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Internet of Things (IoT) has gained substantial attention over the past years. And the main discussion has been how to process the amount of data that it generates which has lead to the edge computing paradigm. Wether it is called fog1, edge or mist, the principle remains that cloud services must become available closer to clients. This documents presents ongoing work on future edge systems that are built to provide steadfast IoT services to users by bringing storage and processing power closer to peripheral parts of networks. Designing such infrastructures is becoming much more challenging as the number of IoT devices keeps growing. Production grade deployments have to meet very high performance requirements, and end-to-end solutions involve significant investments. In this paper, we aim at providing a solution to extend the range of the edge model to the very farthest nodes in the network. Specifically, we focus on providing reliable storage and computation capabilities immediately on wireless IoT sensor nodes. This extended edge model will allow end users to manage their IoT ecosystem without forcibly relying on gateways or Internet provider solutions. In this document, we introduce Achlys, a prototype implementation of an edge node that is a concrete port of the Lasp programming library on the GRiSP Erlang embedded system. This way, we aim at addressing the need for a general purpose edge that is both resilient and consistent in terms of storage and network. Finally, we study example use cases that could take advantage of integrating the Achlys framework and discuss future work for the latter.

Tämä kirja syntyi alkujaan Tampereen teknillisen yliopiston kurssille TIE-30500 "Identiteetin ja pääsynhallinta, 4 op", jonka aihepiiristä yhtenäistä suomenkielistä oppimateriaalia on muutoin saatavilla varsin niukasti. publishedVersion

International audience

The Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is the de-facto means of network management in the Internet. SNMP forms the basis of many tools and applications used by operators and network administrators for network and device monitoring, management and troubleshooting. As the Internet continues its evolution towards incorporating vast amounts of resource limited devices and constrained networks, deploying SNMP capabilities into such environments would be highly challenging. Consequently, consistent network and device management via the usage of SNMP becomes problematic. Such devices, of which sensors and actuators are good examples, however would in all likelihood support the Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP) in future. CoAP is a resource retrieval protocol for IoT under design which will soon be adopted as an IETF standard. The purpose of this report is to analyse means of allowing SNMP-based tools and applications to co-exist and interact with CoAP-enabled endpoints. Compatible protocol characteristics of both SNMP and CoAP are highlighted, and potential pitfalls and significant network and device management challenges are investigated. Solutions for overcoming these are also proposed. publishedVersion

This article takes the first steps towards building a theory to explain how students interact with program visualizations when learning programming. First, we present the findings of a previous study we conducted to investigate how students voluntarily and regularly engaged with the program visualization tool VIP in a three-month programming course. Then, we interpret the empirical results of the study using Activity Theory. Finally, based on the interpretation, we propose two research hypotheses about students‘ long-term engagement with VIP. These hypotheses also set guidelines for future research on visualizations and teaching with visualizations, but most importantly, they offer a sustainable basis for further work on the theorization of students‘ interactions with visualizations. publishedVersion

This article presents a review of the current body of academic literature concerning gamification of production and logistics to understand the status quo and provide suggestions for future research. The findings indicate that the execution and control of production and logistic processes has been addressed most often in the current body of literature, which mostly consists of design research. Objectives and goals, points, achievements, multimedial feedback, metaphorical or fictional representations, and levels and progress are currently the most often employed affordances within this field. Research has focused in the given context on examining or considering motivation, enjoyment and flow, as the main psychological outcomes of gamification, while individual performance and efficiency are the most commonly examined or suggested behavioral and organizational impacts. Future studies should employ more rigorous designs within new subdomains of production and logistics and should firmly ground research designs and discussions in management theory and critical studies. acceptedVersion

To increase productivity in designing digital hardware components, high-level synthesis (HLS) is seen as the next step in raising the design abstraction level. However, the quality of results (QoR) of HLS tools has tended to be behind those of manual register-transfer level (RTL) flows. In this paper, we survey the scientific literature published since 2010 about the QoR and productivity differences between the HLS and RTL design flows. Altogether, our survey spans 46 papers and 118 associated applications. Our results show that on average, the QoR of RTL flow is still better than that of the state-of-the-art HLS tools. However, the average development time with HLS tools is only a third of that of the RTL flow, and a designer obtains over four times as high productivity with HLS. Based on our findings, we also present a model case study to sum up the best practices in comparative studies between HLS and RTL. The outcome of our case study is also in line with the survey results, as using an HLS tool is seen to increase the productivity by a factor of six. In addition, to help close the QoR gap, we present a survey of literature focused on improving HLS. Our results let us conclude that HLS is currently a viable option for fast prototyping and for designs with short time to market. acceptedVersion

Context: Contemporary software development is typically conducted in dynamic, resource-scarce environments that are prone to the accumulation of technical debt. While this general phenomenon is acknowledged, what remains unknown is how technical debt specifically manifests in and affects software processes, and how the software development techniques employed accommodate or mitigate the presence of this debt. Objectives: We sought to draw on practitioner insights and experiences in order to classify the effects of agile method use on technical debt management. We explore the breadth of practitioners' knowledge about technical debt; how technical debt is manifested across the software process; and the perceived effects of common agile software development practices and processes on technical debt. In doing so, we address a research gap in technical debt knowledge and provide novel and actionable managerial recommendations. Method: We designed, tested and executed a multi-national survey questionnaire to address our objectives, receiving 184 responses from practitioners in Brazil, Finland, and New Zealand. Results: Our findings indicate that: 1) Practitioners are aware of technical debt, although, there was under utilization of the concept, 2) Technical debt commonly resides in legacy systems, however, concrete instances of technical debt are hard to conceptualize which makes it problematic to manage, 3) Queried agile practices and processes help to reduce technical debt; particularly, techniques that verify and maintain the structure and clarity of implemented artifacts. Conclusions: The fact that technical debt instances tend to have characteristics in common means that a systematic approach to its management is feasible. However, notwithstanding the positive effects of some agile practices on technical debt management, competing stakeholders' interests remain a concern.(Abridged), Comment: Journal paper, 23 pages, 7 figures, 2 tables

Context Individuals and organizations are increasingly adopting Open Source Software (OSS) for the benefits it provides. Although the OSS evaluation process and the information it requires are nowadays well known, users still have problems finding the right information and are not supported by any decision support system. Objective The aim of this study is to bridge the gap between OSS adoption models, especially with the aim of supporting users in evaluating the OSS they are planning to select. Method To reach this aim, we studied the processes and the information considered by the major OSS assessment models. Then we carried out a case study to identify which information can be automatically retrieved from the main OSS platforms, namely GitHub, SonarCloud, and StackExchange. Finally, we characterized the maturity of the projects available on these three platforms. Results Projects available on the three platforms are commonly old, stable, and mature ones. Moreover, thanks to the API provided, we were able to extract most of the information not commonly accessible from the main website. Conclusions Our results confirm that it is possible to develop a decision support system based on these three platforms, and that is also possible to evaluate both the quality and the maturity of the projects available there.

While data parallelism aspects of OpenCL have been of primary interest due to the massively data parallel GPUs being on focus, OpenCL also provides powerful capabilities to describe task parallelism. In this article we study the task parallel concepts available in OpenCL and find out how well the different vendor-specific implementations can exploit task parallelism when the parallelism is described in various ways utilizing the command queues. We show that the vendor implementations are not yet capable of extracting kernel-level task parallelism from in-order queues automatically. To assess the potential performance benefits of in-order queue parallelization, we implemented such capabilities to an open source implementation of OpenCL. The evaluation was conducted by means of a case study of an advanced noise reduction algorithm described as a multi-kernel OpenCL application. publishedVersion

Especially in programmable processors, energy consumption of integrated memories can become a limiting design factor due to thermal dissipation power constraints and limited battery capacity. Consequently, contemporary improvement efforts on memory technologies are focusing more on the energy-efficiency aspects, which has resulted in biased CMOS SRAM cells that increase energy efficiency by favoring one logical value over another. In this paper, xor-masking, a method for exploiting such contemporary low power SRAM memories is proposed to improve the energy-efficiency of instruction fetching. Xor-masking utilizes static program analysis statistics to produce optimal encoding masks to reduce the occurrence of the more energy consuming instruction bit values in the fetched instructions. The method is evaluated on LatticeMico32, a small RISC core popular in ultra low power designs, and on a wide instruction word high performance low power DSP. Compared to the previous “bus invert” technique typically used with similar SRAMs, the proposed method reduces instruction read energy consumption of the LatticeMico32 by up to 13% and 38% on the DSP core. acceptedVersion

Even though digital learning games have become common in education, relatively little is known about the usefulness of game-based assessment. This paper aims to explore if a game-based math test can provide added value to math education with respect to cognitive and affective outcomes. We used in-game measures, embedded in the game called Semideus Exam, focusing on conceptual fraction knowledge. In order to validate the game-based assessment approach, we compared the cognitive outcomes of fifty-one Finnish sixth graders, who completed both paper-based and game-based math tests in a randomized order. In addition, the students’ test anxiety and flow experience were measured to evaluate the affective outcomes. The results indicate that the game-based test scores correlated significantly with the paper-based test scores suggesting that the game-based assessment was successfully implemented and the game provided comparable data with the paper-based test approach. More importantly, the results revealed that game-based assessment lowered test anxiety and increased engagement which is likely to decrease assessment bias caused by test anxiety. In addition, the results show that earlier playing experience and gender did not influence the game-based test score suggesting fairness of the game-based assessment approach. Although we identified several benefits of the game-based assessment approach, more evidence is needed on the usefulness and fairness of game-based assessments. acceptedVersion

Progressive rendering, for example Monte Carlo rendering of 360° content for virtual reality headsets, is a time-consuming task. If the 3D artist notices an error while previewing the rendering, they must return to editing mode, make the required changes, and restart rendering. We propose the use of eye-tracking-based optimization to significantly speed up previewing of the artist’s points of interest. The speed of the preview is further improved by sampling with a distribution that closely follows the experimentally measured visual acuity of the human eye, unlike the piecewise linear models used in previous work. In a comprehensive user study, the perceived convergence of our proposed method was 10 times faster than that of a conventional preview, and often appeared to be instantaneous. In addition, the participants rated the method to have only marginally more artifacts in areas where it had to start rendering from scratch, compared to conventional rendering methods that had already generated image content in those areas.

