Digital Commons Network^™

Structuring Lecture Videos For Distance Learning Applications, Chong-Wah Ngo, Feng Wang, Ting-Chuen Pong

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This paper presents an automatic and novel approach in structuring and indexing lecture videos for distance learning applications. By structuring video content, we can support both topic indexing and semantic querying of multimedia documents. In this paper, our aim is to link the discussion topics extracted from the electronic slides with their associated video and audio segments. Two major techniques in our proposed approach include video text analysis and speech recognition. Initially, a video is partitioned into shots based on slide transitions. For each shot, the embedded video texts are detected, reconstructed and segmented as high-resolution foreground texts for commercial …

Infrastructure For Performance Tuning Mpi Applications, Kathryn Marie Mohror

Dissertations and Theses

Clusters of workstations are becoming increasingly popular as a low-budget alternative for supercomputing power. In these systems, message-passing is often used to allow the separate nodes to act as a single computing machine. Programmers of such systems face a daunting challenge in understanding the performance bottlenecks of their applications. This is largely due to the vast amount of performance data that is collected, and the time and expertise necessary to use traditional parallel performance tools to analyze that data.

The goal of this project is to increase the level of performance tool support for message-passing application programmers on clusters of …

Task Allocation Via Multi-Agent Coalition Formation: Taxonomy, Algorithms And Complexity, Hoong Chuin Lau, L. Zhang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Coalition formation has become a key topic in multiagent research. In this paper, we propose a preliminary classification for the coalition formation problem based on three driving factors (demands, resources and profit objectives). We divide our analysis into 5 cases. For each case, we present algorithms and complexity results. We anticipate that with future research, this classification can be extended in similar fashion to the comprehensive classification for the job scheduling problem.

Apparatus For Discovering Computing Services Architecture And Developing Patterns Of Computing Services And Method Therefor [Sg 107499], Emarson Victoria, Hui Tseng, Hwee Hwa Pang, Tau Chen Cham, Siew Choo Tay

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

An apparatus for discovering computing services architecture and developing patterns of computing services and method therefor are disclosed. The apparatus, according to an embodiment of the invention, provides a graphical user interface for displaying a deployment plan of deployed computing services. Components in the deployment plan are interconnected by links indicating dependency relationships between the components. Each component and link is assigned a confidence value, which is based on a calculated weight of the properties of each component. The apparatus further provides editing tools for manipulating the components in the deployment plan as well as for creating and managing patterns.

A Token-Based Model For Fraud Detection And Prevention, Yunhua Lu, Leszek T. Lilien, Bharat Bhargava

Department of Computer Science Technical Reports

No abstract provided.

Content-Aware Authentication Of Motion Jpeg2000 Stream In Lossy Networks, Yongdong Wu, Robert H. Deng

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Stream authentication schemes (SAS) aim to achieve effective authentication of multicast streams over lossy networks. Almost all the existing SASs is designed for stream data integrity protection only. In this paper, we argue that content integrity protection is more important than data integrity to human users. We present a content-aware SAS in motion JPEG2000 streaming. In our scheme, a chunk of JPEG2000 codestreams is encapsulated into a block of packets using multiple description coding (MDC). Our MDC exploits the inherent structure of motion JPEG2000 codestreams and is used to preserve the semanteme/content of the stream over lossy networks. To achieve …

Web Unit Mining: Finding And Classifying Subgraphs Of Web Pages, Aixin Sun, Ee Peng Lim

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In web classification, most researchers assume that the objects to classify are individual web pages from one or more web sites. In practice, the assumption is too restrictive since a web page itself may not always correspond to a concept instance of some semantic concept (or category) given to the classification task. In this paper, we want to relax this assumption and allow a concept instance to be represented by a subgraph of web pages or a set of web pages. We identify several new issues to be addressed when the assumption is removed, and formulate the web unit mining …

Aa Flexible And Scalable Authentication Scheme For Jpeg 2000 Image Codestreams, Cheng Peng, Robert H. Deng, Yongdong Wu, Weizhong Shao

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

JPEG2000 is an emerging standard for still image compression and is becoming the solution of choice for many digital imaging fields and applications. An important aspect of JPEG2000 is its "compress once, decompress many ways" property [1], i. e., it allows extraction of various sub-images (e.g., images with various resolutions, pixel fidelities, tiles and components) all from a single compressed image codestream. In this paper, we present a flexible and scalable authentication scheme for JPEG2000 images based on the Merkle hash tree and digital signature. Our scheme is fully compatible with JPEG2000 and possesses a "sign once, verify many ways" …

