Comments on: Computing Research Initiatives for the 21st Century http://www.cccblog.org/2008/12/19/computing-research-initiatives-for-the-21st-century/ The Computing Community Consortium Wed, 28 Jul 2010 10:36:39 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 By: Benefits of Vdeo Conferencing http://www.cccblog.org/2008/12/19/computing-research-initiatives-for-the-21st-century/comment-page-1/#comment-451 Benefits of Vdeo Conferencing Wed, 04 Feb 2009 05:47:19 +0000 http://www.cccblog.org/?p=87#comment-451 About six months I witness the wonder of videoconferencing when I was asked to deliver my lecture from my university to a high school via video conferencing. First I was thinking it was just a camera recording my lecture and will make the necessary editing to show the high school students but later I realized that I was interacting with the students live. Great technology About six months I witness the wonder of videoconferencing when I was asked to deliver my lecture from my university to a high school via video conferencing. First I was thinking it was just a camera recording my lecture and will make the necessary editing to show the high school students but later I realized that I was interacting with the students live. Great technology

]]> By: Ruzena Bajcsy http://www.cccblog.org/2008/12/19/computing-research-initiatives-for-the-21st-century/comment-page-1/#comment-424 Ruzena Bajcsy Tue, 23 Dec 2008 00:17:31 +0000 http://www.cccblog.org/?p=87#comment-424 Creating a USA-wide (and eventually internationally-wide) Cyber Infrastructure for True Immersive Collaboration among Geographically Distributed Sites. By Ruzena Bajcsy (UCB) and Klara Nahrstedt (UIUC) Geographically Distributed Tele-immersive Applications (TI) represent a new class of collaborative systems that allow for direct interaction in a shared visual space . Current Status: The current collaborative geographically distributed multi-party technologies can share via video conferencing (tele-presence) only independent views, but there exists no shared visual space for all participants with direct interaction among them. The only interaction available in current collaborative technologies is via shared slides (e.g., WebEx), text (e.g., InstantMessaging), audio (e.g., Free Conference Call service) and individual video feeds in separate windows (e.g., AccessGrid, Polycom). The 3D camera and display technologies in conjunction with Computer Vision and Graphics software are quite advanced so that they can provide the necessary information to create locally acceptable, real-time shared, immersive visual environments for physical interactions. Network technologies for LAN-based real-time interactivity are available and enable LAN-based shared visual environments. Many applications of shared visual and immersive environments exist in military, civilian domains such as health care (physiotherapy, collaborating on planning surgery), manufacturing to facilitate different designs, education of physical activities (e.g., tai-chi, dance, wheel-chair basketball) and entertainment (e.g., Wii-fit games). Future Vision and Challenges: We need investment into the distributed immersive infrastructure to connect at least 5 to 10 sites and the corresponding research. With this investment we will be able to gain insights and understanding of the following problems: - 3D Data compression for multi-view video, i.e., what and how much information and in what format should be extracted and transmitted so that for given application the RIGHT Information is available at the RIGHT time. - End-to-End resource allocation approaches, efficient distributed algorithms and sound network architectures and protocols for diverse computing and networking infrastructures residing between the multi-sensory (multimedia) 3D data acquisition (TI site) and data display (TI site) to achieve efficacy in power and bandwidth consumptions, while yielding interactive delays and latency capabilities for immersive data dissemination and view changes. The main challenges for the above research are that the end performance of all involved components must yield REAL TIME experience for end users to give them interactivity capabilities! This means, e.g. at least 30-100 fps for immersive 3D HDTV-size data acquisition and 80-100 ms user end-to-end delays for TI computational and networking algorithms. Creating a USA-wide (and eventually internationally-wide) Cyber Infrastructure for True Immersive Collaboration among Geographically Distributed Sites.

By Ruzena Bajcsy (UCB) and Klara Nahrstedt (UIUC)

Geographically Distributed Tele-immersive Applications (TI) represent a new class of collaborative systems that allow for direct interaction in a shared visual space .

Current Status: The current collaborative geographically distributed multi-party technologies can share via video conferencing (tele-presence) only independent views, but there exists no shared visual space for all participants with direct interaction among them. The only interaction available in current collaborative technologies is via shared slides (e.g., WebEx), text (e.g., InstantMessaging), audio (e.g., Free Conference Call service) and individual video feeds in separate windows (e.g., AccessGrid, Polycom).
The 3D camera and display technologies in conjunction with Computer Vision and Graphics software are quite advanced so that they can provide the necessary information to create locally acceptable, real-time shared, immersive visual environments for physical interactions. Network technologies for LAN-based real-time interactivity are available and enable LAN-based shared visual environments. Many applications of shared visual and immersive environments exist in military, civilian domains such as health care (physiotherapy, collaborating on planning surgery), manufacturing to facilitate different designs, education of physical activities (e.g., tai-chi, dance, wheel-chair basketball) and entertainment (e.g., Wii-fit games).

Future Vision and Challenges: We need investment into the distributed immersive infrastructure to connect at least 5 to 10 sites and the corresponding research. With this investment we will be able to gain insights and understanding of the following problems:
- 3D Data compression for multi-view video, i.e., what and how much information and in what format should be extracted and transmitted so that for given application the RIGHT Information is available at the RIGHT time.
- End-to-End resource allocation approaches, efficient distributed algorithms and sound network architectures and protocols for diverse computing and networking infrastructures residing between the multi-sensory (multimedia) 3D data acquisition (TI site) and data display (TI site) to achieve efficacy in power and bandwidth consumptions, while yielding interactive delays and latency capabilities for immersive data dissemination and view changes.

The main challenges for the above research are that the end performance of all involved components must yield REAL TIME experience for end users to give them interactivity capabilities! This means, e.g. at least 30-100 fps for immersive 3D HDTV-size data acquisition and 80-100 ms user end-to-end delays for TI computational and networking algorithms.

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