The majority of contemporary mobile devices and personal computers are based on heterogeneous computing platforms that consist of a number of CPU cores and one or more Graphics Processing Units (GPUs). Despite the high volume of these devices, there are few existing programming frameworks that target full and simultaneous utilization of all CPU and GPU devices of the platform. This article presents a dataflow-flavored Model of Computation (MoC) that has been developed for deploying signal processing applications to heterogeneous platforms. The presented MoC is dynamic and allows describing applications with data dependent run-time behavior. On top of the MoC, formal design rules are presented that enable application descriptions to be simultaneously dynamic and decidable. Decidability guarantees compile-time application analyzability for deadlock freedom and bounded memory. The presented MoC and the design rules are realized in a novel Open Source programming environment "PRUNE" and demonstrated with representative application examples from the domains of image processing, computer vision and wireless communications. Experimental results show that the proposed approach outperforms the state-of-the-art in analyzability, flexibility and performance., Comment: This is the author's version of an article that has been published in this journal. Changes were made to this version by the publisher prior to publication

System design where cyber-physical applications are securely coordinated from the cloud may simplify the development process. However, all private data are then pushed to these remote “swamps,” and human users lose actual control as compared to when the applications are executed directly on their devices. At the same time, computing at the network edge is still lacking support for such straightforward multidevice development, which is essential for a wide range of dynamic cyber-physical services. This article proposes a novel programming model as well as contributes the associated secure-connectivity framework for leveraging safe coordinated device proximity as an additional degree of freedom between the remote cloud and the safety-critical network edge, especially under uncertain environment constraints. This article is part of a special issue on Software Safety and Security Risk Mitigation in Cyber-physical Systems. acceptedVersion

Despite of many researchers and practitioners agreeing on that organisational issues are equally important as technical issues from the software cost estimation (SCE) success point of view, most of the research focus has been put on the development of methods, whereas organisational factors have received surprisingly little academic scrutiny. This study aims to identify organisational factors that either support or hinder meaningful SCE, identifying their impact on estimation success. Top management's role is specifically addressed. The study takes a qualitative and explorative case study based approach. In total, 18 semi-structured interviews aided the study of three projects in three organisations. Hence, the transferability of the results is limited. The results suggest that the role of the top management is important in creating prerequisites for meaningful estimation, but their day-to-day participation is not required for successful estimation. Top management may also induce undesired distortion in estimation. Estimation maturity and estimation success seem to have an interrelationship with software process maturity, but there seem to be no significant individual organisational factors, which alone would make estimation successful. Our results validate several distortions and biases reported in the previous studies, and show the SCE research focus has remained on methodologies and technical issues. acceptedVersion

Ray tracing is a computationally intensive rendering technique traditionally used in offline high-quality rendering. Powerful hardware accelerators have been recently developed that put real-time ray tracing even in the reach of mobile devices. However, rendering animated scenes remains difficult, as updating the acceleration trees for each frame is a memory-intensive process. This article proposes MergeTree, the first hardware architecture for Hierarchical Linear Bounding Volume Hierarchy (HLBVH) construction, designed to minimize memory traffic. For evaluation, the hardware constructor is synthesized on a 28nm process technology. Compared to a state-of-the-art binned surface area heuristic sweep (SAH) builder, the present work speeds up construction by a factor of 5, reduces build energy by a factor of 3.2, and memory traffic by a factor of 3. A software HLBVH builder on a graphics processing unit (GPU) requires 3.3 times more memory traffic. To take tree quality into account, a rendering accelerator is modeled alongside the builder. Given the use of a toplevel build to improve tree quality, the proposed builder reduces system energy per frame by an average 41% with primary rays and 13% with diffuse rays. In large ( > 500K triangles) scenes, the difference is more pronounced, 62% and 35%, respectively.

In the information society of today, privacy is a premium service and user-related information a commodity. This development has gone unnoticed for many, but for some it contradicts with their common sense and perception of right and wrong. If we look into user agreements, and the effect Fair Information Practice Principles (FIPPs) seem to have, this development is particularly evident. One-on-one agreements such as End User License Agreements (EULAs) between the providers and users have become ubiquitous to most users who simply scroll through the agreement and click 'I agree' without actually understanding or caring what they have accepted. There are various reasons for this kind of behavior ranging from complete indifference, to inadequate internet and technology literacy, and even to peer pressure as certain applications have become a 'must have' amongst a group of users. This problem is particularly current as personal mobile devices have become important, for some even inseparable, part of our daily lives. These devices, such as smart phones and tablets, have also become user-centered aggregation points of information that contain personal, even sensitive information about us, and those around us. At the same time, the number of different applications that have practically unrestrained access to the Internet, is on the rise. When combined with ignorance and negligence, the risk of placing personal information into wrong hands is a very real one. In the following, we focus on this well-explored challenge from a novel perspective---informed consent---and argue that one way to address this problem is to develop solutions that not only promote personal choice and awareness, but are also context-dependent. In order to provide a practical insight into our primarily conceptual work, we use one of the most popular applications, the Pokémon GO by Niantic Inc., in highlighting some of the encountered privacy-related issues.

The Internet undergoes a fundamental transformation as billions of connected ”things” surround us and embed themselves into the fabric of our everyday lives. However, this is only the beginning of true convergence between the realm of humans and that of machines, which materializes with the advent of connected machines worn by humans, or wearables. The resulting shift from the Internet of Things to the Internet of Wearable Things (IoWT) brings along a truly personalized user experience by capitalizing on the rich contextual information, which wearables produce more than any other today’s technology. The abundance of personally identifiable information handled by wearables creates an unprecedented risk of its unauthorized exposure by the IoWT devices, which fuels novel privacy challenges. In this paper1, after reviewing the relevant contemporary background, we propose efficient means for the delegation of use applicable to a wide variety of constrained wearable devices, so that to guarantee privacy and integrity of their data. Our efficient solutions facilitate contexts when one would like to offer their personal device for temporary use (delegate it) to another person in a secure and reliable manner. In connection to the proposed protocol suite for the delegation of use, we also review the possible attack surfaces related to advanced wearables. acceptedVersion

There is recent interest in GPU architectures designed to accelerate ray tracing, especially on mobile systems with limited memory bandwidth. A promising recent approach is to store and traverse Bounding Volume Hierarchies (BVHs), used to accelerate ray tracing, in low arithmetic precision. However, so far there is no research on refitting or construction of such compressed BVHs, which is necessary for any scenes with dynamic content. We find that in a hardware-accelerated tree update, significant memory traffic and runtime savings are available from streaming, bottom-up compression. Novel algorithmic techniques of modulo encoding and treelet-based compression are proposed to reduce backtracking inherent in bottom-up compression. Together, these techniques reduce backtracking to a small fraction. Compared to a separate top-down compression pass, streaming bottom-up compression with the proposed optimizations saves on average 42% of memory accesses for LBVH construction and 56% for refitting of compressed BVHs, over 16 test scenes. In architectural simulation, the proposed streaming compression reduces LBVH runtime by 20% compared to a single-precision build, and 41% compared to a single-precision build followed by top-down compression. Since memory traffic dominates the energy cost of refitting and LBVH construction, energy consumption is expected to fall by a similar fraction. submittedVersion

In wireless communication systems, high-power transmitters suffer from nonlinearities due to power amplifier (PA) characteristics, I/Q imbalance, and local oscillator (LO) leakage. Digital Predistortion (DPD) is an effective technique to counteract these impairments. To help maximize agility in cognitive radio systems, it is important to investigate dynamically reconfigurable DPD systems that are adaptive to changes in the employed modulation schemes and operational constraints. To help maximize effectiveness, such reconfiguration should be performed based on multidimensional operational criteria. With this motivation, we develop in this paper a novel evolutionary algorithm framework for multiobjective optimization of DPD systems. We demonstrate our framework by applying it to develop an adaptive DPD architecture, called the adaptive, dataflow-based DPD architecture (ADDA), where Pareto-optimized DPD parameters are derived subject to multidimensional constraints to support efficient predistortion across time-varying operational requirements and modulation schemes. Through extensive simulation results, we demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed multiobjective optimization framework in deriving efficient DPD configurations for run-time adaptation. publishedVersion

