Study Reveals What Women Want From IT Jobs
PressEsc.com (05/24/07) Panditaratne, Vidura
A Penn State study of 92 female IT professionals shows that the
traditional sales pitch focusing on job promotion and security actually
stops women from taking information technology jobs. Eileen Trauth, a
professor of information sciences and technology at Penn State, says that
human-resource workers need to recognize that women have diverse values and
motivations throughout the course of their careers and hiring and retention
practices need to be adjusted to fit those needs. The study focused on
three traditional "career anchors"--technical competence, managerial
competence, and organizational security--while interviewing women from a
variety of ethnic identities, ages, and backgrounds. All of the women work
in IT positions ranging from Web developers and IT administrators all the
way up to CIO and upper-level managers. The study found that, contrary to
traditional theories, none of the anchors alone was a deciding factor in
the women's career choices. About 30 percent said they valued careers that
let them perfect technical skills while others said they wanted career
paths with managerial opportunities. Women interested in management were
most attracted to the opportunity to supervise, manage, and coordinate the
work of others, and several spoke on the importance of earning graduate
degrees to move into management. The research is described in a paper,
"What Do Women Want: An Investigation of Career Anchors among Women in the
IT Workforce," given at the recent SIGMIS Computer Personnel Research
Conference in St. Louis.
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Phishers Can Use Social Web Sites as Bait to Net Victims:
Informatics Study
Indiana University (05/24/07)
Popular social network sites such as Facebook and MySpace are being used
by cybercriminals to gather personal information to create targeted
phishing attacks, according to Indiana University School of Informatics
researchers. In their study, "Social Phishing," the researchers
established a baseline for the success rate of traditional and social
network-based phishing attacks. Phishers steal personal information by
sending authentic looking requests, either by email or instant messaging,
asking someone to click on a link and submit their information on what
looks like a legitimate Web site. "Phishing has become such a prevalent
problem because of its huge profit margins, ease in launching an attack,
and the difficulty of identifying and prosecuting those who do it," says
associate professor of informatics and computer science Filippo Menczer.
"Our study clearly shows that social networks can provide phishers with a
wealth of information about unsuspecting victims." The study sent email
messages to two groups of students asking them to enter their university ID
and password. One group received an email from what they thought was a
friend, while the other group received an email from a stranger. Only 16
percent of students who received an email from a stranger entered their
information, while 72 percent of those receiving emails from "friends" gave
away their information. Associate professor of informatics and member of
the research team Markus Jakobsson says they were astonished by the 72
percent response rate. The researchers suggested some countermeasures to
prevent phishing, including digital signatures on emails to verify the
source, browser toolbars that alert users to spoofing attempts, spam
filters that detect spoofed emails, and providing users with a secure path
to enter passwords, alerting users that they are trying to authenticate to
an unknown site. The study is scheduled to be published in the October
2007 issue of Communications of the ACM.
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Carnegie Mellon Project Boosts Book Digitization
Efforts
Carnegie Mellon News (05/24/07) Spice, Byron; Watzman, Anne
Carnegie Mellon University researchers have developed a way for people to
help create digital records of books every time they solve CAPTCHAs, the
distorted word puzzles commonly found when registering at a Web site or
making an online purchase. Researchers believe that about 60 million
CAPTCHA puzzles are solved everyday around the world, each taking an
average of about 10 seconds to solve and type in. "Humanity is wasting
150,000 hours everyday on these," said Carnegie Mellon assistant professor
of computer science Luis von Ahn, who helped develop CAPTCHAs about seven
years ago. To take advantage of that manpower, Von Ahn devised a system
that uses CAPTCHAs to help create digital records of books. The huge,
numerous efforts to digitize books and store them online is primarily done
through optical character recognition (OCR), but OCR frequently does not
work on older, faded, or distorted texts. The Internet Archive scans about
12,000 books a month, and sends von Ahn images that the computer is unable
to recognize. Von Ahn then splits those images into single words that can
be used in his reCAPTCHA tests. To ensure people are correctly deciphering
the printed text, reCAPTCHA requires users to type two words, one of which
the system already knows. If the user types the known word correctly, the
system has greater confidence that the unknown word was submitted correctly
as well. If several visitors type the same answer for the unknown word,
the system knows the word can be archived. Internet Archive director
Brewster Kahle said he believes reCAPTCHA is a brilliant idea that utilizes
the Internet to correct OCR mistakes. "This is an example of why having
open collections in the public domain is important," Kahle said.
