Accounting Regulations Essay Example for Free

Accounting Regulations Essay Accountant Responsibilities By: Jennifer Koppelman March 11, 2014 Accountant Responsibility Accountants have responsibilities to many different groups such as their clients, the government and third parties. It is important that accountants act in a particular manner and have high ethical standards, integrity and professionalism. Accountant’s job responsibility is to validate financial statements and perform the duties in accordance with all the principles, standards and laws. Even though an accountant is hired by a company, they have a responsibility to many more people than just the company. Some of the people that accountants are responsible to, would be the companys management, investors, creditors, outside regulatory bodies, and the integrity of the financial markets. Accountants need to be consistent and constantly be carefully exercising due diligence and pay close consideration of the materiality of content (Accountant Responsibility). Accountants have a code of professional conduct that they should adhere to. This states that accountants should maintain objectivity and be free of conflicts of interest in the discharging professional responsibilities. An accountant in public practice should be independent in fact and appearance when providing audit and other attestation services. Situations where accountants will need to show objectivity would be when they are felt compelled to deliver bad news to a client or employer based on an analysis that they had performed (Colson, 2004). There are two different types of auditors; internal auditors and external auditors which have different responsibilities. Internal auditors have the main responsibility to develop statements that present the financial situation of a company in a fair way, meaning that as much disclosure as necessary to give a reasonable picture of the financial situation to any user having a claim to the knowledge. External auditor’s responsibility is to affirm that this has happened by issuing an opinion as to whether the financial statement fairly presents the financial position of that corporation (Duska, 2005). Accountant Responsibility to Clients Accountants have a professional responsibility to clients to keep their information confidential. The rule states that a member in the public practice shall not disclose any confidential client information without the specific consent of the client. This also extends to other accountants not directly involved with the client who obtain information through practice reviews or sanctioned disciplinary hearings to maintain confidentially. There are certain exceptions that facilitate compliance with other professional and legal obligations. Maintaining confidentiality is not only a professional obligation but also a legal obligation. General knowledge and expertise obtained through a client engagement is not considered to be confidential information (Cashell). Accountants have ethical responsibility to protect their clients, produce financial statements and tax returns that are to the best of their ability after performing proper due diligence. If there was an event that an audit would occur for a government agency they should represent their clients with professionalism. Accountants should always maintain the highest ethical standards. Accountants perform essential and critical roles in society. Accountants have responsibilities to all of those who use their professional services. The American Institution of CPAs has an official rule, Rule 301 states a member in the public practice shall not disclose any confidential information without the specific consent of the client. Accountant’s number one responsibility is to its clients, it is important that accountants do not disclose client information to anyone without the client’s permission first. There are consequences to the accountant if they do not keep client information confidential. It can also have a negative effect on the clients business, which will negatively affect the accountant also (ET Section 301 Client Confidential Information). CPA Responsibility to Clients Case Even when an accountant has the intention to warn others of pending financial harm the courts have held that accountants must not give any client information, client information should always remain confidential. In a case Wagenheim v. Alexander Grant Co the court ruled that Alexander Grant improperly divulged confidential information about their client, Consolidata Data Services, to other clients. Consolidata Data Services, an audit client of Alexander Grant performed payroll services for several of Alexander Grants other clients. Alexander Grant discovered that Consolidata Data Services was having financial difficulty; Alexander Grant warned their other clients to stop doing business with Consolidata Data Services. Alexander Grant argued that the other clients would suffer financial damage without warning them. The ruling was against Alexander Grant, the court said that there was no proof that Consolidata Data Services was in a financial hardship that they could not recover from. Which Alexander Grant had no legal right to inform third parties of the financial burden that Consolidata Data Services was in (Cashell, 1995). It is important that accountants keep client information confidential at all times. The accountant might not know the whole picture of a business and a company can state that they could have recovered from the financial burden but because the accountant may have told other clients that could ruin the reputation of the client and affect the business. It is always safer not to say anything in regards to the financial situations when you have an obligation to your client. Accountant Responsibility to Third Parties Accountants do not have as much liability to third parties as they do to clients. Accountants have a liability to third parties who are relying on the audit information, only if there is fraudulent conduct or proof of negligence would they be liable to the third party. When public accountants are done with an audit of their clients records and financials they put an opinion letter which sets forth, among other things, the scope of the audit and a professional opinion concerning the financial representations. Even though third parties may rely and act upon the auditor’s opinion, the auditor is contractually bond only to the client and usually owes nothing, no legal duty to third parties for negligence (Greene, 2003). Accountants need to be very careful when warning outsiders of a client’s fraud. Based on prior court cases, CPAs generally do not have an obligation to inform outsiders of known fraud unless if they remain silent they are becoming