Internet search volumes have been successfully adopted for time series analysis of different phenomena. This empirical paper evaluates the feasibility of search volumes in modeling of weekly video game sales. Building on the theoretical concepts of product life cycle, diffusion, and electronic word-of-mouth advertisement, the empirical analysis concentrates on the hypothesized Granger causality between sales and search volumes. By using a bivariate vector autoregression model with a dataset of nearly a hundred video games, only a few games exhibit such causality to either direction. When correlations are present, these rather occur instantaneously; the current weekly amount of sales tends to mirror the current weekly amount of searches. According to the results, search volumes contribute only a limited additional statistical power for forecasting, however. Besides this statistical limitation, the presented evaluation reveals a number of other limitations for use in practical marketing and advertisement foresight. Internet search volumes continue to provide a valuable empirical instrument, but the value should not be exaggerated for time series modeling of video game sales. acceptedVersion

This empirical paper models three structural factors that are hypothesized to affect the turnaround times between the publication of security advisories and Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs). The three structural factors are: (i) software product age at the time of advisory release; (ii) severity of vulnerabilities coordinated; and (iii) amounts of CVEs referenced in advisories. Although all three factors are observed to provide only limited information for statistically predicting the turnaround times in a dataset comprised of Microsoft, openSUSE, and Ubuntu operating system products, the paper outlines new research directions for better understanding the current problems related to vulnerability coordination. publishedVersion

This paper presents a new methodology for design and implementation of signal processing systems on system-on-chip (SoC) platforms. The methodology is centered on the use of lightweight application programming interfaces for applying principles of dataflow design at different layers of abstraction. The development processes integrated in our approach are software implementation, hardware implementation, hardware-software co-design, and optimized application mapping. The proposed methodology facilitates development and integration of signal processing hardware and software modules that involve heterogeneous programming languages and platforms. As a demonstration of the proposed design framework, we present a dataflow-based deep neural network (DNN) implementation for vehicle classification that is streamlined for real-time operation on embedded SoC devices. Using the proposed methodology, we apply and integrate a variety of dataflow graph optimizations that are important for efficient mapping of the DNN system into a resource constrained implementation that involves cooperating multicore CPUs and field-programmable gate array subsystems. Through experiments, we demonstrate the flexibility and effectiveness with which different design transformations can be applied and integrated across multiple scales of the targeted computing system. publishedVersion

Context: Global software development (GSD), although now a norm in the software industry, carries with it enormous challenges mostly regarding communication and coordination. Aforementioned challenges are highlighted when there is a need to transfer knowledge between sites, particularly when software artifacts assigned to different sites depend on each other. The design of the software architecture and associated task dependencies play a major role in reducing some of these challenges. Objective: The current literature does not provide a cohesive picture of how the distributed nature of software development is taken into account during the design phase: what to avoid, and what works in practice. The objective of this paper is to gain an understanding of software architecting in the context of GSD, in order to develop a framework of challenges and solutions that can be applied in both research and practice. Method: We conducted a systematic literature review (SLR) that synthesises (i) challenges which GSD imposes on software architecture design, and (ii) recommended practices to alleviate these challenges. Results: We produced a comprehensive set of guidelines for performing software architecture design in GSD based on 55 selected studies. Our framework comprises nine key challenges with 28 related concerns, and nine recommended practices, with 22 related concerns for software architecture design in GSD. These challenges and practices were mapped to a thematic conceptual model with the following concepts: Organization (Structure and Resources), Ways of Working (Architecture Knowledge Management, Change Management and Quality Management), Design Practices, Modularity and Task Allocation. Conclusion: The synthesis of findings resulted in a thematic conceptual model of the problem area, a mapping of the key challenges to practices, and a concern framework providing concrete questions to aid the design process in a distributed setting. This is a first step in creating more concrete architecture design practices and guidelines. acceptedVersion

More and more application deployments are moving towards leveraging the microservice paradigm in hopes of increased efficiency of operations and more flexible software development. Microservices are not a straightforward successor of existing methods and they introduce a lot of new complexity. Especially security concerns lack analysis in academic literature and new developments have mostly been assessed in grey literature. The thesis explores the solutions to increase the security of microservice applications hosted in virtual private clouds. We start with the assumption that the networking security controls have been bypassed and the adversary is inside the network. We look at the situation through a holistic lens to identify the biggest gaps and how they can be filled in REST service-to-service communications. The solutions are platform agnostic to support the multi-cloud paradigm to reduce operational costs and increase global coverage. Defense-in-depth methods proposed are establishing mutually authenticated TLS connections between services comprising an application and introducing granular access control using cryptographically secure methods. The industry state of the art ways to achieve these are assessed and analyzed comparatively and against good security engineering design principles. Both methodologies and their practical implementations are explored. We assess two distinct models for reference use for secure architecture design in microservices. These models piece lower level pieces into a comprehensive idea of what good microservice security looks like. The architectures can be used as is, as a basis for designing secure application architectures. The thesis introduces security analysis of existing methods of deploying and establishing secure microservice applications, from container level orchestration to high level architectural choices. The work adds to the existing body of knowledge by assessing some of the security concerns enterprises moving towards microservice deployments are facing and by providing a new analysis of industry developments that have not been looked at thoroughly through a security lens in scientific literature.

Ohjelmointirajapintojen dokumentaatio on tärkeässä osassa rajapintojen käytön oppimisessa ja oikeanlaisessa käytössä. Dokumentaation virheettömyys ja ajantasaisuus ovat tärkeitä elementtejä dokumentaation laadun kannalta. Rajapinnan dokumentaatio täytyy yleensä aina päivittää, kun rajapinnan totetutus päivittyy. Dokumentaation uudistaminen voi olla työlästä ja manuaalisesti dokumentoidessa voi syntyä helposti virheitä tai rajapintaan lisättyjen uusien ominaisuuksien dokumentaatiota ei välttämättä muisteta lisätä. Muodostettaessa dokumentaatiopohja automaattisesti lähdekoodista voidaan varmistua siitä, että dokumentaatiosta löytyvien rakenteiden nimet, tyypit ja ominaisuudet vastaavat senhetkistä toteutusta. Dokumentaatiopohjan muodostaminen ei kuitenkaan poista ohjelmistokehittäjän vastuuta rakenteiden kuvauksien kirjoittamisesta dokumentaatioon, mutta vähentää manuaalisesti suoritettavan työn määrää dokumentoidessa. Työssä suunniteltiin ja toteutettiin työkalu ohjelmointirajapintojen dokumentointiin. Toteutetun työkalun avulla pyrittiin helpottamaan dokumentointiprosessia sekä varmistamaan rajapinnan toteutuksen ja rajapinnan dokumentaation vastaavuus toisiinsa nähden. Rajapintadokumentointityökalu lukee rajapinnan lähdekoodia ja muodostaa rajapintaa kuvaavan tietomallin hyödyntäen lähdekoodia. Dokumentoitavan rajapinnan lähdekoodiin lisättiin attribuuttiluokkia, joilla voidaan kirjata lisätietoja dokumentaatiotyökalun jäsentäjälle. Muodostettua rajapinnan tietomallia voidaan muokata sekä tallentaa siihen kuvaustekstejä työkaluun toteutetun graafisen käyttöliittymän kautta. Rajapintaa kuvaavan tietomallin muodostamisessa käytettiin .NET-kehyksen kääntäjään perustuvaa Roslyn-työkalua, jonka avulla voitiin tarkastella C#-ohjelmointikielellä kirjoitetusta lähdekoodista käätämisen jäsennysvaiheessa muodostettua syntaksipuuta. Dokumentoitavien rakenteiden tunnistamiseen syntaksipuusta käytettiin työssä suunniteltuja attribuuttiluokkia, joita oli lisätty dokumentoitavan eRA-järjestelmän koodiin. Attribuuttiluokkien avulla kirjattiin lähdekoodiin dokumentointia helpottavia lisätietoja, kuten rajapintaversionumeroita, metodien poikkeuksia ja metodien kutsumiseen vaadittavia esiehtoja. Tietomallista voidaan muodostaa toteutetulla dokumentointityökalulla LaTeX-muotoinen dokumentaatio. Toteutetulla dokumentointityökalulla tuotettiin dokumentoitavaksi valitun Atostek eRA -järjestelmän integraatiorajapinnan uuden version dokumentaatio. Työkalun käyttäminen nopeutti dokumentaation muodostamista verrattuna edellisten dokumentaatioversioiden kirjoittamiseen. Toteutetun työkalun toimintaa testattiin tuottamalla jo olemassa oleva rajapintadokumentaatio uudestaan ja vertaamalla sitä manuaalisesti kirjoitettuun dokumentaation. Työkalun ansiosta havaittiin virheitä edellisissä dokumentaatioversiossa, joten työkalun käyttäminen paransi myös dokumentaation laatua.

