Dutch broadcaster BNN tests the intuitive train planner developed at the Database Group. Their verdict: “ingenious”, and “approved for elderly”. Picture of Kien Tjin-Kam-Jet proudly in the back (in Dutch). See the treinplanner in action at: http://treinplanner.info
Jimmy Lin will give a keynote lecture at the SIKS/BigGrid Big Data tutorial that preceeds the DBDBD on 30 November and 1 December 2011. Dr. Lin, who holds a PhD from MIT, is associate professor in the iSchool at the University of Maryland. He also has appointments in the Institute for Advanced Computer Studies (UMIACS) and the Department of Computer Science at Maryland. Lin works at the intersection of natural language processing (NLP) and information retrieval (IR), with a recent emphasis on scalable algorithm design and large-data issues. He directs the recently-formed Cloud Computing Center, an interdisciplinary group which explores the many aspects of cloud computing as it impacts technology, people, and society. He is also a member of both the Computational Linguistics and Information Processing Lab (CLIP) and the Human-Computer Interaction Lab (HCIL). Lin worked on Cloudera, which aims to bring Hadoop MapReduce to the enterprise, and is currently spending a sabbatical at Twitter
See: Big Data Tutorial
by Saskia Akkersdijk, Merel Brandon, Hanna Jochmann-Mannak, Djoerd Hiemstra, and Theo Huibers
Recent work shows that children are very well capable of searching with Google, due to their familiarity with the interface. However, children do have difficulties with the vertical list representation of the results. In this paper, we present an alternative result representation for a touch interface, the ImagePile. The ImagePile displays the results as a pile of images where the user navigates through via horizontal swiping. This representation was tested on a search engine for the Emma child hospital’s library. Using a within subject experiment, both representations were tested with children to compare the usability of both systems. The vertical representation was perceived as easier to use, but the ImagePile system was considered more fun to use. Also, with the ImagePile system more relevant results were chosen by the children, and they were more aware of the number of results.
The university’s main entrance honours the FC
I did some research into Computer Architecture for Embedded Systems by joining the CAES & Co football team at the university’s christmas tournament, starring: Djoerd, Ricardo, Paul, Arend, Harm, Sergio, and Yacob.
The University Curriculum Committee IT (opleidingcommissie IT or OLC-IT) discusses the bachelor “Informatica” and “Telematica” and the master Computer Science, Human Media Interaction, and Telematics. The committee’s 50th meeting was celebrated by cooking Italian dishes at Kook & Co.
Standing from left to right: Paul Havinga, Marieke Huisman, Georgios Karagiannis, Betsy van Dijk, Johan Noltes, Sabine Padberg, Ralph Broenink, Beer Sijpestijn, Bas Stottelaar, Ruud Verbij, Jan Schut, Hans Romkema. Sitting from left to right: Rom Langerak, Djoerd Hiemstra, Gerrit van der Hoeven.
by Michel Jansen, Wim Bos, Paul van der Vet, Theo Huibers and Djoerd Hiemstra
Despite several efforts to make search engines more child-friendly, children still have trouble using systems that require keyboard input. We present TeddIR: a system using a tangible interface that allows children to search for books by placing tangible figurines and books they like/dislike in a green/red box, causing relevant results to be shown on a display. This way, issues with spelling and query formulation are avoided. A fully functional prototype was built and evaluated with children aged 6-8 at a primary school. The children understood TeddIR to a large extent and enjoyed the playful interaction.
TeddIR in the set-up used during evaluation.
TeddIR will be presented at 9th International Conference on Interaction Design and Children, Barcelona June 9-11, 2010.
Newest logo UT a real bargain 
Photos taken by Wessel Kraaij and Suzan Verberne during DIR 2010 in Nijmegen are now on-line
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RBgVEnZjWQ
The university finally realized that there are new media. Way to go!