This study focused on three different menu designs each with their own unique interactions and organizational structures to determine which design features would perform the best. Fifty-four participants completed 27 tasks using each of the three designs. The menus were analyzed based on task performance, accuracy, usability, intuitiveness, and user preference. Also, an analysis was conducted between two different menu organization styles: top-down menu organization (Method-TD) and bottom-up organization (Method-BU). There was no evidence that demographic factors had any effect on the overall results. By and large, the Stacked menu design received very positive results and feedback from all the participants. The Spatial design received average feedback with some participants preferring it while others struggled to use it and felt that it was too physically demanding. The worst performer was the Radial design that consistently ranked last and failed to pass usability and accuracy tests. A NGOMSL study was conducted to determine any differences in performance between a top-down menu organizational approach and a bottom-up approach or differences between the predicted task completion times and the reported times. The results of this study predicted that the Spatial design should have taken the least amount of time to perform, however, the experimental results showed that the Stacked design in fact out-performed the Spatial design’s task completion times. A potential explanation as to why the Stacked outperformed the Spatial is the increased physical demand of the Spatial design not anticipated with the NGOMSL analysis because of a design feature which caused a high level of cumbersomeness with the interactions. Overall, there were no statistical differences found between Method-TD and Method-BU, but a large difference found between the predicted times and observed times for Stacked, Radial, and Spatial. Participants overwhelmingly performed better than the predicted completion times for the Stacked design, but then did not complete the tasks by the predicted times for the Radial and Spatial. This study recommends the Stacked menu for VR environments and proposes further research into a Stacked-Spatial hybrid design to allow for the participant’s preferred design aspects of both designs to be used in a VR environment.

This research report gives a general description of virtual memory systems. The mechanisms and policies and their effect on the operation and efficiency of virtual memory are explained. A virtual memory using a real time virtual address decoder, to decode a 32 bits of virtual address for the secondary memory to obtain the primary address location discussed. The decoder is developed with the use of associative or content-addressable memories. Replacement algorithms, used for selecting the pages of the main memory to be replaced, are described. The hardware implementation of the least recently used and least often used replacement policies using associative memories is presented.

Within each of us, there exists a need to be connected with others. The need to belong to someone or something is integral to whom we are as God's creation. In this search to be connected, youth are usually known to be the first on the scene to access the new technologies that bring them closer in touch with each other. Historically, youth have embraced the telephone, the television and the radio, among other various technologies. In the past decade there has been a monumental shift in the way people communicate with each other. With the revolution of the Internet and its related technologies, youth are able to extend their friendship circles far beyond the borders of culture, time and economy. This dissertation is an examination of the responses of231 Canadian youth (aged 13 to 23) and their thoughts about the characteristics of virtual community on the Internet as a means of initiating, cultivating and maintaining relationships. Reginald Bibby and Donald Posterski in their seminal work with Project Teen Canada in the early 1980's determined there had been a shift in values from teens highly valuing family and other significant relationships to developing a high value for peers and friends. One of the purposes of this work is to examine the extension of those significant friendships and relationships through the exploding popularity of the Internet. The qualities of community will be examined both from sociological and theological viewpoints. One of the questions in this study is: "Can the Internet provide a forum for authentic Christian community?". Or is it glorified technology that is merely a continuing step in our evolution as a society of communicators? / Dissertation / Doctor of Ministry (DMin)

In this thesis, we study alternating virtual knots. We show the Alexander polynomial of an almost classical alternating knot is alternating. We give a characterization theorem for alternating knots in terms of Goeritz matrices. We prove any reduced alternating diagram has minimal genus, and use this to prove the frst Tait Conjecture for virtual knots, namely any reduced diagram of an alternating virtual knot has minimal crossing number. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

No / The article surveys virtual humans and techniques to control the face and body. It also covers higher level interfaces for direct speech input and issues of real-time control.

<p dir="ltr">This study talks about the use of Nanite in Unreal Engine 5.3 in a VR environment and evaluates its impact on scene performance and image quality. Through experimental studies, it was found that Nanite significantly reduced the number of triangles and draw calls for complex scenes. However, Nanite may have caused FPS drops and excessive GPU load, limiting its application areas. Additionally, as a prior condition for Nanite, disabling forward shading reduces performance even though it has positive impacts on graphic quality. The results show that Nanite may have potential in VR environments but requires further optimization to improve its performance. Future research should focus on new optimization methods and expand the use of Nanite in different fields while hardware technology improves.</p>

No / PANIVE (PC-based Architecture Networked Interactive Virtual Environments) is an extensible architecture in which various networked virtual environment applications can be realized. This chapter describes our efforts in realizing applications in the area of “3D virtual community building”, in which people can virtually meet each other, speak to each other, interact with each other, etc. in a virtual equivalent of conventional social communities. The overall architecture will be discussed briefly. Some attention will be given to the realization of the audio component in the system (speech input and 3D sound output) that supports intuitive interaction among the participants in a shared virtual environment. The main part of the chapter discusses and illustrates some demonstrative example applications that highlight the potential for realizing 3D networked virtual communities in the architecture.

