Failures in safety-critical embedded systems can result in loss of life, environmental damage or significant property damage. Examples include control systems for commercial industries, but also protection devices in residential settings. The reliability of such systems depends on their ability to periodically execute safety-related software tasks without interruption. When updating the firmware of such safety-critical embedded systems, execution is suspended until the update is complete. This suspension, or down-time, needs to be minimized or avoided completely in order to mitigate the resulting safety risks. Here, we present the design and implementation of a secure on-the-fly method for firmware updates that minimizes the down-time of safety-critical embedded systems during firmware updates. Design considerations based on the hardware capabilities of typical micro-controllers are highlighted, a software architecture is detailed, and an experimental evaluation of the down-time and memory requirements demonstrate that the proposed approach facilitates secure on-the-fly firmware updates for general safety-critical embedded applications.

Technology integration in educational settings has led to the development of novel sensor-based tools that enable students to measure and interact with their environment. Although reports from using such tools can be positive, evaluations are often conducted under controlled conditions and short timeframes. There is a need for longitudinal data collected in realistic classroom settings. However, sustained and authentic classroom use requires technology platforms to be seen by teachers as both easy to use and of value. We describe our development of a sensor-based platform to support science teaching that followed a 14-month design process. We share insights from this design and development approach, and report findings from a six-month large-scale evaluation involving 35 schools and 1245 students. We share lessons learnt, including that technology integration is not an educational goal per se and that technology should be a transparent tool to enable students to achieve their learning goals.

This paper introduces the project Scale4Edge. The project is focused on enabling an effective RISC-V ecosystem for optimization of edge applications. We describe the basic components of this ecosystem and introduce the envisioned demonstrators, which will be used in their evaluation.

Scientific inquiry involves prediction, observation and explanation (POE) of phenomena and data. Appropriate guidance through these steps is essential for helping students learn and form positive attitudes towards science. Sensor-based education toolkits are becoming a popular way to provide this guidance, but they typically present different interfaces for measurement and learning materials which places a high cognitive demand on learners. To address this challenge, we developed a web application to integrate the scientific inquiry method where students are guided step-by-step, using a scaffolded-learning approach, through slide-based worksheets that provide direct interaction with real-time sensor measurements. We evaluate this approach through a qualitative analysis of data collected from two field studies in classrooms with a total of 42 students. We show that our approach encouraged positivity and further learning in science. Students displayed and expressed interest to conduct science experiments outside of class. We identify design implications for seamless learning, storytelling and integration of POE guided scientific inquiry with sensor-based toolkits.

Emerging research has demonstrated the viability of on-textile actuation mechanisms, however, an easily customizable and versatile on-cloth actuation mechanism is yet to be explored. In this paper, we present ClothTiles along with its rapid fabrication technique that enables actuation of clothes. ClothTiles leverage flexible 3D-printing and Shape-Memory Alloys (SMAs) alongside new parametric actuation designs. We validate the concept of fabric actuation using a base element, and then systematically explore methods of aggregating, scaling, and orienting prospects for extended actuation in garments. A user study demonstrated that our technique enables multiple actuation types applied across a variety of clothes. Users identified both aesthetic and functional applications of ClothTiles. We conclude with a number of insights for the Do-It-Yourself community on how to employ 3D-printing with SMAs to enable actuation on clothes.

Self-Tracking stress at work is an important aspect of stress management and is often the first step to improving mental health and personal well-being. We introduce StressShoe, a DIY toolkit for self-tracking stress and just-in-time stress interventions for office workers performing sedentary tasks. Informed by a focus group study and a pilot study, we designed and tested a toolkit that consists of a single, off-the-shelf, shoe-mounted inertial measurement unit (IMU), a machine learning model that estimates acute stress, and a companion mobile app. The mobile app allows for user-defined just-in-time interventions on the estimated stress level. To demonstrate the benefits of our system we evaluated StressShoe with 10 users over 4 weeks. We identified several effective just-in-time personalised intervention users created and found that StressShoe is easy to use and helped them reflect on their daily stressful experiences.

