diff --git a/data/README.md b/data/README.md
index d5808fa..7f6bebc 100644
--- a/data/README.md
+++ b/data/README.md
@@ -7,9 +7,9 @@
 * [FRGC](FRGC/README.md)
 * [LFW](LFW/LFW.md)
 * [MEDS](MEDS/README.md)
+* [MNIST](MNIST/README.md)
 * [PCSO](PCSO/README.md)
 
-For both practical and legal reasons we don't include images in this repository.
-Open source datasets can be downloaded using `../scripts/downloadDatasets.sh`.
+For both practical and legal reasons we only include images for some of the datasets in this repository.
 Researchers should contact the respective owners of the other datasets in order to obtain a copy.
 The provided sigsets indicate how the images are expected to be arranged in directories, generally following the conventions established by the original authors.
diff --git a/openbr/core/core.cpp b/openbr/core/core.cpp
index 1312dd1..09e5370 100644
--- a/openbr/core/core.cpp
+++ b/openbr/core/core.cpp
@@ -248,9 +248,8 @@ struct AlgorithmCore
                     if (!partitionSizes.empty()) targetPartitions = targets.partition(partitionSizes);
                     else targetPartitions.append(targets);
 
-                    if (queryPartitions[i].first().size() != targetPartitions[i].first().size()) qFatal("Query and target templates have different number of matrices.");
-
                     outputs[i]->setBlock(queryBlock, targetBlock);
+
                     distance->compare(targetPartitions[i], queryPartitions[i], outputs[i]);
 
                     Globals->currentStep += double(targets.size()) * double(queries.size());
diff --git a/openbr/core/plot.cpp b/openbr/core/plot.cpp
index c0e3c4d..51e5439 100644
--- a/openbr/core/plot.cpp
+++ b/openbr/core/plot.cpp
@@ -248,24 +248,29 @@ float Evaluate(const Mat &simmat, const Mat &mask, const QString &csv)
     lines.append(qPrintable(QString("BC,0.001,%1").arg(QString::number(getTAR(operatingPoints, 0.001), 'f', 3))));
     lines.append(qPrintable(QString("BC,0.01,%1").arg(QString::number(result = getTAR(operatingPoints, 0.01), 'f', 3))));
 
+
     // Write SD & KDE
     points = qMin(qMin(Max_Points, genuines.size()), impostors.size());
     QList<double> sampledGenuineScores; sampledGenuineScores.reserve(points);
     QList<double> sampledImpostorScores; sampledImpostorScores.reserve(points);
-    for (int i=0; i<points; i++) {
-        float genuineScore = genuines[double(i) / double(points-1) * double(genuines.size()-1)];
-        float impostorScore = impostors[double(i) / double(points-1) * double(impostors.size()-1)];
-        if (genuineScore == -std::numeric_limits<float>::max()) genuineScore = minGenuineScore;
-        if (impostorScore == -std::numeric_limits<float>::max()) impostorScore = minImpostorScore;
-        lines.append(QString("SD,%1,Genuine").arg(QString::number(genuineScore)));
-        lines.append(QString("SD,%1,Impostor").arg(QString::number(impostorScore)));
-        sampledGenuineScores.append(genuineScore);
-        sampledImpostorScores.append(impostorScore);
+
+    if (points > 1) {
+        for (int i=0; i<points; i++) {
+            float genuineScore = genuines[double(i) / double(points-1) * double(genuines.size()-1)];
+            float impostorScore = impostors[double(i) / double(points-1) * double(impostors.size()-1)];
+            if (genuineScore == -std::numeric_limits<float>::max()) genuineScore = minGenuineScore;
+            if (impostorScore == -std::numeric_limits<float>::max()) impostorScore = minImpostorScore;
+            lines.append(QString("SD,%1,Genuine").arg(QString::number(genuineScore)));
+            lines.append(QString("SD,%1,Impostor").arg(QString::number(impostorScore)));
+            sampledGenuineScores.append(genuineScore);
+            sampledImpostorScores.append(impostorScore);
+        }
     }
 
