meeting of the minds 2009

2009

Undergraduate Research Symposium

+ Business Administration+ Computer Science+ Information Systems

Excellence. At Carnegie Mellon.

Phone + 974 454 8400Fax + + 974 454 8410Web www.qatar.cmu.edu

Meeting of the Minds is an annual symposium at Carnegie Mellon University that gives students an opportunity to present their research and project work to a wide audience of faculty, fellow students, family members, industry representatives and the larger community. Students use posters, videos and other visual aids to present their work in a manner that can be easily understood by both experts and non experts.

Through this experience, students learn how to bridge the gap between conducting research and presenting it to a wider audience. A review committee consisting of industry experts and faculty members from other universities will review the presentations and choose the best projects and posters. Awards and certificates are presented to the winners.

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TITLE BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION POSTERS Dark NetworksSurviving and Thriving ‘Under the Radar’The Designer Handbags SyndromeThe South American Experiment that sold the World on Globalization

COMPUTER SCIENCE POSTERS Dynamic Path Planning and Traffic Light Coordination for Emergency Vehicle RoutingExploring Visual Odometry for Mobile RobotsKnow About MeNeeds Assessment and Educational Technology in Rural Cambodia

INFORMATION SYSTEMS POSTERS Cross Registration SystemEvently: A Social Event Recommendation System for University CampusesGlobal Software Development ExperienceGreenMiles

LIBERAL ARTS & SCIENCES POSTERS Camping CultureDomestic Workers in QatarEmerging Communities: The Case of Hispanics in QatarFishermenHeylowPolitics of Identity in Multicultural Settings: a Literary Analysis of Leila Aboulela’s novels, The Translator and MinaretQ-VOIP Laborers’ Communication NeedsThe State of Migrant Workers in Qatar: The Workers’ PerspectiveThe Use of Silence in JapanTranslating Safety and Security messages

GRADUATE STUDENT POSTERS A higher order language to deploy and secure web-servicesThe Deductive Spreadsheet

POSTER #

Q1Q2Q3Q4

Q5

Q6Q7Q8

Q9Q10Q11Q12

Q13Q14Q15Q16Q17Q18

Q19Q20Q21Q22

Q23Q24

Dark Networks

Dark Networks are covert networks that participate in illegal activity such as arms smuggling and drug trafficking. Their formation comes as a result of a need to ‘solve’ a complex problem. In the case of drugs and arms, it is the supply of an illegal commodity to the consumer safely. In our research, we tried to study a dark network in Doha. We tried to study this network during a period of time. We analyze the structure of the network before and after the attack and we explain how the network reach to changes in the environment.

Poster Q1

AuthorSaad Al-Matwi (BA 2010)Mohammed Al-Ibrahim (BA 2009)

Faculty advisorRamamoorthi Ravi

CategoryBusiness Administration

2

Dark NetworksSaad Al-Matwi & Mohamed Al-Ibrahim

Email: Srmatwi-mibrahim Advisor: Professor R.RaviTepper School of Business

Definition Dark Networks are covert networks that participate in illegal activity such as arms smuggling and drug trafficking. Their formation comes as a result of a need to ‘solve’ a complex problem. In the case of drugs and arms, it is the supply of an illegal commodity to the consumer safely.

Before the Attack

After the Attack

Dark Networks Examples:• Al-Qaeda• Tamil Tigers (LTTE)• Weapon & Drug Traffickers • Hezbollah

Case Study:• Event study on ‘Wonder Land’ Network• Network participant was attacked by law enforcers• Network automatically re-formed and re-structured

Related Work:• Xu, Jennifer J. and Hsinchun Chen. 2008. “The topology of dark networks”Communications of the ACM, 51(10).• Raab, Jörg and H. Brinton Milward. 2003. Dark Networks as Problems. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory 13(4): 413-439.

Findings:• Dark Networks are highly adaptable to attacks• Attacks on lower levels are ineffective• Dark networks can restructure itself to adapt to the new environment

Future Work:• Availability of information is limiting attack effectiveness• How long does it take for Dark Networks to adapt to attacks and how is this time related to the structure of the Dark Network?• Can Dark networks be permanently eliminated or only controlled?

4

Surviving and Thriving Under the Radar

This paper intends to explore the colloquialism: “going under the radar.” It is meant to refer to the actions or strategy of a person or group of persons who discretely get far ahead in a task by going unnoticed. The Nazis used it to great effect, the Soviets spent billions to counter it, the Viet Cong from North Vietnam succeeded when the US failed, “going under the radar” is useful in many situations. In this paper, this strategy is analyzed firstly in a popular US TV show called Survivor, and then how effective it is in terms of networks.

We will not only use networks and prove the usefulness of going under the radar, but also find its limitations and why people tend not to use the strategy, or to what extent they use it. There are several strategies that are used in Survivor, and in a game where strong social skills are so important, it is very interesting to see how going under the radar is very effective.

Upon closer analysis and observation, going under the radar can be a very effective tool when used properly, and it can be used in many different kinds of situations, such as other reality shows where contestants’ fates are in the hands of other contestants and in real life.

Poster Q2

AuthorArsalan Arif (BA 2010)



Surviving and Thriving ‘Under the Radar’By: Arsalan Arif

[email protected]: R. Ravi

Business Administration

Strategies Used• Physical Domination• Social Manipulation• Making strong friendships/alliances• Going Under the Radar

Similarities to The Apprentice• Good Work Ethic is valuable• Too much control disliked• Negative Relationships are dangerous• Going Under the Radar not appreciated• Need to prove that you deserve to win

Future Work• Analyze real life examples further• Optimal ‘breakout’ times• Possible psychological reasons• More focus when Going Under the

Radar can not work

Observations

• Cassandra went under the radar:• Physically incompetent• Not major contributor to camp life• No negative relationships• Reached 2nd Place

Gary

Liliana

Lisi

Edgardo Alex

Stacy

Boo

Dreamz

Cassa-ndra

Gary

Liliana

Lisi

Edgardo Alex

Stacy

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Cassa-ndra

Mikey B

Tracy

Joel

Kathy

Mary

ErikChet

Natalie

Jason Alexis

Mikey B

Tracy

Joel

Kathy

Mary

ErikChet

Natalie

Jason Alexis

Going Under the Radar• Used for centuries• Warfare:

• U-boats• Stealth• Sabotage

• Crime & Deterrence• Security & Defense

Survivor: TV Show• Reality game show in survival setting• Game format:

• Tribes compete (2-4 of up to 9)• Reward & Immunity Challenges• Losing tribe voted member out

• Numbers & probability (with alliances)• Social Networks & Merges

• Natalie went under the radar:• Physically incompetent• Last fan after merge, i.e. alliance• No obvious negative relationships• Reached 4th Place

Conclusions• In order to maximize payoff, need to

seize the opportunity:• Last ¾ in Survivor• Second ½ in The Apprentice

• Used by Stealth Startups, usually tech.• Airline Industry Example• Opposite used by Web Startups

6

The Designer Handbags Syndrome

In this study, we will draw a DCCP series diagram that tracks a handbag starting from your favorite designer’s sketch and ending in your hands. This will lead us to distinguish the strategies that made some designers succeed and others fail in the fashion industry. Moreover, the study will explore the role of influence and learning among designers that made the designs of several popular handbags similar in the market.

