ImageJ2: ImageJ for the next generation of scientific image data

ImageJ is an image analysis program extensively used in the biological sciences and beyond. Due to its ease of use, recordable macro language, and extensible plug-in architecture, ImageJ enjoys contributions from non-programmers, amateur programmers, and professional developers alike. Enabling such a diversity of contributors has resulted in a large community that spans the biological and physical sciences. However, a rapidly growing user base, diverging plugin suites, and technical limitations have revealed a clear need for a concerted software engineering effort to support emerging imaging paradigms, to ensure the software's ability to handle the requirements of modern science. Due to these new and emerging challenges in scientific imaging, ImageJ is at a critical development crossroads. We present ImageJ2, a total redesign of ImageJ offering a host of new functionality. It separates concerns, fully decoupling the data model from the user interface. It emphasizes integration with external applications to maximize interoperability. Its robust new plugin framework allows everything from image formats, to scripting languages, to visualization to be extended by the community. The redesigned data model supports arbitrarily large, N-dimensional datasets, which are increasingly common in modern image acquisition. Despite the scope of these changes, backwards compatibility is maintained such that this new functionality can be seamlessly integrated with the classic ImageJ interface, allowing users and developers to migrate to these new methods at their own pace. ImageJ2 provides a framework engineered for flexibility, intended to support these requirements as well as accommodate future needs

Caring, sharing widgets: a toolkit of sensitive widgets

Although most of us communicate using multiple sensory modalities in our lives, and many of our computers are similarly capable of multi-modal interaction, most human-computer interaction is predominantly in the visual mode. This paper describes a toolkit of widgets that are capable of presenting themselves in multiple modalities, but further are capapble of adapting their presentation to suit the contexts and environments in which they are used. This is of increasing importance as the use of mobile devices becomes ubiquitous

An Experimental Digital Library Platform - A Demonstrator Prototype for the DigLib Project at SICS

Within the framework of the Digital Library project at SICS, this thesis describes the implementation of a demonstrator prototype of a digital library (DigLib); an experimental platform integrating several functions in one common interface. It includes descriptions of the structure and formats of the digital library collection, the tailoring of the search engine Dienst, the construction of a keyword extraction tool, and the design and development of the interface. The platform was realised through sicsDAIS, an agent interaction and presentation system, and is to be used for testing and evaluating various tools for information seeking. The platform supports various user interaction strategies by providing: search in bibliographic records (Dienst); an index of keywords (the Keyword Extraction Function (KEF)); and browsing through the hierarchical structure of the collection. KEF was developed for this thesis work, and extracts and presents keywords from Swedish documents. Although based on a comparatively simple algorithm, KEF contributes by supplying a long-felt want in the area of Information Retrieval. Evaluations of the tasks and the interface still remain to be done, but the digital library is very much up and running. By implementing the platform through sicsDAIS, DigLib can deploy additional tools and search engines without interfering with already running modules. If wanted, agents providing other services than SICS can supply, can be plugged in

An authoring tool for structuring and annotating on-line educational courses : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Computer Science at Massey University

This thesis studies the design and prototype implementation of a new web-based course authoring system for the Technology Integrated Learning Environment (TILE) project. The TILE authoring system edits the course structure and allows the author to annotate the course structure with meta-data. It makes extensive use of XML technology to communicate structured data across the Internet, as well as for both local and web-side databases. The Authoring tool is designed to support development by multiple authors and has check-in and check - out, as well as version control facilities. It also provides an interface for adopting other multimedia tools such as AudioGraph. The tool has an easy-to-use graphical user interface. The technical problems that have been solved in this project include issues such as cross-platform support, drag and drop functionality using JDK l.l.8, etc. System environments, such as relational database set up, XML database set up, Java swing set up in Mac also have been discussed. The authoring system interface analysis, database analysis and function analysis have been completed for the complete the system as specified. An intermediate system, designed to a reduced specification, has been implemented as a prototype and details of this system, which can work independently of the TILE delivery system, are included. The Full TILE authoring system including InstantDB database access also has been partially implemented. The prototype application has also has been tested on the PC platform

