910 research outputs found
Extending the 5S Framework of Digital Libraries to support Complex Objects, Superimposed Information, and Content-Based Image Retrieval Services
Advanced services in digital libraries (DLs) have been developed and widely used to address the required capabilities of an assortment of systems as DLs expand into diverse application domains. These systems may require support for images (e.g., Content-Based Image Retrieval), Complex (information) Objects, and use of content at fine grain (e.g., Superimposed Information). Due to the lack of consensus on precise theoretical definitions for those services, implementation efforts often involve ad hoc development, leading to duplication and interoperability problems. This article presents a methodology to address those problems by extending a precisely specified minimal digital library (in the 5S framework) with formal definitions of aforementioned services. The theoretical extensions of digital library functionality presented here are reinforced with practical case studies as well as scenarios for the individual and integrative use of services to balance theory and practice. This methodology has implications that other advanced
services can be continuously integrated into our current extended framework whenever they are identified. The theoretical definitions and case study we present may impact future development efforts and a wide range of digital library researchers, designers, and developers
Search Interoperability, OAI, and Metadata: Handout for METRO Workshop
Handout for the workshop on the OAI Protocol for Metadata Harvesting given for METRO on December 8, 2006
Augmenting applications with hyper media, functionality and meta-information
The Dynamic Hypermedia Engine (DHE) enhances analytical applications by adding relationships, semantics and other metadata to the application\u27s output and user interface. DHE also provides additional hypermedia navigational, structural and annotation functionality. These features allow application developers and users to add guided tours, personal links and sharable annotations, among other features, into applications. DHE runs as a middleware between the application user interface and its business logic and processes, in a n-tier architecture, supporting the extra functionalities without altering the original systems by means of application wrappers.
DHE automatically generates links at run-time for each of those elements having relationships and metadata. Such elements are previously identified using a Relation Navigation Analysis. DHE also constructs more sophisticated navigation techniques not often found on the Web on top of these links. The metadata, links, navigation and annotation features supplement the application\u27s primary functionality.
This research identifies element types, or classes , in the application displays. A mapping rule encodes each relationship found between two elements of interest at the class level . When the user selects a particular element, DHE instantiates the commands included in the rules with the actual instance selected and sends them to the appropriate destination system, which then dynamically generates the resulting virtual (i.e. not previously stored) page. DHE executes concurrently with these applications, providing automated link generation and other hypermedia functionality. DHE uses the extensible Markup Language (XMQ -and related World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) sets of XML recommendations, like Xlink, XML Schema, and RDF -to encode the semantic information required for the operation of the extra hypermedia features, and for the transmission of messages between the engine modules and applications.
DHE is the only approach we know that provides automated linking and metadata services in a generic manner, based on the application semantics, without altering the applications. DHE will also work with non-Web systems.
The results of this work could also be extended to other research areas, such as link ranking and filtering, automatic link generation as the result of a search query, metadata collection and support, virtual document management, hypermedia functionality on the Web, adaptive and collaborative hypermedia, web engineering, and the semantic Web
Content delivery and challenges in education hybrid students
Traditionally, taught postgraduate programmes placed students in well-defined categories such as 'distance learning' and 'on-campus' or 'part-time' and 'full-time'. The practical reality is that postgraduate students rarely fall into such simple, diametric roles and can be more suitably generalised under the concept of the 'hybrid student'. Hybrid students are dynamic, with changing
requirements in relation to their education. They expect flexibility and the ability to make changes relating to module participation level, study mechanism and lecture attendance, in order to suit personal preference and circumstance. This paper briefly introduces the concept of the hybrid student and how the concept has been handled within the School of Electronic Engineering at DCU.
Following this, some discussion is provided in relation to a number of the content delivery technologies used in programmes facilitating these students: HTML, PowerPoint, Moodle, DocBook and Wiki. Finally, some of the general challenges, which have been encountered in supporting such
diverse students, are briefly discussed
ImageJ2: ImageJ for the next generation of scientific image data
ImageJ is an image analysis program extensively used in the biological
sciences and beyond. Due to its ease of use, recordable macro language, and
extensible plug-in architecture, ImageJ enjoys contributions from
non-programmers, amateur programmers, and professional developers alike.
Enabling such a diversity of contributors has resulted in a large community
that spans the biological and physical sciences. However, a rapidly growing
user base, diverging plugin suites, and technical limitations have revealed a
clear need for a concerted software engineering effort to support emerging
imaging paradigms, to ensure the software's ability to handle the requirements
of modern science. Due to these new and emerging challenges in scientific
imaging, ImageJ is at a critical development crossroads.
