24 Matching Results

Results open in a new window/tab.

Tangible Struggle (open access)

Tangible Struggle

The focus of my graduate work was to find my own voice through my continued efforts in woodcarving. I proposed to produce six to eight wood carved sculptures for my thesis that would be dealing with a juxtaposition of struggle expressively portrayed by the figure between two-dimensional and three-dimensional worlds. I used these works to express my emotions about myself, and my interactions with others in a form of nonverbal communication with the viewer. The result of this process did lead me to find my own voice and with this voice I expressed three-dimensionally, not only my own struggles, but also those that many other women have experienced as well.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Whelan, Shawn
System: The UNT Digital Library
User Modeling Tools for Virtual Architecture (open access)

User Modeling Tools for Virtual Architecture

As the use of virtual environments (VEs) is becoming more widespread, user needs are becoming a more significant part in those environments. In order to adapt to the needs of the user, a system should be able to infer user interests and goals. I developed an architecture for user modeling to understand users' interests in a VE by monitoring their actions. In this paper, I discussed the architecture and the virtual environment that was created to test it. This architecture employs sensors to keep track of all the users' actions, data structures that can store a record of significant events that have occurred in the environment, and a rule base. The rule base continually monitors the data collected from the sensors, world state, and event history in order to update the user goal inferences. These inferences can then be used to modify the flow of events within a VE.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Uppuluri, Raja
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Feasibility of Multicasting in RMI (open access)

The Feasibility of Multicasting in RMI

Due to the growing need of the Internet and networking technologies, simple, powerful, easily maintained distributed applications needed to be developed. These kinds of applications can benefit greatly from distributed computing concepts. Despite its powerful mechanisms, Jini has yet to be accepted in mainstream Java development. Until that happens, we need to find better Remote Method Invocation (RMI) solutions. Feasibility of implementation of Multicasting in RMI is worked in this paper. Multicasting capability can be used in RMI using Jini-like technique. Support of Multicast over Unicast reference layer is also studied. A piece of code explaining how it can be done, is added.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Ujjinihavildar, Vinay
System: The UNT Digital Library
Content-Based Image Retrieval by Integration of Metadata Encoded Multimedia Features in Constructing a Video Summarizer Application. (open access)

Content-Based Image Retrieval by Integration of Metadata Encoded Multimedia Features in Constructing a Video Summarizer Application.

Content-based image retrieval (CBIR) is the retrieval of images from a collection by means of internal feature measures of the information content of the images. In CBIR systems, text media is usually used only to retrieve exemplar images for further searching by image feature content. This research work describes a new method for integrating multimedia text and image content features to increase the retrieval performance of the system. I am exploring the content-based features of an image extracted from a video to build a storyboard for search retrieval of images. Metadata encoded multimedia features include extracting primitive features like color, shape and text from an image. Histograms are built for all the features extracted and stored in a database. Images are searched based on comparing these histogram values of the extracted image with the stored values. These histogram values are used for extraction of keyframes from a collection of images parsed from a video file. Individual shots of images are extracted from a video clip and run through processes that extract the features and build the histogram values. A keyframe extraction algorithm is run to get the keyframes from the collection of images to build a storyboard of images. In …
Date: May 2003
Creator: Anusuri, Ramprasad
System: The UNT Digital Library
Voyeurism and Fetishism (open access)

Voyeurism and Fetishism

This problem in lieu of thesis concerns voyeurism and fetishism and how they relate to art. It addresses at voyeurism from both sides of the gaze. It describes a body of work that was created to explore the relationship between the voyeur and the fetish object and the viewer and the art object.
Date: May 2003
Creator: De Anda, Veronica
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Creation of Modern Fashions through the Merging of Eastern and Western culture: Spring Message (open access)

The Creation of Modern Fashions through the Merging of Eastern and Western culture: Spring Message

I have always believed the design of clothes should not try to conceal the naked body but should act as a catalyst that reveals the existence and strength of the individual. Spring Message includes three phases, Spring Message, Mystification, and My Paradise to reflect my three life experiences. Spring Message is an attempt to express my thoughts and ideas though designs in fashion, which were derived from the ancient beliefs, traditions, and western influence I have experienced. Through my individual pieces and creations I hope the viewer will be able to see who I am, where I came from, and understand the happiness and changes in my life.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Cui, Yan
System: The UNT Digital Library
Woven Music (open access)