     // Write Cumulative Match Characteristic (CMC) curve
-    const int Max_Retrieval = 100;
+    const int Max_Retrieval = 200;
     const int Report_Retrieval = 5;
+
     float reportRetrievalRate = -1;
     for (int i=1; i<=Max_Retrieval; i++) {
         int realizedReturns = 0, possibleReturns = 0;
@@ -467,6 +472,8 @@ struct RPlot
     }
 };
 
+// Does not work if dataset folder starts with a number
+
 bool Plot(const QStringList &files, const br::File &destination, bool show)
 {
     qDebug("Plotting %d file(s) to %s", files.size(), qPrintable(destination));
diff --git a/openbr/openbr_plugin.cpp b/openbr/openbr_plugin.cpp
index 61b760c..7e83f9b 100644
--- a/openbr/openbr_plugin.cpp
+++ b/openbr/openbr_plugin.cpp
@@ -52,7 +52,7 @@ QString File::flat() const
         const QVariant value = this->value(key);
         if (value.isNull()) values.append(key);
         else {
-            if (QString(value.typeName()) == "QVariantList" || QString(value.typeName()) == "QStringList") {
+            if (QString(value.typeName()) == "QVariantList") {
                 QStringList variants;
                 foreach(const QVariant &variant, qvariant_cast<QVariantList>(value)) {
                     variants.append(QtUtils::toString(variant));
@@ -137,7 +137,7 @@ QVariant File::value(const QString &key) const
 
 QVariant File::parse(const QString &value)
 {
-    bool ok;
+    bool ok = false;
     const QPointF point = QtUtils::toPoint(value, &ok);
     if (ok) return point;
     const QRectF rect = QtUtils::toRect(value, &ok);
@@ -1003,7 +1003,7 @@ void Output::reformat(const FileList &targetFiles, const FileList &queryFiles, c
     const int columns = targetFiles.size();
     for (int i=0; i<rows; i++)
         for (int j=0; j<columns; j++)
-            o->setRelative(m.at<float>(i,i), i, j);
+            o->setRelative(m.at<float>(i,j), i, j);
 }
 
 /* Output - protected methods */
diff --git a/openbr/openbr_plugin.h b/openbr/openbr_plugin.h
index e5290b4..f6a2419 100644
--- a/openbr/openbr_plugin.h
+++ b/openbr/openbr_plugin.h
@@ -410,7 +410,7 @@ struct TemplateList : public QList<Template>
             sum+=partitionSizes[i];
         }
 
-        if (sum != first().size()) qFatal("Partition sizes do not span template matrices properly");
+        if (sum != first().size()) qFatal("Partition sizes %i do not span template matrices %i properly", sum, first().size());
 
         foreach (const Template &t, *this) {
             int index = 0;
diff --git a/openbr/plugins/ct8.cpp b/openbr/plugins/ct8.cpp
index 51d5598..a48fb24 100644
--- a/openbr/plugins/ct8.cpp
+++ b/openbr/plugins/ct8.cpp
@@ -11,9 +11,9 @@
 #include <exception>
 #include <string>
 #include <vector>
-#include "openbr_internal.h"
 
-#include "core/resource.h"
+#include "openbr_internal.h"
+#include "openbr/core/resource.h"
 
 using namespace cv;
 using namespace br;
diff --git a/openbr/plugins/eigen3.cpp b/openbr/plugins/eigen3.cpp
index 8ee362e..750e6fa 100644
--- a/openbr/plugins/eigen3.cpp
+++ b/openbr/plugins/eigen3.cpp
@@ -330,6 +330,7 @@ class LDATransform : public Transform
     void train(const TemplateList &_trainingSet)
     {
         TemplateList trainingSet = TemplateList::relabel(_trainingSet);
+
         int instances = trainingSet.size();
 
