Reasoning with Classification in Interactive Knowledge Elicitation

This paper describes METIS, a system based upon a Method of Elicitation of Taxonomies used to Identify conceptual Structures. METIS is an interactive tool using a minimal core of structured descriptions, in order to acquire objects and to discriminate them. This core is progressively extended through the acquisition and recognition of a lot of objects; it represents a generalization hierarchy. The knowledge acquisition. and therefore the building of the generalization hierarchy, is guided by the taxonomy of classes associated to objects. The knowledge acquisition principle is incremental and uses the formalism of cooceptual graphs. We have applied METIS to the ichthyological field (i.e., the part of zoology dealing with fishes) as partofa research conventiori with U.R.2.C (i.e., research unit on environmentand aquatic resources of topical river valleys) from ORSlOM (i.e., the French cooperative research institute for the purpose of development)

Community detection for access-control decisions: Analysing the role of homophily and information diffusion in Online Social Networks

Access-Control Lists (ACLs) (a.k.a. “friend lists”) are one of the most important privacy features of Online Social Networks (OSNs) as they allow users to restrict the audience of their publications. Nevertheless, creating and maintaining custom ACLs can introduce a high cognitive burden on average OSNs users since it normally requires assessing the trustworthiness of a large number of contacts. In principle, community detection algorithms can be leveraged to support the generation of ACLs by mapping a set of examples (i.e. contacts labelled as “untrusted”) to the emerging communities inside the user’s ego-network. However, unlike users’ access-control preferences, traditional community-detection algorithms do not take the homophily characteristics of such communities into account (i.e. attributes shared among members). Consequently, this strategy may lead to inaccurate ACL configurations and privacy breaches under certain homophily scenarios. This work investigates the use of community-detection algorithms for the automatic generation of ACLs in OSNs. Particularly, it analyses the performance of the aforementioned approach under different homophily conditions through a simulation model. Furthermore, since private information may reach the scope of untrusted recipients through the re-sharing affordances of OSNs, information diffusion processes are also modelled and taken explicitly into account. Altogether, the removal of gatekeeper nodes is further explored as a strategy to counteract unwanted data dissemination

E-learning for the New Generations, a Web 2.0 Approach

Non

PACA-ITS: A Multi-Agent System for Intelligent Virtual Laboratory Courses

This paper describes an intensive design leading to the implementation of an intelligent lab companion (ILC) agent for an intelligent virtual laboratory (IVL) platform. An IVL enables virtual labs (VL) to be used as online research laboratories, thereby facilitating and improving the analytical skills of students using agent technology. A multi-agent system enhances the capability of the learning system and solves students’ problems automatically. To ensure an exhaustive Agent Unified Modeling Language (AUML) design, identification of the agents’ types and responsibilities on well-organized AUML strategies is carried out. This work also traces the design challenge of IVL modeling and the ILC agent functionality of six basic agents: the practical coaching agent (PCA), practical dispatcher agent (PDA), practical interaction and coordination agent (PICA), practical expert agent (PEA), practical knowledge management agent (PKMA), and practical inspection agent (PIA). Furthermore, this modeling technique is compatible with ontology mapping based on an enabling technology using the Java Agent Development Framework (JADE), Cognitive Tutor Authoring Tools (CTAT), and Protégé platform integration. The potential Java Expert System Shell (Jess) programming implements the cognitive model algorithm criteria that are applied to measure progress through the CTAT for C++ programming concept task on IVL and successfully deployed on the TutorShop web server for evaluation. The results are estimated through the learning curve to assess the preceding knowledge, error rate, and performance profiler to engage cognitive Jess agent efficiency as well as practicable and active decisions to improve student learning

E-learning

ELearning is a vast and complex research topic that poses many challenges in every aspect: educational and pedagogical strategies and techniques and the tools for achieving them; usability, accessibility and user interface design; knowledge sharing and collaborative environments; technologies, architectures, and protocols; user activity monitoring, assessment and evaluation; experiences, case studies and more. This book’s authors come from all over the world; their ideas, studies, findings and experiences are a valuable contribution to enriching our knowledge in the field of eLearning. The book consists of 18 chapters divided into three sections. The first chapters cover architectures and environments for eLearning, the second part of the book presents research on user interaction and technologies for building usable eLearning environments, which are the basis for realizing educational and pedagogical aims, and the last part illustrates applications, laboratories, and experiences