Recent innovations in the information technology and computing devices magnified the volume of available information. Today’s decision makers face the challenge of analyzing ever more data in shorter timeframes. Demand for technology that can efficiently assist systematic data analysis is constantly growing. Development of dedicated information systems is, however, difficult both from organizational and technological point of view. First, traditional software production is a complex and time-consuming process that can not be performed under time-pressure. Second, changing business conditions and evolving stakeholder needs require solutions that can be efficiently tailored over time. Finally, costs of custom software development are high, so that not all use cases and scenarios can be covered sufficiently. This thesis proposes a holistic approach to address the challenges above and to enable efficient development of decision support software. The main idea is to empower end users, i.e., decision makers, in constructing their own case-specific solutions. The proposed approach called Web-Composition for End-User Development consists of a systematic process for development and evolution of decision support systems, assistance mechanisms to address lack of programming skills by decision makers and evolution facilities to enable cost- and time-efficient extensibility of user-produced solutions. The thesis describes implementation of the devised principles and ideas in the context of several open-source projects and application scenarios. Applicability and usability of the concepts are demonstrated in user studies with respective target groups. Based on the outcome analysis the thesis concludes that end users can and should actively participate in construction of decision support software.

En grafisk designer är van att arbeta i en klassisk rak metod, och skapa sina designlösningar med tanke på användaren i tron om att de är experter på att visuellt kommunicera. Samhället kräver dock mer hållbara och användbara produkter och tjänster, vilket tyder på att slutanvändarintegrering kan vara en lösning som ger bred feedback på en potentiell lösningsmetod. En grafisk designers uppgift är att visualisera sin uppdragsgivares uppdrag, göra en målgruppsanalys och leverera en produkt eller tjänst efter en brief; detta inom designerns konstnärliga stil samt expertis. Hur blir det då att inkorporera en slutanvändare i en process där man som grafiker ofta gör individuella beslut? Denna uppsats undersöker vilket värde slutanvändarintegrering skapar och i vilken grad det används idag inom brädspelsbranchens skapandeprocess. Uppsatsen utmanar också genom att presentera barriärer för implementering av en slutanvändar-baserad designmodell. Med utgångspunkt i ett intervjumaterial destilleras ett standardiserat arbetsflöde för brädspelsdesign fram, vilket leder till en bättre förståelse för när och hur slutanvändaren framgångsrikt kan inkorporeras i processen. Detta jämförs sedan med egenutförda användarcentrerade designmetoder där brädspelet ”Green Guardians” har designats men hjälp av speltestningsgrupper bestående av slutanvändare. Intervjumaterialet ger en bred och generell förståelse för hur brädspel skapas, med ett fokus på vad moderatorn studerar under ett speltestningstillfälle. Det sammanfattade resultatet redovisar integrering av slutanvändare som en vital och tillförlitlig del av skapandeprocessen av brädspel. Däremot finns för lite forskning på hur teori och metod tillämpas i praktiken. Dessutom påvisar resultatet att det inte är vanligt att få feedback om brädspelets grafiska utformning och utmanar denna teori med påståenden om att den grafiska designern ser sig som expert, och att kommunikationsproblem kan stå som barriär. Uppsatsen ger därför förslag på hur interaktionen kan förbättras mellan moderator och speltestare för att brädspelet ska utvecklas optimalt.

