Abstract
This paper describes a proposal to develop a Tourism Recommendation System based in Users and Points-of-Interest (POI) functionality/accessibility levels. The focus is to evaluate if user’s physical and psychological functionality levels can perform an important role in recommendation results accuracy. This work also aims to show the importance of POI classification (accessibility levels are related with each POI ability to receive tourists with certain levels of physical and psychological issues), through the definition of a different model regarding their accessibility and other characteristics. © Springer International Publishing AG 2018.

Abstract
Posicast feedback control systems are very sensitive to model uncertainty. This paper proposes the use of Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) to auto-tune two-degrees of freedom control systems. The system considers as a pre-filter a half-cycle Posicast command shaper and a PID controller in the feedback loop. A model reference technique is proposed to track differences among model and system to be controlled, feeding a decision block which will trigger an auto-tuning optimization mechanism. Preliminary simulation results are presented showing the proposed technique effectiveness to deal with prescribed plant uncertainties.

Abstract
The use of rigid robot manipulators with good performance in industrial applications demands a proper robust and optimized control technique. Several works have proven the efficient use of metaheuristics optimization algorithms to work with complex problems in the robotic area. In this work, it is proposed the use of Grey Wolf Optimizer (GWO) with chaotic basis to optimize the parameters of a robust Higher Order Sliding Modes (HOSM) controller for the position control in joint space of a rigid robot manipulator. A total of seven test cases were considered varying the chosen chaotic map, face to the original GWO and the general repeatability of such algorithm is improved using chaotic versions. Also, two cost functions were tested within the HOSM optimization. Simulation results suggest that both algorithm and cost function formulations influence the chaotic map choice. In fact, the chattering problem, presented by HOSM controllers, is reduced when the cost function attempts to minimize the total variation of the control signal.

Abstract
Water level regulation of irrigation canals represents a major challenge for control systems design. Those systems exhibit large dynamic variations in their operating conditions. To overcome this fact, robust controllers should be applied. The sliding mode control paradigm reveals this ability which make it a suitable candidate to be incorporated in the irrigation canal control loop. Moreover, its flexibility can be further potentiated by extending the ordinary formulation by adding fractional-order integro-differential operations. In this work, fractional-order sliding mode control is applied to the above mentioned problem. This application represents a novelty and, according to the obtained simulation results, leads to an accurate and proper performance when compared to its integer-order counterpart and to a fractional proportional-integrative controller, recently proposed for this problem.

Abstract
Multi-objective optimization evolutionary techniques provide solutions for a specific problem using optimally concepts taking into consideration all the design criteria. In the last years, several multi-objective algorithms were proposed but usually the performance is measured at the end neglecting, therefore, the solution diversity along the interactions. In order to understand the evolution of the solutions this work studies the dynamic of the successive iterations. The analysis adopts the fractional entropy for measuring the statistical behavior of the population. The results show that the entropy is a good tool to monitor and capture phenomena such as the diversity and convergence during the algorithm execution. © Springer International Publishing AG 2017.

Abstract
Hill climbing and simulated annealing are two fundamental search techniques integrating most artificial intelligence and machine learning courses curricula. These techniques serve as introduction to stochastic and probabilistic based metaheuristics. Simulated annealing can be considered a hill-climbing variant with a probabilistic decision. While simulated annealing is conceptually a simple algorithm, in practice it can be difficult to parameterize. In order to promote a good simulated annealing algorithm perception by students, a simulation experiment is reported here. Key implementation issues are addressed, both for minimization and maximization problems. Simulation results are presented.