We present student perceptions of a new first-year engineering programming class that was designed by informed research practices. While the College of Engineering at Oregon State University saw a lot of major switching in the first year, there were not many students switching into computer science (CS). This could have...
SpotFinder is the mobile frontend of a parking system that helps drivers find a parking spot on campus. (The backend piece of the parking system was developed by others in the lab as part of a previous project.) Finding parking can be viewed as both a search problem and a...
RF data-driven device fingerprinting through the use of deep learning has recently surfaced as a possible method for secure device identification and authentication. Traditional approaches are commonly susceptible to the domain adaptation problem where a model trained on data from one domain performs badly when tested on data from a...
The impact of MCNP6 depletion resolution on core lifetime is examined in the context of the Snowflake microreactor with explicit TRISO fuel. The change in core lifetime and iso- tope mass as a result of different tracked isotopes, timesteps, and spatial regions is discussed. Calculation speed of a prototype MCNP...
The understanding of Discipline-Specific Language is an important competency for students of any field to begin mastering early in their studies, since it serves as a prerequisite for both the analysis of expert text and precise communication. Therefore, an introductory curriculum should pay careful attention to how it incorporates, defines,...
Transportation agencies continuously strive to improve driving quality and highway safety, which are both highly correlated with the level of smoothness of the road. The International Roughness Index (IRI) is a widely adopted, standardized metric calculated from longitudinal profile data collected on the road. Inertial profilers are devices mounted to...
A curb ramp is an indispensable ramp system in the transportation network that provides a transition between a sidewalk and a roadway. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires that the design, construction, and maintenance of curb ramps meet the ADA standards. However, many existing curb ramps are noncompliant, as...
Nearly 24% of Formerly Used Defense Sites (FUDS) containing military munitions are in the nearshore coastal zone with approximately 30% of those sites containing heterogeneous sediment compositions of gravel-sand. Previous exploration in munition mobility was performed on beaches of sandy or muddy bottoms leaving the influence of heterogeneous sediment properties...
NAND flash based solid state drives (SSDs) require out-of-place updating due to the characteristics of flash memories. In addition, due to the mismatched granularity between read/write and erase operations, a cleaning policy involving garbage collection and wear leveling has to perform data migration incurring high overhead. Another challenge is that...
High Entropy Alloys (HEA) exhibit unusual properties and are gaining interest as new materials for challenging applications in the aerospace, hypersonic and medical fields. The application of HEAs have been limited by the development of powder production at scale. A recently developed process of plasma spheroidization by 6K, inc. has...
The use of board games for teaching introductory computer science is a promising recent avenue of research. The goal is to introduce computing concepts through their use in the implementations of simple games, thereby keeping students engaged through their learning process. However, there is a gap between students' algorithmic descriptions...
Tracr is a modern browser-based user interface, designed to be used with languages that can generate customized explanations from execution traces. While Tracr is primarily designed for use with the Xtra language, Tracr defines a generalized interface that would allow it to be used with other languages as well. Explanations...
University students first learning about computer science (CS) can be intimidated and frustrated by programming. In addition, the general-purpose programming languages chosen for introducing students to programming contain several features that have the potential to overwhelm and distract them from focused curriculum topics, which can lead to reduced retention of...
Many older reinforced concrete bridges and buildings in the United States are considered deficient due to past design codes that are not conservative, increased loading, and deterioration of structural components. Deterioration is most commonly caused by corrosion, which reduces the steel cross sectional area and damages the concrete cross section....
Smart home devices, such as voice assistants, smart lights, and smart video doorbells have become a part of end users' daily lives. Many of these devices combine their features with other services and smart devices to create a simple and efficient user experience. This is partly because of the contribution...
Teaching CS is a challenging task, especially for those without prior programming experience. Even for veteran educators, having to learn CS concepts while also trying to teach those same concepts is difficult; as is the case for many K-12 CS instructors. Unfortunately, there is often no formalized order with CS...
We consider three problems on simplicial complexes: the Optimal Bounded Chain Problem, the Optimal Homologous Chain Problem, and 2-Dim-Bounded-Surface. The Optimal Bounded Chain Problem asks to find the minimum weight d-chain in a simplicial complex K bounded by a given (d−1)-chain, if such a d-chain exists. The Optimal Homologous Chain...
With the overwhelming number of open-source resources available online, the developer community is always looking to expand their knowledge. Collaborative development has been recognized as an efficient method of learning by several students and industry professionals. Hence, developers seek to obtain more hands-on experience while collaborating with people of similar...
