Paper Reading #23: Intelligent understanding of handwritten geometry theorem proving

Comments:

TBD

Reference Information:

Title: Intelligent understanding of handwritten geometry theorem proving

Authors: Yingying Jiang, Feng Tian, Hongan Wang, Xugang Wang, and Guozhong Dai ofInstitute of Software, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China; Xiaolong Zhang of The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

Presentation Venue: IUI '10 Proceedings of the 15th international conference on Intelligent user interfaces

Summary:

The goal that the researchers who wrote this paper are working towards is to create a system that is able to understand handwritten geometric proofs. It is based on continuing examinations into sketch recognition techniques and applying it to this specific task. One of the key motivations behind the design for this system is that it relies on an intuitive method that humans are comfortable with.

The system will be able to recognize the writing and interpret the symbolic meaning of it. It will have the capability to provide dynamic assistance to the user in completing a valid proof of geometric concept. The results the researchers have accumulated from the users have mostly been shown to be positive.

Discussion:

This system sounds like it could get a lot of good use in places such as high school geometry class or any kind of similar class in college. I think it would help to illustrate the mathematical concepts in a useful, visual manner that most people would be comfortable with. This system sounds like it would be quite useful in helping to teach students how to create valid proofs.

This concept could also be extended to other mathematical subjects such as calculus and trigonometry. It could be adapted for physics and chemistry as well. There are many applications I'm sure I haven't thought of that would benefit from intelligent analysis systems such as this one. I think it would be a wise idea to develop it and extend the idea to its fullest extent to help advance the understanding of young people and draw more individuals into technical positions.

Book Reading #49: Why We Make Mistakes

Chapters 10 and 11:

Summary:

TBD

Discussions:

TBD

Book Reading #48: Media Equation

Parts 1, 2, and 3

Summary:

TBD

Discussions:

TBD

Paper Reading #22: Usability guided key-target resizing for soft keyboards

Comments:

TBD

Reference Information:

Title: Usability guided key-target resizing for soft keyboards

Authors: Asela Gunawardana, Tim Paek, and Christopher Meek of Microsoft Research, Redmond, WA, USA

Presentation Venue: IUI '10 Proceedings of the 15th international conference on Intelligent user interfaces

Summary:

The researchers at Microsoft are attempting to find a way to make the input from users working with soft keyboards less error prone and easier to use. They have engineered a technique they refer to as anchored dynamic key-targets in order to accomplish this goal.

They have found that this technique appears to reduce the amount of error over other state-of-the art solutions. These findings come despite the lack of haptic feedback or the lack of traditional hard keyboard solutions that people are most used to currently.

Discussion:

Since I decided to test drive one of Microsoft's Windows 7 phones for awhile to see how it all worked, I would love it if they could improve the soft keys found on it. I found that the learning curve on the built-in soft keyboards was considerable and I still make a lot of mistakes to this day. I see myself making similar mistakes when using other similar solutions, such as on the iPhone, etc.

Any fix they could make would be welcome. I am getting better at it, but from what it sounds like in this paper, I think there could be many improvements that I would appreciate with the technology that I am using. Perhaps it will provide some innovation and drive the development of additional systems in future devices that have yet to be produced.

Full Blog: Media Equation

Comments:

TBD

Reference Information:

Title:

Authors:

Presentation Venue:

Summary:

TBD

Discussion:

TBD

Book Reading #47: Why We Make Mistakes

Chapters 8 and 9:

Summary:

TBD

Discussions:

TBD

Paper Reading #21: SocialSearchBrowser: a novel mobile search and information discovery tool

Comments:

TBD

Reference Information:

Title: SocialSearchBrowser: a novel mobile search and information discovery tool

Authors:  Karen Church, Joachim Neumann, Mauro Cherubini, and Nuria Oliver of Telefonica Research, Barcelona, Spain

Presentation Venue: IUI '10 Proceedings of the 15th international conference on Intelligent user interfaces

Summary:

The researchers are interested in exploring new ways in which to expand the usage of social media. To this end, they are proposing a research project they are dubbing the SocialSearchBrowser. This new technology is designed to take advantage of the way in which humans are utilizing mobile networking schemes.

In this exploratory paper, the researchers gained preliminary results into insights based on trials using the Social Search Browser in a mobile networking situation. Their ultimate goal is to improve the way in which humans are utilizing this space by taking certain key mobile contexts and analyzing how they interact with the social space.

Discussion:

I think that this has certain interesting implications. Currently, I find that search on Facebook is somewhat lacking when I want to search people based on differing criteria, such as demographic information. It would make my life easier if I could search using key words that represent my interests. MySpace was easier to find people with some of those similar interests, and this is probably the only area where I will concede that MySpace had any edge on Facebook.

That being said, I would find it beneficial to have improved tools to help me navigate and utilize the social search space to optimum potential usage. I find that I enjoy using some of these social tools to keep track of friends, family, and colleagues as well as finding and retaining new contacts. Hopefully this can help mobile computing devices in the same way that is has other platforms.