The reuse of machining knowledge to improve designer awareness through the configuration of knowledge libraries in PLM

The nature of competition induces the need to constantly improve and perform better. For global aerospace manufacturers, this is as timely an epithet as ever as market forces urge for more growth, better financial return and market position. The macroeconomic aspect is compounded by the growth of product complexity and the need for higher product quality, hence the drive to reduce waste places emphasis upon production costs and the need to improve product performance. This paper focuses upon a rapid development and deployment method that enables the capture and representation of machining knowledge so that it may be shared and reused by design engineers to accelerate the design-make process. The study and mapping of information and knowledge relationships are described and put forward as a lightweight ontology. From this, a set of knowledge document templates were created to facilitate the capture, structuring and sharing of machining knowledge within a collaborative multidisciplinary aerospace engineering environment. An experimental pilot system has been developed to test and demonstrate that knowledge document templates can accelerate the sharing of machining knowledge within an industrial product lifecycle management environment. The results are discussed to provide a case for further development and application within the product domain

Multimedia search without visual analysis: the value of linguistic and contextual information

This paper addresses the focus of this special issue by analyzing the potential contribution of linguistic content and other non-image aspects to the processing of audiovisual data. It summarizes the various ways in which linguistic content analysis contributes to enhancing the semantic annotation of multimedia content, and, as a consequence, to improving the effectiveness of conceptual media access tools. A number of techniques are presented, including the time-alignment of textual resources, audio and speech processing, content reduction and reasoning tools, and the exploitation of surface features

Access to recorded interviews: A research agenda

Recorded interviews form a rich basis for scholarly inquiry. Examples include oral histories, community memory projects, and interviews conducted for broadcast media. Emerging technologies offer the potential to radically transform the way in which recorded interviews are made accessible, but this vision will demand substantial investments from a broad range of research communities. This article reviews the present state of practice for making recorded interviews available and the state-of-the-art for key component technologies. A large number of important research issues are identified, and from that set of issues, a coherent research agenda is proposed

Spoken content retrieval: A survey of techniques and technologies

Speech media, that is, digital audio and video containing spoken content, has blossomed in recent years. Large collections are accruing on the Internet as well as in private and enterprise settings. This growth has motivated extensive research on techniques and technologies that facilitate reliable indexing and retrieval. Spoken content retrieval (SCR) requires the combination of audio and speech processing technologies with methods from information retrieval (IR). SCR research initially investigated planned speech structured in document-like units, but has subsequently shifted focus to more informal spoken content produced spontaneously, outside of the studio and in conversational settings. This survey provides an overview of the field of SCR encompassing component technologies, the relationship of SCR to text IR and automatic speech recognition and user interaction issues. It is aimed at researchers with backgrounds in speech technology or IR who are seeking deeper insight on how these fields are integrated to support research and development, thus addressing the core challenges of SCR

Okapi-based XML indexing

Purpose – Being an important data exchange and information storage standard, XML has generated a great deal of interest and particular attention has been paid to the issue of XML indexing. Clear use cases for structured search in XML have been established. However, most of the research in the area is either based on relational database systems or specialized semi‐structured data management systems. This paper aims to propose a method for XML indexing based on the information retrieval (IR) system Okapi. Design/methodology/approach – First, the paper reviews the structure of inverted files and gives an overview of the issues of why this indexing mechanism cannot properly support XML retrieval, using the underlying data structures of Okapi as an example. Then the paper explores a revised method implemented on Okapi using path indexing structures. The paper evaluates these index structures through the metrics of indexing run time, path search run time and space costs using the INEX and Reuters RVC1 collections. Findings – Initial results on the INEX collections show that there is a substantial overhead in space costs for the method, but this increase does not affect run time adversely. Indexing results on differing sized Reuters RVC1 sub‐collections show that the increase in space costs with increasing the size of a collection is significant, but in terms of run time the increase is linear. Path search results show sub‐millisecond run times, demonstrating minimal overhead for XML search. Practical implications – Overall, the results show the method implemented to support XML search in a traditional IR system such as Okapi is viable. Originality/value – The paper provides useful information on a method for XML indexing based on the IR system Okapi

Implementation of Systems Engineering Approach in Academic Projects: Software Defined Radio Technology Development as a Case Study

Each year, federal and private agencies spend billions of dollars on research projects that academic institutions conduct for them. However, the communication language between these agencies as clients and academia as hosts, is not very efficient and well-established. This has resulted in lack of clarity in clients’ description of what exactly to be expected and in hosts’ description of their capabilities and challenges. In addition, many of these projects are essentially interdisciplinary and demand the involvement of diverse research teams from different university departments. Lack of cohesive collaboration among these diverse teams results in mismatches between different compartments of project output, and consequently, generation of superfluous product prototypes. Finally, for their real-time tracking and later retrieval, the current situation of documentation of academic projects needs to be significantly altered. We suggest that the presence of a systems engineering team should be an indispensable part of a large academic research project, in order to monitor and manage the various aspects and phases from initiation to completion.For this purpose, we proposed a systems engineering model specific for academic research projects, which considers both strengths and challenges of universities as host research institutes. As a case study, we applied this proposed systems engineering approach on a NASA-funded project at Morgan State University (MSU) which was about design and implementation of software defined radio (SDR) for space exploration. Application of this model significantly improved the professional dialogue and technical clarifications between NASA and MSU partners, as well as within MSU teams. Moreover, the sub-system compatibility among different modules of the implemented product was notably enhanced. Overall, application of systems engineering approach in academic projects can result in mutual benefits for the institution and either federal or private client