Avaliação comparativa da regulamentação para estruturas offshore no dimensionamento de elementos tubulares circulares em aço (ISO 19902 e EC3)
Silva, Luís Simões da
2014
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This paper describes a system developed to implement the actuation after the data acquisition and processing from the plant. It was implemented over a previous developed CAN network, based on the 80C592 microcontroller from Philips implementing a hierarchical structure to form a tree topology. In this network a Personal Computer is connected through a Net Manager to units named Masters, located at the greenhouses, that allows the management of several secondary units named Slaves. This units are implemented using a SLIO (Serial Linked I/O device) from Philips, making possible the greenhouses control. This choice is due to the fact that the SLIO allows a cheaper solution to applications where no high speed requirements are needed such as the on/off functions. The assembling of the actuators within a greenhouse allows the use of an architecture whose communication is done through the main power cables. As mean of communication is used the CAN (Controller Area Network) protocol, which has a great flexibility and robustness needed in real-time control. The system, must allow easy expansion and configuration without compromising its performance. This is the case when the parameters must be changed whenever the weather conditions (Summer/Winter), force us to modify the setpoints of several control variables such as: temperature, light, humidity, among others.
Traditionally, context-aware applications are developed
using one of the following approaches: each application
communicates directly with sources of context information;
applications are developed with the aid of reusable libraries for
processing context information or applications have their own
context models. These approaches not only require effort on the
part of those who develop them, but also create dependency
between the developed context-aware applications and the
systems developed for obtaining and providing the context
information, thus hindering their reuse in other applications. In
this paper we present a system that autonomously characterizes
the physical, social and organizational context of a public space
and delivers this information to context-aware applications.
Experiments show that it provides relevant and useful context
information that can be used by context-aware applications to
improve their services.
To provide the best training in software engineering, several approaches and strategies are carried out. Some of them are more theoretical, learned through books and manuals, while others have a practical focus and often done in collaboration with companies. In this paper, we share an approach based on a balanced mix to foster the assimilation of knowledge, the approximation with what is done in software companies and student motivation. Two questionnaires were also carried out, one involving students, who had successfully completed the subject in past academic years (some had already graduated, and others are still students), and other questionnaire involving companies, in the field of software development, which employ students from our school. The analysis of the perspectives of the different stakeholders allows an overall and holistic) view, and a general understanding, of the effectiveness of the software engineering teaching approach. We analyse the results of the questionnaires and share some of the experiences and lessons learned.
Nowadays there are a vast number of devices and technologies available for the common citizen to
improve their communication with others. This fosters the design and implementation of systems that explore
the available features of these devices. This paper presents a system that allows to inform, on a personalized
way, the actors of an education institution on a free way using popular communication standards. Features like
the system’s architecture, prototype and system’s evaluation are explained in the paper. Results show that this
system can be an important complement to other popular systems in education environments (e.g. e-mail, chats,
Wikis, forums, e-learning platforms etc.).
This paper describes a web-based system which allows the user to manage and to do real time monitoring the access to the educational building spaces, using two data nets.
The first one is based on the CAN bus for data acquisition and actuation tasks to which are connected control devices like, magnetic cards readers, door locks and sensors. The second one is an Internet/Intranet infrastructure and uses standard web technologies like PHP and Java to provide an effective control and real time monitoring. This system is implemented on the Linux operating system using the Apache HTTP server and make use of standard technologies in use on the Web, to make an effective campus-wide security system. To close the gap between these two nets we used a CAN/Intranet gateway.
In this paper the system layout and its main components are described.
In recent years, there has been enormous research interest in natural resources monitoring. So, there is a need to develop easily accessible, cheap and reliable information systems for monitoring and early warning, which could be used in most natural resources. This paper presents an ongoing information system development that aims the monitoring and supervising of some parameters on water supply, such as quality and quantity. To implement our system we use several technologies in order to monitoring about 100 water tanks in an area of ±1000 Km2. In these technologies is included GSM communication, web infrastructure and sensing equipment that allows the access of information from any place of the world. In paper sections the main blocks of the system architecture are described in detail.