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WPI Receives $2 Million Award to Develop an Intelligent
Tutoring System That Can Improve Math Education
Worcester Polytechnic Institute (05/23/07)
Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) and Carnegie Mellon University
researchers have received a four-year, $2 million award to continue
research on ASSISTment, a computerized tutoring system designed to help
middle school students master mathematical skills. ASSISTment will provide
schools with the long-term data on student performance required under the
federal No Child Left Behind Act, and will provide teachers and parents
with instantaneous, day-to-day feedback on what students have and have not
learned, making it easier to tailor instruction to help students understand
concepts they are having problems with. WPI associate professor of
computer science and leader of ASSISTment research Neil Heffernan says
ASSISTment is the only system that can provide longitudinal data, benchmark
skills assessment, and student tutoring without taking time out of
classroom instruction. Kenneth R. Koedinger, Carnegie Mellon University
associate professor in the Human Computer Interaction Institute and
co-principal investigator on the grant, says students should not have to
stop learning to take a test, particularly a practice test. "Students keep
learning while they are using the ASSISTment system, and we are showing
that we get just as good if not a better idea of what they know and do not
know than we can from high pressure, one-shot tests." The ASSISTment
system, which was built around more than 900 test items from the
Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System 8th grade math exam, will be
expanded to include sixth and seventh grade mathematics and will be able to
generate user-friendly reports to show teachers and parent how individual
students are performing. Finally, the system will utilize new features to
help students achieve mastery of math topics. The system will track each
student's progress and record which skills they have not yet mastered.
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SIGGRAPH 2007 Papers Program Reveals Innovative
Research
Business Wire (05/23/07)
A record 108 papers on the most innovative research in computer graphics
and interactive techniques will be presented at ACM's SIGGRAPH 2007.
Modeling, animation, rendering, and imaging, as well as related subjects
such as visualization, computer vision, human-computer interaction, and
applications of computer graphics will be the focus of the papers. "The
SIGGRAPH Papers review process, with its unique blend of internal and
external reviewers, its long and detailed reviews, and its large
face-to-face committee meeting, is recognized as being one of the fairest
and most thorough peer review systems in computer science," says Marc
Levoy, SIGGRAPH 2007 Papers Chair from Stanford University, about the task
of assessing 455 international submissions. Select highlights of the
SIGGRAPH 2007 Papers Program include Image Deblurring with Blurred/Noisy
Image Pairs by researchers at the Hong Kong University of Science and
Technology and Microsoft Research Asia; Scene Completion Using Millions of
Photographs by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University; Active Refocusing
of Images and Videos by researchers at CVLAB, Ecole Polytechnique Federale
de Lausanne and Columbia University; and Interactive Cutaway Illustrations
of Complex 3D Models by researchers at the University of Washington and the
University of California, Berkeley. Researchers will have 20 minutes to
present their papers, which will be followed by five minutes of discussion
led by the session chair. SIGGRAPH 2007 is scheduled for August 5-9, 2007,
at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego, Calif. [For more
information about SIGGRAPH 2007, or to register, visit
http://www.siggraph.org/s2007/]
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The Top 10 Dead (or Dying) Computer Skills
Computerworld (05/24/07) Brandel, Mary
Although few technology skills can truly be called "dead" because there
will always be employers with older systems that require such skills,
technology experts have compiled a list of skills and technologies that,
while not dead, are on their last legs. These technologies include Cobol,
nonrelational database management systems, non-IP networks, cc:Mail,
ColdFusion, C programming, PowerBuilder, certified NetWare engineers, PC
network administrators, and OS/2. All of these technologies have been
replaced by newer technologies, with fewer instructors in these fields.
However, although they are not being used by new companies and taught to
new computer students, that does not mean there is no demand for
programmers with these skills. Heikki Topi, chair of computer information
services at Bentley College in Waltham, Mass., and a member of the ACM's
education board, said that plenty of companies still run on these systems.
"When you talk to practitioners, they'll say there are applications in
thousands of organizations that have to be maintained."
