CHORUS Deliverable 2.2: Second report - identification of multi-disciplinary key issues for gap analysis toward EU multimedia search engines roadmap

After addressing the state-of-the-art during the first year of Chorus and establishing the existing landscape in multimedia search engines, we have identified and analyzed gaps within European research effort during our second year. In this period we focused on three directions, notably technological issues, user-centred issues and use-cases and socio- economic and legal aspects. These were assessed by two central studies: firstly, a concerted vision of functional breakdown of generic multimedia search engine, and secondly, a representative use-cases descriptions with the related discussion on requirement for technological challenges. Both studies have been carried out in cooperation and consultation with the community at large through EC concertation meetings (multimedia search engines cluster), several meetings with our Think-Tank, presentations in international conferences, and surveys addressed to EU projects coordinators as well as National initiatives coordinators. Based on the obtained feedback we identified two types of gaps, namely core technological gaps that involve research challenges, and “enablers”, which are not necessarily technical research challenges, but have impact on innovation progress. New socio-economic trends are presented as well as emerging legal challenges

User-activity aware strategies for mobile information access

Information access suffers tremendously in wireless networks because of the low correlation between content transferred across low-bandwidth wireless links and actual data used to serve user requests. As a result, conventional content access mechanisms face such problems as unnecessary bandwidth consumption and large response times, and users experience significant performance degradation. In this dissertation, we analyze the cause of those problems and find that the major reason for inefficient information access in wireless networks is the absence of any user-activity awareness in current mechanisms. To solve these problems, we propose three user-activity aware strategies for mobile information access. Through simulations and implementations, we show that our strategies can outperform conventional information access schemes in terms of bandwidth consumption and user-perceived response times.Ph.D.Committee Chair: Raghupathy Sivakumar; Committee Member: Chuanyi Ji; Committee Member: George Riley; Committee Member: Magnus Egerstedt; Committee Member: Umakishore Ramachandra

MACE – Enriching Architectural Learning Objects for Experience Multiplication.

Stefaner, M., Dalla Vecchia, E., Condotta, M., Wolpers, M., Specht, M., Apelt, M., Duval, E. (2007) MACE – Enriching Architectural Learning Objects for Experience Multiplication. In: Duval, E., Klamma, R., & Wolpers, M. (eds.) EC-TEL 2007. LNCS 4753; Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; pp. 322-336.Education in architecture requires access to a broad range of architectural learning material to develop flexibility and creativity in design. The learning material is compromised of digital information captured in textual and visual media including single images, videos, description of architectural concepts or complete architectural projects, i.e. digital artifacts on different aggregation levels. The repositories storing such information are not interrelated and do not provide unified access so that retrieval of architectural learning objects is cumbersome and time consuming. In this paper, we describe how an infrastructure of federated architectural learning repositories will provide unique, integrated access facilities for high quality architectural content. The integration of various types of content, usage, social and contextual metadata enables users to develop multiple perspectives and navigation paths that support experience multiplication for the user. A service– oriented software architecture that is based on open standards, and a flexible user interface design solutions based on widgets ensure easy integration and re- combinability of contents, metadata and functionalities

Hybrid features-based prediction for novel phish websites

Phishers frequently craft novel deceptions on their websites and circumvent existing anti-phishing techniques for insecure intrusions, users’ digital identity theft, and then illegal profits. This raises the needs to incorporate new features for detecting novel phish websites and optimizing the existing anti-phishing techniques. In this light, 58 new hybrid features were proposed in this paper and their prediction susceptibilities were evaluated by using feature co-occurrence criterion and a baseline machine learning algorithm. Empirical test and analysis showed the significant outcomes of the proposed features on detection performance. As a result, the most influential features are identified, and new insights are offered for further detection improvement

Digital Image Access & Retrieval

The 33th Annual Clinic on Library Applications of Data Processing, held at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in March of 1996, addressed the theme of "Digital Image Access & Retrieval." The papers from this conference cover a wide range of topics concerning digital imaging technology for visual resource collections. Papers covered three general areas: (1) systems, planning, and implementation; (2) automatic and semi-automatic indexing; and (3) preservation with the bulk of the conference focusing on indexing and retrieval.published or submitted for publicatio

Exploring Campus through Web-Based Immersive Adventures Using Virtual Reality Photography: A Low-Cost Virtual Tour Experience

This study aims to assess the incorporation of virtual reality (VR) photography into the web-based immersive application “virtual interactive campus tour (VICT).” This application offers users an immersive experience, allowing them to virtually explore university campuses and access information about the facilities and services available. The VICT application offers a cost-effective, attractive, and sustainable alternative for universities to display their resources and interact with potential students. Through black box testing, we conducted user acceptance testing (UAT) and functionality testing, confirming the application’s readiness for deployment and its capability to meet institutional and end-user requirements. This study also examined the potential for universities to use VR to meet the expectations of prospective students. The application is compatible with both desktop and mobile devices. The results indicated that the overall average validity score was 0.88, suggesting that the measure is valid. The validation results were thoroughly tested and reliable. This study emphasizes the potential of immersive web-based tours in higher education and aims to bridge the divide between virtual exploration and physical visits. By offering an immersive virtual campus experience, this innovative tool has the potential to revolutionize university marketing strategies, increase student engagement, and transform campus visit approaches

CHORUS Deliverable 2.1: State of the Art on Multimedia Search Engines

Based on the information provided by European projects and national initiatives related to multimedia search as well as domains experts that participated in the CHORUS Think-thanks and workshops, this document reports on the state of the art related to multimedia content search from, a technical, and socio-economic perspective. The technical perspective includes an up to date view on content based indexing and retrieval technologies, multimedia search in the context of mobile devices and peer-to-peer networks, and an overview of current evaluation and benchmark inititiatives to measure the performance of multimedia search engines. From a socio-economic perspective we inventorize the impact and legal consequences of these technical advances and point out future directions of research