Embedded systems are the foundation of many of today's consumer products and industrial applications - and they are increasingly connected. To teach this topic we created a course with the overarching goal of designing and constructing an automated escape room. This provided motivation and opportunity for students to learn the engineering and soft skills required for building networked embedded systems. The game was open for faculty members and friends of the students after the course concluded. By dividing the building process into multiple tasks, such as individual puzzles, the presented concept encourages inter- and intra-group work, including conceptualizing, designing and developing reliable, connected embedded systems. In this paper we first present the motivation, context, and pedagogical approach of the course, then describe the course structure and conclude with experiences from constructing an escape room with multiple groups of students.

We present a novel FPGA based active stereo vision system, tailored for the use in a mobile 3D stereo camera. For the generation of a single 3D map the matching algorithm is based on a correlation approach, where multiple stereo image pairs instead of a single one are processed to guarantee an improved depth resolution. To efficiently handle the large amounts of incoming image data we adapt the algorithm to the underlying FPGA structures, e.g. by making use of pipelining and parallelization.Experiments demonstrate that our approach provides high-quality 3D maps at least three times more energy-efficient (5.5 fps/W) than comparable approaches executed on CPU and GPU platforms. Implemented on a Xilinx Zynq-7030 SoC our system provides a computation speed of 12.2 fps, at a resolution of 1.3 megapixel and a 128 pixel disparity search space. As such it outperforms the currently best passive stereo systems of the Middlebury Stereo Evaluation in terms of speed and accuracy. The presented approach is therefore well suited for mobile applications, that require a highly accurate and energy-efficient active stereo vision system.

Industrial events and exhibitions play a powerful role in creating social relations amongst individuals and firms, enabling them to expand their social network so to acquire resources. However, often these events impose a spatial structure which impacts encounter opportunities. In this paper, we study the impact that the spatial configuration has on the formation of network relations. We designed, developed and deployed a Wi-Fi analytics solution comprising of wearable Wi-Fi badges and gateways in a large scale industrial exhibition event to study the spatio-temporal trajectories of the 2.5K+ attendees including two special groups: 34 investors and 27 entrepreneurs. Our results suggest that certain zones with designated functionalities play a key role in forming social ties across attendees and the different behavioural properties of investors and entrepreneurs can be explained through a spatial lens. Based on our findings we offer three concrete recommendations for future organisers of networking events.

A searchable database of multi-media recordings provides a way to augment one's memory. This database might contain video, audio and motion data, which is indexed to allow for quick searches. Ultimately, queries for similarity on each recorded modality would be supported. For example video sequencing showing similar objects or comparable sequences of gestures can be retrieved. An important aspect of this challenge is how to encode such multi-modal data, and how to make it searchable. One approach, based on a multi-media container format, is proposed in this paper together with an architecture to allow for similarity queries on multiple modalities.

Wet Laboratories are highly dynamic, shared environments full of tubes, racks, compounds, and dedicated machinery. The recording of experiments, despite the fact that several ubiquitous computing systems have been suggested in the past decades, still relies predominantly on hand-written notes. Similarly, the information retrieval capabilities inside a laboratory are limited to traditional computing interfaces, which due to safety regulations are sometimes not usable at all. In this paper, Google Glass is combined with a wrist-worn gesture sensor to support Wetlab experimenters. Taking "in-situ" documentation while an experiment is performed, as well as contextualizing the protocol at hand can be implemented on top of the proposed system. After an analysis of current practices and needs through a series of explorative deployments in wet labs, we motivate the need for a wearable hands-free system, and introduce our specific design to guide experimenters. Finally, using a study with 22 participants evaluating the system on a benchmark DNA extraction experiment, we explore the use of gesture recognition for enabling the system to track where the user might be in the experiment.