2,094 research outputs found
2023-2024 Graduate School Catalog
You and your peers represent more than 67 countries and your shared scholarship spans 140 programs - from business administration and biomedical engineering to history, horticulture, musical performance, marine science, and more. Your ideas and interests will inform public health, create opportunities for art and innovation, contribute to the greater good, and positively impact economic development in Maine and beyond
Facilitating prosociality through technology: Design to promote digital volunteerism
Volunteerism covers many activities involving no financial rewards for volunteers but which contribute
to the common good. There is existing work in designing technology for volunteerism in HumanComputer Interaction (HCI) and related disciplines that focuses on motivation to improve
performance, but it does not account for volunteer wellbeing. Here, I investigate digital volunteerism
in three case studies with a focus on volunteer motivation, engagement, and wellbeing. My research
involved volunteers and others in the volunteering context to generate recommendations for a
volunteer-centric design for digital volunteerism. The thesis has three aims:
1. To investigate motivational aspects critical for enhancing digital volunteersâ experiences
2. To identify digital platform attributes linked to volunteer wellbeing
3. To create guidelines for effectively supporting volunteer engagement in digital volunteering
platforms
In the first case study I investigate the design of a chat widget for volunteers working in an
organisation with a view to develop a design that improves their workflow and wellbeing. The second
case study investigates the needs, motivations, and wellbeing of volunteers who help medical
students improve their medical communication skills. An initial mixed-methods study was followed by
an experiment comparing two design strategies to improve volunteer relatedness; an important
indicator of wellbeing. The third case study looks into volunteer needs, experiences, motivations, and
wellbeing with a focus on volunteer identity and meaning-making on a science-based research
platform. I then analyse my findings from these case studies using the lens of care ethics to derive
critical insights for design.
The key contributions of this thesis are design strategies and critical insights, and a volunteer-centric
design framework to enhance the motivation, wellbeing and engagement of digital volunteers
Implementing Robotic Process Automation in Sales Support
Digitalization has been shaping the ways how we work and live for a considerable length of time. Businessesâ competitiveness is partially determined by their capability to adopt and leverage new technologies. One of the latest trends in digitalization is the automation of repetitive, low-cognitive human tasks in white-collar jobs. A tool that was created to automate low-cognitive hu-man tasks, Robotic Process Automation (further only RPA) utilizes software robots to address this topic. RPA gains attraction because it is easily scalable and implemented at a rather low cost and the use of it doesnât require prior programming skills. The implementation of RPA has been studied to some extent, however, the studies of implementation in sales and sales support are lacking. Notably, the automation of sales tasks is lagging far behind other business functions, even though a great deal of sales tasks could be automated. To address the limited understanding of automation in sales this studyâs objective was to investigate the impact special features on sales might have with automation on a practical level, and the influence of human factors in RPA implementation and addressing employeesâ commitment factors to ensure the use of RPA.
Reaching the targets of the study was ensured by answering the following research questions: 1) What are the prerequisites for the automation of sales support processes, 2) How to ensure employeesâ commitment to RPA, 3) What kind of resources are needed from the organization in the RPA implementation, and 4) How to prioritize the tasks to be automated with RPA. The study was conducted as a single case study at a Finnish technology company. The primary data was gathered through semi-structured interviews and the interviewees were all employees of the case company with a relevant role to the studied issue. Multi-sourced secondary data was used to ensure data triangulation and broaden the insights of the results provided. The data was analysed through a thematic analysis.
To understand the main empirical findings some prevailing facts must be known. First, RPA is to be utilised by the Sales Support team for the first time, but RPA is not new in the company. However, the Sales Engineers (further only SE) have been provided with RPA training before this study took place. Second, the RPA process at the case company relies on the individual users and their motivations as it is not mandatory for SEs to use RPA.
It was discovered that SEsâ lack of motivation to use RPA is the main reason hindering the automation process in Sales Support. This could be addressed by increasing SEsâ knowledge of RPA by improving the provided training courses and by naming a key user or users to support SEs with the automation design. The importance of the key user should diminish when the use of RPA stabilises. It is also suggested to make the use of RPA temporarily mandatory through KPIs because the voluntariness of use has not led to the adoption of RPA as intended. Lastly, the first tasks to be automated should be prioritized based on task simplicity, as it will support the learning of the individuals and minimize the risk of systems operations being compromised.
This study contributes to the literature by increasing the understanding of the factors affecting the new technology implementation within sales and confirming some prior findings in the rather new field of study. In practice, the findings of the study advise managers on how to deal with and support already overloaded salespeople in RPA adoption. The study also investigated the voluntary use of technology at work which has been previously associated with private life only in the literature but could be further studied in the future. The study despite aiming for generalisability covers only a niche area of sales and thus a general study of RPA possibilities in sales could be of interest
GENDER, HUMAN RIGHTS AND EDUCATION IN AFRICA
Proceedings of the 2023 International Conference of the Association for the Promotion of African
Studies (APAS) held at the University of Nigeria Nsukka on 24th - 27th Ma
Security considerations in the open source software ecosystem
Open source software plays an important role in the software supply chain, allowing stakeholders to
utilize open source components as building blocks in their software, tooling, and infrastructure. But
relying on the open source ecosystem introduces unique challenges, both in terms of security and trust,
as well as in terms of supply chain reliability.
