This thesis presents a series of studies to explore and understand the design of eyes-free interfaces for mobile devices. The motivation is to devise a holistic design concept that is based on the WIMP paradigm and is adapted to the requirements of mobile user interaction. It is proposed that audio is a very efficient and effective modality for use in an eyes-free mobile interface. Methods to transfer the WIMP paradigm to eyes-free interfaces are proposed and evaluated. Guidelines for the implementation of the paradigm are given and – by means of an example – a holistic design concept is proposed. This thesis begins with an introduction to and critical reflection of re- currently important themes and research methods from the disciplines of psychoacoustics, psychology, and presence research. An overview of related work is given, paying particular attention to the use of interface metaphors in mobile eyes-free interfaces. The notion of distance is discussed as a method to prioritise, structure, and manage attention in eyes-free interfaces. Practical issues arising from sources becoming inaudible with increasing distance can be addressed by proposing a method modeled on echo location. This method was compared to verbally coded distance information and proved useful for identifying the closest of several objects, while verbally coded distance infor- mation was found to be more efficient for identifying the precise distance of an object. The knowledge gained from the study can contribute to improv- ing other applications, such as GPS based navigation. Furthermore, the issue of gaining an overview of accessible objects by means of sound was exam- ined. The results showed that a minimum of 200 ms between adjacent sound samples should be adhered to. Based on these findings, both earcons and synthesized speech are recommendable, although speech has the advantage of being more flexible and easier to learn. Monophonic reproduction yields comparable results to spatial reproduction. However, spatial reproduction has the additional benefit of indicating an item’s position. These results are transferable and generally relevant for the use of audio in HCI. Tactile interaction techniques were explored as a means to interact with an auditory interface and were found to be both effective and enjoyable. One of the more general observations was that 2D and 3D gestures were intuitively used by participants, who transferred their knowledge of established gestures to auditory interfaces. It was also found that participants often used 2D ges- tures to select an item and proceeded to manipulate it with a 3D gesture. The results suggest the use of a small gesture set with reversible gestures for do/undo-type actions, which was further explored in a follow up study. It could be shown that simple 3D gestures are a viable way of manipulating spatialized sound sources in a complex 3D auditory display. While the main contribution of this thesis lies in the area of HCI, pre- viously unresearched issues from adjacent disciplines that impact the user experience of auditory interfaces have been addressed. It was found that regular, predictable movement patterns in 3D audio spaces cause symptoms of simulator sickness. However, these were found to be minor and only oc- curred under extreme conditions. Additionally, the influence of the audio reproduction method on the perception of presence, social presence, and realism was examined. It was found that both stereophonic and binaural reproduction have advantages over monophonic sound reproduction: stereo- phonic sound increases the perception of social presence while binaural sound increases the feeling of being present in a virtual environment. The results are important contributions insofar as one of the main applications of mobile devices is voice based communication; it is reasonable to assume that there will be an increase in real-time voice based social and cooperative networking applications. This thesis concludes with a conceptual design of a system called “Foogue”, which uses the results of the previous experiments as the basis of an eyes-free interface that utilizes spatial audio and gesture input.

A number of issues related to graduate education in pharmacy have become apparent in the last several years. Recruitment of pharmacy students into graduate programs is one of the concerns. Currently, little information exists regarding this topic other than annual enrollment data. A certain number of pharmacy undergraduates must pursue graduate education to allow for the continued growth of the profession. A study was conducted to determine if a newly created videotape intervention would change participants attitudes and awareness levels concerning graduate educational pursuits in pharmacy. First and third professional year students at four Colleges of Pharmacy were randomly assigned to the treatment or control groups. Members of the control group were asked to complete the survey instrument only. The instrument consisted of three measures of intention to pursue graduate education, personal attitudes toward this pursuit, and perceptions of how significant others (the subjective norm) felt about these endeavors. The Theory of Reasoned Action (Ajzen and Fishbein) provided the theoretical framework for the research. Results of the study indicated that the intervention was able to change intentions, attitudes, and awareness levels regarding graduate education and research activities. Intentions of enrolling in graduate school did not differ between two entry level degree programs or in males versus females. First year students had higher intentions of obtaining graduate education than third year students. The subjective norm was more important than attitudes in predicting the intentions concerning graduate school attendance. These results demonstrate that positive changes in intentions, attitudes, and awareness levels can be obtained from such videotape interventions.

