My Interior Design practicum is an inquiry about the nature of urban informality through the study of present and emerging urban vernaculars within Kambi Moto, an informal area in Nairobi Kenya. I argue that unique vernacular characteristics manifest in everyday living and can be captured through the experience and knowledge of self-builders, entrepreneurs and dwellers within informal settlements. An understanding of these vernacular characteristics is instrumental in the designing of meaningful and effective social housing prototypes. The main methods used to document vernacular characteristics include, post occupancy evaluations (POEs), time diaries, photographs and observation. Within an interior design context, these tools helped describe the spatial needs, wants and desires of the everyday dwellers of Kambi Moto. The four resulting compact housing configurations support one-to-ten member households with provisions for a home-based business (HBB) or a rental unit. All units have an adaptable rooftop with a garden.

Un équipement portable moderne intègre plusieurs capteurs d'image qui peuvent être de différents types. On peut citer en guise d'exemple un capteur couleur, un capteur infrarouge ou un capteur basse lumière. Cet équipement doit alors supporter différentes sources qui peuvent être hétérogènes en terme de résolution, de granularité de pixels et de fréquence d'émission des images. Cette tendance à multiplier les capteurs, est motivée par des besoins applicatifs dans un but de complémentarité en sensibilité (fusion des images), en position (panoramique) ou en champ de vision. Le système doit par conséquent être capable de supporter des applications de plus en plus complexes et variées, nécessitant d'utiliser une seule ou plusieurs sources d'image. Du fait de cette variété de fonctionnalités embarquées, le système électronique doit pouvoir s'adapter constamment pour garantir des performances en terme de latence et de temps de traitement en fonction des applications, tout en respectant des contraintes d'encombrement.% Même si depuis de nombreuses années, un grand nombre de solutions architecturales ont été proposées pour améliorer l'adaptabilité des unités de calcul, un problème majeur persiste au niveau du réseau d'interconnexion qui n'est pas suffisamment adaptable, en particulier pour le transfert des flux de pixels et l'accès aux données. Nous proposons dans cette thèse un nouveau réseau de communication sur puce (NoC) pour un SoC dédié à la vision. Ce réseau permet de gérer dynamiquement différents types de flux en parallèle en auto-adaptant le chemin de donnée entre les unités de calcul, afin d'exécuter de manière efficace différentes applications. La proposition d'une nouvelle structure de paquets de données, facilite les mécanismes d'adaptation du système grâce à la combinaison d'instructions et de données à traiter dans un même paquet. Nous proposons également un système de mémorisation de trames à adressage indirecte, capable de gérer dynamiquement plusieurs trames image de différentes sources d'image. Cet adressage indirect est réalisé par l'intermédiaire d'une couche d'abstraction matérielle qui se charge de traduire des requêtes de lecture et d'écriture, réalisées suivant des indicateurs de la trame requise (source de l'image, indice temporel et dernière opération effectuée). Afin de valider notre proposition, nous définissons une nouvelle architecture, appelée Multi Data Flow Ring (MDFR) basée sur notre réseau avec une topologie en anneau. Les performances de cette architecture, en temps et en surface, ont été évaluées dans le cadre d'une implémentation sur une cible FPGA

My Interior Design practicum is an inquiry about the nature of urban informality through the study of present and emerging urban vernaculars within Kambi Moto, an informal area in Nairobi Kenya. I argue that unique vernacular characteristics manifest in everyday living and can be captured through the experience and knowledge of self-builders, entrepreneurs and dwellers within informal settlements. An understanding of these vernacular characteristics is instrumental in the designing of meaningful and effective social housing prototypes. The main methods used to document vernacular characteristics include, post occupancy evaluations (POEs), time diaries, photographs and observation. Within an interior design context, these tools helped describe the spatial needs, wants and desires of the everyday dwellers of Kambi Moto. The four resulting compact housing configurations support one-to-ten member households with provisions for a home-based business (HBB) or a rental unit. All units have an adaptable rooftop with a garden.

The purpose of this study was to develop a list of usability guidelines, i.e. a usability checklist, which can assist in evaluating the usability of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) user interfaces. Interviews were conducted to help understand their context of use and to find design focus points for the evaluation of MOOCs interface. These design focus points were then inspected for usability issues with Jakob Nielsen’s usability inspection method - heuristic evaluation - using author’s own set of 10 usability heuristics. The study reveals two main findings. Firstly, the context of use of MOOCs differs from a regular university course in the manner of how users perceive and approach them. And secondly, the usability checklist has to be adaptable and up-to-date in order to support the constant change of context of use of MOOCs. The combination of both findings is what makes this study not just another checklist, but a valid contribution to the understanding of MOOCs and the research field in HCI.

