Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Rapport multimedia conferencing system-a software overview

The Rapport multimedia conferencing system supports interactive, real-time, distributed conferences among two or more people. Executing on personal workstations interconnected by data and voice networks, Rapport provides basic mechanisms to create, manage, and terminate conferences. The authors focus on the Rapport software, which is a three-level hierarchy comprised of the user interface, conference server, and system levels. The user interface level provides humans and other programs with access to the Rapport system. Maintaining consistent views of the conference for all the participants, the conference server level coordinates the activities of the conferees and provides basic protocols for exchanging information and control during a conference. The system level includes window management service and drivers for the hardware required to transmit data in the various media. <<ETX>>
Design of Luma and Chroma Sub-pixel Interpolator for H.264 Motion Estimation

This paper describes an efficient design of the interpolation circuit to generate the luma and chroma sub-pixels for H.264 motion estimation. The circuit based on the proposed architecture does not require any input data buffering and processes the horizontal, vertical and diagonal sub-pixel interpolations in parallel. The performance of the circuit is further improved by simultaneously processing the 1/2-pixel and 1/4-pixel interpolations for luma components and the 1/8-pixel interpolations for chroma components. In order to reduce the circuit size, we store the intermediate data required to process all the interpolations in parallel in the internal SRAM`s instead of registers. We described the proposed circuit at register transfer level and verified its operation on FPGA board. We also synthesized the gate-level circuit using 130nm CMOS standard cell library. It consists of 20,674 gates and has the maximum operating frequency of 244MHz. The total number of SPSRAM bits used in our circuit is 3,232. The size of our circuit (including logic gates and SRAM`s) is smaller than others and the performance is still comparable to them.
Research on Corner Matching-Based Video Localization by Robots in RoboCup

In this paper, a corner matching-based localization algorithm is brought forward, which refers to doing corner matching every two frames for the video documents generated in the operation of the robot and calculating the corner offset between two frames so as to realize the self-localization of the robot. It turns out in tests that the localization by this algorithm is featured by little error and high robustness
The development of an image analysis system that can detect fraudulent alterations made to printed images

An image analysis system that can differentiate between different black toners or inks non-destructively on printed text documents and images is currently under development at The London College of Printing. It is envisaged that the system will be able to find alterations in documents or images that are difficult to detect even by the most skilled expert document examiners using established forensic techniques. This paper describes the development of a nondestructive method that is intended to detect imperceptible fraudulent alterations to digital print samples. A digital image analysis system that incorporated a high-resolution low noise CCD monochrome camera with an optical system to enlarge images was used. Software that could obtain measurements of the relative optical reflectivity and sharpness characteristics of printed image areas from the raw image analysis data was developed. A single A4 sized paper sheet with a printed image that was produced using a combination of two different laser printers and an optical photocopier was illuminated using visible light. The results of subsequent image analysis measurements demonstrated it was possible to detect imperceptible alterations on the A4 sheet using this technique.
Capture Surface Light Field for Gesture with Sparse Multi-view Videos ⋆

A Surface Light Field (SLF) is a function that assigns a color to each ray originating on a surface, it reveals light information surrounding a scene or object. This paper presents a framework for capturing SLF for gestures with sparse multi-view videos. Captured SLF is saved in discrete SLF matrix sequence, and it can be used for rendering images for new view point and moment. In order to process dynamics of gesture light field, a prior geometry model and related shape deforming are introduced into the frame, which relaxes requirement for accuracy of the prior shape model and make the light field available for scenes with complex self-occlusion such as sign language words. Also because the dynamic SLF sequence has same geometry topological structure, it is convenient for interpolation such as what is used in sign language synthesis.
Performance of the Piecewise Rate Modulation Strategy to Convey Mandarin Tonal Information for Cochlear Implant Using Neural Network Simulation

In order to improve the pitch perception of cochlear implant (CI) users speaking tonal language, it has been suggested to frequency-modulate the electric stimulus rate by the spectral information of the tonal language. A piecewise CI rate modulation strategy has been recently proposed, which not only encoded the spectral information but also took account of the psychological perception feature for the stimulus rate variation by CI users. This paper further examines its performance to convey Mandarin tonal information by a neural-network-based simulation. The experimental results shown that the correct rates to identify the four Mandarin tones of 80 Mandarin monosyllabic words were 95%, 95%, 100% and 100%, respectively, indicating that the piecewise rate modulation strategy might efficiently convey Mandarin tonal information. Therefore, the piecewise rate modulation strategy could help to design novel CI electric stimulator and enhance the speech perception ability of CI users speaking tonal language, such as Mandarin.
Text Visualization for Competitive Intelligence