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U of C Scientists Unveil the Virtual Human
University of Calgary (05/23/07)
The University of Calgary has completed its work on CAVEman, the world's
first complete object-oriented computer model of a human body, which will
be beneficial to researchers who are studying genetic diseases and
physicians in need of surgical training. CAVEman is a 4D human atlas that
resides in the CAVE, the cube-shaped virtual reality room that acts as a
"research Holodeck." In the CAVE, the CAVEman, which is projected from
three walls and the floor below, floats in space. Researchers will be able
to translate medical and genomic data into 4D images, and literally get
inside their experiments. And the model of the complete human is at least
10 times the resolution offered by other virtual systems, and it can be
scaled to any size, and select components or the total model can be
displayed at any time. "The project is a major breakthrough in medical
informatics and systems biology," says Dr. Grant Gall, dean of the faculty
of medicine at the university. Benedikt Hallgrimsson, associate professor
of cell biology and anatomy, adds, "As the technology grows, it will be
useful for diverse studies of growth and development, both for creating
predictive models and also for complex visualization."
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College or H-1B Visas; Educate Tomorrow's Workers or
Import Them, Report Says
San Francisco Chronicle (05/24/07) P. C1; Abate, Tom
A Public Policy Institute of California report says that California's
shortage of college-educated workers could slow the state's economic growth
unless more residents finish college or employers are allowed to import
more foreign talent. The report supports the case of high-tech employers
who argue that Congress needs to redesign the nation's immigration laws to
allow more college-educated foreigners to obtain H-1B visas so they can
work in the country for up to six years. However, University of California
at Davis computer science professor Norman Matloff, an outspoken H-1B visa
critic, says the study is flawed because it automatically accepts the idea
of a labor shortage without considering his counter-argument that employers
would prefer to hire younger, inexpensive college-graduates than older,
more experienced, and more expensive tech workers. As more tech companies
form in other parts of the country, California has become increasingly
unable to rely on domestic migration to boost its ranks of college
graduates and has been forced to rely on educated workers from abroad. For
instance, the report notes that in 1960, only 8 percent of college-educated
California residents came from other countries, but by 2005 that number
increased to 31 percent. Meanwhile, the percentage of jobs that will
require a college degree is expected to increase. In 2005, of the 15.1
million jobs in California, only 31 percent required a bachelor's degree or
higher, but by 2025 about 41 percent of the state's projected 19.7 million
jobs will require at least a bachelor's degree. Abdi Soltani, executive
director of the nonprofit Campaign for College Opportunity, says the report
should provoke California to refocus its efforts to help young people and
their families, particularly from minority groups, be more aware of the
benefits of a college education and the availability of financial aid.
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New Approach to Fixing Spreadsheet Errors Could Save
Billions
Oregon State University News (05/24/07)
Oregon State University computer scientists have developed GoalDebug, a
new, simpler method to fix errors in spreadsheets that could potentially
help businesses around the world reduce errors and save billions of
dollars. GoalDebug, short for "Goal Directed Debugging of Spreadsheets,"
enables non-specialists to identify and fix a problem by selecting from a
list of suggestions. An estimated 11 million people in the United States
create about 100 million spreadsheets a year, but experts say they are
notorious for containing errors. "Most users of spreadsheets are
overconfident, they believe that the data is correct," says OSU associate
professor of computer science Martin Erwig. "But it has been observed that
up to 90 percent of the spreadsheets being used have non-trivial errors in
them." Erwig says part of the problem is that so many spreadsheet users
have very limited training or interest in computer software programming and
simply want, and expect, the program to work. "There are dozens of places
an error can be made," he says. "And these errors can be awfully difficult
to spot, especially with large spreadsheet that have thousands of cells."
GoalDebug attempts to identify the most common human mistakes and then
suggests what the correct approach might have been. A study performed by
recent OSU doctoral graduate Robin Abraham found that in 80 percent of the
cases, the needed change was one of the top five suggestions made by
GoalDebug, and in 72 percent of the cases the correct solution was one of
the top two suggestions. Erwig says the system gives users a prioritized
list of where the problem is most likely to be that allows people with
comparatively little training to identify and repair errors.
