CSE4080

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====== Currently offered Projects, Winter 2013 (updated January 9, 2013)  ======
(Listed in order received.)

====== 3D Drawing System with Leap Motion finger tracker ======

**Supervisor**: Wolfgang Stuerzlinger

**Required Background**: 3D computer graphics, C/C++ coding

The Leap Motion, leapmotion.com, is a new device that lets users control a computer with their fingers. This project creates a new 3D drawing system that enables users to quickly generate 3D solids.

====== 3D Drawing System with 3Gear gesture tracker ======

**Supervisor**: Wolfgang Stuerzlinger

**Required Background**: 3D computer graphics, C/C++ coding

The 3Gear system, threegear.com, lets users control a computer with their hands and fingers. This project creates a new 3D drawing system that enables users to quickly generate and modify 3D solids.

====== Comparison of Finger Tracking systems ======

**Supervisor**: Wolfgang Stuerzlinger

**Required Background**: C/C++ coding

This project compares the Leap Motion and the 3Gear System against each other in a comparative Fitts' law study

====== Tilt Target Selection on Touchscreen Phones ======

**Supervisor**: Scott MacKenzie

**Required Background**: General 4080 prerequisites, CSE3461, and (preferably) CSE4441. Interest in user interfaces and human-computer interaction (HCI).  Students can use their own Android phone for the project or one supplied by the course supervisor.

Touchscreen mobile devices commonly use a built-in accelerometer to sense movement or tilting actions of the device.  Tilt is commonly used the change the orientation of the display between portrait and landscape.  Gaming is another common use for tilting actions.  However, tilt may also be used for target selection, as a replacement for touch.  This research project will evaluate tilt as an input primitive for target selection on touchscreen mobile devices.

**Readings**: MacKenzie, I. S., & Teather, R. J. (2012). FittsTilt: The application of Fitts’ law to tilt-based interaction. Proceedings of the Seventh Nordic Conference on Human-Computer Interaction – NordiCHI 2012, pp. 568-577. New York: ACM. 

====== Attentive Sensing for Better Two-Way Communication in Remote Learning Environments ======

**Supervisor**: James Elder

**Required Background**: General CSE408x prerequisites, good programming skills, 
good math skills, knowledge of C and MATLAB programming languages

One of the challenges in remote learning is to allow students to communicate effectively with the lecturer.  For example, when a student asks a question, communication will be more effective if the instructor has a zoomed view of the student’s face, so that s/he can interpret expressions etc.
 
The goal of this project is to apply attentive sensing technology (www.elderlab.yorku.ca) to this problem.  This technology is able to monitor a large environment such as a classroom and direct a high-resolution ‘attentive’ sensor to events of interest.
 
In particular, working with a senior graduate student or postdoctoral fellow, the  successful applicant will:
 
  - Study the problem of detecting hand-raises in the preattentive sensor stream
  - Implement algorithms for detecting hand-raises based upon this investigation
  - Evaluate these algorithms in a real-classroom setting, using proprietary attentive sensing technology
 

====== Continuation of a Path Diagram to Syntax Application ======

**Supervisor**: Jeff Edmonds

**Required Background**: General CSE408x prerequisites

**Recommended Background**: Java software development

Structural equation modeling (SEM) is a statistical technique that is becoming increasingly popular in the educational and behavioral sciences. SEM allows researchers to test the validity of hypothesized models involving complex relationships among multiple variables. Collected data is used to estimate the parameters of the equations and assessing the fit of the model. 

The software required is an application that allows researchers to define their hypothesized models visually and will output the correct syntax for the analytical software of their choosing.

To date a promising functional application has been developed in JAVA by a Computer Science student as a 4080 project. The existing software allows the user to draw a path diagram and outputs code for the R package sem.  There are a number of improvements to be made (refinements and additions to graphical user interface) and then the application needs to be extended to output syntax appropriate for additional software applications (openMX, MPlus and EQS).  Though this project may not begin at “the first stages” of the software lifecycle, this scenario is likely common in the software development market. In addition, the student will be working with a primary “client” who is far less technically advanced, which is also reflective of real-world situations.

More details {{:continuation_of_a_path_diagram_to_syntax_application.pdf|here}}.