Nowadays there are a vast number of devices and technologies available for the common citizen to improve their communication with others. This fosters the design and implementation of systems that explore the available features of these devices. In this paper, we propose a Bluetooth-based interactive system for delivering personalized information in high education institutions. The system allows informing, on a personalized way, the actors of an education institution on a free way using popular communication standards. The scenario we promote in the paper is mainly focused on learning environments, however the framework is also applicable in other shared public and semi-public spaces such as offices, homes, companies and many others. One of the most important contributions of this work is to combine public displays and personal mobile devices for delivering personalized information according to the students’ location. A prototype has been built and discussed with demonstrative user scenarios. Early results show that teachers and students found some advantages in this system comparing to traditional approaches. This system can effectively support a wide range of activities for students. It provides to each student the possibility to have a personal interaction with the technology in an authentic and appropriate use context. Features like the system’s architecture, prototype and system’s evaluation are explained in the paper. Results show that this system can be an important complement to other popular systems in education environment (e.g. e-mail, chats, Wikis, forums, e-learning platforms etc.).
The development time in industrial informatics systems, within industry environments, is a very important
issue for competitiveness. The usage of adequate targetspecific
programming languages is very important because
they can facilitate and improve developers’ productivity, allowing solutions to be expressed in the idiom and at the level
of abstraction of the problem’s domain.
In this paper we present a target-specific programming
language, which was designed to improve the design cycle of
code generation, for an industrial embedded system. The native assembly code, the new language structure and their
constructs, are presented in the paper. The proposed targetspecific language is expressed using words and terms that are
related to the target’s domain and consequently it is now easier
to program, understand and to validate the desired code. It is also demonstrated the language efficiency by comparing some
code described using the new language against the previous
used code. The design cycle is improved with the usage of the
target-specific language because both description and debug
time are significantly reduced with this new software tool. This
is also a case of university-industry partnership.
The dissemination of large displays and personal mobile computing devices has created new
opportunities for the joint use of these devices. Together these devices can enrich public spaces, promoting new
and more engagement interaction mechanisms, giving users relevant information and providing important
resources that can promote conversations and group activities. In this paper we explore the joint use of public
displays and personal mobile computing devices, as equipments for the dissemination of personalized
information that is delivered to users according to their interests and expectations. Three main aspects
characterize our proposal. First, it encloses in the same system two types of devices for delivering information:
mobile devices and large public displays. Second, the user only receives information of his interest point of view
and the information is delivered through the most proper device. Third, our proposal combines into the same
system two different perspectives: informative, providing users with information about their subscriptions and
socializing, i.e. presenting, in a public display, information about the place, about users’ interests and about
interests of other people that visits the same place. We have developed and evaluate a partial prototype based on
those principles. The results show that the system is easy-to-use, that it can support a wide range of activities and
that the users recognize an added value of the system comparing to traditional approaches.
This paper describes some successful experiences within engineering departments where emerging paradigms have been used to improve student’s know-how. This experience has resulted in students with high skills in fields of high acceptance in the employment market and with experience to deal within multi-disciplinary working teams.
Aspects of a case study that has involved the collaboration and supervision of staff from institutions of two countries (UK and Portugal) are reported.
The work included the programming and application of handheld devices as the human-machine interface. The designed machines are mechatronic devices, to be used in Domotic (Domestic Robotic) tasks. The main focus of this paper involves the pedagogical experience, since the technical features have already been published.
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In higher education, as in other levels of education, there are different teaching strategies (expository with interaction, use of technological resources, problem-solving, project-based, game-based, etc.) in which success always depends on the involvement of students, the commitment of teachers, and much of the interaction between them in the task of contributing together so that the teaching-learning process is as fruitful as possible for the student. This task is not always easy for the teacher, because they have to divide the teaching activity with other tasks, because the number of students in charge is large, because each student has different characteristics and competences, etc. Correctly monitoring the different learning speeds of each student requires frequent collection of appropriate information, metrics and respective analysis. In this context, continuous assessment is a good approach, but it requires tools that, without consuming too much useful class time, allow the teacher to collect information about the perception and retention of knowledge by the students, and through the analysis of this information, allows them to adapt the strategies in order to reinforce the matters in which there are more difficulties or to increase the teaching pace in the case of matters already assimilated. It is also important that the collection of this information during class is done in a non-intrusive and in a motivating way, exploring the means currently available to students, namely in terms of technology.
