Javier Finat

An evaluation of ontology matching techniques on geospatial ontologies

Standardization is one of the pillars of interoperability. In this context, efforts promoted by the Open Geospatial Consortium, such as CityGML (Technical University, Berlin), a standard for exchanging three-dimensional models or urban city objects, are welcomed. However, information from other domains of interest (e.g. energy efficiency or building information modeling) is needed for tasks such as land planning, large-scale flooding analysis, or demand/supply energy simulations. CityGML allows extension in order to integrate information from other domains, but the development process is expensive because there is no way to perform it automatically. The discovery of correspondences between CityGML concepts and other domains concepts poses a significant challenge. Ontology matching is the research field emerged from the Semantic Web to address automatic ontology integration. Using the ontology underlying CityGML and the ontologies which model other domains of interest, ontology matching would be able to find the correspondences that would permit the integration in a more automatic manner than it is done now. In this paper, we evaluate if ontology matching techniques allow performing an automatic integration of geospatial information modeled from different viewpoints. In order to achieve this, an evaluation methodology was designed, and it was applied to the discovery of relationships between CityGML and ontologies coming from the building information modeling and Geospatial Semantic Web domains. The methodology and the results of the evaluation are presented. The best results have been achieved using string-based techniques, while matching systems give the worst precision and recall. Only in a few cases the values are over 50%, which shows the limitations when these techniques are applied to ontologies with a partial overlap.

Mobile health monitoring and smart sensors: a product line approach

The evolution of the population pyramid in developed countries, with an increasing proportion of aged people introduces new challenges to the public and private assistance services. A form of improving these services while keeping controlled the associated costs is to use remote continuous assistance. Wireless sensors allow obtaining real-time information of health parameters in a non-intrusive way. The determination of alert values for these parameters and the computing possibilities of the current mobile devices can facilitate a faster intervention which will minimize risks linked to delays in medical assistance. However, the diversity of risk situations is a factor that increases costs as many similar but not exactly identical products will be necessary now and in the future. We aim to solve this problem using an approach of software product lines, as multiple options can be easily incorporated to each final product implementation. This article presents the product line generic architecture and some examples of application, using wireless sensors connected to a central station by means of a smart phone, which is able to detect alarm situations.

Remote Monitoring and Fall Detection: Multiplatform Java Based Mobile Applications

Life quality of dependent persons is associated with personal autonomy and mobility, between others parameters. But the development of mobile applications for autonomy support is a challenging activity. Some of the challenges are the diversity of target platforms (including display sizes, keypads or tactile screens variations in each platform), and the limits in memory size, processing resources, battery duration, etc. For these reasons, a software product line (SPL) approach can provide a considerable advantage in mobile application development. This article presents a SPL that makes possible the remote monitoring of dependent people to facilitate their autonomy. Wireless sensors allow real-time information such as heart rate or oxygen saturation level to be controlled. Risk situations, including fall detection, critical in elderly persons who live alone, can also be detected. In the SPL approach, only the required features are incorporated in each concrete product (avoiding the device overload with a resource-costly extensive solution). The article presents an Android/Symbian based SPL architecture, using Bluetooth wireless sensors connected to a Smartphone. The mobile system is able to detect alarm situations and is remotely connected to a central system, aimed for its use in elderly residences.

Remote Health Monitoring: A Customizable Product Line Approach

The increasing proportion of aged people in the population of developed countries requires the provision of assistance services based on remote continuous monitoring. Wireless sensors allow regular and real-time information to be obtained concerning health parameters in a non-intrusive way. The identification of critical values for these parameters and the computing possibilities of the current mobile devices provide support for a fast intervention which can minimize risks linked to delays in medical assistance. The diversity of individual situations has guided us towards a solution based on the software product line paradigm, as multiple options can be easily incorporated to the final product implementation. This article presents the product line generic architecture and an example of application, using a wireless sensor connected to a central station by means of a smart phone, which is able to detect alarm situations