The increasing use of model-driven software development has renewed emphasis on using domain-specific models during application development. More specifically, there has been emphasis on using domain-specific modeling languages (DSMLs) to capture user-specified requirements when creating applications. The current approach to realizing these applications is to translate DSML models into source code using several model-to-model and model-to-code transformations. This approach is still dependent on the underlying source code representation and only raises the level of abstraction during development. Experience has shown that developers will many times be required to manually modify the generated source code, which can be error-prone and time consuming. An alternative to the aforementioned approach involves using an interpreted domain-specific modeling language (i-DSML) whose models can be directly executed using a Domain Specific Virtual Machine (DSVM). Direct execution of i-DSML models require a semantically rich platform that reduces the gap between the application models and the underlying services required to realize the application. One layer in this platform is the domain-specific middleware that is responsible for the management and delivery of services in the specific domain. In this dissertation, we investigated the problem of designing the domain-specific middleware of the DSVM to facilitate the bifurcation of the semantics of the domain and the model of execution (MoE) while supporting runtime adaptation and validation. We approached our investigation by seeking solutions to the following sub-problems: (1) How can the domain-specific knowledge (DSK) semantics be separated from the MoE for a given domain? (2) How do we define a generic model of execution (GMoE) of the middleware so that it is adaptable and realizes DSK operations to support delivery of services? (3) How do we validate the realization of DSK operations at runtime? Our research into the domain-specific middleware was done using an i-DSML for the user-centric communication domain, Communication Modeling Language (CML), and for microgrid energy management domain, Microgrid Modeling Language (MGridML). We have successfully developed a methodology to separate the DSK and GMoE of the middleware of a DSVM that supports specialization for a given domain, and is able to perform adaptation and validation at runtime.

Inom Sverige flyttade 1,6 miljoner människor år 2020 varav 60 000 av flyttarna skeddeinom samma fastighet. Genom att utveckla bostäder och göra dem anpassningsbara går det enklare att möta människors behov vid val av bostäder. Genom att utforma bostäder med fokus på arkitektoniska kvalitéer och anpassningsbarhet går det att bidra till och stödja social hållbarhet. Syftet med arbetet är att utforma anpassningsbara planlösningar för ett flerbostadshus med målet att bidra till ökad social hållbarhet, samt att redogöra för vad som kan bidra till en socialt hållbar bostad. Syftet uppnåddes genom att göra en fallstudie och projektera för planlösningar utifrån de teoretiska utgångspunkterna.En planlösning som kan stödja social hållbarhet ska möta de boendes behov. Genom anpassningsbarhet går det att möta behov vid förändrade familjesituationer och olika faser i livet. Att smidigt kunna få ett extra rum eller få bort ett rum som ej används till en behövande granne stödjer social hållbarhet i byggnaden. De arkitektoniska aspekternasom planlösningarna utformas efter berör den inre miljön i lägenheterna. Genom att jobba med ljus via fönsterplacering och axialitet, rumsorganisation, rörelser, omslutenhet, tillgänglighet och trygghet går det bidra till social hållbarhet. Individens välbefinnande har också haft en central roll i projekteringen och även det kan stödjas utifrån aspekterna studien arbetar omkring. En viktig faktor i social hållbarhet är social interaktion, att utforma en byggnad där hänsyn tas till sociala interaktioner stödjer social hållbarhet. Arbetet begränsas till flerbostadshuset och berör därför inte området runt bostaden. Gemensamma ytor finns ofta belägna runt om huset, en gemensam yta bidrar till sociala interaktioner men kan vara svårt att få plats med inuti ett flerbostadshus utan att ta yta från lägenheterna, att använda flerbostadshusets tak till en gemensam yta medför att lägenhetsstorlekarna inte blir beroende av ytan den gemensamma ytan tar.Social hållbarhet är ett komplext ämne, förslaget studien har arbetat fram är ett av många förslag på vad social hållbarhet i en planlösning kan innebära. Resultatet av studien visar att flera olika aspekter har betydelse när det handlar om social hållbarhet, flera av aspekterna går att koppla till varandra, ljus är hälsofrämjande och samspelar med axialitet som leder till trygghet via naturlig övervakning. Att utforma anpassningsbara flerbostadshus stödjer också social hållbarhet ur ett längre perspektiv, möjligheten att möta människors behov och marknadens efterfrågan blir enklare med ett anpassningsbart flerbostadshus. Social hållbarhet är ett ämne för framtida forskning och studien visar ett resultat som går att arbeta vidare på. / The purpose of the work is to design adaptable floor plans for an apartment building with the goal of contributing to increased social sustainability. And explain what can contribute to a socially sustainable home.The result shows that there are several aspects to consider in social sustainability. The study has chosen to focus on aspects related to the floor plan. The surroundings and location of the apartment building have therefore not been studied. By working with aspects such as light, axiality, room organization, immersion, adaptability, security, movements and accessibility, it is possible to contribute to social sustainability. Customizable floor plans can be designed in different ways, the study's proposal describes floor plans that are adapted between the different apartments to change the area of the apartments and the availability of an extra or fewer room. To support social sustainability, residents' needs need to be met.The difficulty with the study is that social sustainability is a complex subject and linking it to a single floor plan makes the work more difficult than if the environment and location had been included. What is considered socially sustainable and what needs tomeet can be subjective.