With the tool presented in this paper, the teacher has at their disposal the means to check if at a given moment their students are assimilating the material taught, what percentage of them are having learning difficulties, if in a period of time they have evolved in terms of knowledge acquired, if students still remember what they have learned since a past period, etc. In this way, the syllabus planning and execution of a given subject can be improved in terms of focus and time slots for explanation of certain topics, reinforcement of exercises, evaluation emphasis, etc. With this tool, it is possible to simplify the sampling of the learning progress, and thus adopt strategies that bring gains in agility to the teaching-learning process.
Low-code development platforms are designed to accelerate software development with a minimum of hand coding. They have allowed professionals with distinct backgrounds to become software developers. This brings more professionals to IT areas, reskilling some of them from different areas of knowledge but, at the same time, it has also brought to the software development area many professionals without a strong background in this area. Although testing should be performed in all applications, regardless of the programming language or the platform used, this reinforces the need for testing low-code developed applications. In this work, we study the test automation process on the OutSystems low-code development platform. The focus is on Unit, Integration/API and System/End-to-End testing levels. Examples illustrate that the implementation of best practices during the development process can have a significant influence on the test automation process. However, it is important to know whether the workload associated with the implementation of the best practices can undermine the benefits of using a low-code platform and it is important to consider that not all test automation tools have the same behavior.
Following the recent trends in software engineering regarding the growing adoption of agile methodologies and low-code development platforms, and considering the results of surveys, we carried out on students, alumni and some IT companies, we adapted the software engineering teaching of a computer engineering course to the needs and new trends of the IT industry. The Scrum methodology and the OutSystems low-code development platform were used in a project-based learning approach for teaching agile software engineering practices. This approach was complemented with the presentation and discussion of several topics during the theoretical classes, lectures given by professionals from IT companies and study visits to an IT company that uses agile methodologies and low-code platforms. This approach aims to enhance the technical skills, namely development skills on a widely used low-code platform and other software engineering skills, but also to reinforce some non-technical skills of students like teamwork and communication, today highly valued by IT companies. The first results are quite positive.
There is currently a high demand for professionals with digital skills in the areas of Information and Communication Technologies. As such, in future this trend is expected to increase. Higher education institutions are unable to train adequate numbers of qualified people to respond to employers' requests. In other areas, it is expected that increasing computerization and automation will have a significant impact on reducing certain types of jobs, which highlights the need and importance for many workers to develop new digital skills in order to be better prepared to face future challenges. It also seems clear that many of the needs may be met by people who, while not having a higher education in ICT fields, such as that taught in higher education institutions, these can be suppressed by people with specific training which is more focused on a particular technology or focused on certain development niches. In this context, low-code development platforms can play an important role in training or retraining people from areas with lower market demand for ICT areas. Their characteristics and potential make them suitable for technicians with higher qualifications in other areas, and other professionals, to acquire new skills through retraining or supplementing / recycling pre-acquired basic knowledge that may become productive labour in the IT world.
In this paper we describe a strategy, and several case studies, where a low-code development platform is used to reskill STEM professionals and/or professionals who, having basic IT knowledge are in precarious activities, to perform ICT professional activity. This strategy not only contributes to the needs of IT professionals but also enables many professionals to make timely retraining into areas of greater competitiveness, greater job stability and better working conditions. Throughout the paper, we present case studies that are part of this strategy and that have had positive results. These case studies include Enterprise-Higher Education collaborative training, reskilling for unemployed people with higher education in other areas, and training for those who are active, working in areas where labour needs are likely to decrease in the mid-term. The paper also identifies the benefits and contributions resulting from the use of the OutSystems low-code platform to implement this strategy.
Implementing best practices during the software development process can significantly influence the test automation process. This is true in all software applications, regardless of the platform or the programming language used, but it is even more important when the software is developed using low-code development platforms. These platforms are commonly used together with agile methodologies, and they are designed to accelerate software development with a minimum of hand-coding. Generally, when using these platforms and methodologies, the focus is on verbal and informal communication rather than documentation. The focus is on getting high-quality source code, adequate test sets, and greater interaction with the end customer. This highlights the need to use best practices in software development to achieve better quality software and facilitate the test automation process. In this work, we analyse the test automation on low-code development platforms and, more specifically, how the best practices for OutSystems development influence the test automation process. A survey on the opinion and practice of OutSystems platform professionals, 27 respondents, is also analysed and discussed. The goal is to understand how they recognise the influence that best development practices have on the testing automation process and how they apply these best practices in their daily activities.
