The design process is important to all landscape architects. It helps generate ideas to solve problems in an efficient amount of time and insure that all stages of a project are completed. Generally, a design process includes project acquisition, inventory and site analysis, conflicts identification, public involvement, draft products, and final presentation. Among these elements, public involvement has been recognized as one of the most important elements in the landscape design process. It not only helps professionals get projects done smoothly, but it also helps with long-term client retention. Traditional two-dimensional communication methods using renderings, design plans, and maps have not been fully successful in their ability to engage and sufficiently inform clients and stakeholders. While professional planners are able to rely on their experience to help them visualize proposed landscapes, the average client is often overwhelmed by the relatively complex and abstract information, and unable to translate this information into landscape visions. Developments in the field of 3D graphics have dramatically extended possibilities to overcome this barrier by providing a tool that produces designs that are easy to comprehend and helps clients better visualize the end product that the designer has put forth. Some people argue that the high investment cost of 3D software such as ArcGIS, 3Dmax, etc., and its time-consuming process to master, is too great an obstacle for most designers and firms to use the software in their work with the average client or stakeholder. However, little research has been done to investigate the extent to which landscape architects have adopted the 3D software. We know even less about their opinions on the suitability of existing 3D software packages to meet their professional needs. A nationwide survey about current use and future demand for 3D simulation software within the landscape profession was conducted for this thesis. Comprehensive online surveys were sent to two groups: (1) landscape architecture firms and freelance landscape architects; and (2) institutions with landscape architecture programs. In total, 3,434 firms and freelance architects were identified based on data from the American Society of Landscape Architecture. Names and contact information of ninety-one faculty members from institutions with landscape architecture programs were found on the Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture website. The opportunities and challenges of 3D visualization technology and its potential applications in landscape and environmental planning have been examined based on the findings from survey results. The results are relevant to the future improvement and innovation of 3D visualization software in the landscape architecture profession and can assist landscape architecture educators with future curriculum development.

Today’s computing vision makes users to access services, applications via lightweight portable devices instead of powerful personal computers (PC). Since today’s applications and services need strong computing power and data storage, raising question will be “Who will provide these 2 attributes if users do not?” Cloud computing trend moves computing power and data storage from users’ side to application infrastructure side. The services that traditionally stored in users’ own computers will move into cloud computing platform and delivered by the Internet to its users. This new platform comes with its own benefits and design characteristics. Since all information data will move into another platform than individual computers, information visualization will be an opportunity field to analyze and maintain the cloud system structure as well as delivering abstract data into meaningful way to end users.

Crew race strategy is typically formulated by coaches based on rowing tradition and years of experience. However, coaching strategies are not generally supported by empirical evidence and decision-support models. Previous models of crew race strategy have been constrained by the sparse information published on crew race performance (quarterly 500-meter splits). Empirical research has merely summarized which quarterly splits averaged the fastest and slowest relative to the other splits and relative to the average speed of the other competitors. Video records of crew race world championships provide a rich source of data for those capable and patient enough to mine this level of detail. This dissertation is based on a precise frame-by-frame video analysis of five world championship rowing finals. With six competing crews per race, a database of 75 race-pair duels was compiled that summarizes race positioning, competitive drives, and relative stroke rates at 10-meter intervals recorded with photo-finish precision (30 frames per second). The drive-based research pioneered in this dissertation makes several contributions to understanding the dynamics of crew race strategy and performance: 1) An 8-factor conceptual model of crew race performance. 2) A generic drive model that decomposes how pairs of crews duel in a race. 3) Graphical summaries of the rates and locations of successful and unsuccessful drives. 4) Contour lines of the margins that winning crews hold over the course of the race. 5) Trend lines for what constitutes a probabilistically decisive lead as a function of position along the course, seconds behind the leader, and whether the trailing crew is driving. This research defines a new drive-based vocabulary for evaluating crew race performance for use by coaches, competitors and race analysts. The research graphically illustrates situational parameters helpful in formulating race strategy and guiding real-time decision-making by competitors. This research also lays the foundation for future industrial engineering decision-support models and associated parameters as applied to race strategy and tactics.

Thesis (M.C.S.)--Miami University, Dept. of Computer Science and Systems Analysis, 2009. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 122-123).

Several decades ago, computer control systems known as Electric Control Units (ECUs) were introduced to the automotive industry. Mechanical hardware units have since then increasingly been replaced by computer controlled systems to manage complex tasks such as airbag, ABS, cruise control and so forth. This has lead to a massive increase of software functions and data which all needs to be managed. There are several tools and techniques for this, however, current tools and techniques for developing real-time embedded system are mostly focusing on software functions, not data. Those tools do not fully support developers to manage run-time data at design time. Furthermore, current tools do not focus on visualization of relationship among data items in the system. This thesis is a part of previous work named the Data Entity approach which prioritizes data management at the top level of development life cycle. Our main contribution is a tool that introduces a new way to intuitively explore run-time data items, which are produced and consumed by software components, utilized in the entire system. As a consequence, developers will achieve a better understanding of utilization of data items in the software system. This approach enables developers and system architects to avoid redundant data as well as finding and removing stale data from the system. The tool also allows us to analyze conflicts regarding run-time data items that might occur between software components at design time. / A Data-Entity Approach for Component-Based Real-Time Embedded Systems Development

