A toolkit of mechanism and context independent widgets

Most human-computer interfaces are designed to run on a static platform (e.g. a workstation with a monitor) in a static environment (e.g. an office). However, with mobile devices becoming ubiquitous and capable of running applications similar to those found on static devices, it is no longer valid to design static interfaces. This paper describes a user-interface architecture which allows interactors to be flexible about the way they are presented. This flexibility is defined by the different input and output mechanisms used. An interactor may use different mechanisms depending upon their suitability in the current context, user preference and the resources available for presentation using that mechanism

Saturable discrete vector solitons in one-dimensional photonic lattices

Localized vectorial modes, with equal frequencies and mutually orthogonal polarizations, are investigated both analytically and experimentally in a one-dimensional photonic lattice with saturable nonlinearity. It is shown that these modes may span over many lattice elements and that energy transfer among the two components is both phase and intensity dependent. The transverse electrically polarized mode exhibits a single-hump structure and spreads in cascades in saturation, while the transverse magnetically polarized mode exhibits splitting into a two-hump structure. Experimentally such discrete vector solitons are observed in lithium niobate lattices for both coherent and mutually incoherent excitations.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures (reduced for arXiv

On-line Context Aware Physical Activity Recognition from the Accelerometer and Audio Sensors of Smartphones

International audienceActivity Recognition (AR) from smartphone sensors has be-come a hot topic in the mobile computing domain since it can provide ser-vices directly to the user (health monitoring, fitness, context-awareness) as well as for third party applications and social network (performance sharing, profiling). Most of the research effort has been focused on direct recognition from accelerometer sensors and few studies have integrated the audio channel in their model despite the fact that it is a sensor that is always available on all kinds of smartphones. In this study, we show that audio features bring an important performance improvement over an accelerometer based approach. Moreover, the study demonstrates the interest of considering the smartphone location for on-line context-aware AR and the prediction power of audio features for this task. Finally, an-other contribution of the study is the collected corpus that is made avail-able to the community for AR recognition from audio and accelerometer sensors

Usability of Nomadic User Interfaces

Abstract. During the last decade, a number of research activities have been performed to enable user interfaces and the underlying user activities to be migrated from one device to another. We call this “Nomadic User Interfaces”. The primary goal of these research activities has been to develop the technologies to enable this. However, not much is known about the usability aspects of Nomadic User Interfaces. In this paper we present the results of three different user tests that we conducted to investigate the usefulness and the usability issues of several prototype Nomadic User Interface systems that we developed

A Hierarchical Framework for Collaborative Artificial Intelligence

We propose a hierarchical framework for collaborative intelligent systems. This framework organizes research challenges based on the nature of the collaborative activity and the information that must be shared, with each level building on capabilities provided by lower levels. We review research paradigms at each level, with a description of classical engineering-based approaches and modern alternatives based on machine learning, illustrated with a running example using a hypothetical personal service robot. We discuss cross-cutting issues that occur at all levels, focusing on the problem of communicating and sharing comprehension, the role of explanation and the social nature of collaboration. We conclude with a summary of research challenges and a discussion of the potential for economic and societal impact provided by technologies that enhance human abilities and empower people and society through collaboration with intelligent systems

Resilient distributed collection through information speed thresholds

Part 6: Large-Scale Decentralised SystemsInternational audienceOne of the key coordination problems in physically-deployed distributed systems, such as mobile robots, wireless sensor networks, and IoT systems in general, is to provide notions of “distributed sensing” achieved by the strict, continuous cooperation and interaction among individual devices. An archetypal operation of distributed sensing is data summarisation over a region of space, by which several higher-level problems can be addressed: counting items, measuring space, averaging environmental values, and so on. A typical coordination strategy to perform data summarisation in a peer-to-peer scenario, where devices can communicate only with a neighbourhood, is to progressively accumulate information towards one or more collector devices, though this typically exhibits problems of reactivity and fragility, especially in scenarios featuring high mobility. In this paper, we propose coordination strategies for data summarisation involving both idempotent and arithmetic aggregation operators, with the idea of controlling the minimum information propagation speed, so as to improve the reactivity to input changes. Given suitable assumptions on the network model, and under the restriction of no data loss, these algorithms achieve optimal reactivity. By empirical evaluation via simulation, accounting for various sources of volatility, and comparing to other existing implementations of data summarisation algorithms, we show that our algorithms are able to retain adequate accuracy even in high-variability scenarios where all other algorithms are significantly diverging from correct estimations

Redundant Notch1 and Notch2 Signaling Is Necessary for IFNγ Secretion by T Helper 1 Cells During Infection with Leishmania major

The protective immune response to intracellular parasites involves in most cases the differentiation of IFNγ-secreting CD4+ T helper (Th) 1 cells. Notch receptors regulate cell differentiation during development but their implication in the polarization of peripheral CD4+ T helper 1 cells is not well understood. Of the four Notch receptors, only Notch1 (N1) and Notch2 (N2) are expressed on activated CD4+ T cells. To investigate the role of Notch in Th1 cell differentiation following parasite infection, mice with T cell-specific gene ablation of N1, N2 or both (N1N2ΔCD4Cre) were infected with the protozoan parasite Leishmania major. N1N2ΔCD4Cre mice, on the C57BL/6 L. major-resistant genetic background, developed unhealing lesions and uncontrolled parasitemia. Susceptibility correlated with impaired secretion of IFNγ by draining lymph node CD4+ T cells and increased secretion of the IL-5 and IL-13 Th2 cytokines. Mice with single inactivation of N1 or N2 in their T cells were resistant to infection and developed a protective Th1 immune response, showing that CD4+ T cell expression of N1 or N2 is redundant in driving Th1 differentiation. Furthermore, we show that Notch signaling is required for the secretion of IFNγ by Th1 cells. This effect is independent of CSL/RBP-Jκ, the major effector of Notch receptors, since L. major-infected mice with a RBP-Jκ deletion in their T cells were able to develop IFNγ-secreting Th1 cells, kill parasites and heal their lesions. Collectively, we demonstrate here a crucial role for RBP-Jκ-independent Notch signaling in the differentiation of a functional Th1 immune response following L. major infection

Ontology-based end-user visual query formulation: Why, what, who, how, and which?

Value creation in an organisation is a time-sensitive and data-intensive process, yet it is often delayed and bounded by the reliance on IT experts extracting data for domain experts. Hence, there is a need for providing people who are not professional developers with the flexibility to pose relatively complex and ad hoc queries in an easy and intuitive way. In this respect, visual methods for query formulation undertake the challenge of making querying independent of users’ technical skills and the knowledge of the underlying textual query language and the structure of data. An ontology is more promising than the logical schema of the underlying data for guiding users in formulating queries, since it provides a richer vocabulary closer to the users’ understanding. However, on the one hand, today the most of world’s enterprise data reside in relational databases rather than triple stores, and on the other, visual query formulation has become more compelling due to ever-increasing data size and complexity—known as Big Data. This article presents and argues for ontology-based visual query formulation for end-users; discusses its feasibility in terms of ontology-based data access, which virtualises legacy relational databases as RDF, and the dimensions of Big Data; presents key conceptual aspects and dimensions, challenges, and requirements; and reviews, categorises, and discusses notable approaches and systems