culpable themselves. It is a risky situation if an accountant decides to blow the whistle (Cashell, 1995). Accountants are generally not responsible to third parties in contracts because there is no privity of contract. However, accountants can be held to be a common law duty of care towards third parties in certain circumstances, despite that there is no contractual duties. Circumstances that give rise to such duty have been considered in a substantial number of cases in recent years and three general tests have been developed. One of the tests would be if there is foreseeability damage, proximity between parties and considerations of justice and reasonableness. Another test would be testing the assumptions of reasonability. If the court would take an incremental approach in comparing the relationship in any given case to previously decided cases in which a duty of care had been recognized or rejected. An accountant can be liable to a third party if the accountant knew or should have known that they were relying on the audit, only for fraudulent conduct and proof of mere negligence is not sufficient. If the accountant knew that the audit report for the client was intended to supply the information to a third party who would rely on the information. If the third party would be relying on the information in a decision concerning transactions involving the client and the third party (Professional Liability of Accountants Auditors). Duty to Disclose to Third Parties In some cases information should be disclosed to third parties but an accountant needs to be very careful and proceed accordingly. If it is detailed in their engagement letter, which is a written agreement to perform services in exchange for compensation then an accountant has a duty to disclose information. Once the letter is signed off on by an officer then the letter serves as a contract (Engagement Letter). In one case; Fund of Funds Ltd. v. Arthur Andersen Co. the CPA had a duty to disclose. Arthur Andersen was the auditor for two clients, Fund of Funds and King Resources Corp. King Resources Corp developed natural resource properties and agreed to be the sole vendor of such properties to Fund of Funds at prices no higher than those charged to King Resource Corp industrial clients. Arthur Andersen learned the agreement was not being met but failed to inform Fund of Funds. The court did rule that Arthur Andersen should have disclosed this fact to Fund of Funds because they had knowledge of the overcharges, knew the terms of the agreement that was being violated and the language of their engagement letter produced a contractual obligation to reveal that information. Another case involving duty to disclose, this one a CPA was found that he did not have a duty to disclose information. The case Gold v DCL Inc. , Price Waterhouse Co. informed DCL in December that they intended to qualify their audit report on DCLs financial statements. DCL was in the business of leasing computers and Price Waterhouse believed that their ability to recover their computer equipment costs was impaired due to the impending release of a new line of more powerful computers by IBM. In February, DCL announced earnings without mentioning Price Waterhouses concern and on February 15 Price Waterhouse was replaced. The court ruled that there was no basis in principle or authority for extending an auditors duty to disclose beyond cases where the auditor is giving or has given some representation or certification and the silence and inaction of the defendants auditors did not make them culpable. The courts reasoning that the CPA did not have to disclose was because the auditors had issued no public opinion, rendered no certification and in no way invited the public to rely on their financial judgment there was no special relationship that imposed a duty of disclosure (Cashell, 1995). Accountant Responsibility to the Government Different local, state and federal governments have different rules and regulations that accountants need to learn for the area and industry that they will be working in. This is important to find out and comply with the different regulations. This is part of an accountant’s responsibility to provide accounting services that are in compliance with the government regulations for your client’s particular industry. There may be different regulations for different industries so it is important to know which regulations are pertinent to your client. CPA for Responsibility to Government Case Some state laws might grant accountant client privileges, but these laws do not usually extend to a summons or subpoena related to a Federal Investigation by such agencies such as the IRS, or the SEC. In a case, Couch v. United States, the Supreme Court concluded that no Federal accountant client privilege exists and state created privileges do not apply to Federal cases. Before an accountant is responding to a Federal agency, the accountant should be sure that they are only responding to a valid and enforceable subpoena. In another case, Roberts v. Chaple, the Appellate Court ruled that the accountant violated Georgias statutory accountant client privilege because he provided information to the IRS without having been served a valid summons or subpoena. Some state privilege laws could also affect the ability to release information pursuant to a review of a CPAs practice. Firms are responsible for meeting and keeping client confidentiality obligations whenever state statutes do not clearly provide a confidentiality exemption for a peer review of a firms practice. Whenever an accountant is not sure on if information should be released it would be best to consult a lawyer and obtain legal counsel to ensure that they are not breaking any laws or violating any confidentiality agreements or obligations(Cashell, 1995). Conclusion Accountants need to be ethical and practice with the highest professionalism and ethics. Accountants have many responsibilities not only to the client that they are servicing but to the government and to third parties. Responsibilities are higher to clients then third parties but it is important to know when and where your responsibility for each is. If an accountant is negligent or not responsible to the parties when they should have been there are consequences. An accountants main responsibility is to their client, it is important to keep client information confidential at all times. Not keeping client information confidential can have a negative effect and consequences on the accountant and the client. It is important that accountants do not disclose client information without the permission from the client first. All accountants need to have and maintain the highest ethics, professionalism and confidentiality.