The purpose of this study was to: (1) ascertain how an activity/child centered approach, in conjunction with student use of manipulatives, affected the mathematics achievement of first and second graders in a rural school setting; and (2) to investigate teacher perception of the success of the specific methodology implemented in the study. The population for this study included the teachers and students in a rural Arizona K-3 elementary school. The study was longitudinal in nature and covered a two year period. The groups used during the first year of the study were first and second graders. The groups for the second year of the study were second and third graders. The K-6 teachers in the district were given an attitude questionnaire constructed to indicate teacher attitude toward worth of the program and various aspects of its implementation. Teacher mathematics lesson descriptions and perceived advantages and disadvantages of the program were also included in the attitude questionnaire. The teacher attitude questionnaires were analyzed in five parts and the findings were represented on charts. Some of the results were determined by a simple tally method and others were converted into percentages. Lesson observations were conducted in each of the six classrooms studied and the results were reported on charts. Achievement for treatment and nontreatment groups was measured by; pre- and post-testing with the Wide Range Achievement Test. T-tests were used to compare student results on the pre- and post-tests each year. In addition, a t-test comparison was made between the first year and second year with Iowa Test of Basic Skills test results. Finally, a one-way analysis of variance was done on the group receiving treatment for only one year, two years, and the non-treatment group. The combined results of the teacher attitude questions, lesson observations and achievement tests were used to make recommendations for program improvements.

Šiame darbe apžvelgiami garso ir animacijos apdorojimo metodai. Pateikiami metodų privalumai ir trūkumai. Aptariama Adobe Flash technologija, jos panaudojimas grafikoje. Supažindinama su objektinio programavimo kalba – ActionScript. Aprašomi išorinių muzikos rinkmenų nuskaitymo ir apdorojimo metodai. Pateikiami duomenų nuskaitymo klasių ir funkcijų sudarymo pavyzdžiai, garso duomenų atvaizdavimas panaudojant SoundMixer biblioteką. Aprašomi animacijos kūrimo etapai atsižvelgiant į objektų struktūrą. Iliustruojami atvirkštinės kinematikos taikymo pavyzdžiai kūno judesiui animuoti. Sukurtas projektas Actionscript programavimo kalba, kuriame nuskaitoma vartotojo pasirinkta mp3 rinkmena, atpažįstamas ritmas ir sinchronizuotai atvaizduojama animacija. Darbą sudaro 4 dalys: įvadas, analitinė ir praktinė dalis, išvados, literatūros sąrašas. Darbo apimtis – 62 p. teksto be priedų, 35 iliustr., 3 lent., 38 bibliografiniai šaltiniai. / An overview of the animation and sound – processing techniques. Methods presented the advantages and disadvantages.Discusses Adobe Flash technology, its use of graphics. Introducing the object-oriented programming language - ActionScript. Describe the external music files scanning and processing methods. Presented data capture forms and functions of examples. Display audio data using SoundMixer library. Describe the animation stage, based on the structure of objects. Illustrated by examples of application of inverse kinematics to animate the body motion. Project is created of ActionScript programming language, which is read by user – selected mp3 file, accepted by over rhythm and synchronization of displayed animations. Structure: introduction, analytical and practical parts, conclusions and suggestions, references. Thesis consists of: 62 p. text without appendixes, 35 pictures, 3 tables, 38 bibliographical entries.