This Master's thesis is concerns digital design course that teaches the basics of digital logic. Students on course learn to design, analyze and implement combinatorial gate networks, sequential systems and state machines on both theoretical level and on practical implementations with FPGA development board. The FPGA board that was previously used is aged and the computer exercises themselves have been fragmented between the greater course project and supplementary tasks. In this thesis, a totally new computer exercise project is designed. Before the development of the exercises begun, the new FPGA development board had already chosen. Selection was done based on the flexibility of the system. The new board can be used by wide selection of courses to create various types of tasks. Along with the new exercise project, a MOOC-based web portal, Plussa, was taken into use. This system allows a semi-automatic grading of exercise tasks. The objective of computer exercises is to combine the theory of digital design concepts and the practice done on paper exercises to work flow that includes real industry grade development tools. The subject of the exercise project is a game implemented on a LED matrix extension of the development board. A reference project was designed and based on that exercise tasks were created. Exercises were divided into five separate exercise sets: Introduction to tools and development flow, arithmetic and hierarchical design, state machine design, extending existing designs and integration. On return, tasks will be graded by an automated system that fetches the students implementation, uses logic simulator on the server to verify the correct functionality and grades the return accordingly. Without an automated grading system the grading would need to be screened manually from students screenshots. Hence, with automated system, the time spent by staff could be used more efficiently to benefit the course attendees. For students, the automatic grading gives instant feedback on returns. On average, students spent 54 hours on computer exercises, which fits well to the total time allocation of the course. Students found the exercises laborious but educational. Perception of the workload varied widely based on the background of the students. Intensity of the load could be lightened by improving instructions and by giving some of the designs as partially ready made. Alternatively, a graduated exercise model could be used for the exercises.

DevOps on kasvattanut suosiotaan viimeisen viiden vuoden aikana varsin tasaisesti Google Trends -palvelun perusteella. Myös tieteellinen kiinnostus termiä kohtaan on kasvanut: esimerkiksi IEEE:n Xplore-hakupalvelussa suoritettujen hakujen perusteella IEEE on julkaissut yli tuplaten DevOpsiin liittyviä artikkeleita vuonna 2017 verrattuna vuoteen 2015. DevOpsin käsite on kuitenkin vielä monitulkintainen. DevOpsia on myös opetettu. Esimerkiksi Japanin Saga Cityn yliopisto on hyödyntänyt siihen liittyviä työkaluja opetuksessaan, ja Moroccon Cadi Ayyad University on järjestänyt aiheesta kurssin. Myös Tampereen teknillisessä yliopistossa ja nykyisessä Tampereen yliopistossa opetetaan ilmiöön liittyviä käytäntöjä. On kuitenkin epäselvää, tehdäänkö niin kuin opetetaan eli hyödynnetäänkö itsekin DevOpsiin liittyviä käytäntöjä. Tämän diplomityön tutkimustavoitteena onkin selvittää, hyödynnetäänkö opetusjärjestelmien kehittämisessä ja ylläpidossa näitä käytäntöjä, ja miten niiden hyödyntämistä voisi kehittää. Koska DevOpsiin liittyy käytäntöjä, joita on mahdollista suorittaa erilaisilla työkaluilla, on tarpeen selvittää sellaiset työkalut, joita yliopistolla on jo tarjota käytettäväksi. Koska ohjelmistojen suoritusympäristöjen esittäminen ohjelmakoodina liittyy DevOpsiin, on myös saatavilla olevien suoritusympäristöjen selvittäminen oleellista. Tällä tavalla voidaan saada tietoa, onko yliopistossa edellytykset DevOpsin hyödyntämiselle. Opetusjärjestelmien DevOps-käytäntöjen hyödyntämistä on selvitetty niihin perustuvalla tapaustutkimuksella. Työkalut ja suoritusympäristöt on selvitetty sähköpostiviestein ja yliopiston intrasivustoa tutkimalla. Tutkimuksen tulokset osoittavat, että yliopistolla on tarjota työkaluja DevOps-käytäntöjen hyödyntämiseen. Suoritusympäristöjen dokumentaation osalta on kuitenkin kehitettävää. Opetusjärjestelmistä Repolainen noudattaa parhaiten DevOpsiin liittyviä käytäntöjä, mutta kaikissa tutkituissa opetusjärjestelmissä on parannettavaa sovelluksen monitoroinnin, suunnittelun ja IT-infrastruktuurin ohjelmakoodina esittämisen suhteen. Repolaisen osalta toimenpiteet työssä esitettäviin kehitysideoihin perustuen on aloitettu, mutta Tietotekniikan yksikölle suositellaan myös muiden ideoiden kokeilemista soveltuvuusselvityksien muodossa. Myös ideoiden jatkokehitys ryhmissä ja aivoriihien järjestäminen voivat olla hyödyllisiä. DevOps has gained popularity during the last five years based on Google Trends. Interest in the science community has also increased. For example searches performed at the IEEE Xplore Digital Library indicate that the IEEE published double the amount of research papers on DevOps in 2017 compared to 2015. However the term DevOps is still ambiguous. DevOps has also been teached. For example Saga University in Japan has utilized an education system which took advantage on tools related to DevOps and Cadi Ayyad University in Morocco has organized a course about DevOps. Tampere University of Technology which is nowadays Tampere University has also teached DevOps practices. It is though unclear whether we follow the guidelines we teach in other words, whether we utilize DevOps practices ourselves. The aim of this research is therefore to find out do the development and maintenance processes of IT systems used in teaching utilize DevOps practices and could that utilizing be developed in some way. Because certain practices are related to DevOps and they can be implemented with various technologies it is worthwhile to discover if the university offers some of these technologies. Since infrastructure as code is a part of DevOps figuring out the available software execution environments is also essential. By investigating these aspects it is possible to discover whether the university provides prerequisites for utilizing DevOps practices. Study on the utilization of DevOps practices in the development and maintenance of educational systems is performed by a case study. Technologies and execution environments available are discovered by email messages and searching them from the intranet website of the university. The results of the study indicate that the university does offer tools to utilize DevOps practices but the documentation on execution environments is lacking. Of the educational systems Repolainen is best at utilizing DevOps practices but all educational systems studied in this thesis have rough edges on continuous monitoring and planning and sharing the IT infrastructure as code. Actions based on the development ideas presented in this thesis considering Repolainen have been started but proof of concept implementations based on the other ideas as well are recommended for the Computing unit. Getting together to develop the ideas further and arranging brainstorms could also be beneficial.

Tietoturvan kehittäminen ja parantaminen yrityksissä on nykypäivänä entistä tärkeäm-pää. Teknologian kehitys ja sen laajemmat käyttömahdollisuudet pakottavat paranta-maan tietoturvaa yrityksissä. Tietoturvaa pitää kehittää, koska yritysten vaatimukset kasvavat koko ajan tietoturvan osalta. Asiat pitää tehdä tietoturvallisesti, jotta yrityk-set luottaisivat tietonsa ja prosessinsa muiden yritysten käsiteltäväksi. Yksi haavoittu-vuus järjestelmässä riittää aiheuttamaan yritykselle suuria taloudellisia tappioita. Tä-män takia tietoturva pitää olla hyvällä tasolla ja sitä pitää kehittää, sekä valvoa koko ajan. Tämän työn tavoitteena on tutkia ja selvittää vaateyrityksen tietoturvan kehitystä vuo-desta 2014 nykypäivään. Näiden tietojen perusteella luodaan kehitysehdotuksia nyky-päivän VAHTI-ohjeista mallia ottamalla. Työn perusteella korjausehdotukset korja-taan, jos se on mahdollista ilman suuria taloudellisia panostuksia. Enemmän rahaa tar-vitsevat kehitysehdotukset korjataan pidemmällä aikavälillä, jos siihen on mahdolli-suus. Samalla tietoturvaa pitää kehitetään jatkuvana prosessina. Työ koostuu kahdek-san eri tietoturva osa-alueen tutkimisesta. Näistä osa-alueista tutkitaan mahdollisia riskejä, uhkia ja näiden mahdollisia korjauksia. Diskussiossa ja päätelmissä käydään läpi mitä muutoksia pitää toteuttaa, että tietotur-vallisuuden yleistaso nousisi nykyistä paremmaksi. Samalla tutkitaan kuinka tärkeitä nämä muutokset ovat tehdä tietoturvallisuuden kannalta. Muutokset yritetään tehdä kustannustehokkaasti, koska isompiin kustannuksiin ei ole tällä hetkellä budjettia. Työssä saatiin organisaation ja ulkoistetun IT-kumppanin tietoon tärkeitä tietoja tutki-tuilta osa-alueilta.

