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A Providing collaborative learning applications the possibility to offer continuous awareness to on-line collaborative learning teams is a challenging issue since it is essential to keep participants informed of both what is happening and what happened in the learning group. Moreover, awareness is the basis to enhance collaboration and improve the individual and group performance since it allows to track and assess the collaborative learning process more objectively and to model students' behavior more efficiently. In order to provide students and tutors with effective awareness, we consider the collaborative actions registered in log files. It is necessary to process large and considerably complex event log files in a constant manner, and thus it may requires processing capacity beyond that of a single computer. In this paper we show how a Grid approach can considerably decrease the time of processing group activity log files and thus allow students and tutors to be aware of what is going on in the group activity even in real time. Our approach is based on the master-worker paradigm and is implemented using Globus technology running on the Planetlab platform. To test our application, we used event log files from the Basic Support for Collaborative Work (BSCW) system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In late years game construction with high reality have been done along with the development of VR technology. However, three components such as behavior generation using rigid body physics, 3D sound generation and haptic feedback are considered necessary for constructing a virtual world with high reality. In the paper, synchronization among visual, auditory and haptic sensation is attained by SCRAME Net, the fastest network system. As a concrete example, a billiards game is built and we would like to confirm that the method used in this research will contribute to build a game with high reality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we present an algorithm to imitate a game player's play patterns using a real-time neuroevolution (NE); the examples of the patterns can be moving and firing units. Our algorithm to learn and imitate is possible to be executed during gameplay. To test effectiveness of our algorithm, we made an application similar to the Starcraft. By using our method, a game player can avoids tediously repeating labors to control units. Moreover, applying this to enemy agents makes it possible to play more difficult and exciting games. From experimental results, we found that agents' ability to imitate a game player's unit control patterns could make human-like agents, and also we found that adaptive game AIs, especially the real-time NE, are efficient in such imitation problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simulation grid (SimGrid) is fit for the large-scale warfare simulation applications. Since stakeholders in warfare simulation include scenario developers, running & managing personnel and model managers, this paper firstly presents a special SimGrid framework which could be divided into three levels: application level, HLA/RTI level and model level. It then detailedly analyzes and describes how to search the model service based on warfare SimGrid architecture and its index integration mechanism. Finally, a model service location solution based on response order and access order is put forward. The service searching solution based on response order and access order is a good solution to rapidly search and locate necessary models in large-scale warfare simulation. The solution takes into whole account the access characteristics of warfare simulation models and its real-time characteristics, which greatly ensured the rapid service searching. In this solution, all kinds of parameters can be easily assigned and controlled. All buffer queues can be dynamically allocated according to requests of users. Obviously the solution can make great contribution to construct large-scale warfare simulation grid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes how Genetic Algorithm can be used to control the level of difficulty in a game based on a user's skill. An algorithm is proposed to control the difficulty of a game according to user's propensity in our previous work [1], [2]. But the searching spaces are very narrow and convergence of chromosomes is also slow because the game progresses step-by-step and chromosomes are evaluated simultaneously while playing the game. Thus, a method is presented to expand the searching spaces and converge quickly on the Genetic Algorithm in the domain of sequential progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents FITGap, an object-oriented framework dedicated to designing innovative interactions occurring in a Virtual Environment such as a Massively Multiplayer Online Game (MMOG). This framework has been designed as the underlying software of a future development environment for online games prototyping. FITGap is an open framework based on an extensible basic-blocks library, and uses a deterministic scheduling model to ease the development and tuning of the final application. Its semantics is well-defined to allow future analysis tools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we report on our experiences in using an animated competitive game with simulated physics to teach Artificial Intelligence techniques in an undergraduate computer science course. Students develop intelligent controllers for simulated vehicles, which compete with each other in a tournament. The simulation includes a real-time visualisation of the contests, and the students' solutions utilise an AI toolkit that provides animated displays showing the internal workings of their controllers in parallel with the simulation. The result is a learning experience that engages students' enthusiasm, and helps them to development mental models of the AI algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper analyzes the significance and feasibility of the undertaking