Virtual Becomes Reality At Stanford
San Francisco Chronicle (04/29/07) P. A1; Sturrock, Carrie
Stanford's Virtual Human Interaction Lab researchers are investigating how
new digital technology can alter human beings and their interactions.
Using advanced virtual reality technology researchers can transport student
subjects into incredibly real environments, technology the researchers say
could be used in a variety of human interactions from police lineups to
America's obesity epidemic. Director of the Virtual Human Interaction Lab
and assistant professor at Stanford Jeremy Bailenson has been researching a
"virtual police lineup" that eliminates the possibility of a witness
identifying the wrong person based on a characteristic that could have
changed, such as weight or hair. By virtually making the lineup suspects
the same weight, dressed in the same clothing, and sporting the same hair
cuts, the witness is forced to identify the suspect based on their face
rather than a changeable trait, resulting in a more accurate and positive
identification. This technology can also be used to transport the witness
back to the scene of the crime to view the suspect in the proper
surroundings. "In virtual reality, you get unlimited information--you can
see someone's face from any distance and any angle," Bailenson said. "When
you give them unlimited information they can use, they're more likely to be
accurate." The system works using a high tech helmet that captures the
users movements using an accelerometer. Four cameras monitor the user's
position in the room by tracing a light-emitting diode on the helmet. A
computer records the movement information, while a second computer
continually redraws the world and sends the information back to the helmet.
Additional studies with the technology include monitoring a subject's
physical activity levels after watching themselves exercise in the virtual
world and tracking a subject's confidence levels after watching an
attractive or unattractive simulation of themselves. Bailenson's research
was funded by a 2002 National Science Foundation grant.
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As the Software World Turns, Part 1: Engineers in,
Programmers Out
TechNewsWorld (04/28/07) Maxcer, Chris
Today, software programmers, developers, analysts, engineers, and
architects rarely fill the traditional positions they were limited to only
a decade ago, and instead handle a wide variety of tasks as organizations
worldwide ask more from application development teams. Software developers
need to have specific and multilingual knowledge. Forrester Research
application development analyst Jeffrey Hammond said, "One of the things
I've seen over the last three years is a decline in the number of folks who
describe themselves as computer programmers and a rise in the number of
people who identify themselves as software engineers for application
development or software engineers for systems development." Developers
need to be able to use a variety of technologies, not just the raw
programming language, so they are becoming less like software engineers and
more like technicians. This change is being driven by a more in-depth
business process that requires project leaders to interact with business
leaders to quickly create a new solution. Software engineer Jason Brooks
said, "A software engineer needs to be able to interpret and implement
business requirements, maybe rewrite them and send them back." In an
effort to quantify skills, dozens of application development certifications
have popped up, but for the most part, certifications are used to push a
resume through the human resources department and into the hiring manager's
office. Hammond said that landing a job is based on languages known,
programming experience, and applications built, not certification.
President of Upside Research David A. Kelly said, "In the future, the real
'developers' will be offshore in India, China, Russia or some other far-off
place, while development managers, architects, and business enablers will
be here in America, helping to define, manage and deploy technology
solutions that solve business problems."
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44th Design Automation Conference to Feature Two
Workshops Addressing Low Power
Business Wire (04/24/07)
Two low power design workshops are scheduled for Sunday, June 3, 2007, at
the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego, Calif., the day before the
start of the 44th Design Automation Conference (DAC). The Low Power
Coalition (LPC) Workshop--Standards for Low Power Design Intent will
address the advantages of the Common Power Format (CPF) specification for
capturing and communicating low power constraints in IC design flow, as
well as the latest developments and planned roadmap of the LPC. The agenda
of the workshop includes presentations on Convergence Activities With Other
Power-Aware Formats and EDA Tool Developers for Low Power, and a panel
discussion featuring all speakers. During the Design and Verification of
Low Power ICs workshop, engineers and tool developers will learn about the
purpose, technical constructs, and usage of the Unified Power Format (UPF),
and top EDA suppliers will demonstrate UPF interoperability in a
multi-vendor flow. "The fact that there are two workshops on low power
design at DAC this year underscores the importance of the topic and the
value of attending DAC to get details on all of the latest developments in
design," says Steve Levitan, general chair of the 44th DAC, scheduled for
June 4-8 in San Diego. [[For more information about DAC, or to register,
visit
http://www.dac.com/44th/index.html]]
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Comp. Sci. Recruits Women
Stanford Daily (04/27/07) Allen, Jenny; Jenn
Stanford, like universities nationwide, has seen its ranks of female
computer science students shrink, as only 13 percent of computer science
undergraduates were female this year, compared to 24 percent during the
1999-2000 school year. Mills College computer science associate professor
Ellen Spertus believes that women generally enter college with less
computer science than men, and are more easily discouraged by 'weeder'
courses. "Even when they earn good grades in these classes, the fear that
they don't belong in computer science and leave," Spertus says. In an
attempt to reverse this trend, Stanford faculty, staff, and students are
making an active effort to recruit and retain more women in computer
science. In 2002, Stanford students organized Women In Computer Science
(WICS), a student group that provides speaker series, workshops, mentoring
programs, and social events for female computer science students, as well
as sponsors attendees to the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computer
Conference, the largest conference for women in computer science.
