Five Straight Lines

'Fascinating ... Composer Andrew Gant is a masterful guide, introducing readers to the major players and key themes of an entrancing topic.' BBC History Magazine Whether you prefer Baroque or pop, Theremins or violins, the music you love and listen to shapes your world. But what shaped the music? Ranging across time and space, this book takes us on a grand musical tour from music's origins in prehistory right up to the twenty-first century. Charting the leaps in technology, thought and practice that led to extraordinary revolutions of music in each age, the book takes us through medieval Europe, Renaissance Italy and Jazz era America to reveal the rich history of music we still listen to today. From Mozart to McCartney, Schubert to Schoenberg, Professor Andrew Gant brings to life the people who made the music, their techniques and instruments, as well as the places their music was played, from sombre churches to rowdy taverns, stately courts to our very own homes.

Edward John Routh (1831-1907) was a highly successful mathematics coach at Cambridge. He also contributed to the foundations of control theory and to the modern treatment of mechanics. Published between 1896 and 1902, this revised two-volume textbook offers extensive coverage of statics, with formulae and examples throughout.

The International Conference on Intelligent Computing (ICIC) was formed to p- vide an annual forum dedicated to the emerging and challenging topics in artificial intelligence, machine learning, bioinformatics, and computational biology, etc. It aims to bring together researchers and practitioners from both academia and ind- try to share ideas, problems and solutions related to the multifaceted aspects of intelligent computing. ICIC 2008, held in Shanghai, China, September 15–18, 2008, constituted the 4th International Conference on Intelligent Computing. It built upon the success of ICIC 2007, ICIC 2006 and ICIC 2005 held in Qingdao, Kunming and Hefei, China, 2007, 2006 and 2005, respectively. This year, the conference concentrated mainly on the theories and methodologies as well as the emerging applications of intelligent computing. Its aim was to unify the picture of contemporary intelligent computing techniques as an integral concept that highlights the trends in advanced computational intelligence and bridges theoretical research with applications. Therefore, the theme for this conference was “Emerging Intelligent Computing Technology and Applications”. Papers focusing on this theme were solicited, addressing theories, methodologies, and applications in science and technology.