Hardwood Flooring Yields from Appalachian Red Oak Lumber

The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of the size and grade of red oak lumber on the quantity and quality of hardwood flooring yield. The data were to provide information which may be used by flooring producers in determining the optimum input lumber mix under varying market conditions. Three grades of kiln-dried red oak lumber, 1, 2, and 3A common, were selected for study. Each of the three grades were subdivided into four size classes based on lumber width and length. The size classes consisted of lumber less than eight inches wide and less than eight feet long, greater than eight inches wide and less than eight feet long, less than eight inches wide and greater than eight feet long, and greater than eight inches wide and greater than eight feet long. The lumber was converted to 25/32 x 2 1/4 inch strip flooring and graded into 2 common, 1 common, select, or clear flooring grades. Analysis of the data showed that lumber grade had a significant effect on both percent yield and the grade distribution of flooring. One common lumber had an overall yield of 75.5 percent followed by 2C and 3AC with yields of 68.5 and 62.7 percent, respectively. With respect to flooring grade distribution, the majority of flooring from 1C lumber was in the clear and select flooring grades, while the majority of flooring from 3AC lumber was concentrated in the 2C and 1C flooring grades. Percent yield of flooring varied considerably with board width. Wide lumber had an average yield of 75.2 percent, while narrow lumber had an average yield of only 62.6 percent. Lumber length had little effect on flooring yield. Simulation methods were employed to show the amount of waste in the manufacture of flooring could possibly be reduced from 31.11 to 27.80 percent by converting two inch strips of waste lumber into 25/32 x 1 1/2 inch flooring. Recommendation for further study dealing with several aspects of hardwood flooring production were suggested

Capturing cultural differences between UK and Malaysian drivers to inform the design of in-vehicle navigation systems

Attending to cultural diversity is important for products and technology intended for global placement, such as automobiles, yet many products (and associated interfaces) lack genuine cultural differentiation. For example, in-vehicle navigation systems are typically identical in form and function across world markets, differing only in the local language and map database. To capture and explore culturally-salient design factors, we utilised a scenario-based design methodology, involving 6 experienced drivers from the UK and Malaysia. Participants were asked to portray their ideal navigation system interface designs – by drawing pictograms and devising accompanying spoken messages – to direct drivers along 3 prescribed routes in the UK, Malaysia and Japan. Routes were presented using video and paper maps, with the order of presentation counterbalanced between groups; participants were not told in advance from which country each route was derived. Proposed designs highlight differences at a country level, which are consequently interpreted from a cultural perspective. For example, Malaysian drivers included a higher density of navigational elements in their designs, particularly in their home environment, compared to UK drivers. Malaysian drivers also created more incremental designs, particularly on the approach to a manoeuvre, suggesting a desire for greater navigational support at this point in the journey. Landmarks were consistently incorporated in designs, but differences were noted in cultural salience. Additionally, the phrasing of instructions (e.g. “go straight on”), nomenclature for road elements (e.g. ‘roundabout’) and distance declaration conventions (e.g. units) differed at a country level. The findings can be used to inform the design of culturally-attuned in-vehicle navigation systems

SUMSS: A Wide-Field Radio Imaging Survey of the Southern Sky. I. Science goals, survey design and instrumentation

The Molonglo Observatory Synthesis Telescope, operating at 843 MHz with a 5 square degree field of view, is carrying out a radio imaging survey of the sky south of declination -30 deg. This survey (the Sydney University Molonglo Sky Survey, or SUMSS) produces images with a resolution of 43" x 43" cosec(Dec.) and an rms noise level of about 1 mJy/beam. SUMSS is therefore similar in sensitivity and resolution to the northern NRAO VLA Sky Survey (NVSS; Condon et al. 1998). The survey is progressing at a rate of about 1000 square degrees per year, yielding individual and statistical data for many thousands of weak radio sources. This paper describes the main characteristics of the survey, and presents sample images from the first year of observation.Comment: 27 pages, 12 figures (figures 2, 8, 10 in jpg format); AJ, in pres

Driven to discussion: engaging drivers in conversation with a digital assistant as a countermeasure to passive task-related fatigue

Using a Wizard-of-Oz approach, we explored the effectiveness of engaging drivers in conversation with a digital assistant as an operational strategy to combat the symptoms of passive task-related fatigue. Twenty participants undertook two 30-minute drives in a medium-fidelity driving simulator between 13:00 and 16:30, when circadian and homeostatic influences naturally reduce alertness. Participants were asked to follow a lead-car travelling at a constant speed of 68mph, in a sparsely-populated UK motorway scenario. During one of the counterbalanced drives, participants were engaged in conversation by a digital assistant (‘Vid’). Results show that interacting with Vid had a positive effect on driving performance and arousal, evidenced by better lane-keeping, earlier response to a potential hazard situation, larger pupil diameter, and an increased spread of attention to the road-scene (i.e. fewer fixations concentrated on the road-centre indicating a lower incidence of ‘cognitive tunnelling’). Drivers also reported higher levels of alertness and lower sleepiness following the Vid drive. Subjective workload ratings suggest that drivers exerted less effort to ‘stay awake’ when engaged with Vid. The findings support the development and application of in-vehicle natural language interfaces, and can be used to inform the design of novel countermeasures for driver fatigue