Additionally, Stanford offers an introductory course designed to expose
more students to the field, works with programs that supports young
students, and provides additional research opportunities through the
Computer Science Undergraduate Research Internship. To develop additional
strategies, Stanford participates in the Academic Alliance of the National
Center for Women in Information Technology. Stanford also works to recruit
more women by including women on search committees to identify qualified
candidates from underrepresented groups. Stanford computer science
professor Eric Roberts says the school needs to increase the number, not
the percentage, of women in the CS department. [[For information about
ACM's Committee on Women in Computing, visit
http://women.acm.org]]
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Sun Opens Doors to Next-Generation Technology
InfoWorld (04/26/07) Krill, Paul
Sun Labs Open House at Sun facilities in Menlo Park, Calif., featured
several presentations and demonstrations on new technologies still in
development such as wire-free chip-to-chip communications, Web 2.0
security, and even a slot car track embedded with real-time Java sensor
technology. One project that drew a significant amount of attention was
Proximity Communication, which seeks to overcome the limitations of Moore's
law. Proximity Communication places silicon parts close to each other,
sending signals between them without wires, which can increase bandwidth,
make chips replaceable, and enable smaller chips, according to Sun. Sun
Labs director and distinguished engineer Robert Drost said there are
challenges, such as heat dissipation, but that the high risk project has
great potential for a very high reward. Proximity Communication could save
power and allow for much larger cashes to be build, a significant
development if Sun is successful, said analyst Nathan Brookwood. "Today,
trying to build a system out of multiple chips really imposes tremendous
performance constraints," Brookwood said. "If they can achieve this, if
they can take several chips and make them behave like on large chip from an
electrical and signal timing perspective, then that's a huge step forward."
Sun fellow at Sun Microsystems Laboratories Robert Sproull said they still
have to get the first prototype working and that it would be years before
Proximity Communications would be available.
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Quantum Computing Offers Big Hopes
Kansas City Star (04/29/07) P. A11; Canon, Scott
Quantum computing could revolutionize every industry from factory
production, to entertainment, to military applications, that is if quantum
computing is even possible. Quantum computing differs from regular
computing, which makes calculations using bits valued as either 1 or 0, by
being able to value bits, or in quantum computing 'qubits,' as both 1 and 0
at the same time. Quantum computing would be capable of this seemingly
impossible task by exploiting the odd properties of quantum mechanics,
which governs the behavior of the super small. At the University of
Pittsburgh, Jeremy Levy directs a quantum computing center and is exploring
the use of spinning electrons to assign simultaneous different values. For
example, an electron spinning clockwise could represent a 0 while a
counterclockwise spinning electron would represent a 1, creating a quantum
computer that uses both electrons at the same time to assign two different
values. Several obstacles need to be resolved in order for this
theoretical quantum computer to become reality. One problem is that qubits
would need to be isolated at a temperature colder than minus 450 degrees
Fahrenheit to control matter that specifically, and all outside world
interference, such as certain types of noise, would need to be shut out to
prevent the delicate process from being disturbed. University of Missouri
computer science professor Jeffrey Uhlmann, who studied the possibilities
of quantum computing at the Naval Research Laboratory for 12 years and
still writes algorithms to help engineers, said quantum computers will
likely be based on the same model as traditional computers, but it is
possible that they could become as powerful as some people predict,
recalling that decades ago computer experts thought it would be impossible
to shrink a computer with less power than a cell phone down to the size of
a refrigerator.
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Xerox Technology Responds to 'Colorful' Language
Network World (04/27/07) Brodkin, Jon
Xerox is working to improve the usability of color control systems by
creating a natural language interface for making color adjustments to
computer documents. The company has developed prototype natural language
color editing technology. Geoff Woolfe, research scientist at Xerox
Innovation Group, says changing colors effectively tends to require
specialized training, and the hiring of a graphics professional or printer.