Statische Codemetriken sind wichtige Indikatoren für die Qualität eines Softwaresystems. Sie beleuchten dabei unterschiedliche Aspekte eines Softwaresystems. Deshalb ist es notwendig, mehrere Codemetriken zu nutzen, um die Qualität eines Softwaresystems in seiner Gesamtheit bewerten zu können. Wünschenswert wäre zudem eine Darstellung, die die Struktur des Gesamtsystems und die Bewertung einzelner Elemente eines Softwaresystems in einer Darstellung kombiniert. Die Arbeit untersucht deshalb, welche Metaphern geeignet sind, um eine solche Darstellung zu ermöglichen. Ein zweites Ziel der Arbeit war es, eine solche Visualisierung automatisch erzeugen zu können. Dafür wurde ein Generator entwickelt, der diese Anforderung erfüllt. Zur Konzeption dieses Generators kamen Techniken aus der generativen Softwareentwicklung zum Einsatz. Bei der Umsetzung des Generators wurde auf Techniken aus der modellgetriebenen Softwareentwicklung zurückgegriffen, vor allem auf Techniken aus dem openArchitectureWare-Framework. Der Generator kann in Eclipse eingebunden werden und ist in der Lage, aus einem Java-Projekt die Struktur und die Metrikwerte automatisch zu extrahieren. Diese Werte werden daraufhin in ein dreidimensionales Modell überführt, das auf dem offenen Extensible 3D Standard basiert. Der Generator ermöglichte zudem die Evaluierung zweier unterschiedlicher Metaphern, die im Rahmen der Arbeit durchgeführt wurde.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-02T19:06:02Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 4856.pdf: 8642944 bytes, checksum: 195edb943248b7c2e28ef209906d1b52 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-12-20 / Universidade Federal de Sao Carlos / Qualitative research seeks to understand a specific subject through descriptions, comparisons and interpretations of the data, which are represented by words, pictures, videos and sounds. In the context of qualitative research were treated in more detail in this work, the steps of data collection and analysis. In step analysis of the data coding technique is used which has a test procedure whereby data is divided, and highly integrated to form a theory. The task involving coding technique when done manually requires a lot of research. Moreover, the tools found supporting the technical coding does offer features that let you work with several documents at once, which would facilitate the task of the researcher in the analysis and data management. This paper presents the iCode, a free tool that supports the technical coding, allowing the coding of multiple documents simultaneously, referenced here as simultaneous coding. Using this tool, we intended to reduce the coding time through the use of visualization and information management. It is intended to facilitate the analysis of the data using the visual metaphor Treemap, to enable management of multiple documents simultaneously. We conducted a feasibility study to assess whether it is feasible to apply the tool to create codes and categories, ie, apply the coding technique using differential functionality that the tool provides, which is the fact that it can handle multiple documents at once. This viability was observed for the efficiency and effectiveness of the participants in the application of manual coding technique, coding simultaneously using the tool iCode and coding each document separately, using the tool iCode. The feasibility study evaluated whether the simultaneous coding is beneficial regarding the coding of a document at a time. The results provide evidence that the simultaneous coding done using the tool iCode, the technique facilitates coding, reducing time spent on your driving, making its implementation more agile. / A pesquisa qualitativa busca o entendimento de um assunto especifico por meio de descrições, comparações e interpretações dos dados, os quais são representados por palavras, figuras, vídeos e sons. No contexto da pesquisa qualitativa foram tratadas com mais detalhes neste trabalho, as etapas de análise e coleta de dados. Na etapa de análise dos dados é utilizada a técnica coding que possui um procedimento analítico, por meio do qual os dados são divididos, conceituados e integrados para formar uma teoria. A tarefa envolvendo a técnica coding quando feita manualmente exige bastante do pesquisador. Além disso, as ferramentas encontradas que apoiam a técnica coding não oferecem recursos que permitem trabalhar com vários documentos ao mesmo tempo, o que poderia facilitar a tarefa do pesquisador na análise e no gerenciamento de dados. Este trabalho apresenta a iCode, uma ferramenta livre que apóia a técnica coding, possibilitando a codificação de vários documentos ao mesmo tempo, referenciada neste trabalho como codificação simultânea. Com o uso desta ferramenta, pretendeu-se reduzir o tempo de codificação, por meio do uso da metáfora visual Treemap para viabilizar a codificação e gerenciamento de vários documentos simultaneamente. Foi realizado um estudo de viabilidade para verificar se é viável aplicar a ferramenta para criação de códigos e categorias, isto é, aplicar a técnica coding, utilizando a funcionalidade diferencial que a ferramenta oferece que é o fato de poder tratar vários documentos ao mesmo tempo. O estudo de viabilidade avaliou a eficiência e eficácia dos participantes na aplicação da técnica coding, verificando se a codificação simultânea é benéfica em relação a codificação de um documento por vez com o uso da ferramenta iCode e na aplicação manual da técnica coding. Os resultados fornecem evidências de que, a codificação simultânea realizada com o uso da ferramenta iCode, facilita a aplicação da técnica coding, reduzindo o tempo gasto em sua condução, tornando sua execução mais ágil.