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- Assessment of activity trackers: toward an acceptance modelPublication . Sol, Ricardo; Baras, KarolinaIn this project we seek to understand the factors that influence user acceptance of Activity Trackers, through a model that quantifies how users come to adhere to the use of Activity Trackers. The proposed research model and hypotheses were validated and tested with data collected from a cross-sectional survey conducted using a self-selected convenience sample. Constructs from half dozen of established models were gathered into a suppositional model, based on their hypothetical applicable relevance for the Activity Trackers use. The results were analyzed using a variety of statistical techniques including Structural Equation analysis. The final result can be a first step for researchers aiming to complement their own processes of study, ideation or design of Activity by taking into account factors such as Usefulness, Ease of Use, Health Consciousness, Hedonic Motivation, Image, Habit, etc.
- Smart mobility: a surveyPublication . Faria, Ricardo; Brito, Lina; Baras, Karolina; Silva, JoséInternet of Things (IoT) describes a world where everyday objects are always connected to the Internet, allowing them to communicate and interact with each other. By connecting these everyday objects to the Internet and making them available everywhere at any time, IoT allows to remotely monitor, manage, and gather status information about them and their surrounding environment. IoT is a revolutionary concept that brought new experiences to everyday life and enabled Smart City initiatives all over the world. These initiatives are using a combination of technology paired with physical infrastructure and services, to improve people’s quality of life. One of the high priority domain to support the Smart City’s vision is the field of Smart Mobility. This paper reviews the current IoT approaches and concepts related to Smart Cities and Smart Mobility. In addition, it analyzes distinct features and numerous applications covering both Intelligent Transportation and Real Time Traffic Management Systems.
- Supporting Students' Mental Health and Academic Success Through Mobile App and IoTPublication . Baras, Karolina; Soares, Luísa; Lucas, Carla Vale; Oliveira, Filipa; Paulo, Norberto Pinto; Barros, ReginaSmartphones have become devices of choice for running studies on health and well-being, especially among young people. When entering college,students often face many challenges,such as adaptation to new situations, establish new interpersonal relationships, heavier workload and shorter deadlines, teamwork assignments and others. In this paper, the results of four studies examining students’ well being and mental health as well as student’s perception of challenges and obstacles they face during their academic journey are presented. In addition, a mobile application that acts as a complement to a successful tutoring project implemented at the authors’ University is proposed. The application allows students to keep their schedules and deadlines in one place while incorporating virtual tutor features. By using both, the events from the student’s calendar and his or her mood indicators, the application sends notifications accordingly. These notifications encompass motivational phrases, time management guidelines, as well as relaxation tips.
- Smart mobility: a mobile approachPublication . Faria, Ricardo; Brito, Lina; Baras, Karolina; Silva, JoséThe Internet of Things (IoT) is one of the key ingredients for the real ization of Smart Cities. IoT devices are essential components of the Smart Cities infrastructure, as they can provide information collected from the environment through sensors or allow other systems to reach out and act on the world through actuators. IoT data collection, however, is not limited to sensors and machines, but to data from social networks, and the web. Social networks have a huge im pact on the amount of data being produced daily, becoming an increasingly cen tral and important data source. The exploitation of these data sources, combined with the growing popularity of mobile devices, can lead to the development of better solutions to improve people’s quality of life. This paper discusses how to take advantage of the benefits of mobile devices and the vast range of information sources and services, such as traffic conditions, and narrow, closed or conditioned roads data. The proposed system uses a real-time collection, organization, and transmission of traffic and road conditions data to provide efficient and accurate information to drivers. With the purpose of supporting and improving traffic data collection and distribution, an Android application was developed to collect in formation about extraordinary events that take place in a city, providing warnings and alternative routes to drivers and helping them to improve their time manage ment. The developed solution also exploits the existing gaps in other applications, implementing a more specific solution for the Madeira Island traffic condition problems.
- Acceptance model in designing for extreme users: extreme athletes using activity trackersPublication . Sol, Ricardo; Baras, Karolina‘Extreme Users’ (EU) is a design method in Human Computer Interaction, which allows user-centered design in design groups. ‘Acceptance Models’ is a theory in Information Systems, which models how users accept and use technology. We conducted a study to explore the relationships of the factors influencing Extreme Athletes in the acceptance and use of Activity Trackers (AT). The data was collected from a cross-sectional survey conducted using a self-selected convenience sample of 206. The research rendered an exploration and an examination of the factors affecting trail-running athletes. The results were analyzed using several statistical techniques including Structural Equation Analysis. Our goal was to observe to what extent the Health Information Technology Acceptance Model patterns and outlines EU use of AT. This contribution, to the best of our knowledge, is new given that the obtained model can be an initial quantitative working primary tool for designers using the EU design method.