This paper presents a target-specific programming
language (TSL) that was designed to improve the design cycle of
code generation for an industrial embedded system. The native
assembly code, the new language structure and their constructs, are
presented in the paper. The proposed TSL is expressed using words
and terms that are related to the target’s domain and consequently it
is now easier to program, understand and to validate the desired code.
It is also demonstrated the language efficiency by comparing some
code described using the new language against the previous used
code. The design cycle is improved with the usage of the TSL
because description time and debug time are significantly reduced
with this new software tool. This is also a case of university-industry
partnership.
Traditional agriculture uses empiric methods and is very exposed to meteorological conditions. To increase the agriculture production, greenhouses had appeared to allow crops with higher quality. Greenhouses also permit the study of cause-effect concepts that by them allow building models that improve the crop’s production and quality.
Based on this reality, this paper presents a system developed by researchers of two schools of the Instituto Politécnico of Castelo Branco(IPCB) to monitor a greenhouse located in the campus of Escola Superior Agrária (ESA). This proposed system uses several different technologies.
No desenvolvimento de aplicações sensíveis ao contexto é
importante que existam aplicações/plataformas que sejam
responsáveis pela descoberta e processamento das informações do
contexto e que disponibilizem essa informação para ser usada por
essas aplicações. Neste trabalho é apresentado um sistema
autónomo para caracterização do contexto de um local, com
informação sobre a sua localização, sobre as condições ambientais
e sobre a natureza da instituição onde se encontra esse espaço, e
que permite disponibilizar essa informação para que possa ser
facilmente usada por outras aplicações. As avaliações preliminares
mostram que o sistema permite obter informações de contexto
relevantes relacionadas com o local e com as características e
natureza da instituição onde este se insere. Esta framework pode
ser útil para facilitar a obtenção de informação de contexto em
espaços públicos e na sua disponibilização para ser usada por
aplicações sensíveis ao contexto.
The main aim of this paper is to describe a developed computer application to simulate the production system of a company located in Castelo Branco-Portugal.
Simulation is used to help to fulfill the necessities of the enterprise in what concerns to its constant optimization and its need to improve its performance during production. It also helps on finding and study potential problems such as the case of bottleneck lines, before they can real happen.
This application allows the implementation of changes in the model, to transform the production system and to stimulate the new system in order to check out if this brings more advantages than the one already installed. The application also allows to simulate the production of a certain number of pieces and to calculate the period of time involved in its production, as well.
This paper proposes a Web-based architecture to monitor and experiment a Digital Pendulum Control System from a remote place. The Digital Pendulum Control System is an interesting educational tool considered ideal for both laboratory and project work, and a typical case of a computer control application.
This paper describes a computerized system that acquires the values of temperature and air humidity, of a laboratorial greenhouse, processes these values and sends orders for actuator to obtain the desired ambient conditions, allowing the automatic regulation of the physical variables through PID (Proportional, Integral and Derivative) control. The developed prototype serves as didactic and research tool for students of High education schools, in the scope of the practical lessons of disciplines of Control. In the following sections of this article is described in a global way the components and functionalities of the developed application.
This paper describes the preliminary steps to design an information system applied to urban transportation, which intends to deal with the resources of the public transportation system. The global layout and first results are presented in the paper. The system designed and the developed application was done within a Computer Engineering Course. One of the goals of this academic work was to stimulate the students’ capabilities in the application of new technologies. Since this is a work-in-progress, preliminary results and future work will be discussed.
The present paper describes the development of an application in a Computer Engineering course using open source software tools. The main goal is the implementation of an educational system to improve the interface between students and teachers, as well as to serve as a mean of communication and events spreading related to computing to all members of the academic community where it is installed. In a first stage the system was built and implemented in one educational Institution but it is now improved based on the collaboration of teaching staff, of other Portuguese Engineering Department, allied to computer Engineering students skills and motivation. The architecture, main features, results and future work of the developed system are reported through the sections of this paper.
Free software has been recognized for many as a differentiated culture of development and use of software that can be strategically and cause economic impact. One of the basic aspects for the success of this paradigm is the capacity of professionals to be able to absorb and to spread the culture of the free software of ample form. In this mission, and several others, the University must assume its role of generation and diffusion of new knowledge, thus contributing for the propagation of the culture of free software development.