World Wide Web (WWW) est devenu le plus grand dépôt d’informations que l’homme ait jamais assemblé et il est en croissance continue. WWW s’est transformé en un environnement génératif qui favorise l’innovation par le développement des technologies et par un changement dans la perception des gens sur le Web et comment l’utilisent. Le nouveau WWW ou l’Internet de l’Avenir est celui d’un Internet des Services et un Internet des Objets.Naturellement, une série des questions se posent à partir de ce contexte : comment filtrez-vous les choses pour créer plus de valeur que vous obtenez actuellement ? Comment pouvez-vous regrouper les choses d’une manière intelligente et facile au lieu de la faire dans votre tête? Le monde ne peut pas être décrit sans ambiguïté, alors comment pouvez-vous permettre aux utilisateurs de traiter avec le monde à leur manière, en fonction de leurcompréhension? Levine dans son livre "Cluetrain manifesto" a argumenté que les marchés sont conversations, alors comment peut-on impliquer les utilisateurs dans la conversation ? Comment les utilisateurs peuvent être autorisés à la consommation facile des services, de l’information, des choses qu’ils trouvent autour?Cependant, la conception et le déploiement d’un tel logiciel capable d’interaction directe et l’autonomisation de l’utilisateur final reste toujours un problème. On a, d’une part, les utilisateurs qui ont des idées, mais qui n’ont pas l’environnement technique et les capacités en programmation pour faire eux-mêmes le développement. D’autre part, on a un grand volume des données, ressources et services qui qui pourraient être regroupées à la fois en termes de données, mais le plus important, en termes de comportement d’innover et de créer nouveaux objets. Notre objectif dans cette thèse est de combler ce manque d’outils qui sont capables d’une interaction directe et l’autonomisation des utilisateurs finaux, de manière unifiée. Ainsi, notre principale contribution dans cette thèse est le développement d’une approche holistique pour les systèmes basés sur le Web qui sont centrés sur l’utilisateur etqui intègrent des données, les services et le comportement disponible sur le Web 2.0. / World Wide Web (WWW) has become the greatest repository of information that man has ever assembled and it is continuously growing. WWW transformed itself into a generative environment that fosters innovation through the advance of technologies and a shift in people’s perception of the Weband how they use it. The new WWW or Future Internet is that of an Internet of Services and Internet of Things.Naturally, a series of questions arise from this context: how do you filter things to create more value than you currently get? how do you aggregate things in an intelligent and easy way instead of doing it in your head? The world cannot be described unambiguously, so how can you allow users to deal with the world in their own way, based on their understanding? Levine in his book "Cluetrain manifesto" was arguing that markets are conversations so how can users be involved in the conversation? how can users be empowered with easy consumption of the services, information, things that they found around?However design and deployment of such software capable of direct interaction and empowerment of the end-user is still an issue. We have on one side users that have ideas, but do not have technical background and lack programming skills to do the development by themselves. On the other side, we have large amounts of data, resources and services that could be aggregated both in terms of data, but most important in terms of behavior to innovate and create new things.Our goal in this thesis is to address this lack of tools that are capable of direct interaction andempowerment of end-users, in a unified manner. Thus our main contribution in this thesis is the development of a holistic approach for web based systems that are user-centric and that integrate data, services and behavior available on the Web 2.0.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / The classification of consumable media by mining relevant text for their identifying features is a subjective process. Previous attempts to perform this type of feature mining have generally been limited in scope due having limited access to user data. Many of these studies used human domain knowledge to evaluate the accuracy of features extracted using these methods. In this thesis, we mine book review text to identify nontrivial features of a set of similar books. We make comparisons between books by looking for books that share characteristics, ultimately performing clustering on the books in our data set. We use the same mining process to identify a corresponding set of characteristics in users. Finally, we evaluate the quality of our methods by examining the correlation between our similarity metric, and user ratings.

No description available.

