Category Archives: CLARITY

Mar 2009 Hiring a Surface Computing research assistant

(updated March 13th 2009)

Research Assistant – Human Computer Interfaces
Post Duration 20 Months

A Research Assistant is sought for a 20 month period to work on ‘Tabletop, Mobile and Interactive Surfaces”, a funded research project and based in UCD School of Computer Science and Informatics with Dr. Aaron Quigley based in the Complex and Adaptive Systems Laboratory. NOTE: The formal advertisement for this will go online in the coming weeks so I will update this post with links to the UCD advertisement and application process then.

This project forms the first part of a phased program of research exploring the role of tabletop computing along with coupled public and private displays in rehabilitation, gaming and computer supported corporative work. The research assistant is expected to explore questions posed by the project lead and other team members. A large component of this post will be the development of research prototypes, using off the shelf development toolkits along with contributing to our open source developments in this area. Strong programming skills along with the ability to work with software and hardware co-design. The research assistant is further expected to support and maintain the tabletop physical hardware systems in place within the CASL along with developing new forms of system as called upon in the course of this research.

Recent developments have seen the wide spread proliferation of both large shared displays and small display technologies. In parallel we have seen the emergence of new classes of device which support both touch or multi touch interaction. Examples of small touch driven devices include PDAs, Tablets and iPhones and examples of large interactive surfaces (mutli-touch driven displays) include the Diamondtouch and Microsoft Surface Computing. Interactive surfaces offer great potential for face-to-face work and social interaction and provide natural ways to directly manipulate virtual objects whereas small devices afford the individual a personal workspace or “scratch space” to formulate ideas before bringing them to a wider audience. Advanced visual interfaces can be built around a combination of both private and public touch driven displays. Such computer mediated multi-device interaction between local touch-driven displays and shared public ones presents a number of novel and challenging research problems.

The Research Assistant will work under the direction of the Project Leader, Dr Aaron Quigley. Candidates for the position must have an undergraduate degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering or Computer Engineering. Demonstrated experience with hardware or image or video processing is a plus. The post would suit an exceptional recent graduate or a graduate with 1-3 years development experience. Given the highly specialised nature of this research, candidates are not expected to have development experience with tabletop or surface computing, however demonstrated experience with the development of novel or exceptional user interfaces is a plus.

Candidates should have very good research skills, an ability to work independently to a tight schedule, and experience in writing and editing reports. The appointment may begin on the 1st of June 2009. The project will be managed by Dr. Aaron Quigley and collaborations with CLARITY researchers may form part of this project going forward. The annual salary for this post is €26,000 – €29,000 per annum.

Please note that although the job is based in Dublin there will be opportunities to travel for conferences and collaborative activities elsewhere (travel and accommodation provision will be made for this.)

Principal Duties and Responsibilities

  • Responsible for the development of demonstrator or proof of concept prototypes will tabletop systems.
  • Responsible for maintenance, support and development of the tabletop hardware systems in this project.
  • Responsible for developing high quality code (suitable for open source release), as well as stand-alone proof-of-concepts and prototypes on mobile platforms (eg. iPhone).
  • Responsible for developing multi-device (coupled) applications software and robust prototypes.
  • Writing standards-compliant APIs.
  • Work with other team members, including postgraduate, postdoctoral and researchers as directed by the project lead.

Selection Criteria
Mandatory

  • Degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering or Computer
    Engineering.
  • Strong programming skills.
  • Excellent communication skills.
  • Strong understanding of interfaces.
  • The ablity to adapt to changing priorities and to thrive in a fast-paced work environment.
  • Fluency in the English language.

Desirable

  • Experience with hardware or image or video processing.
  • Understanding of basics of Usability, Human Computer Interaction, and Design Guidelines.

Oct 2008 PhD-position: Collaborative Tabletop Recommender – CLARITY

University College Dublin as part of the CLARITY research centre is seeking an exceptional candidate to apply for a postgraduate (PhD) research scholarship on a “Collaborative Tabletop Recommender” project.

CLARITY, the Centre for Sensor Web Technologies is a joint initiative between University College Dublin and Dublin City University and supported by the Tyndall National Institute. CLARITY is a research centre that focuses on the intersection between two important research areas, Adaptive Sensing and Information Discovery, to develop innovative new technologies of critical importance to Ireland’s future industry base and contribute to improving the quality of life of people in areas such as personal health, digital media and management of our environment. http://www.clarity-centre.com

Funding is available for a student to start in Jan 2009 or July 2009. The post will remain open until filled but preference will be given, in this first round call, to candidates who apply before Oct 31st 2008. Funding includes a scholarship, fee payment and an equipment and travel allowance. The use of equipment and travel budget is by agreement with academic supervisors.

The position is supervised by Dr. Aaron Quigley and Professor Barry Smyth.
http://www.csi.ucd.ie/staff/aquigley/home
http://www.cs.ucd.ie/Staff/AcademicStaff/bsmyth/

This post will be advertised in May 2009 for a start in Sept 2009.

Apr 2008 SFI Funded CSET: CLARITY

Science Foundation Ireland is to fund a €16.4m technology partnership between UCD, DCU and Tyndall in the CLARITY CSET. I’m one of the collaborators in this centre and other academics in my research group such as Simon and Paddy and in my school in UCD are leading researchers in this world class research effort.

This CSET has grown out of the AIC who helped us secure our SFI UREKA grant in 2007 for ODCSSS, which continues to this day. Congrats to Barry and Alan and the rest of the CLARITY PIs.

Interested students should keep an eye open for future calls for both postgraduate and postdoctoral research positions with this new CSET.
News Coverage:

Jan 2008 CLARITY SFI site-visit

I’ve been involved with the Adaptive Information Cluster in UCD and DCU for a number of years. Primarily through ODCSSS, our undergraduate research internship program which they helped support with funds for the first couple of years. More recently this group of the Principal Investigators along with their associate PIs and affiliated collaborators (of which I am just 1) and their numerous industrial partners presented their bid for a CSET entitled CLARITY to an independent site visit panel. This review is part of the SFI process in the high quality peer review to decide on a CSET.

Side note…..

I’ve only been back in Ireland a few years and I’ve been through a few of these CSET visits and reviews. They are always an interesting experience. Last year I was on Computer Engineering grant review panel myself for the Foundation for Science and the Technology Portugal (Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia) so it’s always a challenging prospect for everyone involved to ensure the best quality research gets funded be it locally, nationally or internationally. By remote review to Canada and the UK and personally in Australia I got to see the full force of their NSERC/EPSRC/CRC processes which are all entirely different dynamics.
From my experience a few key aspects of successful grant review include:

  • Quality research should be the first and last metric for evaluation
  • An international panel for small countries or for larger grants
  • Zero interference from the funding body to the reviewers/panel
  • A clear understanding of the national/international funding context by the panellists
  • Both breath and depth in the review panels in terms of topics and governance.

From what I’ve seen, the SFI is one of the leaders in getting grant reviews right. They are improving the local ecosystem for research not just because they follow good practice but because they help define it.