More than 10 million members of the photo-sharing Web site Flickr snap
pictures of their surroundings and then post those photos on the
Internet. One group of researchers is doing the reverse -- downloading
thousands of photos from Flickr and using them to recreate the original
scenes. In a technical paper "Multi-View Stereo for Community Photo
Collections" then describe how photos from online sites such as Flickr
can be used to create a virtual 3D model of landmarks, including Notre
Dame Cathedral in Paris and the Statue of Liberty in New York City.
The long-term vision is to be able to reconstruct the detailed geometry
of all the structures on the surface of the Earth. Many people are
working toward that goal, but by using online collections this work
brings in a whole new source of imagery and level of detail. The paper
abstract: "We present a multi-view stereo algorithm that addresses the
extreme changes in lighting, scale, clutter, and other effects in
large online community photo collections. Our idea is to intelligently
choose images to match, both at a per-view and per-pixel level. We show
that such adaptive view selection enables robust performance even with
dramatic appearance variability. The stereo matching technique takes as
input sparse 3D points reconstructed from structure-from-motion methods
and iteratively grows surfaces from these points. Optimizing for surface
normals within a photoconsistency measure significantly improves the
matching results. While the focus of our approach is to estimate
high-quality depth maps, we also show examples of merging the resulting
depth maps into compelling scene reconstructions. We demonstrate our
algorithm on standard multi-view stereo datasets and on casually acquired
photo collections of famous scenes gathered from the Internet." More Information
Saturday, November 3, 2007
Wikipedia's Non-Profit Foundation Hits Fundraising Milestone
The Wikimedia Foundation has attracted 10,000 fundraising contributors
in nine days. The foundation's annual fundraiser supports the nonprofit
organization that runs Wikipedia. The group announced Thursday that its
10,000th donation came from someone in Finland who donated 10 Euros.
The total amount raised was not disclosed. The fundraiser, which began
October 22, 2007 and continues until December 22, is held to support
Wikipedia's online encyclopedia and the Foundation's other projects.
Although users contribute material for free, the Foundation employs
people to edit, monitor, and run the online encyclopedia, as well as
other operations. Funds raised this year will help support programs that
encourage the development of smaller-language Wikipedias, like the
Wikipedia Academies occurring in Africa on Nov. 10 and Nov. 11. The
Academies teach students, scholars, and community members how to edit
Wikipedia. The Foundation hopes the work will help preserve endangered
or lesser-known languages and record cultural knowledge for future
generations. Most of the Foundation's revenue comes from private
individuals, and donations average around $25. More Information
in nine days. The foundation's annual fundraiser supports the nonprofit
organization that runs Wikipedia. The group announced Thursday that its
10,000th donation came from someone in Finland who donated 10 Euros.
The total amount raised was not disclosed. The fundraiser, which began
October 22, 2007 and continues until December 22, is held to support
Wikipedia's online encyclopedia and the Foundation's other projects.
Although users contribute material for free, the Foundation employs
people to edit, monitor, and run the online encyclopedia, as well as
other operations. Funds raised this year will help support programs that
encourage the development of smaller-language Wikipedias, like the
Wikipedia Academies occurring in Africa on Nov. 10 and Nov. 11. The
Academies teach students, scholars, and community members how to edit
Wikipedia. The Foundation hopes the work will help preserve endangered
or lesser-known languages and record cultural knowledge for future
generations. Most of the Foundation's revenue comes from private
individuals, and donations average around $25. More Information
The New Lightweight Service Models: A No-Brainer for SMB
Google and Amazon are two of the companies offering Web-based services
that let your enterprise focus on its strongest value-added layer. Last
week I had an experience that drove home the giant leaps IT is making,
particularly with Web-based service models. In my spare time, I've
been developing a niche-content Web site. I'm user-testing it now, and
the biggest user request has been for a search box. Developing on a
shoestring, I'd written off search for version 1, thinking it would
take months to build. Imagine my delight to find that Google just began
offering a "business edition" of its custom search product, ad-free and
with results delivered via XML into your pages, for as little as $100
per year for up to a 5,000-page site. Within five hours of my own
tinkering time, I was up and running with site search. This is the future,
ladies and gentlemen. Tap into the expertise and resources of larger,
more specialized organizations and focus on the layer where you really
add value. Here's an even better example: A friend of mine, Avery Lyford,
has a company called Digisense, which provides secure data management
(backup, archiving, recovery, and search) services to SMB customers
