Conversation and critique within the architectural design process: a linkograph analysis

Conversation and critique are central to architectural design practice as they function as tools for probing and further improving design ideas. We study the kind of design activities that take place in such conversation and critique within the architectural design process. We use linkographs to characterise the design process taking place during conversation. More precisely, we study conversations between design teachers and design students. In this article, an example design process is considered that takes place via a traditional face-to-face meeting. Using the resulting linkograph, we are able to assess the kind of design activity taking place during such sessions of conversation and critique

Segmenting Publics

This research synthesis was commissioned by the National Co-ordinating Centre for Public Engagement (NCCPE) and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) to examine audience segmentation methods and tools in the area of public engagement. It provides resources for assessing the ways in which segmentation tools might be used to enhance the various activities through which models of public engagement in higher education are implemented. Understanding the opinions, values, and motivations of members of the public is a crucial feature of successful engagement. Segmentation methods can offer potential resources to help understand the complex set of interests and attitudes that the public have towards higher education. Key findings: There exist a number of existing segmentations which address many of the areas of activity found in Universities and HEIs. These include segmentations which inform strategic planning of communications; segmentations which inform the design of collaborative engagement activities by museums, galleries, and libraries; and segmentations that are used to identify under-represented users and consumers. Segmentation is, on its own, only a tool, used in different ways in different contexts. The broader strategic rationale shaping the application and design of segmentation methods is a crucial factor in determining the utility of segmentation tools. Four issues emerged of particular importance: 1. Segmentation exercises are costly and technically complex. Undertaking segmentations therefore requires significant commitment of financial and professional resources by HEIs; the appropriate interpretation, analysis, and application of segmentation exercises also require high levels of professional capacity and expertise 2. Undertaking a segmentation exercise has implications for the internal organisational operations of HEIs, not only for how they engage with external publics and stakeholders 3. Segmentation tools are adopted to inform interventions of various sorts, and superficially to differentiate and sometime discriminate between how groups of people are addressed and engaged. 4. For HEIs, the ethical issues and reputational risks which have been identified in this Research Synthesis as endemic to the application of segmentation methods for public purposes are particularly relevant

A smart vision sensor for detecting risk factors of a toddler's fall in a home environment

This paper presents a smart vision sensor for detecting risk factors of a toddler's fall in an indoor home environment assisting parents' supervision to prevent fall injuries. We identified the risk factors by analyzing real fall injury stories and referring to a related organization's suggestions to prevent falls. In order to detect the risk factors using computer vision, two major image processing methods, clutter detection and toddler tracking, were studied with using only one commercial web-camera. For practical purposes, there is no need for a toddler to wear any sensors or markers. The algorithms for detection have been developed, implemented and tested

A survey of comics research in computer science

Graphical novels such as comics and mangas are well known all over the world. The digital transition started to change the way people are reading comics, more and more on smartphones and tablets and less and less on paper. In the recent years, a wide variety of research about comics has been proposed and might change the way comics are created, distributed and read in future years. Early work focuses on low level document image analysis: indeed comic books are complex, they contains text, drawings, balloon, panels, onomatopoeia, etc. Different fields of computer science covered research about user interaction and content generation such as multimedia, artificial intelligence, human-computer interaction, etc. with different sets of values. We propose in this paper to review the previous research about comics in computer science, to state what have been done and to give some insights about the main outlooks

User-Generated Tagging and Segmentation of Video Records of Practice: A Tool for Meaning-Marking.

The field of teacher education is consciously shifting its focus to be more “practice-oriented” and increasingly using video as a way of examining teaching practice. However, questions remain about how educators make sense of video and what types of tools and supports are needed. This exploratory study examines the potential of user-generated segmenting and tagging of videos of teaching practice as a tool for marking what educators find salient about teaching and the language they use to describe those phenomena. Data was collected in a teacher education program where video was used extensively for the purposes of learning about and improving teaching practice. There were two participant groups: pre-service teachers (n=6) and teacher educators/educational researchers (n=8). Each participant watched the same 8-minute video of practice and applied segments and tags to the video. The data included segments and tags created by each participant, interviews, and questionnaires; themes in the data were uncovered using content analysis. Interview data was used to interpret participants’ meaning in order to accurately categorize the tags. Using tag gardening strategies, hierarchal and networked tagging language was visualized. Findings indicate that user-generated segment and tag data of video records of practice can provide insight into what participants pay attention to and the language they use to describe that meaning making. This study uncovered three tensions that influenced participants’ segmenting and tagging behavior: findability versus nuance, concerns with being critical, and the need for a social context and community of practice. Educators’ specific and unique needs, purposes, and culture directly affected what participants marked as salient and what tagging language they used, resulting in some misleading segment and tag data. This work provides insights into the design of segmenting and tagging video tools and online communities of practice that support educators’ use of video. This research is particularly relevant to teacher education professionals and designers of tools that support educators’ use of video records of practice, laying the groundwork for further research on using and designing video annotation tools that support the work of teaching and aggregate data about how educators are making sense of videos of teaching.PHDEducational StudiesUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/116765/1/jrsteine_1.pd