JxAppDev framework for hybrid applications

Dissertação de mestrado em Computer ScienceIn modern days, it becomes more and more common for software solutions to focus on mobile and web technologies, therefore the current desktop market has been shrinking. Due to the big impact that web technologies are having on the market and user’s daily basis it has become impossible for developers to neglect this evolution. Nevertheless, in some cases it is difficult to justify the development of some web applications since the benefits are to small and the costs to high. Due to this problem and some other small inconveniences, there are some emerging technologies that try to close the gap between desktop and web applications by trying to combine the best of both worlds. There are some well-known technologies such as Java Applets, which are mainly Java applications that can be executed on the browser. Even though these technologies are very interesting and in some specific cases very useful, companies avoid taking this path since this kind of software applications raise some problems, which are making sure that these new technologies are abandoned and forgotten (e.g. some security problems with regard to plugin installation). With this project, we intend to create a Framework, which main goal is to ease the hybrid application development. This framework allows users to develop native Java SE applications, that can be accessed as normal Desktop applications, but at the same time it is possible to access the same content through a regular Web Browser, using common well-known technologies such as HTML, JavaScript and CSS. With this solution, it is possible to avoid high costs on Web application development, and avoid other small problems such as security problems when installing plugins that can be found in the current existing solutions. This way it is possible to develop a single Desktop application that is reusable on the Browser if needed. The idea is not to allow the user to create a new application that can be accessed on both platforms, but on the contrary it aims Java applications that have already been developed or that will be developed with no intention of making them accessible on the Web, but at some point the urge to port the application appears and the user won’t need to rebuild everything from scratch, but he will simply need to invest some time developing the new User Interface for the Web version that he wants to provide.Nos dias de hoje é cada vez mais comum as soluções de software que se encontram no mercado serem feitas à volta de tecnologias mobile ou web, o que tem criado uma diminuição no mercado de aplicações nativas desktop. Devido ao grande impacto que as tecnologias web têm tido no mercado e nos utilizadores, tem sido impossível para os desenvolvedores de aplicações, negligenciar esta evolução. Mesmo assim, em alguns casos específicos torna-se muito difícil justificar o desenvolvimento de aplicações web, sendo que os benefícios obtidos são muito baixos e os gastos de produção muito altos. Devido a este tipo de problemas entre outros pequenos detalhes, tem surgido novas tecnologias que tentam encurtar a diferença entre aplicações desktop e web, tentando combinar o melhor dos dois mundos. Existem algumas tecnologias muito conhecias tais como Java Applets, que são no fundo aplicações Java que podem ser executadas dentro de um browser. Mesmo estas tecnologias sendo muito interessantes e até mesmo muito úteis em certos casos, grandes companhias tendem a evitar o uso destas devido a alguns problemas que têm aparecido ao longo do tempo e que podem por em jogo a segurança e duração de vida dessas aplicações. Um grande problema encontrado neste ramo, são falhas de segurança na instalação de plugins, que esta a fazer com que este tipo de tecnologias esteja a ser abandonada. Com este projeto criamos uma Framework que permite e facilita o desenvolvimento de aplicações híbridas. Esta Framework permite que os utilizadores desenvolvam aplicações em Java SE, que podem ser acedidas como aplicações normais, desktop, mas ao mesmo tempo é possível aceder a algum do conteúdo dessas aplicações através de um simples Navegador de Internet. Isto tudo criando uma nova camada composta de tecnologias Web tais como HTML5, CSS e JavaScript sem ter de recriar a aplicação. Com esta solução é possível evitar grandes custos no desenvolvimento de novas aplicações Web, e ao mesmo tempo evitar pequenos problemas de segurança como os que já foram mencionados antes em soluções já existentes. Desta forma é possível criar aplicações nativas que podem ser reutilizadas como aplicações Web caso necessário. A ideia por trás deste projeto não se concentra em permitir criar novas aplicações híbridas, sendo que já se encontram soluções para este tipo de problemas. Pelo contrário o principal problema que tentamos resolver com esta solução é permitir a aplicações Java que já existem ou que estão a ser desenvolvidas como simples aplicações nativas, possam no futuro ser portadas para o domínio Web sem que seja necessário a recriação de uma versão completa Web, e ao mesmo tempo limitar o custo desse processo a um mínimo, requerendo apenas que uma nova UI para a versão Web seja desenvolvida

A Flexible Framework for Collaborative Visualization Applications Using Java Spaces

The complexity of modern tasks is rising along with the level of technology. Two techniques commonly used to deal with complexity are collaboration and information visualization. Recently, computer networks have arisen as a powerful means of collaboration, and many new technologies are being developed to better utilize them. Among the newer, more promising of these technologies is Sun Microsystems\u27 JavaSpaces ™, a high-level network programming API. This thesis describes a tool for developing collaborative visualization software using JavaSpaces-an application framework and accompanying toolkit. In addition to a detailed description of the framework, the thesis also describes an application implemented using the framework, discusses the benefits of development under the framework, evaluates the performance of JavaSpaces in the context of the framework, and addresses the issue of network bandwidth limitations, which are a concern when developing visualizations that deal with large data sets

State diagram design application for EDAG Production Solutions

En este trabajo de fin de grado se presenta el desarrollo realizado de una aplicación de escritorio para la empresa EDAG Production Solutions GmbH & Co. KG, dedicada a implementar soluciones de producción para sus clientes. Dentro de la empresa, los desarrolladores de software del departamento de producción IT emplean distintas herramientas software al trabajar en las diferentes fases que un proyecto requiere, y, como le ocurre a otras empresas, para ciertos casos el mercado no ofrece soluciones accesibles cuando se trata de resolver problemas concretos. En concreto, EDAG Production Solutions GmbH & Co. KG necesita para el departamento de producción IT una aplicación de escritorio para diseñar diagramas que representan el comportamiento de un sistema y que, a partir de este diseño, genere automáticamente una plantilla del diagrama escrito en Java, ya que esta tarea se realiza manualmente y el tiempo de desarrollo de un proyecto se reducirá notablemente con esta herramienta. Actualmente, la empresa no ve adecuadas las soluciones existentes ya que o no son software libre o no permiten generar código a partir de un diagrama de la forma que necesitan. Además, estas herramientas no son intuitivas y demasiado complejas para lo que realmente necesita la empresa, por ello buscan una solución más adecuada a sus necesidades. La aplicación desarrollada como trabajo final de grado permite esta funcionalidad que EDAG Production Solutions GmbH & Co. KG necesita. Además de la importación y exportación de diagramas en formato GraphML. Esta aplicación se ha desarrollado utilizando Angular, un framework para desarrollar aplicaciones web, sobre Electron, un framework de código abierto que permite ejecutar componentes para aplicaciones web en una aplicación de escritorio compatible con los sistemas operativos para ordenador más utilizados