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Digital Showcase Touts Interdisciplinary
Innovation
UCLA Today (05/22/07) Lin, Judy
Students in the class of UCLA assistant professor of Germanic languages
Todd Presner are not limited to reading about Berlin in a traditional
textbook. Using Hypermedia Berlin, an Internet-based digital mapping
platform, the students can experience Berlin as it exists today, but also
travel back 800 years to take in the culture, language, and history in
which the city is rooted. Presner developed Hypermedia Berlin with the
help of an interdisciplinary team of geographers, urban planners,
architects, and computer scientists. Hypermedia Berlin represents one way
in which digital technology is being used creatively for teaching and
research at UCLA, and it was on display at the university's May 10 event
"Countries, Cultures, Communication: Digital Innovation at UCLA." More
than two dozen digital creations were showcased, and some 350 faculty,
staff, and students in attendance had an opportunity to test-drive the
Web-based applications. Other creations included video clips of
storytellers narrating "Arabian Knights," a visual simulation of The
World's Columbia Exposition of 1893, a Web site offering access to
resources that will help improve the lives of people with disabilities, the
Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative, and the California Land Opportunities
Tracking System. "This showcase presents the best of UCLA," said Vice
Chancellor Roberto Peccei, whose office was a host of the gathering. "It
is really interesting to see that digital innovation is not in one little
niche of the campus but is all over the place."
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NCSA Embarks on Diverse Projects With 17 Fellows
HPC Wire (05/21/07)
Seventeen researchers, 11 of whom are from the University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign, will be awarded fellowships from the National Center for
Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) to work on collaborative projects in
next-generation computers, petascale applications, and virtual world
design, among other areas. Roy Campbell from U of I's Computer Science
department and Guy Garnett from the School of Music plan to co-develop a
framework for generating 3D virtual environments for the sciences,
education, and the arts using NCSA's collaborative and cyber-environments
expertise. Caroline A. Haythornwaite of U of I's School of Library and
Information Sciences will partner with Michael Welge and Xavier Llora to
devise methods and tools to examine "communal conversation" produced
through email, chat, blogs, and bulletin boards. 2007 summer fellow
Yaohang Li of North Carolina A&T State University plans to enhance the
resolution of computationally predicted protein structures in collaboration
with NCSA's Rick Kufrin and Eric Jakobsson, while analysis of the recently
sequenced honeybee genome to uncover molecular clues of the insect's social
behavior will be the focus of U of I's Saurabh Sinha. He will be aided by
NCSA in the adaptation of genomics tools to exploit cluster and grid
computing systems, while the center will also supply expertise in data
management and analysis. "NCSA's fellowships enable researchers to address
their most challenging research questions with the assistance of our expert
staff and the benefit of our expertise in information technology,
high-performance computing, data analysis, and other critical areas," noted
NCSA director Thom Dunning. "Our mission is to advance discovery by
empowering our collaborators."
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Can Cyborg Moths Bring Down Terrorists?
Times Online (UK) (05/24/07) Bebber, David
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is funding research that
seeks to raise moths that can be remotely controlled to spy on enemies
inconspicuously. A computer chip implanted in the moth while it is a pupa,
in the cocoon, will allow the moth's entire nervous system to be controlled
remotely. If successful, the moth would fly into enemy training camps and
bases undetected and send video and other information back to a control
center. Rodney Brooks, director of the computer science and artificial
intelligence lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which
participates in the research, says U.S. military research has increasingly
focused on robotics, and the remote-controlled moths are one of a number of
new technologies that will soon be utilized in combat zones. "This is
going to happen," Brooks says. "It's not science like developing the
nuclear bomb, which costs billions of dollars. It can be done relatively
cheaply." Brooks says previous experiments have used simple animals, such
as rats and cockroaches, that can be remotely controlled, but this is the
first time the chip was implanted during an animal's developmental stage
and "grown" inside the animal. Speaking at the University of Southampton's
School of Electronics and computer science, Brooks says debates over stem
cell research would "pale in comparison" to the increasingly blurred line
between creatures, including humans, and machines. "Biological engineering
is coming," Brooks says. "There's going to be more and more technology in
our bodies, and to stomp on all this technology and try to prevent it
happening is just? Well, there's going to be a lot of moral debates."