It was based on this idea that the work that we will present on the present article as appeared. Thus, based on a partnership with a commercial company, the idea of to build a project based on three components: a software application; a base philosophy (use of free software); a goal (that the pupils acquire in the end of its project know how with applicability in "the real" world outside of the Education Institution).
Nowadays the amount of information available on the Internet is immense and so the importance and quality of that information is questioned. Even though the amounts of available information are vast, sometimes the information useful for a specific purpose are limited. The present paper describes the development of a project in a Computer Engineering course based on this reality. The main goal to achieve is the implementation of an educational system to improve the interface between students and tutors, as well as to serve as a mean of communicating and spreading events related to computing to all members of the academic community where it is installed. The system was first built and implemented in one educational Institution but it is now improved based on the collaboration of teaching staff, of two different Portuguese institutions, with experience in teaching, allied to computer Engineering students skills and motivation. The architecture and the main features allowed by the developed system are reported through the several sections of this paper.
This paper describes a machine designed to process small PVC pieces, used in automobile cable testing equipment. This machine should allow several different processing tasks without too much reconfiguration, thus providing a high level of automation. The solution is based on a three axis movable platform moving inside a cage structure where several tools are attached. This paper describes the machine control hardware and software, not the mechanical structure.
The machine processes a piece at a time. The piece is placed in the platform and held in place by a gripper. The platform moves inside the cage placing the piece in the appropriate tool position, following a checklist of operations.
The machine is controlled by a PC (Personal Computer), equipped with a commercial I/O interface board and a motion control board. The software developed is composed of three modules for the different control and configuration needs. One used after the machine is physically reconfigured. The second module allows the definition of the operations to be performed and respective coordinates. This module is used when a new series of pieces is to be processed. The third module controls the manufacturing process.
Cada vez mais se questiona a importância de utilizar plataformas de desenvolvimento referidas vulgarmente por software free e projectos open source. É neste contexto que surge o presente artigo o qual descreve o desenvolvimento de um trabalho no âmbito de um curso de Engenharia Informática. O objectivo consiste na implementação de um site de comércio electrónico assente sobre a filosofia de utilização de ferramentas free.
Ao longo das secções do artigo é apresentada a arquitectura e as opções que a aplicação desenvolvida permite. Ainda tendo por base o trabalho aqui descrito, refira-se a interligação e colaboração entre a instituição de ensino e o “mundo real” permitindo ao aluno tomar conhecimento com o que poderá ser o seu ambiente de trabalho num futuro próximo, ou seja, preparando-o para a realização de trabalhos no domínio da Engenharia Informática.
Recent growth in the WWW (Word Wide Web) and Java has received significant attention as means to share sophisticated and expensive laboratory equipment in Computer Engineering Courses. To share a Digital Pendulum System in class laboratory and with other educational institutions, this paper proposes an Internet Toolkit for Computer Engineering Courses. This allows the monitoring and experiment of a Digital Pendulum System from remote place. A simple and easy-to-use Web interface was developed to help students, and other users, in lab experiences using default control algorithms.
Information and Communications Technology is a growing area with a growing demand for employees. However, there is a shortage of professionals in this area and integrated strategies are required to foster the access of more people to these areas and provide training to develop the necessary skills.
In this paper we present a short course that was designed to retrain unemployed people, mainly with already a higher education level in the area of the science technology engineering and math (STEM), to be Information and communications technology (ICT) professionals. After this training, trainees will have the opportunity to significantly increase the likelihood of being able to obtain employment in ICT areas. The course described involves public entities (including a higher education institution) and a private company, which is also a demonstration of synergies between academia and business. In the paper, the context that led to the appearance of the course, the fundamentals that supported the syllabus design, the partners involved, the objectives of the several subjects, the profile of the trainees and the results already achieved are described. To explain the fundamentals of the course syllabus we explain the most original features of the course regarding the usefulness of taking advantage of the abstraction allowed by the new low-code platforms, what seem to be appropriate and facilitator for retraining professionals from STEM to ICT. This approach, using a low code platform for retraining professionals to ICT, presents in our point of view, advantages over other approaches. In short, in the paper we intend to share the work done during the design and follow-up of the course, as well as the preliminary results obtained in the meantime.