The overreliance on quantitative, numeric information and the underuse of qualitative, textual information is a common weakness in strategic management. This affects particularly the practice of competitive intelligence, which aims to provide actionable information about the company-external environment for decision making. Yet, forward-looking and insightful information about the environment often comes in qualitative form, much of it as publicly available text documents, whereas public quantitative information often arrives too late to be useful for strategic management. This thesis proposes that text visualization, and in particular, a method called collocational networks, could increase the use of textual information in competitive intelligence. Collocational networks are networks consisting of words that co-occur in a statistically significant way in a text, or in a collection of texts. They are particularly useful for discovering changes between sequences of texts of a similar nature, e.g. annual or quarterly reports. In line with design science research practice, the proposed method is also evaluated for utility. The evaluation is carried out in two stages. First, collocational networks of quarterly report texts are compared to self-organizing maps created out of the financial figures of the same reports. This evaluation shows that changes in the collocational network of a company’s quarterly report are followed by a change in the position of the company in the self-organizing map in the next quarter. Second, a series of interviews with competitive intelligence practitioners are carried out, in which the interviewees are shown collocational networks created out of annual reports from telecommunications service companies during 2003-2008. This evaluation shows that the interviewees consider the networks to reflect actual developments within the industry. They also consider them to be a useful tool for discovering changes that may go unnoticed when reading the texts. In summary, the evaluations suggest that by using collocational networks, competitive intelligence practitioners could easily have access to forward-looking, qualitative information about the company-external environment to strengthen strategic management practice.
Nature-Inspired cognitive evolution to play Ms. Pac-Man

Recent developments in nature-inspired computation have heightened the need for research into the three main areas of scientific, engineering and industrial applications. Some approaches have reported that it is able to solve dynamic problems and very useful for improving the performance of various complex systems. So far however, there has been little discussion about the effectiveness of the application of these models to computer and video games in particular. The focus of this research is to explore the hybridization of nature-inspired computation methods for optimization of neural network-based cognition in video games, in this case the combination of a neural network with an evolutionary algorithm. In essence, a neural network is an attempt to mimic the extremely complex human brain system, which is building an artificial brain that is able to self-learn intelligently. On the other hand, an evolutionary algorithm is to simulate the biological evolutionary processes that evolve potential solutions in order to solve the problems or tasks by applying the genetic operators such as crossover, mutation and selection into the solutions. This paper investigates the abilities of Evolution Strategies (ES) to evolve feed-forward artificial neural network's internal parameters (i.e. weight and bias values) for automatically generating Ms. Pac-man controllers. The main objective of this game is to clear a maze of dots while avoiding the ghosts and to achieve the highest possible score. The experimental results show that an ES-based system can be successfully applied to automatically generate artificial intelligence for a complex, dynamic and highly stochastic video game environment.
Use of Visualization and Contextualization in Training Operators of Complex Systems

The complexity of control systems in complex dynamic systems can lead to increased cognitive demands on the operator. Lacking accurate and complete system knowledge and/or interfaces that clearly present the system state and constraints, the operator may misunderstand the automation and its behaviors. This paper presents a research effort that uses visualization and contextualization in training as tools for addressing these problems. A problematic feature of modern glass cockpit aircraft's automated systems, vertical path navigation (VNAV), is used as a testbed. The VNAV Tutor uses contextualization and visualization to improve the pilot's understanding of VNAV control and the interaction of various levels of automation during VNAV usage. Furthermore, it attempts to help pilots build a robust conceptual model of vertical navigation operation. An evaluation showed that the VNAV Tutor enhanced both the conceptual understanding and use of the vertical navigation function by pilots.
Investigation on influence of wavefront property of reference beams on the quality of images reconstructed from holograms