Mobile manipulators are changing the way companies and industries complete their work. Untrained end users risk facing unfunctional and nonuser- friendly Graphical User Interfaces. Recently, there has been shortages of people and talent in the heathcare industry where these applications would benefit in being used to accomplish easy and low level tasks. All these reasons contribute to the need of finding functional robot-user ways of communicating that allow the expansion of mobile manipulation applications. This thesis addresses the problem of finding an intuitive way to deploy a mobile manipulator in a laboratory environment. This thesis has analyzed whether it is possible to permit the user to work with a manipulator efficiently and without too much effort via a functional graphical user interface. Creating a modular interface based on user needs is the innovation value of this work. It allows the expansion of mobile manipulator applications that increases the number of possible users. To accomplish this purpose a Graphical User Interface application is proposed using an explanatory research strategy. First, user data was acquired using an ad hoc research survey and mixed with literature implementations to create the right application design. Then, an iterative implementation based on code-creation and tests was used to design a valuable solution. Finally, the results from an observational user study with non-roboticist programmers are presented. The results were validated with the help of 10 potential end users and a validation matrix. This demonstrated how the system is both functional and user-friendly for novices, but also expressive for experts. / Mobilmanipulatorer förändrar sättet som företag och industrier utför sitt arbete. Otränade slutanvändare och särskilt de utan programmeringskunskap kommer att bemötas av icke-funktionella och användarovänliga grafiska användargränssnitt. Den senaste tiden har det varit brist på specialiserad personal inom hälsovårdsindustrin som har resulterat i ett beroende på dessa applikationer för att genomföra enkla uppgifter samt uppgifter på låg nivå. Alla dessa faktorer bidrar till det ökande behovet att hitta ett funktionellt sätt att kommunicera mellan robot och slutanvändare vilket tillåter expansionen av mobilmanipulatorapplikationer. Arbetet som beskrivs i denna avhandling adresserar problemet att finna ett intuitivt sätt att använda en mobilmanipulator i ett laboratoriemijö. Möjligheten att tillåta användaren att på ett enkelt och effektivt sätt arbeta med en manipulator via ett funtionellt grafiskt användargränssnitt analyseras. Innovationsvärdet och detta examensarbetes bidrag till nuvarande kunskap betraktar möjligheten att skapa ett modulärt gränssnitt baserat på användares behov. Detta möjliggör expansionen av mobilmanipulatörers applikation vilket ökar antalet möjliga användare. En förklarande forskningsstrategi används för att föreslå en grafisk användargränssnittsapplikation för att uppnå detta mål. Först användes data från ad hoc-undersökningar blandat med litteraturimplementeringar för att skapa den rätta applikationsdesignen. En iterativ implementering baserad på kodskapande samt tester användes sedan för att designa en värdefull lösning redo att testas. Slutligen presenteras resultat från en användarobservationsstudie med icke-robotikprogrammerare. De insamlade resultaten som samlades in under valideringsstadiet tack vare en grupp bestående av tio potentiella slutanvändare har analyserats genom användandet av en valideringsmatris som är baserad på tre parametrar. Detta demonstrerade hur systemet är både funktionellt och användarvänligt för nybörjare men också expressivt för experter.

As the Internet continues to evolve, without providing any performance guarantees or explicit feedback to applications, the only way to infer the state of the network and to dynamically react to congestion is through end-to-end measurements. The emph{available bandwidth} (avail-bw) is an important metric that characterizes the dynamic state of a network path. Its measurement has been the focus of significant research during the last 15 years. However, its estimation remained elusive for several reasons. The main contribution of this thesis is the development of the first estimation methodology for the avail-bw in a network path using end-to-end measurements. In more detail, our first contribution is an end-to-end methodology, called SLoPS, to determine whether the avail-bw is larger than a given rate based on the sequence of one-way delays experienced by a periodic packet stream. The second contribution is the design of two algorithms, based on SLoPS, to estimate the mean and the variation range, respectively, of the avail-bw process. These algorithms have been implemented in two measurement tools, referred to as PathLoad and PathVar. We have validated the accuracy of the tools using analysis, simulation, and extensive experimentation. Pathload has been downloaded by more than 6000 users since 2003. We have also used PathVar to study the variability of the avail-bw process as a function of various important factors, including traffic load and degree of multiplexing. Finally, we present an application of avail-bw estimation in video streaming. Specifically, we show that avail-bw measurements can be used in the dynamic selection of the best possible overlay path. The proposed scheme results in better perceived video quality than path selection algorithms that rely on jitter or loss-rate measurements.