Identification of floodwater source areas in Nepal using SCIMAP‐Flood

Practical approaches for managing flooding from fluvial sources are moving away from mitigation solely at the point of impact and towards integrated catchment management. This considers the source areas, flow pathways of floodwaters and the locations and exposure to the risk of communities. For a field site in southern Nepal, we analyse catchment response to a range of simulated rainfall events, which when evaluated collectively can help guide potential flood management solutions. This is achieved through the adoption of SCIMAP-Flood, a decision support framework that works at the catchment-scale to identify critical source areas for floodwaters. The SCIMAP-Flood Fitted inverse modelling approach has been applied to the East Rapti catchment, Nepal. For multiple flood impact locations throughout the catchment, SCIMAP-Flood effectively identifies locations where flood management measures would have the most positive effects on risk reduction. The results show that the spatial targeting of mitigation measures in areas of irrigated and rainfed agriculture and the prevention of deforestation or removal of shrubland would be the most effective approaches. If these actions were in the upper catchment above Hetauda or upstream of Manahari they would have the most effective reduction in the flood peak

An experimental proposal to study collapse of the wave function in travelling-wave parametric amplifiers

The read-out of a microwave qubit state occurs using an amplification chain that enlarges the quantum state to a signal detectable with a classical measurement apparatus. However, at what point in this process did we really `measure' the quantum state? In order to investigate whether the `measurement' takes place in the amplification chain, we propose to construct a microwave interferometer that has a parametric amplifier added to each of its arms. Feeding the interferometer with single photons, the visibility depends on the gain of the amplifiers and whether a measurement collapse has taken place during the amplification process. We calculate the interference visibility as given by standard quantum mechanics as a function of gain, insertion loss and temperature and find a magnitude of $1/3$ in the limit of large gain without taking into account losses. This number reduces to $0.26$ in case the insertion loss of the amplifiers is $2.2$ dB at a temperature of $50$ mK. We show that if the wave function collapses within the interferometer, we will measure a reduced visibility compared to the prediction from standard quantum mechanics once this collapse process sets in.Comment: 21 pages and 23 figures (including appendices and subfigures). v4: Abstract and introduction rewritten and note on stochasticity of quantum state collapse added to section 6. v5: no content changes w.r.t. v

Lessons from Oz: Design Guidelines for Automotive Conversational User Interfaces

This paper draws from literature and our experience of conducting Wizard-of-Oz (WoZ) studies using natural language, conversational user interfaces (CUIs) in the automotive domain. These studies have revealed positive effects of using in-vehicle CUIs on issues such as: cognitive demand/workload, passive task-related fatigue, trust, acceptance and environment engagement. A nascent set of human-centred design guidelines that have emerged is presented. These are based on the analysis of users' behaviour and the positive benefits observed, and aim to make interactions with an in-vehicle agent interlocutor safe, effective, engaging and enjoyable, while confirming with users' expectations. The guidelines can be used to inform the design of future in-vehicle CUIs or applied experimentally using WoZ methodology, and will be evaluated and refined in ongoing work.Comment: Accepted to the 11th International ACM Conference on Automotive User Interfaces and Interactive Vehicular Applications (AutomotiveUI '19

Understanding the effects of peripheral vision and muscle memory on in-vehicle touchscreen interactions

It is important to gain a better understanding of how drivers interact with in-vehicle touchscreens to help design interfaces to minimise “eyes off road” time. The study aimed to investigate the relative effects of two interaction mechanisms (peripheral vision - PV and muscle memory - MM) shown to be relevant to visual behaviour when driving, on the time to press different sized buttons (small 6x6cm, medium 10x10cm, large 14x14cm) on an in-vehicle touchscreen. Twenty-five participants took part in a driving simulator study. They were presented with a single, white, square button on the touchscreen on 24 successive trials. For MM conditions, participants wore a pair of glasses that blocked their peripheral vision and for PV conditions they were asked to keep their focus on the vehicle in front throughout. Results showed that task time gradually decreased for the trials when participants could only use MM. However, overall task time for MM conditions were significantly higher than for those in which PV was utilised, and participants rated the use of MM to be more difficult than PV. In contrast, results suggest that for interfaces that utilise peripheral visual processing the learning effect is not evident and operation times are constant over time. These findings indicate that in-vehicle touch screens should be designed to utilise peripheral vision for making simple button selections with reduced visual demand

Understanding the effects of peripheral vision and muscle memory on in-vehicle touchscreen interactions

It is important to gain a better understanding of how drivers interact with in-vehicle touchscreens to help design interfaces to minimise “eyes off road” time. The study aimed to investigate the relative effects of two interaction mechanisms (peripheral vision - PV and muscle memory - MM) shown to be relevant to visual behaviour when driving, on the time to press different sized buttons (small 6x6cm, medium 10x10cm, large 14x14cm) on an in-vehicle touchscreen. Twenty-five participants took part in a driving simulator study. They were presented with a single, white, square button on the touchscreen on 24 successive trials. For MM conditions, participants wore a pair of glasses that blocked their peripheral vision and for PV conditions they were asked to keep their focus on the vehicle in front throughout. Results showed that task time gradually decreased for the trials when participants could only use MM. However, overall task time for MM conditions were significantly higher than for those in which PV was utilised, and participants rated the use of MM to be more difficult than PV. In contrast, results suggest that for interfaces that utilise peripheral visual processing the learning effect is not evident and operation times are constant over time. These findings indicate that in-vehicle touch screens should be designed to utilise peripheral vision for making simple button selections with reduced visual demand