through the managed service provider channel. Rather than building a
gigantic datacenter and writing man-centuries of code to deliver this
service, Digisense developed on top of best-of-breed resources and open
source modules so that the company could focus its own brainpower on
the key value-added security and management layers. The Digisense service,
offered as a subscription through your managed service provider, consists
of a small on-site appliance that encrypts and indexes the data locally
before sending it out over a regular broadband connection for archiving
to the Digisense back end. But where is the Digisense back end? It's at
Amazon. More Information
that let your enterprise focus on its strongest value-added layer. Last
week I had an experience that drove home the giant leaps IT is making,
particularly with Web-based service models. In my spare time, I've
been developing a niche-content Web site. I'm user-testing it now, and
the biggest user request has been for a search box. Developing on a
shoestring, I'd written off search for version 1, thinking it would
take months to build. Imagine my delight to find that Google just began
offering a "business edition" of its custom search product, ad-free and
with results delivered via XML into your pages, for as little as $100
per year for up to a 5,000-page site. Within five hours of my own
tinkering time, I was up and running with site search. This is the future,
ladies and gentlemen. Tap into the expertise and resources of larger,
more specialized organizations and focus on the layer where you really
add value. Here's an even better example: A friend of mine, Avery Lyford,
has a company called Digisense, which provides secure data management
(backup, archiving, recovery, and search) services to SMB customers
through the managed service provider channel. Rather than building a
gigantic datacenter and writing man-centuries of code to deliver this
service, Digisense developed on top of best-of-breed resources and open
source modules so that the company could focus its own brainpower on
the key value-added security and management layers. The Digisense service,
offered as a subscription through your managed service provider, consists
of a small on-site appliance that encrypts and indexes the data locally
before sending it out over a regular broadband connection for archiving
to the Digisense back end. But where is the Digisense back end? It's at
Amazon. More Information
Will OpenSocial Open Wallets for Google?
So how is this working out for Palo Alto, Calif.'s Facebook, which has
seen the mad creation of some 7,000 food-fighting, sheep-throwing,
slide-show presenting widgets pop up on the Web since it opened its
platform May 24? Facebook, which a spokesperson said has "not been
briefed on OpenSocial," and therefore is not sure if joining will
benefit its 50 million users, declined to discuss dollar amounts with
eWEEK. As Ovum's Bradshaw noted, Facebook pioneered the use of
third-party widgets on its site, which has proven to be a success in
terms of user enthusiasm and adoption. However, despite its lead in
this area, Facebook requires programmers to use its proprietary APIs,
while OpenSocial is built using standards such as HTML and JavaScript.
This means widgets on Facebook will be a lot harder to deploy on other
sites, and vice-versa, while OpenSocial widgets should be relatively
easy to deploy to between sites, he said. So, for all those laughing
at the amount of sheep flying or food being thrown between friends,
remember that somewhere Google, Facebook and their armies of software
developers are happily padding their coffers with your clicks. More Information
seen the mad creation of some 7,000 food-fighting, sheep-throwing,
slide-show presenting widgets pop up on the Web since it opened its
platform May 24? Facebook, which a spokesperson said has "not been
briefed on OpenSocial," and therefore is not sure if joining will
benefit its 50 million users, declined to discuss dollar amounts with
eWEEK. As Ovum's Bradshaw noted, Facebook pioneered the use of
third-party widgets on its site, which has proven to be a success in
terms of user enthusiasm and adoption. However, despite its lead in
this area, Facebook requires programmers to use its proprietary APIs,
while OpenSocial is built using standards such as HTML and JavaScript.
This means widgets on Facebook will be a lot harder to deploy on other
sites, and vice-versa, while OpenSocial widgets should be relatively
easy to deploy to between sites, he said. So, for all those laughing
at the amount of sheep flying or food being thrown between friends,
remember that somewhere Google, Facebook and their armies of software
developers are happily padding their coffers with your clicks. More Information
OpenSocial Makes the Web Better
This memo from Google Director of Product Management introduces
OpenSocial, "a set of common APIs that make it easy to create and host
social applications on the web." A tremendous amount of activity is
occurring on social networks these days. Hundreds of millions of people
share photos, rate movies, and throw virtual sheep at one another. But
there's a problem: [not only] one or two social networks doing this,
but ten or fifteen. Now, to get on all the social networks a developer
has to customize their application for each one. When your "development
team" is just one or two people, the proliferation of APIs forces you
to make tough choices, because you can't do that much one-off work...
