Human-computer interaction, sometimes referred to as Man-Machine Interaction, is a concept that emerged simultaneously with computers, or more generally machines. The methods by which humans have been interacting with computers have traveled a long way. New designs and technologies appear every day. However, computer systems and complex machines are often only technically successful, and most of the time users may find them confusing to use; thus, such systems are never used efficiently. Therefore, building sophisticated machines and robots is not the only thing someone has to address; in fact, more effort should be put to make these machines simpler for all kind of users, and generic enough to accommodate different types of environments. Thus, designing intelligent human computer interaction modules come to emerge. In this work, we aim to implement a generic framework (referred to as CIMF framework) that allows the user to control the synchronized and coordinated cooperative type of work that a set of robots can perform. Three robots are involved so far: Two manipulators and one mobile robot. The framework should be generic enough to be hardware independent and to allow the easy integration of new entities and modules. We also aim to implement the different building blocks for the intelligent manufacturing cell that communicates with the framework via the most intelligent and advanced human computer interaction techniques. Three techniques shall be addressed: Interface-, audio-, and visual-based type of interaction.

Human-computer interaction, sometimes referred to as Man-Machine Interaction, is a concept that emerged simultaneously with computers, or more generally machines. The methods by which humans have been interacting with computers have traveled a long way. New designs and technologies appear every day. However, computer systems and complex machines are often only technically successful, and most of the time users may find them confusing to use; thus, such systems are never used efficiently. Therefore, building sophisticated machines and robots is not the only thing someone has to address; in fact, more effort should be put to make these machines simpler for all kind of users, and generic enough to accommodate different types of environments. Thus, designing intelligent human computer interaction modules come to emerge. In this work, we aim to implement a generic framework (referred to as CIMF framework) that allows the user to control the synchronized and coordinated cooperative type of work that a set of robots can perform. Three robots are involved so far: Two manipulators and one mobile robot. The framework should be generic enough to be hardware independent and to allow the easy integration of new entities and modules. We also aim to implement the different building blocks for the intelligent manufacturing cell that communicates with the framework via the most intelligent and advanced human computer interaction techniques. Three techniques shall be addressed: Interface-, audio-, and visual-based type of interaction.

The work described provides the development, implementation and evaluation of engineering product design guidelines suitable for engineering product designers. The motivation arises from collaborative efforts that continue to be made by the Least Economically Developed Countries (LDC) and the Most Economically Developed Countries (MDC) towards the development of the engineering design field. It is argued here that product design guidelines which are derived from existing product design methods enhance the capability of engineering designers to shorten time to market, deal adequately with product design constraints and boost supply chains. The sample for the proposed study is comprised of companies in Botswana (a least economically developed country) and the United Kingdom (a most economically developed country). The research has been conducted using a mixed qualitative research approach comprised of aspects from the framework method, cluster analysis and Kolb's model. The findings have identified five themes central to the product design process which are incorporated into the engineering product design guidelines. Case study work was conducted to validate the approach. The following claims are made for contributions to knowledge: 1. A conceptual framework which is a graphical co-ordinate system of engineering and management techniques required by nine engineering product design methods. The conceptual framework is arranged according to two orthogonal axes that describe the structure of the product design process and incorporate the need function form structure, the divergent convergent structure, the product design drivers, product realisation process and product development lifecycles. 2. The product design method notation which is a register of the expressions derived from the conceptual framework and is used to communicate and aid in the selection of a group of techniques being implemented, or intended for implementation by design teams; and 3. The configuration scheme which provides a clear link between components, subassemblies, products, projects, programmes and policies. The critical point put forward by this work is that the conceptual framework is only comprehensible today because the engineering product design methods in the public domain have imparted knowledge about the functions of physical products (described here as part of the need function form structure) at the expense of human needs and the interactive forms of human responses to physical products. The contributions of this research provide a holistic and coherent means of integrating design methodologies for the benefit of design teams in Botswana. The approach is, however, universal and may also be beneficial for design projects in the most economically developed countries.