Woven Music

When I am weaving I listen to music and notice that my hands and feet fall into a rhythm. This connection reminds me of playing the piano. I took a closer look at weaving drafts; the movement of the threading setup reminded me of the notes on musical scores. This relationship inspired me to see what textures I could achieve by actually weaving the musical notes. The focus of my study is the exploration of the relationships between weaving and music utilizing elements and principles found in both, such as: color, texture, form, repetition, rhythm, and time. Both music and color produce emotional responses and will be taken into consideration within the weavings.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Jackson, Melanie S.
System: The UNT Digital Library

Evaluation of MPLS Enabled Networks

Access: Use of this item is restricted to the UNT Community
Recent developments in the Internet have inspired a wide range of business and consumer applications. The deployment of multimedia-based services has driven the demand for increased and guaranteed bandwidth requirements over the network. The diverse requirements of the wide range of users demand differentiated classes of service and quality assurance. The new technology of Multi-protocol label switching (MPLS) has emerged as a high performance and reliable option to address these challenges apart from the additional features that were not addressed before. This problem in lieu of thesis describes how the new paradigm of MPLS is advantageous over the conventional architecture. The motivation for this paradigm is discussed in the first part, followed by a detailed description of this new architecture. The information flow, the underlying protocols and the MPLS extensions to some of the traditional protocols are then discussed followed by the description of the simulation. The simulation results are used to show the advantages of the proposed technology.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Ratnakaram, Archith
System: The UNT Digital Library

Study and Sample Implementation of the Secure Shell Protocol (SSH)

Access: Use of this item is restricted to the UNT Community
Security is one of the main concerns of users who need to connect to a remote computer for various purposes, such as checking e-mails or viewing files. However in today's computer networks, privacy, transmission to intended client is not guaranteed. If data is transmitted over the Internet or a local network as plain text it may be captured and viewed by anyone with little technical knowledge. This may include sensitive data such as passwords. Big businesses use firewalls, virtual private networks and encrypt their transmissions to counter this at high costs. Secure shell protocol (SSH) provides an answer to this. SSH is a software protocol for secure communication over an insecure network. SSH not only offers authentication of hosts but also encrypts the sessions between the client and the server and is transparent to the end user. This Problem in Lieu of Thesis makes a study of SSH and creates a sample secure client and server which follows SSH and examines its performance.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Subramanyam, Udayakiran
System: The UNT Digital Library
Technology, Ontology, and Pop (open access)

Technology, Ontology, and Pop

This problem in lieu of thesis outlines a body of work that uses technology and pop elements to discover ways to understand what it means to be human. In doing so it expands the interpretation of technology, ontology, and pop, and allowed the artist to find an essential balance between the three. It details the understanding of these borrowed aesthetics and their connection to the creative process.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Tosten, Erik
System: The UNT Digital Library

Students' Perception of Videoconference Courses: A Case Study of the University of North Texas

Access: Use of this item is restricted to the UNT Community
The objective of the survey is to observe students' perceptions of videoconference courses offered by the University of North Texas (UNT). The perceptions of 348 students enrolled in videoconferencing (VC) courses in the fall 2002 semester were obtained through a 29-item course evaluation questionnaire. From this study, I conclude generally that UNT students perceive videoconference courses as a positive stride in providing classes. While it was expected that students at remote sites would experience greater technological problems and lower levels of student/teacher interaction, evaluations from remote sites indicate higher degrees of student satisfaction than those students taking VC courses at the main campus location.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Christopher, Chris-Junior
System: The UNT Digital Library

The Production Effects of Protectionist Announcements: An Examination of the Steel Industry

Access: Use of this item is restricted to the UNT Community
The well-being of the American steel industry is vital to the overall health of the United States (U.S.) economy. This belief is, in part, the impetus for the enactment of protective tariffs and quotas. This paper examines the impact of the announcement of the 2001 tariffs. Numerous forces have buffeted the U.S. steel industry over the last decade. Domestic steel firms operate in a highly global, fiercely competitive, and capital-intensive industry. This environment has proven inhospitable to the U.S. steel industry, widely criticized for inefficiency and overcapacity. A regression analysis finds that the announcement of the 2001 tariffs had no statistically significant impact on U.S. domestic raw steel production. Supporting theories are reexamined, and the implications of this finding for trade policy are explored.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Pharr, Matthew C.
System: The UNT Digital Library