The Gulf of Alaska (GOA) is home to the most productive fisheries in the world. In 2019, 2.2 million metric tons of fish were shipped from Alaska to destinations all over the world (NOAA Fisheries, 2019). From 2014-2016 and, more recently, in 2019 the largest heatwaves in recorded history caused...
The licensing of novel nuclear reactor power plant designs requires extensive research and testing. A significant portion of this work is dedicated to the design and operation of scaled-down testing facilities that emulate various plant conditions. The data gathered from these test facilities is used to compare to predictive models....
Safety at home and other indoor venues is one of the most important aspects of everyday life. Yet according to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), in 2018, approximately 3000 people died in home fires, while 11.7 thousand people were injured. Most household fires start as cooking accidents, which can...
More than 50% of American families have at least one pet nowadays, and the number is still rising. Pet caring needs are also growing with it. When people need to leave home for work or vacation, leaving pets home alone might bother some pet owners. Unfortunately, existing approaches all have...
In the construction industry, people seek to deliver a successful project. The major success performance measurements in the construction industry are cost, time, and quality. Several researchers have determined critical success factors for construction projects, and one of these critical success factors was management actions. Furthermore, there is an inadequacy...
Collaboration with people in a team environment to build software is common. In the beginning stage of a team project, it is required that a team decides what tools and services to utilize to control the source code for the project, communicate with the members, and manage the tasks. In...
More and more people have incorporated GIF in their messaging these days and often send gif as a reply. GIF is Graphics Interchange Format and is a short-animated picture without a sound. Searching a trivial gif with a regular emotion is easy to find but if some iconic expression is...
New MS in CS students in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science school at OSU are required to file their Program of Study by the end of their 2nd term. Many of them, especially international students, are in a totally new ecosystem, so they find it overwhelming to choose the...
Automatic music transcription (AMT) is the task, given an acoustic representation of music, to recover a symbolic notation of the written notes expressed by the sound. Transcribing music with multiple notes sounding simultaneously is difficult for both humans and machines. Much existing work on AMT has focused on suitable acoustic...
The rapid advancement of manufacturing has led to the creation of a myriad of technologies that facilitate the analysis and simulation of manufacturing processes. These technologies have become a pivotal component in maintaining and improving processes in today’s complex manufacturing environments. Discrete Event Simulation (DES) is one such technology that...
The work of engineering education researchers has resulted in the development of research-based instructional strategies (RBISs) aimed at providing educators with means to increase student learning. Research has shown that there is a disconnect between the development of RBISs and their use by educators. Means to make new practices more...
Complex information environments are often organized as hierarchies. However, computational models of Information Foraging Theory (IFT) have almost entirely ignored this fact. Models and tools for predicting programmer navigations have ignored people’s foraging behavior across hierarchies —called hierarchical foraging. Without modeling hierarchical foraging, our ability to build tools to support...
Urban green space is associated with multiple physical and mental health outcomes. Several benefits of green space, such as stress reduction and attention restoration, are dependent on visual perception of green space exposures. However, traditional green space exposure measures do not capture street-level exposures. In this project, we apply deep...
The magnitude of global AIS data exceeds the capability of conventional in-browser graphic rendering technologies like Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) and Canvas. Normal practices of rendering AIS data in browser will either suffer from low frame rates or will have to limit the total number of visual elements. In this...
Software testing is the process of evaluating the accuracy and performance of software, and automated software testing allows programmers to develop software more efficiently by decreasing testing costs. We compared two advanced random test generators, a Feedback-Directed Random Test Generator (FDR) and a Feedback-Controlled Random Test Generator (FCR), for an...
Mutation testing is one of the effective approaches measuring test adequacy of test suites. It is widely used in both academia and industry. Unfortunately, the adoption and practical use of mutation testing for Python 2.x programs face three obstacles. First, limited useful mutation operators. Existing mutation testing tools support very...
Debugging, an integral part of software development, is difficult for end-user programmers, especially in the case of complex programs. The process of isolating errors is time consuming without the help of debugging support provided by the tool. For example, the visual programming tool LondonTube supports creation of custom mobile-cloud-web applications,...
Large numbers of reinforced concrete (RC) bridges were built in the past that are now considered seismically deficient. The structural members most likely to be considered deficient are the supporting columns. Typical deficient columns contain inadequate transverse reinforcement and poorly detailed lap splice lengths above the foundation. Insufficient lap splice...
In the current education environment, many instructors make use of some type of software, such as Visual Studio or a software library like OpenGL, in the classroom. Incorrect setup and configuration on an individual’s own system is a common problem when using these software tools. This thesis explores the difficulty...