Tato práce pojednává o návrhu architektury systému pro řízení podnikových procesů, který je schopen reagovat i na měnící se kontext již běžících procesů. Architektura systému je navržena tak, aby systém byl schopen měnit jednotlivé fragmenty procesů dle aktuálního kontextu. Tímto zajišťuje i řízení přeplánování procesu, při čemž využívá k rozhodování optimální varianty historická data po řízená vlastním během systému.

Background: The victimization of children has been a prevalent issue long before the emergence of social media. The rapid development of the world wide web during the last decades has created more ways to get access to anyone anywhere at any time. This has brought along a yearly increase in the number of children who are abused online with the help of technological devices. So far, the existing research in the field of online grooming has been limited and especially in Estonia. Although the problem has been acknowledged, little is known about the offenders and how they target children for sexual purposes. Aim: The thesis aims to create a fuller picture of different types of online offenders in Estonia by using typology formed by the European Online Grooming Project. Furthermore, it looks into the rational choice processes of these offenders and how they establish a connection with their victims for personal sexual gratification while minimizing their risk of getting caught. Method: The data consists of 13 court cases of offenders who were found guilty in 2017-2022. The documents were accessed in Estonian Harju County Court and analyzed using thematic analysis. Results: The results showed that the most common types of online offenders in Estonia are intimacy-seeking and adaptable. The findings add support to previous research, showing that most online offenders use different controlling tactics like emotional abuse, threatening, blackmailing, and flattery to benefit their chances of gaining sexual gratification from the relationship. To minimize their chances of getting caught, the offenders had chosen vulnerable victims, faked details about their personal information, used different social media applications to their own benefit, and consistently asked the victims about their surrounding environment. Conclusion: The findings of the study are in line with previous research about the typologies and strategies of online groomers whilst providing new data for future research on the topic. The hope is that with a deeper analysis of the groomers behavior, the study helps to create further preventative measures to decrease the number of potential future victims.

Advanced devices that can assist the therapists to offer rehabilitation are in high demand with the growing rehabilitation needs. The primary requirement from such rehabilitative devices is to reduce the therapist monitoring time. If the training device can autonomously adapt to the performance of the user, it can make the rehabilitation partly self-manageable. Therefore the main goal of our research is to investigate how to make a rehabilitation system more adaptable. The strategy we followed to augment the adaptability of the GENTLE/A robotic system was to (i) identify the parameters that inform about the contribution of the user/robot during a human-robot interaction session and (ii) use these parameters as performance indicators to adapt the system. Three main studies were conducted with healthy participants during the course of this PhD. The first study identified that the difference between the position coordinates recorded by the robot and the reference trajectory position coordinates indicated the leading/lagging status of the user with respect to the robot. Using the leadlag model we proposed two strategies to enhance the adaptability of the system. The first adaptability strategy tuned the performance time to suit the user’s requirements (second study). The second adaptability strategy tuned the task difficulty level based on the user’s leading or lagging status (third study). In summary the research undertaken during this PhD successfully enhanced the adaptability of the GENTLE/A system. The adaptability strategies evaluated were designed to suit various stages of recovery. Apart from potential use for remote assessment of patients, the work presented in this thesis is applicable in many areas of human-robot interaction research where a robot and human are involved in physical interaction.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-03-05T18:36:38Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 21 / Nenhuma / Competir deixou de ser somente a disputa pelo mercado para tornar-se fator de sobrevivência para a grande maioria das empresas. As organizações devem estabelecer e colocar em prática estratégias, o mais rapidamente possível, para manter-se em seu mercado. A Tecnologia da Informação e Comunicação (TIC) é ferramenta essencial para o posicionamento estratégico, pois fornece um maior detalhamento das informações disponíveis, com maior agilidade. Aliado a isso, a aplicação de uma estratégia de fidelização dos clientes rentáveis à empresa, também conhecida como estratégia de CRM (Customer Relationship Management) possibilita uma redução nos custos com captação de novos clientes, além do conhecimento mais aprofundado das preferências e costumes dos atuais clientes. Porém, mesmo com a unificação da TIC, através dos sistemas de CRM com a busca pela fidelização dos clientes, diversas empresas estão tendo dificuldades em sua utilização. Os principais fatores que impossibilitam o sucesso no uso não se referem a fatore / Competition is no longer just the fight for market share. It became critical factor for the survival of most companies. Organizations must establish strategies and put them into practice as soon as possible to survive in their markets. The Technology of Information and Communication (TIC) is an essential tool for the strategic positioning because it provides more detail regarding information available, with more agility. In addition, the implementation of a strategy to increase the loyalty of profitable costumers, known as Customer Relationship Management (CRM), makes it possible cost reductions through the acquisition of new costumers and in-depth knowledge of current costumers’ preferences and habits. However, despite the integration of the TIC, through the systems of CRM with the goal of increased costumer loyalty, many companies are finding it difficult to use it. The main factors that prevent the success of the use of such tool are not technical, as, for instance, systems or equipments, but are related t