With the new technology, consumers will be able to make changes with voice
commands or typing words and phrases such as "slightly less yellow," "much
darker," or "greener," although the adjustments will not be as precise as
numerical color encodings used in color image-processing and device-control
applications. "First, there is no uniquely defined natural color
language," according to Woolfe in a statement. "Second, the boundaries
between named colors are not precisely defined--indeed; they are somewhat
fuzzy and can vary, to some extent, between individuals." Xerox has
created a dictionary of 267 color names, including simple names such as
red, names with hue-modifiers such as yellowish-green, and color names that
use modifiers to distinguish lightness and colorfulness such as pale and
vivid.
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CMU High Tech Aims Higher for Blind, Deaf
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (04/30/07) Heinrichs, Allison M.
Carnegie Mellon robotics and computer science students are given the
opportunity to participate in a program called TechBridgeWorld that allows
them to earn credit while developing technology to help underserved
communities. In the past, projects have taken students as far as West
Africa, where they tested a computerized reading aid to improve the
literacy rates. This year, two projects were developed to help the blind
and the deaf. BlindAid uses a scanner and scan tags, like those used on
items in a grocery store, to help blind people orient themselves and
navigate in unfamiliar environments. By scanning a tag near a door, the
subject can receive information on where he or she is and how to get to his
or her destination. BlindAid is not ready for commercial use as the
scanner is rather bulky and the directions can become confusing if the
person takes a wrong turn, but initial results were very positive as
participants found their way to different rooms 25 percent faster than if
they relied on the Braille room labels alone. In the future, BlindAid
could be extended for use on street signs and buildings. The other
project, called DeSIGN, is a computer game to improve the literacy skills
of deaf children, which tend to lag behind the reading skills of hearing
students by two to three grade levels. The game introduces new vocabulary
worlds by using them in sentences and playing a video of the student's
teacher signing the word. When students correctly identify the word, an
object is added to a jungle, baseball, or outer-space scene as a reward. A
test run of the game on eight children showed that their vocabulary
retention improved by 17.8 percent when using DeSIGN.
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Engineers from Diverse Backgrounds Discuss
Mechatronics
Design News (04/26/07) Dodge, John
A panel of engineers--Jet Propulsion Laboratory chief engineer Brian
Muirhead, Colorado State University Department of Mechanical Engineering
professor David Alciatore, Galil Motion Control application support
engineer Todd Shearer, and Siemens Energy and Automation consulting system
engineer Razvan Panaitescu--was organized to discuss mechatronics, whose
meaning can vary depending on who you ask, Alciatore says. He cites a
textbook definition that describes mechatronics as "a rapidly developing
interdisciplinary field of engineering dealing with the design of products
whose function relies on the integration of electrical and mechanical
components coordinated by a control architecture," while Panaitescu says
mechatronics is to Siemens a holistic strategy for determining the meaning
of mechanical and electrical systems. Muirhead describes mechatronics as a
melding of mechanical engineering and high performance digital electronics
that is often found in gears, actuators, motors, and controls, and to
Shearer it is "a discipline that is 30 percent software, 30 percent
electrical, and 40 percent mechanical or some mix therein." Alciatore
explains that software is playing an increasingly essential role in
mechatronics, and working in the discipline requires being well-versed in
many other areas. The panelists offer examples of how they are applying
best practices in their organizations. Panaitescu says Siemens offers
mechatronics to clients in the design and production phases, with a focus
on clients who use automation equipment for manufacturing machine tools and
production machines; Alciatore says the focus of his mechatronics course
changes every year, and he recommends implementing modeling, analysis, and
simulation as early in the design process as possible for complex
mechatronics projects; Muirhead notes that JPL is trying to make gearboxes
operable in extreme environments by incorporating electrical components
directly into the motor; and Shearer says that application engineers more
versed in mechatronics will approach the original equipment manufacturer
and attempt to cover all the software, electronics, and mechanics.
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Stanford's Compute Power Gets Boost From PlayStation
3
IDG News Service (04/25/07) Williams, Martyn
About 250,000 PlayStation 3 consoles are contributing some 400 TFLOPS
(trillion floating-point operations per second) of computing power to the
Folding@home distributed computing project overseen by researchers at
Stanford University. PlayStation 3 owners have jumped at the opportunity
to offer idle processor cycles for research into how proteins fold. Total
computer power for the project has grown to about 700 TFLOPS, and power
contributions from PlayStation 3 consoles is more than double what comes
from Windows PCs. The publicity surrounding PlayStation 3 participation
has helped bring more PC users onboard, boosting active PC involvement in
the project by 20 percent in the last month. Sony says it is looking
forward to assisting other distributed computing projects in a "wide
variety of academic fields such as medical and social sciences."