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Computer Viruses Invade SSU Class--on Purpose
Press Democrat (Santa Rosa, Calif.) (05/22/07) Halverson, Nathan
Sonoma State University (SSU) professor and former chair of the computer
science department George Ledin Jr. created a class that taught students
how to design and execute malicious programs that can take over a computer,
steal information, or cause the computer to erase vital information and
need a complete overhaul. Ledin believes that teaching students how to
write computer viruses will give them a better understanding of how
malicious programs are made and the knowledge needed to create better
defenses. The controversial class, which SSU officials call the first of
its kind in the nation, has drawn heavy criticism from members of the
computing community. Three security software development companies sent
SSU hostile letters, according to Ledin, and have pledged not to hire SSU
graduates. That threat did not stop 15 students from signing up for the
course. To prevent any malware created during the course from endangering
any computers on the Internet, all work was done in an isolated lab
disconnected from the network. Ledin acknowledged that there is a danger
that some student might maliciously release a virus, but like with other
academic fields that deal with dangerous and controversial material,
teachers must rely on the students' ethics. To help reinforce those
ethics, SSU assistant professor of philosophy John Sullins was added to the
course as a second instructor, and continuously reminded students of the
potential consequences. Ledin developed the idea for this class after
writing an editorial emphasizing the need for better education on malware
for an ACM publication. Ledin said that despite the criticism he plans to
teach the course again. "There is a perception that this is a taboo topic
and shouldn't be taught," Ledin said. "But if we are going to develop
better security, we need to know how these programs work."
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Moore's Law Meets Gore's Law
IDG News Service (05/23/07) Mullins, Robert
Intel researchers, speaking at In-Stat's Microprocessor Forum 2007 this
week in San Jose, said they can increase the performance of microprocessors
while reducing leaked, or wasted, electricity by adding a new layer to the
silicon. The technology supports Moore's law, but also takes into
consideration what is being called Gore's law, a concern for reducing
energy consumption to help reduce power use and carbon emissions. The new
chips use "high-k metal gate" instead of silicon dioxide, which provides
better insulation and reduces energy leakage. The high-k coating, which
will be used in Intel's upcoming 45-nm processor, code-named Penryn, is
expected to use 30 percent less power, operate 20 percent faster, and leak
five times less electricity than current 65-nm processors, said Intel
fellow Mark Bohr. Intel is also researching tera-computing, which involves
processors with as many as 80 cores. Tera-computing could increase the
ability to perform parallel processing, said Intel's director of tera-scale
computing research Jim Held. Held says the benefits of tera-computing are
still a ways off, however, and hinge on software and internal memory
development keeping pace. Advanced Micro Devices is also working on more
power-friendly technology by researching mobile processing platform
technology. AMD's Griffin processor features processors that power down
when not in use, according to AMD fellow Maurice Steinman. In-Stat
principal analyst Max Baron said such innovative technologies may end the
era of processors as commodity products, because the price for such
advanced technology is likely to increase beyond what the consumer is
willing to pay.
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IT: The Next Generation
Computing (05/24/07) Richards, Justin
A recent roundtable discussion organized by the British Computer Society
concluded that unless a greater effort is made to attract young people to
computing, and dispel the mechanical image that surrounds it, computing may
be unable to revolutionize some of the most important issues of the 21st
century, including environmental and social concerns, as it did for the
workplace and education only a few years ago. The discussion highlighted
how the infrastructure that surrounds most major aspects of work,
education, and government have shifted toward digital forms, but the
technology that surrounds us is considered mundane and unremarkable. The
panel also discussed the future of computing. As technology and wireless
networking continues to develop, computing will shift away from familiar
desktops, laptops, and PDAs and will become embedded into building
architecture, furniture, and daily routines, invisible but ever-present in
the fabric of everyday life. Human-computer interfaces will become more
blurred, as increasing numbers of people choose to have implants that can
assist them while traveling or act as payment systems. Over the next 50
years, new computing paradigms will emerge out of quantum physics and
biological computing. However, a significant potion of young talent will
not view technology as a fulfilling career path, primarily because they
believe the IT industry does not fulfill its promises.