Due to the increased popularity of virtual environment (VE) technology and its potential to develop further technological advances in many fields, considerable research is being done in this area. Nevertheless, VE technology, due to its very nature, depends very strongly on its human user. One of the biggest drawbacks of VE technology today is the health and safety concerns it presents to users. Many VE users experience motion sickness and other aftereffects. In addition, the human body reacts to-these disturbances by adapting to the VE, returning an individual that has learned maladaptive behavior. This is a big concern due to potential health and safety risks. Thus, there is potential to develop effective. measurement techniques that measure changes in visuomotor functioning, such as the kinesthetic position sense (i.e., eye-hand coordination), to gauge VE aftereffects. This research project consists of identifying and testing an objective measurement algorithm that may determine changes in eye-hand coordination by evaluating an individual's pointing ability before and after VE exposure. In order to obtain an effective measurement technique, methods that have proven to quantitatively characterize the nature of pointing behavior and, therefore, provide a measure of kinesthetic position sense, as well as other proposed methods, were investigated. These methods included pointing accuracy in the X, Y and Z directions, difference between identity and experimental touch, the total distance, and the average pointing error. Data gathered from an experiment was analyzed in order to obtain a measurement technique that demonstrates reliability and sensitivity . The results from this study suggested that when measuring changes in proprioceptive functioning due to VE exposure, an individual's exact coordinate location in X, Y and Z dimensions with eyes open conditions (visual feedback) should be measured since, compared to other measurement techniques, this method provides more reliability and sensitivity to changes in proprioceptive functioning.

Virtual enterprises are increasingly being used as an organizational strategy for meeting customer needs. Potential benefits of virtual enterprises include increased profits, flexibility, increased customer service, better quality, a quicker time to market, and access to larger markets. However, the brokers that organize these ventures face challenges that arise in five key management activities: select partners, develop communication, develop culture, develop trust, and enhance behavior through motivation. A broker?s ability to overcome the problems in these activities determines the degree to which the benefits are achieved. Examples in the literature point to the possibility that interactive relationships exist between the five management activities. Considering all of these possible associations leads to a complex web of relationships that makes it difficult to determine the overall impact of specific improvements. This research investigates the five management activities and defines the primary relationships between them. The primary relationships are used to develop a conceptual model that brokers can apply as a methodology for systematically developing a virtual enterprise and thereby proactively addressing potential problems. In developing the conceptual model, this research utilizes approaches from other disciplines for addressing similar problems. The application of these approaches results in the use of systems engineering concepts to plan and design a virtual enterprise, the development of a partner selection methodology that incorporates ideas from the supplier performance measurement literature, the development of a pre-partner cultural assessment and post-partner cultural development process that are based on ideas found in the literature on mergers, and the use of project management as a means for coordinating the activities in a virtual enterprise. In addition to the preceding contributions, this research provides a comprehensive view of the characteristics of virtual enterprises. Included in these provisions are a detailed definition process and an extension of the literature to establish a typology of virtual enterprises.

The changing world of work that we live in is characterised by forming part of globalisation and virtualness. The previous era managers focused on how to make money and how this money can work for them. The changing world of work is characterised by global competitiveness in delivering quality products quicker and cheaper. Globalisation presents continuous advancements in technology, which requires a new mindset. These technological advancements have a profound effect on culture, training and management of staff. This brings about change in flexible working arrangements and the traditional office made space within certain organisations for virtual offices. The move towards virtualness causes companies to work more closely with their customers to be able to coordinate rapid changes in products (Schuh, Millarg & Gorannson, 1998; Weissenfeld, Fisscher, Pearson & Brockhoff, 200 1). The financial institution referred to in this study was also driven by globalisation and technological advancements to re-engineer the current way in which they do business. It became evidently clear that there was a need for a shift towards virtualness, which called for the identifying of relevant competencies; needed by employees for working in a virtual environment. These competencies will enable the organisation to select the right employees and provide them with information that could be utilised in training the current virtual employees according to the competencies identified. The objectives of this research were firstly to conduct a job analysis to determine the important competencies needed by virtual workers, in a specific job at a financial institution in South Africa. Secondly to compare the current competencies of the virtual workers (who took part in the research) with the competencies identified by the job analysis to be important for this specific job. Thirdly to determine the skills required for virtual workers and compare these skills with the skills ranked by the current virtual workers to be important. Fourthly to identify how these virtual workers experienced the effect of virtualness on their performance. Lastly to make recommendations regarding future training and selection purposes. A survey design (cross-sectional) was used to determine competencies needed by virtual workers for a specific job at a financial institution in South Africa. The study population consisted of (N= 71) employees in a virtual job at a financial institution in South Africa. The Work Profile Systems (WPS), Occupational Personality Questionnaire (OPQ), Performance Assessment Questionnaire (PAQ) and a Skills Audit (SA) were administered. Results of the research indicated that 44% of the study population exhibits the competencies needed by virtual workers as indicated by the Inventory of Management Competencies (IMC) Profile of the WPS. The results of the Performance Assessment Questionnaire (PAQ) indicated that the current virtual workers experienced the greatest impact of virtualness on improving the attainment of personal goals, as well as improving the achievement of organisational goals. The results from the Skills Audit (SA) identified skills that were essential for virtual workers in a specific job within a virtual environment, according to the feedback received from the current virtual workers. They compared favourably with the skills identified by literature as being important. Recommendations to the organisation and for future research have been made and limitations were also discussed. / Thesis (M.A. (Industrial Psychology))--North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2005.