Poster Q3

AuthorBayan Taha (BA 2009)Shuaa Al-Nasr (BA 2010)



8

The South American Experiment that sold the World on Globalization

My project aims at examining the situation in South America during the cold war, more specifically how the economic ideology was related to the political turmoil. I have taken a look at how economic ideologies are implemented and the methods to get the policies adopted, sometimes it proves a popular choice among the majority, other policies aim to benefit the rich few, and thus must be forced on the majority of the population.

We now live in a globalized economy with corporations dictating our future path. Since before the cold war, the preferred economic system was that of a mixed economy, but something happened that led us to adopt a free market economic system.

ConclusionThe Neo-liberal policies were systematically implemented over time, with many trials and errors, coupled with the lack of proper media coverage led the South Americas to do adopt an economic system that benefited the few and offered an enticing prospect that anybody can get rich.

Poster Q4

AuthorRamsey Ramadan (BA 2009)



The South American Experiment that

sold the World on Globalization

During the Cold war, the period of bipolar rivalry between the East and West was not just about political disagreements or differences in opinions, it was about differences between two distinct economic ideologies communism and capitalism, the latter being the system that offered benefits to the few and required the sacrifice of the majority. I must stress the notion that no economic system is good or evil, this judgment can only be cast on how it is implemented.

Milton Friedman, an economist at the University of Chicago was on a mission was to create a state of pure capitalism by removing all the distortions such as government regulations, trade barriers and entrenched interests. In order to test his Free Market economic theories, he needed a test subject: Chile.

1956

The Chile Project was born in the Chile’s Catholic University, so as to promote the teachings of the Chicago school of economics. ‘Los Chicago Boys’ were born“We came here to compete, not collaborate”

1968 20% of U.S. foreign investment was tied up in South America, and there were 5436 subsidiaries in the region.

Salvador Allende’s Popular Unity government won with promises of greater nationalization.

1970

1971

General Augusto Pinochet in command of the military forces staged a coup and took control of the government

Chile was transformed from a democracy to a dictatorship under the control of General Pinochet

The Chilean army under the command of general Pinochet disappeared 100,000 Chileans.

New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis asked the question ‘’if the pure Chicago economic theory can be carried out in Chile only at the price of repression, should its authors feel some responsibility?’’

Under the guidance of Milton Friedman, the Chicago boys implemented its neoliberal policies and sent Chile into economic turmoil.

Amnesty International is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for its 1976 report on the Human rights abuses and atrocities in Chile. ’We do not support or oppose any government or political system and neither do we necessarily support or oppose the views of the victims/survivors or human rights defenders whose rights we seek to protect. ‘’

The Chicago Boys’ policies hovered under the radar as human rights’ groups made no association between the Chilean atrocities and economic ideologies, thus allowing Free Market economics to survive its first ever trial on route to becoming the globalized economic system we now know .

Conclusion Citation ‐ The Shock Doctrine‐ The Evatt Foundation‐ Democracynow.org

The network

Milton Friedman is awarded the Nobel Prize for economics for his work on the relationship between inflation and unemployment. In essence hw was awarded for his theoretical work because in reality, his policies had almost caused the economy to fail.

Timeline

by Ramsey RamadanAdvisor: Ramamoorthi Ravi

10

Dynamic Path Planning and Traffic Light Coordination for Emergency Vehicle Routing

The result of an ambulance or fire truck arriving a couple of seconds late can be the difference between life and death for some. Our research builds on the state of the art in vehicle path planning to help save these few seconds. We particularly combine dynamic path planning with traffic signal pre-emption to reach this goal.

D*Lite, an informed search algorithm, efficiently and optimally plans and replans according to changing costs, travel times, of routes in the traffic network. For a chosen route, a pre-emption strategy is applied to reduce emergency vehicle delay while maximizing flow through the intersection. We present our approach and our initial results in this poster.

Poster Q5

AuthorHend Gedawy (CS 2009)

Faculty advisorsM. Bernardine Dias and Khaled Harras

CategoryComputer Science

Dynamic Path Planning and Traffic Light Coordination for Emergency Vehicle Routing

Hend Geddawy, [email protected] Advisors:

M.Bernardine Dias, Ph.D, Assistant Research Professor, Robotics Institute Khaled A. Harras, Ph.D, Assistant Teaching Professor, Computer Science Department

I. Abstract & Introduction II. Solution

Contribution Domain

The result of an ambulance or fire truck arriving a couple of seconds late can be the difference between life and death for some. Our research builds on the state of the art in vehicle path planning to help save these few seconds. We particularly combine dynamic path planning with traffic signal pre-emption to reach this goal. D*Lite, an informed search algorithm, efficiently and optimally plans and replans according to changing costs, travel times, of routes in the traffic network. For a chosen route, a pre-emption strategy is applied to reduce emergency vehicle delay while maximizing flow through the intersection. We present our approach and our initial results in this poster.

1. Traffic lights controlled by a central server2. Constant wireless connection between the vehicle and the central server3. Congestion detection system that measures congestion level4. GPS tracking system in the emergency vehicle5. Traffic model that identifies traffic flow patterns on intersections

Assumptions

III. Future Work

IV. Acknowledgement

II-A. Path Planning

Initial Evaluation

Second Evaluation (VISSIM)

Phase Selection Results

Traffic Signal Phases and Selection Criteria

D* Lite Background

D*Lite Algorithm

D* Lite applied

III. Evaluation•An informed or heuristic search algorithm• Invented by Keonig and Likhachey in 2002 •Can be customized for a specific domain using heuristic.•Enhancement of Lifelong Planning A* and a simpler version of D*. •Complete, optimal, and can handle dynamic cost changes•Implements fast replanning •Makes no assumptions about how the costs of the edges are changing

•Implemented a graph version of the algorithm to incorporate the intersections, the roads and their

associated costs. •Measure : Travel Time

•Objective Function: Time•Admissible Heuristic Function:

Distance / Maximum speed

II-B. Signal Preemption VISSIM Background• Microscopic traffic simulator • Developed in Germany by Planung Transport Verkehr (PTV) company • Models different traffic engineering problems • Major advantages over other existing traffic simulators:

flexible structure that allows continuous interaction between VISSIM’s main simulation module and an external module that controls every traffic light in the network

•Considering the emergency vehicle’s vicinity

•Handling Multiple Priorities at an intersection

• Dr. M.Bernardine Dias and Dr. Khaled Harras my advisors

• Dr. Amer Shalaby, Associate Professor, Department of Civil Engineering, University of Toronto

Scenario snapshots

12

Exploring Visual Odometry for Mobile Robots

Visual odometry makes use of the image sequence from a camera to estimate the motion of the camera. The low cost, small size, and high information content of cameras as sensors makes them ideal for robot platforms. In this work, we develop a visual odometry system based on stereo input. Our algorithm makes use of Structure-From-Motion techniques by exploiting the projective geometry between 3D point landmarks in the world and their projection into 2D imagery.