[pt] Smartphones se tornaram uma parte integrante da vida de muitas pessoas. Podemos usar esses dispositivos para executar uma grande variedade de tarefas, que vão desde dar telefonemas a acessar a Internet. No entanto, às vezes gostaríamos que algumas tarefas fossem executadas automaticamente. Estas tarefas podem ser automatizadas usando aplicativos de automação, os quais monitoram continuamente o contexto do smartphone para realizar um conjunto de ações quando um evento acontece sob certas condições. Estas automações estão começando a ficar popular entre os usuários finais, uma vez que elas podem tornar os celulares mais fáceis de usar e ainda mais eficientes no uso da bateria. No entanto, pouco foi feito para capacitar os usuários finais a criar tais automações. Propomos uma abordagem para automatizar tarefas de smartphones por demonstração retrospectiva. Sucintamente, consideramos a lógica por trás da abordagem como sendo continue fazendo o que eu acabo de fazer : a aplicação de automação grava continuamente as interações dos usuários com seus telefones, e depois que os usuários realizaram uma tarefa que eles gostariam de automatizar, basta eles pedirem à aplicação para criar uma regra de automação com base em suas últimas ações gravadas. Como os usuários só têm que usar seus smartphones, como eles naturalmente fariam, para demonstrar automações, acreditamos que a nossa abordagem pode reduzir a dificuldade na criação de automações de smartphones. Para avaliar a nossa abordagem, desenvolvemos protótipos de um aplicativo chamado Keep Doing It, que permite automatizar tarefas por demonstração. Realizamos um estudo em laboratório com o primeiro protótipo para coletar as primeiras impressões dos participantes. Os participantes tiveram que criar regras de automação usando o nosso aplicativo com base em cenários pré-determinados. Baseado no feedback dos participantes e na nossa observação, nós refinamos o protótipo e realizamos um estudo remoto de cinco dias com novos participantes, os quais desta vez podiam criar quais e quantas regras quisessem. No geral, os resultados de ambos os estudos sugerem que, embora houvesse algumas ocasionais imprecisões (especialmente ao demonstrar regras que contêm condições), os participantes gostariam de automatizar tarefas de smartphones por demonstração devido à facilidade de uso. Concluiu-se que esta abordagem tem muito potencial para ajudar os usuários finais a automatizar seus smartphones, mas ainda há questões que precisam ser abordadas em pesquisas futuras. / [en] Smartphones have become an integral part of many people s lives. We can use these powerful devices to perform a great variety of tasks, ranging from making phone calls to connecting to the Internet. However, sometimes we would like some tasks to be performed automatically. These tasks can be automated by using automation applications, which continuously monitor the smartphone s context to execute a sequence of actions when an event happens under certain conditions. These automations are starting to get popular with end users, since they can make their phones easier to use and even more battery efficient. However, little work has been done on empowering end users to create such automations. We propose an approach for automating smartphone tasks by retrospective demonstration. Succinctly, we consider the logic behind the approach as keep doing what I just did: the automation application continuously records the users interactions with their phones, and after users perform a task that they would like to automate, they can ask the application to create an automation rule based on their latest recorded actions. Since users only have to use their smartphones, as they would naturally do, to demonstrate the actions, we believe that our approach can lower the barrier for creating smartphone automations. To evaluate our approach, we developed prototypes of an application called Keep Doing It, which supports automating tasks by demonstration. We conducted a lab user study with the first prototype to gather participants first impressions. The participants created automation rules using our application based on given scenarios. Based on their feedback and on our observations, we refined the prototype and conducted a five-day remote user study with new participants, who could then create which and how many rules they wanted. Overall, the findings of both studies suggest that, although there were some occasional inaccuracies (especially when demonstrating rules that contain conditions), participants would be willing to automate smartphone tasks by demonstration due to its ease of use. We concluded that this approach has much potential to aid end users to automate their smartphones, but there are still issues that need to be addressed by further research.

