This paper proposes a novel case-based reasoning (CBR) recommender system for intelligent energy management in buildings. The proposed approach recommends the amount of energy reduction that should be applied in a building in each moment, by learning from previous similar cases. The k-nearest neighbor clustering algorithm is applied to identify the most similar past cases, and an approach based on support vector machines is used to optimize the weight of different parameters that characterize each case. An expert system composed by a set of ad hoc rules guarantees that the solution is adequate and applicable to the new case scenario. The proposed CBR methodology is modeled through a dedicated software agent, thus enabling its integration in a multi-agent systems society for the study of energy systems. Results show that the proposed approach is able to provide suitable recommendations on energy reduction, by comparing its results with a previous approach based on particle swarm optimization and with the real reduction in past cases. The applicability of the proposed approach in real scenarios is also assessed through the application of the results provided by the proposed approach on a house energy resources management system. Index Terms-Building energy management, case-based reasoning (CBR), energy efficiency, multi-agent systems (MAS).

The current situation with COVID-19 is changing our courses of action toward ensuring health security. This is particularly crucial in airports, which usually receive more than 300,000 travellers in one single day. In this work, we present an Internet of Things (IoT) network to monitor the status of toilets and improve their maintenance. The system is based on IoT networks with different sensors to control soap levels, room capacity, distances, temperature, and humidity. This information is processed by a multi-agent system that detects possible anomalies and makes decisions accordingly. A case study in a real environment is developed in order to demonstrate the usefulness of the system. The results show that the proposed method can be used to successfully manage and control airport toilets.

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Smart environments are pervasive computing systems that provide higher comfort levels on daily routines throughout interactions among smart sensors and embedded computers. The lack of privacy within these interactions can lead to the exposure of sensitive data. We present PRIPRO (PRIvacy PROfiles), a management tool that includes an Android application that acts on the user’s smartphone by allowing or blocking resources according to the context, in order to address this issue. Back-end web server processes and imposes a protocol according to the conditions that the user selected beforehand. The experimental results show that the proposed solution successfully communicates with the Android Device Administration framework, and the device appropriately reacts to the expected set of permissions imposed according to the user’s profile with low response time and resource usage.

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Chord progressions are core elements of Western tonal harmony regulated by multiple theoretical and perceptual principles. Ideally, objective measures to evaluate chord progressions should reflect their tonal fitness. In this work, we propose an objective measure of the fitness of a chord progression within the Western tonal context computed in the Tonal Interval Space, where distances capture tonal music principles. The measure considers four parameters, namely tonal pitch distance, consonance, hierarchical tension and voice leading between the chords in the progression. We performed a listening test to perceptually assess the proposed tonal fitness measure across different chord progressions, and compared the results with existing related models. The perceptual rating results show that our objective measure improves the estimation of a chord progression's tonal fitness in comparison with existing models.

In tonal music, musical tension is strongly associated with musical expression, particularly with expectations and emotions. Most listeners are able to perceive musical tension subjectively, yet musical tension is difficult to be measured objectively, as it is connected with musical parameters such as rhythm, dynamics, melody, harmony, and timbre. Musical tension specifically associated with melodic and harmonic motion is called tonal tension. In this article, we are interested in perceived changes of tonal tension over time for chord progressions, dubbed tonal tension profiles. We propose an objective measure capable of capturing tension profile according to different tonal music parameters, namely, tonal distance, dissonance, voice leading, and hierarchical tension. We performed two experiments to validate the proposed model of tonal tension profile and compared against Lerdahl’s model and MorpheuS across 12 chord progressions. Our results show that the considered four tonal parameters contribute differently to the perception of tonal tension. In our model, their relative importance adopts the following weights, summing to unity: dissonance (0.402), hierarchical tension (0.246), tonal distance (0.202), and voice leading (0.193). The assumption that listeners perceive global changes in tonal tension as prototypical profiles is strongly suggested in our results, which outperform the state-of-the-art models.

Devices in a smart home should be connected in an optimal way; this helps save energy and money. Among numerous optimization models that can be found in the literature, we would like to highlight artificial immune systems, which use special bioinspired algorithms to solve optimization problems effectively. The aim of this work is to present the application of an artificial immune system in the context of different energy optimization problems. Likewise, a case study is performed in which an artificial immune system is incorporated in order to solve an energy management problem in a domestic environment. A thorough analysis of the different strategies is carried out to demonstrate the ability of an artificial immune system to find a successful optima which satisfies the problem constraints.