Subband domain coding of binary textual images for document archiving

Cataloged from PDF version of article.In this work, a subband domain textual image compression method is developed. The document image is first decomposed into subimages using binary subband decompositions. Next, the character locations in the subbands and the symbol library consisting of the character images are encoded. The method is suitable for keyword search in the compressed data. It is observed that very high compression ratios are obtained with this method. Simulation studies are presented

Subband domain coding of binary textual images for document archiving

In this work, a subband domain textual image compression method is developed. The document image is first decomposed into subimages using binary subband decompositions. Next, the character locations in the subbands and the symbol library consisting of the character images are encoded. The method is suitable for keyword search in the compressed data. It is observed that very high compression ratios are obtained with this method. Simulation studies are presented

Subband coding of binary textual images for document retrieval

Efficient compression of binary textual images is very important for applications such as document archiving and retrieval, digital libraries and facsimile. The basic property of a textual image is the repetitions of small character images and curves inside the document. Exploiting the redundancy of these repetitions is the key step in most of the coding algorithms. In this paper, we use a similar compression method in subband domain. Four different subband decomposition schemes are described and their performances on textual image compression algorithm is examined. Experimentally, it is found that the described methods accomplish high compression ratios and they are suitable for fast database access and keyword search

Image coding for digitized libraries

Ankara : The Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering and the Institute of Engineering and Sciences of Bilkent Univ., 1998.Thesis (Ph.D.) -- Bilkent University, 1998.Includes bibliographical references leaves 104-113III this thesis, image coding methods for two basic image types are developed under a digitized library framework. The two image types are gray tone or color images, and binary textual images, which are the digitized image versions of text documents. The grciy tone images are encoded using an adaptive subband decomposition followed by zerotree quantizers. The adaptive sub- l)and decomposition filter bank adaptively updates the filter bank coefficients in which the values of one of the subbands is predicted from the other sub- band. It is observed that the adaptive subband decomposition performs better than a regulcir subband decomposition with a fixed filter bank in terms of compression. For the binary textual images, a compression algorithm using binary subband decomposition followed by a textual image compression (TIC) method that exploits the redundancy in repeating characters is developed. The binary subband decomposition yields binary sub-images, and the TIC method is applied to the low band sub-image. Obtaining binary sub-images improves compression results as well as pattern matching time of the TIC method. Simulation results for both adaptive subband decomposition and multiresolution TIC methods indicate improvements over the methods described in the literature.Gerek, Ömer NezihPh.D

Wavelet domain textual coding of Ottoman script images

Image coding using wavelet transform, DCT, and similar transform techniques is well established. On the other hand, these coding methods neither take into account the special characteristics of the images in a database nor are they suitable for fast database search. In this paper, the digital archiving of Ottoman printings is considered. Ottoman documents are printed in Arabic letters. Witten et al. describes a scheme based on finding the characters in binary document images and encoding the positions of the repeated characters This method efficiently compresses document images and is suitable for database research, but it cannot be applied to Ottoman or Arabic documents as the concept of character is different in Ottoman or Arabic. Typically, one has to deal with compound structures consisting of a group of letters. Therefore, the matching criterion will be according to those compound structures. Furthermore, the text images are gray tone or color images for Ottoman scripts for the reasons that are described in the paper. In our method the compound structure matching is carried out in wavelet domain which reduces the search space and increases the compression ratio. In addition to the wavelet transformation which corresponds to the linear subband decomposition, we also used nonlinear subband decomposition. The filters in the nonlinear subband decomposition have the property of preserving edges in the low resolution subband image

VHDL design and simulation for embedded zerotree wavelet quantisation

This thesis discusses a highly effective still image compression algorithm – The Embedded Zerotree Wavelets coding technique, as it is called. This technique is simple but achieves a remarkable result. The image is wavelet-transformed, symbolically coded and successive quantised, therefore the compression and transmission/storage saving can be achieved by utilising the structure of zerotree. The algorithm was first proposed by Jerome M. Shapiro in 1993, however to minimise the memory usage and speeding up the EZW processor, a Depth First Search method is used to transverse across the image rather than Breadth First Search method as initially discussed in Shapiro\u27s paper (Shapiro, 1993). The project\u27s primary objective is to simulate the EZW algorithm from a basic building block of 8 by 8 matrix to a well-known reference image such Lenna of 256 by 256 matrix. Hence the algorithm performance can be measured, for instance its peak signal to noise ratio can be calculated. The software environment used for the simulation is a Very-High Speed Integrated Circuits - Hardware Description Language such Peak VHDL, PC based version. This will lead to the second phase of the project. The secondary objective is to test the algorithm at a hardware level, such FPGA for a rapid prototype implementation only if the project time permits

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

Design of a secure architecture for the exchange of biomedical information in m-Health scenarios