In the context of location, large amounts of information are available on the Internet to be accessed by people via different devices. However, at times people have to manually search and access it. If the space where location-based services are available can be identified by hand-held devices, people can be prompted with services available around them. This thesis explores the use of ultrasound as a communication medium to tag such spaces and access location-based services with the related information; and demonstrates the indoor implementation of the prototype of a location-based services enabling system for hand-held devices. This system allows users to search and access the available services in their surroundings through their hand-held devices. A beacon generator placed in the service location broadcasts a service code mappable to the services particular to that location encoded in an ultrasound signal. The hand-held device can identify this signal and prompt the user with available services. System design and architecture is demonstrated and the viability of the system is tested through a variety of environments and scenarios showing that potentially this has both a wide range of applications and can enhance the way people access location-based services. / Thesis (Master, Computing) -- Queen's University, 2013-01-30 17:50:20.285

This thesis studies the application of the wavelet filter bank (WFB) in perceptual audio coding by providing brief overviews of perceptual coding, psychoacoustics, wavelet theory, and existing wavelet coding algorithms. Furthermore, it describes the poor frequency localization property of the WFB and explores one filter design method, in particular, for improving channel separation between the wavelet bands. A wavelet audio coder has also been developed by the author to test the new filters. Preliminary tests indicate that the new filters provide some improvement over other wavelet filters when coding audio signals that are stationary-like and contain only a few harmonic components, and similar results for other types of audio signals that contain many spectral and temporal components. It has been found that the WFB provides a flexible decomposition scheme through the choice of the tree structure and basis filter, but at the cost of poor localization properties. This flexibility can be a benefit in the context of audio coding but the poor localization properties represent a drawback. Determining ways to fully utilize this flexibility, while minimizing the effects of poor time-frequency localization, is an area that is still very much open for research.

For my creative thesis project I authored an interactive tour of the Ball State Department of Art. Many underlying factors go into this project. My desire to learn multimedia design, the departments desire to develop a new information tool and having the necessary hardware and software to do such a project were all key to its sucess.In the summer of 1994 I came to Ball State to learn multimedia authoring while getting a master's degree in art. Unknown to me at that time, the department had set a goal of increasing visibility both within and beyond the Ball State community. Faculty members Professor Phil Repp and Professor Christine Paul were collaborating on a promotional identity campaign. From these collaborations grew the idea of a departmental publication to promote the mission and programs of the Department of Art. With the rapid advancement of technology, it seemed appropriate to use computers as part of this promotional campaign.As Professors Paul and Repp researched the possible ways in which computers could be incorporated into this project, many questions remained. Exactly what form should a project like this take and who could do it? Careful discussion and planning also followed over what physical form the project should take (i.e. video tape, a computer disk, or printed material). Eventually the decision was made that an interactive tour of the Department of Art on CD-ROM was the most appropriate solution. For the amount of information that needed to be included and to engage the end user in a dynamic, interactive way, this medium was also the most logical.My decision to return to school coincides perfectly with the departments needs. Professor Paul’s and Professor Repp’s collaboration led to the conclusion that a third person would be needed. Someone who was already literate in advanced computer graphics and had the desire for such an undertaking. Therefore, my goals of advancing my understanding of Macintosh based digital imagery learning multimedia are significant on two levels; my career as a teacher and a professional artist would realize significant gains and this project is an outstanding addition to my portfolio.For the past several years, the primary area of artistic study for me has been in the area of computer graphics and I came to Ball State last summer with some very specific goals. One of them being to learn Macromedia Director (the authoring package I used to create the project). Director is nationally recognized by professionals in this field as the top program for this type of work. Therefore, this was both an opportunity to reach personal goals and to create a thesis project that could be used as an important part of the Department of Arts identity campaign. My thesis project is the result of my own goals and the Department of Arts goals to utilize cutting edge technology for designing innovative computer programs.I’m sure at the onset of this project that I did not understand the full magnitude of an undertaking such as this. However, it is very rewarding to look back and see both how far I’ve come personally and how the piece has progressed into a dynamic information tool. / Department of Art

