I have seen the future: it is flooded with email

I have been using electronic mail for years, first via Bitnet, then via the Internet. What do you do when you get email from someone you know? Delete it? No, of course not. You read it and you answer it. Therein lies my problem. Everyone is answering me! A few months ago, when I logged on, I had five or six messages each day. Now I log on to find 10 or 20 messages, all of them requiring a response. I suppose I could delete them, but friends are hard to find, so I find myself reading and responding to more and more messages-often on subjects I don't really care about. Everyone, it seems, feels it is better to send than to receive. Did Alvin Toffler warn us about this? I have had a vision of the future. In it, we live in a virtual-reality environment and we spend all our waking hours as employees of the US Electronic Postal Service. Wake me when it's over     

Rats, robots, and rescue

In early May, media inquiries started arriving at my office at the Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue (www.crasar.org). Because I'm CRASAR's director, I thought the press was calling to follow up on the recent humanitarian award given to the center's founder, John Blitch, for successfully using small, backpackable robots at the World Trade Center disaster. Instead, I found they were asking me to comment on the "roborats" study in the 2 May 2002 Nature. In this study, rats with medial force brain implants underwent operant conditioning to force them into a form of guided behavior, one aspect of which was thought useful for search and rescue. The article's closing comment suggested that a guided rat could serve as both a mobile robot and a biological sensor. Although a roboticist by training, I'm committed to any technology that will help save lives while reducing the risk to rescuers. But rats?.     

橘枳理论——论工业设计本土化

如今工业设计已成为企业在市场竞争中制胜的法宝,而我国的工业设计起步较晚,受重视不够,设计理念落后,对西方的盲目的拿来主义过于严重。本文主要谈论作为外来文化的工业设计在完成本土化的过程中所遇到的种种困难及本人的一些见解,唯望有识之士保持清醒,真正做一些切实的工作,为我国工业设计的崛起贡献自己的一份力量。     

Leverage your lessons [project management]

In today's fast-moving market, software project teams don't have time to make several attempts to meet a customer's requirements. Teams need to be smart about what they do learning from the experiences of colleagues within their own organization and in the industry. In short, teams need to take the time to do things as “right” as they can because they don't have time to do things over. Why do we often have to do things over? Why do we repeat the mistakes of the past? It's related to this: Insanity is doing things the same way we did them before, but expecting different results. It's hard for a team to get better at what it's doing if it doesn't think about its work and how to improve it. Some project teams do, in fact, think about how and why their projects worked. They gather and document lessons learned. Some teams share that information with others in their organization, and a few teams attempt to review what others have learned as they start a new project or new phase of a project. But many teams do none of this. They're the ones that encounter the same problems over and over again, attributing them to bad luck when, in fact, poor project learning and poor organizational learning are the underlying causes     

Why We Need Better Reporters to Solve Our Security Problems

I do not go to the media when I find out confidential information that I wish the world would understand. Instead, I write articles about the underlying issues we face and how I think they might be reasonably solved. And when the media occasionally seeks to talk to me about such issues, I tell them what I think but nothing specific about clients. That’s all part of my job, and I try to do it well.

The job of the media is to seek the truth and tell all of us about it. But the media in the United States seems to be so weak at seeking the truth that I am starting to understand why people seek them out to leak secrets. Unless you lead them by the nose to the thing that stinks, they do not seem to have the nose for news that they once did have.     

Interactive pop-up card design. 2

Pop-up cards are fun to create and receive. They're also a great output medium for computer graphics, offering an economic and compact way to show 3D scenes without the need for special glasses, shutters or any other electronic hardware. Two basic pop-up mechanisms - the single-slit and the V-fold - are the heart of my interactive pop-up design assistant, which I use to design cards on the computer that I then print out and assemble. Happily, these two mechanisms are also among the most general of all techniques used in pop-ups, since many of the other constructions are combinations of these mechanisms or variations on their geometry. Of course, a variety of pop-up mechanisms exist that aren't captured by those ideas. Happily, most of those are straightforward to design and create with special-purpose code and don't present the sort of design challenges that the slit and V-fold designs do     

The Computer Virus — From There to Here.: An Historical Perspective.

I was sitting at my desk in the Computer Centre of University College, Dublin, checking my E-mail. Suddenly, from the corner of my right eye, I detected an arm swooping down towards my keyboard, like an axe about to fell a tree. This was an arm with a mission. It removed my hand, which was just about to press ‘receive’ on an interesting looking E-mail involving a Christmas tree greeting. Of course, my better-informed colleague knew that this was the Christma Exec virus, and that I would not be doing myself, or anyone else, any favours by accepting and executing it. It was December 1987, and my very first introduction to the computer virus. My love affair with the subject has continued over the past thirteen years (although I do not claim to have a copy of The Little Black Book of Computer Viruses sitting on my bookshelf!), and like myself, the computer virus has evolved into a more complex and sophisticated entity.     