Organic Revelations

Access: Use of this item is restricted to the UNT Community
Recently my creative process has led to a new area of investigation and exploration. I have discovered that I enjoy the unexpected occurrences that happen while painting. I have an appreciation for the parts of my works that do not follow the preliminary sketch and are produced more subconsciously. While usually this aspect has been restricted by the adherence to a preliminary sketch and narrative, the new works explore these occurrences more fully. In the new works, I worked in a more spontaneous manner to create work that does not focus strictly on narrative but reveals itself more as a journey or exploration.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Jones, Paul David
System: The UNT Digital Library
Agent-Based Architecture for Web Deployment of Multi-Agents as Conversational Interfaces. (open access)

Agent-Based Architecture for Web Deployment of Multi-Agents as Conversational Interfaces.

Agent-based architecture explains the rationale and basis for developing agents that can interact with users through natural language query/answer patterns developed systematically using AIML (artificial intelligence mark-up language) scripts. This thesis research document also explains the architecture for VISTA (virtual interactive story-telling agents), which is used for interactive querying in educational and recreational purposes. Agents are very effective as conversational interfaces when used along side with graphical user interface (GUI) in applications and Web pages. This architecture platform can support multiple agents with or with out sharing of knowledgebase. They are very useful as chat robots for recreational purposes, customer service and educational purposes. This platform is powered by Java servlet implementation of Program D and contained in Apache Tomcat server. The AIML scripting language defined here in is a generic form of XML language and forms the knowledgebase of the bot. Animation is provided with Microsoft® Agent technology and text-to-speech support engine.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Pothuru, Ranjit Kumar
System: The UNT Digital Library
Security problems in 802.11 wireless networks standard due to the inefficiency of wired equivalent privacy protocol. (open access)

Security problems in 802.11 wireless networks standard due to the inefficiency of wired equivalent privacy protocol.

Due to the rapid growth of wireless networking, the fallible security issues of the 802.11 standard have come under close scrutiny. Nowadays most of the organizations are eager to setup wireless local area networks to reduce the hassles of limited mobility provided by conventional wired network. There are serious security issues that need to be sorted out before everyone is willing to transmit valuable corporate information on a wireless network. This report documents the inherent flaws in wired equivalent privacy protocol used by the 802.11 standard and the ensuing security breaches that can occur to a wireless network due to these flaws. The solutions suggested in this report might not actually make the 802.11 standard secure, but will surely help in the lead up to a secure wireless network standard.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Samanthapudi, Varma
System: The UNT Digital Library
Precision measurements of the hyperfine structure in the 23P state of 3He. (open access)

Precision measurements of the hyperfine structure in the 23P state of 3He.

The unusually large hyperfine structure splittings in the 23P state of the 3He isotope is measured using electro-optic techniques with high precision laser spectroscopy. Originally designed to probe the fine structure of the 4He atom, this experimental setup along with special modifications I implemented to resolve certain 3He related issues has made possible new high precision hyperfine structure measurements. Discussed are the details of the experimental setup and the modifications, including in depth information necessary to consider while performing these measurements. The results of these hyperfine structure measurements give an order of magnitude improvement in precision over the best previously reported values.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Smiciklas, Marc
System: The UNT Digital Library
Analysis of Japanese Exports and Imports of Rice (open access)

Analysis of Japanese Exports and Imports of Rice

This research shows that the Japanese rice policy has affected the volume of exported and imported rice; moreover, multilateral and bilateral agreements have also affected Japanese rice policy. Japan's institution of subsidies and trade barriers has made its rice products too expensive for foreign trade and its domestic consumers. Since the WTO agreement has forced Japan to open its market gradually over six years, Japan may be unable to compete internationally because of its limited land, high labor costs, and the field utility fees.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Shiraiwa, Toshio
System: The UNT Digital Library
DICOM Image Scrubbing Software Library/Utility (open access)

DICOM Image Scrubbing Software Library/Utility

This software is aimed at providing user-friendly, easy-to-use environment for the user to scrub (de-identify/modify) the DICOM header information. Some tools either anonymize or default the values without the user interaction. The user doesn't have the flexibility to edit the header information. One cannot scrub set of images simultaneously (batch scrubbing). This motivated to develop a tool/utility that can scrub a set of images in a single step more efficiently. This document also addresses security issues of the patient confidentiality to achieve protection of patient identifying information and some technical requirements
Date: May 2003
Creator: Ponnam, Bhavani Srikanth
System: The UNT Digital Library
Memento (open access)