Personalized Mobile Applications for Remote Monitoring

The development of mobile applications is a challenging activity. The main problems are the limits of the mobile devices (in memory size, processing power, battery duration, etc.) and the diversity of target platforms, display sizes, or input modes (keypads or tactile screens). For these reasons, the software product line (SPL) development paradigm can improve the process of designing and implementing mobile systems. The authors’ approach to SPL development uses the package merge relationship of the standard UML to represent the variability in all the SPL design and implementation models. The combination of this technique and conventional CASE and IDE tools (Eclipse or MS Visual Studio) makes the developments of SPLs for mobile applications easier as it removes the need for specialized tools and personnel. This article presents a SPL that makes possible the remote monitoring of dependent people to facilitate their autonomy. The SPL generic architecture uses Bluetooth wireless sensors connected to mobile devices. These devices are remotely connected to a central system, which could be used in hospitals or aged person’s residences. Moderate cost sensors allow health parameters such as heart rate or oxygen saturation level to be controlled. Risk situations can also be detected using a range of predefined values or specific sensors. The diversity of individual situations and the resource limitations favor the use of the SPL paradigm, as only the required features are incorporated in each concrete product.

Weighted Voronoi Diagrams for Optimal Location of Goods and Services in Planar Maps

Location of industries or services is a classical problem with an overlapping of techniques involving a geographic support, a quantitative evaluation of supply and demand components, and communication networks. Traditional Cost-Benefit Analysis are focused towards maximization of economic and social benefits in terms of distance maps, minimization transport costs and desirability of goods and services. Economic, population and infrastructures models are variable along time, and consequently, sites used for their representation must be adequately weighted according to different criteria. The aggregation of different criteria in a unique objective function (depending on adjustable parameters) allows to identify a unique solution for the problem in terms of weighted distance maps linked to the objective function. Thus, Weighted Voronoi Diagrams (WVD) provide the most adequate framework for computing and representing the optimal localization linked to a unique global function. This paper considers the interaction between Weighted Voronoi Diagrams and Multicriteria Analysis in Facility Location Problem. First, we introduce a weighted Voronoi diagram based on the places to avoid filter the points of the scenario from infinite to a finite number. Then, Multicriteria Analysis chooses one point of the resulting set from a function that accumulates a list of given criteria. As a result of the process we get the ideal position of the new facility we want to locate in. The solution can afford both private and public facilities, desirable or undesirable as well with three levels of application relative to urban, metropolitan and regional areas.

Mobile Voronoi Diagrams for Traffic Monitoring under Bad Visibility Conditions

A semiautomatic management of traffic scenes displays a large diversity of mobile data arising from usual Computer Vision techniques. The mobile nature of inputs requires the combination of different techniques for filtering, tracking, and clustering features along a video sequence. These problems are considerably harder in presence of low visibility conditions arising from rain, fog or dazzling conditions. It is necessary a robust coarse-to-fine approach for supporting early alert in presence of conflict or dangerous situation at road intersections. Currently, there is no a general solution developed for low visibility conditions, and what there is, has been developed following particular strategies involving a specific combination of filters for extracting and analyzing the situation. Under low visibility conditions, mobile features are clustered as blobs with similar motion patterns and labelled in terms of a mobile Voronoi site which represents the centroid of a coloured region with similar kinematic pattern. For a fixed camera, and in absence of information about relative velocities of vehicles, kinematic involves the relative variation of colour and shape. With low visibility conditions and for real-time response, it is not necessary to work with a large palette of colours, and a reduction of bits per pixel is performed in the preprocessing stage. We illustrate our results with some scenes where reflections in water (rainy weather) or discontinuities linked to fog, can produce hallucinations for which our approach provides a robust kinematic method justifying the application of mobile Voronoi diagrams for mobile blobs as unifying principle.

A software platform for eLearning of interventions in Cultural Heritage environments

We have developed a software tool for Learning of Conservation and Rehabilitation Tasks in AEC [Architecture, Engineering, Construction] environments. It is based on different multimedia contents [text, image, video, laser scan] which are georeferenced to a representation of an outdoor scene. Three-dimensional modelling is compatible with any kind of devices for photogrammetric surveying, including images and laser-based information. It intends to become an educational and corporative learning platform (e-Learning and e-Working), which will enable to instructors an effective design of online courses and an efficient management of learning techniques and collaboration activities on the web. Our contribution is focused towards the design and development of collaborative working environments, where experts with different expertise can share their knowledge in a common framework. This tool has been applied for planning intervention strategies, products and methodologies focused towards surveying, planning and executing conservation policies in architectural elements of the Spanish Cultural Heritage with a special regard to Accessibility issues.