Importance Of Time In Distributed Systems

Importance Of Time In Distributed Systems Time is an important and interesting issue in Distributed Systems for several reasons. First, time is a quantity we always want to measure accurately. In order to know at what time of day a particular event occurred at a particular computer, it is necessary to synchronize its clock with an authoritative, external source of time. Second, algorithms that depend upon clock synchronization have been developed for several problems in distribution; these include maintaining the consistency of distributed data, checking the authenticity of a request sent to a server and eliminating the processing of duplicate updates [1] In Centralized systems, there is no need for clock synchronization because, generally, there is only a single clock. A process gets the time by simply issuing a system call to the kernel. When another process after that tries to get the time, it will get a higher time value. Thus, in such systems, there is a clear ordering of events and there is no ambiguity about the times at which these events occur. [4] In Distributed systems, there is no global clock or common memory. Each processor has its own internal clock and its own notion of time. In practice, these clocks can easily drift apart by several seconds per day, accumulating significant errors over time. Also, because different clocks tick at different rates, they may not remain always synchronized although they might be synchronized when they start. This clearly poses serious problems to applications that depend on a synchronized notion of time. Distributed systems are subject to timing uncertainties as certain processes may lack a common notion of real time. Due to an uncertainty in message delay time, absolute process synchronization is known to be impossible for such systems The literature presents issues of timing in distributed systems, physical clocks and their synchronization problems, algorithms for synchronizing physical clocks are presented with their limitations, and also techniques for implementing logical clocks which are used to monitor the order of events without measuring the physical time at which the events occurred The concept of time Let us begin by asking this simple question; does anybody really know what time it is [3] As Lamport notes, the concept of time is fundamental to our way of thinking [7] In fact, real time helps to master many problems of our decentralized real world. Time is also a useful concept when considering possible causality. Consider a person suspected of a crime, if that person has an alibi because he or she was far enough away from the site of the crime at some instant close enough to the time of the crime, then he or she cannot be the culprit. Timing problems Accurate time is important to determining the order in which events occur; [3] this is a basic standard of transactional integrity, system and networkà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ wide logging, auditing, troubleshooting and forensics. Having an accurate time source plays a critical role in tracing and debugging problems that occur on different platforms across a network. Events must be correlated with each other regardless of where they were generated. Furthermore, the notion of time (or time ranges) is used in many forms of access control, authentication, and encryption. In some cases, these controls can be bypassed or rendered inoperative if the time source could be manipulated. For example, a payroll function could be tricked into providing access over a weekend when normally it would be restricted to normal business hours. [3] Physical clocks Most computers today keep track of the passage of time with a battery-backed up Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) clock circuit, driven by a quartz resonator. This allows the timekeeping to take place even if the machine is powered off. When on, an operating system will generally program a timer circuit (a Programmable Interval Timer, or PIT, in older Intel architectures and Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller, or APIC, in newer systems.) to generate an interrupt periodically (common times are 60 or 100 times per second). The interrupt service procedure simply adds one to a counter in memory. While the best quartz resonators can achieve an accuracy of one second in 10 years, they are sensitive to changes in temperature and acceleration and their resonating frequency can change as they age. Standard resonators are accurate to 6 parts per million at 31 °C, which corresponds to  ±Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½ second per day. The problem with maintaining a concept of time is when multiple entities expect each other to have the same idea of what the time is. Two watches hardly ever agree. Computers have the same problem: a quartz crystal on one computer will oscillate at a slightly different frequency than on another computer, causing the clocks to tick at different rates. The phenomenon of clocks ticking at different rates, creating an ever widening gap in perceived time is known as clock drift. The difference between two clocks at any point in time is called clock skew and is due to both clock drift and the possibility that the clocks may have been set differently on different machines. The Figure below illustrates this phenomenon with two clocks, A and B, where clock B runs slightly faster than clock A by approximately two seconds per hour. This is the clock drift of B relative to A. At one point in time (five seconds past five oclock according to As clock), the difference in time between the two clocks is approximately four seconds. This is the clock skew at that particular time. Compensating for drift We can envision clock drift graphically by considering true Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) flowing on the x-axis and the corresponding computers clock reading on the y-axis. A perfectly accurate clock will exhibit a slope of one. A faster clock will create a slope greater than unity while a slower clock will create a slope less than unity. Suppose that we have a means of obtaining the true time. One easy (and frequently adopted) solution is to simply update the system time to the true time. To complicate matters, one constraint that well impose is that its not a good idea to set the clock back. The illusion of time moving backwards can confuse message ordering and software development environments. If a clock is fast, it simply has to be made to run slower until it synchronizes. If a clock is slow, the same method can be applied and the clock can be made to run faster until it synchronizes. The operating system can do this by changing the rate at which it requests interrupts. For example, suppose the system requests an interrupt every 17 milliseconds (pseudo-milliseconds, really the computers idea of what a millisecond is) and the clock runs a bit too slowly. The system can request interrupts at a faster rate, say every 16 or 15 milliseconds, until the clock catches up. This adjustment changes the slope of the system time and is known as a linear compensating Function. After the synchronization period is reached, one can choose to resynchronize periodically and/or keep track of these adjustments and apply them continually to get a better running clock. This is analogous to noticing that your watch loses a minute every two months and making a mental note to adjust the clock by that amount every two months (except the system does it continually). Synchronizing physical clocks With physical clocks, our interest is not in advancing them just to ensure proper message ordering, but to have the system clock keep good time. We looked at methods for adjusting the clock to compensate for skew and drift, but it is essential that we get the time first so that we would know what to adjust. One possibility is to attach a GPS (Global Positioning System) receiver to each computer. A GPS receiver will provide time within  ± 1 msec. of UTC time but Unfortunately, they rarely work indoors. Alternatively, if the machine is in the U.S., one can attach a WWV