In this dissertation, I investigate approaches, considerations, and encountered challenges of stakeholders in the context of security, privacy, and trustworthiness of the open source software supply
chain. Overall, my research aims to empower and support software experts with the knowledge and
resources necessary to achieve a more secure and trustworthy open source software ecosystem. In the
first part of this dissertation, I describe a research study investigating the security and trust practices
in open source projects by interviewing 27 owners, maintainers, and contributors from a diverse set
of projects to explore their behind-the-scenes processes, guidance and policies, incident handling, and
encountered challenges, finding that participantsâ projects are highly diverse in terms of their deployed
security measures and trust processes, as well as their underlying motivations. More on the consumer
side of the open source software supply chain, I investigated the use of open source components in
industry projects by interviewing 25 software developers, architects, and engineers to understand their
projectsâ processes, decisions, and considerations in the context of external open source code, finding
that open source components play an important role in many of the industry projects, and that most
projects have some form of company policy or best practice for including external code. On the side of
end-user focused software, I present a study investigating the use of software obfuscation in Android
applications, which is a recommended practice to protect against plagiarism and repackaging. The
study leveraged a multi-pronged approach including a large-scale measurement, a developer survey, and
a programming experiment, finding that only 24.92% of apps are obfuscated by their developer, that
developers do not fear theft of their own apps, and have difficulties obfuscating their own apps. Lastly,
to involve end users themselves, I describe a survey with 200 users of cloud office suites to investigate
their security and privacy perceptions and expectations, with findings suggesting that users are generally
aware of basic security implications, but lack technical knowledge for envisioning some threat models.
The key findings of this dissertation include that open source projects have highly diverse security
measures, trust processes, and underlying motivations. That the projectsâ security and trust needs are
likely best met in ways that consider their individual strengths, limitations, and project stage, especially
for smaller projects with limited access to resources. That open source components play an important
role in industry projects, and that those projects often have some form of company policy or best
practice for including external code, but developers wish for more resources to better audit included
components.
This dissertation emphasizes the importance of collaboration and shared responsibility in building and maintaining the open source software ecosystem, with developers, maintainers, end users,
researchers, and other stakeholders alike ensuring that the ecosystem remains a secure, trustworthy, and
healthy resource for everyone to rely on
University of Windsor Graduate Calendar 2023 Spring
https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/universitywindsorgraduatecalendars/1027/thumbnail.jp
Teaching Unknown Objects by Leveraging Human Gaze and Augmented Reality in Human-Robot Interaction
Roboter finden aufgrund ihrer auĂergewöhnlichen Arbeitsleistung, PrĂ€zision, Effizienz und Skalierbarkeit immer mehr Verwendung in den verschiedensten Anwendungsbereichen. Diese Entwicklung wurde zusĂ€tzlich begĂŒnstigt durch Fortschritte in der KĂŒnstlichen Intelligenz (KI), insbesondere im Maschinellem Lernen (ML). Mit Hilfe moderner neuronaler Netze sind Roboter in der Lage, Objekte in ihrer Umgebung zu erkennen und mit ihnen zu interagieren. Ein erhebliches Manko besteht jedoch darin, dass das Training dieser Objekterkennungsmodelle, in aller Regel mit einer zugrundeliegenden AbhĂ€ngig von umfangreichen DatensĂ€tzen und der VerfĂŒgbarkeit groĂer Datenmengen einhergeht. Dies ist insbesondere dann problematisch, wenn der konkrete Einsatzort des Roboters und die Umgebung, einschlieĂlich der darin befindlichen Objekte, nicht im Voraus bekannt sind. Die breite und stĂ€ndig wachsende Palette von Objekten macht es dabei praktisch unmöglich, das gesamte Spektrum an existierenden Objekten allein mit bereits zuvor erstellten DatensĂ€tzen vollstĂ€ndig abzudecken. Das Ziel dieser Dissertation war es, einem Roboter unbekannte Objekte mit Hilfe von Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) beizubringen, um ihn von seiner AbhĂ€ngigkeit von Daten sowie den EinschrĂ€nkungen durch vordefinierte Szenarien zu befreien. Die Synergie von Eye Tracking und Augmented Reality (AR) ermöglichte es dem als Lehrer fungierenden Menschen, mit dem Roboter zu kommunizieren und ihn mittels des menschlichen Blickes auf Objekte hinzuweisen. Dieser holistische Ansatz ermöglichte die Konzeption eines multimodalen HRI-Systems, durch das der Roboter Objekte identifizieren und dreidimensional segmentieren konnte, obwohl sie ihm zu diesem Zeitpunkt noch unbekannt waren, um sie anschlieĂend aus unterschiedlichen Blickwinkeln eigenstĂ€ndig zu inspizieren. Anhand der Klasseninformationen, die ihm der Mensch mitteilte, war der Roboter daraufhin in der Lage, die entsprechenden Objekte zu erlernen und spĂ€ter wiederzuerkennen. Mit dem Wissen, das dem Roboter durch diesen auf HRI basierenden Lehrvorgang