of long-range marine cruise mission by Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and proposes the composition and major functions of this long-range marine cruise system, which lays foundations to the realization of long-range marine cruise of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and to the establishment of a marine supervision and administration system with all-directional coverage, all-weather operation and rapid response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the nature of player behaviour in game environments in relation to the methodology of the dramatist Bertolt Brecht. Firstly, a conceptualisation of how manipulation of both a player's actions, and their affective state is achieved by contemporary first-person games will be described. It will be questioned whether such game experiences can be reconfigured as spaces for complex and ethical learning experiences or whether their formal characteristics preclude this. Brecht's theatre, in particular the Lehrstucke (learning plays); Verfremdung (the alienation effect); and his exposure of the mechanics of the theatre experience will be introduced as a means of further exploring ways of delivering FPS experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

E-learning provides a solution to meet the challenge of enrolments increasing. This paper describes design and implementation of wireless LAN based virtual laboratory (WLANVL) used as an e-learning environment. Users of WLANVL can develop and remotely execute a variety of laboratory experiments over internet. The WLANVL mainly includes end user's workbench, management server and lab resources which are based on a set of controlled instruments. Wireless LAN based lab resources make this virtual laboratory scalable and redundancy management server makes it robust. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present in this paper researches focussed on training scenario specification. These researches are conducted in the context of a collaboration with Giat-Industries (a French military manufacturer) in order to introduce Virtual Reality(VR) in maintenance training. The use of VR environments for training is strongly stimulated by important needs of training on sensitive equipment, sometimes fragile, unavaiblable, costly or dangerous. Our project, named GVTGVT is a trademark of GIAT-Industries., is developped in a research/Industry collaboration. A first version of GVT is already available as a final product, which allows maintenance virtual training on GIAT-Industries equipments. Internal models have been designed in order to achieve reusability and standardization for the efficient development of new virtual training environments. In particular, we defined a scenario language named LORA, which is both textual and graphical. This language lets non-computer scientists author various and complex tasks in a virtual scene. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a visual world, the ability to sketch is an important asset for communicating complex ideas. However, sketching is a frustrating task for many people, and most never progress beyond a rudimentary skill level. In this paper we present SKIT, a computer-assisted sketch instruction tool. SKIT attempts to teach beginning students one of the important skills of sketching, the ability to perceive effectively. It is based on traditional art instruction techniques, which break the complex task of drawing into smaller tasks. These sub-tasks are combined into a final drawing, which can be then rendered using several different NPR styles. We also present preliminary results from people who have used SKIT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, a number of instructional design platforms have emerged in educational informatizing process. However, teachers still can not form their individualised instructional design through them, because these platforms lack the combination with a specific subject. Thus, an informatized instructional design platform for physics is programmed in this paper to meet the needs of teachers in physics. Keywords: Integration of curriculum, instructional design in physics, lesson planning system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have developed a learning platform to simplify and improve teaching and practice of Computer Graphics for beginners and advanced students. Our goal is to offer a set of tools to help students having a better mental vision of the abstract notions introduced during the course. Our platform is composed by a pedagogical-oriented, intuitive and user-friendly graphic engine, offering a powerful amount of features with an extremely easy and comfortable interface, and a set of interactive and collaborative applications (called modules) to use during lessons and workshop sessions to present complex concepts in an easy and clear way. In this paper we expose how we have built our platform, what it offers and which role will play in our courses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on our approach to developing a Virtual Learning Environment, CrimCity, aimed at learning about crime and its prevention. We describe the approach taken to gaining information relating to interactivity and the learning potential of CrimCity, presenting a user study involving 27 novice learners. A number of interesting results have emerged, including the clear disinclination and negative perspective of virtual learning environments experienced by women in the 14-19 age range along with the positive response from older adults, particularly women. Responding to the results of this study has resulted in greater clarity for learning approaches within CrimCity and the interaction styles required to support them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is an interim report on the project to develop and evaluate the curricula in which the unification of rudimentary robotics and English education is aimed for. The intended goal of this project is to turn out the young children that are conversant with the adequate, basic