radio receiver to obtain time broadcasts from Texas, Colorado or Washington, DC, giving accuracies of  ± 3-10 msec. depending on the distance from the source. Another option is to obtain a GOES (Geostationary Operational Environment Satellites) receiver, which will provide time within  ± 0.1 msec. of UTC time. For reasons of economy, convenience, and reception, these are not practical solutions for every machine. Most machines will set their time by asking another machine for the time (preferably one with one of the aforementioned time sources). A machine that provides this information is called a time server. Several algorithms have been proposed for synchronizing clocks and they all have the same underlying model of the system Cristians algorithm The simplest algorithm for setting the time would be to simply issue a remote procedure call to a time server and obtain the time. That does not account for the network and processing delay. We can attempt to compensate for this by measuring the time (in local system time) at which the request is sent (T0) and the time at which the response is received (T1). Our best guess at the network delay in each direction is to assume that the delays to and from are symmetric (we have no reason to believe otherwise). The estimated overhead due to the network delay is then (T1- T0)/2. The new time can be set to the time returned by the server plus the time that elapsed since the server generated the timestamp: Suppose that we know the smallest time interval that it could take for a message to be sent between a client and server (either direction). Lets call this time Tmin. This is the time when the network and CPUs are completely unloaded. Knowing this value allows us to place bounds on the accuracy of the result obtained from the server. If we sent a request to the server at time T0, then the earliest time stamp that the server could generate the timestamp is T0 + Tmin. The latest time that the server could generate the timestamp is T1 Tmin, where we assume it took only the minimum time, Tmin, to get the response. The range of these times is: T1 T0 2Tmin, so the accuracy of the result is: Errors are cumulative. If machine A synchronizes from a server B and gets an accuracy of  ±5 msec but server B in turn got its time from server C with an accuracy of  ±7 msec, the net accuracy at machine A is  ±(5+7), or  ±12 msec. Several time requests may be issued consecutively in the hope that one of the requests may be delivered faster than the others (e.g., it may be submitted during a time window when network activity is minimal). This can achieve improved accuracy. Cristians algorithm suffers from the problem that afflicts all single-server algorithms: the server might fail and clock synchronization will be unavailable. It is also subject to malicious interference. Berkeley algorithm The Berkeley algorithm, developed by Gusella and Zatti in 1989 [8], is form of an internal synchronization that does not assume that any machine has an accurate time source with which to synchronize. Instead, it opts for obtaining an average time from the participating computers and synchronizing all machines to that average. The machines involved in the synchronization each run a time dà ¦mon process that is responsible for implementing the protocol. One of these machines is elected (or designated) to be the master. The others are slaves. The server polls each machine periodically, asking it for the time. The time at each machine may be estimated by using Cristians method to account for network delays. When all the results are in, the master computes the average time (including its own time in the calculation). The hope is that the average cancels out the individual clocks tendencies to run fast or slow. Instead of sending the updated time back to the slaves, which would introduce further uncertainty due to network delays, it sends each machine the offset by which its clock needs adjustment. The operation of this algorithm is illustrated in the Figure below. Three machines have times of 3:00, 3:25, and 2:50. The machine with the time of 3:00 is the server (master). It sends out a synchronization query to the other machines in the group. Each of these machines sends a timestamp as a response to the query. The server now averages the three timestamps: the two it received and its own, computing (3:00+3:25+2:50)/3 = 3:05. Now it sends an offset to each machine so that the machines time will be synchronized to the average once the offset is applied. The machine with a time of 3:25 gets sent an offset of -0:20 and the machine with a time of 2:50 gets an offset of +0:15. The server has to adjust its own time by +0:05. The algorithm also has provisions to ignore readings from clocks whose skew is too great. The master may compute a fault-tolerant average averaging values from machines whose clocks have not drifted by more than a certain amount. If the master machine fails, any other slave could be elected to take over Logical clocks Lets again consider cases that involve assigning sequence numbers (timestamps) to events upon which all cooperating processes can agree. What matters in these cases is not the time of day at which the event occurred but that all processes can agree on the order in which related events occur. Our interest is in getting event sequence numbers that make sense system-wide. If we can do this across all events in the system, we have something called total ordering: every event is assigned a unique timestamp (number), every such timestamp is unique. However, we dont always need total ordering. If processes do not interact then we dont care when their events occur. If we only care about assigning timestamps to related (causal) events then we have something known as partial ordering. Leslie Lamport [7] developed a happened before notation to express the relationship between events: aà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢b means that a happened before b. If a represents the timestamp of a message sent and b is the timestamp of that message being received, then aà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢b must be true; a message cannot be received before it is sent. This relationship is transitive. If aà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢b and bà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢c then aà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢c. If a and b are events that take place in the same process the aà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢b is true if a occurs before b. The importance of measuring logical time is in assigning a time value to each event such that everyone will agree on the final order of events. That is, if aà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢b then clock (a) < clock (b) since the clock (our timestamp generator) must never run backwards. If a and b occur on different Processes that do not exchange messages (even through third parties) then aà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢b is not true, these events are said to be concurrent: there is no way that a could have influenced b. Each event is assigned a timestamp by its respective process. The process simply maintains a global counter that is incremented before each event gets a timestamp. If we examine the timestamps from our global perspective, we can observe a number of peculiarities. Event g, the event representing the receipt of the message sent by event a, has the exact same timestamp as event a when it clearly had to take place after event a. Event e has an earlier time stamp (1) than the event that sent the message (b, with a timestamp of 2). Lamports algorithm Lamport [7] proposed an algorithm that forces the resequencing of timestamps to ensure that the happened before relationship is properly depicted for events related to sending and receiving messages. It works as follows: Each process has a clock, which can be a simple counter that is incremented for each event. The sending of a message is an event and each message carries with it a timestamp obtained from the current value of the clock at that process (sequence number). The