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As Women Steer Clear of Computers Nationwide, Tufts U.
Breaks Trends
Tufts Daily (04/25/07) Battan, Carrie
Faculty and students say Tufts University is one of the most active
universities in its efforts to attract more women to the field of computer
science. Tufts has specific scholarships for women in computer science, a
campus organization called Women in Computer Science, and is one of the few
computer science faculties in the world with an equal number of men and
women on staff. Stacy Ecott, president and co-founder of Women in Computer
Science, believes that stereotypes associated with computer science tends
to drive women away, as does the overall difficulty of the major. Senior
Lecturer of Computer Science Judy Stafford agrees with Ecott, and has
noticed that women entering college have less of a concept of what computer
science is really like than male students. "Computer science has a problem
with minorities in general," Stafford said. "It tends to be a white male
population." Ecott estimates, based on her observations in classes, that
women make up about a tenth of undergraduate computer science majors, and
Stafford said she has noticed a lack of women at conferences, usually 20
percent or less. Tufts recently rewrote the course descriptions for some
of the classes to make them more interesting, and is trying to make
computer science more appealing to women by stressing the potential for
interdisciplinary work. "We're looking at the introductory curriculum and
trying to make sure that it includes materials that appeal to women,"
Stafford said. "Women tend to go into fields in which they feel that the
can make a contribution to society. We're trying to make sure that it's
obvious that computer science is an important field for supporting society
in general and that it's strongly connected to other fields."
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A World of Connections
Economist (04/26/07)
As short development cycles, lower costs, and increased innovation expand
the wireless network, more everyday objects will become connected to
networks, devices such as televisions, cars, industrial machinery, and
coffee makers. David Clark, a computer scientist at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology and developer of the Internet believes that in 15
to 20 years the network will need to accommodate a trillion devices, most
of them wireless. Currently, the majority of wireless networking progress
and research has been focused on mobile phones, with about 2.8 billion
already in use and 1.6 million being added every day, but new machines,
sensors, and objects are being developed for use on the Web, such as a
lighting system capable of receiving wireless controls and detecting smoke
and fires. Philips, an electronics firm, plans to introduce wirelessly
controlled lighting systems in about five years that would be capable of
monitoring objects throughout a building, tracking equipment in hospitals
or preventing thefts in offices. Still, it will be a while before
machine-to-machine communications and sensor networks become common place
because, although the technology exists, each system needs to be custom
designed and tailor made, unlike computer software that can be adapted and
deployed with a few clicks.
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Saving the Digital Record
Washington Times (04/26/07) Geracimos, Ann
Digital information, much of it considered valuable to historians, is
quickly lost in the fast-changing digital world. The average lifespan of a
Web site is 44 days, according to Guy Lamolinara, a spokesman for the
Library of Congress' Office of Strategic Initiatives, which has started a
collaborative project designed to preserve digital information. The
National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program
(NDIIPP) is a 10-year project dedicated to identifying the problems
involved and outlining possible solutions for saving digital information
deemed important to parts of the country's heritage. Lamolinara highlights
the fact that Web sites used in the 1994 national election, the first time
the Web was used in an election, no longer exist and are forever lost. The
project hopes to be able to save Web sites following events such as
September 11 or Hurricane Katrina, digitally recorded music or video, and
even potentially social networking sites. As Lamolinara points out, so
much of what is being created exists only online. Mary Rasenberger, a
policy adviser working on issues related to copyright laws, said NDIIPP was
assigned five goals, which could be defined as "content," defining what is
important to save and why; "management," how the network will operate;
"technical infrastructure," developing the tools and techniques need to
preserve and create the network; "sustainability," who will fund the
system; and "policy," how copyright issues will be handled and creating
incentives to preserve material. Copyright is a particularly tricky
problem because, while libraries and archives are exempt for the purpose of
preservation, digital material is so easily copied and distributed that it
could undermine the ability to recoup an investment and consequently
undermine the need for preservation altogether, according to
Rasenberger.
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Designs to Focus on IT Needs of Disabled
Computing Canada (04/20/07) Vol. 33, No. 6, Buckler, Grant
IBM has signed up five universities to participate in its Accessibility
Common Courseware Exchange for Software Studies (ACCESS) program, designed
to help institutions design and share coursework aimed at teaching students
how to design software that people with disabilities can use with ease and
comfort. IBM saw a need for the project during a contest that challenged
student to write a computer program to see if Web sites were accessible to
people with disabilities, when it became apparent that many students were
learning little or nothing about designing for people with disabilities.