Our approach tracks CenSurE features from a stereo camera over multiple frames. By combining the 3D depth information from the stereo process with robust pose estimation using RANSAC and relative orientation, we show that it is possible to robustly estimate camera pose over time. Furthermore, we show that careful use of Sparse-Bundle-Adjustment (SBA) produces refined solutions that estimate both world structure and camera motion.

We compare different approaches within this framework and show that relative orientation is superior to using absolute orientation to estimate pose. Secondly, we introduce a track selection process that improves the fault tolerance of SBA to short baseline feature tracks. We test our algorithm on outdoor and indoor environments and present results showing its effectiveness.

Poster Q6

AuthorHatem Alismail (CS 2009)

Faculty advisorBrett Browning


Exploring Visual Odometry for Mobile Robots Exploring Visual Odometry for Mobile Robots Senior Honors ThesisHatem Alismail {[email protected]}Advised by: Brett Browning, Ph.D. {[email protected]}

Extract CenSurE features from left image

Match features across frames using marriage assignment

Build tracks for motion and structure refinement

Full Sparse Bundle Adjustment

Camera motion using Relative Orientation

Given three 3D points in frames A and B, find Euclidean transform such that:

TR += BA XX

Absolute Orientation

Refine motion and structure using Levenberg-Marquardt non-linear least squares

Sliding window approach for efficiency

…Sliding window SBA

Cost function: reprojection error

Cameras are low-cost high-information content sensors

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Obtain 3D points from real-time stereo using STOC from VidereDesign

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“Given a stream of imagery, can we estimate the camera pose and world structure robustly and efficiently?”

Motivation Robust Pose Estimation

Aim to build visual mapping system from imagery

4

Extract features from left image

TR,TR,

Obtaining 3D Points

Robust Pose Estimation

Nonlinear refinement

1

2 3Correspondence & Feature Tracking

Research Question & Approach

Obtaining 3D Points

Correspondence & Feature Tracking

Nonlinear Refinement

Experimental Results

Conclusions & Future WorkGood feature detector performance is crucialRelative orientation is superior to absolute orientationSelecting large baseline points only for nonlinear refinementFuture work to incorporate image retrieval to overcome broken tracks

Make robust using RANSAC outlier rejection framework

14

Know About Me

Social networking has revolutionized the concept of human networks and friends. Although, there continue to exist a large number of people who do not maintain social networking profiles/identities/accounts because of the ambiguity associated with it. Also, it is seen that rather than one single web network or application, there have been numerous social networks and services which provide for communication between users/members.

The “Know About Me” web profile generator is a Web 2.0 tool for saving the effort and the time it takes to know about other people on the web. This idea is similar to a semantic web model, and strives to break Social network barriers. It aims to eliminate the need for multiple accounts on Social networks and/or application and allows a user to present a customized & static web identity which can be easily published and shared. This tool depends on personal information of users available on social networks, which allows the user to generate a quick profile without needing to create personal content.

Poster Q7

AuthorVarun Arora (IS 2012)Ghanim Al-Sulaiti (IS 2012)Ahmed Emam (CS 2012)

Faculty advisorPeter Bowman


know about.methe web profile generatorStudents: Varun Arora (varora), Ghanim Al-Sulaiti (gsulaiti)Advisor: Dr. Peter Bowman

facebook orkut hi5 last.fm twitter MySpace Friendster YouTube Calender Blogger

Objectives

Facilitating quick, simple and efficient social networking without the need of identity maintenance on • multiple ambiguous online social networks.Allowing all web users to maintain static & public web-page based profiles without the need to learn • web design.Giving complete control to Social network users while communicating a personal profile over the • Web.

Project

To be able to generate static web profiles using aggregated user content and information...

...retrieved from user profiles on Social Networks and Web ap-• plications with content-access capability (authenticated or unau-thenticated access)...after selective customization of data on user needs• & being able to use the generated web profiles for enhancing a • web identity in multiple ways

Supported Networks

Facebook• Orkut• hi5• YouTube• Blogger• Last.fm• Twitter•

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Design

know about.methe web profile generatorStudents: Varun Arora (varora), Ghanim Al-Sulaiti (gsulaiti)Advisor: Dr. Peter Bowman

facebook orkut hi5 last.fm twitter MySpace Friendster YouTube Calender Blogger

Objectives

Facilitating quick, simple and efficient social networking without the need of identity maintenance on • multiple ambiguous online social networks.Allowing all web users to maintain static & public web-page based profiles without the need to learn • web design.Giving complete control to Social network users while communicating a personal profile over the • Web.

Project

To be able to generate static web profiles using aggregated user content and information...

...retrieved from user profiles on Social Networks and Web ap-• plications with content-access capability (authenticated or unau-thenticated access)...after selective customization of data on user needs• & being able to use the generated web profiles for enhancing a • web identity in multiple ways

Supported Networks

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16

Needs Assessment and Educational Technology in Rural Cambodia

Cambodia has suffered a tragic history characterized by wars and political unrest, and hence, the development process in Cambodia re-started as late as the 1990s. The government and several non-governmental and funding organizations are working to enhance the development process in Cambodia; especially in rural communities. Reach Out To Asia (ROTA), a charity initiative in Qatar, has undertaken an educational development project aimed at addressing multiple educational needs in the Vihear Suork Commune in the Kandal Province of Cambodia.

Education in Cambodia is characterized by low literacy rates, low enrollment rates, high dropout rates, high repetition rates, among other factors. Hence, ROTA’s aim is to increase the literacy level and provide vocational training and additional avenues for income generation to the youth in the region. This research, funded by the Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF), is about designing a needs assessment and educational technology strategy to enhance ROTA’s work in Cambodia. Educational Technology includes multiple tools and methodologies that facilitate teaching and learning.

Therefore, a culturally relevant needs assessment and educational technology strategy must be built on a thorough understanding of cultural traditions, challenges and enablers specific to the user community. We are exploring factors influencing the current state of education in Cambodia to identify major challenges for successful education in the Kandal province. This required the researchers to travel to Cambodia and conduct needs assessment (through interviews, surveys and community walk). The state of technology was studied and a detailed educational technology strategy has been suggested by the students to ROTA. This research has been completed, and the work has produced a detailed report submitted to ROTA and QNRF.

