Graphics and Human Computer Interfaces Commons^™

Building Capable, Energy-Efficient, Flexible Visualization And Sensing Clusters From Commodity Tablets, Thomas Delgado Dias, Xian Yan, Konstantin Läufer, George K. Thiruvathukal

Konstantin Läufer

We explore the application of clusters of commodity tablet devices to problems spanning a “trilogy” of concerns: visualization, sensing, and computation. We conjecture that such clusters provide a low-cost, energy-efficient, flexible, and ultimately effective platform to tackle a wide range of problems within this trilogy. This is a work in progress, and we now elaborate our position and give a preliminary status report.

A wide range of Android tablet devices are available in terms of price and capabilities. “You get what you pay for” w.r.t. display resolution, sensors, and chipset---corresponding to the trilogy. $200 gets one a 1280x800-pixel ...

Accessibility And Usability Of Government Websites In Tanzania, Joel S. Mtebe, Aron W. Kondoro

The African Journal of Information Systems

The government of Tanzania has been embracing information systems specifically websites in order to widen access to government services, lower administrative costs, and to increase public participation in decision making. As a result, almost every ministry, department, and agency (MDA) has developed a website of different kind. However, the majority of existing websites were developed without sufficiently considering user needs which indicates that they do have some usability and accessibility problems. This study used SortSite tool to evaluate accessibility and usability of government websites taking a sample of 22 websites. The report from the SortSite tool was then checked against ...

The Utility Of Beautiful Visualizations, Laura Tateosian, Reza Amindarbari, Christopher Healey, Pavel Kosik, James Enns

Free and Open Source Software for Geospatial (FOSS4G) Conference Proceedings

Geovisualizations provide a means to inspect large complex multivariate datasets for information that would not otherwise be available with a tabular view or summary statistics alone. Aesthetically appealing visualizations can elicit prolonged exploration and encourage discovery. Creating data geovisualizations that are effective and beautiful is an important yet difficult challenge. Here we present a tool for rendering geovisualizations of continuous spatial data using the painterly techniques of impressionist-era artists. The techniques, which have been tested in controlled studies, vary the visual properties (e.g., hue, size, and tilt) of brush strokes to represent multiple data attributes simultaneously in each location ...

The Billion Object Platform (Bop): A System To Lower Barriers To Support Big, Streaming, Spatio-Temporal Data Sources, Devika Kakkar, Ben Lewis, David Smiley, Ariel Nunez

Free and Open Source Software for Geospatial (FOSS4G) Conference Proceedings

With funding from the Sloan Foundation and Harvard Dataverse, the Harvard Center for Geographic Analysis (CGA) has developed a big spatio-temporal data visualization platform called the Billion Object Platform or "BOP". The goal of the project is to lower barriers for scholars who wish to access large, streaming, spatio-temporal datasets. Since once archived, streaming data gets big fast, and since most GIS systems don't support interactive visualization of millions of objects, a new platform was needed. The BOP is loaded with the latest billion geo-tweets and is fed a real-time stream of about 1 million tweets per day. The ...

Card Tricks: A Workflow For Scalability And Dynamic Content Creation Using Paper2d And Unreal Engine 4, Owen Gottlieb, Dakota Herold, Edward Amidon

Presentations and other scholarship

In this paper, we describe the design and technological methods of

our dynamic sprite system in Lost & Found, a table-top-to-mobile

card game designed to improve literacy regarding prosocial

aspects of religious legal systems, specifically, collaboration and

cooperation. Harnessing the capabilities of Unreal Engine’s

Paper2D system, we created a dynamic content creation pipeline

that empowered our game designers so that they could rapidly

iterate on the game’s systems and balance externally from the

engine. Utilizing the Unreal Blueprint component system we were

also able to modularize each actor during runtime as data may be

changed. The technological approach behind ...