- PhysioVR: a novel mobile virtual reality framework for physiological computingPublication . Muñoz, John Edison; Paulino, Teresa; Vasanth, Harry; Baras, KarolinaVirtual Reality (VR) is morphing into a ubiquitous technology by leveraging of smartphones and screenless cases in order to provide highly immersive experiences at a low price point. The result of this shift in paradigm is now known as mobile VR (mVR). Although mVR offers numerous advantages over conventional immersive VR methods, one of the biggest limitations is related with the interaction pathways available for the mVR experiences. Using physiological computing principles, we created the PhysioVR framework, an Open-Source software tool developed to facilitate the integration of physiological signals measured through wearable devices in mVR applications. PhysioVR includes heart rate (HR) signals from Android wearables, electroencephalography (EEG) signals from a low cost brain computer interface and electromyography (EMG) signals from a wireless armband. The physiological sensors are connected with a smartphone via Bluetooth and the PhysioVR facilitates the streaming of the data using UDP communication protocol, thus allowing a multicast transmission for a third party application such as the Unity3D game engine. Furthermore, the framework provides a bidirectional communication with the VR content allowing an external event triggering using a real-time control as well as data recording options. We developed a demo game project called EmoCat Rescue which encourage players to modulate HR levels in order to successfully complete the in-game mission. EmoCat Rescue is included in the PhysioVR project which can be freely downloaded. This framework simplifies the acquisition, streaming and recording of multiple physiological signals and parameters from wearable consumer devices providing a single and efficient interface to create novel physiologically-responsive mVR applications.
- Groups and frequent visitors shaping the space dynamicsPublication . Baras, Karolina; Moreira, AdrianoOur research is about a dynamic symbolic space model that is fed with data from the environment by a set of processing modules that receive raw data from sensor networks. For the conducted experiments we have been using data from a WiFi network as it is a widely available infrastructure in our campus. Here we propose two processing modules which will provide more information about the spaces described in the model. The first one tries to implement our human perception of the usual visitors of a place using two measures, the long term and the short term tenant level. The second one detects where groups of users emerge, how many there are and what are their dimensions. Based on this new perspective of the campus we intend to realize how the presence of people shapes the dynamics of a space.
- Navigation based on symbolic space modelsPublication . Baras, Karolina; Moreira, A.; Meneses, F.Existing navigation systems are very appropriate for car navigation, but lack support for convenient pedestrian navigation and cannot be used indoors due to GPS limitations. In addition, the creation and the maintenance of the required models are costly and time consuming, and are usually based on proprietary data structures. In this paper we describe a navigation system based on a human inspired symbolic space model. We argue that symbolic space models are much easier to create and to maintain, and that they can support routing applications based on self-locating through the recognition of nearby features. Our symbolic space model is supported by a federation of servers where the spatial descriptions are stored, and which provide interfaces for feeding and querying the model. Local models residing in different servers may be connected between them, thus contributing to the system scalability. 1
- Overview of context-sensitive technologies for well-beingPublication . Freitas, André; Brito, Lina; Baras, Karolina; Silva, JoséToday smart devices such as smartphones, smartwatches and activity trackers are widely available and accepted in most developed societies. These devices present a broad set of sensors capable of extracting detailed information about different situations of daily life, which, if used for good, have the potential to improve the quality of life not only for individuals but also for the society in general. One of the key areas where this type of information can help to improve the quality of life is in healthcare since it allows to monitor and infer the current level of well-being of the smart devices carriers. In this paper, some of the available literature about well-being sensing through context-aware data is reviewed. Also, the main types of mechanisms used in these studies are identified. These mechanisms are related to monitoring, generalization, inference, feedback, energy management and privacy. Furthermore, a description of the mechanisms used in each study is presented.
- Towards a novel optical access networks management solution: addressing general management complexityPublication . Gonçalves, Tiago; Baras, Karolina; Brito, LinaPast technological advances and an increasing need to communicate have led to the creation of the current telecommunications networks. A critical part of a telecommunications network is the access network, since it must bridge the clients with the services provided, ensuring an efficient connection between them. In the last few years, both governments and organizations from several countries have adopted large fiber optics implementations in their access networks, given its broadband capabilities. However, the structure of such networks can become very complex, forcing organizations to use means that allow them to efficiently manage such complexity. Several software solutions available on the market are capable of providing management features for these networks, but the complexity of these solutions can negatively affect management, making it lengthy and error-prone. In this paper, we describe the initial development of a software solution, consisting of a set of integrated tools that will make optical access networks management more efficient by addressing the complexity limitations of the current solutions. One of the tools, presented in this paper, was tested with a local ISP (Internet Service Provider) and showed to be capable of overcoming the limitations faced by the organization on managing their optical access network.