Rafah A. Hosn

Adaptive Content for Device Independent Multi-modal Browser Applications

Adapting content appropriate to the device and modality of a users preference becomes more important as users begin to expect universal access to information, whether they are on the phone, on a desktop or using a PDA. This paper outlines the design of a travel application authored using an XForms compliant language and deployed using a DOM-based MVC multi-modal browser. The travel application authored in a language of conversational gestures that can be transcoded into multiple synchronized views for access via a variety of devices.

Characteristics of document similarity measures for compliance analysis

Due to increased competition in the IT Services business, improving quality, reducing costs and shortening schedules has become extremely important. A key strategy being adopted for achieving these goals is the use of an asset-based approach to service delivery, where standard reusable components developed by domain experts are minimally modified for each customer instead of creating custom solutions. One example of this approach is the use of contract templates, one for each type of service offered. A compliance checking system that measures how well actual contracts adhere to standard templates is critical for ensuring the success of such an approach. This paper describes the use of document similarity measures - Cosine similarity and Latent Semantic Indexing - to identify the top candidate templates on which a more detailed (and expensive) compliance analysis can be performed. Comparison of results of using the different methods are presented.

Single application model, multiple synchronized views

User interface is a mean to an end —its primary goal is to capture user intent and communicate the results of the requested computation. On today’s devices, user interaction can be achieved through a multiplicity of interaction modalities including speech and visual interfaces. As we evolve toward an increasingly connected world where we access and interact with applications through multiple devices, it becomes crucial that the various access paths to the underlying content be synchronized. This synchronization ensures that the user interacts with the same underlying content independent of the interaction modality — despite the difference in presentation that each modality might impose. It also ensures that the effect of user interaction in any given modality is reflected consistently across all available modalities. We describe an application framework that enables tightly synchronized multimodal user interaction. This framework derives its power from representing the application model in a modality-independent manner, and by traversing this model to produce the various synchronized multimodal views. As the user interaction proceeds, we maintain our current position in the model and update the application data as determined by user intent, then reflect these updates in the various views being presented. We conclude the paper by outlining an example that demonstrates this tightly synchronized multimodal interaction, and describe some of the future challenges in building such multimodal frameworks.

Remediating Overload in Over-Subscribed Computing Environments

Resource over subscription brings the risk of resource overload. This paper proposes a mechanism to remediate overload without assuming there is always resource available for migration. A work value notion is introduced to compare importance of VMs, and the overload remediation problem is formulated as a variant of Removable Online Multi-Knapsack Problem. An algorithm is proposed to solve this optimization problem. The mechanism is implemented in a large commercial Cloud environment. Experiments and model-based studies demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed mechanism in remediating overload and its performance in maximizing work values provided by computing environments (27% higher work values than the baseline algorithm in our study).

A DOM-based MVC multi-modal e-business

Modality: A particular type physical interface that can be perceived or interacted with by the user (e.g. voice interface, GUI display with keypad etc...) Multi-modal Browser: A browser that enables the user to interact with an application through different modes of intercation (e.g. typically: Voice and GUI). Accordingly a multi-modal-browser provides different moadlities for input and output Ideally it lets the user select at any time the modality that is the most appropriate to perform a particular interaction given this interaction and the users situation Thesis: By improving the user interface, we believe that multi-modal browsing will significantly accelerate the acceptance and growth of m-Commerce. Multiple access mechanisms One interaction mode per device PC Standardized rich visual interface Not suitable for mobile use I need a direct flight from New York to San Francisco after 7:30pm today There are five direct flights from New Yorks LaGuardia airport to San Francisco after 7:30pm today: Delta flight nnn...

Conversational multi-modal browser: an integrated multi-modal browser and dialog manager

This paper describes a multi-modal, free flow browser. A multi-modal browser allows the user to perform tasks via any of several modalities, such as speech and GUI or devices available sequentially or concurrently. A free-flow or mixed initiative browser allows the user to choose the navigation across an application and the order in which tasks are completed. This paper describes a system to provide flow conversational capability across modalities or devices. Multi-modal interaction is provided using a DOM based MVC multi-modal browser extended with an event-driven form-based dialog manager. We use XForms-based device independent authoring for the application. This paper details the XForms-based programming model of conversational applications, the principles and architecture of an XForms-based and event driven, task oriented, mixed initiative dialog manager and the integration of a dialog manager and a multi-modal browser using a standard-based DOM event driven interface. The dialog manager relies on a DOM based representation of the form-based framework presented by Papineni (1999) and Davies et al. (1999) to provide free-flow dialog management. It determines the users intention by measuring the relevance of user input to different tasks. It also provides focus determination by determining the next logical turn in the conversation.

An Ontology-Based Framework for Model-Driven Analysis of Situations in Data Centers

The capability to analyze systems and applications is commonly needed in data centers to address diverse problems such as root cause analysis of performance problems and failures, investigation of security attack propagation, and problem determination for predictive maintenance. Such analysis is typically facilitated by a hodgepodge of procedural code and scripts representing heuristics to be applied, and configuration databases representing state. As entities in the data center and relationships among them change, it is a challenge to keep the analysis tools up-to-date. We describe a framework that is based primarily on the principle of interpreting declarative representations of knowledge rather than capturing such knowledge in procedural code, and a variety of techniques for facilitating the continuous update of knowledge and state. A metamodel representing data center-specific domain knowledge forms the foundation for the framework. A model of the data center topological elements is an instantiation of the metamodel. Using the framework, we present a methodology for conducting a variety of analyses as a model-driven topology subgraph traversal, governed by knowledge embedded in the corresponding metamodel nodes. We apply the methodology to perform root cause analysis of performance problems in the domains of 3-tier Web and InfoSphere Streams applications.

Measuring Compliance and Deviations in a Template-Based Service Contract Development Process

Asset-based approaches, involving the use of standardized reusable components (as opposed to building custom solutions), are increasingly being adopted by IT service industries to achieve higher standardization, quality and cost reduction goals. In this paper, we address issues related to the use of an asset-based approach for authoring service contracts, where standard templates are defined for each type of service offered. The success of such an approach relies on a compliance checking system. We focus on three key components of such a system. The first measures how well actual contracts comply with the standard templates. The second analyzes compliant contracts containing moderate deviations and reports on the consistent patterns of deviations observed for each template to help identify necessary modifications required in templates to keep them up-to-date with evolving business requirements and customer needs. The third analyzes noncompliant contracts and identifies groups within them such that members of each group have enough similarity to each other to warrant consideration for development of new templates for each group. We describe the architecture of the proposed system, our experience in the use of various text analysis techniques to prototype different system components, and the lessons learned.