Creació d'una aplicació web per a un videoclub

El present projecte final de carrera vol assolir un entorn web per a administrar un videoclub i que els usuaris puguin fer reserves on-line. Així dons l'aplicació es pot dividir en dos mòduls, un d'administració i un altre de gestió de reserves. La implementació s'ha fet sobre l'arquitectura J2EE, la qual proporciona totes les eines per fer una aplicació robusta i escalable.

BD:XML natives per a documents MPEG-7

Aquest projecte avalua diferents BD:XML natives per a desar i recuperar documents XML basats en l'estàndard MPEG-7. Es tracta d'un estàndard que proposa un llenguatge per descriure el contingut (metadades) de documents multimèdia, és a dir, àudio i vídeo. El seu format de representació és XML i es basa en un esquema ja predefinit (XMLSchema d'MPEG-7).

Construcció d'una eina per manipular especificacions UML.

La finalitat d'aquest projecte, consisteix en estudiar detalladament el funcionament del llenguatge d'intercanvi XMI (de l'anglès XML Metadata Interchange), cosí del XML, que transporta al seu codi especificacions del llenguatge UML, de manera que ens permet compartir i enviar aquest UML entre diferents plataformes i eines de manipulació d'aquest llenguatge.

Generación de metadatos semánticos mediante juegos on-line

Actualmente se pretende que los ordenadores puedan entender la semántica de la información que hay en la Web y que sea posible integrar diversas fuentes de información independientemente de la procedencia y formato de éstas, haciendo así una Web Semántica. Uno de los mayores problemas que tiene la Web Semántica es la falta de contenidos semánticos, principalmente debido a la falta de métodos de anotación automáticos existentes. Una forma de resolver este problema se basa en esconder tras aplicaciones que la gente usa diariamente, como los juegos on-line, estos procesos de generación de metadatos semánticos. El objetivo de este proyecto es estudiar diferentes iniciativas que tratan de enmascarar la generación de metadatos semánticos a través de los juegos on-line y el desarrollo de un prototipo de casual game para anotar semánticamente recursos. Se trata de un juego sencillo de pregunta-respuesta, donde dos usuarios concurrentes contestan a preguntas preestablecidas y definidas dentro de una ontología de dominio, obteniendo puntos en aquellas preguntas donde hayan dado la misma respuesta.

What should a virtual University Library environment look like?

Over the past year, the Open University of Catalonia library has been designing its new website with this question in mind. Our main concern has been how to integrate the library in the student day to day study routine to not to be only a satellite tool. We present the design of the website that, in a virtual library like ours, it is not only a website but the whole library itself. The central point of the web is my library, a space that associates the library resources with the student's curriculum and their course subjects. There the students can save the resources as favourites, comment or share them. They have also access to all the services the library offers them. The resources are imported from multiple tools such as Millennium, SFX, Metalib and Dspace to the Drupal CMS. Then the resources' metadata can be enriched with other contextual information from other sources, for example the course subjects. And finally they can be exported in standard, open data formats making them available for linked data applications.

A two-stage approach for tonic identification in indian art music

In this paper we propose a new approach for tonic identification in Indian art music and present a proposal for acomplete iterative system for the same. Our method splits the task of tonic pitch identification into two stages. In the first stage, which is applicable to both vocal and instrumental music, we perform a multi-pitch analysis of the audio signal to identify the tonic pitch-class. Multi-pitch analysisallows us to take advantage of the drone sound, which constantlyreinforces the tonic. In the second stage we estimate the octave in which the tonic of the singer lies and is thusneeded only for the vocal performances. We analyse the predominant melody sung by the lead performer in order to establish the tonic octave. Both stages are individually evaluated on a sizable music collection and are shown toobtain a good accuracy. We also discuss the types of errors made by the method.Further, we present a proposal for a system that aims to incrementally utilize all the available data, both audio and metadata in order to identify the tonic pitch. It produces a tonic estimate and a confidence value, and is iterative in nature. At each iteration, more data is fed into the systemuntil the confidence value for the identified tonic is above a defined threshold. Rather than obtain high overall accuracy for our complete database, ultimately our goal is to develop a system which obtains very high accuracy on a subset of the database with maximum confidence.