Poster Q8

AuthorAysha Siddique (CS 2010)

Faculty advisorsM. Bernardine Dias and Yonina Cooper


Needs Assessment and Technology Design for Education in Rural Cambodia

Aysha [email protected]

Advisors: Dr. M. Bernardine Dias, Dr. Yonina CooperDepartment: Computer Science

Why Cambodia?Cambodia’s past is marked by de-cades of war and political unrest that crushed the country’s infra-structure. Cambodia has restarted from zero and it needs help to catch up with the rest of the world. Reach Out To Asia has marked Cambodia as one of its priority countries and has initiated an edu-cational project in the Kandal Province.

Expansion of a primary and sec-ondary school in Vihear Surok commune, Kandal District of Cambodia.

Goals:- To raise the literacy level- To provide vocational training

ROTA Project

I very much want to go to high school, but I don’t know if I can because we are poor,” says Chenda Prom (15 years). Studying the keyboard, she added, “I want to learn computers for my future.

Education in Cambodia

- Low Literacy Rates- Low Enrollment Rates- High Dropout Rates- Low Teacher Salary- Low Government Funding- Poverty- High Cost of Education- Lack of Resources- No Electricity

Needs Assessment- Interviews with NGO’s in the education sector.- Surveys of community members- Transect walk of commune- Community mapping exercise

Educational TechnologyStudy and ethical practice of facili-tating learning and improving per-

formance by creating, using and managing appropriate technological

resources.

Work Accomplished- Conducted background research on Cambodia- Conducted an official presentation to ROTA- Conducted research on Educational Technology and Needs As-sessment- Prepared a final report to ROTA and QNRF with detailed rec-ommendations for needs assessment and culturally appropriate educational technology and business model for the commune.

Field Visit to Cambodia in October 2006

Who? Students Aysha Siddique and Shakir Hussain, along with faculty advisor Dr. Yonina Cooper, and ROTA staff memer, Mrs. Cherie Clark-Moore When? 19th-25th October, 2008. What? Met with the Ministry of Education representatives, met with NGO’s working in fields of similar in-terest and visited the commune and the school that ROTA is working on.

Recommendations- Integrate technology with a business model giving people an incentive to use technology and for the technology to sustain itself.- Use of Khmer language software in the computer labs- Conversion of computer labs into public computer cafe’s by night- Familiarity of culture and local language is important iin developing stronger relationship- Use of gifts with interviewees should be well thought-out

18

Cross Registration Project

The current Cross Registration System in Education City is a paper based system in which students have to physically move between advisors and registrars offices to get approvals. The current system is time and effort consuming for all users and it is unsecured since papers could be lost.

As a project for 67-373, Team 14 (ourselves) have thought of developing an online cross registration system that will ease the process among all users. We are developing the system to fulfill Carnegie Mellon Qatar needs only, and then adapt it to all Education City universities if it was successful.

The system has many functionalities that meet the needs of the students, Registrar, Advisors, and Assistant Dean. Some of these functionalities include add courses, apply for a course, search for a course, accept/reject application, set advisor, and close/open registration.

Poster Q9

AuthorKhalid Alsooj (IS 2010)

Faculty advisorIan Lacey

CategoryInformation Systems

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20

Evently: A Social Event Recommendation System for University Campuses

Clubs and organizations send out mass invitations everyday to the student body about various campus events. One of the drawbacks of this approach is that it floods students’ inboxes and makes it hard for them to make an informed decision about which event to go to. This paper proposes a social-networking approach to solve this problem of event notification. Instead of sending out invites, student will be able to choose the different clubs and organizations from which they would prefer to get the invites. To add to this there will be also be an event recommendation system that will recommend events to students based on their choices and social influence of their friends.

The recommendation system computes the similarity of students based on their participation in the events that took place in the last thirty days. It uses this similarity value to divide the student body into several interest groups. Once these groups are computed, if there is any event that anybody in the group is attending, then that event is recommended to the group.

Poster Q10

AuthorShariar Haque (CS 2010)Nasreen Zahan (IS 2010)



Evently: A Social Event Recommendation SystemShahriar Haque

[email protected] Science

Nasreen [email protected] Systems

Advisor: Ramamoorthi Ravi

Problem:

On any given day, there are usually a lot of events happening on campus

Clubs and organizations send out mass email invitations to the whole campus for these events.

As a result, a typical student receives, on average, 20 emails per day

Over the course of the day, we eventually forget abut the emails and end up not going to an

interesting event.

Related Work:

Item Based Filtering

One of the well known recommendation systems is that of Amazon. Whenever you make a purchase, the system looks at the purchase history of customers who bought the same item. The items that are similar in nature to the one you bought are then recommended to you. This process is known as item-to-item collaborative filtering.

User-based collaborative filtering computes the similarity of users instead of items. If any user is found to be similar to you, then the items he purchased are recommended to you. The problem with this approach is that it does not scale up with the number of users. In a large domain with millions of users it is not feasible to compare similarity against all users.

User Based Filtering Clustering

Clustering is a well-known technique in the field of image processing. It involves partitioning points lying on a plane into arbitrary number of segments or clusters. Clustering can be done to group together users or items and doing so can significantly redeuce the domain size.

Approach:

Instead of sending out emails if we could recommend events to students based on their past record of participation, then students would not miss the events of their interest.

Students tend to attend events in groups. So, if a friend of your is going to an event, there is a good chance that you will also be interested in it.

Solution:

Students as Vectors Comparing students with Cosine Similarity

Since we represented each student as a vector, we can now compare them as by computing the cosine of the angle between the two vectors. This value will be in the range of 0 to 1. If the student went to the exact same events then their similarity value will be 1. Else they will get a lower value depending on the number of mis-matching events.

We represent each student as a one-dimensional vector. Each component of the vector represents an event. The component is 1 if the student attended the corresponding event, 0 otherwise. In order to use less memory we only consider the events that took place in the last 30 days. The vector of a typical student is usually very sparse.

Grouping students with K-Means Clustering

Since we represented students with an N-dimensonal vector, we can think of the set of all students as points on an N-dimensional plane. Thus we can apply the K-Means Clustering algorithm to partition this plane into K segments. This lets us get away with comparing the student only with students of the same cluster, not the entire university.

22

Global Software Development Experience

Software Development Project is a Junior project course for the Information System students. In this course, student teams are required to design and build a software application following a disciplined software project life cycle. One of the main objectives of this course is to allow students to gain valuable experience in team work, problem solving, software process and project management. This poster tells the story of a first-of-its-kind global team, consisting of two students in Doha and two students in Pittsburgh, and their project, CMUconnect.

Global teams are becoming the standard in the software development realm. This group of students are presenting through this poster their experience of working in a global team - the unique benefits and challenges, and how they overcame it to deliver a successful project. Their project, CMUconnect, has been created with a vision to further encourage collaborative projects such as these within the CMU networks, and bring all of the CMU global campuses closer together. In the long run, CMUconnect also hopes to serve as an alumni-student interaction center.

