Thesis (M.S.)--Oregon State University, 2007. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 37-39). Also available on the World Wide Web.

I introduce a compositional approach to application software development. In this approach, an extended entity-relationship diagram (EERD), which represents the component types and the relationship types within an application domain, is used as a template of executable programs in that application domain. As we use structural active objects as the components of a program, we can obtain an executable program if those components are instantiated and interconnected as dictated by an EERD. Furthermore, the graphical editor in the proposed software development environment, entity-relationship software development environment (ERSDE), uses EERDs as menus in constructing application software. An EERD used as a menu can enforce legitimate patterns of relationships among components, in addition to providing an intuitive view of available components and possible relationships among them. Two experiments were conducted in order to compare the effectiveness between EERDs and class diagrams of Object Modeling Technique (OMT) and between the ERSDE and the menu-based Structural-Active Object System (SAOS) graphical editors. From these experiments, we obtained the following results. 1. A significant proportion of the subjects who used EERDs to compose certain applications did so correctly, while only a small proportion of the students who used the OMT class diagrams composed these applications correctly. 2. Most of the subjects preferred EERDs to OMT class diagrams as design documents. 3. Although the proportion of the students who composed applications correctly with the ERSDE application editor was larger than the proportion of the students who did so with the menu-based SAOS graphical editors, this difference was statistically not significant. 4. The subjects took significantly longer time to compose applications with the menu-based SAOS editors than with the ERSDE editor. 5. All the subjects preferred the ERSDE application editor to the menu-based SAOS graphical editors as a software development environment. / Graduation date: 1998

published_or_final_version / Electrical and Electronic Engineering / Master / Master of Philosophy

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 1995. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 96-105).

by Lam Shing Yung, Anton. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1991. / Includes bibliographical references. / Chapter I. --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1. --- Motivations for Presentation System --- p.2 / Chapter 1.2. --- Shortcomings of Traditional Method --- p.2 / Chapter 1.3. --- Computerized Courseware Production and Presentation System --- p.5 / Chapter 1.4. --- Hardware Advances --- p.7 / Chapter 1.5. --- "Windowed, Graphical Applications" --- p.9 / Chapter 1.6. --- Interaction Techniques --- p.10 / Chapter 1.7. --- Research Objectives --- p.12 / Chapter II. --- Existing Products and Related Research --- p.13 / Chapter 2.1. --- Existing Products --- p.13 / Chapter 2.1.1. --- PRESENT Slide Presentation System --- p.14 / Chapter 2.1.2. --- Harvard Graphics --- p.15 / Chapter 2.1.3. --- HyperCard --- p.15 / Chapter 2.1.4. --- Macromind Director --- p.16 / Chapter 2.1.5. --- Authorware Professional --- p.17 / Chapter 2.1.6. --- "PageMaker, Ventura and MacDraw" --- p.19 / Chapter 2.1.7. --- Summary --- p.20 / Chapter 2.2. --- Related Research --- p.20 / Chapter 2.2.1. --- Authoring Systems --- p.20 / Chapter 2.2.2. --- User Interface Management System (UIMS) --- p.23 / Chapter 2.2.3. --- Visual Programming --- p.24 / Chapter III. --- User's Model --- p.27 / Chapter 3.1. --- A Simple User's Model --- p.27 / Chapter 3.1.1. --- Object-0riented Presentation Material --- p.27 / Chapter 3.1.2. --- Frame -Based Presentation --- p.29 / Chapter 3.1.3. --- Presentation Styles --- p.29 / Chapter 3.2. --- Novice Users vs Experienced Users --- p.30 / Chapter IV. --- Design of the Courseware Production and Presentation System --- p.31 / Chapter 4.1. --- Overview --- p.31 / Chapter 4.2. --- Object Oriented Design --- p.31 / Chapter 4.3. --- Object Oriented Graphics --- p.31 / Chapter 4.3.1. --- Modification of Object --- p.32 / Chapter 4.3.2. --- Clipboard --- p.34 / Chapter 4.3.3. --- Stacking of Objects --- p.35 / Chapter 4.3.4. --- Group Together and Break Apart --- p.36 / Chapter 4.3.5. --- Hierarchy of Grouping --- p.38 / Chapter 4.3.6. --- Storage Requirements --- p.39 / Chapter 4.4. --- Operations --- p.39 / Chapter 4.4.1. --- Manipulative Operations --- p.39 / Chapter 4.4.2. --- Frame Control Operations --- p.39 / Chapter 4.4.3. --- Timer Operation --- p.40 / Chapter 4.5. --- Active-Object-Set Model --- p.40 / Chapter 4.5.1. --- Importance of Objects --- p.41 / Chapter 4.5.2. --- Active Object --- p.42 / Chapter 4.5.3. --- Active Set --- p.43 / Chapter 4.5.4. --- The Timer Event --- p.43 / Chapter 4.6. --- Properties of Visual Objects --- p.45 / Chapter 4.6.1. --- Physical Attributes --- p.45 / Chapter 4.6.1. --- Event-Handling Operations --- p.45 / Chapter 4.6.2. --- Private Status --- p.46 / Chapter 4.7. --- Object Class --- p.47 / Chapter 4.8. --- User-Defined Object Classes --- p.47 / Chapter 4.9. --- User-Defined Operations --- p.47 / Chapter V. --- Interaction Techniques for Defining New Object Classes and Operations --- p.49 / Chapter 5.1. --- Interaction Techniques --- p.49 / Chapter 5.2. --- Object Creation --- p.49 / Chapter 5.3. --- Operations --- p.51 / Chapter 5.3.1. --- Direct Manipulation --- p.51 / Chapter 5.3.2. --- Menu Selection --- p.51 / Chapter 5.3.3. --- Parameter Selection --- p.51 / Chapter 5.4. --- New Object Class Definition --- p.52 / Chapter 5.4.1. --- Definition through Drawing --- p.53 / Chapter 5.4.2. --- Creating New Object Instances of the New Object Classes --- p.54 / Chapter 5.5. --- New Operations Definition --- p.55 / Chapter 5.5.1. --- Specification of Parameter Type --- p.55 / Chapter 5.5.2. --- Selection and Sequencing of Primitive Operations …… --- p.57 / Chapter 5.5.3. --- Using the New Operations --- p.60 / Chapter 5.6. --- Binding of Operations to an Object --- p.61 / Chapter 5.7. --- Default Operations for User-Defined Classes --- p.63 / Chapter VI. --- Implementation Issues --- p.64 / Chapter 6.1. --- Operating Environment --- p.64 / Chapter 6.1.1. --- The User Interface --- p.64 / Chapter 6.1.2. --- The Operating System --- p.66 / Chapter 6.1.3. --- The Hardware Requirement --- p.66 / Chapter 6.1.4. --- The Final Choice --- p.67 / Chapter 6.2. --- Representation of Objects --- p.68 / Chapter 6.2.1. --- Basic Objects --- p.68 / Chapter 6.2.2. --- Group and User-Defined Objects --- p.69 / Chapter 6.2.3. --- Set of Active Objects --- p.70 / Chapter 6.3. --- Object-Oriented Graphics Management Subsystem --- p.71 / Chapter 6.4. --- Multiple Editing Window --- p.73 / Chapter 6.5. --- Clipboard --- p.73 / Chapter 6.6. --- Graphical Menu --- p.73 / Chapter 6.7. --- Font Management --- p.74 / Chapter 6.8. --- Mapping of the Active-Object-Set Model to the Implementation --- p.75 / Chapter 6.9. --- Representation of Operations --- p.76 / Chapter VII. --- Future Work and Conclusions --- p.79 / Chapter 7.1. --- Limitations --- p.79 / Chapter 7.1.1. --- Direct Manipulations --- p.79 / Chapter 7.1.2. --- Multiple Presentation Windows --- p.79 / Chapter 7.1.3. --- Editing of User-Defined Operations --- p.80 / Chapter 7.2. --- Future Work --- p.80 / Chapter 7.2.1. --- Maintaining Relationship Through Constraint Satisfaction --- p.80 / Chapter 7.2.2. --- Functions for System Status/Values Query --- p.82 / Chapter 7.2.3. --- "Private Status Flag, Pre-Conditions and Conditional Execution" --- p.82 / Chapter 7.2.4. --- Object Oriented Programming --- p.85 / Chapter 7.3. --- Other Related Application Areas --- p.86 / Chapter 7.3.1. --- Visual-Object Oriented Systems --- p.86 / Chapter 7.3.2. --- User Interface Management Systems --- p.89 / Chapter 7.4. --- Conclusions --- p.89 / References --- p.91