El paradigma de m-Salud (salud móvil) aboga por la integración masiva de las más avanzadas tecnologías de comunicación, red móvil y sensores en aplicaciones y sistemas de salud, para fomentar el despliegue de un nuevo modelo de atención clínica centrada en el usuario/paciente. Este modelo tiene por objetivos el empoderamiento de los usuarios en la gestión de su propia salud (p.ej. aumentando sus conocimientos, promocionando estilos de vida saludable y previniendo enfermedades), la prestación de una mejor tele-asistencia sanitaria en el hogar para ancianos y pacientes crónicos y una notable disminución del gasto de los Sistemas de Salud gracias a la reducción del número y la duración de las hospitalizaciones. No obstante, estas ventajas, atribuidas a las aplicaciones de m-Salud, suelen venir acompañadas del requisito de un alto grado de disponibilidad de la información biomédica de sus usuarios para garantizar una alta calidad de servicio, p.ej. fusionar varias señales de un usuario para obtener un diagnóstico más preciso. La consecuencia negativa de cumplir esta demanda es el aumento directo de las superficies potencialmente vulnerables a ataques, lo que sitúa a la seguridad (y a la privacidad) del modelo de m-Salud como factor crítico para su éxito. Como requisito no funcional de las aplicaciones de m-Salud, la seguridad ha recibido menos atención que otros requisitos técnicos que eran más urgentes en etapas de desarrollo previas, tales como la robustez, la eficiencia, la interoperabilidad o la usabilidad. Otro factor importante que ha contribuido a retrasar la implementación de políticas de seguridad sólidas es que garantizar un determinado nivel de seguridad implica unos costes que pueden ser muy relevantes en varias dimensiones, en especial en la económica (p.ej. sobrecostes por la inclusión de hardware extra para la autenticación de usuarios), en el rendimiento (p.ej. reducción de la eficiencia y de la interoperabilidad debido a la integración de elementos de seguridad) y en la usabilidad (p.ej. configuración más complicada de dispositivos y aplicaciones de salud debido a las nuevas opciones de seguridad). Por tanto, las soluciones de seguridad que persigan satisfacer a todos los actores del contexto de m-Salud (usuarios, pacientes, personal médico, personal técnico, legisladores, fabricantes de dispositivos y equipos, etc.) deben ser robustas y al mismo tiempo minimizar sus costes asociados. Esta Tesis detalla una propuesta de seguridad, compuesta por cuatro grandes bloques interconectados, para dotar de seguridad a las arquitecturas de m-Salud con unos costes reducidos. El primer bloque define un esquema global que proporciona unos niveles de seguridad e interoperabilidad acordes con las características de las distintas aplicaciones de m-Salud. Este esquema está compuesto por tres capas diferenciadas, diseñadas a la medidas de los dominios de m-Salud y de sus restricciones, incluyendo medidas de seguridad adecuadas para la defensa contra las amenazas asociadas a sus aplicaciones de m-Salud. El segundo bloque establece la extensión de seguridad de aquellos protocolos estándar que permiten la adquisición, el intercambio y/o la administración de información biomédica -- por tanto, usados por muchas aplicaciones de m-Salud -- pero no reúnen los niveles de seguridad detallados en el esquema previo. Estas extensiones se concretan para los estándares biomédicos ISO/IEEE 11073 PHD y SCP-ECG. El tercer bloque propone nuevas formas de fortalecer la seguridad de los tests biomédicos, que constituyen el elemento esencial de muchas aplicaciones de m-Salud de carácter clínico, mediante codificaciones novedosas. Finalmente el cuarto bloque, que se sitúa en paralelo a los anteriores, selecciona herramientas genéricas de seguridad (elementos de autenticación y criptográficos) cuya integración en los otros bloques resulta idónea, y desarrolla nuevas herramientas de seguridad, basadas en señal -- embedding y keytagging --, para reforzar la protección de los test biomédicos.The paradigm of m-Health (mobile health) advocates for the massive integration of advanced mobile communications, network and sensor technologies in healthcare applications and systems to foster the deployment of a new, user/patient-centered healthcare model enabling the empowerment of users in the management of their health (e.g. by increasing their health literacy, promoting healthy lifestyles and the prevention of diseases), a better home-based healthcare delivery for elderly and chronic patients and important savings for healthcare systems due to the reduction of hospitalizations in number and duration. It is a fact that many m-Health applications demand high availability of biomedical information from their users (for further accurate analysis, e.g. by fusion of various signals) to guarantee high quality of service, which on the other hand entails increasing the potential surfaces for attacks. Therefore, it is not surprising that security (and privacy) is commonly included among the most important barriers for the success of m-Health. As a non-functional requirement for m-Health applications, security has received less attention than other technical issues that were more pressing at earlier development stages, such as reliability, eficiency, interoperability or usability. Another fact that has contributed to delaying the enforcement of robust security policies is that guaranteeing a certain security level implies costs that can be very relevant and that span along diferent dimensions. These include budgeting (e.g. the demand of extra hardware for user authentication), performance (e.g. lower eficiency and interoperability due to the addition of security elements) and usability (e.g. cumbersome configuration of devices and applications due to security options). Therefore, security solutions that aim to satisfy all the stakeholders in the m-Health context (users/patients, medical staff, technical staff, systems and devices manufacturers, regulators, etc.) shall be robust and, at the same time, minimize their associated costs. This Thesis details a proposal, composed of