JPype vs Jython

It is often desirable to access Java libraries (such as Weka and Mallet) in Python code. There are currently two possible approaches: JPype and Jython. The former looks more attractive, as it is achieved not through re-implementing Python (as the latter does), but rather through interfacing at the native level in both Virtual Machines.

Curve Fitting in Matlab

EzyFit is a free toolbox for Matlab that enables quick curve fitting of 1D data using arbitrary (nonlinear) fitting functions. It can work in both interactive and command-line modes.

Converting HTML to text using Python

html2text is a Python script that does a good job in extracting text from HTML files. It handles HTML entities correctly and ignores JavaScript. However, it does not exactly produce plain text: it produces markdown that would then have to be turned into plain text.

Stanford Named Entity Recognizer

Stanford Named Entity Recognizer is an open source named entity recognition tool implemented in Java. The software is based on the linear chain Conditional Random Field (CRF) sequence model.

Anytime Algorithms

Anytime algorithms are algorithms that trade execution time for quality of results. In particular, an anytime algorithm always has a best-so-far answer available, and the quality of the answer improves with execution time. The user may examine this answer at any time and choose to terminate, temporarily suspend, or continue the algorithm’s execution until completion. Using an anytime algorithm can mitigate the need for high performance hardware.

[1] Shlomo Zilberstein: Using Anytime Algorithms in Intelligent Systems. AI Magazine 17(3): 73-83 (1996)
[2] Xiaopeng Xi, Ken Ueno, Eamonn J. Keogh, Dah-Jye Lee: Converting non-parametric distance-based classification to anytime algorithms. Pattern Anal. Appl. 11(3-4): 321-336 (2008)