Poster Q11

AuthorAysha Siddique (CS 2010)Shakir Hussain (CS 2010)

Faculty advisorIan Lacey


Global Software Development ExperienceAysha Siddique, Shakir Hussain

[email protected], [email protected]: Dr. Ian Lacey, Dr. Jeria Quesenbery

Department: Information Systems

Software Development Project

Goals:

- Design and build a real software application- Follow a disciplined software project life cycle- Gain experience in teamwork, problem solv-ing, software process and project management- Learn about team dynamics and process fac-tors such as software project planning, man-agement and execution to a realistic plan

Benefits of a Global Team:

- Extended working time due to different time zones

- Different skill sets due to differ-ent academic backgrounds

- Two advisors resulting in more guidance throughout the project

- Work can be split between the two continents and work can be caught up on faster.

Challenges of a Global Team:

- Difficulties in setting meeting times due to different time zones

- Difficulties in brain-storming in early stages of the project

- Lack of physical inter-action

- Technical difficulties in sharing code / Debug-ging

- Lack of opportunities to hang out and have team jokes.

Global Team Interactions:

- Weekly formal meeting with advi-sors over Video Conference- Weekly brainstorming session within the team over Video Confer-ence- Two or three weekly meetings within the team over Skype- Haris came to Qatar over the Pitts-burgh Spring Break- Aysha and Shakir went to Pittsburgh over the Qatar Spring Break

Conclusion:- Successful project implementation- Real world scenario- Valuable experience working in a global team

Recommendations:- Physical interactions are very important- Team should maintain strong communication throughout the project- Deadlines should be strictly followed- Choose project in line with team structure snd skill set

Haris Krijestorac

Fernando Mestanza

Project Manager, Pittsburgh

User Advocate, PittsburghShakir Hussain

Aysha Siddique

Quality Assurance Manager, Doha

Technical Lead, Doha

Doha team: Pittsburgh team:

Project: CMUconnectVision: To encourage collaborative projects within the CMU network and bring together

the global campuses. The vision of CMUconnect complemented the global nature of the team. Salient Features: Projects, connections, opportunity feeds, favorites.

24

Green Miles

The GreenMiles project was conceived of as an innovation assignment with the goal of bringing together environmental awareness and information systems in a new way. The focus of GreenMiles was to encourage children and young adults to recycle by offering prizes or credits for those who participated. GreenMiles is government funded and would work closely with the Department of Education in order to better integrate with the public school system.

Participation in GreenMiles would be as simple as turning in used paper to a machine and using a GreenCard to identify the donor. Points accumulated through this activity depend on the amount of paper turned in. Sign-up for the program would involve mall kiosks at first and would later evolve to include the involvement of GreenLeaders, which are students assigned to help their school organize events and registrations there. We hope this will encourage more school children to engage actively in the shaping of their environment and teach them valuable lessons in consumption and cleanliness.Materials collected through the donation process are collected by truck once a week, with modifications to the schedule taking place if there is an especially high amount of paper turned in. The machines receiving the paper will be distributed in schools and malls, so accessibility to children and some adults is provided.

Prizes and organization are all to be handled electronically through the greenmiles.com website. The website will be a portal to all the activities related to the program as well as provide a forum and user pages for GreenMiles participants to better communicate and get involved. Eventually, GreenMiles would extend to other parts of the world if the local government desires to support this program. Furthermore, the project will eventually encompass other areas of recycling such as glass and plastic, with the same points/reward system previously mentioned.

Poster Q12

AuthorRashid Alkaabi (IS 2012)Dania Abed Rabbou (IS 2012)Yazan Abu-Hijleh ( IS 2012)

Faculty advisorSelma Limam Mansar


26

Camping Culture

Sealine is Qatar’s most popular camping destination and a trip out during the weekend will reveal a vibrant and active region of the coastline. Several thousand people drive between Doha and Messaieed to enjoy recreational activities such as dune-bashing, which is perhaps the most popular regional pastime. With such a high volume of patrons, Sealine is starting to show significant wear- suffering from campsite littering and the pollution of hundreds of cars traversing the dunes. SCENR, Qatar’s Environmental Ministry, has periodic trash clean-up days, but these are isolated efforts and do little to treat the issue.

While it may seem counter intuitive that building more in an area might help pollute less, I propose that a strategic entry gate to the Sealine area might help address the situation. The entry gate is an opportunity to bundle several services which Sealine and its patrons are in desperate need of. Some of these services include a cell-phone check in point for emergency contact information, a kiosk for the dissemination of educational material regarding SCENRs regional efforts as well as a drop off point for trash when exiting the gate.

By bundling some of these services with businesses, these non-profit endeavors become more viable and the partnership could be viewed as mutually beneficial. Additional services help make the businesses more attractive and socially-minded organizations help make businesses more accountable. This partnership helps provide better services to the visitor and Sealine simultaneously.

Poster Q13

AuthorKristina Ricco (Architecture 2009)

Faculty advisorRosemary Lapka

CategoryLiberal Arts and Sciences

Camping Culture

DOHA

DOHA

Kristina RiccoDesign for People and Planet Professor Rosemary LapkaLAS program

As a country whose cultural heritage is strongly associated with the nomadic bedouin, today Qatar has a vibrant camping culture that lives on just outside the boundaries of Doha proper. Although camping today is very different from it’s survivalist past some elements persist, including the Majlis tent which is set up every October. �e season is 6 months long (ending in March) and weekend excursions are centered largely around the practice of “dune bashing” where 4-wheel drive vehicles off-road over sand dunes. Modern tents rely on generators to

While adding new construction to an area might seem counterintuitive as a strategy for perserving the environment, the current model Sealine operates within is incredibly damaging to the surrounding region. �ere is heavy traffic along Messaieed Road because patrons do not have local access to needed resources. By adding some of these to the Sealine area, traffic will be reduced greatly. �e informal nature of the services that are currently there lack accountability. Small vendors set up shop anywhere along the road, and often leave trash and litter behind. �ere is no area for trash collection and so the dunes which were once pristine, are increasingly polluted. �ere is no recognizable wayfinding method where Messaieed Road ends and the patron will find themselves literally in the middle of nowhere. Sealine is host to several thousand patrons weekly and has incredible opprotunities to capitalize on its draw as a leisure destination.

provide energy for a large electrical load created by air conditioners, lighting, even flat screen televisions. 500 L water tanks are erected for handwashing and cooking. �ese ammenities are localized to each tent and often a camp will include several tents.

How can creating infrastructure for utilities help manage patterns of use?

Offer localized, bundled ammenities to reduce traffic between locations. Pair non-profit services with businesses to increase partnership and accountability.Create a centralized entry point as a means to funnel users past new services and ammenities.