Mobile devices are part of the everyday life of the modern citizen. Currently these devices are used for simple dayto- day tasks, where we need information available on the web or on the mobile device itself (smartphone, tablet, etc.). One area where a number of mobile applications have emerged is urban mobility, for route planning and the use of transport networks. However, few applications have addressed this issue considering the needs of users with some type of disability. This paper describes the development of an Android app intended to be used to provide information on urban mobility, including transport accessibility features. It is intended that this mobile application will provide its users with information about the public transport of a certain city and its schedules including routes covered by each transport and the accessibility of each of them. The application intends to allow to choose the best options, according to the profile of the user its geographical location and the accessibility features of the means of transport of that geographical area.
The industry high quality requirements stimulate the development and spread of automatic systems that allow flexibility and easy adaptation to new tasks and needs. The system explained in this paper is built to allow a quick and easy way to process small quantities of small pieces made of PVC substance. The system, made up of several components, brings a high level of automation as required by the company that will use it. To implement this machine, based on a movable platform, National Instruments I/O boards and the LabView 6i software tool have been used. This paper describes, in a general way, a system that allows a high variety of applications but, for the moment, is applied only to process little lots of PVC parts.
This paper proposes a Web-based toolkit to monitor and experiment a Digital Pendulum Control System from any host of an intranet. “The Digital Pendulum Control System is a modern version of a classical control problem: that of balancing a free swinging pendulum in its inverted position”.
This paper describes a machine designed to process little quantities of small PVC pieces, used in automobile test equipment. The system should provide a easy way of reconfiguring to process all the pieces used, as they are very much alike, but with significant differences.
The machine this paper proposes is based in a 3 axes moving platform controlled by a PC equipped with commercial I/O boards. The next sections will explain the different modules that constitute the above-mentioned system.
O presente trabalho visa o desenvolvimento de uma aplicação que permite a partilha de um equipamento didáctico existente, neste caso na Escola Superior de Tecnologia de Castelo Branco, via Internet, tornando possível realizar, de forma interactiva, experiências de controlo a partir de um local remoto (na sala de aula, outra sala de aula ou do exterior).
O equipamento didáctico é o sistema Pêndulo Digital que opera num ambiente Matlab/Simulink, e juntamente com a toolbox Pendulum da Feedback [Fdb], fabricante do pêndulo, permitem controlar o sistema e realizar experiências através da alteração de parâmetros predefinidos (Figura 1). Este equipamento permite a aplicação de diversos algoritmos de controlo ao pêndulo, tais como o algoritmo baseado em regras (Rule-Based), o algoritmo PID, etc.
With the universal use of mobile computing devices, there has been a notable increasein the number of mobile applications developed for educational purposes. Gamification strategiesoffer a new set of tools to educators and, combined with the location services provided by thosedevices, allow the creation of innovative location-based mobile learning experiences. In this literaturereview, we conduct an analysis of educational mobile location-based games. The review includesarticles published from January of 2010 to October of 2020, and from 127 records screened, 26 articleswere analysed in full-text form. This analysis allowed us to answer the following six predefinedresearch questions: Who are the target audiences for location-based games? In which subjects arelocation-based games most used? Which strategies are implemented with mobile devices to improvethe student’s learning process? What are the main impacts of location-based games on students’learning? What are the main challenges to the development of location-based games for education?What future tendencies and research opportunities can be identified from the analysis of the currentstate of the art?
The way patient information is presented has been proven to have an
important impact on patient care. This paper presents a software component to be
integrated in a virtual patient record used in a Portuguese hospital. This component
supports genetic oncology consultations and aims to help the physician needs
to visualize the patient's family tree in order to diagnose hereditary cancers in both
patient and patient descendants. This system allows the physician to view relevant
medical information of the elements of the family of a given patient, add new
tests, as well as record new cancer situations that occur in any member of the patient’s
family. Besides the graphical display of the patients’ family tree, the system
also allows to differentiate between different groups of cancer by using symbols
and colours, register new cancer occurrences within that family network, as well
as information related to tests performed by them.
This is a pre-copyedited version of a contribution published in Rocha A., Adeli H., Reis L.P., Costanzo S. (eds) Trends and Advances in Information Systems and Technologies. WorldCIST'18 2018 published by Springer. The definitive authenticated version is available online via https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-77712-2_16
“This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in Information Technology & Tourism. The final authenticated version is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40558-018-0110-2”.