It is beneficial for continuous integration (CI), that building and testing a software happens as quickly as possible. Sometimes, when a test suite grows large during the lifecycle of the software, testing becomes slow and inefficient. It is a good idea to parallelize test executions to speed up testing, but in addition to that, test case selection and prioritization can be used. In this case study, we use incremental machine learning techniques to predict failing and passing tests in the test suite of existing software from the space industry and execute only test cases that are predicted failing. We apply such test case selection techniques to 35 source code modifying commits of the software and compare their performances to traditional coverage based selection techniques and other heuristics. Secondly, we apply different incremental machine learning techniques in test case prioritization and compare their performances to traditional coverage based prioritization techniques. We combine features that have been used successfully in previous studies, such as code coverage, test history, test durations and text similarity to separate passing and failing tests with machine learning. The results suggest, that certain test case selection and prioritization techniques can enhance testing remarkably, providing significantly better results compared to random selection and prioritization. Additionally, incremental machine learning techniques require a learning period of approximately 20 source code modifying commits to produce equal or better results than the comparison techniques in test case selection. Test case prioritization techniques with incremental machine learning perform significantly better than the traditional coverage based techniques, and they can outweigh the traditional techniques in the weighted average of faults detected (APFD) values immediately after initial training. We show that machine learning does not need a rigorous amount of training to outperform traditional approaches in test case selection and prioritization. Therefore, incremental machine learning suits test case selection and prioritization well, when initial training data does not exist. Jatkuvan integraation toimivuuden edellytyksenä on, että ohjelmiston kääntäminen ja testaaminen tapahtuu mahdollisimman nopeasti. Ohjelmiston kehitystyön edetessä automaattisesti ajettavien testien määrä voi kasvaa suureksi. Tällöin on olemassa riski, että testaaminen hidastuu ja jatkuva integraatio kärsii sen seurauksena. Testejä voidaan nopeuttaa esimerkiksi rinnakkaistamalla testiajoja, mutta sen lisäksi testejä voidaan myös priorisoida tai testeistä voidaan valita vain pieni määrä ajettaviksi. Tässä tapaustutkimuksessa tutkimme testien valintaa ja priorisointia koneoppimisen avulla. Valitsemme ajettaviksi ainoastaan sellaiset testit, jotka koneoppimismallit ennustivat hajoaviksi. Koneoppimismallit päättelevät testien lopputulemia eri tietolähteitä yhdistelemällä. Näitä tietolähteitä ovat mm. koodikattavuus, testien ajohistoria, testien kestoaika ja testien ja koodimuutosten samankaltaisuus. Käytämme tällaista testien valintaa aineistoon, joka on kerätty avaruusteollisuuden ohjelmistoprojektista. Vertaamme koneoppimisen avulla saatuja tuloksia perinteisiin testien valintamenetelmiin ja heuristiikkoihin. Tapaustutkimuksessa vertailemme myös koneoppimisen avulla suoritettua testien priorisointia perinteisiin koodikattavuuspohjaisiin priorisointimenetelmiin. Tutkimuksen tulokset osoittavat, että tietyt testien valinta- ja priorisointimenetelmät tehostavat testaamista huomattavasti ja tuottavat merkittävästi parempia tuloksia kuin satunnaisuuteen perustuvat menetelmät. Tämän lisäksi tulokset osoittavat, että testien valinnassa koneoppimismenetelmät saavuttavat samankaltaisen tai paremman tuloksen kuin paras heuristiikka noin kahdenkymmenen koodimuutoksen jälkeen. Testien priorisoinnissa koneoppimismenetelmät tuottavat merkittävästi parempia tuloksia kuin vertailumenetelmät. Tutkimuksen tulokset osoittavat, että koneoppimismenetelmät eivät välttämättä tarvitse suuria määriä koulutusdataa, vaan voivat ennustaa pienelläkin määrällä koulutusdataa testien lopputulemia paremmin kuin vertailumenetelmät.

Local food has become a significant attraction of travel, and consuming local food involves sustainability by reducing the distance the food comes from the production. In other words, travelers provide benefits for destination and environment in addition to their pleasures and memories from local food consumption. However, local food is unfamiliar to travelers in the new place, and it is a challenge that requires much time and effort to choose and find the information. In this sense, Augmented Reality (AR) and gamification can derive a possibility to support travelers to consume local food. AR can provide travelers with an easy way to acquire information by over-layering the virtual items on top of the real environment in one screen. Mobile Augmented Reality (MAR) operating on mobile devices has further advantages of mobility. Moreover, gamification can motivate travelers and increase their pleasure using game elements. In this thesis, the benefits of MAR and gamification were explored through design and evaluation of a gamified MAR application prototype to encourage travelers’ local food consumption. From the user study with observations, interviews and initial concept evaluation, tourists’ needs were identified, and UX goals were defined as adventure, autonomy, and competence as to what experiences the application provides. The goals guided the design and evaluation of a gamified MAR application. The application recognizes the real food through an AR mobile screen and displays basic food information with name/ingredient and 'food miles' which refers to how far the main ingredients come from the distance. Besides, gamification was applied for the users’ actions as collecting the food/ingredients and assigning levels according to how much local food a user consumed. After two rounds of paper prototyping design and evaluation, the final interactive prototype was created in the prototyping tool, Torch, working on iOS-based iPhone (In this study, iPhone 7). A total of 10 participants tested the interactive prototype. The final evaluation of the interactive prototype indicated that users were highly motivated to consume local food using the application, although the long-term effect of the motivation is uncertain. The test users enjoyed the prototype due to the use of new AR technologies and gamified capabilities. Notably, users reacted positively from the experience of competence based on game elements and the experience of autonomy based on exploring various information in the user’s context with easy interaction. In this study, a variety of factors such as MAR, gamification, the specific context of food consumption in travel, and motivational purpose were brought together and showed the possibility of a gamified MAR application. In order to develop further after this research, considering the findings obtained from user studies, design and evaluation, it is expected that more advanced designs will boost more potential by adding feedback and interaction with personalization, social aspects, and multi-sensory feedback or interaction in the future. In addition, as AR technology is further developed, and more people are accustomed to the use of technology, the gamified MAR application could provide more useful and fruitful experience in the future.

This thesis discusses the topic of automated testing as it relates to microservice systems. Microservice architecture is a highly scalable way of designing and implementing online applications. Since microservice applications are network-based applications by nature, testing them has to also happen in a network environment. Automating tests for this kind of environment involves generating artificial network traffic, often in the form of HTTP requests to a network API of some kind, like a REST API. These topics are discussed from a test design and implementation point of view, along with main features of the microservice architecture and automated testing in general. The main part of this thesis describes and documents the process of designing and implementing a test automation framework for Intel Insight, an automatic image storage and photogrammetry processing platform that is implemented as a microservice system. The framework design involves setting initial requirements for potential automation tools and finding and evaluating candidates for the task. In the end, the framework core is formed by automation tools Postman, Selenium, and SikuliX. The use of this combination for test automation purposes is examined by looking at how to the tools can be used to automate a core use case of the Intel Insight platform. The resulting framework was found to be well-suited and versatile enough for its intended purpose. The tools of the framework had a low barrier of entry to them and as such were easy to begin working with and to integrate automated test cases implemented with them to Continuous Integration systems Gitlab CI and Jenkins. All tools are reviewed in-depth, and positives and negatives of each individual automation tool that were encountered during test implementation are analyzed. The main negatives are brought up as possible ideas for future development of each tool, enabled by the fact that they are all open-source projects.

People attend seminars to get to know other individuals in the field and gain expert knowledge while networking and socializing. Although networking is beneficial to build a relationship with others, some people find it to be challenging. The challenge is in the fact that not everyone contributes to conversations or they are too shy to approach strangers and break the ice. There are different ice-breaker solutions developed to make the process easier for event attendees to socialize with unfamiliar people. For example, there are wearable technologies available that use proximity sensors to connect people with similar interests at events. Mobile phone applications are also very popular to use and make it possible for event attendees to connect before or after events. Similarly, interactive tabletops can also be ice-breakers and assist people to connect through multi-user interactions. However, social robots have not been studied in event context, although previous work has shown that they can be used as facilitators and mediators for connectedness in general. In this thesis, we have used a social robot called Pepper to study how robots can act as facilitators of social connectedness among strangers at events and create pleasurable and positive user experiences for event attendees. While there has been few earlier research in social connection using virtual assistants and social robots, physical social robots have never been studied as facilitators of connectedness at events. In order to identify if social robots can act as facilitators of connectedness, and create pleasurable and positive experiences for seminar attendees, we have conducted a pilot study and two field trials with overall 55 participants. In our pilot study (n=12), our goal was to gather feedback from university staff and students on the topic of social robots as facilitators of connectedness. In the field trials, we gathered information and feedback from the target users on the two concepts we implemented in the Pepper robot to address their needs and requirements. The concept for the first field trial was a Welcoming application to give information on the seminar. And the second concept for the second field trial was a simple two player game for event participants to play and connect to each other. In the first field trial (n=31), we took insights from our pilot study and conducted a field study with seminar attendees to gather feedback from the real users on a Welcoming application. For the second field trial (n=12), we created a prototype of an interaction concept called Color Game based on the feedback gathered from the earlier studies, and evaluated it at an event. The empirical research of this thesis includes surveys, interviews, and observations through qualitative and quantitate methods of data gathering and analysis. The findings suggest that social robots have the potential of becoming facilitators of connectedness at events, and participants had mostly positive and pleasurable experiences evoked by social robots and concepts during the events. Social robots can become acceptable ice-breakers at events by providing the attendees with fun and entertaining activities, such as games. Most participants expressed having fun and joyful interactions with the robot, and their experiences with the evaluated applications were positive . Positive experiences made it possible for attendees to accept social robots as ice-breakers and as means to connect and become familiar with strangers during events. Although in the study we found out that the majority of participants were interested in social robots, it is important for robotic platforms to follow certain guidelines to create better interactions and experiences for users. Thus, we have created a list of design implications which can be used for future developments of social robotic as ice-breakers at events, and also to contribute to the field of human-robotic interaction.