DOHA

AL WAKRA

MESSAIEEDINDUSTRIAL CITY

SEALINE

UMM SAID

Q-TEL OASIS

Mes

saiee

d Rd

PROPOSED SERVICES

SERVICE STRATEGY

CURRENT ISSUES

current state

goal state

Sealine Resort

to hospital

proposed entry

Emergency Contact Service

A check in service at the gate or at the hospital would provide an opportunity for patrons to leave emergency contact information. This could be an automated SMS service that alerts the hospital to who is present should there be an accident.

Q-tel + hospitalWater/Petrol Delivery/Rental ServiceTrash pick-upA water/petrol delivery service reduces the number of times people drive between Doha and Sealine to pick-up, refill, drop-off and store their water tanks and generators. SCENR could offer a trash pick-up service bundled with water and petrol delivery which would also reduce camp site littering.

SCENR + petrolWelcome Center

Augmenting the existing tire refill station, a welcome center could be added which might include public restroons, a map kiosk and even a small place to eat. This could help attract visitors who otherwise might not visit the area and would offer a place to disburse useful information. Additional services for the car, including a car wash and a mechanic would round out the ammenity.

Marhaba + mechanic

28

Domestic Workers in Qatar

Qatar is the second biggest importer of workers in terms of the proportion of migrant workers compared to the indigenous population. In the past nine years, there have been increased incidents of domestic workers breaking their contracts with their sponsors without any prior notice. The research is to find the reasons of this problem and suggest an appropriate solution.

After conducting the research, the main reasons for breaking a contract are: to escape abuse, pursue a better job opportunity or simply because there are no legal consequences. The proposed solution resolves both the worker’s and sponsor’s problems at the same time. Workers will have a better job opportunity and have their rights protected, while sponsors save money and time to train their workers.

Poster Q14

AuthorSalwa Al-Mannai (IS 2012)



12

3

4

5Client Worker

Reasons why sponsors lose• Pay fees for importing office• Pay for Airline tickets • Pay for driving lessons• Spend time training the worker

Problem

Reasons:

Outcome

Hired by

OverviewThe agency links the client and the worker

Contacts

Solution

Sources: * ProQuest Database** Employee in Ministry of Interior *** Survey conducted on 30 citizens

Write contractsProvide trainingHandle disputes

Before After

Workers rights not protected Workers rights fully protected

Sponsors lose money and time

Reduce crime rate in QatarHigher crime rate in 10 years

Client get trained workers

The Situation

Human Trafficking occurred Reduce human trafficking

Qatar is the second biggest importer of workers in terms of the proportion of migrant workers compared to the indigenouspopulation. *

In the last few years, the sponsors started to complain about their workers who break their contract and disappear. Around 120,000 cases were reported in the last 7 years. **This domestic issue could lead to other problems, such as: 1- Human trafficking: because workers look for better job opportunity, they might become a victim of human trafficking. 2- 2- Illegal organizations: forming organizations that stealor use human trafficking to make profit.

Domestic Workers In QatarReasons for breaking contracts without prior notice

Reasons why domestic workers break their contracts***

Apply for a jobGet trained

Receive salary

Submit a requestGet trained workers

Pay salary

30

Emerging Communities: The Case of Hispanics in Qatar

This study examines the profile and the characteristics of the Spanish-speaking community in Qatar through a survey and interviews. A household survey of 122 questions was administered online and completed by 72 respondents belonging to the approximately 1,500-2,000 members of the Hispanic community in Qatar.

The survey included questions about the respondents’ personal and professional backgrounds, life prior to Qatar, living and working conditions in Qatar, connection to the home country’s culture, and attitudes toward life in Qatar. In addition, eleven case studies were conducted to obtain a more thorough and detailed understanding of the life histories and living and working conditions of selected survey respondents. The findings indicate that the Spanish speakers in Qatar, mostly married couples with children, are a highly educated community that came to Qatar in search of better economic opportunities.

In Qatar, the respondents live a typical professional expatriate life with high salaries and an array of benefits in a secure and safe environment. Despite the physical distance from their home countries and their immersion in an Arabic and English speaking environment, the participants place great importance in maintaining their culture, identity, and language. In general, the participants are satisfied with their employment and lives in Qatar and plan to stay in Qatar indefinitely, which may have significant implications for brain drain in their home countries. Recommendations are discussed for the improvement of certain areas of expatriate life in Qatar.

Poster Q15

AuthorMaha Mahmoud (BA 2009)Dana Hadan (BA 2009)

Faculty advisorsSilvia Pessoa and Erik Helin


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32

Fishermen

My research about fishermen was generally because I wanted to find a solution for their unstable salary, but when I conducted my research, I found out that the unstable salary is only one of several problems that these poor fishermen have.

So what I basically did, was interviewing and surveying fishermen in the main fishing docks in Al-Wakra, Al-Khour and the Corneiche. From the interviews I got to know even more than the information that I wanted. I was surprised when the financial need was also accompanied by educational, cultural and social needs. I identified the main problems that can be fixed, and proposed a solution for each of them. The best thing about my solutions is that all of them can be done in one place, The Fishermen Community Center.

The unstable salary to these fishermen caused a serious financial “crisis” to them. It was because the salary depended on the catch, and the system of distributing the salaries was sometimes unfair, because one third of the whole catch goes to these fishermen and the other two thirds are for the owner and the boat expenses. So I’m suggesting that the The Fishermen Community Center takes all the salaries from the owners and average them and distributes them equally tp the fishermen. Also the center could act like a place to gather fishermen of the same nationality and interests and celebrate national holidays or traditional celebrations.

Poster Q16

AuthorNaif Al Sowaidi (BA 2012)



34

Heylow

The problem in hand is that labor workers earn low salaries and Qtel being a monopoly in Qatar for a long time can charge at whatever rates it wants. Vodafone is being introduced to Qatar and will officially begin operating in July. Now that Qtel faces competition for customers, it will fight harder for its’ clients.

My audience is the Indian labor workers. Their living conditions are poor and their salaries range from 550QR to 4000QR. They send 75% of their salaries to their families back home and live on around 500QR per month. From the 500QR they spend between 50QR to 300QR on communication.In my opinion there are two possible solutions for this problem:

1.The business that the labor workers belong to sets up a special lounge just for them to spend their free time in and in that lounge have 10 phones with the VOIP service. The business can charge the labor workers (with a license from ICTDQatar) to use it at a low rate.

2.A newer version of the Hala Card: ‘Heylow’ which permanently establishes the Qtel promotion that states that rates are 65% cheaper between 7pm and 7am Saturday through Thursday and around the clock on Fridays. Also, text messaging between ‘Heylow’ sim card users will follow the same system that the BlackBerry messenger system follows.

I chose to go with my 2nd solution because it makes more sense and why would the company pay to set up a lounge with the VOIP service.