OpenSocial allows developers to write an application once that will run
anywhere that supports the OpenSocial APIs. OpenSocial applications use
Google's gadget architecture but with extensions that provide programmatic
access to social data within its container environment. Similar to Google
Gadgets, OpenSocial apps are hosted XML documents with HTML/JavaScript
within their bodies. Social apps have most of the infrastructure of
Google Gadgets available to them but with a few minor exceptions...
Social apps are initially created in the same manner as Google Gadgets:
with your favorite text editor or within the Google Gadget Editor. They
then can be augmented with the OpenSocial JavaScript APIs, where they
can fetch and post social data about friends and activities. The Google
Gadgets API consists of a few simple building blocks: XML, HTML, and
JavaScript. To get started, all you need is a basic understanding of HTML.
XML is a general purpose markup language. It describes structured data
in a way that both humans and computers can read and write. XML is the
language you use to write gadget specifications. A gadget is simply an
XML file, placed somewhere on the internet where Google can find it.
The XML file that specifies a gadget contains instructions on how to
process and render the gadget. The XML file can contain all of the data
and code for the gadget, or it can have references (URIs) for where to
find the rest of the elements... Common APIs mean you have less to learn
to build for multiple websites. OpenSocial is currently being developed
by Google in conjunction with members of the web community. The ultimate
goal is for any social website to be able to implement the APIs and host
3rd party social applications. There are many websites implementing
OpenSocial, including Engage.com, Friendster, hi5, Hyves, imeem, LinkedIn,
MySpace, Ning, Oracle, orkut, Plaxo, Salesforce.com, Six Apart, Tianji,
Viadeo, and XING. More Information
OpenSocial, "a set of common APIs that make it easy to create and host
social applications on the web." A tremendous amount of activity is
occurring on social networks these days. Hundreds of millions of people
share photos, rate movies, and throw virtual sheep at one another. But
there's a problem: [not only] one or two social networks doing this,
but ten or fifteen. Now, to get on all the social networks a developer
has to customize their application for each one. When your "development
team" is just one or two people, the proliferation of APIs forces you
to make tough choices, because you can't do that much one-off work...
OpenSocial allows developers to write an application once that will run
anywhere that supports the OpenSocial APIs. OpenSocial applications use
Google's gadget architecture but with extensions that provide programmatic
access to social data within its container environment. Similar to Google
Gadgets, OpenSocial apps are hosted XML documents with HTML/JavaScript
within their bodies. Social apps have most of the infrastructure of
Google Gadgets available to them but with a few minor exceptions...
Social apps are initially created in the same manner as Google Gadgets:
with your favorite text editor or within the Google Gadget Editor. They
then can be augmented with the OpenSocial JavaScript APIs, where they
can fetch and post social data about friends and activities. The Google
Gadgets API consists of a few simple building blocks: XML, HTML, and
JavaScript. To get started, all you need is a basic understanding of HTML.
XML is a general purpose markup language. It describes structured data
in a way that both humans and computers can read and write. XML is the
language you use to write gadget specifications. A gadget is simply an
XML file, placed somewhere on the internet where Google can find it.
The XML file that specifies a gadget contains instructions on how to
process and render the gadget. The XML file can contain all of the data
and code for the gadget, or it can have references (URIs) for where to
find the rest of the elements... Common APIs mean you have less to learn
to build for multiple websites. OpenSocial is currently being developed
by Google in conjunction with members of the web community. The ultimate
goal is for any social website to be able to implement the APIs and host
3rd party social applications. There are many websites implementing
OpenSocial, including Engage.com, Friendster, hi5, Hyves, imeem, LinkedIn,
MySpace, Ning, Oracle, orkut, Plaxo, Salesforce.com, Six Apart, Tianji,
Viadeo, and XING. More Information
HELD Device Identity Extensions
IETF has announced the publication of "HELD Device Identity Extensions,"
released by members of the Geographic Location/Privacy (GEOPRIV)
Working Group. Protocols such as "HTTP Enabled Location Delivery
(HELD)" need to identify a device in order to perform some task.
Basic HELD only provides device identity through the IP address of
the requesting Target, while ["GEOPRIV Layer 7 Location Configuration
Protocol: Problem Statement and Requirements" provides examples of
where this may be insufficent. This memo defines a set of URIs an a
containment schema that allow the specification of device identity
beyond source IP address and may be used with HELD and general presence
documents as described in RFC 4479. This document defines a set of URIs
for Device identities and a XML containment schema. These can be used
in conjunction with HELD to provide Device identification beyond source
IP Address. Examples and usage in HELD message syntax are provided.