In this paper, the quality of the reconstructed images by general plane, Gaussian, speckle imaging, and speckle reference beams, is investigated by numerical simulation and preliminary experiments, and is quantitatively evaluated using the signal to noise ratio (SNR) and the loss of signal to noise ratio (LSNR) for the purpose of comparing experimental results. The results of numerical simulation show that with plane reference, the quality of reconstructed images are very good and with Gaussian beam the noise of the reconstructed images is restrained but the boundary information is also weakened. What is worthy to be noticed, the results of both numerical simulation and preliminary experiments show that with speckle reference, the quality of the images is not good; although with the speckle imaging reference that is the image of the random phase, the situation is a little better. So, it is necessary to improve the quality of the reconstructed images when the random-phase multiplexing technology is to be used for high density storage. And in order to implement high-density holographic storage with high reconstruct quality, the reference beam must be optimized.
Syntax and Machine Translation: The Metal Project

Unlike much theoretical linguistics, both the comparative perspective and the automatic aspect of Machine Translation reveal that there cannot be a clear-cut borderline between grammar and lexicon. The interdependence of grammatical computation and lexical storage has become extremely obvious during the research and development work in the METAL-project. After outlining the history of this project, section 1 of this paper sketches the system's projected application environment. The systern's main lexical tools are discussed in section 2, and section 3 deals with its main grammatical techniques. The final section raises a number of problems and issues for further research. Some of these are well-known but still await a satisfactory solution given the present (1987) state of the project. Others are raised much less often and derive from the technical nature of the texts that METAL is intended to translate.
Translation of Japanese Noun Compounds at Super-Function Based MT System

Noun compounds are frequently encountered construction in nature language processing (NLP), consisting of a sequence of two or more nouns which functions syntactically as one noun. The translation of noun compounds has become a major issue in Machine Translation (MT) due to their frequency of occurrence and high productivity. In our previous studies on Super-Function Based Machine Translation (SFBMT), we have found that noun compounds are very frequently used and difficult to be translated correctly, the overgeneration of noun compounds can be dangerous as it may introduce ambiguity in the translation. In this paper, we discuss the challenges in handling Japanese noun compounds in an SFBMT system, we present a shallow method for translating noun compounds by using a word level translation dictionary and target language monolingual corpus.
An Architecture for High Data Rate Very Low Frequency Communication

Very low frequency (VLF) communication is used for long range shore-to-ship broadcasting applications. This paper proposes an architecture for high data rate VLF communication using Gaussian minimum shift keying (GMSK) modulation and low delay parity check (LDPC) channel coding. Non-data aided techniques are designed and used for carrier phase synchronization, symbol timing recovery, and LDPC code frame synchronization. These require the estimation of the operative Eb/N0 for which a kurtosis based algorithm is used. Also, a method for modeling the probability density function of the received signal under the bit condition is presented in this regard. The modeling of atmospheric radio noise (ARN) that corrupts VLF signals is described and an algorithm for signal enhancement in the presence of ARN in given. The BER performance of the communication system is evaluated for bit rates of 400 bps, 600 bps, and 800 bps for communication bandwidth of ~200 Hz. Defence Science Journal, 2013, 63(1), pp.25 -33 , DOI:http://dx.doi. org/10.14429/dsj. 63.3760
The Ball within the Box: A Sound-Processing Metaphor

The physical-modeling paradigm is already popular in the computer music community. Nevertheless, few compositions are being written using this class of techniques. It seems that composers, who often complain about the lack of intuition in most signal-processing techniques, are nevertheless "stuck with them. " What prevents a composer from approaching synthesis by physical modeling? One of the reasons is the lack of generality. Until now, most physical-modeling research has focused on the challenge of simulating existing acoustical instruments. Many ad hoc techniques have been developed for reed instruments, strings, percussion, etc. It is hard for a composer to find a way to collect these techniques and use them with the freedom of choice he/she expects to have. The classical "computer music utopia" that implies having the power to do everything seems to be contradicted by the physically based approach. Therefore, computer musicians, most of whom are "utopists," keep using frequency modulation or granular synthesis as general tools for forming musical material. We feel that to escape this bottleneck, we need general models and representations of the physical sounding objects. In this article, we try to provide one such a model, which we call the Ball within the Box (BaBo). The BaBo can be thought of as a generalized model of a resonator, in the exciter-resonator classical view of physical modeling (Borin, De Poli, and Sarti 1992). It retains the main advantage of physical modeling techniques, namely, the availability of physically meaningful parameters like size, absorption, damping, diffusion, etc. At the same time, the BaBo model is sufficiently general that it can be used as instrument resonator, post-processing filter, or reverberator. Sound from Boxes
SuperRIVAM: software for the computation of the super-resolution of medical images and video