This thesis describes a database-centric legacy system. The system wasn’t originally under version control at all and while version control was introduced later, it was backup-minded in nature. Business logic of the systesm was largely coded in database procedures, functions and triggers. Deployments of the system were done by copying previously deployed databases and over time the system’s version history was blurred or entirely forgotten. Problems caused by this are identified and their harmfulness is described. The problems are significant and cause harm different ways depending on the point of view. Programmers find that their work becomes more difficult and less appealing when they are wasting time figuring out the state of different environments, end up doing extra work because of forgotten features and the state of the software code in general deteriorates. Project management will find specification and planning more difficult for the same reasons and businesswise all wasted time ends up costing money. After identifying the problems solutions are looked from the software engineering theory. Cases where similar problems have been solved are especially looked for. It can be said, that much less is written about version controlling databases than on version control in general. The biggest challenge when version controlling databases is extracting the business logic from the database into version controllable scripts. The key part in various solutions is using tools to make this part easier. Methods that would make database version control as easy as version control in general cannot be found, though. Next a set of actions is introduced to improve the state of the described system. The actions aim at helping to avoid overlapping work, make the version history more clear and improve level of the software code in general. Workload of the actions is estimated using the planning poker method and the most cost effective ones are selected to be implemented. Implementation and effectiveness of these actions are evaluated. Some of the actions were implemented differently than planned, some weren’t implemented at all and some non-planned actions were implemented. It could be acknowledged that overlapping development work could be prevented and version history became clearer, but maintaining the process created more workload overhead. Next changes to this process and organization in general are suggested. Finally, it is pointed out that not too much time should be spent fixing a legacy system and the root cause of problems can be avoided altogether by allocating more resources to the development. Työssä esitellään tietokantaa normaalia enemmän hyödyntävä legacy-järjestelmä. Järjestelmää kehittäessä ei ole käytetty versiohallintaa ollenkaan, ja myöhemminkin vain varmuuskopionäkökulmasta. Järjestelmän ohjelmistologiikka on suurelta osin toteutettu tietokantojen proseduureissa, funktioissa ja liipaisimissa. Järjestelmästä on tehty julkaisuja asiakastoimituksia varten kopioimalla vanhoja toimituksia varten tehtyjä julkaisuja ja ajan kuluessa järjestelmän versiohistoria on hämärtynyt tai unohtunut kokonaan. Työssä pyritään tunnistamaan tästä aiheutuvia ongelmia ja perustelemaan, miksi ne ovat haitallisia. Ongelmat ovat merkittäviä ja aiheuttavat haittaa eri tavalla näkökulmasta riippuen. Ohjelmistokehittäjien työ vaikeutuu ja muuttuu epämiellyttävämmäksi, kun eri versioiden tilan selvittämiseen täytyy käyttää aikaa. Jo tehdyn kehitystyön unohtuminen aiheuttaa päällekkäisen työn tekemistä ja ylipäätään järjestelmän ohjelmistotekninen laatu laskee. Projektinjohtonäkökulmasta työn määrittely ja suunnittelu vaikeutuvat samoista syistä, sekä liiketoimintanäkökulmasta kaikkeen päällekkäiseen ja ylimääräiseen työhön kuluva aika maksaa rahaa. Ongelmien tunnistamisen jälkeen etsitään ratkaisukeinoja ohjelmistotieteen kirjallisuudesta. Erityisesti paneudutaan tapauksiin, joissa on ratkaistu vastaavia ongelmia. Voidaan todeta, että aiheesta on kirjoitettu vähän verrattuna versiohallintaan yleisesti. Suurin haaste tietokantojen versiohallinnoinnissa on ohjelmistologiikan muuttaminen versiohallintaa tukeviksi tiedostoiksi. Ratkaisujen oleellisin osuus onkin työkalujen käyttö tämän vaiheen helpottamiseksi. Keinoja, jotka tekisivät tietokantojen versionhallinnoinnista yhtä helppoa kuin tyypillisen ohjelmistokoodin versiohallinnoinnista ei löytynyt. Seuraavaksi esitellään joukko toimenpiteitä esitellyn järjestelmän tilan parantamiseksi. Toimenpiteet keskittyvät päällekkäisen työn välttämiseen, versiohistorian selventämiseen ja ohjelmistokoodin tason parantamiseen. Toimenpiteiden työmäärä arvioidaan planning poker -menetelmällä ja niistä valitaan toteutettavaksi kustannustehokkaimmat. Toimenpiteiden toteutuksen jälkeen niiden toteutusta ja tehoa arvioidaan. Osa niistä toteutettiin eri tavalla kuin oli suunniteltu, joitain jäi toteuttamatta ja lisäksi tehtiin joitain suunnittelemattomia toimenpiteitä. Voidaan todeta, että päällekkäisen kehitystyön tekeminen ja versiohistorian hämärtyminen saatiin estettyä, mutta itse prosessin ylläpitämisestä tuli työläämpää. Jatkoehdotuksissa ehdotetaan korjauksia tähän prosessiin ja organisaatioon yleensä. Lopuksi todetaan, että vanhaa järjestelmää ei kannata korjata liian työläästi ja ongelmiin päätyminen voidaan alkujaan välttää poistamalla juurisyynä toiminut resurssipula.

Tässä työssä toteutettiin sovellus, joka pyrkii tunnistamaan ja seuraamaan videosta ihmisiä ja heidän liikkeitään. Sovellus ennustaa seurattujen ihmisten liikeratoja ja yrittää havaita tilanteet, joissa kaksi tai useampi ihmistä on tormäämässä. Sovelluksen toteuttamiseen käytettiin Python-ohjelmointikieltä sekä OpenCVkuvankäsittelykirjastoa. Sovelluksen toiminta jaettiin kolmeen osaan, kohteiden tunnistus, seuranta ja törmäysten ennustus. Kohteiden tunnistukseen käytettiin siihen soveltuvaa, erittäin hyväksi todettua Yoloneuroverkkoa. Seurannassa hyödynnettiin OpenCV:n tarjoamia toteutuksia seuraavista seuranta-algoritmeista: kernelisöity korrelaatiosuodatin, diskriminatiivinen korrelaatiosuodatin, MOSSE, MedianFlow. Seuranta-algoritmeja vertailtiin testivideosekvenssillä, jossa algoritmin suorituskykyä mitattiin yhden seurattavan kohteen avulla laskemalla IoU, Precision, Recall sekä päivitysnopeus. Algoritmien vertailutuloksista tehtiin johtopäätös, että MOSSE-algoritmi on erittäin hyvä valinta nopeuden ja tarkkuuden ansiosta. Sitä tarkempi on ainoastaan diskriminatiivinen korrelaatiosuodatin, joka on seuranta-algoritmeista hitain. Valintapäätös tulee tehdä käyttötapauksen mukaan, jos kyseessä on turvallisuuteen liittyvä sovellus, niin tarkkuus on tärkeämpää kuin nopeus.

Piceasoft is a software company from Tampere, Finland. Main products of the company are different kind of solutions for the whole lifecycle of a mobile phone. Solutions contain services to transfer content from phone to phone, erase data from devices, diagnose device and trade-in. Most of Piceasoft’s customers are teleoperators, recyclers, mobile phone retailers and used device vendors. Piceasoft’s software is commercial and is based on licensing. Customers can use their copies of software based on the contract made with Piceasoft. License management needs work from support team and there must be a tool for it. It is common that customers want small changes in used software and this also adds load on support team. Typical needs from customers are related to branding and customization. Piceasoft’s current product management tool, PMT, was implemented in the early years of the company and has collected some technological debt. It can be used only by internal users and for management purposes only. Branding configurations and PDF customizations are made on-demand by developers and require quite much work. Piceasoft needs a web-based solution, which could be used by internal and external users and where customers could manage their products and branding configurations by themselves. This thesis contains design and implementation of a web-based product management tool. Web application is multi-paged but uses JavaScript library React in pages where interactivity is needed. System has a multitier architecture, where data layer is the new License API. Designed web application does not have straight connection to database but it uses services from License API to get and manage data. Application and the user interface are designed with MVC architecture pattern. Designed application allows five kind of users to manage and view resources related to licensing. Customers can make branding configurations by themselves without need to make support request for it. Implemented user interface combines set of new features and user flow from the current product management tool.