Thesis (PhD)--University of Stellenbosch, 2011. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The role of public transport is to stimulate urban, social, sustainable and economic developments by transport of passengers based on their needs with public transport organizations functioning as operators in this environment. This dissertation reports on the research done on resilience in urban public transport organizations; it presents the guiding principles and the framework of resilience and the ability of public transport organizations to embed this capability. The emerging discipline of resilience studies is multidimensional and multidisciplinary. The phenomenon has been examined to present a holistic perspective on resilience through an extensive review of the literature, supplemented by empirical research in the European public transport sector. Resilience has been defined as the capacity of an organization to survive, adapt and grow in the face of turbulent change. Existing research tends to focus on the relevance of the concept of resilience in a diversity of environments. There is little information or research that reflects the design principles and specific success factors in the public transport sector. The literature research produced several logical conclusions, which were reviewed by using structured interviews with a selected group of specialists in this field. This made it possible to determine guiding principles, to structure the framework, and to develop a unique classification of (i) the most fundamental vulnerability factors that make an organization susceptible to disruptions; and (ii) the capability factors as attributes required for sustained performance or accomplishment. All these findings are synthesised and this research establishes the ability of public transport organizations to implement a resilience approach within the boundaries of their level of advancement and prioritised direction statements. Recommendations for further research include extending the proposed framework empirically to other functions and to other organizations than urban public transport organizations. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Die rol van openbare vervoer is om stedelike, sosiale, volhoubare en ekonomiese ontwikkeling te stimuleer deur die vervoer van passasiers op grond van hul behoeftes. Openbare vervoerorganisasies funksioneer as operateurs in hierdie omgewing. Hierdie proefskrif doen verslag oor die navorsing oor veerkrag in stedelike openbare vervoerorganisasies en verskaf die basiese beginsels en die raamwerk van veerkrag en die moontlikheid dat openbare vervoerorganisasies hierdie vermoë insluit. Die opkomende dissipline van veerkragstudies is multidimensioneel en multidissiplinêr en die verskynsel is ondersoek om 'n holistiese perspektief op veerkrag aan te bied deur ’n omvattende oorsig van die literatuur, aangevul deur empiriese navorsing oor die Europese openbare vervoer. Veerkrag word gedefinieer as die vermoë van 'n organisasie om te oorleef, aan te pas en te groei ten spyte van turbulente verandering. Bestaande navorsing neig om te fokus op die toepaslikheid van die konsep van veerkrag in 'n verskeidenheid van omgewings. Min inligting of navorsing weerspieël die ontwerpbeginsels en spesifieke suksesfaktore daarvan in die openbare vervoer. Die literatuurnavorsing het tot verskeie logiese gevolgtrekkings gelei, wat hersien is deur die gebruik van gestruktureerde onderhoude met 'n geselekteerde groep spesialiste in hierdie veld. Dit het dit moontlik gemaak om riglyne op te stel, die raamwerk te struktureer, en 'n unieke klassifikasie te ontwikkel van (i) die mees basiese kwesbaarheidsfaktore wat ’n organisasie vatbaar maak vir ontwrigting, en (ii) die vermoëfaktore as eienskappe wat vereis word vir volgehoue prestasie of vervulling. Al hierdie bevindings word gesintetiseer en hierdie navorsing vestig die vermoë van openbare vervoerorganisasies om ’n veerkragbenadering te implementeer binne die grense van hul vlak van vooruitgang en geprioritiseerde rigtingverklarings. Aanbevelings vir verdere navorsing sluit in die uitbreiding van die voorgestelde raamwerk empiries na ander funksies en na ander organisasies as die van stedelike openbare vervoer.

The goal of this thesis is to design and implement a framework to support Legacy system access. Legacy systems are databases that use incompatible and obsolete technologies and can not be easily abandoned. The framework allows the abstraction of application logic from database platform and will enable full or incremental migration to a new, modern platform in the future. The framework also considers the option of encapsulation of an existing legacy application to be included in the new system as a black box. A system based on proposed framework has been succesfully deployed in a company. The system facilitated the migration of the company to a new information system with an entirely different database platform. The practice shows the viability of the framework design. 1

The goal of this thesis is to design and implement a framework to support Legacy system access. Legacy systems are databases that use incompatible and obsolete technologies and can not be easily abandoned. The framework allows the abstraction of application logic from database platform and will enable full or incremental migration to a new, modern platform in the future. The framework also considers the option of encapsulation of an existing legacy application into the new system as a black box. The framework is well configurable and extendable and is independent on database platform or data context. A system based on proposed framework has been succesfully deployed in a company. The system facilitated the migration of the company to a new information system with an entirely different database platform. The practice shows the viability of the framework design. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

<p> </p><p>MTsim (Mobile Traffic Simulator) is an Ericsson AB internal software application that is part of 2Gsim. It is used to simulate elements of a GSM (Global System for Mobile communications) network for feature testing and automated testing. It is written in the programming language TSS Language, also known as SMILE which is a proprietary Ericsson programming language. SMILE is based on the principles of state matrix programming which in essence means that each program is on its own a finite state machine. The language is old and was originally intended as a macro language for smaller test programs, not for applications the size of MTsim.</p><p>It is of interest to evaluate the feasibility of performing an automatic conversion of applications written in SMILE, with special interest in converting MTsim, to a Java framework since Java has many advantages compared to SMILE. Java, as a language, is well suited for larger applications, there are numerous well supported tools and there is a much wider spread competence than there is for SMILE.</p><p>It is clear that in order to do a full conversion of a SMILE program to a Java framework two applications must be implemented. First a Java framework, which acts as a run time environment, must be designed which can host the translated programs. The other part is an actual translator which takes a SMILE program as input and ouputs a translated Java program. A more sophisticated framework is preferred since it makes the actual translated programs more light weight and easy to read which means higher degree of maintainability.</p><p>There are different ways to implement state machines in Java but the most flexible and versatile is to implement it as a black-box framework in an object oriented way where the framework has sophisticated mechanisms for message and event handling which is central to any state machine framework.</p><p>The translation for SMILE can easily be done by using a AST (abstract syntax tree) representation, which is a full representation of the SMILE program in tree-form. The AST is obtained from an intermediate state of the SMILE program compiler.</p><p> </p>

Práce se zabývá podrobnou analýzou požadavků na moderní aplikační rámec pro prostředí cloud. Za pomoci standardních návrhových vzorů a technik připravuje teoretický základ a pravidla, která musí uvnitř rámce platit. V práci je realizována referenční implementace a připravena demonstrační aplikace středního rozsahu, aby představila výhody plynoucí z užití frameworku.

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