Pricing And Qos Of Information Services In A Competitive Market, Zhen Liu, Laura Wynter, Cathy Xia

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Design of e-commerce services that are competitive in a quickly responding market requires the analyses of prices and price structures. We develop a general model of an e-commerce market that allows us to analyze optimal price structures, both flat and usage-based. Based on the price structure of a major web hosting provider, we consider single-tier and two-tier (burst-rate) pricing, and our result suggests that the more complex two-tier structure may not be worth the marketing effort, as the firm's equilibrium profits will not increase through the use of this structure. An essential feature of our approach is that we model …

A Robust Dissolve Detector By Support Vector Machine, Chong-Wah Ngo

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In this paper, we propose a novel approach for the robust detection and classification of dissolve sequences in videos. Our approach is based on the multi-resolution representation of temporal slices extracted from 3D image volume. At the low-resolution (LR) scale, the problem of dissolve detection is reduced as cut transition detection. At the highresolution (HR) space, Gabor wavelet features are computed for regions that surround the cuts located at LR scale. The computed features are then input to support vector machines for pattern classification. Encouraging results have been obtained through experiments.

Synchronization Of Lecture Videos And Electronic Slides By Video Text Analysis, Feng Wang, Chong-Wah Ngo, Ting-Chuen Pong

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

An essential goal of structuring lecture videos captured in live presentation is to provide a synchronized view of video clips and electronic slides. This paper presents an automatic approach to match video clips and slides based on the analysis of text embedded in lecture videos. We describe a method to reconstruct high-resolution video texts from multiple keyframes for robust OCRrecognition. A two-stage matching algorithm based on the title and content similarity measures between video clips and slides is also proposed.

High-Performance Architectures For Ip-Based Multihop 802.11 Networks, Arup Acharya, Archan Misra, Sorav Bansal

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The concept of a forwarding node, which receives packets from upstream nodes and then transmits these packets to downstream nodes, is a key element of any multihop network, wired or wireless. While high-speed IP router architectures have been extensively studied for wired networks, the concept of a "wireless IP router" has not been addressed so far. We examine the limitations of the IEEE 802.11 MAC protocol in supporting a low-latency and high-throughput IP datapath comprising multiple wireless LAN hops. We first propose a wireless IP forwarding architecture that uses MPLS with modifications to 802.11 MAC to significantly improve packet forwarding …

Validating Digital Signatures Without Ttp’S Time-Stamping And Certificate Revocation, Jianying Zhou, Feng Bao, Robert H. Deng

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In non-repudiation services where digital signatures usually serve as irrefutable cryptographic evidence for dispute resolution, trusted time-stamping and certificate revocation services, although very costly in practice, must be available, to prevent big loss due to compromising of the signing key. In [12], a new concept called intrusion-resilient signature was proposed to get rid of trusted time-stamping and certificate revocation services and a concrete scheme was presented. In this paper, we put forward a new scheme that can achieve the same effect in a much more efficient way. In our scheme, forward-secure signature serves as a building block that enables signature …

Security Remarks On A Group Signature Scheme With Member Deletion, Guilin Wang, Feng Bao, Jianying Zhou, Robert H. Deng

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

A group signature scheme allows a group member of a given group to sign messages on behalf of the group in an anonymous and unlinkable fashion. In case of a dispute, however, a designated group manager can reveal the signer of a valid group signature. Based on the Camenisch-Michels group signature scheme, Kim, Lim and Lee proposed the first group signature scheme with a member deletion procedure at ICISC 2000. Their scheme is very efficient in both communication and computation aspects. Unfortunately, their scheme is insecure. In this paper, we first identify an effective way that allows any verifier to …

Variations Of Diffie-Hellman Problem, Feng Bao, Robert H. Deng, Huafei Zhu

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This paper studies various computational and decisional Diffie-Hellman problems by providing reductions among them in the high granularity setting. We show that all three variations of computational Diffie-Hellman problem: square Diffie-Hellman problem, inverse Diffie-Hellman problem and divisible Diffie-Hellman problem, are equivalent with optimal reduction. Also, we are considering variations of the decisional Diffie-Hellman problem in single sample and polynomial samples settings, and we are able to show that all variations are equivalent except for the argument DDH ⇐ SDDH. We are not able to prove or disprove this statement, thus leave an interesting open problem. Keywords: Diffie-Hellman problem, Square Diffie-Hellman …

Multi-Agent Coalition Via Autonomous Price Negotiation In A Real-Time Web Environment, Hoong Chuin Lau, Wei Sian Lim

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In e-marketplaces, customers specify job requests in real-time and agents form coalitions to service them. This paper proposes a protocol for self-interested agents to negotiate prices in forming successful coalitions. We propose and experiment with two negotiation schemes: one allows information sharing while the other does not.