beigebracht worden war, war dessen FĂ€higkeit Objekte zu erkennen vergleichbar mit den FĂ€higkeiten modernster Objektdetektoren, die auf umfangreichen DatensĂ€tzen trainiert worden waren. Dabei war der Roboter jedoch nicht auf vordefinierte Klassen beschrĂ€nkt, was seine Vielseitigkeit und AnpassungsfĂ€higkeit unter Beweis stellte. Die im Rahmen dieser Dissertation durchgefĂŒhrte Forschung leistete bedeutende BeitrĂ€ge an der Schnittstelle von Machine Learning (ML), AR, Eye Tracking und Robotik. Diese Erkenntnisse tragen nicht nur zum besseren VerstĂ€ndnis der genannten Felder bei, sondern ebnen auch den Weg fĂŒr weitere interdisziplinĂ€re Forschung. Die in dieser Dissertation enthalten wissenschaftlichen Artikel wurden auf hochrangigen Konferenzen in den Bereichen Robotik, Eye Tracking und HRI veröffentlicht.Robots are becoming increasingly popular in a wide range of environments due to their exceptional work capacity, precision, efficiency, and scalability. This development has been further encouraged by advances in Artificial Intelligence (AI), particularly Machine Learning (ML). By employing sophisticated neural networks, robots are given the ability to detect and interact with objects in their vicinity. However, a significant drawback arises from the underlying dependency on extensive datasets and the availability of substantial amounts of training data for these object detection models. This issue becomes particularly problematic when the specific deployment location of the robot and the surroundings, including the objects within it, are not known in advance. The vast and ever-expanding array of objects makes it virtually impossible to comprehensively cover the entire spectrum of existing objects using preexisting datasets alone. The goal of this dissertation was to teach a robot unknown objects in the context of Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) in order to liberate it from its data dependency, unleashing it from predefined scenarios. In this context, the combination of eye tracking and Augmented Reality (AR) created a powerful synergy that empowered the human teacher to seamlessly communicate with the robot and effortlessly point out objects by means of human gaze. This holistic approach led to the development of a multimodal HRI system that enabled the robot to identify and visually segment the Objects of Interest (OOIs) in three-dimensional space, even though they were initially unknown to it, and then examine them autonomously from different angles. Through the class information provided by the human, the robot was able to learn the objects and redetect them at a later stage. Due to the knowledge gained from this HRI based teaching process, the robotâs object detection capabilities exhibited comparable performance to state-of-the-art object detectors trained on extensive datasets, without being restricted to predefined classes, showcasing its versatility and adaptability. The research conducted within the scope of this dissertation made significant contributions at the intersection of ML, AR, eye tracking, and robotics. These findings not only enhance the understanding of these fields, but also pave the way for further interdisciplinary research. The scientific articles included in this dissertation have been published at high-impact conferences in the fields of robotics, eye tracking, and HRI
Building Digital Projects to Outlive Their Funding
Sustainability is a well-known issue in the digital humanities, but it is rarely discussed in print. Too many valuable online research tools struggle to secure the funding to remain available indefinitely. This problem is especially pronounced in the case of short-term, grant-funded projects, which face the dual problem of limited development time and a horizon of active support. Yet these projects often produce bodies of knowledge that remain useful long after the project ends. Taking one specific case as a prototypical example, The Zodiac Glossary, this paper examines various strategies for ensuring the longevity of online digital resources. What works in extremis is easier to implement in other circumstances. This paper is, on one hand, an implicit call for better funding for digital projects. On the other, it is a brief guide to navigating the situation as it stands. Those working on digital projects may find strategies here to guide their own decision-making processes
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Sonic heritage: listening to the past
History is so often told through objects, images and photographs, but the potential of sounds to reveal place and space is often neglected. Our research project âSonic Palimpsestâ1 explores the potential of sound to evoke impressions and new understandings of the past, to embrace the sonic as a tool to understand what was, in a way that can complement and add to our predominant visual understandings. Our work includes the expansion of the Oral History archives held at Chatham Dockyard to include womenâs voices and experiences, and the creation of sonic works to engage the public with their heritage. Our research highlights the social and cultural value of oral history and field recordings in the transmission of knowledge to both researchers and the public. Together these recordings document how buildings and spaces within the dockyard were used and experienced by those who worked there. We can begin to understand the social and cultural roles of these buildings within the community, both past and present
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