====== YUsend Thermal Vacuum (TVAC) Test Manager ======

**Supervisor**: Rob Allison (co-supervised with Hugh Chesser, Space Engineering)

**Required Background**: General CSE408x prerequisites, familiarity with C++ and Windows software tools

**Description** The YUsend (York University Space Engineering Nanosatellite Demonstration) Lab has procured a Windows XP-based industrial computer and temperature acquisition card (as well as other hardware) for performing TVAC testing of nanosatellites in the CSIL Lab (PSE 003). A “TVAC Test Manager” application written using LabView's G programming language will oversee the acquisition of temperatures (thermal test outputs) and control of IR lamps (thermal test inputs) during the rather long periods (4 or more days, 24 hours a day) of a TVAC test.

Specific tasks include: 1. Writing temperature acquisition card (OMEGA Engineering CIO-DAS-Temp) drivers for LabView - should be written in Visual C++ or similar and compiled into SubVI format. 2. Write LabView VI's (“Virtual Instrument”) to perform (a) Test set-up activities - checkout of sensor and lamps, assigning neumonics to temperature sensors, setting of alarm conditions for sensors and lamps (b) Acquire and monitor temperature data and control lamp voltage during test, raise operator alarms for temperature or IR lamp anomalous conditions as required © Store temperature and control data for subsequent analysis and reporting. 3. (Optional) Interface the Test Manager with an orbital simulation tool which would be used to compute IR lamp inputs based on a simulation of the nanosatellite's orbital position and attitude (eg - in the sun, lamps on, in eclipse lamps off). The simulation tool is a package called Satellite Toolkit (STK) which has an TCP/IP-based API.




====== Numerical Methods ======

**Supervisor**: Mike McNamee

**Required Background**: Good grade in a Numerical Methods course and good knowledge
of Fortran, C or similar language. 

**Description**: Write, debug and run several Fortran programs related to solving
polynomial equations, with a view to comparing different known methods.

====== Enabling SaaS access to an experimental AI planner ======

**Supervisor**: Sotirios Liaskos (liaskos at yorku dot ca)

**Required Background**: Good knowledge of Unix tools / Python, Perl or Awk. Comfort with algorithms and programming. Essential: 2031 -- Software Tools. Desired:
3402 -- Functional & Logic Programming,
3101 -- Design and Analysis of Algorithms,
4302 -- Compilers and Interpreters.

**Description**: This project involves enriching and integrating a set of fairly complex scripts, which are components of an Artificial Intelligence (AI) planner, and exporting them to the public in a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) fashion.

The components are various Unix executables and LISP programs that need to interact in complex ways. The components may be residing in different servers in different universities. Currently integration is performed manually, at the expense of usability. Thus, we aim at constructing a module that: (a) integrates involved components to deliver output in one call, (b) exports a unique web interface (preferably following WSDL/SOAP) to be easily accessed by custom front-end tools by anyone, anywhere, (c ) offers a simple front-end for human users.

Learning objectives:
  * Understand the technologies and process involved in turning native code into a web-service ("servicizing").
  * Study a state-of-the-art AI planner and understand its workings.
  * Exercise scripting skills.


====== Predicting Angular Error in Rigid Registration ======

**Supervisor**: Burton Ma

**Description**: Registration is a fundamental step in image-based surgical
navigation. Several (seemingly) different approaches for predicting
distance errors in registration are known, but for some surgical
procedures, the angular error in registration is more important.
This project will validate an approach for predicting angular
error in registration; the student will use a combination of
simulated and actual registration data for testing purposes.

====== Calibration of a Tracked Pointer ======

**Supervisor**: Burton Ma

**Description**: Tracked pointers are the most common tools used in surgical
navigation systems. A typical pointer has a tracked target on one
end and a sharp or ball tip on the other end. Finding the location
of the tip relative to the target is a calibration problem. One
solution to the calibration problem involves pivoting the pointer
about the tip while tracking the target; if the tip is kept
stationary, then the target moves on the surface of a sphere.
Fitting the tracking data to the surface of a sphere yields the
location of the tip as the sphere center. Unfortunately, the
calibrated tip position obtained using such a spherical calibration
has high variance. This project will investigate how much variance
there is in the calibrated tip position, and methods for reducing
the variance of the calibrated tip position.


====== A privacy safeguard framework for sharing photos on Facebook ======

**Supervisor**: Uyen Trang Nguyen
 

**Description**:
One of the major privacy concerns in Online Social Networks is photo sharing.  A user may post his/her friends’ photos without their consent.  The friends have no control over the user’s Facebook activities, namely photo sharing.  In this project, we design and implement a third-party Facebook application that allows people to protect their identities in photos uploaded by another user without their consent.

**Required prerequisite background**:  Proficiency in programming, especially in Java and Web application programming.

**Desired prerequisite**: Knowledge of image processing, Facebook API, JavaScript Object Notation (JSON)