Analysis of the folksonomy of freesound

User generated content shared in online communities is often described using collaborative tagging systems where users assign labels to content resources. As a result, a folksonomy emerges that relates a number of tags with the resources they label and the users that have used them. In this paper we analyze the folksonomy of Freesound, an online audio clip sharing site which contains more than two million users and 150,000 user-contributed sound samplescovering a wide variety of sounds. By following methodologies taken from similar studies, we compute some metrics that characterize the folksonomy both at the globallevel and at the tag level. In this manner, we are able to betterunderstand the behavior of the folksonomy as a whole, and also obtain some indicators that can be used as metadata for describing tags themselves. We expect that such a methodology for characterizing folksonomies can be useful to support processes such as tag recommendation or automatic annotation of online resources.

Estándares para e-learning adaptativo y accesible

Currently there are many standards that deal with accessibility issues regarding users’ models, learning scenarios, interaction preferences, devices capabilities, metadata for specifying the delivery of any resource to meet users’ needs, and software accessibility and usability. It is difficult to understand the existing relationships between these standards, as each one represents a different viewpoint and thus has its own sets of goals and scope. This paper gives an overview on existing standards addressing accessibility, usability and adaptation issues in e-learning, and discusses their application to cope with the objectives of the A2UN@ project, which focuses on attending the accessibility and adaptation needs for ALL in Higher Education

The situation of open access institutional repositories in Spain: 2009 report

Introduction. The DRIVER I project drew up a detailed report of European repositories based on data gathered in a survey in which Spain's participation was very low. This created a highly distorted image of the implementation of repositories in Spain. This study aims to analyse the current state of Spanish open-access institutional repositories and to describe their characteristics. Method. The data were gathered through a Web survey. The questionnaire was based on that used by DRIVER I: coverage; technical infrastructure and technical issues; institutional policies; services created; and stimulators and inhibitors for establishing, filling and maintaining their digital institutional repositories. Analysis. Data were tabulated and analysed systematically according responses obtained from the questionnaire and grouped by coverage. Results. Responses were obtained from 38 of the 104 institutions contacted, which had 29 institutional repositories. This represents 78.3% of the Spanish repositories according to the BuscaRepositorios directory. Spanish repositories contained mainly full-text materials (journal articles and doctoral theses) together with metadata. The software most used was DSpace, followed by EPrints. The metadata standard most used was Dublin Core. Spanish repositories offered more usage statistics and fewer author-oriented services than the European average. The priorities for the future development of the repositories are the need for clear policies on access to scientific production based on public funding and the need for quality control indicators. Conclusions.This is the first detailed study of Spanish institutional repositories. The key stimulants for establishing, filling and maintaining were, in order of importance, the increase of visibility and citation, the interest of decision-makers, simplicity of use and search services. On the other hand the main inhibitors identified were the absence of policies, the lack of integration with other national and international systems and the lack of awareness efforts among academia.

IEEE LOM is not an option. Lessons to learn

Although some projects and most LMS still rely on IEEE LOM, this standard is not yet an option. We suggest some lessons to learn.

SICA2 : la experiencia de integración CRIS/RI en el ámbito regional de Andalucía

El proyecto SICA2, presentado por Beatriz Barros y Miguel Ángel Aguirre, de la Consejería de Economía, Innovación y Ciencia de la Junta de Andalucía, supone una innovadora extensión del concepto de CRIS universitario a un ámbito regional para el conjunto de las universidades andaluzas. El sistema de recogida y validación de la información científica en tiempo real se basa en una primera fase SICA que organiza la investigación en unidades mínimas o 'Grupos PAIDI' y que ya implementó el estándar CVN para las nueve universidades andaluzas que forman parte del proyecto. Esta segunda fase de integración tiene además prevista su prolongación en el repositorio institucional Reposit-AN de ámbito igualmente regional que se alimentará de los metadatos procedentes del sistema CRIS de la Junta de Andalucía y se presentará oficialmente a final de año.