During the orientation week, new students face different challenges that are hectic. International students are especially confused about the new education system and come across many difficulties to overcome these challenges. There are too many information, which can be overwhelming. Not only for internationals, but for Finnish students also face information management issues. Although there are tutors assigned to help and take care of them, the tutors are not available at all times. Thus, we decided to design an interactive university guidance robot that could help the students whenever needed with relevant information. Our aim was to understand the users’ expectations and design the guidance robot to provide relevant information. There were also latent user needs and these can vary according to different culture. Thus, we addressed the needs according to Finnish, Chinese and Indian culture and aim to design the robot according to the needs of the target users. In the second phase, we conducted trials with new students to understand the experience of the participants. Moreover, we tried find out what was the preferred tasks among the students. We used Pepper robot as the platform for guidance robot. According to our research, the new students found the robot useful and it successfully addressed the needs of the participants. Moreover, the university guidance robot evoked experiences like nurture, fellowship, natural/humanlike and playfulness. In this thesis, we report how we collected the users’ expectation, analyzed the data to gather design implications, implemented functionalities in the university guidance robot and performed trials.

Face recognition is one of the earliest applications in the field of computer vision. In general, face recognition refers to recognizing the identity of a person from the facial image, by comparing the image to the set of facial images from known identities. Numerous approaches for solving this face recognition problem utilizing traditional machine learning methods have been proposed over the years. However, these methods have not been capable of solving the problem in an unconstrained environment. Due to increase of available data and computational power over the past 5 years, convolutional neural network (CNN) based deep learning approaches have became a state-of-the-art solution for face recognition problem. While some of these methods are capable of even beating a human in recognition accuracy, also the computational complexity of deep learning models used in solutions, have increased significantly and usually a graphics processing unit (GPU) is required to run face recognition in real-time. A pipeline for solving the face recognition problem in an unconstrained environment on real-time from the video stream, is presented in this thesis. For solving the problem, the pipeline is divided into 4 steps where each step solves one smaller more specific problem. For each of the steps, multiple approaches are tested to find an optimal solution to the problem solved in the step. After all, a solution for each of the steps in the pipeline are proposed and the solutions are collected for demonstrating the complete system. The system is designed to run on embedded NVIDIA Jetson TX2 hardware. Face detection is the first step in the pipeline, where faces are detected from the video stream and extracted. Then, the affection of applying different image alignments for the extracted facial croppings before the following steps of the pipeline, are tested. Alignment is performed by training machine learning models for facial landmark detection and applying an image transformation based on the detections. The third step, feature extraction from the facial images, is solved by training CNN’s with different alignments and loss functions to find an optimal solution for extraction. In the last step, an embedding of extracted features, is classified using nearest neighbor search from the set of known embeddings extracted earlier. Different clustering approaches are tested for accelerating the search speed by finding the nearest neighbor only from the subset of known embeddings. For face detection, all the tested lightweight CNN object detectors achieved similar accuracy and each of them could be used. For extracted facial images, trained Multi-task Cascaded Convolutional Networks (MTCNN) framework’s ONet achieved superior accuracy in facial landmark detection and it was utilized in implementing different alignments for facial images. Different alignments and loss functions had significant affection to nearest neighbor search. The highest accuracy was achieved by applying an affine transformation based on detected facial landmarks before feature extraction performed by CNN trained with Additive Angular Margin (ArcFace) loss. For accelerating nearest neighbor search, a hierarchical correlation clustering algorithm CHUNX achieved very accurate approximation for the nearest neighbor with significantly smaller slope compared to the exact nearest neighbor search. After all, the implemented demo application runs in real-time on Jetson TX2 hardware with over 10 frames per seconds (FPS).

Minimum Viable Product (lyhennetään MVP), suomeksi pienin toimiva tuote, on Eric Riesin The Lean Startup kirjan esittelemä ketterä tapa kehittää tuotteita tai palveluita. MVP:n ajatuksena on kehittää mahdollisimman nopeasti mahdollisimman pienillä kustannuksilla minimaalinen toimiva versio tuotteesta. Esineiden internet (Internet of Things, IoT) on verkko, jossa asiat ovat langattomasti yhteydessä toisiinsa älykkäiden antureiden avulla. IoT:n tarkoituksena on tuoda tavallisiin esineisiin ja asioihin älykkyyttä anturien avulla, kerätä niistä dataa ja yhdistää esineet verkkoon. Tämän diplomityön tarkoituksena on selvittää, kuinka hyvin MVP -malli soveltuu ketterän IoT -ohjelmistoprojektin käyttäjäkokemuksen suunnitteluun sekä mitkä ovat MVP -mallin hyvät ja huonot puolet ketterissä IoT -projekteissa. Tämän työn pohjana toimii MVP -mallin avulla toteutettu Freesi -sisäilmapalvelu. Freesi on IISY Oy:n vuonna 2017 kehittämä IoT -palvelu, jossa langattomat mittauslaitteet mittaavat kiinteistöjen ilmanlaa-tua ja lähettävät mittausdatansa pilvipalveluun. Freesiä käytetään kiinteistökannan ilmanlaadun etävalvontaan. Työssä toteutettiin kaksi haastattelututkimusta. Ensimmäisen tarkoituksena oli selvittää Freesi -palvelun käytettävyyttä haastattelemalla palvelun käyttäjiä. Toisen tutkimuksen tarkoituksena oli selvittää MVP -mallin hyviä ja huonoja puolia haastattelemalla asiantuntijoita, joilla oli kokemusta IoT -projekteista, joissa oli kehitetty MVP. Ensimmäisen haastattelututkimuksen tulokset osoittivat, että MVP -malli soveltui hyvin Freesi -sisäilmapalvelun suunnitteluun. Käyttäjät pitivät Freesiä selkeänä, loogisena, helppokäyttöisenä ja nopeasti opittavana. Toisen haastattelututkimuksen tulokset antavat tukea sille, että MVP -malli on toimiva ratkaisu ketterien IoT -projektien kehittämiseen. MVP -mallin hyvinä puolina pidettiin sen joustavuutta, nopeaa pääsyä markkinoille ja kehitystiimin kehitystyön fokusoimista. MVP -mallin heikkouksina pidettiin riskejä tehdä MVP:stä liian minimaalinen sekä hukata resursseja keskeneräiseksi jäävien kehityshaarojen tekemiseen.

Web-sovelluksia käytetään nykyaikana yhä enemmän kannettavilla laitteilla, kuten älypuhelimilla ja tableteilla. Tällöin joudutaan käyttämään usein mobiiliverkkoja, mikä voi tuottaa ongelmia esimerkiksi matkustettaessa tai syrjäisemmillä seuduilla liikuttaessa. Tällöin verkkoyhteydestä riippuvaisten web-sovellusten käytettävyys kärsii. Tässä työssä on tarkoitus tarkastella, kuinka tämä ongelma voidaan ratkaista offline-toiminnallisuuden ja tietojen synkronoinnin avulla. Tietojen synkronointi palvelimelle on tärkeässä osassa tukemassa offline-toiminnallisuutta, jotta muutokset saadaan myös palvelimelle. Web-sovelluksen offline-toiminnallisuuden mahdollistamiseksi täytyy selaimeen pystyä tallentamaan sekä sovelluksen vaatimia resursseja että sovelluksen käsittelemää dataa. Sovelluksen resurssit ovat useimmiten staattisia tiedostoja, joiden sisältö muuttuu harvoin. Sovelluksen data puolestaan muuttuu myös offline-käytön aikana, joten sitä pitää pystyä myös päivittämään offline-tilassa. Selaimeen täytyy siis tallentaa hyvin monenlaisia tietoja, joten tässä työssä tutkitaankin erilaisia vaihtoehtoja siihen tarkoitukseen. Tässä diplomityössä toteutettu toiminnallisuus on tehty osana asiakasprojektia, jossa on tarkoituksena tarjota offline-toiminnallisuus maatiloille tehtävien työterveyshuollon tilakäyntien havaintojen kirjaamista varten. Tilakäyntien aikana tietoja voi muokata useampi henkilö, jolloin tietojen synkronoinnissa täytyy varautua myös mahdollisiin konfliktitilanteisiin. Koska maatilat voivat mahdollisesti sijaita hyvinkin syrjäisillä alueille maaseuduille, ei haluta olla pelkästään verkkoyhteyden varassa kirjauksia tehtäessä. Tästä syystä tilakännillä tehtävien havaintojen kirjaaminen on tarkoitus mahdollistaa myös offline-tilassa. Lisäksi tiedot täytyy synkronoida palvelimelle, jotta saadaan tarvittavat tiedot myös järjestelmään. Lopputuloksena oli service workereita ja redux-offlinea hyödyntävä web-sovellus, jonka käyttö onnistuu ilman verkkoyhteyttä. Lisäksi tietojen synkronointi palvelimelle tapahtuu automaattisesti verkkoyhteyden ollessa jälleen saatavilla. Sovelluksen staattisten resurssien tallentaminen välimuistiin toteutettiin service workereilla. Näiden avulla sovelluksen suorittamiseen vaadittavat tiedostot saatiin helposti tallennettua pyyntö-vastaus-pareina selaimeen, josta niitä voidaan tarjota käyttäjän saataville, mikäli verkkoyhteyttä ei ole saatavilla. Sovelluksen datan tallentaminen ja tilan hallinta toteutettiin Redux-kirjaston avulla. Offline-toiminnallisuutta helpottamaan käytettiin lisäksi redux-offlinea, jonka avulla sovelluksen tilan tallentaminen paikallisesti localStorageen saatiin automatisoitua. Lopuksi tietojen synkronoinnissa toteutettiin yksinkertainen konfliktien havaitseminen ja ratkaisu siten, että viimeisimpänä tallennetut muutokset jäävät voimaan.