Poster Q17

AuthorSarah Allouba (BA 2012)



HeylowSarah Allouba

[email protected] Advisor: Rosemary Lapka

LAS

Problem Overview

Research

Definitions

The problem is that labor workers receive a low salary and Qtel charges 3.19QR per minute to call India.This price is high relative to what labor workersmake per month and therefore they find contacting theirfamilies back home expensive. As we cannot raise thelabor workers’ salaries because their contractors decidedon how much they are paid, we may take a differentapproach and try to come up with a cheaper means of communication for them.

We need:•Fewer costs involved in talking for longer hours•A stable system that offers cheaper communication

• Interviews with 19 labor workers• Their salaries range from 550QR to 4000QR• 47% of them pay for their own food

• VOIP - Voice Over Internet Protocol - and how it works• Can be used via computers or special IP telephones• Works using wireless

• BlackBerry Messenger service and how it operates• It has been newly adopted in Qatar.• Free texting between BlackBerry service users

• Background information on qtel and the promotions it offers Qtel in the past has been a monopolistic organization.Now since Vodafone is being introduced to Doha, Qtelhas been offering more and more promotions for itsusers. Unfortunately these promotions are onlytemporarily offered.

• Promotion that call rates to India will be reduced by 65% between 7pm and 7am Saturday through Thursday and round theclock on Fridays

• Call rates to India are currently 3.19QR per minute

•Qtel: (short for Qatar Telecom) is the exclusivetelecommunications provider in Qatar and is one of the largestpublic companies in Qatar•BlackBerry: A smartphone that comes with a special service –that can be activated by the user - called the BlackBerry service•Smartphone: A mobile telephone with extended features as a personal digital assistant, Internet browser, etc.•IP phones: can connect to a wireless network and make calls•‘Heylow’ will be an improved version of the Hala card where it permanently establishes the Qtel promotion that states that ratesare 65% cheaper between 7pm and 7am Saturday through Thursday and around the clock on Fridays. Also, text messagingbetween ‘Heylow’ sim card users will follow the same system that the BlackBerry messenger system follows

Qtel PromotionHeylow Service

heyl

ow

Possible solutions

OR

SOLUTION!

Heylow

Permanently establishing Qtelpromotions

Results

New version of Hala Heylow

VOIP

The company that the labors work for offers a lounge with 10 IP phones where the workers can go to in their free time, pay a lower rate and call their families.

Heylow

Before

After

36

Politics of Identity in Multicultural Settings: A Literary Analysis of Leila Aboulela’s Novels – The Translator and Minaret

In both Novels, Aboulela portrays a Sudanese heroine living in a foreign land, London in Minaret and Aberdeen in The Translator. The heroines of both novels hold to religion in Multicultural settings. The heroines are displayed in the land that they migrated to. They feel like strangers in an unfamiliar setting where both of them long for their native land, Sudan. As a result they both try to take advantage of the Multicultural setting in Aberdeen and London. They go to the mosque and gather with minorities like them to create a sense of home.

Thus, Aboulela points out the positive aspects about Multiculturalism such as the existence of mosque and Halal meat stores and as well as the dark sides of Multiculturalism such as hinting at hidden racism and the struggle to belong to the majority culture. In both Novels, Aboulela describes the journey of female protagonists that gain their strength from their spiritual devotion. Aboulela delivers a clear message to the Western reader which is that Islam enlightens the life of Muslims. Aboulela addresses issues related to feminism where both characters seek to find comfort in unfamiliar setting and have to give up their dependency to men to go on in life.

Poster Q18

AuthorSara Al-Asmakh ( BA 2009)

Faculty advisorAmal Al-Malki


Politics of Identity in Multicultural Settings: a Literary

Analysis of Leila Aboulela'snovels, The Translator and

MinaretSara Al-Asmakh

[email protected] Amal Al-Malki

The Author

Abuolela's first novel The Translator(1999) was nominated for the Orange Prize in 2002 and her second novel Minaret (2005) won the Best Novel nominee for the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction in 2006.

Main Themes

Both Heroines are hybrids who belong to different cultures but can’t identify themselves with any. They experience a sense of displacement in the foreign land which make them look for comfort and solace in the mosque.

Post-Colonial Sudanese culture:

•Admiration of the west in Post Colonial Culture•Creation of a Western Elite and Sub Culture•Conflicting political and soci-cultural ideologies

Multicultural British and Scottish societies:

•Fragmented Multicultural Culture of the West•Creating of Islamic sub-communities and Islamic identity•Islamic Feminism

38

Q-VOIP: An Innovative Approach to Laborer Communication Needs

Qatar, as a rapidly developing country attracts a large number of immigrant laborers every year. These people face the problem of timely communication with their families (back in the home country) due to exorbitantly high international calling rates. Our project: “Q-VoIP Solutions” focuses on using the VoIP technology to aid the immigrant laborers stay in touch with their families, taking into consideration their general lack of computer literacy.

The aim of the project is to make the use of VoIP handy, and as easy as possible, especially for those with no previous computer skills. The project provides two different solutions. The first solution is: VoIP-Go, which requires a mobile phone, a valid VoIP-Go account and takes 4-easy steps to connect. The second solution is: e-LandPhone that is mainly targeted for Internet cafés in Qatar; it requires a valid Q-VoIP account, a BroadBand internet connection and a landline phone. This solution after the initial setup requires one easy step to get connected and reach the targeted contact.

As “Voice Over Internal Protocol” or VoIP is one of the most economical ways to communicate with people over the phone, we believe that providing cheap and easy access to this technology will significantly improve the general condition of labor-class by providing them the ability to be in touch with their families at a much lower opportunity cost.

Poster Q19

AuthorRashid Alkaabi (IS 2012)



40

The State of Migrant Workers in Qatar: The Worker’s Perspective

Aiming to contribute to the limited literature on migrant labor in Qatar, this project investigated the current situation of low-skilled migrant workers in Qatar through an extensive survey. The survey documented the workers’ personal information, life before Qatar, and working and living conditions in Qatar. A convenience sample of 169 migrant workers who make less than 2,000 Qatari Riyals a month were surveyed in their work place and in public spaces in Qatar.

Although the results are in line with the current literature, the reported living and working conditions were better than expected. Despite the low salaries and long working hours reported, there were no major reports of abuse or exploitation. More specifically, the findings show that the respondents, mostly men from Southeast Asian countries such as India and the Philippines, came to Qatar for economic reasons in order to sustain their families in their home countries through the remittances they send. In order to secure employment in Qatar, 32% of the workers incurred debts of approximately $500 to recruiting agencies.

In Qatar, the respondents worked an average of 11 hours daily earning an average of $300 with many working under no contract and surrendering their passport to their employers. Despite these working conditions and the discrimination faced in Qatar, the respondents were resigned and showed interest in staying in Qatar longer. Recommendations for policy implementation to protect the rights of migrant workers in Qatar are discussed.