Experiencias de interoperabilidad entre CRIS y repositorios en Catalunya

Toni Prieto, Técnico IC del Servicio de Bibliotecas y Documentación (SBD) de la UPC, en su presentación 'Experiencias de interoperabilidad entre CRIS y repositorios en Catalunya', describió la integración del repositorio UPCommons y del CRIS DRAC (Descriptor de la Recerca i l'Activitat Acadèmica) de la UPC. El resultado de esta integración es un esquema integrado de archivo CRIS/IR en dos fases, envío y revisión, en el que los metadatos se introducen en DRAC -para posteriormente ser transferidos, validados y enriquecidos si procede- y el archivo de texto completo asociado se realiza en UPCommons. De manera similar funciona la integración de GIR (Gestió Integral de la Recerca, basado en Universitas XXI Investigación) y el repositorio O2 en la UOC, permitiendo la asignación del identificador handle de un ítem en O2 a una referencia en GIR. Ambos sistemas, DRAC en la UPC y GIR en la UOC, están integrados en el Proyecto CVN de generación de CVs normalizados. Se mencionaron asimismo experiencias posteriores de integración CRIS/IR actualmente en curso en la Universitat de Barcelona y en la U Pompeu Fabra, y se mostró el impacto significativo de la estrategia de integración de sistemas sobre el ritmo de incorporación de contenidos a UPCommons.

Extending Learning Objects by Means of Social Networking

Learning objects have been the promise of providing people with high quality learning resources. Initiatives such as MIT Open-CourseWare, MERLOT and others have shown the real possibilities of creating and sharing knowledge through Internet. Thousands of educational resources are available through learning object repositories. We indeed live in an age of content abundance, and content can be considered as infrastructure for building adaptive and personalized learning paths, promoting both formal and informal learning. Nevertheless, although most educational institutions are adopting a more open approach, publishing huge amounts of educational resources, the reality is that these resources are barely used in other educational contexts. This paradox can be partly explained by the dificulties in adapting such resources with respect to language, e-learning standards and specifications and, finally, granularity. Furthermore, if we want our learners to use and take advantage of learning object repositories, we need to provide them with additional services than just browsing and searching for resources. Social networks can be a first step towards creating an open social community of learning around a topic or a subject. In this paper we discuss and analyze the process of using a learning object repository and building a social network on the top of it, with respect to the information architecture needed to capture and store the interaction between learners and resources in form of learning object metadata.

L'avaluació, tria i eliminació de fons fotogràfics digitals. Estudi de cas del fons del fotògraf Efren Montoya a l'Arxiu Històric de Sabadell

Durant la última dècada hem viscut l’explosió de la fotografia digital. Les possibilitats de captar imatges s’ha multiplicat de manera gairebé infinita sense implicar costos afegits pel fotògraf. Això ens obliga a replantejar-nos la necessitat d’establir uns criteris ben definits per avaluar, triar i eliminar les fotografies que ingressen als nostres arxius. El treball que es presenta aquí té com a objectiu establir uns protocols per tal de poder aplicar aquests procediments al nous fons que passin a formar part del nostre patrimoni documental. Finalment, s’ha dut a terme l’experiència d’entregar al productor d’un fons part de la seva documentació per tal que ell l’avalués i després comparar els resultats amb l’avaluació duta a terme des de l’arxiu. Paraules clau: avaluació, tria, eliminació, fotografia born-digital, ingrés, metadades, arxiu digital, formats de preservació

Towards personalization in digital libraries through ontologies

In this paper we describe a browsing and searching personalization system for digitallibraries based on the use of ontologies for describing the relationships between all theelements which take part in a digital library scenario of use. The main goal of thisproject is to help the users of a digital library to improve their experience of use bymeans of two complementary strategies: first, by maintaining a complete history recordof his or her browsing and searching activities, which is part of a navigational userprofile which includes preferences and all the aspects related to community involvement; and second, by reusing all the knowledge which has been extracted from previous usage from other users with similar profiles. This can be accomplished in terms of narrowing and focusing the search results and browsing options through the use of a recommendation system which organizes such results in the most appropriatemanner, using ontologies and concepts drawn from the semantic web field. The complete integration of the experience of use of a digital library in the learning process is also pursued. Both the usage and information organization can be also exploited to extract useful knowledge from the way users interact with a digital library, knowledge that can be used to improve several design aspects of the library, ranging from internal organization aspects to human factors and user interfaces. Although this project is still on an early development stage, it is possible to identify all the desired functionalities and requirements that are necessary to fully integrate the use of a digital library in an e-learning environment.