Embedded-system design plays catch-up

Embedded systems are becoming more prevalent, controlling systems from microwave ovens to the Mars Rover. They are also more complex, in part because of the availability of low-cost 32- and 64-bit processors. Companies sold 180 million 32- and 64-bit embedded processors in 1997-a 50% increase over the number sold in 1996. Embedded processors outsold general-purpose processors (the type in PCs) by 2 to 1 in 1997. Despite this rapid change, the design process lags behind: embedded system design is largely the same as it was 20 years ago, when 8-bit microcontrollers were the state of the art. The much heralded explosion of consumer products will be a major flop if design processes don't catch up. In addition, although design tools have improved in terms of doing what they do better, they are still generally the same tools performing the same functions. But this is hardly enough. The increased complexity and new features of applications mean that designers need tools that not only do better, but more     

Household hints for embedded systems designers

I spend a lot of time working on tools for embedded system design-hardware-software codesign, system scheduling, software optimization. I've worked on them because I think that good tools are important. They help make design tasks possible that would otherwise be impossible; they also help provide the discipline that produces working systems and minimizes working nights. But tools don't necessarily have to be complex or specially designed for embedded systems. just as you can use a screwdriver to open a can, you can adapt existing, everyday programs to new uses for embedded computing     

Configural displays can improve nutrition-related. decisions: an application of the proximity compatibility principle

The nutrition label format currently used by consumers to make dietary-related decisions presents significant information-processing demands for integration-based decisions; however, those demands were not considered as primary factors when the format was adopted. Labels designed in accordance with known principles of cognitive psychology might enhance the kind of decision making that food labeling was intended to facilitate. Three experiments were designed on the basis of the proximity compatibility principle (PCP) to investigate the relationship between nutrition label format and decision making; the experiments involved two types of integration decisions and one type of filtering decision. Based on the PCP, decision performance was measured to test the overall hypothesis that matched task-display tandems would result in better decision performance than would mismatched tandems. In each experiment, a statistically significant increase in mean decision performance was found when the display design was cognitively matched to the demands of the task. Combined, the results from all three experiments support the general hypothesis that task-display matching is a design principle that may enhance the utility of nutrition labeling in nutrition-related decision making. Actual or potential applications of this research include developing robust display solutions that aid in less effortful assimilation of nutrition-related information for consumers.     

When is two too many? [standards]

One statement often repeated in the standards world is that one standard is good, but two standards are bad. I've heard this statement lately, and take exception with it. I don't disagree that one standard is usually better than two or more, but that doesn't necessarily make two or more standards bad. Good examples of multiple standards that work are modem standards. There is the old, reliable 300-bps modem standard. I don't know about you, but I don't use it. I use the V.90 56-Kbps standard. In fact, there are many modem standards. If we didn't have many, we would still be using 300 bps. There are many other examples of multiple standards. But, you may say modem standards aren't a good example because each improves on the previous one     

Agile model driven development is good enough

I'm not all that sure about the direction that model-driven development appears to be taking. Don't get me wrong-I'm a firm believer in modeling. It's just that I think that there's a lot more to development than this. Here's my point: We need to distinguish between generative MDD and Agile MDD. Generative MDD, epitomized by the Object Management Group's Model Driven Architecture, is based on the idea that people will use very sophisticated modeling tools to create very sophisticated models that they can automatically "transform" with those tools to reflect the realities of various deployment platforms. Great theory-as was the idea that the world is flat. In my opinion, generative MDD is a lost cause for the current generation of developers. Agile MDD will be a struggle to pull off, but at least it has a chance of succeeding.     

Ambiguous Physiognomy

ABSTRACT

I know that all contemporary artists need a written introduction to their work, something that provides it with a bit of context. At best a narrative that portrays my work as the logical culmination of a personal journey, full of struggle and heroism. I sit here in front of my screen, trying to make a diverse artistic practice involving installations, video, performance, sculpture and online work out to be a single cohesive body of work. But below almost each of the words that I slowly type on the keyboard, a squiggly red line appears. It is as if the spell checker is determined to undermine the carefully constructed artistic persona that I am putting together from shows in and outside of institutions and other arts spaces. It is as if the computer is suggesting a potential drift through my own biography that opens the possibility that I could be writing a far more interesting text about my work than I am right now: a less regulated and smooth narrative of who I am as an artist, led by the associative structure of my spell checker’s software, rather than my own preconceived notions of who I am and what I do.     