Recent years have seen an increasing realization of the importance and potential of accessible tourism. To support it, the ICT industries have provided many different applications, especially for mobile computing frameworks. An analysis of these applications allows us to identify some issues that are not yet fully addressed. These include the absence of collaborative features; the lack of involvement of all stakeholders; the inexistence of synergies; the lack of widely accessible geographic databases and the limited scope of focus within the disability range. To tackle some of these issues, we propose a common framework for development of tourism accessible related applications. This framework stores and manages tourism information and makes this information available to be used by mobile applications developers through specific web services. This approach can represent an important contribution to accessible tourism, by decreasing the cost and facilitating the development of new applications supporting new products and services.
The increasing demand of comfort levels in the home area stimulates the development of systems to reach several goals. Some features of this kind of systems are: energy savings, environmental control, safety monitoring, remote definition of the system set points, etc. This kind of systems is made up of several units spread in the target areas of the house where they are implemented. Those units communicate between them and the master stations through different sort of links: cable, radio frequency, optical fibre, power line, etc. Also, they can use different kind of communications protocols like: Controller Area Network (CAN), Profibus, Bitbus, user defined, etc.
To implement the mentioned systems there are a large quantity of devices, furnished from several chip manufacturers. For example, T exas Instruments as Digital Signal Processors (DSP) that have embedded CAN modules to allow easy and powerful solutions like for instance the improving of motor control applications using the above-mentioned communication protocol.
This paper describe a CAN based system that uses a DSP Controller and allows the control of several actuation/acquisition devices that form a flexible, robust and easy maintained Domotic network.
Uma área onde a educação para a saúde pode ter um
papel importante diz respeito à exposição excessiva ao sol, e outros
elementos climáticos, especialmente por grupos de pessoas mais
sensíveis como é o caso das crianças. Embora sejam conhecidos
bastantes benefícios para a saúde humana com a exposição solar
também é verdade que, em situações extremas, podem surgir
doenças relacionadas com a exposição a estes elementos. É, por
isso, importante criar mecanismos de monitorização para que as
crianças possam estar a salvo de riscos de saúde que possam advir
da exposição aos mesmos. Neste artigo é apresentado o
desenvolvimento de um dispositivo que permite monitorizar
alguns parâmetros associados à saúde e condições a que uma
criança pode estar exposta e, consoante essas condições, permite
alertar para o risco a que esta se encontra exposta. Os pontos fortes
do protótipo apresentado, no que respeita à saúde das crianças,
centram-se, não só nos avisos que a alteração das cores do alerta
luminoso lhes fornecerá relativamente à radiação solar UV,
temperatura corporal, e temperatura ambiente como também na
aprendizagem dos cuidados e das medidas de proteção a adotar,
em tempo real e face às condições específicas do momento. Para os
adultos, o protótipo mostra-se também ser interessante, de acordo
com as respostas aos inquéritos, e vantajoso na medida em que os
pode ajudar, em determinadas circunstâncias, no
acompanhamento e monitorização constante das crianças. Mas,
acima de tudo, promove sensibilização para a importância de ter
cuidados com a saúde, em especial com as crianças.
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Physical education in schools aims to promote physical activity, socialisation, and interaction among students. Today, it is considered a very important subject for development and health. It encompasses several sports modalities, always with the purpose of promoting physical activity and motor development of those who practice. Orienteering is one of the modalities that has recently gained fame. Orienteering is a sport modality that integrates physical, cognitive, and emotional dimensions. It consists, as the name implies, of navigating to a certain area, using a map and a compass, aiming for the shortest possible route between several points marked on a map. The work described in this paper presents a case of the introduction of new digital technologies in this modality to simplify the administration of these events in a school environment and to promote interest in the practice of this sport modality. The web application that allows the creation and addition of the orienteering event, the visualisation of detailed information in an after-event context, and the registration and management of new organisers or orienteers will be presented throughout the paper. It also presents the mobile application that allows the organisers to start and finish events, manage orienteers of a given event, view the current position of orienteers, and view the results of past events. The mobile application presents a static orienteering map to the orienteer. The visit of the orienteer to each control point (assigned on the orienteering map by the organisers) is verified using the georeferencing features of the device. These tools facilitate the management of these events by organisers as well as their analyses through automatically generated information. It also makes the practice of this modality more appealing to students because it introduces a type of gamification. Moreover, it also benefits from being paperless because it makes it unnecessary to print maps for the execution of an event and because the administration of an event can be done without the need to mark the control points in the terrain.
