Guest Editors' Introduction: Cross-Reality Environments

In this article, we define cross-reality as the union between ubiquitous sensor/actuator networks and shared online virtual worlds-a place where collective human perception meets the machines' view of pervasive computing. We describe how five of the articles in this issue expand on aspects of this theme.     

Event Processing Support for Cross-Reality Environments

Complex event processing (CEP) is an essential functionality for cross-reality environments. Through CEP, we can turn raw sensor data generated in the real world into more meaningful information that has some significance for the virtual world. In this article, the authors present DejaVu, a general-purpose event processing system built at ETH Zurich. SmartRFLib, a cross-reality application, builds on DejaVu and enables real-time event detection over RFID data streams feeding a virtual library on second life.     

Metaphor and Manifestation Cross-Reality with Ubiquitous Sensor/Actuator Networks

A series of projects by the MIT Media Lab's Responsive Environments Group explore ways of bridging the rapidly expanding reach of networked electronic sensors with the limited realm of human perception. These include various implementations of cross-reality which render and manifest phenomena between the real world and shared online virtual environments via densely embedded sensor and actuator networks. We visualize information from ubiquitously deployed real-world smart power strips and sensor-rich media portals at different levels of abstraction through analogous Second Life constructs. Conversely, we manifest virtual world events into physical space using on-platform actuators and displays. We also show a set of simpler 2D visualizations that enable mobile devices to efficiently browse and interact with sensor network data. We touch on a recently developed system that uses a small badge to passively manage dynamic privacy in environments such as these that stream potentially revealing information across the real/virtual divide. These technologies' application areas involve fluid browsing of and interaction with the geographically dispersed real world in an unconstrained virtual environment and ubiquitous multiscale telepresence.     

应用直接立面法与辅助心点量点法绘制透视图

摘 要：在“建筑阴影透视”课程教学中,量点法作建筑透视图的原理较复杂,而且在手工绘制量点法两点透视图时,经常遇到图幅过大造成灭点与视点落在图板之外（即不可达）而难以操作的情况。提出一种简便易行、有效利用有限图纸空间的方法：应用直接立面法与心点为辅助灭点综合的作图方法。如此,可以省略灭点,应用必然可达的心点和图板内的量点作图,还避免了学生容易将灭点和量点混淆的错误。并以基本立体和建筑群为例对该方法进行了应用和验证。结果显示,方法行之有效,值得推广应用。     

Building 3-D Visual Perception of a Mobile Robot Employing Extended Kalman Filter

The paper aims at designing a novel scheme for sensory data fusion by a mobile robot for reconstructing its 3-D world from their multiple gray images. Extended Kalman filter has been employed for determining the coordinates of the 3-D vertices and equation of the planes of the obstacles in the robot's workspace from their multiple images. The geometric relations among these 3-D planes are then determined by using a logic program for recognizing the obstacles. The time required for recognition of a typical planer obstacle such as a box on a Pentium-III client with 64 MB RAM and a Pioneer-2 type robot server including the time involvement for the motion of the robot around the obstacle is approximately 18 seconds.     

VisiDAQ结合BasicScript进行控制程序开发

以组态软件VisiDAQ在灭菌监控系统的实际应用为例,介绍了VisiDAQ结合BasicScript进行程序设计的几个例子,强调了该编程工具对VisiDAQ工控软件功能的增强与完善.     

Pitch Detection Enhancement Employing Music Prediction

Pitch detection methods are widely used for extracting musical data from digital signals. A review of those methods is presented in the paper. Since musical signals may contain noise and distortion, detection results can be erroneous. In this paper a new method employing music prediction to support pitch determination is introduced. This method was developed in order to override disadvantages of standard pitch detection algorithms. The new approach utilizes signal segmentation and pitch prediction based on musical knowledge extraction employing artificial neural networks. Signal segmentation allows for estimating the pitch for a single note as a whole, therefore suppressing errors in transient and decay phases. Pitch prediction helps correcting pitch estimation errors by tracking musical context of the analyzed signal. As it was shown in the experimental results, pitch estimation errors may be reduced by using both signal segmentation and music prediction techniques.     