Interactive pop-up card design. 1

Pop-up cards are fun to make and receive, and it's a pleasure to watch 3D shapes appear out of nowhere, jump up off the page, and reach for the sky. And as an output medium for 3D computer graphics, they're a perfect match; you get real 3D effects like perspective and parallax, and you don't even need special glasses or other hardware. I talk about the issues involved in designing and writing a pop-up design assistant. My goal in creating my assistant wasn't to create pop-up cards for viewing on the computer. The idea is to make it easier to design wonderful cards, which we can then construct and share in the real world. I talk about how pop-up cards work. I also cover some of the basic geometry behind the most fundamental form of pop up. This sets the stage for writing the program, which I discuss in part 2     

New Challenges for the New Year

You've heard from me in this space before, but this is my first column as IEEE Security & Privacy's editor in chief. I feel both honored and privileged to have the opportunity to assume this responsibility. George Cybenko, as both the driving force behind the magazine's creation and its EIC for the first four years, is a hard act to follow. But because he created such a strong base for the magazine, I'm hoping it won't be a difficult act to continue. You can expect the mix of articles, departments, and special issues on current topics to continue. You'll see some new names in the masthead as we replace those rotating off the editorial board; this is a normal process for all IEEE publications. We'll continue to strive for fresh and interesting material to keep you at the forefront of technology and issues in security and privacy.     

Possibilistic programming approach for fuzzy multidimensional analysis of preference in group decision making

Multiple attribute decision making (MADM) problems are the most encountered problems in decision making. Fuzziness is inherent in decision making process and linguistic variables are well suited to assessing an alternative on qualitative attributes using fuzzy rating. A few techniques in MADM assess the weights of attributes based on preference information on alternatives. But they are not practical any more when the set of all paired comparison judgments from decision makers (DMs) on attributes are not crisp and also we have to deal with fuzzy decision matrix. This paper investigates the generation of a possibilistic model for multidimensional analysis of preference (LINMAP). The model assesses the fuzzy weights as well as locating the ideal solution with fuzzy decision making preference on attributes and fuzzy decision matrix. All of the information is assumed as triangular fuzzy numbers (TFNs). This method is developed in group decision making environments and formulates the problem as a possibilistic programming with multiple objectives.     

YUTPA as a design tool for public participation

Engaging the public in decision-making processes is commonly accepted as an effective strategy for a better policy making, a better policy support and for narrowing the gap between government and the public. In today’s digitised society, participation via online media is becoming more important. But is this so-called e-participation being used optimally? Or is a better design possible? In my opinion, the answer to these questions is a ‘yes’. Despite numerous efforts in engaging the public with policy deliberation, the actual amount of participants remains low. In this article, I have used the YUTPA model (Nevejan 2009) to analyse some existing e-participation projects. Additionally, I derived ten characteristics of ‘play’ to make proposals for a more designerly e-participation approach.     

Is finding security holes a good idea?

Despite the large amount of effort that goes toward finding and patching security holes, the available data does not show a clear improvement in software quality as a result. This article aims to measure the effect of vulnerability finding. Any attempt to measure this kind of effect is inherently rough, depending as it does on imperfect data and several simplifying assumptions. Because I'm looking for evidence of usefulness, where possible, I bias such assumptions in favor of a positive result - explicitly calling out those assumptions biased in the opposite direction. Thus, the analysis in this article represents the best-case scenario, consistent with the data and my ability to analyze it, for the vulnerability finding's usefulness     

The effect of individual differences in working memory in older adults on performance with different degrees of automated technology

Abstract

A leading hypothesis to explain older adults’ overdependence on automation is age-related declines in working memory. However, it has not been empirically examined. The purpose of the current experiment was to examine how working memory affected performance with different degrees of automation in older adults. In contrast to the well-supported idea that higher degrees of automation, when the automation is correct, benefits performance but higher degrees of automation, when the automation fails, increasingly harms performance, older adults benefited from higher degrees of automation when the automation was correct but were not differentially harmed by automation failures. Surprisingly, working memory did not interact with degree of automation but did interact with automation correctness or failure. When automation was correct, older adults with higher working memory ability had better performance than those with lower abilities. But when automation was incorrect, all older adults, regardless of working memory ability, performed poorly.

Practitioner Summary: The design of automation intended for older adults should focus on ways of making the correctness of the automation apparent to the older user and suggest ways of helping them recover when it is malfunctioning.