The layout of the factories in the apparel industry has several processing stations that are grouped in sections that have to do with a particular task (ex. trousers stitch). This together with high levels of production capacity demands the implementation of automatic monitoring systems that allow some sort of feedback related with the production progress of those stations.
This paper describes a system that is being developed at Escola Superior de Tecnologia de Castelo Branco, which is part of the Instituto Politécnico de Castelo Branco. It consists of a prototype for a real time data pick up system, using the Controller Area Network (CAN) [1] bus. The aimed objective is to collect the data contained in bar code labels that are coupled to cloths pieces in an apparel factory during the production process. Those labels have useful information to the production stage (ID number of the piece), and accompany each apparel piece. This system is part of a more global system that will allow the production management using a wed platform linking the commercial, production scheduling, manufacturing control and customer/seller stages.
The use of computer simulations to teach control engineering it is quite common, through adequate commercially available software allowing an easy visualization of systems behaviour. The work reported in this article describes a multimedia tool (FEMECO) with several components, as a support for teaching related control subjects. This can be used as a technical support both for teachers and students, favouring the learning process, which will take place according to student’s own progression. For this purpose, a new CD-ROM is being developed; covering both theoretical and practical subjects which are combined with a strong pedagogical component based on simulations of the problems in study, as well as a logistic support web site.
Pressure ulcers are associated with significant morbidity, resulting in a decreased quality of life for the patient, and contributing to healthcare professional burnout, as well as an increase of health service costs. Their prompt diagnosis and treatment are important, and several studies have proposed solutions to help healthcare professionals in this process. This work analyzes studies that use machine-learning algorithms for risk assessment and management of preventive treatments for pressure ulcers. More specifically, it focuses on the use of machine-learning algorithms that combine information from intrinsic and extrinsic pressure-ulcer predisposing factors to produce recommendations/alerts to healthcare professionals. The review includes articles published from January 2010 to June 2021. From 60 records screened, seven articles were analyzed in full-text form. The results show that most of the proposed algorithms do not use information related to both intrinsic and extrinsic predisposing factors and that many of the approaches separately address one of the following three components: data acquisition; data analysis, and production of complementary support to well-informed clinical decision-making. Additionally, only a few studies describe in detail the outputs of the algorithm, such as alerts and recommendations, without assessing their impacts on healthcare professionals’ activities
Pressure ulcers are a critical issue for patients and healthcare professionals, requiring their frequent monitoring, with a consequent impact on healthcare costs. This problem has been gaining attention and approaches have been proposed, using sensor-based systems, to facilitate this monitoring and help health caregivers to achieve greater effectiveness in the treatment of this type of ulcer. In this paper, the architecture, and the prototype of a new system for pressure ulcer monitoring and prevention are presented. It considers information related to both intrinsic and extrinsic predisposing factors and it addresses the components of data acquisition, data analysis, and production of complementary support to well-informed clinical decision-making. The system includes a pressure ulcer management portal and a mobile application, that allows caregivers to manage clinical information about pressure ulcers of the patients and uses data acquired from a pressure sensor sheet under the mattress to provide useful information for monitoring the patients. Considering the situation of each patient, the system will produce indicators/alerts to healthcare professionals, simultaneously improving pressure-ulcer patient care quality and safety and minimizing the burnout in healthcare professionals.
Efficient use of resources is a critical factor in almond crops. Technological solutions can significantly contribute to this purpose. The VeraTech project aims to explore the integration of sensors and cloud-based technologies in almond crops for efficient use of resources and reduction of environmental impact. It also makes available a set of relevant and impactful performance indicators in agricultural activity, which promote productivity gains supported by efficient use of resources. The proposed solution includes a sensor network in the almond crops, the transmission of data and its integration in the cloud, making this data available to be consumed, processed, and presented in the monitoring and alerts dashboard. In the current state of the development, several data are collected by sensors, transmitted over LoRaWAN, integrated using AWS IoT Core, and monitored and analysed through a cloud business analytics service.