A Computer-Based Articulation Training Aid For Short Words (Cata), Mukund Devarajan

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Several improvements in the vowel articulation training aid (VATA) are described, as well as the efforts to extend the visual feedback system to operate with short words in the form of consonant, vowel and consonant (CVC). The extended version of the visual feedback system is referred to as CATA (Computer-based Articulation Training Aid); the vowel version of the aid (VATA) only operates with ten American English monopthong vowels. Improvements in VATA include the use of a neural network (NN) recognizer method to prune a large database of vowel recordings to eliminate noisy and/or mispronounced tokens. The spectral jitter problem, previously …

Making The Key Agreement Protocol In Mobile Ad Hoc Network More Efficient, Gang Yao, Kui Ren, Feng Bao, Robert H. Deng, Dengguo Feng

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Mobile ad hoc networks offer convenient infrastructureless communications over the shared wireless channel. However, the nature of mobile ad hoc networks makes them vulnerable to security attacks, such as passive eavesdropping over the wireless channel and denial of service attacks by malicious nodes. To ensure the security, several cryptography protocols are implemented. Due to the resource scarcity in mobile ad hoc networks, the protocols must be communication efficient and need as less computational power as possible. Broadcast communication is an important operation for many application in mobile ad hoc networks. To securely broadcast a message, all the members in the …

An Efficient Known Plaintext Attack On Fea-M, Hongjun Wu, Feng Bao, Robert H. Deng

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Yi et al. have proposed a cipher called the fast encryption algorithm for multimedia (FEA-M). Recently Mihaljevi and Kohno pointed out that FEA-M is insecure. However, their attacks are not efficient: their chosen plaintext attack and known plaintext attack require 2³⁷-bit chosen plaintext and 2⁶⁰-bit known plaintext, respectively. In this paper we give an efficient known plaintext attack against FEA-M. Our attack requires only 2²⁸-bit known plaintext and about 2³³ XOR operations.

Adaptive Collusion Attack To A Block Oriented Watermarking Scheme, Yongdong Wu, Robert H. Deng

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In this paper, we propose an adaptive collusion attack to a block oriented watermarking scheme [1]. In this attack, traitors conspire to selectively manipulate watermarked blocks to remove the watermark information. To this end, the traitors compare the watermarked blocks generated from the same original block. If two watermarked block are not equal, they average these two blocks to generate a pirated block. Then, replace the watermarked blocks with the pirated blocks so as to build a pirated image. The pirated image has no watermark but has much higher quality than watermarked images. We also give a theoretical analysis on …

An Efficient Public-Key Framework, Jianying Zhou, Feng Bao, Robert H. Deng

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Public-key certificates play an important role in binding the public key with the identity of the owner of the corresponding private key. A certificate might be revoked before its scheduled expiry date by the issuing CA. Efficient and timely distribution of certificate revocation information is a big challenge facing the PKI providers. Existing certificate revocation schemes place a considerable processing, communication, and storage overheads on the CA as well as the relying parties. To improve the current situation, we propose a revocation-free public-key framework, in which the maximum lifetime of a certificate is divided into short periods and the certificate …

Safe Robot Driving In Cluttered Environments, Chuck Thorpe, Justin Carlson, Dave Duggins, Jay Gowdy, Rob Maclachlan, Christoph Mertz, Arne Suppe, Bob Wang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The Navlab group at Carnegie Mellon University has a long history of development of automated vehicles and intelligent systems for driver assistance. The earlier work of the group concentrated on road following, cross-country driving, and obstacle detection. The new focus is on short-range sensing, to look all around the vehicle for safe driving. The current system uses video sensing, laser rangefinders, a novel light-stripe rangefinder, software to process each sensor individually, and a map-based fusion system. The complete system has been demonstrated on the Navlab 11 vehicle for monitoring the environment of a vehicle driving through a cluttered urban environment, …

Automatic Video Summarization By Graph Modeling, Chong-Wah Ngo, Yu-Fei Ma, Hong-Jiang Zhang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

We propose a unified approach for summarization based on the analysis of video structures and video highlights. Our approach emphasizes both the content balance and perceptual quality of a summary. Normalized cut algorithm is employed to globally and optimally partition a video into clusters. A motion attention model based on human perception is employed to compute the perceptual quality of shots and clusters. The clusters, together with the computed attention values, form a temporal graph similar to Markov chain that inherently describes the evolution and perceptual importance of video clusters. In our application, the flow of a temporal graph is …