Employing GPU architectures for permutation-based indexing

Multimedia Tools and Applications - Permutation-based indexing is one of the most popular techniques for the approximate nearest-neighbor search problem in high-dimensional spaces. Due to the...     

面向目标检测的高光谱图像压缩技术

提出了一种基于面向目标检测的高光谱图像压缩算法。该算法利用主成分分析对高光谱图像进行降维,引入虚拟维数对高光谱图像的本征维数进行估计,在估计结果基础上确定降维后的主成分数,并采用SPIHT算法对保留的主成分进行有损压缩。同时,虚拟维数可以实现对图像中端元数目的有效估计,继而采用基于无监督正交子空间投影的端元提取算法提取各目标端元,利用算术编码对目标端元的位置进行无损压缩,解码端可以利用获得的端元位置信息对解压缩后的主成分进行目标检测。实验结果表明,该算法在获得较高压缩性能的同时,能够有效检测出图像中的目标信息。     

Employing subgroup evolution for irregular-shape nesting

This paper introduces a new method to solve the irregular-shape, full-rotation nesting problem by a genetic algorithm. Layout patterns are evolved in hierarchical subgroups to facilitate the search for an optimal solution in such a complex solution space. The genotype used in the genetic algorithm contains both the sequence and rotation for each shape, requiring new genetic operators to manipulate a multi-type genetic representation. A lower-left placement heuristic coupled with matrix encoding of the shapes and plate prevents overlap and constrains the solution space to valid solutions. This new method is able to efficiently search the solution space for large problems involving complex shapes with 360 degrees of freedom. The algorithm generates better solutions than previously published evolutionary methods.     

Industrial Robot Navigation and Obstacle Avoidance Employing Fuzzy Logic

This paper proposes a novel conceptual approach based on fuzzy logic to solve the local navigation and obstacle avoidance problem for industrial 3-dof robotic manipulators. The proposed system is divided into separate fuzzy units, which control individually each manipulator link. The fuzzy rule-base of each unit combines a repelling influence, which is related to the distance between the manipulator and the nearby obstacles, with the attracting influence produced by the angular difference, between the actual and the final manipulator configuration, to generate a new actuating command for each link. It can be considered as an on-line local navigation method for the generation of instantaneous collision-free trajectories. The strategy has been successfully applied to manipulators in different simulated workspace environments providing collision-free paths. Some of the simulation results obtained are included.     

语义信息与CRF结合的汉语功能块自动识别

为了构建汉语功能块自动识别系统,该文利用条件随机域模型对经过正确词语切分和词性标注处理的汉语句子进行功能块边界识别和功能信息标注处理,通过在特征提取阶段优化组合丰富的上下文特征,得到功能块识别的精确率、召回率和F1-measure值分别为85.84%、85.07%和85.45%。在此基础上,该文引入由词义聚合关系将汉语单词组织起来的《同义词词林》作为语义资源,把其中的语义信息作为特征加入到功能块的识别过程,缓解了数据稀疏以及歧义问题对识别结果造成的影响,使得上述三个性能指标分别提高到86.21%、85.31%和85.76%。     

Cost-Efficient Traffic Aggregation Employing Cross-Layer Shared Protection

Shared protection/restoration is a promising solution for reducing protection resources and is supported at each layer of the current multi-layer networks. Software-defined networking is expected to reduce equipment cost as well as operational cost by orchestrating these shared protection functionalities. However, although protection resource sharing improves link utilization, it sometimes increases the required equipment. Meanwhile, traffic re-aggregation at each layer is an important technique for low volume traffic to utilize the underlying link capacity more efficiently, but re-aggregation also makes it difficult to share protection resources with traffic at lower layers. In this paper, we present multi-layer network design strategy and method that reduce equipment cost by means of both traffic re-aggregation at each layer and protection resource sharing among multiple service traffic at different layers. The strategy first prioritizes traffic re-aggregation at each layer, and then maximally delegates shared protection to lower layers as long as it does not increase the required capacity at the lower layer. Evaluation results from the example three-layer networks confirm that the proposed method can effectively reduce equipment cost compared to the conventional design method. Cost reduction is achieved by leveraging shared protection functions at multiple layers.     