Super-resolution is the process to construct an image of better quality based on images of low quality. Superresolution of medical images has been studied for many years, but there is not a software that computes it. Super-rivam is a software that is based in 6 different algorithms to compute the super-resolution. Two of them, use only one image to produce the super-resolution and four of them use two or more image to compute the super-resolution images (video). Two of these algorithms were developed by our team of researches. The algorithms based on only one image are useful for X-ray, CT, Tomography, etc. The algortihms based on two or more images are useful for ecographies. The paper explains the algorithms and gives a comparison between them. The results shown are the summary of more than 200 different test to the algorithms.
Research on Method of Items Recognition Based on SURF Algorithm

Items detection and recognition have become one of hotspots in the field of computer vision research. Based on image features method has the advantage of low amount of information, fast running speed, high precision, and SIFT algorithm is one of them. But traditional SIFI algorithm have large amount of calculation data and spend long time to compute in terms of items recognition. Therefore, this paper come up with a method of items recognition based on SURF. This article elaborates the basic principle of SURF algorithm that firstly use SURF algorithm to extract feature points of item image, secondly adopt Euclidean distance method to find corresponding interest points of image, and finally get the image after items recognition combination with mapping relation of item image using RANSAC(Random Sample Consesus). Experimental results show that the system of item recognition based on SURF algorithm have better effect on matching recognition, higher instantaneity, better robustness.
Electron Microscopy and the Materials Chemistry of Solid Catalysts

Abstract No other method rivals electron microscopy (EM) in the wealth of structural (atomic, nanoscopic, microscopic, and mesoscopic), topographic, and electronic information that it provides in the characterization of solid catalysts such as those used commercially, for laboratory trials or model studies: EM provides deep insights into the structure of solid catalysts—their precursors, active sites, and expired or regenerated forms—as well as vital clues to their mode of operation. In some important instances it serves as the only trustworthy means of determining the structure and composition of a catalyst. After a brief update on the significance of recent advances in EM techniques which allow (i) the probing of catalysts at atomic resolution, (ii) electron crystallography, and (iii) the determination of the chemical compositions of catalysts, we illustrate these achievements with specific examples. These include (a) pin-pointing the location and topography of nanoparticle catalysts; (b) constructing elemental maps (and compositional distributions) of solid catalysts; (c) in situ investigations of active sites and reaction processes at the atomic level; (d) elucidating the nature of intergrowths (coherent, recurrent, and random) of closely similar structures within a supposed new catalyst; (e) identifying atoms (or small groups of atoms) of high atomic number supported on high-area solids; and (f) characterizing nanoparticles on uneven supports. In (a) and (e) the recently developed technique of electron tomography plays a crucial role.
Gemini-north multiobject spectrograph integration, test, and commissioning

The first of two Gemini Multi Object Spectrographs (GMOS) has recently begun operation at the Gemini-North 8m telescope. In this presentation we give an overview of the instrument and describe the overall performance of GMOS-North both in the laboratory during integration, and at the telescope during commissioning. We describe the development process which led to meeting the demanding reliability and performance requirements on flexure, throughput and image quality. We then show examples of GMOS data and performance on the telescope in its imaging, long-slit and MOS modes. We also briefly highlight novel features in GMOS that are described in more detail in separate presentations, particularly the flexure compensation system and the on-instrument wavefront sensor. Finally we give an update of the current status of GMOS on Gemini-North and future plans.
New Technique of Hidden Data in PE-File with in Unused Area One

The strength of the combination between hiding and encryption science is due to the non-existence of standard algorithms to be used in hiding and encrypting secret messages. Also there are many ways in hiding methods such as combining several media (covers) with different methods to pass a secret message. Furthermore, there is no formal method to be followed to discover a hidden data.For this reason, the task of this paper becomes difficult. In this paper proposed a new system of information hiding is presented. The proposed system aim to hide information (data file) in unused area 1 of any execution file (exe.file), to make sure changes made to the exe.file will not be detected by anti-virus and the functionality of the exe.file is still functioning. The system includes two main functions; first is the hiding of the information in the unused area 1 of PE-file (exe.file), through the execution of four process (specify the cover file, specify the information file, encryption of the information, and hiding the information) and the second function is the extraction of the hiding information through three process (specify the steno file, extract the information, and decryption of the information). The testing result shows; the result file does not make any conflict with anti-virus software and the exe.file still function as usual after the hiding process. The proposed system is implemented by using Java.