Memento

Chapter 1 describes my previous jewelry work related to my interest in body parts and other materials as medium and lockets. The questions in the statement of problem deal with how the use of a specific body site, color and incorporation of body parts in my jewelry make my work more intimate to the wearer. Chapter 2 discusses the work I focused around the questions proposed in Chapter 1. Important points are: a more focused way of using specific body sites to support my ideas, the use of different skin colors in my work, and the physical effect of my jewelry to the wearer. Chapter 3 expresses my own criticism about the work and my future goals after this project.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Kataoka, Masumi
System: The UNT Digital Library
Industrial Landscapes: Humanity Coexisting with Nature (open access)

Industrial Landscapes: Humanity Coexisting with Nature

The focus of this project was on creating images of our industrial landscape and shows the coexistence of culture and nature. I confronted the landscape from a position that is accepting of our present landscape. While not idealizing the present industrial landscape I wanted to depict it in a way that is not devoid of beauty. I believe that no matter how the land is altered a certain grace still comes through in any landscape. In not idealizing or criticizing I wanted to show industrial areas in an accepting light and reveal the grace and beauty that is within every landscape. It is through my photographs and all the subjective decisions made when creating these images that make it possible for others to see the beauty in these industrial landscapes.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Espey, Benjamin
System: The UNT Digital Library
Benchmark-based Page Replacement (BBPR) Strategy: A New Web Cache Page Replacement Strategy (open access)

Benchmark-based Page Replacement (BBPR) Strategy: A New Web Cache Page Replacement Strategy

World Wide Web caching is widely used through today's Internet. When correctly deployed, Web caching systems can lead to significant bandwidth savings, network load reduction, server load balancing, and higher content availability. A document replacement algorithm that can lower retrieval latency and yield high hit ratio is the key to the effectiveness of proxy caches. More than twenty cache algorithms have been employed in academic studies and in corporate communities as well. But there are some drawbacks in the existing replacement algorithms. To overcome these shortcomings, we developed a new page replacement strategy named as Benchmark-Based Page Replacement (BBPR) strategy, in which a HTTP benchmark is used as a tool to evaluate the current network load and the server load. By our simulation model, the BBPR strategy shows better performance than the LRU (Least Recently Used) method, which is the most commonly used algorithm. The tradeoff is a reduced hit ratio. Slow pages benefit from BBPR.
Date: May 2003
Creator: He, Wei
System: The UNT Digital Library
Pop Baroque (open access)

Pop Baroque

My objective was to make a body of work that used baroque sensibilities with my own connections to popular culture. A series of mixed media works and one installation were created that infused baroque motifs with present popular design. My interpretation of the presence of the Baroque was expanded by using vivid colors, textures, patterns and designs collected from my environment during an investigation of the theatrical fantasies of popular culture. I expected to make work that could be approached conceptually from different angles, while being seductive on the surface.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Gassiraro, Jennifer
System: The UNT Digital Library
Masking Meaning (open access)

Masking Meaning

Chapter I describes the purpose of the project, which was to develop a body of work that exhibits my current thought process. The questions presented to myself consisted of the following: 1. How effective was the expression of my ideas socially and politically after the change to the work? 2. Was the minimal approach a tool that contributes or detracts from this effectiveness? 3. Did an increase in scale successfully act as an element of confrontation? Chapter II describes the inspiration behind the making of my work it also discusses problems encountered with an understanding of the viewer concerning imagery. Chapter III summarizes the methodology behind the execution of the new body of work. It also discusses how simplification of imagery works as a solution to my problems.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Allee, Jake R.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Experiencing the view. (open access)

Experiencing the view.

This article discusses the way people experience the landscape. Tracing the progress of landscape photography from the late nineteenth century to the present, the author introduces the way concepts in landscape photography have changed. The author's photographs are discussed regarding how they build on the foundation of this historical precedent. Using photographs of individuals at places they think are special, the author examines their perception of landscape. The positions and actions of the subjects shape the way their attitudes are conveyed. The concept of beauty is discussed as it relates to the appreciation of landscape. By discussing with the subjects why these places are special and photographing with the intent to convey what those reasons are, the author's photographs examine the relationship of people to the landscape.
Date: May 2003
Creator: Madsen, Michael J.
System: The UNT Digital Library