Using the Common Cartridge profile to enhance learning content interoperability

The concept of Learning Object (LO) is crucial for the standardization on eLearning. The latest LO standard from IMS Global Learning Consortium is the IMS Common Cartridge (IMS CC) that organizes and distributes digital learning content. By analyzing this new specification we considered two interoperability levels: content and communication. A common content format is the backbone of interoperability and is the basis for content exchange among eLearning systems. Communication is more than just exchanging content; it includes also accessing to specialized systems and services and reporting on content usage. This is particularly important when LOs are used for evaluation. In this paper we analyze the Common Cartridge profile based on the two interoperability levels we proposed. We detail its data model that comprises a set of derived schemata referenced on the CC schema and we explore the use of the IMS Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) to allow remote tools and content to be integrated into a Learning Management System (LMS). In order to test the applicability of IMS CC for automatic evaluation we define a representation of programming exercises using this standard. This representation is intended to be the cornerstone of a network of eLearning systems where students can solve computer programming exercises and obtain feedback automatically. The CC learning object is automatically generated based on a XML dialect called PExIL that aims to consolidate all the data need to describe resources within the programming exercise life-cycle. Finally, we test the generated cartridge on the IMS CC online validator to verify its conformance with the IMS CC specification.

JSON on Mobile: is there an efficient parser?

The two largest causes for battery consumption on mobile devices are related with the display and network operations. Since most application need to share data and communicate with remote servers, communications should be as lightweight and efficient as possible. In network communication, serialization plays a central role as the process of converting an object into a stream of bytes. One of the most popular data-interchange format is JSON (JavaScript Object Notation). This paper presents a survey on JSON parsers in mobile scenarios. The aim of the survey is to find the most efficient JSON parser in mobile communications characterised by high transfer rate of small amounts of data. In the performance benchmark we compare the time required to read and write data with several popular JSON parser implementations such as Gson, Jackson, org.json and others. The results of this survey are important for others that need to select an efficient parser for mobile communication.

Social network analysis applied to knowledge creation and transfer in the portuguese agricultural R&D field: an exploratory study

Paper presented at the 9th European Conference on Knowledge Management, Southampton Solent University, Southampton, UK, 4-5 Sep. 2008. URL: http://academic-conferences.org/eckm/eckm2008/eckm08-home.htm

Enterprise information portals: potential for evaluating research for knowledge management and human capital assets using social network analysis

Paper presented at the ECKM 2010 – 11th European Conference on Knowledge Management, 2-3 September, 2010, Famalicão, Portugal. URL: http://www.academic-conferences.org/eckm/eckm2010/eckm10-home.htm

Fast mobility support in low-power wireless networks: smart-HOP over RPL/6LoWPAN

With the emergence of low-power wireless hardware new ways of communication were needed. In order to standardize the communication between these low powered devices the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) released the 6LoWPAN stand- ard that acts as an additional layer for making the IPv6 link layer suitable for the lower-power and lossy networks. In the same way, IPv6 Routing Protocol for Low- Power and Lossy Networks (RPL) has been proposed by the IETF Routing Over Low power and Lossy networks (ROLL) Working Group as a standard routing protocol for IPv6 routing in low-power wireless sensor networks. The research performed in this thesis uses these technologies to implement a mobility process. Mobility management is a fundamental yet challenging area in low-power wireless networks. There are applications that require mobile nodes to exchange data with a xed infrastructure with quality-of-service guarantees. A prime example of these applications is the monitoring of patients in real-time. In these scenarios, broadcast- ing data to all access points (APs) within range may not be a valid option due to the energy consumption, data storage and complexity requirements. An alternative and e cient option is to allow mobile nodes to perform hand-o s. Hand-o mechanisms have been well studied in cellular and ad-hoc networks. However, low-power wireless networks pose a new set of challenges. On one hand, simpler radios and constrained resources ask for simpler hand-o schemes. On the other hand, the shorter coverage and higher variability of low-power links require a careful tuning of the hand-o parameters. In this work, we tackle the problem of integrating smart-HOP within a standard protocol, speci cally RPL. The simulation results in Cooja indicate that the pro- posed scheme minimizes the hand-o delay and the total network overhead. The standard RPL protocol is simply unable to provide a reliable mobility support sim- ilar to other COTS technologies. Instead, they support joining and leaving of nodes, with very low responsiveness in the existence of physical mobility.

Including context in a routing algorithm for the internet of things

Dissertação apresentada na Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa para obtenção do grau de Mestre em Engenharia Informática

A influência do marketing de redes sociais no relacionamento

Dissertação de Mestrado apresentada ao Instituto de Contabilidade e Administração do Porto para a obtenção do grau de Mestre em Marketing Digital, sob orientação do Professor Doutor José de Freitas Santos

Lisboa cidade criativa: preparação de uma candidatura à Rede de Cidades Criativas da UNESCO

Trabalho de projeto apresentado à Escola Superior de Comunicação Social como parte dos requisitos para obtenção de grau de mestre em Gestão Estratégica das Relações Públicas.

