Unifying Distributed Processing and Open Hypertext through a Heterogeneous Communication Model

A successful distributed open hypermedia system can be characterised by a scaleable architecture which is inherently distributed. While the architects of distributed hypermedia systems have addressed the issues of providing and retrieving distributed resources, they have often neglected to design systems with the inherent capability to exploit the distributed processing of this information. The research presented in this paper describes the construction and use of an open hypermedia system concerned equally with both of these facets

Semantically annotated hypermedia services

Hypermedia systems’ researchers investigate the various approaches in the way documents and resources are linked, navigated and stored in a distributed environment. Unfortunately, those systems fail to provide effortlessly usable discrete services, since it is difficult both to discover and to invoke any of them. This paper proposes the usage of emerging technologies that try to augment the Web resources with semantics in order to provide Hypermedia services that can be easily discovered, and integrated by potential third party developers. In this context, we analyze the benefits for the Hypermedia community upon the adoption of Semantic Web technologies for the description of Hypermedia services, and we implement an initial corresponding ontology

Towards a Framework for Developing Mobile Agents for Managing Distributed Information Resources

Distributed information management tools allow users to author, disseminate, discover and manage information within large-scale networked environments, such as the Internet. Agent technology provides the flexibility and scalability necessary to develop such distributed information management applications. We present a layered organisation that is shared by the specific applications that we build. Within this organisation we describe an architecture where mobile agents can move across distributed environments, integrate with local resources and other mobile agents, and communicate their results back to the user

Hypermedia support for argumentation-based rationale: 15 years on from gIBIS and QOC

Having developed, used and evaluated some of the early IBIS-based approaches to design rationale (DR) such as gIBIS and QOC in the late 1980s/mid-1990s, we describe the subsequent evolution of the argumentation-based paradigm through software support, and perspectives drawn from modeling and meeting facilitation. Particular attention is given to the challenge of negotiating the overheads of capturing this form of rationale. Our approach has maintained a strong emphasis on keeping the representational scheme as simple as possible to enable real time meeting mediation and capture, attending explicitly to the skills required to use the approach well, particularly for the sort of participatory, multi-stakeholder requirements analysis demanded by many design problems. However, we can then specialize the notation and the way in which the tool is used in the service of specific methodologies, supported by a customizable hypermedia environment, and interoperable with other software tools. After presenting this approach, called Compendium, we present examples to illustrate the capabilities for support security argumentation in requirements engineering, template driven modeling for document generation, and IBIS-based indexing of and navigation around video records of meetings

Educational Technology as Seen Through the Eyes of the Readers

In this paper, I present the evaluation of a novel knowledge domain visualization of educational technology. The interactive visualization is based on readership patterns in the online reference management system Mendeley. It comprises of 13 topic areas, spanning psychological, pedagogical, and methodological foundations, learning methods and technologies, and social and technological developments. The visualization was evaluated with (1) a qualitative comparison to knowledge domain visualizations based on citations, and (2) expert interviews. The results show that the co-readership visualization is a recent representation of pedagogical and psychological research in educational technology. Furthermore, the co-readership analysis covers more areas than comparable visualizations based on co-citation patterns. Areas related to computer science, however, are missing from the co-readership visualization and more research is needed to explore the interpretations of size and placement of research areas on the map.Comment: Forthcoming article in the International Journal of Technology Enhanced Learnin

Integrating institutional repositories into the Semantic Web

The Web has changed the face of scientific communication; and the Semantic Web promises new ways of adding value to research material by making it more accessible to automatic discovery, linking, and analysis. Institutional repositories contain a wealth of information which could benefit from the application of this technology. In this thesis I describe the problems inherent in the informality of traditional repository metadata, and propose a data model based on the Semantic Web which will support more efficient use of this data, with the aim of streamlining scientific communication and promoting efficient use of institutional research output

On the Turing completeness of the Semantic Web

The evidenced fact that “Linking is as powerful as computing” in a dynamic web context has lead to evaluating Turing completeness for hypertext systems based on their linking model. The same evaluation can be applied to the Semantic Web domain too. RDF is the default data model of the Semantic Web links, so the evaluation comes back to whether or not RDF can support the required computational power at the linking level. RDF represents semantic relationships with explicitly naming the participating triples, however the enumeration is only one method amongst many for representing relations, and not always the most efficient or viable. In this paper we firstly consider that Turing completeness of binary-linked hypertext is realized if and only if the links are dynamic (functional). Ashman’s Binary Relation Model (BRM) showed that binary relations can most usefully be represented with Mili’s pE (predicate-expression) representation, and Moreau and Hall concluded that hypertext systems which use the pE representation as the basis for their linking (relation) activities are Turing-complete. Secondly we consider that RDF –as it is- is a static version of a general ternary relations model, called TRM. We then conclude that the current computing power of the Semantic Web depends on the dynamicity supported by its underlying TRM. The value of this is firstly that RDF’s triples can be considered within a framework and compared to alternatives, such as the TRM version of pE, designated pfE (predicate-function-expression). Secondly, that a system whose relations are represented with pfE is likewise going to be Turing-complete. Thus moving from RDF to a pfE representation of relations would give far greater power and flexibility within the Semantic Web applications

Foraging for spatial information: Patterns of orientation learning using desktop virtual reality

The purpose of the study was to provide a description of how learners use desktop VR systems for orientation learning that instructional designers could use to improve the technology. The study used a mixed method, content analysis approach based on a theoretical framework that included principles of self-regulated learning (SRL) and orientation learning. Twelve participants used desktop virtual reality (VR) systems to explore the virtual surround of a residential space. A screen-recording program captured participants' navigation movements and think-aloud verbalizations. Participants' recorded think-aloud verbalizations were coded to identify the orientation learning and SRL events they used during the session. Analysis of the participant movement data revealed that eight of the participants generally moved in a single direction through the surround, whereas the remaining four moved in a direction and then reversed that direction. Movement patterns of some participants were found to be different at the beginning and end of their VR session, and some participants tended to navigate through certain areas of the surround more slowly than through other areas. Some participants tended to view the scene at a constant field of view level, whereas other varied the level. Additionally, some participants tended to view a particular area of the scene with narrower or wider fields of view, but others varied the field of view level across the scene. A model of orientation learning events was derived from content analysis of the think-aloud transcripts showing that participants engaged in four major types of learning categories: identifying, locating, regulating, and contextualizing. Participants were classified into four groups according to relative frequency distributions of the event categories. The study concluded that use of SRL events varied amongst the participants, and that the participant used a diverse set of movement and learning event patterns. Further conclusions noted that virtual scene objects possessed meaning for learners, and that thought verbalizations indicated that some of the learners attained a sense of presence in the VR environment. Finally, the study concluded that qualitative techniques such as thought verbalizations may provide a new paradigm for measuring presence in virtual environments