arrival of a message at a process is also an event will also receive a timestamp by the receiving process, of course. The process clock is incremented prior to time stamping the event, as it would be for any other event. If the clock value is less than the timestamp in the received message, the systems clock is adjusted to the (messages timestamp + 1). Otherwise nothing is done. The event is now time stamped. If we apply this algorithm to the same sequence of messages, we can see that proper message ordering among causally related events is now preserved. Note that between every two events, the clock must tick at least once. [4] Lamports algorithm [7] allows us to maintain proper time ordering among causally- related events. In summary, Lamports algorithm requires a monotonically increasing software counter for a clock that has to be incremented at least when events that need to be time stamped take place. These events will have the clock value, or Lamport timestamp, associated with them. For any two events, where aà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢b, L (a) < L (b) where L(x) represents the Lamport timestamp for event x. Lamport timestamps [7] assure us that if there is a causal relationship between two events, then the earlier event will have a smaller time stamp than the later event. Causality is achieved by successive events on one process or by the sending and receipt of messages on different processes. As defined by the happened-before relationship, causality is transitive. For instance, events a and f are causally related in the figure above (through the sequence a, b, e, f). Implementing Logical clocks To implement logical clocks, [11] each process p, maintains data structures that give it the following two capabilities: A logical clock, denoted by C, that helps P, measure its own progress; and A global logical clock denoted by gC, that represents Ps local view of the global logical time. A protocol is presented to update the data structures; the protocol ensures that a processs logical clock and its view of the global time are consistent. The protocol consists of the following two rules: R1. maintains how a process updates the local logical clock when it executes an Event, whether send or receive R2. maintains how a process updates its global logical clock to update its view of the Global time. It dictates what information about the logical time a process Piggybacks in a message and how the receiving process uses this information to Update its view of the global time A distributed system consisting of logical clocks differ in their representation of logical time and in the protocol for updating logical clocks. However, all systems consisting of logical clocks implements some form of R1 and R2 and thereby achieving the fundamental monotonicity property associated with events and casualty Total ordering of events Note that it is very possible for multiple non-causal (concurrent) events to share identical Lamport timestamps (e.g., c, e, and h in the Figure above). This may cause confusion if multiple processes need to make a decision based on the timestamps of two events. The selection of a specific event may not matter if the events are concurrent but we want all the processes to be able to make the same decision. This is difficult if the timestamps are identical. Fortunately, theres an easy remedy. We can create a total order on events by further qualifying them with identities of processes. We define a global logical timestamp (Ti,i) where Ti represents the local Lamport timestamp and i represents the process ID (in some globally unique way: for example, a concatenation of host address and process ID). We are then able to globally compare these timestamps and conclude that There is no physical significance to the order since process identifiers can be arbitrary and do not relate to event ordering but the ability to ensure that no two Lamport timestamps are the same globally is helpful in algorithms that need to compare these timestamps. In real life, depending on the application, one may use a combination of thread ID, process ID, and IP address as a qualifier to the timestamp. Vector clocks If two events are causally related and event e happened before event e then we know that L (e) < L (e). However, the converse is not necessarily true. With Lamports algorithm, if L (e) < L (e) we cannot conclude that eà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢e. Hence, if we look at Lamport timestamps, we cannot conclude which pairs of events are causally related and which are not. One solution that has been proposed to deal with this problem is the concept of vector clocks (proposed by Mattern in 1989 and Fidge in 1991) [9, 10]. A vector clock in a system of N processes is a vector of N integers. Each process maintains its own vector clock (Vi for a process Pi) to timestamp local events. Like Lamport timestamps, vector timestamps (the vector of N integers) are sent with each message. The rules for using vector clocks are: The vector is initialized to 0 at all processes: Vi[j] = 0 for i,j = 1, à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦, N Before a process Pi timestamps an event, it increments its element of the vector in its local vector: Vi[i] = Vi[i]+1 A message is sent from process Pi with Vi attached to the message. When a process Pj receives a vector timestamp t, it compares the two vectors element by element, setting its local vector clock to the higher of the two values: Vj[i] = max(Vj[i], t[i]) for i=1, à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦, N We compare two vector timestamps by defining: V = V iff V[j] = V'[j] for i=1, à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦, N V à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ °Ã‚ ¤ V iff V[j] à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ °Ã‚ ¤ V'[j] for i=1, à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦, N For any two events e, e, if eà ¢Ã¢â‚¬  Ã¢â‚¬â„¢e then V(e) < V(e). This is the same as we get from Lamports algorithm. With vector clocks, we now have the additional knowledge that if V(e)

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Ancient Egyptian Burial A profound belief in life after death is why burials in ancient Egypt are so elaborate. There was two different ways to artificially preserve bodies. When the Ancient Egyptians buried their dead they did not want the bodies to be washed away by the floods. They also didn’t want to use up valuable farmland for cemeteries. The dead were buried close to the villages in the higher elevated dry deserts that covered the Nile. One-way of preserving a body was the linen and plaster method. The body would be wrapped in many layers of preservative linen. This would give the body the look of mummies that are in today’s movies. The idea of wrapping the bodies in linen was to preserve as much as the body’s features as possible. The linen and plaster was used to hold the shape of the face. Another widely used method of preserving bodies has to do with Natron. Natron is a natural salt that is found in Egypt. The salts would dry out the body parts so rotting would go slow. Salts were used to â€Å"pickle† a dead body. The Egyptians experimented with many different ways of mummifying. Only kings and their royal wives were buried in pyramids. Funerals depended on how much money you had. There were many different burials for different people. The poor, craftsmen and artists, nobles and courtiers, royal family, and the kings had different methods in which they were buried.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The poor people didn’t have very elaborate funerals. They were just buried in the sand. Given the gifts of a pot, some food and some other small goods is what poor people used to survive in the world after life. Craftsmen and artists were buried with a little more care but the burials were still not fancy at all. Buried in the fetal position they were basically just thrown in the dirt and mud. The nobles and courtiers were sometimes given the gift of a tomb. The nobles and courtiers were buried in shafts that sometimes were nice.