Submitted by PPG Ci?ncia da Computa??o (ppgcc@pucrs.br) on 2018-06-19T12:02:08Z No. of bitstreams: 1 CAROLINE_QUEIROZ_SANTOS_TES.pdf: 16112949 bytes, checksum: fe22f5c9acd1d52e51f0dcfb05c80e68 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Sheila Dias (sheila.dias@pucrs.br) on 2018-06-27T11:19:29Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 CAROLINE_QUEIROZ_SANTOS_TES.pdf: 16112949 bytes, checksum: fe22f5c9acd1d52e51f0dcfb05c80e68 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-06-27T11:39:56Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 CAROLINE_QUEIROZ_SANTOS_TES.pdf: 16112949 bytes, checksum: fe22f5c9acd1d52e51f0dcfb05c80e68 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-04-12 / The analysis of data from social media has been a growing practice, making data visualization an important aspect in the context of presenting the large volumes of data typically extracted from these media. One of the challenges in this area is the efficient presentation of these large volumes of data, providing techniques that support the design processes, analysis and understanding of these data. Moving forward in this direction, this thesis presents CIViS, a customizable interface design model to support the construction of interactive narrative visualizations of data extracted from social media. It is a descriptive model, based on the theory of Semiotic Engineering and its view on End-user Development, as well as on narrative visualization concepts. The model considers that the social-media data analyst has interest in organizing his/her data presentation in such a way to tell a story with them. Thus, CIViS proposes a set of components that structure the design space, with the purpose of assisting designers and data analysts as co-designers to reflect on different aspects that influence the construction of customizable interactive narrative visualizations. We carried out four studies and, based on the results triangulation, we obtained the bases for consolidating the idea of the model, continuing with its creation. After conceiving the CIViS model, we conducted a study focusing on the use of the model by social-media data analysts. With the conclusion of the study of use of the CIViS, we obtained results that indicate pertinent ways of representing relevant narrative aspects. We have also verified that the model is satisfactorily descriptive to assist in the design of visualizations, whether narrative or not. Finally, we present the potential epistemic value of the CIViS, considering that its use can instigate important discussions and reflections during the process of designing customizable interactive narrative visualizations, assisting both designers and co designers in its epistemic character. / A an?lise de dados de m?dias sociais tem sido uma pr?tica crescente, tornando a visualiza??o de dados um aspecto importante no contexto de apresenta??o dos grandes volumes de dados tipicamente extra?dos dessas m?dias. Um dos desafios nesta ?rea est? na apresenta??o eficiente desses grandes volumes de dados, provendo t?cnicas que apoiem os processos de design, an?lise e compreens?o destes dados. Avan?ando neste sentido, esta tese apresenta o CIViS, um modelo de design de interface customiz?vel para apoiar a constru??o de visualiza??es narrativas interativas de dados extra?dos de m?dias sociais. Trata-se de um modelo descritivo, fundamentado na teoria da Engenharia Semi?tica e sua vis?o sobre End-user Development, assim como em conceitos de visualiza??o narrativas. O modelo considera que o analista de dados de m?dias sociais tem interesse em organizar a apresenta??o de seus dados de forma a contar uma hist?ria com eles. Assim, o CIViS prop?e um conjunto de componentes que estruturam o espa?o de design, tendo o prop?sito de auxiliar designers e analistas de dados co-designers a refletirem sobre diferentes aspectos que influenciam a constru??o de visualiza??es narrativas interativas customiz?veis. Realizamos quatro estudos e, a partir da triangula??o dos resultados, obtivemos