knowledge of robotics and competent in the practical use of English skills. We like to call such children "would-be super engineers". The "would-be super engineers" will be our nation's valuable human resources in future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social navigation in a community of practice (CoP) is an approach of locating information through increased social awareness. Designing support for social navigation requires precise knowledge about the users' needs and wishes so as to meet user participatory design methodology. User requirement definition on social navigation is, however, difficult to elicit. On the one hand, without the context of the CoP, it is hard to collect the user requirements on navigation, especially when the concept of virtual community is new to the target user group. On the other hand, to set up such a virtual community, preliminary studies on social navigation is however necessary. This paper presents the experiences how we dealt with such a chicken and egg problem. Different approaches were used: performing a theoretical study, administering an online questionnaire, observing on an existing virtual society, analyzing similar systems, prototyping, and conducting an expert walk-through. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we present the architecture and function of a Web-based Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS), which incorporates decision tree and fuzzy matching for instruction strategy. ITS contains following components: information collecting system, learner profile analysis system, strategy matching system and strategy updating system; using domain knowledge base, web log base, learner model base and instruction strategy base . The system analyzes learning models of different users and applies different instruction strategies to meet personalized requirements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we propose a novel method of perceptual evaluation of pronunciation quality for Computer Assisted Language Learning used in e-learning. The overall score of the pronunciation quality is the combination of the matching score, the perceptual score and the asymmetric score. The matching score is the measure of the acoustic distortion of the test speech, the perceptual score models the perceived distortion by human in perception domain and the asymmetric score describes the asymmetric effect of the sensation of the deletion error and the insertion error in spoken English. The correlation coefficient between the predicted objective score and the subjective score by the experts is 0.75, which is advantageous over current methods based on HMM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To quantify the regularity of state updates, the concept of Irregular Degree was introduced. Two experiments corresponding to four different filtering policies were designed. In the first experiment three filtering policies based on Irregular Degree were compared. In the second experiment, the filtering policy achieving the best task performance in the first experiment was selected to compare with other filtering policies. The results of the first experiment indicate that the stability of state updates per second is a more important impact factor than Irregular Degree on the task performance. The results of the second experiment indicate that corresponding to different state updates per second, the filtering policies can achieve different task performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A source-less attitude measurement system and robust heading self-calibration method for virtual surgery navigation is presented. The proposed system includes three accelerometers and three magnetometers to measure the gravity field and the geomagnetic filed to calculate the attitude. During the heading calibration procedure, both the magnetic field and gravity field are measured in all three axes with a set of combinations of attitudes. The set of measurements of magnetometer triad are first selected by random sampling consensus (RANSAC), and then are used to fit an ellipsoid to remove the hard iron error, finally the measurements of the magnetometer triad without the hard iron error and the measurements of accelerometer triad are rearranged to a set of equations to solve the soft iron matrix. Compared with other existing calibration method, the proposed calibration method does not require heading reference. Experimental results show the effectiveness of the proposed method and its potential application in virtual surgery navigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a new method for efficient out-of-core rendering of complex 3D scenes. The method consists of two main phases: a new out-of-core preprocessing and a run-time, view-dependent rendering of the scene. In the preprocessing, we partition the scene with a spatial octree and build an on-disk multi-resolution hierarchical representation for the scene. Then at run-time, the multi-threaded technology is used. The prefetching thread predicts the motion of the viewer and prefetches the scene that would be seen next. The rendering thread traverses the octree hierarchy and renders the scene by view-dependent selective refinement. Experimental results show that our system can render large complex 3D scenes of tens of millions of triangles at interactive rates on commodity PC with fine image quality and minimal popping artifacts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taking Dunhuang MoGao Frescoes as research background, a new method to generate the sketch for Dunhuang frescoes is proposed. Learning from the traditional manual imitation procedure, we first get the contour line of a Dunhuang fresco which is composed of many connected curves, and then render the strokes by learning styles from examples. For several example strokes, the style of example strokes are captured and expressed as style function. Given a target curve, a new stroke can be generated with the style of one example and moreover, the style of the target stroke can be further