A Clean Well-Lighted Place Essay -- A Clean Well Lighted Place Ernest

A Clean Well-Lighted Place A Clean, Well-Lighted Place by Ernest Hemingway looks at age from the viewpoint of an inexperienced and experienced individual, with the aid of an old man to emphasize the difference between the two. This story takes place late one night in a caf. The caf is clean, pleasant, and well lighted, which brings some kind of comfort to the atmosphere. Here in the caf sits a deaf, lonely, older man, who although is deaf can feel the difference that the night brings to the caf, a younger waiter, who believes people stay around the caf to make his life miserable, and a waiter who is a bit older and seems to understand that this place, the caf, is comforting. The older man spends his late nights in the caf, because at his home there is nobody, he is widowed. All he has is the comfort that the light inside the caf brings to him at night, and the appearance and thought of other human beings may bring him. The old man is under the care of his niece, who last week had to cut him down from his attem pting to commit suicide. Why did he attempt to kill himself? He was in despair. Stated one waiter, and I am assuming it is the younger waiter because he goes on to state that he was in despair over nothing because he has plenty money. Money would be the answer to any problem to an individual of youth because when one is younger he/she has not yet come to realize the importance of relationships. The older waiter shows us the importance of relationships by stating, Each night I am reluctant to close up because there may be some one who needs the caf. This appearing to mean that he knows that there are many lonely people in the world without relationships and no one to turn to in time of need or having some one to just be ... ...per meanings. Looking at my critical approach New historicism and comparing it with my piece A Clean Well-Lighted Place, only from the point of view of a new historicist without doing any additional research into the ties or times of the author I believe I have a well understanding of what it means to be a new historicist and how it applies to my piece that I have chose. I tend to think that knowing more about Hemingway and the life he led might give me a better understanding of his reasons for writing A Clean Well-Lighted Place. The meaning of Hemingways piece also will differ greatly across cultures and how it is a particular society looks at the differences in age and communication factors. . Work Cited Hemingway, Ernest. A Clean Well-Lighted Place Literature Reading and Writing The human Experience. Donna Erickson. New York: St. Martins press, 1998. 115

Karl Marx :: essays research papers fc

Karl Marx The most influential person pre-1900   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã¢â‚¬Å"If a fair list were given, †¦, it would seem reasonable to say that he was bad tempered, caustic, fierce, vain, self-sacrificing, selfish, whining, capable of great love, a good father, a lover of mankind, fatherly to all, honest, scrupulous, tender, brilliant, eminently rational, racist in an off hand manner, irony as an art, a person obsessed with irony, obsessive in general, flexible, a brilliant politician, but a candid one as they go.†(Olson 11) Hopefully we have all heard the name Karl Marx at some time or another, but what did he do that’s so important? Marx was a great influence from before 1900, but his influences are also felt throughout this century. Marx was the most influential person in world history before 1900 because he developed a new form of government, Marxism influenced several world leaders, and Marxism can be linked to such important events as the Russian Revolution and the Cold War.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The main reason Marx is so important is because of the political philosophy that he developed, appropriately dubbed Marxism and commonly called Communism. Marx’s goal was to spiritually release mankind by freeing him of his economic chains and allowing him to find harmony with his fellow man and with nature (Fromm 3). Marx’s interests in economics started when he wrote two extensive essays on the position of Eifel peasants and Moselle vinegrowers (Leonhard 4). His interests were also engaged by the labor movement, which the effects of were just becoming apparent (Leonhard 4). As talk about communist ideas first began to rise, Marx was reserved about his opinions (Leonhard 4). In spite of his reservations, Marx heavily researched the contemporary French literature on socialism and Communism, and in 1843 moved to Paris, the heart of the revolutionary movement (Leonhard 4). While in Paris, one of the most important events of his stay occurred, his meeti ng with Friedrich Engels. â€Å"This was the beginning of a lifelong friendship and collaboration of the founders of scientific socialism.† (Leonhard 5) Marx and Engels emphasized the connection of socialist aims, economic reality, and the struggle of the working class (Leonhard 5-6). In 1847 Marx was invited to join the â€Å"League of the Just† which was later renamed the â€Å"Communist League†(Leonhard 6). Marx and Engels were instructed to work out a political program form the Communist League (Leonhard 6-7). Engels sketched a draft of questions and answers know as the Principles of Communism, after reworking by Marx this became the Communist manifesto (Leonhard 7).