Segmentation Of Heart Ventricles Using Skeletal Representations, Hasana Chaudry, Toshiro Kubota

Landmark Conference Summer Research Symposium

The objective of the project is to develop practical algorithms to segment the human heart’s left and right ventricles from isotropic Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). An advanced algorithm that allows for efficient analysis of the ventricles in 3D or 4D would help diagnose and treat numerous cardiac diseases and illnesses. The left ventricle is a convex-like structure whereas the right ventricle has a relatively more abstract shape. The constant blood flow in and out of the ventricles causes them to look different at any given time. Therefore, our data set is in 4D where the fourth dimension is time ...

Touchscreen Smartphone User Interfaces For Older Adults, Ai Sano

Scholarly Horizons: University of Minnesota, Morris Undergraduate Journal

Today the world is experiencing the rapid growth of the older population. The number of older adults who own digital devices such as smartphones is increasing as well. The current smartphone user interfaces, however, appear not optimized for older adults. When designing smartphone user interfaces for older adults, we must consider their age-related physical and cognitive changes, which most likely affect their user experience. The present paper explores smartphone user interface guidelines for older adults and heuristics for evaluating the usability of Android launchers for older adults as well as a research study that developed an Android launcher for older ...

An Overview Of Modern Global Illumination, Skye A. Antinozzi

Scholarly Horizons: University of Minnesota, Morris Undergraduate Journal

Advancements in graphical hardware call for innovative solutions, which can improve the realism of computer generated lighting. These innovative solutions aim to generate state of the art computer generated lighting through a combination of intelligent global illumination models and the use of modern hardware. The solution described in this paper achieves global illumination by ray tracing over geometry within a 3D scene from distributed light field probes and proceeds to shade the scene with a deferred renderer. Such a solution provides the flexibility and robustness that many other global illumination models have previously lacked while still achieving realistic lighting that ...

An Examination Of A Theory Of Embodied Social Presence In Virtual Worlds, Brian E. Mennecke, Janea L. Triplett, Lesya M. Hassall, Zayira Jordán Conde, Rex Heer

Lesya Hassall

In this article, we discuss and empirically examine the importance of embodiment, context, and spatial proximity as they pertain to collaborative interaction and task completion in virtual environments. Specifically, we introduce the embodied social presence (ESP) theory as a framework to account for a higher level of perceptual engagement that users experience as they engage in activity-based social interaction in virtual environments. The ESP theory builds on the analysis of reflection data from Second Life users to explain the process by which perceptions of ESP are realized. We proceed to describe implications of ESP for collaboration and other organizational functions.

The Cognitive Implications Of Virtual Locomotion With A Restricted Field Of View, William E. Marsh, Jonathan W. Kelly, Veronica J. Dark, James H. Oliver

Jonathan W. Kelly

A study was conducted to examine the impact, in terms of cognitive demands, of a restricted field of view (FOV) on semi-natural locomotion in virtual reality (VR). Participants were divided into two groups: high-FOV and low-FOV. They were asked to perform basic movements using a locomotion interface while simultaneously performing one of two memory tasks (spatial or verbal) or no memory task. The memory tasks were intended to simulate the competing demands when a user has primary tasks to perform while using an unnatural interface to move through the virtual world. Results show that participants remembered fewer spatial or verbal ...

Institutional Research And Advanced Analytics, Mary Kathryn Starkey, Shelby Albers

Research Data and Scholarly Communications Committee Workshops

Tableau empowers everyone to see and understand their data. The Institutional Research & Advanced Analytics (IRAA) team will deliver an engaging one-hour demonstration that covers the ins and outs of Tableau Desktop and Tableau Server. We will also show you University of Kentucky data that is currently available to you, as well as where to find and how to access said data.

The presentation slides are available by clicking the Download button on the right. The video and audio files of this workshop are listed as additional files below and are available for download.