four interrelated blocks, to integrate appropriate levels of security in m-Health architectures in a cost-efcient manner. The first block designes a global scheme that provides different security and interoperability levels accordingto how critical are the m-Health applications to be implemented. This consists ofthree layers tailored to the m-Health domains and their constraints, whose security countermeasures defend against the threats of their associated m-Health applications. Next, the second block addresses the security extension of those standard protocols that enable the acquisition, exchange and/or management of biomedical information | thus, used by many m-Health applications | but do not meet the security levels described in the former scheme. These extensions are materialized for the biomedical standards ISO/IEEE 11073 PHD and SCP-ECG. Then, the third block proposes new ways of enhancing the security of biomedical standards, which are the centerpiece of many clinical m-Health applications, by means of novel codings. Finally the fourth block, with is parallel to the others, selects generic security methods (for user authentication and cryptographic protection) whose integration in the other blocks results optimal, and also develops novel signal-based methods (embedding and keytagging) for strengthening the security of biomedical tests. The layer-based extensions of the standards ISO/IEEE 11073 PHD and SCP-ECG can be considered as robust, cost-eficient and respectful with their original features and contents. The former adds no attributes to its data information model, four new frames to the service model |and extends four with new sub-frames|, and only one new sub-state to the communication model. Furthermore, a lightweight architecture consisting of a personal health device mounting a 9 MHz processor and an aggregator mounting a 1 GHz processor is enough to transmit a 3-lead electrocardiogram in real-time implementing the top security layer. The extra requirements associated to this extension are an initial configuration of the health device and the aggregator, tokens for identification/authentication of users if these devices are to be shared and the implementation of certain IHE profiles in the aggregator to enable the integration of measurements in healthcare systems. As regards to the extension of SCP-ECG, it only adds a new section with selected security elements and syntax in order to protect the rest of file contents and provide proper role-based access control. The overhead introduced in the protected SCP-ECG is typically 2{13 % of the regular file size, and the extra delays to protect a newly generated SCP-ECG file and to access it for interpretation are respectively a 2{10 % and a 5 % of the regular delays. As regards to the signal-based security techniques developed, the embedding method is the basis for the proposal of a generic coding for tests composed of biomedical signals, periodic measurements and contextual information. This has been adjusted and evaluated with electrocardiogram and electroencephalogram-based tests, proving the objective clinical quality of the coded tests, the capacity of the coding-access system to operate in real-time (overall delays of 2 s for electrocardiograms and 3.3 s for electroencephalograms) and its high usability. Despite of the embedding of security and metadata to enable m-Health services, the compression ratios obtained by this coding range from ' 3 in real-time transmission to ' 5 in offline operation. Complementarily, keytagging permits associating information to images (and other signals) by means of keys in a secure and non-distorting fashion, which has been availed to implement security measures such as image authentication, integrity control and location of tampered areas, private captioning with role-based access control, traceability and copyright protection. The tests conducted indicate a remarkable robustness-capacity tradeoff that permits implementing all this measures simultaneously, and the compatibility of keytagging with JPEG2000 compression, maintaining this tradeoff while setting the overall keytagging delay in only ' 120 ms for any image size | evidencing the scalability of this technique. As a general conclusion, it has been demonstrated and illustrated with examples that there are various, complementary and structured manners to contribute in the implementation of suitable security levels for m-Health architectures with a moderate cost in budget, performance, interoperability and usability. The m-Health landscape is evolving permanently along all their dimensions, and this Thesis aims to do so with its security. Furthermore, the lessons learned herein may offer further guidance for the elaboration of more comprehensive and updated security schemes, for the extension of other biomedical standards featuring low emphasis on security or privacy, and for the improvement of the state of the art regarding signal-based protection methods and applications

Computer vision based unistroke keyboard system and mouse for the handicapped

In this paper, a unistroke keyboard based on computer vision is described for the handicapped. The keyboard can be made of paper or fabric containing an image of a keyboard, which has an upside down U-shape. It can even be displayed on a computer screen. Each character is represented by a non-overlapping rectangular region on the keyboard image and the user enters a character by illuminating a character region with a laser pointer. The keyboard image is monitored by a camera and illuminated key locations are recognized. During the text entry process the user neither have to turn the laser light off nor raise the laser light from the keyboard. A disabled person who has difficulty using his/her hands may attach the laser pointer to an eyeglass and easily enter text by moving his/her head to point the laser beam on a character location. In addition, a mouse-like device can be developed based on the same principle. The user can move the cursor by moving the laser light on the computer screen which is monitored by a camera. © 2003 IEEE