A Role for Equity Theory in the Turnover Process Essay

The purpose o f the present study was to examine the role o f equity theory in the context of the contemporary turnover process. A model was developed and tested with 192 hospital employees using structural equation modeling (SEM), which placed satisfaction and intention to quit as mediators of employee turnover. The results strongly support the present model, but also suggest a role for other mediators, some of which are suggested for future research. Equity theory (Adams, 1963, 1965) continues to be a major model stimulating considerable research regarding work motivation in recent years (Bretz & Thomas, 1992; Carr, McLoughlin, Hodgson, & Maclachlan, 1996; Glass & Wood, 1996; Greenberg, 1990; Harder, 1991, 1992; Huseman, Hatfield, & Miles, 1985, 1987; Johnson & Johnson, 1991; Joshi, 1990; King & Miles, 1994; King, Miles, & Day, 1993; Miles, Hatfield, & Huseman, 1994; Perry, 1993; Sheehan, 1993; Sweeney, 1990; Van Dierendonck, Schaufeli, & Sixma, 1994). Briefly summarized, equity theory suggests that an employee compares the ratio of his or her outcomes to inputs to the ratio of outcomes to inputs of some referent other. Employees who perceive themselves in an inequitable situation will be dissatisfied and will try to reduce the inequity. Although Adams (1963,1965) proposed a number of ways that employees might reduce inequity, research concerned with organizations has tended to focus on employee reactions to pay inequity, such as low performance and dissatisfaction (Greenberg, 1990). Leaving the situation (i.e., voluntary turnover) was also postulated as a tension reaction mode by Adams ( 1 963, 1965), but only a few studies have examined the impact of inequity perceptions on turnover in the context of contemporary ideas regarding a turnover process (e.g., Horn & Griffeth, 1995; Mobley, 1977). The purpose of the present study is to test the relationship between equity perceptions and turnover within the context of such a contemporary turnover process model.  Ã¢â‚¬ËœThe authors greatly appreciate the comments of Peter Hom, Debra Cohen, Peggy Lewis, and two anonymous reviewers on earlier versions of this paper. 1018 GRIFFETH AND GAERTNER Early research into the equity-turnover relationship, using aggregate rates of turnover, found mixed results. For example, Telly, French, and Scott (1971) found aggregated perceptions of equity within subunits of an organization to be significantly related to that subunit’s turnover rate for the previous 11 months on five of the seven dimensions (e.g., supervision, social aspects). Dittrich and Carrel1 ( 1 979) developed and tested a five-dimension measure of equity perceptions that they called the Organizational Fairness Questionnaire (OFQ). They found that the five factors (pay rules, pay administration, work pace, pay level, and rule administration) underlying the OFQ were not predictive of turnover rates by department. However, pay rules (a factor that combines comparisons of one’s own pay to that of coworkers with the fairness of the rules for granting pay increases and promotions) and work pace (fairness of the supervisor in maintaining a fair pace of work activity) were predictive of absence. While not directly predictive of turnover, employee perceptions of the fairness of pay rules and equality of pay among coworkers and of supervisor control of the work pace were strongly predictive of job satisfaction ( R 2 = S8). Equity and Individual Turnover At the individual level, tests of a direct relationship between equity perceptions and turnover have also had mixed results. For example, Oldham, Kulik, Ambrose, Stepina, and Brand ( 1 986) found that equity perceptions in combination with job complexity descriptions were marginally predictive of  turnover. Vecchio, Griffeth, and Hom’s (1986) initial findings were that perceptions of supervisor control over work-pace equity were significantly related to turnover. However, when leader-member exchange quality was added, this variable fully mediated the equity-turnover relationship. Finally, Randall and Mueller (1995) found no significant direct relationships between turnover and distributive or procedural justice perceptions. They suggested two plausible explanations for this lack of significant findings. First, the effect of equity on turnover is not direct, but rather is mediated by several other variables such as job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and intention to stay. Second, a lack of alternative employment opportunities among the nurses in their sample induced them to stay despite possible inequities. This latter explanation seems less probable since turnover and shortage rates among nurses remained high into the mid-1990s (Hom & Griffeth, 1995). Another set of studies has examined the relationship of equity perceptions to intention to stay. The results in these studies have also been mixed. Scholl, Cooper, and McKenna ( 1 987) found that comparisons using others outside the company in similar jobs and comparisons of one’s own pay in the past were significant predictors of turnover intentions. However, Ronen (1 986) found that neither equity referent (others inside the organization or others outside the organization) nor job level (skilled workers vs. managers) was significantly  related to turnover intentions. Finally, Berg (1991) found that global perceptions of equity were significant predictors of intention to stay among television employees. Strictly speaking, however, Berg did not actually measure equity. Instead, he asked employees to assess their perceptions of fairness without reference to some comparison other. Again, it seems plausible, especially based on Adams’ (1 963, 1965) theory, that job  dissatisfaction would be the immediate result of inequity perceptions, mediating the effects on turnover intentions and actual turnover. In conclusion, these studies show relatively weak or inconsistent support regarding the relationship between inequity perceptions and turnover. There are several reasons for this inconsistency. First, all of these studies examined the direct influence of equity on turnover, generally ignoring the mediating role of felt tension of job dissatisfaction (Adams, 1963, 1965). Some studies attempted to link equity perceptions to intention to stay (or quit), a weak test of the equityturnover relationship. According to Steel and Ovalle (I 984), intention to quit is a relatively poor surrogate for actual turnover, typically accounting for less than 25% of turnover variance. Moreover, the earlier studies were unable to take advantage of recent advances in the study of turnover identifying the process of employee turnover (Horn & Griffeth, 1991, 1995; Hom, Griffeth, & Sellaro, 1984; Mobley, 1977). Contemporary turnover theorists posit a series of cognitive and affective linkages translatingjob dissatisfaction into turnover