Thesis (Ph.D. (Computer Science)) - Rhodes University, 2007.

Thesis (M.S. in Modeling, Virtual Environments and Simulation)--Naval Postgraduate School, March 2005. / Thesis Advisor(s): Christian J. Darken. Includes bibliographical references (p. 45-46). Also available online.

Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited / In visual simulations, the human must make most of her decisions based on the visual cues rendered to her display. On the other hand, synthetic forces have the luxury of basing their decisions on the data contained in the simulation's model. Line of sight calculations are often examples of the synthetic player's excess of information. Current methodologies for determining a synthetic player's line of sight to a target are generally variations of a ray-casting technique. Hiding from a synthetic player "in plain sight" by using shadow, camouflage, or by simply remaining motionless is not possible. Synthetic vision is an alternative to ray-casting. We perform multiple renders from each synthetic player's point of view and temporarily maintain those images in graphics memory. We then execute vertex and fragment shader programs to make comparisons of the stored images. All the renders and calculations are performed on the Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) and the result is returned to the synthetic player in the form of an annotated list of visible targets. Performing these target visibility calculations on the GPU gives the synthetic player a more robust spectrum of visual inputs with which to make decisions, enabling more realistic behaviors. / Captain, United States Marine Corps

How might capabilities for algorithm animation be seamlessly integrated into a programming language that is both visual and declarative? Until now, visual programming language researchers have not attempted to answer that question, making the fruits of algorithm animation available only to users of textual programming languages. Users of visual programming languages (VPLs) have been deprived of the unique semantic insights algorithm animation offers, insights that would foster the understanding and debugging of visual programs. We have answered the question by seamlessly integrating algorithm animation capabilities into Forms/3, a general-purpose, declarative VPL. Our results show that such a VPL can support algorithm animation without leaving the declarative, visual model, without adding new concepts to the language or how to program in it, and without deviating from the uniform representation established for the language. In addition, our research shows that the characteristics of declarative VPLs result in some interesting algorithm animation features not found in other systems. / Graduation date: 1995

No description available.