customized into different styles similar to the examples by interpolation of styles. This research has the potential to provide a computer aided tool for art historians to do imitation work, and improve the efficiency of imitation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a data-driven shape model for reconstructing human body models from one or more 2D photos. One of the key tasks in reconstructing the 3D model from image data is shape recovery, a task done until now in utterly geometric way, in the domain of human body modeling. In contrast, we adopt a data-driven, parameterized deformable model that is acquired from a collection of range scans of real human body. The key idea is to complement the image-based reconstruction method by leveraging the quality shape and statistic information accumulated from multiple shapes of range-scanned people. In the presence of ambiguity either from the noise or missing views, our technique has a bias towards representing as much as possible the previously acquired ‘knowledge' on the shape geometry. Texture coordinates are then generated by projecting the modified deformable model onto the front and back images. Our technique has shown to reconstruct successfully human body models from minimum number images, even from a single image input. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present an approach for constructing feature-based 3D characters from scanned models with feature markers specified. Our method consists of three phases. Firstly, a Radial Basis Function (RBF) based global warping function is applied to deform a feature-template to a shape interpolating the features points on the scanned model. A surface fitting process is then adopted to refine the feature-template to approximate the given model. The surface fitting process is a hybrid of the closest point scheme and the region propagation based scheme, which leads to an excellent result even if large size holes are introduced on the scanned data or the warped template mesh is apart from the scanned model. Finally, with the template fitting results, we introduce a method to transform the complex geometry to 3D character models by using the Compactly Supported Radial Basis Function (CSRBF). Keywords: mesh fitting, geometry modeling, 3D character, features, computer game. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to design and implement a mobile class Web site for elementary schools using intelligent user interface. Especially, our mobile class Web site encourages parents to participate in various school matters including their children's scholastic achievements. Traditional class Web sites provide information to parents through wired networks. Recently, with the development of wireless data transmission technologies, traditional class Web sites can be linked with wireless networks. Armed with wireless transmission handset devices such as cellular phones and PDA (personal digital assistants), students' parents can get class information directly through those devices. This work is to develop class Web sites that can be synergistically linked between wired and wireless networks. The communication through both wired and wireless networks enables students' parents to overcome the limitation of space and time and further promotes better collaboration with teachers. The survey results show that our class Web site promotes active participation of parents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the outdoor 3D game, the terrain can be modified because of interaction. This brings two new complexities to render terrain in 3D game. The first lies in the real-time visualization of dynamic terrain, and the second is that the modified terrain surface need to be preserved. We present an algorithm for dynamic terrain LOD(DT LOD) with preserving region in 3D game engine. The algorithm uses a DAG to represent dependency relationship of vertices which split triangles, and employs an active vertices set to update triangles in two consecutive frames for improving rendering performance. The region LOD can be constructed according to the view direction and the distance between the viewpoint and regions. The results of experiments show that our algorithm has a effective performance during rendering terrain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In film, cinematographic techniques are used in a concurrent sense, predominantly to achieve creative goals. The use of cinematographic techniques in edutainment applications would especially affect the modeling of virtual characters as well as the authoring and perception of interactive stories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of computer, internet and multimedia technology have changed our world to information society and caused great effect to our daily life. Especially in education environment, the traditional teacher-oriented learning is facing various changes due to the introduction of information technology. This new technology allows individual learners to have opportunities for active participation and self-paced learning. Until now, most web-based cyber classes have been developed using passive media such as text, image, sound and video, and thus failed to induce interactivity and active participation from users. The proposed contents development model is consisted of interactive contents, executable contents, process contents, animation contents, and media-oriented contents. This model can be used as a guideline to develop web-based cyber classes which fully exploit the advantages of up-to-date internet and multimedia techniques. A Computer Graphics Cyber Class case is shown to explain how to apply the contents development and implementation model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A multi-modal virtual reality application that aims to investigate the effect of olfaction on learning, retention, and recall of complex 3D structures such as organic molecules, is presented. Students interact with molecules in either desktop or immersive configuration. In the latter case, visual immersion is achieved through the use of a large rear-projected stereoscopic screen. In both configurations motion parallax is provided using a camera-based head tracking technique. Both desktop and large-scale fan-based devices that allow real-time smell diffusion are used. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We introduce a projection-space interaction tool (Digital Canvas) which can be used for visual environments. Using Digital Canvas, users are allowed to interact with the visual items on the same space where they are displayed. Digital Canvas has resolved some limitations of previous interaction tools by merging interaction space and display space, providing tangible interface, and allowing for intuitive and natural interfaces. Digital Canvas was successfully used for digital painting education and a virtual environment manipulation. As a painting tool, it provided tactile feedback, freedom of choosing painting tools, erasable and undoable procedures, and an interface that is similar to traditional painting. As a virtual environment interaction tool, Digital Canvas allowed for projection-space tangible interactions using physical objects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an augmented game is a game, which is overlapping virtual objects on a real environment and attacking the virtual objects, accurate location estimation in a real environment is one of important issues. Existing global positioning systems(GPS) to track users' positions do not work inside a building, and systems using sensors such as Active Badge are expensive to install and maintain. Therefore, researches for low-cost vision-based navigation system have been attempted. Since most of scenes include a floor, ceiling and wall in a building, it is difficult to represent characteristics of those scenes. We propose an image matching method using image texts instead of objects included uniformly in natural scenes for navigation. The image texts are widely distributed in our environments, are very useful for describing the contents of an image, and can be sassily extracted compared to other semantic contents, and we obtain image texts using a method combining edge density and multi-layer perceptrons with CAMShift. However, since a camera attached to moving vehicles(robots) or hand-held devices has a low resolution, it is not easy to perform extraction using a binarization and a text recognition. Therefore, we perform an image matching using a matching window based on a scale and orientation of image texts and its neighborhood to recognize discriminated places including same image texts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An improved 6DOF electromagnetic tracking algorithm is proposed. It utilizes the scattering parameters, which are about the transmitter coils, the receiver coils and the involved circuits, to determine the pose and orientation information of the target. Compared with the traditional algorithm which takes the system parameters as same in all the three directions, it is more accordant to the nature of the current tracking device. And it also simplifies the system hardware design. The experimental results prove the algorithm is valid and can improve the accuracy of the system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a novel method for merging a live video stream of multiple users into a shared virtual world in a large VR display environment. Collaborators at a remote site can be displayed in a virtual world as video textures to support visual communication more efficiently. To generate the video texture of a user in a dynamic background environment such as a CAVETM-like system, we use a camera pair which consists of two gray-scale cameras with band-pass filters, and two color cameras. The gray-scale cameras capture infrared images in which the dynamic background on the screen is eliminated, having only the infrared light reflected by the person. This makes it easy to extract the user's silhouette robustly. Using projection histogram we found rough position of the all users' head in the image. We can then find exact corresponding points using cross-correlation between two user silhouette images to determine the 3D position of each user. The extracted user silhouette is warped by rectification and translated to fit into a color image. We can now generate a video texture of the user by masking the background of the user in the color image. Each video texture is then transmitted to a remote site and displayed on a billboard in virtual space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a distributed computing framework for network- optimized visualization and steering of real-time scientific simulations and computations executed on a remote host, such as workstation, cluster or supercomputer. Unlike the conventional "batch" simulations, this system enables: (i) monitoring of an on-going remote computation using visualization tools, and (ii) on-line specification of simulation parameters to interactively steer remote computations. Using performance models for transport channels and visualization modules, we develop a dynamic programming method to optimize the realization of the visualization pipeline over a wide-area network to maximize the frame rate. We present experimental results to illustrate the effectiveness of this system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Virtual Five Animals Exercise is an interactive game which is an important part of Virtual Olympic Museum for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad. Users can learn and imitate Five Animals Exercise without any interactive device. To do these, we make use of motion capture data to drive the virtual human motion, and use template matching method to recognize users' motion. We improve the motion editing and motion retargetting methods in our system. Many people enjoy our game. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a hybrid geometry-image representation of trees, which consists of three hierarchies. In the lowest hierarchy, a collection of triangles are used to represent the trunk and salient branches. The finer hierarchy for the small branches is represented by Frond Map, a special type of textures. As the finest hierarchy, the leaves are clustered first and represented as a set of billboards. For each hierarchy, we generate a sequence of LODs (Level of Details). The appropriate level is selected on-the-fly. Smooth transitions between successive levels are accomplished using an image-space voting technique. Our representation facilitates the rapid modeling of trees, the dynamic simulation of trees swaying under wind as well as realistic simulation of large-scale forest scenes. Experimental results demonstrate the efficiency and high quality of our approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mechanical behaviour of the human skin shows a non-linear stress-strain relationship. Based on the behaviour of human dermis proposed by Hendriks, we develop a system to draw a specific skin incision shape which consists of four spine curves and two lines. Users can firstly define the two incision points on the skin, our system can superimpose the shape on the surface and show the skin incision cutaway. OBBTree analysis for the skin surface is used to put the incision shape. Followed by shape shown on the surface and finally a cutaway is generated to show the cut. Jittering problem generated by the above steps is also resolved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

3D video mosaics created by 3D image mosaicking, our previous research, are for 3D visualization of the roadside standing building scene captured by a side-looking video camera as a continuous set of vertical-textured planar faces. These vertical faces were concatenated to create an approximate model on which the images could be back-projected as textures. We proposed a retrieval technique of selecting vertical-textured planar faces from archived 3D image mosaics to fast represent a 3D world, where this selection is based on proximity to the user location in the virtual world. The chosen vertical-textured planar faces are recomposed as a continuous set formed stream and are then rendered in 3D virtual space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this system, we first build the geometrical model of out-door scene. Then by establishing an energy equation based on principle of energy equilibrium, the surface temperatures of the infrared scene under various conditions are acquired. We propose a new method to obtain infrared texture from its corresponding visible image. The infrared effect due to different weather conditions such as rain, cloud, fog is accounted for. The infrared shadow with high-reality and the high dynamic range effect of infrared dynamic scene are also simulated, and real-time walkthrough of large-scale infrared dynamic scene is carried out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A uniform active model adaptation is proposed for some specific applications related with realistic face reconstruction and sketch generation, which is separated into tow phases: global adaptation and local adaptation. During the global adaptation, a coarse matching is used for adjusting the facial contour and five sense organs according to the correspondence of feature points both in 2D facial image and 3D model. An interpolation is processed on the global adjusted 3D model for a fine matching, which forms the local adaptation. A personalized facial sketch generation method is present based on the similar idea of 3D facial model adaptation. By comparison between the feature points of specific person's face and those of a predefined generic face, metamorphosis can be drawn for generating a personalized cartoon facial sketch. Two systems are built, and face reconstruction and sketch results show that proposed method is efficient and desirable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new freehand text entry method, called EasyStroke, is presented for mobile devices. Based on the multi-stroke philosophy and analogy principle, 26 lowercase characters are described. Trails of stylus movement are segmented dynamically and best approximated through the three captured points. Then, each segment is rendered immediately using hardware-accelerated OpenVG APIs. Finally, combination of the types of all segments flows into the small LUT-based recognizer, using some additional bits. Thus, this new method is easy, efficient and quick to use. Implementation and evaluation of such system are presented. Prototype of mobile game, WordCollection, is demonstrated to help users experience functions of both education and entertainment. Keyword. Multi-stroke, text entry, segmentation, recognition, OpenVG, hardware accelerated APIs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wearable computers and other handheld devices are now used beyond the research lab, in diverse applications, and this trend toward ubiquitous computing is accelerating. One challenge that remains in this emerging research field is the ability to build reliable industrial information management and training system for the mobile knowledge workers in the manufacture application. A Wearable Learning and Support System which has been designed as tools to support learning, training and operation of maintenance activity in industrial settings is presented. With the context information service, resources information process, and adaptive strategies, this system can suit for the requirements of operation assistant, learning, training and information management processes on the job. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multiplayer computer games are becoming more and more popular. While much effort has been contributed to point-to-point communication based architecture and network game traffic, we proposed a server decentralized game architecture based on Jabber in order to have high availability, performance, scalability, fault tolerance and security. Three components of the architecture: players, game servers and record-keeper are defined and functioned. The architecture is implemented and instanced as a Chinese Chess game. The game data are packed with XML stanzas and delivered to the addressed player through XML streams. In order to test the availability, the game is experimented and the result is meaningful even though the test environment is rough. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are two main approaches, conservative and optimistic, for maintaining consistency in distributed network games. Under the conservative approach, players may experience network latency, depending on packet transfer delay caused by the send-and-wait and acknowledging processes. Under the optimistic approach, the processes do not wait for other players' packets and advance to their own frames, hence there is no network latency. However, when inconsistency happens, the processes must roll back. This can cause irritation and confusion to players, and thus the game quality deteriorates. Overall, the optimistic approach may not be suitable for networked games. To overcome the network latency problem in the conservative approach, we propose a new system which can reduce the network latency and bandwidth requirements. Furthermore, the effect of the number of players in multiplayer game sessions is examined in detail with varying number of players. Experimental results with our proposed system confirm improved performances in latency and frame rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Firstly, the methodology for characters development in computer games was analyzed from both aspects of art-sourced character development and story-sourced character development separately from the different views of various research fields. In the second section, four different techniques relating to character design and the creation of emotion has been deeply discussed. At the end, the four diverse designs for character OEDIPUS were given according to the plot development based on the background of tragical fable of the ancient Greece. Keywords: Characters Development, Creating Emotion, Characters Design, OEDIPUS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The expeditious growth of the Internet and the related technologies hastily contribute and fill up educational applications. While most of them are intended to facilitate the teaching process and are teacher-oriented, the society has continuously asked for a paradigm shift to a student-centred approach. The VISOLE teaching style is a learning paradigm is made up of student-oriented elements which contemplate to infuse learning with amusement. Farmtasia is an online game designed to implement the VISOLE idea with situated learning. Students are suggested to play this online game in groups, interact and compete with other group members. Eventually they are expected to learn the subject knowledge embedded in the game and develop high-order skills through playing the game. The design and implementation of the game follow two principles. The first one is to make the game as realistic as possible so that students can learn from an authentic environment. The second one is to inject fun and interactive components in the game, so that students are eager to immerse and interact in the multiuser environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

"Online Learning" has been commonly viewed as a mechanism for empowering improved learning outcome, increased flexibility of aligning the individual need of learners, and better quality of educational interaction. In fact, a lot of "digitized" and "ready-to-use" learning and teaching resources are already available online; nevertheless, we must not confuse quantity and quality, as these resources may just continue to perpetuate teacher-centred approaches, rather than student-centred approaches. The present research aimed to compare the educational values, learning effectiveness, students and teachers' perceptions of a new online educational paradigm - Situated Game-based Learning with Traditional Web-based Learning in secondary education in Hong Kong. A combination of quantitative and qualitative research methods were employed for data collection and analysis. Results showed that, under the present research settings, although no significant difference of students' learning outcome with respect to these two approaches was found, the participating students and teachers were quite positive towards the educational paradigm of Situated Game-based Learning. This provides vital insights and a basis for further investigating the paradigm's application and development for learning and teaching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current findings suggest that human-computer interaction following the basics of human-human interaction, in which emotions play a critical role. We performed a set of consecutive experiments in a laboratory environment for identification, recognition, visualization and interactive computing of affective states within a gaming application framework. To start our research and to get a data base we analyzed more than 90 test hours of user tests using rating-scales and physiological measurements. As results we provide (1) a mini-game with extra features for the induction and obtaining of affective states, (2) integrated data mining methods with recognition rates up to 70 percent, (3) different kind of visual representation of recognized emotions, and (4) an architecture for control of an affective game. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dance is one of the entertainments where the physical movement is the key factor. On the other hand, the main reason why robots are kind of boom is that they have physical body. Combining there two element, a concept of a dancing robot is proposed. First, various kind of factors concerning entertainment and dance is studied. Also we describe the functions required for robots to achieve dancing. Then we describe one of the dancing robot we have developed focusing its hardware functions and show several examples of dance performance we have developed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]