Poster Q20

AuthorHanoof Al-Thani (BA 2010)Samiha Kamel (BA 2009)

Faculty advisorsSilvia Pessoa and Marjorie Carlson


42

The Use of Silence in Japan

The video focuses on the use of silence in classrooms and in business meetings. Silence is an important part of the language in Japan. Japan is a collectivistic society where people do not just represent themselves but also their family and cultural group. Japan is also a society with high power distance. “Power” refers to the vertical disparity between the participants in hierarchical structure. In the Japanese classroom, silence is used for a polite acknowledgement of failure or inability. Silence signals to the teacher to move on.

Seltman (1991) classified silence in Japanese classrooms into four categories: surprised silence, silence as an expression of agreement and disagreement, silence as an expression of defiance and silence as an expression of femininity. There can be several reasons for the silence in business meetings. If a suggestion has been made by the foreign CEO, the Japan side may sit quietly pondering over it and the foreign CEO should wait, not breaking the silence even if it goes for several minutes.

A second possible reason for the delay is that everyone is waiting for their leader to say something. It is great thing to understand how people in other societies think but we should always remember using the right method of communication depends on the context. Understanding the reasons behind specific behaviors goes back to the kind of society that the individual belongs to whether it is individualistic or collectivistic.

Poster Q21

AuthorSara Al-Asmakh (BA 2009)

Faculty advisorAndreas Karatsolis


The Use of Silence in JapanSara Al-Asmakh

[email protected] Professor Andreas Karatsolis

In order to explore the topic of silence in Japan for educational and business contexts, a seven-minute video was developed to present the main concepts in an educational and engaging format.

Individualistic VS Collectivistic Society

In Collectivistic Societies people do not justrepresent themselves but also their familyand cultural group while in Individualistic Societies people represent themselves and are independent.

classrooms in four categories:

Surprised silence

Silence as an expression of agreement and dis-Agreement

Silence as an expression of defiance

Silence as an expression of femininity

In Business, there can be Several Reasons For Silence:

If a suggestion has been made by the foreign CEO, the Japanese side may sit quietly pondering over it and the foreign CEO should wait, not breaking the silence.

Everyone is waiting for their leader to say something and in hierarchical Japan they feel constrained to keep quite until he breaks the silence.

ReferencesLandauer, Jeff, and Joseph Rowlands. "Collectivism." Importance of Philosophy. 2001. 24 Feb. 2009, Scollon textbook and Seltman

44

Translating Safety and Security Messages

This poster presents the project that five students worked on for “Bridging Civilization: Translating Arabic to English and vice versa” course. This project is a collaborative project between Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar represented by the Bridging Civilization class and Qatar Foundation represented by HSSE department, aiming to benefit the Education City community, by reaching out to the whole community that compromises both English and Arabic speakers.

The project was to translate HSSE weekly messages from English to Arabic. These messages included various topics covering health, safety, security, and environment, and were originally written in English and by translating these messages the target readers have doubled and included as well as benefited Arabic speakers in The Education City.

Poster Q22

AuthorButhayna Al-Madhadi (BA 2010)Saad Al-Matwi (BA 2010)Noor Al-Jassim (BA 2009)Sara Al-Asmakh (BA 2009)Mariam Al-Sayed (CS 2009)

Faculty advisorAmal Al-Malki


46

A Higher Order Language to Deploy and Secure Web-Services

The concept of web-service carries the promise of distributed computing from the niche markets of scientific computing to the wider Business to Business (B2B) audience. Using web-services, different organizations can collaborate on common processes by communicating using a standard language. Web-services are governed by many XML-based standards that are built upon each other. Several are dedicated to security. These security standards cover different aspects of security such as authentication, secure channels, trust management and information flow. However, providing assurance gets more complex when security administration is decentralized.

So, deploying safe and secure web-services is a complex task. This project aims at designing a high level programming language to easily deploy and secure a web-service using existing standards. This high level language will hide the complexity of the underlying architecture of the web service and provide security assurance at a low level.

In the current stage of the project, the low level architecture has been developed. The server and the client have been developed in PHP using the wso2 framework. Web-service messages can be exchanged securely using encryption, digital signatures, time stamp according a given security policy.

Poster Q23

AuthorRashi Dhing (Research Scholar)

Faculty advisorsThierry Sans and Iliano Cervesato


48

The Deductive Spreadsheet

The spreadsheet is one of the most widely used computing applications of all times. Millions of users with no formal training in CS use it every day for calculations simple and complex. However, the majority of the decisions we make depend on information that is not only numerical and require logical reasoning, but the traditional spreadsheet does not provide any support for such tasks.

The deductive spreadsheet overcomes this very limitation by providing deductive capabilities to the traditional spreadsheet that support logical reasoning while maintaining its usability. The deductive spreadsheet allows users to define logical statements and inference rules for symbolic reasoning in the same way that Excel allows them to define mathematical formulas for numerical calculations. A prototype is currently being developed as an Excel add-in.

Poster Q24

AuthorRashi Dhing (Research Scholar)

Faculty advisorIliano Cervesato


The problem Spreadsheets provide excellent support for

numerical decisions BUT many decisions are also based on non

numerical dataE.g. Course eligibility, Travel schedule,

Diagnosis of diseases, Fashionable color co-ordination etc.

Hence a need arises to include support for symbolic decision making

Future work Enhancements to User Interface Assess usability based on HCI

=indirect(From,To)

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indirect(“JFK”,“LAX”)

Explanation

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indirect(“SFO”,“LAX”)

directFlight(“JFK”,“SFO”)

directFlight(“SFO”,“LAX”)



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Query: indirect(“JFK”, To)

Save query as relation



Explanation

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directFlight(“JFK”,“SFO”)




indirect(“JFK”,“LAX”)IF directFlight(“JFK”, “SFO”)AND indirect(“SFO”,”LAX”).

Query: indirect(“JFK”, To)indirect(“JFK”, To)

Save query as relation


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Foundations Cognitive psychology (GUI extension) Logic programming and databases (Inference engine)

Extends spreadsheet formulae with logical statements

Integrates seamlessly with thetraditional spreadsheet

Maintains usability of thetraditional spreadsheet

Considerably extends the problem space of the traditional spreadsheet

Features Deductive expression within traditional

formulae and vice versa Support for recursion and negation Guaranteed termination

Efficient evaluation andupdate propagation Explanation Extended GUI

Spreadsheets are popular because of …

User friendly interface Usefulness of calculations

No need for formal CS training

Status Prototype under development

as an Excel add-in Inference engine 80% done User interface 10% done

The solution

The Deductive Spreadsheet !The solution

The Deductive Spreadsheet !

Sponsors

P.O.Box 24866 | Doha, Qatar | Ph: +974 454 8400 | Fax: +974 454 8410 | www.qatar.cmu.edu