IoT implementations. You will then be guided on the selection and configuration of Identity and Access Management solutions for an IoT implementation. In conclusion, you will explore cloud security architectures and security best practices for operating and managing cross-organizational, multi-domain IoT deployments.