An Evaluation Of On-Screen Keyboards For First Time Single Switch Users, Paul Ahern, Rupert Westrup

The ITB Journal

This paper presents an evaluation of three designs for on-screen keyboard layouts for use by Single Switch Users (SSUs). SSUs are those users who have a disability which means that they are able to activate a switch into an "on" or "off'' position but are not able to locate or position a particular switch. The first keyboard layout design was alphabetically based, the second design was based upon the most frequently occurring letters in the English alphabet and the third design was the standard QWERTY layout found on most keyboards. The research shows that there is no significant difference in ...

Unreal Engine 4 Rpg, Jacob W. Russ, Jeffrey J. Nunez

Computer Engineering

Classic RPG videogames have become few and far between in the Western market over the years as modern RPG systems have gained popularity. The purpose of this project is to present a vertical slice of a hybrid RPG game that takes the gameplay mechanics and styles of classic RPG videogames and infuses them with a modern presentation. Through the use of the powerful Unreal Engine 4 graphics engine, this project is able to combine impressive graphical fidelity with modernized systems to fuel a videogame that is undeniably a classic RPG at heart. This is not a full game, but a ...

Procedurally Generating Genetic Keys, Adam A. Levasseur

Computer Engineering

This project presents a method for creating multi-part models based on input keys to generate new, variant models via genetic algorithms. By utilizing 3D models as modular parts, this method allows for the generation of a unique, compound model based on one or multiple input keys. This paper explains the process of creating and testing such generation styles using simple geometry to create more complex, compound models.

Analyzing The Keystroke Dynamics Of Web Identifiers, Andrew G. West

Dr. Andrew G. West

A Period Examination Through Contemporary Energy Analysis Of Kevin Roche’S Fine Arts Center At University Of Massachusetts-Amherst, L Carl Fiocchi Jr

L. Carl Fiocchi

Studies of buildings belonging to a subset of Modernist architecture, Brutalism, have included discussions pertaining to social and architectural history, critical reception, tectonic form and geometry inspirations, material property selections, period technology limitations, and migration of public perceptions. Evaluations of Brutalist buildings’ energy related performances have been restricted to anecdotal observations with particular focus on the building type’s poor thermal performance, a result of the preferred construction method, i.e. monolithic reinforced concrete used as structure, interior finish and exterior finish. A valid criticism, but one that served to dismiss discussion that the possibility of other positive design strategies ...

Learning To Identify Depth Edges In Real-World Images With 3d Ground Truth, Krista A. Ehinger, Kevin T. Joseph, Wendy J. Adams, Erich W. Graf, James H. Elder

MODVIS Workshop

No abstract provided.

Measuring Presence In A Police Use Of Force Simulation, Dharmesh Rajendra Desai

University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

We have designed a simulation that can be used to train police officers. Digital simulations are more cost-effective than a human role play. Use of force decisions are complex and made quickly, so there is a need for better training and innovative methods. Using this simulation, we are measuring the degree of presence that a human experience in a virtual environment. More presence implies better training. Participants are divided into two groups in which one group performs the experiment using a screen, keyboard, and mouse, and another uses virtual reality controls. In this experiment, we use subjective measurements and physiological ...

Development Of An Alumni Relations Web App Using An Agile Approach, Spencer Linsner

Senior Honors Theses

I present my experience developing a web app to interface with an alumni database for the Computing Sciences department at Brockport. Prior to the end of each semester, the College seeks to gather relevant information from graduating students (e.g. contact information, employment data, etc.). All this information is stored in a database, whose schema was designed by the department faculty some years ago. A prior project took a UML modeling-based waterfall approach to constructing the web app to interface to this database using a ‘pure’ MVC approach and the CakePHP tool. This effort did not meet user needs. Therefore ...

Introduction To Gephi, Jesse Fagan

Research Data and Scholarly Communications Committee Workshops

Gephi is a visualization and exploration software for graphs and networks. Think Photoshop, but for graph data. This session will provide an overview of the software, its features, and resources for further study. Gephi is open-source, free to download, and runs on Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux.

The presentation slides are available by clicking the Download button on the right. The video and audio files of this workshop are listed as the additional files below and are available for download.