Expert System for Structural Optimization Exploiting Past Experience and A-priori Knowledge.

The availability of comprehensive Structural Optimization Systems in the market is allowing designers direct access to software tools previously the domain of the specialist. The use of Structural Optimization is particularly troublesome requiring knowledge of finite element analysis, numerical optimization algorithms, and the overall design environment. The subject of the research is the application of Expert System methodologies to support nonspecialists when using a Structural Optimization System. The specific target is to produce an Expert System as an adviser for a working structural optimization system. Three types of knowledge are required to use optimization systems effectively; that relating to setting up the structural optimization problem which is based on logical deduction; past, experience; together with run-time and results interpretation knowledge. A knowledge base which is based on the above is set, up and reasoning mechanisms incorporating case based and rule based reasoning, theory of certainty, and an object oriented approach are developed. The Expert SVstem described here concentrates on the optimization formulation aspects. It is able to set up an optimization run for the user and monitor the run-time performance. In this second mode the system is able to decide if an optimization run is likely to converge to a, solution and advice the user accordingly. The ideas and Expert System techniques presented in this thesis have been implemented in the development; of a prototype system written in C++. The prototype has been extended through the development of a user interface which is based on XView

Internship Portfolio

My one-year internship program work was with Mayo Clinic, Rochester. I was involved in the software development as part of a work term, all of which will be outlined in this report. The report will cover some background information on the projects I was involved in, as well as details on how the projects were developed. The report also states how and what academic courses and projects helped me in overall internship experience so far. At the beginning of the internship, I formulated serval learning goals, which I wanted to achieve: To understand the functioning and working conditions of the organization; To explore working in a professional environment; To explore the work environment for the possibility of a future career; To utilize my gained skills and knowledge; To find skills and knowledge I still need to work in a professional environment; To learn about software development life cycle; To learn about the development methodologies; To obtain fieldwork experience/collect data in an environment unknown for me; To obtain experience working in multicultural and diverse environment; To enhance my interpersonal and technical skills; To network with professionals in the industry. There are five major projects that I had a significant role in. The first project was Space Tools, involved gaining a good understanding of a javascript framework called Angular. My task was to study its working, develop wireframes from the view point of developing an application using that technology. My task was to Understand working with Angular framework, Understand working with Git, Develop wireframes. As this was my first project with Mayo Clinic, particularly at Development Shared Services (DSS) as a team project, I also had a large scope of understanding Agile Methodology - Scrum Process in particular. The second project was BAMS which was a rewrite of existing application in Windows Presentation Framework(WPF) and .Net backend. In this project my tasks were Understand using WinForms and WPF, Develop pages using WPF- MVVM Framework. The third project was DSA, where I acquired knowledge of working on Angular4 and frontend Unit testing in Karma using Mocha and Chai frameworks. The fourth project is MML Notification and Delivery, which started with an analysis phase in which were asked to analyze the data flow and system integrations the current Mayo Access and Mayo Link (MML Internal Operations) are dependent upon. We are to provide a new functionality to Mayo Access users of Notification and Delivery of tests results. The current project that I’m working on now is “MML Database Analysis”. This project is in the analysis phase. We were given a task to analyze MML databases to write an API instead of frontend calls to the database. I acquired many new technical skills throughout my work. I acquired new knowledge in Front-end development using various versions of Angular framework and Unit testing using Mocha and Chai framework in Karma. I also brushed my HTML/HTML5, CSS/CSS3, Javascript, Java, C# skills while working on various projects. Then I was introduced to the area of research and analysis and how to approach it. Most importantly, the work included good fellowship, cooperative teamwork and accepting responsibilities. Although I spent much time as a learning curve, I found that I was well trained in certain areas that helped me substantially in my projects. Many programming skills and Software Development Life Cycle understanding that I used in my internship, such as programming style and design, were the skills that I had acquired during my studies in Computer Science. This report also includes advantages of using Angular framework over other Javascript frameworks. The report concludes with my overall impressions of my work experience as well as my opinion of the Industrial Internship Program in general

A Social Media mHealth Solution to Address the Needs of Dengue Prevention and Management in Sri Lanka