Consumer energy management system with integration of smart meters

This paper develops an energy management system with integration of smart meters for electricity consumers in a smart grid context. The integration of two types of smart meters (SM) are developed: (i) consumer owned SM and (ii) distributor owned SM. The consumer owned SM runs over a wireless platform - ZigBee protocol and the distributor owned SM uses the wired environment - ModBus protocol. The SM are connected to a SCADA system (Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition) that supervises a network of Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC). The SCADA system/PLC network integrates different types of information coming from several technologies present in modern buildings. The developed control strategy implements a hierarchical cascade controller where inner loops are performed by local PLCs, and the outer loop is managed by a centralized SCADA system, which interacts with the entire local PLC network. In order to implement advanced controllers, a communication channel was developed to allow the communication between the SCADA system and the MATLAB software. (C) 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Projecto de parceria entre a ONGD Estímulo e a Rede de Farmácias Portuguesas: a união de esforços entre sectores para a resolução de problemas contemporâneos

Trabalho de projeto apresentado à Escola Superior de Comunicação Social como parte dos requisitos para obtenção de grau de mestre em Gestão Estratégica das Relações Públicas.

LSP communication in a digital age: the outcomes of teaching and learning in tertiary education

This paper discusses the changes brought by the communication revolution in teaching and learning in the scope of LSP. Its aim is to provide an insight on how teaching which was bi-dimensional, turned into a multidimensional system, gathering other complementary resources that have transformed, in a incredibly short time, the ways we receive share and store information, for instance as professionals, and keep in touch with our peers. The increasing rise of electronic publications, the incredible boom of social and professional networks, search engines, blogs, list servs, forums, e-mail blasts, Facebook pages, YouTube contents, Tweets and Apps, have twisted the way information is conveyed. Classes ceased to be predictable and have been empowered by digital platforms, innumerous and different data repositories (TILDE, IATE, LINGUEE, and so many other terminological data banks) that have definitely transformed the academic world in general and tertiary education in particular. There is a bulk of information to be digested by students, who are no longer passive but instead responsible and active for their academic outcomes. The question is whether they possess the tools to select only what is accurate and important for a certain subject or assignment, due to that overflow? Due to the reduction of the number of course years in most degrees, after the implementation of Bologna and the shrinking of the curricula contents, have students the possibility of developing critical thinking? Both teaching and learning rely on digital resources to improve the speed of the spreading of knowledge. But have those changes been effective to promote really communication? Furthermore, with the increasing Apps that have already been developed and will continue to appear for learning foreign languages, for translation among others, will the students feel the need of learning them once they have those Apps. These are some the questions we would like to discuss in our paper.

Model morphisms (MoMo) to enable language independent information models and interoperable business networks

MSc. Dissertation presented at Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia of Universidade Nova de Lisboa to obtain the Master degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering

Exciting dynamical behavior in a network of two coupled rings of Chen oscillators

We study exotic patterns appearing in a network of coupled Chen oscillators. Namely, we consider a network of two rings coupled through a “buffer” cell, with Z3×Z5 symmetry group. Numerical simulations of the network reveal steady states, rotating waves in one ring and quasiperiodic behavior in the other, and chaotic states in the two rings, to name a few. The different patterns seem to arise through a sequence of Hopf bifurcations, period-doubling, and halving-period bifurcations. The network architecture seems to explain certain observed features, such as equilibria and the rotating waves, whereas the properties of the chaotic oscillator may explain others, such as the quasiperiodic and chaotic states. We use XPPAUT and MATLAB to compute numerically the relevant states.

‘Thy love afar is spite at home' Emerson, Thoreau and Carey: an alternative perspective of communication in US

The conquest of the West by the stagecoaches and then by railway, Ford and the automobile civilization, the Moon landing by Apollo 11, Microsoft, Apple, CNN, Google and Facebook have appeared to us as celebratory examples of the willingness and ability of the US to overcome the distance and the absence through so-called modern progress of transportation and communication. Undoubtedly, the imaginary and the instrumental power associated to transports and communication of the last century and a half are identified with the mental images that the world has of the US. A world that has eagerly imported and copy their technology and technological culture. Beyond the illusions, this attempting, which has always been praised to transcende space and eclipse the time to get to places and peole increasingly distant and fast, has always a dark side: the political control of population, commercial advertising, the spread of the rumors, noise and gossip. However, since at least the nineteenth century, the political project incorporated in modern transportation and communication technologies was not shared by some of the most remarkable thinkers in the US not only in that century, but also in the 20th century. This paper begins by rescue Ralph W. Emerson and Henry D. Thoreau legacy regarding to communication. Emerson conceived communication as a give-and-take with no coordination between the two, and does not involve contact with the other. Thoreau, in turn, argued that modern trasnportation and communications inventions are but pretty toys which distract attention from serious things, nothing more than 'improved means to an end that is not perfected.' Secondly, we show that this skeptical view of the techological improvement of transport and communication was proceed in an original way with James W. Carey, a media studies thinker who became known for his criticism of the transmission view of communication.

Building a person home behavior model based on data from smart house sensors 2015

Dissertação para a obtenção do grau de Mestre em Engenharia Electrotécnica Ramo de Energia