Singing voice separation (SVS) can be defined as the process of extracting the vocal element from a given song recording. The impetus for research in this area is mainly that of facilitating certain important applications of music information retrieval (MIR) such as lyrics recognition, singer identification, and melody extraction. To date, the research in the field of SVS has been relatively limited, and mainly focused on the extraction of vocals from monophonic sources. The general approach in this scenario has been one of considering SVS as a blind source separation (BSS) problem. Given the inherent diversity of music, such an approach is motivated by the quest for a generic solution. However, it does not allow the exploitation of prior information, regarding the way in which commercial music is produced. To this end, investigations are conducted into effective methods for unsupervised separation of singing voice from stereophonic studio recordings. The work involves extensive literature review of existing methods that relate to SVS, as well as commercial approaches. Following the identification of shortcomings of the conventional methods, two novel approaches are developed for the purpose of SVS. These approaches, termed SEMANICS and SEMANTICS draw their motivation from statistical as well as spectral properties of the target signal and focus on the separation of voice in the frequency domain. In addition, a third method, named Hybrid SEMANTICS, is introduced that addresses time‐, as well as frequency‐domain separation. As there is lack of a concrete standardised music database that includes a large number of songs, a dataset is created using conventional stereophonic mixing methods. Using this database, and based on widely adopted objective metrics, the effectiveness of the proposed methods has been evaluated through thorough experimental investigations.

Hypermedia Learning Systems (HLS) are being used increasingly widely in Higher Education, offering non-linear navigation through complex learning materials and, it is argued, leading to improve cognitive flexibility. For some learners, though, nonlinear navigation in HLS leads to higher levels of disorientation, which can have an impact on their learning performance and attitudes towards the learning system. There has been significant research into the factors that can influence individual learners‘ experiences. For example, a number of studies have confirmed that individual differences such as cognitive style, domain knowledge and computer experience affect individuals‘ levels of disorientation and learning performance, and influence their attitudes towards HLS. It has also been suggested that instructional aids (in the form of certain visual elements and audio elements) can reduce levels of disorientation and, in turn, increase learning performance in, and positive attitudes towards, HLS for some learners. However, existing studies have tended to look at only a subset of these three individual differences in relation to an individual and/or consider only a small number of visual instructional aids. No study up to this point has considered the impact of cognitive style, domain knowledge and computer experience on disorientation, learning performance and attitudes in a HLS that incorporates a full range of visual instructional aids. In terms of the research related to audio instructional aids, no studies have looked into the effects of audio aids and these three individual differences in relation to disorientation, learning performance and attitudes in HLS. This thesis addresses these two shortcomings through two experiments. The aim of experiment 1 was to examine the effects of and between these three individual differences with respect to disorientation, learning performance and attitudes in two versions of a HLS: one that incorporated the set of visual instructional aids and one that did not. Experiment 2 aimed to do the same, but with respect to a HLS that provided audio instructional aids. The experiments used quantitative and qualitative approaches to gather data to address a set of research questions and research hypotheses. The participants were 384 university students from across London. The Cognitive Style Analysis (CSA) test was administered to determine participants‘ field dependence, and participants‘ demographic information, levels of computer experience and levels of prior knowledge were gathered using questionnaires. Learning performance was measured through achievement tests and a practical task. Levels of disorientation were measured using questionnaires, and attitudes were assessed using questionnaires and interviews. Participants were also observed when they were interacting with the HLS to perform learning tasks. A number of interesting results were revealed. Significant effects were found between the three individual differences with respect to disorientation, learning performance and attitudes in the HLS that provided no instructional aids. No significant effects were found between the three individual differences with respect to disorientation or learning performance in the other two versions of the HLS – those providing visual and audio instructional aids. Significant effects were found between the three individual differences with respect to the use of the visual and audio instructional aids to perform learning in the HLS. No significant effects were found between the three individual differences with respect to attitudes in the HLS that provided visual instructional aids. Significant effects were found between the three individual differences with respect to attitudes in the version that provided audio instructional aids. Analysis of the results led to the framing of a set of HLS design guidelines which are presented in this thesis. Finally, an agenda for future research leading on from the study‘s findings is presented.

El presente proyecto de tesis tiene como finalidad diseñar un sistema de emisión de comerciales para los medios de transporte masivos en Lima conmutando la señal abierta del aire OneSeg ISDB-T con los spots de publicidad contratados. Asimismo, el presente proyecto de tesis tiene como alcance la implementación de un prototipo (versión beta), según el diseño propuesto, para demostrar la funcionalidad del sistema. El presente libro de tesis consta de seis capítulos.