运用DH-EKE增强WTLS握手协议的安全性

WTLS握手协议不满足前向安全性,非匿名验证模式下不满足用户匿名性,完全匿名模式下易遭受中间人攻击.DH-EKE协议具有认证的密钥协商功能,将改进的DH-EKE集成到WTLS握手协议中,只需使用可记忆的用户口令,不需使用鉴权证书及数字签名.该方案适用于完全匿名的验证模式,可抵御中间人攻击和字典式攻击,且在服务器中不直接存储口令,攻击者即使攻破服务器获得口令文件也无法冒充用户,能够在WTLS握手协议中实现简单身份认证和安全密钥交换.     

C++Builder与MATLAB/SIMULINK的接口

MATLAB／SIMULINK由于其丰富的工具箱,开放的可扩展环境,作为系统仿真计算软件被世界上绝大部分的工程技术和研究人员所喜爱。但开发者在实际应用中往往会发现MATLAB／SIMULINK应用程序的用户界面设计是那么地困难!为了给MATLAB模块程序配置通用友好的用户界面,并结合C Builder界面设计灵活且交互性强的特点及MATLAB快速的矩阵计算和卓越的数值可视化能力,该文提出了利用MATLAB Engine来作为C Builder程序与SIMULINK数据通讯的载体,进而实现对MATLAB／SIMULINK的完全操纵。利用这一方法,作者开发了异步电机起动／发电仿真系统的界面,成功地进行了系统的仿真运行,并取得了良好的预期效果。     

Employing transport layer multi-railing in cluster networks

Building clusters from commodity off-the-shelf parts is a well-established technique for building inexpensive medium- to large-size computing clusters. Many commodity mid-range motherboards come with multiple Gigabit Ethernet interfaces, and the low cost per port for Gigabit Ethernet makes switches inexpensive as well. Our objective in this work is to take advantage of multiple inexpensive Gigabit network cards and Ethernet switches to enhance the communication and reliability performance of a cluster. Unlike previous approaches that take advantage of multiple network connections for multi-railing, we consider CMT (Concurrent Multipath Transfer) that extends SCTP (Stream Control Transmission Protocol), a transport protocol developed by the IETF, to make use of the multiple paths that exist between two hosts. In this work, we explore the applicability of CMT in the transport layer of the network stack to high-performance computing environments. We develop SCTP-based MPI (Message Passing Interface) middleware for MPICH2 and Open MPI, and evaluate the reliability and communication performance of the system. Using Open MPI with support for message striping over multiple paths at the middleware level, we compare the differences in supporting multi-railing in the middleware versus at the transport layer.     

Fluorescence Array Scanner Employing a Flying Objective

DNA-based fluorescent microarrays (sometimes called “biochips”) are fast becoming the preferred tool for studying a variety of complex biochemical phenomena ranging from multiplex mutation detection, to gene mapping and expression monitoring, to high throughput screening for new drug candidates. Fluorescence is a low energy phenomenon. The need for rapid, high resolution, wide field imaging of fluorescent microarrays calls for a specialized microscope architecture. We now describe the design of a “Flying Objective” epi-fluorescence microscope that is ideally suited to this application, and compare the performance of this novel instrument with two other commercial epi-fluorescence microscopes designed to read DNA microarrays.     

“复制”的使用技巧

本文通过对广义的复制即复制、阵列复制、镜像复制、偏移复制以及具有复制功能的块操作等的比较分析，介绍各种复制方法的使用。     

一种综合考虑主客观权重的Web服务QoS度量算法

已有的Web服务QoS(quality of service)度量方法由于无法对用户偏好的模糊性予以准确量化,以及对候选服务 QoS 属性数据分布特征的忽视,导致其度量结果不准确。为此,提出了一种综合考虑主客观权重的 Web 服务QoS 度量算法。该算法利用自适应用户偏好的主观权重计算方法和服务潜能保障的客观权重计算方法,从主观和客观两个角度进行QoS度量,以保障度量结果在符合用户偏好的基础上能够准确地反映服务的整体性能。理论分析和基于QWS真实数据集的实验结果表明,所提出的方法能够准确地获得Web服务QoS的度量结果。