subs?dios para a consolida??o da ideia do modelo, dando prosseguimento ? sua cria??o. Ap?s a concep??o do modelo CIViS, realizamos um estudo com foco no uso do modelo por analistas de dados de m?dias sociais. Com a conclus?o do estudo de uso do CIViS, obtivemos resultados que sinalizam formas pertinentes de representar aspectos relevantes de narrativas. Tamb?m verificamos que o modelo ? satisfatoriamente descritivo para auxiliar no design de visualiza??es, sejam elas narrativas ou n?o. Por fim, apresentamos o potencial valor epist?mico do CIViS, considerando que seu uso pode instigar discuss?es e reflex?es importantes durante o processo de design de visualiza??es narrativas interativas customiz?veis, atendendo tanto designers quanto co-designers em seu car?ter epist?mico.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-04T18:31:39Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Deivis Fernandes Pirani.pdf: 1504986 bytes, checksum: e4989c06d3fc9c76df085862e18609d0 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-02-07 / This paper shows a field-trial investigation comparing the use of IPv4 and IPv6 protocols on web pages access considering the real user perspective and the transition period from IPv4 to IPv6. To perform this study, it was developed a testbed in which three adressing configurations of Internet Protocol, IPv4, IPv6, and Duas Stack (IPv4+IPv6), were used to access the top 100 world most visited web pages with an IPv6 enabled address. In addiction, several software tools were developed, that enabled more than 600 simultaneous accesses between IPv4, IPv6 and Dual Stack, to each of these pages. Those accesses were performed every hour during the period of a month, enabling to obtain more than 20 GB of information on the web access. Results showed that lower loading times obtained by IPv6 and Dual Stack are related to the partial acquisition of the content. In fact, for IPv6, the number of web pages with faster loading times goes from 57 to 20% when the average number of bytes obtained by IPv6 and the IPv4 is similar. For Dual Stack the number goes from 25 to 5% given the same conditions. It was also noted that 18 of the 100 pages which were considered, no content would be presented to the user in more than 50% of the performed accesses. Regarding the preference for IPv6 instead of IPv4, on Dual Stack it was observed that 90% of the acquired content for 27 of 100 web pages was made by IPv6. / Este trabalho apresenta um estudo de campo, comparativo, sobre a utiliza??o dos protocolos IPv4 e IPv6 no acesso a p?ginas web. Foi considerada a perspectiva de um usu?rio real deste tipo de servi?o, no atual per?odo de transi??o do IPv4 para o IPv6. Para que tal estudo pudesse ser realizado, foi desenvolvido um arranjo no qual tr?s configura??es de endere?amento do Protocolo de Internet, IPv4, IPv6 e Pilha Dupla (IPv4+IPv6), foram utilizadas nos acessos ?s 100 p?ginas web, com suporte ao I v6, mundialmente mais visitadas. Al?m disso, foram desenvolvidas uma s?rie de shell scripts que possibilitaram mais de 600 acessos simult?neos do IPv4, IPv6 e Pilha Dupla, a cada uma dessas p?ginas. Tais acessos foram executados de hora em hora, durante o per?odo de um m?s, possibilitando a obten??o de mais de 20 GB de informa??es relativas ao acesso web. Os resultados do estudo mostraram que os tempos de carregamento menores obtidos pelo IPv6 e pela Pilha Dupla, est?o relacionados com a aquisi??o parcial do conte?do. De fato, para o IPv6, o n?mero de p?ginas web com tempos de carregamento menores diminui de 57 para 20% quando a m?dia do n?mero de bytes obtidos pelo IPv6 e pelo IPv4 ? similar. Para a Pilha Dupla, dadas as mesmas condi??es, o n?mero diminui de 25 para 5%. Tamb?m foi observado que para 18 das 100 p?ginas web consideradas, nenhum conte?do foi apresentado ao usu?rio em mais de 50% dos acessos efetuados. Com rela??o ? prefer?ncia pelo IPv6 ao IPv4, na Pilha Dupla, observou-se que 90% da aquisi??o do conte?do, de 27 das 100 p?ginas web, ocorreu pelo IPv6.