We present ImageJ2, a total redesign of ImageJ offering a host of new
functionality. It separates concerns, fully decoupling the data model from the
user interface. It emphasizes integration with external applications to
maximize interoperability. Its robust new plugin framework allows everything
from image formats, to scripting languages, to visualization to be extended by
the community. The redesigned data model supports arbitrarily large,
N-dimensional datasets, which are increasingly common in modern image
acquisition. Despite the scope of these changes, backwards compatibility is
maintained such that this new functionality can be seamlessly integrated with
the classic ImageJ interface, allowing users and developers to migrate to these
new methods at their own pace. ImageJ2 provides a framework engineered for
flexibility, intended to support these requirements as well as accommodate
future needs
Referencing Sources of Molecular Spectroscopic Data in the Era of Data Science: Application to the HITRAN and AMBDAS Databases
The application described has been designed to create bibliographic entries
in large databases with diverse sources automatically, which reduces both the
frequency of mistakes and the workload for the administrators. This new system
uniquely identifies each reference from its digital object identifier (DOI) and
retrieves the corresponding bibliographic information from any of several
online services, including the SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data Systems (ADS) and
CrossRef APIs. Once parsed into a relational database, the software is able to
produce bibliographies in any of several formats, including HTML and BibTeX,
for use on websites or printed articles. The application is provided
free-of-charge for general use by any scientific database. The power of this
application is demonstrated when used to populate reference data for the HITRAN
and AMBDAS databases as test cases. HITRAN contains data that is provided by
researchers and collaborators throughout the spectroscopic community. These
contributors are accredited for their contributions through the bibliography
produced alongside the data returned by an online search in HITRAN. Prior to
the work presented here, HITRAN and AMBDAS created these bibliographies
manually, which is a tedious, time-consuming and error-prone process. The
complete code for the new referencing system can be found at
\url{https://github.com/hitranonline/refs}.Comment: 11 pages, 5 figures, already published online at
https://doi.org/10.3390/atoms802001
Standardizing data exchange for clinical research protocols and case report forms: An assessment of the suitability of the Clinical Data Interchange Standards Consortium (CDISC) Operational Data Model (ODM)
AbstractEfficient communication of a clinical study protocol and case report forms during all stages of a human clinical study is important for many stakeholders. An electronic and structured study representation format that can be used throughout the whole study life-span can improve such communication and potentially lower total study costs. The most relevant standard for representing clinical study data, applicable to unregulated as well as regulated studies, is the Operational Data Model (ODM) in development since 1999 by the Clinical Data Interchange Standards Consortium (CDISC). ODMâs initial objective was exchange of case report forms data but it is increasingly utilized in other contexts. An ODM extension called Study Design Model, introduced in 2011, provides additional protocol representation elements.Using a case study approach, we evaluated ODMâs ability to capture all necessary protocol elements during a complete clinical study lifecycle in the Intramural Research Program of the National Institutes of Health. ODM offers the advantage of a single format for institutions that deal with hundreds or thousands of concurrent clinical studies and maintain a data warehouse for these studies. For each study stage, we present a list of gaps in the ODM standard and identify necessary vendor or institutional extensions that can compensate for such gaps. The current version of ODM (1.3.2) has only partial support for study protocol and study registration data mainly because it is outside the original development goal. ODM provides comprehensive support for representation of case report forms (in both the design stage and with patient level data). Inclusion of requirements of observational, non-regulated or investigator-initiated studies (outside Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulation) can further improve future revisions of the standard
Just-in-time hypermedia
Many analytical applications, especially legacy systems, create documents and display screens in response to user queries dynamically or in real time . These documents and displays do not exist in advance, and thus hypermedia must be generated \u27just in time -automatically and dynamically.
This dissertation details the idea of \u27just-in-time hypermedia and discusses challenges encountered in this research area. A fully detailed literature review about the research issues and related research work is given. A framework for the \u27just-in-time hypermedia compares virtual documents with static documents, as well as dynamic with static hypermedia functionality. Conceptual \u27just-in-time hypermedia architecture is proposed in terms of requirements and logical components. The \u27just-in-time hypermedia engine is described in terms of architecture, functional components, information flow, and implementation details. Then test results are described and evaluated. Lastly, contributions, limitations, and future work are discussed
Web Accessibility: A Tutorial for University Faculty
Web accessibility is the practice of making Web sites accessible to people, such as the disabled, to access the Internet. Approximately 40 million Americans have some form of disability, and slightly less than 2.5 million are enrolled in postsecondary institutions. Since the instructional role of the Internet has become a central part of both conventional classroom instruction and distance education, it is imperative that instructional Web sites be designed for accessibility. The purpose of this article is to introduce Web accessibility issues to university faculty. The tutorial contains two main sections. In the first, we review the literature on the magnitude of the problem, empirical studies, and the legal mandates surrounding Web accessibility. In the second section, we discuss the standards related to Web accessibility, and the authoring and evaluation tools available for designing accessible Web sites
From Artifacts to Aggregations: Modeling Scientific Life Cycles on the Semantic Web
In the process of scientific research, many information objects are
generated, all of which may remain valuable indefinitely. However, artifacts
such as instrument data and associated calibration information may have little
value in isolation; their meaning is derived from their relationships to each
other. Individual artifacts are best represented as components of a life cycle
that is specific to a scientific research domain or project. Current cataloging
practices do not describe objects at a sufficient level of granularity nor do
they offer the globally persistent identifiers necessary to discover and manage
scholarly products with World Wide Web standards. The Open Archives
Initiative's Object Reuse and Exchange data model (OAI-ORE) meets these
requirements. We demonstrate a conceptual implementation of OAI-ORE to
represent the scientific life cycles of embedded networked sensor applications
in seismology and environmental sciences. By establishing relationships between
publications, data, and contextual research information, we illustrate how to
obtain a richer and more realistic view of scientific practices. That view can
facilitate new forms of scientific research and learning. Our analysis is
framed by studies of scientific practices in a large, multi-disciplinary,
multi-university science and engineering research center, the Center for
Embedded Networked Sensing (CENS).Comment: 28 pages. To appear in the Journal of the American Society for
Information Science and Technology (JASIST
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