Thermal Transport Eveluations Related To Waste Package Design -- Model Evaluations -- Task 19, Roald Akberov

Publications (YM)

The purpose of the “Thermal Transport Evaluations Related to Waste Package Design” Task # 19 of Cooperative Agreement Number DE-FC28-98NV12081 was to develop a new CFDHT model for heat transfer and fluid flow in the potential rsepository at the Yucca Mountain, Nevada and to study the effects of forced convection during the pre-closure period and natural convection during the postclosure period. The analysis was performed for the drift dimensions shown in Figure 4-1 below. The intended use of the model is to estimate the velocity and temperature distribution as well as the highest temperature in the drift during the pre-closure …

Trust Negotiation For Authentication And Authorization In Healthcare Information Systems, Charles D. Knutson, Kent E. Seamons, Tore L. Sundelin, David K. Vawdrey

Faculty Publications

The expanding availability of health information in an electronic format is strategic for industry-wide efforts to improve the quality and reduce the cnst of health care. The implementation of electronic medical record systems has been hindered by inadequate security provisions. This paper describes the use of frust negotiation as a framework for providing authentication and access control services in healthcare information systems. nust negotiation enables two parties with no pre-existing relationship to establish the trust necessary to perform sensitive transactions via the mutual disclosure of attributes contained within digital credentials. An extension of this system, surrogate irusf negoikiion is introduced …

Schema Matching And Data Extraction Over Html Tables, Cui Tao

Theses and Dissertations

Data on the Web in HTML tables is mostly structured, but we usually do not know the structure in advance. Thus, we cannot directly query for data of interest. We propose a solution to this problem for the case of mostly structured data in the form of HTML tables, based on document-independent extraction ontologies. The solution entails elements of table location and table understanding, data integration, and wrapper creation. Table location and understanding allows us to locate the table of interest, recognize attributes and values, pair attributes with values, and form records. Data-integration techniques allow us to match source records …

Improving Requirements Tracing Via Information Retrieval, Jane Huffman Hayes, Alex Dekhtyar, James Osborne

Computer Science and Software Engineering

This paper presents an approach for improving requirements tracing based on framing it as an information retrieval (IR) problem. Specifically, we focus on improving recall and precision in order to reduce the number of missed traceability links as well as to reduce the number of irrelevant potential links that an analyst has to examine when performing requirements tracing. Several IR algorithms were adapted and implemented to address this problem. We evaluated our algorithms by comparing their results and performance to those of a senior analyst who traced manually as well as with an existing requirements tracing tool. Initial results suggest …

Aggregated Causal Maps: An Approach To Elicit And Aggregate The Knowledge Of Multiple Experts, S. Nadkarni, Fiona Fui-Hoon Nah

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This paper presents a systematic procedure to elicit and aggregate the knowledge of multiple individual experts and represent it in the form of an Aggregated Causal Map (ACM). This procedure differs from existing methods in two ways. First, unlike other methods, this method does not rely on group interaction in eliciting knowledge of multiple experts, and, therefore, is not fraught with biases associated with group dynamics. Second, this method uses both the idiographic and nomothetic approaches while existing methods focus on nomothetic approaches to knowledge elicitation. We draw on the strengths of both approaches by using the idiographic approach to …

On Mining Group Patterns Of Mobile Users, Yida Wang, Ee Peng Lim, San-Yih Hwang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In this paper, we present a group pattern mining approach to derive the grouping information of mobile device users based on the spatio-temporal distances among them. Group patterns of users are determined by a distance threshold and a minimum duration. To discover group patterns, we propose the AGP and VG-growth algorithms that are derived from the Apriori and FP-growth algorithms respectively. We further evaluate the efficiencies of these two algorithms using synthetically generated user movement data.

Target Sets: A Tool For Understanding And Predicting The Behavior Of Interacting Q-Learners, Nancy Fulda, Dan A. Ventura

Faculty Publications

Reinforcement learning agents that interact in a common environment frequently affect each others’ perceived transition and reward distributions. This can result in convergence of the agents to a sub-optimal equilibrium or even to a solution that is not an equilibrium at all. Several modifications to the Q-learning algorithm have been proposed which enable agents to converge to optimal equilibria under specified conditions. This paper presents the concept of target sets as an aid to understanding why these modifications have been successful and as a tool to assist in the development of new modifications which are applicable in a wider range …