This thesis describes the front-end architectural design and implementation process of a modular web portal application, which is going to provide solutions for creating different kinds of tax and transfer pricing reports. All the reports are heavily legislated and currently require a lot of legal knowledge provided by tax lawyers, as well as a lot of information about the corporate finances. This is what the web portal application and the solutions it provides aim to ease. To evaluate the success of the architectural design to be created, the requirements for the architecture are first defined. These requirements aim to take all of the different aspects of the architecture into account. The front-end architectural design process covers the design of the solution that enables the modularity of the web portal application, the design of the guidelines that can be applied in the development of a single page application, and the planning process of the design system that is utilized in the whole web portal application. After the architectural design process is completed, the implementation of the web portal application is described. The implementation work done in this thesis included the creation and utilization of the design system planned as part of the architecture, the creation of base application that forms the core of the web portal application and the integration work needed to connect the different module application to the web portal application. The implemented web portal application and its architecture are then evaluated based on the requirements set in the beginning of the thesis and future improvements are discussed. The resulting web portal application and its architecture, based on the microservice architecture, are still a work in progress, but so far they both have proven to be adequate solutions.

Käyttäjäkokemukseen (UX) vaikuttavat ratkaisut tehdään projekteissa siirtyen laajemmista kokonaisuuksista pienempiin yksityiskohtiin. Tämän työn tavoitteena oli ensinnäkin selvittää, kuinka käyttäjäkokemuksen suunnittelu on yhdistetty projekteissa ketteriin menetelmiin. Toisena tavoitteena oli selvittää, millaisia käyttäjäkokemukseen vaikuttavia ratkaisuja ohjelmistokehittäjät tekevät ja mikä on heidän kokemuksensa käyttäjäkokemukseen vaikuttavien ratkaisujen tekemisestä. Työ koostuu teoriaosasta ja empiirisestä osasta. Teoriaosassa käydään läpi käyttäjäkokemukseen liittyvät peruskäsitteet ja tutustutaan ketteriin menetelmiin. Lisäksi tutustutaan siihen, millaisilla malleilla käyttäjäkeskeisen suunnittelun menetelmiä voidaan yhdistää ketteriin menetelmiin. Empiirisessä osassa toteutettiin haastattelututkimus, jossa haastateltiin henkilöitä seitsemästä eri ohjelmistoprojektista. Saatuja tuloksia verrattiin kirjallisuudesta löydettyihin tuloksiin. Tutkimuksessa havaittiin, että kirjallisuudessa esiintyneitä malleja ei käytetty projekteissa. Lisäksi eri projektien tavat yhdistää käyttäjäkokemuksen suunnittelu ketteriin menetelmiin erosivat toisistaan. Kehittäjien havaittiin tekevän projekteissa käyttäjäkokemukseen vaikuttavia ratkaisuja, joiden laajuus ja laatu riippuivat projektin tilanteesta ja kehittäjän mielenkiinnonkohteista. Kehittäjien havaittiin tekevän itsenäisesti erityisesti pienempiä käyttöliittymäratkaisuja, toimivan yhtenä UX-suunnittelijan työn laatua arvioivana portaana ja kertovan teknisistä rajoitteista, jotka vaikuttivat UX-ratkaisujen tekemiseen.

Laajoilla järjestelmähankkeilla on kyseenalainen maine, sillä useat projektit ovat joko ylittäneet budjettinsa, ylittäneet aikataulunsa tai keskeytetty kokonaan. Hankkeiden monimutkaisuus kasvattaa myös epävarmuustekijöiden määrää hankkeen laajuuden arvioinnissa. Mitkä tekijät luovat epävarmuutta arviointiin eli kasvattavat muutosten todennäköisyyttä? Tässä työssä tutkittiin näiden epävarmuustekijöiden, muutosvaikut-timien, tunnistamista ennen järjestelmän käyttöönottoprojektin aloittamista. Tutkimuksen toteutettiin haastattelemalla ihmisiä kolmesta eri järjestelmäprojektista sekä luomalla kirjallisuuskatsaus järjestelmäprojekteja edeltäviin toimenpiteisiin, kuten hankkeen käynnistämiseen, esiselvitykseen, vaatimusmäärittelyyn sekä hankintavaiheeseen. Työtä varten toteutettiin 9 haastattelua, joissa kartoitettiin näitä projektia edeltäneitä vaiheita sekä projektin lopputulemaa. Yksi esimerkkiprojekti käsitteli laajaa identiteetin- ja pääsynhallintajärjestelmän käyttöönottoa eurooppalaisessa ICT-palveluyrityksessä. Kaksi muuta esimerkkiprojektia olivat julkisen organisaation järjestelmähankkeita, joissa hankittiin tuotteistettu ratkaisu tai palvelu ilman erillistä kilpailutusta. Toisessa oli kyse uuden asianhallintajär-jestelmän käyttöönotosta ja toisessa taloushallinnon ulkoistuksesta, johon sisältyi myös uusien taloushallintojärjestelmien käyttöönotto. Haastattelujen pohjalta tunnistettiin seuraavat tekijät, joilla on vaikutuksia projektin muutosmäärään, ja jotka olisi tunnistettavissa ennen projektin alkua: monitulkintaiset vaatimukset, projektiviestinnässä käytetty kieli, järjestelmätoimittajan projektipäälli-kön kokemus, asiakasorganisaation kyvykkyys tai halukkuus muuttaa prosessejaan, si-dosryhmien määrä, projektihallinnon suhteellinen osuus työmääräarviosta, järjestelmäintegraatioiden määrä, käsiteltävien järjestelmien datamallien tai käsitemallien puuttuminen sekä projektin laajuuden arvioinnissa käytetty arviointimenetelmä. Tuloksia ei voida pitää kovin yleistettävinä, sillä tutkitut projektit olivat keskenään erilaisia, eikä kahdessa tutkitussa projektissa niiden tuotteistetun luonteen vuoksi voitu hyödyntää asiakkaan omia vaatimusmäärittelyjä.

With the continuous growth and improvements of visual displays and the high qualities easily accessible by consumers, a need for supporting audio formats grows as well. One of the growing trends over the past few years has been vir-tual reality and 360° video. Spatial audio provides enhanced perceptions of presence and immersion and thus is crucial to continuous success and ex-pansive VR and 360° applications. This study focuses on the perceptions of spatial audio in a 360° music video setting, and compares it to the perceptions of stereo audio; both using flat dis-play and head-mounted display. The approach in this thesis is to evaluate four different test conditions with each participant, and compare the results of each participant, as well as between the participants. The four scenarios consist of a music video watched twice on a flat display, once with spatial audio and once with stereo audio at no particular order. Then twice using a head mounted dis-play, once with spatial audio and another with stereo audio in no particular or-der. The test used evaluation forms with a 7-point Likert scale, in addition to semi-structured interviews. The interviews aim to gauge music listening habits and the impact they may have on spatial and stereo audio perceptions. The interviews also allow the participants to explicitly state their preference and why, thus providing a better look into the connections between all the different answers. The results show that spatial audio paired with a head mounted display scored the highest in all our metrics. However, the results from the interviews held af-ter the tests concluded showed less interest in becoming active users of spatial audio. Participants prefer the familiar experience for their day-to-day listening. The participants predominantly listen to music as a secondary task which works better with stereo audio and is unpleasant with spatial audio. Spatial au-dio needs to provide a higher value and serve in areas where stereo audio is found lacking. Future studies may focus on that as a topic of research to find the right audience and the right applications for spatial audio.

A well-designed and functioning development environment is crucial for every software company to push the productivity of the development team to the max. With the appropriate development environment, the limited time of the development team can be used for productive work. In this thesis, a successful development environment for mobile application development is designed and implemented for the Finnish company called Piceasoft. Piceasoft has been increasingly investing in the development of mobile applications over the last few years. The mobile application development team has identified problems with the development environment. In this thesis, these flaws of the development environment are pinpointed and solved. The thesis declares a whole new Version Control System (VCS) and branching model for the mobile applications codebase. This VCS is deployed with self-hosted Gitlab instance that runs in the internal network and integrates with existing Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) authentication system. With integrated Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) system of Gitlab, a fully automated CI/CD pipeline for mobile applications is created. The transition to the new system from old Subversion VCS is described. The system implemented in this thesis turned out to be well suited for Piceasoft. The system was evaluated by interviewing the developers from the mobile application development team and PC development team as well as Quality Assurance (QA) engineers from the testing department. Additionally, data about integrated alpha builds of the applications during development was collected. The data shows a significant increase in deliverables available for integration and testing.