Background: Sri Lanka has witnessed a series of dengue epidemics over the past five years, with the western province, home to the political capital of Colombo, bearing more than half of the dengue burden. Existing dengue monitoring prevention programs are exhausted as public health inspectors (PHIs) cope with increasing workloads and paper-based modes of surveillance and education, characterizing a reactive system unable to cope with the enormity of the problem. On the other hand, the unprecedented proliferation and affordability of mobile phones since 2009 and a supportive political climate have thus far remained unexploited for the use of mobile-based interventions for dengue management. Objective: To conduct a needs assessment of PHIs in Colombo with respect to their dengue-related tasks and develop a new mobile-based system to address these needs while strengthening existing systems. Methods: One-on-one in-depth interviews were conducted with 29 PHIs to a) gain a nuanced, in-depth understanding of the current state of surveillance practices, b) understand the logistical, technological and social challenges they confront, and c) identify opportunities for mobile-based interventions. Quantitative analysis included simple descriptive statistics while qualitative analysis comprised textual analysis of 209 pages of transcripts (or nearly 600 minutes of conversations) using grounded theory approaches. Results: Current paper-based data collection practices for dengue surveillance involved a circuitous, time consuming process that could take between 7-10 days to officially report and record a single case. PHIs confronted challenges in terms of unreliable, standalone GIS devices, delays in registering mosquito breeding sites and lack of engagement from communities while delivering dengue education. These findings, in concert with a high motivation to use mobile-based systems, informed the development of Mo-Buzz, a mobile-based system that integrates three components – digitized surveillance, dynamic disease mapping and digitized dengue education – on a common platform. The system was developed through an iterative, evolutionary, collaborative process, consistent with the Spiral model of software development and is currently being used by all 55 PHIs in the CMC system. Conclusions: Given the entrenched nature of existing paper-based systems in PHIs’ work habits, we expect a gradual adoption curve for Mo-Buzz in the future. Equally, we expect variable adoption of the system with respect to its specific components, and specific PHI sub-groups (younger versus older). The Mo-Buzz intervention is a response to multiple calls by the global mHealth community for collaborations in the area of mobile interventions for global health. Our experience revealed that the benefits of this paradigm lies in alleviating country-specific public health challenges through a commonly shared understanding of cultural mores, and sharing of knowledge and technologies. We call upon future researchers to further dissect the applicability of the Spiral Model of software development to mHealth interventions and contribute to the mHealth evidence debate from theoretical and applied perspectives

Software development: A paradigm for the future

A new paradigm for software development that treats software development as an experimental activity is presented. It provides built-in mechanisms for learning how to develop software better and reusing previous experience in the forms of knowledge, processes, and products. It uses models and measures to aid in the tasks of characterization, evaluation and motivation. An organization scheme is proposed for separating the project-specific focus from the organization's learning and reuse focuses of software development. The implications of this approach for corporations, research and education are discussed and some research activities currently underway at the University of Maryland that support this approach are presented

Open-TEE - An Open Virtual Trusted Execution Environment

Hardware-based Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs) are widely deployed in mobile devices. Yet their use has been limited primarily to applications developed by the device vendors. Recent standardization of TEE interfaces by GlobalPlatform (GP) promises to partially address this problem by enabling GP-compliant trusted applications to run on TEEs from different vendors. Nevertheless ordinary developers wishing to develop trusted applications face significant challenges. Access to hardware TEE interfaces are difficult to obtain without support from vendors. Tools and software needed to develop and debug trusted applications may be expensive or non-existent. In this paper, we describe Open-TEE, a virtual, hardware-independent TEE implemented in software. Open-TEE conforms to GP specifications. It allows developers to develop and debug trusted applications with the same tools they use for developing software in general. Once a trusted application is fully debugged, it can be compiled for any actual hardware TEE. Through performance measurements and a user study we demonstrate that Open-TEE is efficient and easy to use. We have made Open- TEE freely available as open source.Comment: Author's version of article to appear in 14th IEEE International Conference on Trust, Security and Privacy in Computing and Communications, TrustCom 2015, Helsinki, Finland, August 20-22, 201