Master of Science in Computer Engineering (MSCE), Wright State University, 2020, Computer Engineering

Features and attributes that describe an event (disasters, social movements, etc.) are heterogeneous in nature. For virtually all events that impact humans, technology enables us to capture a large amount and variety of data from many sources, including humans (i.e., social media) and sensors/internet of things (IoTs). The corresponding modalities of data include text, imagery, voice and video, along with structured data such as gazetteers (i.e., location-based data) and government and statistical data. However, even though there is often an abundance of information produced, this information is fragmented across the various modalities and sources. The DisasterRecord system aims to provide a way to combine (interlink and integrate) data streams in different modalities in a meaningful way, with the in-depth use case of flood events. The DisasterRecord project was originally developed as a demo to showcase the efforts of the team at Kno.e.sis in the area of combining and analyzing multimodal data for the IBM CallForCode challenge in 2018. This thesis represents extensive follow-on work in the areas of deployability, flexibility, and reliability. Specific topics addressed are: a method that utilizes current technologies to easily deploy into cloud infrastructure; the modifications made to add flexibility to add and modify the multimodal analysis pipeline; and reliability improvements to make it a stable and reliable system.

Committee: Amit Sheth Ph.D. (Advisor); Krishnaprasad Thirunarayan Ph.D. (Committee Member); Valerie Shalin Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Computer Engineering; Computer Science; Web Studies

Master of Computing and Information Systems, Youngstown State University, 2008, Department of Computer Science and Information Systems

At Ctest Laboratories we are exploring the notion of automated conversion of the semi-structured text to an epistemic structure suitable for deductive inference. In this paper we will develop an epistemic structured representation for electronic transcripts ofinterrogative domains. We propose that knowledge which is typically not visible to keyword search or string matching, can be readily extracted from the an electronic transcript when it is given an appropriate epistemic structure. We introduce an Epistemic Structure Es and a process for converting a semi-structured transcript from and interrogative domain to Es. In this paper we restrict our discussion and analysis to transcripts that have been stored as semi-structured text. In particular we are interested in any knowledge that can be deduced by an interrogative agent from the content of an electronic transcript. Further we develop the notion of an interrogative agent that relies on epistemic justification as a condition for knowledge.

Committee: Alina Lazar PhD (Committee Chair); John Sullins PhD (Committee Member); Yong Zhang PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Artificial Intelligence; Computer Science; Information Systems; Linguistics; Technology

Master of Computer Science, Miami University, 2012, Computer Science and Software Engineering

This thesis suggests a software architecture for a video discussion board using the Online Language Environment (OLE) Board as a case study. A more suitable architecture will enable it to meet its goals. Goals for the new board are to support future developers and users. Developer-oriented goals are ease of readability, maintenance, and enhancement. User-oriented goals are ease of use, new or improved features such as data collection, and enhanced security. The old system is out of date, making planned expansion difficult. The new system uses a Model-View-Controller architecture utilizing updated frameworks. Updated protocols based on XML were introduced, and elements were added to allow for new features. Developer goals have been met with minimal drawbacks. The new board was used by 42 students at the University of Aizu and Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. New features proved useful and security was increased, with some decrease in usability during initial testing.

Committee: Dr. Douglas Troy (Advisor); Dr. Scott Campbell (Committee Member); Dr. Paul Lyddon (Committee Member) Subjects: Computer Science; Educational Software; Educational Technology