The details of this memo consist of a simple schema extension for HELD
to support the inclusion of a device identity in the form of a URI or
typed-token, and a set of URI definitions that can be used for device
identities. The GEOPRIV WG was chartered to to assess the the
authorization, integrity and privacy requirements that must be met in
order to transfer such information, or authorize the release or
representation of location information through an agent. As more and
more resources become available on the Internet, some applications
need to acquire geographic location information about certain resources
or entities. These applications include navigation, emergency services,
management of equipment in the field, and other location-based services. More Information
released by members of the Geographic Location/Privacy (GEOPRIV)
Working Group. Protocols such as "HTTP Enabled Location Delivery
(HELD)" need to identify a device in order to perform some task.
Basic HELD only provides device identity through the IP address of
the requesting Target, while ["GEOPRIV Layer 7 Location Configuration
Protocol: Problem Statement and Requirements" provides examples of
where this may be insufficent. This memo defines a set of URIs an a
containment schema that allow the specification of device identity
beyond source IP address and may be used with HELD and general presence
documents as described in RFC 4479. This document defines a set of URIs
for Device identities and a XML containment schema. These can be used
in conjunction with HELD to provide Device identification beyond source
IP Address. Examples and usage in HELD message syntax are provided.
The details of this memo consist of a simple schema extension for HELD
to support the inclusion of a device identity in the form of a URI or
typed-token, and a set of URI definitions that can be used for device
identities. The GEOPRIV WG was chartered to to assess the the
authorization, integrity and privacy requirements that must be met in
order to transfer such information, or authorize the release or
representation of location information through an agent. As more and
more resources become available on the Internet, some applications
need to acquire geographic location information about certain resources
or entities. These applications include navigation, emergency services,
management of equipment in the field, and other location-based services. More Information
DITA for Enterprise Business Documents Subcommittee Proposal Background
Members of the OASIS Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) TC
have published a proposal for a Subcommittee focusing on 'Enterprise
Business Documents'. The proposal document presents a brief discussion
of the increasing usage of DITA for a broad range of narrative business
documents that has led to a proposal for a DITA Enterprise Business
Documents Subcommittee. It includes preliminary goals of the committee,
and a discussion of the rationale for each goal. From the accompanying
message: "In the past year, a growing number of organizations have come
to believe that DITA not only provides the best basis from which to
start addressing their requirements for structured authoring of narrative
business documents, but that characteristics of DITA simplify the usability
issues as well. The DITA standard is so compelling, that the absence of
a sub-committee focus on narrative business documents has not stopped
several organizations from embarking on the use of DITA for this purpose.
Many of us who are currently engaged in DITA-based business document
projects feel that this is an ideal time for the DITA technical committee
to support the efforts of these business users with standardized
approaches and experienced-based guidance. For your consideration at the
next open Technical Committee agenda, we propose that the Technical
Committee officially establish an Enterprise Business Document
subcommittee. Attached are the name, goals, deliverables, chair, and
initial membership for this proposed subcommittee. A background document
has been uploaded to the OASIS site and may be accessed by interested
parties." More Information
have published a proposal for a Subcommittee focusing on 'Enterprise
Business Documents'. The proposal document presents a brief discussion
of the increasing usage of DITA for a broad range of narrative business
documents that has led to a proposal for a DITA Enterprise Business
Documents Subcommittee. It includes preliminary goals of the committee,
and a discussion of the rationale for each goal. From the accompanying
message: "In the past year, a growing number of organizations have come
to believe that DITA not only provides the best basis from which to
start addressing their requirements for structured authoring of narrative
business documents, but that characteristics of DITA simplify the usability
issues as well. The DITA standard is so compelling, that the absence of
a sub-committee focus on narrative business documents has not stopped
several organizations from embarking on the use of DITA for this purpose.
Many of us who are currently engaged in DITA-based business document
projects feel that this is an ideal time for the DITA technical committee
to support the efforts of these business users with standardized
approaches and experienced-based guidance. For your consideration at the
next open Technical Committee agenda, we propose that the Technical
Committee officially establish an Enterprise Business Document
subcommittee. Attached are the name, goals, deliverables, chair, and
initial membership for this proposed subcommittee. A background document
has been uploaded to the OASIS site and may be accessed by interested
parties." More Information
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