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Globalization Has Made Software Development a National
Security Issue
Computerworld Australia (05/23/07) Rossi, Sandra
Software development has been transformed into a issue of national
security as a result of IT globalization, according to a warning from
former U.S. cybersecurity czar Andy Purdy. "Companies are looking for the
least expensive source of production, but there isn't enough concern about
the security of these networks and the data being stored on them," he
reported. "If the software is being developed in a part of the world that
poses a risk we need to address this." As special government employee on
the U.S. Department of Defense Science Board Task Force on Software
Assurance, Purdy is attempting to improve the quality of software and
broaden collaboration via a partnership between the public and private
sectors. At the AusCERT 2007 IT security conference, Purdy urged delegates
to support the U.S. Homeland Security Department's Software Assurance
Program, whose goal is to decrease software vulnerabilities through
international collaboration. He lauded software vendors for their
recognition of the software quality problem and their attempts to rectify
their development processes. Purdy commented that security must be
embedded in the software development lifecycle, and pointed out that the
Software Assurance Program focuses on the areas of people, processes,
technology, and acquisitions. The initiative's acquisitions component will
involve the release of guidelines for outsourcing and offshore software
development.
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DHS Publishes Sector-Specific Protection Plan for IT
Infrastructure
Computerworld (05/22/07) Vijayan, Jaikumar
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security this week released the Sector
Specific Plan (SSP) for IT, which outlines a number of actions that
technology companies and government entities can take to reduce the threat
of terrorism to the nation's IT infrastructure. The plan establishes
shared security goals and initiatives, describes roles and responsibilities
for stakeholders in the IT industry, and provides opportunities for
integrating public and private sector preparedness efforts and
technologies. The document also discusses strategies for preventing,
protecting, and responding to threats to the IT infrastructure; identifying
vulnerabilities; and analyzing and sharing threat information, data
recovery, and out-of-band data delivery. In addition, the SPP outlines a
plan for measuring progress and assigning responsibility for implementing
recommendations. "It's very much saying these are our challenges and
here's a set of action steps we need to take if we are to mitigate those
challenges," says John Sabo, president of the IT-Information Sharing and
Analysis Center (IT-ISAC), one of the entities that helped to develop the
SPP for IT. Sabo says it is important to ensure that the strategies
spelled out in the SPP are used.
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Usability Engg Professionals Grow in Pune
Financial Express (India) (05/22/07) Nair, Geeta
Usability experts in Pune view the Indian city as a potential center for
usability engineering, and are now holding discussions with universities to
add the emerging discipline to their curriculum. The number of usability
engineers has been growing in Pune, which is home to Persistent Systems,
whose usability engineering chief is Jhumkee Iyengar, who has a MS in Human
Factors Engineering from Tufts University. Persistent Systems' technical
manager of usability engineering is Samir Chabuksar, who earned the same
degree from Clemson University and spent six years in the United States
developing usable software interfaces. C-DAC's National Multimedia
Resource Center is in the city and Dr. Dinesh Katre heads the center's
Human Computer Interaction Design group, and Symantec has its User Centered
Design Group. Independent companies include Pure IT Group, which focuses
on usability in the Internet and telecom sectors, and Genesis Usability is
run by usability specialist and graphical user interface design consultant
Atul Manohar. Usability could account for 10 percent of the outsourced
product development market, says Chabuksar. Some 60,000 usability
professionals are needed, according to a Jacob Neilson survey. India has
about 1,000 usability professionals, but IDC and NID are not producing
enough graduates.
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Entering a New Dimension
T.H.E. Journal (05/07) Vol. 34, No. 5, P. 24; Starkman, Neal
Advanced display technology is expected to transform the classroom by
making keyboards a thing of the past through breakthrough interaction
techniques that allow people to manipulate information via finger and hand
movement. New York University research scientist Jeff Han is working on
"multi-touch interaction," while Andy Wilson of Microsoft Research is
focusing on a similar technology called TouchLight. Wilson says he
foresees a future in which "potentially any surface in the world is a site
of input and computation, and the very displays we use and spaces we
inhabit are aware of our presence." Thornburg Center director David
Thornburg is expecting 3D displays to supplant conventional computer
screens, because multicore processors will provide the parallel processing
needed to furnish affordable 3D displays. Thornburg even imagines a future
in which schools use androids of historical personages to educate students
through interaction. International Education Technology Associates CEO
Perry Reeves believes display projectors will become less costly, brighter,
and boast shorter throw distances. Toshiba has devised a new LCD panel
that uses low-temperature poly-silicon technology to function in both dark
indoor and bright outdoor environments. And Jim Phillips with Hitachi's
StarBoard Group identifies interactive whiteboards as a "huge growth area,"
and anticipates a movement toward pen interaction, backlit wireless
projection, larger screens, mobile panels, multiple inputs, and the merging
of distance learning and videoconferencing.
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