cognitions and behavior. Perhaps the major weakness of each of these studies was the omission of satisfaction as a mediating variable. More recent models that propose linkages between equity and turnover explicitly incorporate perception of equity as an exogenous variable that has an impact on turnover via job satisfaction and quit intentions (Hulin, Roznowski, & Hachiya, 1985; Price & Mueller, 198 1). Two studies have placed the equity-tumover relationship within the context of such a process model. Summers and Hendrix (1991) included perceptions of pay equity for comparisons with a generalized other (someone of similar knowledge, skills, and abilities), self (past), others inside the company, and others outside the company. Respondents were then asked to select the three most important referents. Only the equity perceptions with regard to the single most important referent were used as a measure of pay equity. Of respondents, 6% chose others outside of the company as their most important referent. A generalized other was the most frequently selected, followed closely by self (past). The model test revealed a significant mediated relationship between pay equity and turnover. The significant and hypothesized intervening variables were pay satisfaction, overall job satisfaction, and intention to  leave. Iverson and Roy (1994) performed a relatively comprehensive test of the Price and Mueller (1981, 1986) turnover model, which specifically includes elements of equity perceptions of various benefits and pay in relationship to coworkers. Although the correlation coefficient for the relationship between equity and job satisfaction was positive and significant, the hypothesized and  revised model yielded a negative (also significant) relationship between the two variables. Such a reversal may be indicative of multicollinearity (Neter, Wasserman, & Kutner, 1990) and suggests that a more parsimonious model might be practical. A second weakness of this test of the equity-turnover relationship is the use of behavioral commitment, or intention to stay, rather than actual turnover as the ultimate dependent variable (Steel & Ovalle, 1984). However, both the hypothesized and the revised model confirm affect Cjob satisfaction) as a mediator of the relationship between equity and intention to stay. For both of the process model tests, the conceptualization of equity was narrowly limited to distributional outcomes, such as pay and benefits (Iverson & Roy, 1994; Summers & Hendrix, 1991) or to comparison others inside the organization (Iverson & Roy, 1994). Prior research has found multiple comparison others to be important and, although pay seems to dominate perceptions of equity (Berg, 1991; Scholl et al., 1987; Summers & Hendrix, 1991), other facets are also important (Oldham et al., 1986; Telly et al., 1971; Vecchio et al., 1986; Wilhelm, Herd, & Steiner, 1993). It is the primary purpose of the present investigation to reexamine the role of equity perceptions within the context of contemporary turnover theory and empirical research at the individual level of analysis. Toward this end, a model of this process is developed and tested based on equity theory. Both the predictive and nomological validity of this model are examined using structural equation modeling (SEM). This model and the hypothesized relationships among the model constructs are shown in Figure 1. Model Development The present model posits a turnover process initiated by perceptions of  inequity in relationship to three key determinants of job satisfaction: pay satisfaction, satisfaction with one’s supervisor, and satisfaction with the work itself. We postulate perceptions of inequity as determinants of these facets of job satisfaction, and, in doing so, we expand on two components of Adams’ (1 963, 1965) equity theory. First, Adams’ conceptualization of equity as concerned with the ratio of inputs to outcomes only (distributive justice) reflects the contemporaneous understanding of justice. More recently, justice has been characterized as a process, and researchers have delineated two meaningful elements in addition to distributive justice as important to explaining perceptions of justice (Bies & Moag, 1986; Greenberg, 1990). These two elements are procedural justice, which refers to the rules and procedures used to arrive at the distribution of outcomes, and interactional justice, which refers to the way those who carry out the process relate to the recipient party (Bies & Moag, 1986; Greenberg, 1990). While these elements tend to be highly correlated, each uniquely adds to our understanding of the justice perceptions and reactions to those perceptions (Folger & Konovsky, 1989; McFarlin & Sweeney, 1992).

Old Testament

How is this relationship made clear? A. Heehaw is Davit's leader, protector and provider. David describes Heehaw as the Sheppard that leads him through the storms of life. In the beginning of the passage, the author speaks of how he does not want this shepherd, I believe this is due to the author not feeling worthy of the shepherd and all he provides, which makes the relationship so beautiful because it illustrates complete love and trust Just like a sheep following his shepherd.The author illustrates how the staff of His shepherd comforts him through the Valley of the Shadow of Death. The author fears nothing because he know he is looked after and well cared for. The language throughout the entire passage speaks of a sheep to his shepherd, this theme can been seen through all of the Old Testament because the People of God lived a life led by Heehaw. David was known as a man after God's own heart showing how close David was to Heehaw Just as a sheep Is very close to Its shepherd. Ide ntify several themes that run through this Incredible short story of Joseph consider loyalty, family, envy, compassion, work). . Joseph shows deep compassion to his brothers even when his brothers wanted to kill him. Joseph was second in command In Egypt and could have easily turned his brothers away leaving them to die, but instead he decided to love them and help them through the famine. Envy Is the basis for how Josephs brothers behaved. It started with them envying Joseph because he was his father's favorite. Then they were envious of his coat of many colors, and finally they were envious and offended y the dreams Joseph experienced.This new drove them to sell their brother Into slavery, which leads to another theme, diligence. Joseph showed diligence and devotion to God. Even when he was thrown In Jail and framed for things he did not do, he still diligently sought God and followed his commandments. HIS diligence eventually paid off and he was given high honors and responsibili ties. Discuss Joseph as both visionary and man of action. What does he value? How does he rise? What Insights Into human nature and the nature of faith and trust In God are revealed?