Surveys are often used in health studies to collect data about participants for scientific research. An increasing number of health scientists are turning to online data collection methods because they are less costly and can reach a large diverse population quickly. Online surveys also make it easy to track and...
While individual portfolio diversity analysis is a well-studied problem in visualization, the visual analysis of individual or groups of portfolios, over time, has received little attention. Such analysis, however, is important to researchers who are interested in better understanding portfolio management behavior of experts as well as novices. We conducted...
Modeling tire-snow interaction is important in designing effective snow tires, which directly affects road safety during wintry weather. Unfortunately, tires have complex tread designs and the physical properties of snow have not been characterized. We employ the Material Point Method (MPM) for simulating a material that mimics the fracturing and...
Branched covering spaces are a mathematical concept which originates from complex analysis and topology and has found applications in tensor field topology and geometry re-meshing. Given a manifold surface and an N-way rotational symmetry field, a branched covering space is a manifold surface that has an N-to-1 map to the...
Application Stores, such as the iTunes App Store, give developers access to their users’ complaints and requests in the form of application reviews. However, little is known about how developers are responding to application reviews. Without such knowledge developers, users, Application Stores, and researchers could make incorrect assumptions. To address...
Biologists regularly collect images of leaves for their further studies. One such biological study of leaves is scoring the phenomic characters of leaves for the construction of the Tree of Life (ToL), i.e. the evolutionary lineage of taxa in botany. There is an opportunity for computer vision to help biologists...
Monte-Carlo Tree Search (MCTS) is an online-planning algorithm for decision-theoretic planning in domains with stochastic and combinatorial structure. The general applicability of MCTS makes it an ideal first choice to investigate when developing planners for complex applications requiring automated control and planning. The first contribution of this thesis is to...
Automatic analysis of American football videos can help teams develop strategies and extract patterns with less human effort. In this work, we focus on the problem of automatically determining which team is on offense/defense, which is an important subproblem for higher-level analysis. While seemingly mundane, this problem is quite challenging...
Desktop widget engines have emerged as an alternative for completing simple tasks without the need for a full-blown application or constant user interaction. Widgets can simply display data in a compact and visually appealing manner (such as stock tickers, weather forecasts, and news notifications), or go so far as to...
There is a growing interest in bringing online and streaming content to the television. Gaming platforms such as the PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii are at the center of this digital convergence; platforms for accessing new media services. This presents a number of interface challenges, as controllers designed for gaming...
Visual programming languages (VPLs) have been widely used to support end-user programming. However, end users are still not able to reuse code as actively as professional programmers, even when given abundant resources such as a large VPL program repository. One reason may be that current VPL development environments lack features...
The increasing demand for forest products and restricted use of natural forests has resulted in a shortage of high-strength wood fiber. The area covered by plantation forests is steadily rising, but the fiber produced by these forests is often unsuitable for high-strength applications. One attempt to combat this problem is...
The gradient of a velocity vector field is an asymmetric tensor field which can provide critical insight that is difficult to infer from traditional trajectory-based vector field visualization techniques. I describe the structures in the eigenvalue and eigenvector fields of the gradient tensor and how these structures can be used...
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) can be defined as companies acting in accordance with societal demands. In recent years, CSR has gradually become a leading issue in business. Heightened corporate attention to CSR has not been entirely voluntary. Many companies awoke to it only after being surprised by public response to...
Virtual environments and simulations are being used increasingly to both visualize and understand data as well as to create scenarios for training and analysis purposes. In this paper, we are interested in the use of simulation and visualization of interactive virtual agents to create realistic motions for training scenarios. We...
A purpose built facility was designed, built and operated at the Advanced Thermal Hydraulic Research Laboratory, which is located at Oregon State University. This facility was used to heat a plate of Alloy 304 Stainless Steel to 800 °C and then cool the plate using a fine mist of water...
Recent efforts in user-control of data-driven characters have focused on designing high-level graph data-structures that we call a Behavior Finite State Machine (BFSM). A BFSM is an interactive data-structure that benefits from the advantages of both motion graphs and blend-based techniques for generating animated motion. Each node in a BFSM...
Fluid simulation is an interesting research problem with a wide range of applications including mechanical engineering, special effects in movies and games, and scientific simulation. Due to the complex nature of typical fluid flow equations, there are circumstances where a full volumetric fluid simulation may not be necessary to generate...
We present an approach for generating a character’s response in anticipation of an impending impact. Protective anticipatory movement is built upon several simple actions that have been identified as response mechanisms in monkeys and in humans. These actions are parameterized by a model of the interaction based on the approaching...