         // Perform PCA dimensionality reduction
diff --git a/openbr/plugins/format.cpp b/openbr/plugins/format.cpp
index e1221d6..2b3b04e 100644
--- a/openbr/plugins/format.cpp
+++ b/openbr/plugins/format.cpp
@@ -317,6 +317,7 @@ BR_REGISTER(Format, maskFormat)
  * \brief MATLAB <tt>.mat</tt> format.
  * \author Josh Klontz \cite jklontz
  * http://www.mathworks.com/help/pdf_doc/matlab/matfile_format.pdf
+ * \note matFormat is known not to work with compressed matrices
  */
 class matFormat : public Format
 {
@@ -324,12 +325,18 @@ class matFormat : public Format
 
     struct Element
     {
+        // It is always best to cast integers to a Qt integer type, such as qint16 or quint32, when reading and writing.
+        // This ensures that you always know exactly what size integers you are reading and writing, no matter what the
+        // underlying platform and architecture the application happens to be running on.
+        // http://qt-project.org/doc/qt-4.8/datastreamformat.html
         quint32 type, bytes;
         QByteArray data;
         Element() : type(0), bytes(0) {}
         Element(QDataStream &stream)
             : type(0), bytes(0)
         {
+            // Read first 4 bytes into type (32 bit integer),
+            // specifying the type of data used
             if (stream.readRawData((char*)&type, 4) != 4)
                 qFatal("Unexpected end of file.");
 
@@ -340,11 +347,16 @@ class matFormat : public Format
                 bytes = bytes >> 16;
             } else {
                 // Regular format
+                // Read 4 bytes into bytes (32 bit integer),
+                // specifying the size of the element
                 if (stream.readRawData((char*)&bytes, 4) != 4)
                     qFatal("Unexpected end of file.");
             }
 
+            // Set the size of data to bytes
             data.resize(bytes);
+
+            // Read bytes amount of data from the file into data
             if (int(bytes) != stream.readRawData(data.data(), bytes))
                 qFatal("Unexpected end of file.");
 
@@ -372,8 +384,9 @@ class matFormat : public Format
         while (!f.atEnd()) {
             Element element(f);
 
-            // miCOMPRESS
+            // miCOMPRESSED
             if (element.type == 15) {
+                // Prepend the number of bytes to element.data
                 element.data.prepend((char*)&element.bytes, 4); // Qt zlib wrapper requires this to preallocate the buffer
                 QDataStream uncompressed(qUncompress(element.data));
                 element = Element(uncompressed);
diff --git a/openbr/plugins/stasm.cpp b/openbr/plugins/stasm.cpp
index f6bdc03..d905296 100644
--- a/openbr/plugins/stasm.cpp
+++ b/openbr/plugins/stasm.cpp
@@ -34,7 +34,7 @@ BR_REGISTER(Initializer, StasmInitializer)
  * \author Scott Klum \cite sklum
  */
 // TODO: Use a global mutex to prevent concurrent calls to AsmSearchDll
-#if 0
+
 class StasmTransform : public UntrainableTransform
 {
     Q_OBJECT
@@ -46,6 +46,9 @@ class StasmTransform : public UntrainableTransform
 
     void project(const Template &src, Template &dst) const
     {
+        static QMutex mutex;
+        QMutexLocker locker(&mutex);
+
         int nlandmarks;
         int landmarks[500];
 
@@ -68,7 +71,6 @@ class StasmTransform : public UntrainableTransform
 };
 
 BR_REGISTER(Transform, StasmTransform)
-#endif
 
 } // namespace br
 
diff --git a/openbr/plugins/validate.cpp b/openbr/plugins/validate.cpp
index c74cf1b..09dbdd3 100644
--- a/openbr/plugins/validate.cpp
+++ b/openbr/plugins/validate.cpp
@@ -52,8 +52,13 @@ class CrossValidateTransform : public MetaTransform
     }
 
     void project(const Template &src, Template &dst) const
-    {
-        transforms[src.file.get<int>("Partition", 0)]->project(src, dst);
+    {        
+        // If the src partition is greater than the number of training partitions,
+        // assume that projection should be done using the same training data for all partitions.
+        int partition = src.file.get<int>("Partition", 0);
+        if (partition >= transforms.size()-1) partition = 0;
+
+        transforms[partition]->project(src, dst);
     }
 
     void store(QDataStream &stream) const