IBM then conducted a survey that confirmed the observations made during the
contest and created the ACCESS program. Universities around the world will
be able to access and contribute lessons, tools, and courseware related to
accessible technologies, stored in an open repository hosted and supported
by IBM Academic Initiative. Any academic can access the materials by
joining the Academic Initiative, which is free. So far, the University of
Toronto, the University of Illinois, California State University at Long
Beach, Georgia Tech, and Rochester Institute of Technology have all agreed
to participate in the ACCESS program. Designing to accommodate people with
disabilities, such as changing colors on the screen to improve contrast or
making easy-to-read controllers, leads to better overall design, according
to Jutta Treviranus, director of the University of Toronto's Adaptive
Technology Resource Center.
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The Average Tech Manager Makes $105,000, Our Salary
Survey Finds. Have Tech Jobs Bounced Back?
InformationWeek (04/28/07) Murphy, Chris
InformationWeek's annual IT salary survey finds that the average U.S.
business tech manager currently earns $105,000, while median compensation
for IT personnel is $78,000. Median base salaries are experiencing an
upward movement for the first time in a number of years. Median base pay
for IT staff and managers is up 5.7 percent and 6.6 percent this year,
respectively, versus around 1 percent in 2004, 2005, and 2006; bonuses are
maintaining their level of 8 percent of pay for managers and 5 percent of
pay for staffers. There is greater confidence from survey respondents
concerning the security and stability of their jobs, while 28 percent of
staff list the opportunity to work with leading-edge technology as the
"most important" job factor (up from 12 percent in 2006), and significantly
more managers also cite IT innovation as being most critical to their job
satisfaction. The portion of staffers who consider pay to be far more
important than soft benefits increased from 48 percent to 60 percent
between 2006 and 2007, while 51 percent of managers felt the same way this
year, compared to 43 percent last year. However, median pay for IT
staffers and managers age 25 and under, who are highly sought-after by
industry, has declined, while U.S. IT job growth has been slow in recent
years; more than 50 percent of IT pros attribute lower morale and fewer
jobs to outsourcing and offshoring. Last year's survey proposed a job
survival strategy in which U.S. business technology pros consider offshore
rivals as their main competition, and that philosophy is still relevant
today. Seven out of 10 surveyed job seekers say higher pay is the chief
reason they are looking for a new job, and managers would be wise to ensure
that their A-list team's salaries are aligned with the market.
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Shedding New Light on Old Islamic Patterns
CITRIS Newsletter (04/07) Slack, Gordy
Artist and entrepreneur Steve Beck and UC Berkeley computer science
professor Carlo Sequin's brainchild is the NOOR project, a CITRIS
initiative designed to investigate the mathematical and geometric
principles underlying patterns found in ancient Islamic artwork, such as
tiled mosaics, and express them in contemporary art and architecture.
Sequin explains that NOOR "employs sophisticated generative algorithms to
demonstrate how some of the intricate patterns may have evolved from simple
line-and-circle drawings." NOOR participants are using the designs'
algorithmic principles to produce immense, light emitting diode sculptures
that highlight and enhance their mathematical motifs. "The original tile
patterns are pretty much set in time by the nature of the medium," notes
Beck. "We are introducing a temporal dimension to the patterns by
animating them." The developers believe exposing computer science, math,
and engineering students to these patterns will help cultivate within them
a perhaps subconscious realization of their disciplines' aesthetic value.
The NOOR researchers plan to study the geometric patterns' physiological
and psychological effects on viewers. The project is part of an
overarching FIAT LUX art and technology research initiative to examine the
interconnections between art, science, and culture.
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DNS Complexity
Queue (04/07) Vol. 5, No. 3, P. 24; Vixie, Paul
The domain name system (DNS) has become immensely complex and
sophisticated even though it is founded on a few simple rules, notes
inventor and Internet Systems Consortium cofounder Paul Vixie. The
complexity would suggest that the DNS protocol is poorly specified, but in
reality it was the DNS creators' intention to loosely specify the protocol
in order to support functional interoperability and ease of deployment.
Future DNS complexity could arise because of emergent variables ranging
from internationalized domain names to Extended DNS to Incremental Zone
Transfer to dynamic update to change notification to transaction security
to data authenticity. Vixie maintains that there is an almost living
quality to DNS, and points out that "in DNS there are more variables in
every axis than in any other distributed system I've studied." He explains
that "the combination of things that were left unspecified in the protocol,
things that were loosely specified ... and things that were unenforceably
specified ... describes a rich and multidimensioned space where it's almost
deliberately impossible to know exactly what's happening or exactly what
would happen under describable circumstances."
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