Chat Code Compile Client (C⁴)

Project Homepage: (Figler)

Project Description:

Remote collaboration and interaction have become an integral part of today’s workspace. Currently, there is no integrated programming environment that allows users to co-operate remotely in a specific source code. The Chat, Code and Compile Client (C4) allows users to send and receive code for programming languages in real time. Multiple users will have the ability to edit, debug, compile, and execute code written within their client while other users will see the action done in their respective client. A similar solution that provides such features only allows for users to connect to a virtual machine and work on that said virtual machine concurrently. The weakness of this approach is the large overhead in communication to broadcast various information from the desktop and the GUI. C4 focuses on streamlined communication in a conducive development environment. The resulting system will have various applications, but it is best used in an IT or CS related industry. C4 can also be utilized to facilitate on-line CS or IT courses that require the interaction of students and teachers that are geographically separated. This allows for the off campus education of computer science courses to be better executed and understood. C4 can also be used in the regular classroom setting where instructors have the ability to chat with their students to guide said students along a particular problem they are having. In the future, C4 can be expanded to support voice and video chat along with support for larger number of participants in real time.

Members (From Left):

JR Figler

Dan Kissel 

Advisor:

Dr. Hyoil Han

ISPeL: An Interactive System for Personalized eLearning

Project Homepage: (Thach)

Project Description:

The ubiquitous Web makes eLearning an attractive supplement to classroom learning. The goal of this project is to develop a personalized elearning system, ISPeL, to help students learn math more effectively and efficiently. ISPeL provides a hierarchical knowledge tree using which students can choose whatever topics they want to study, as long as the chosen topic prerequisites are met. This is contrast with traditional eLearning that requires all learners to take the same path. ISPeL generates questions on the fly to help students assess their own learning. The auto-generated questions span all the six levels of the Bloom's revised taxonomy. ISPel also provides progress tracking and various reports to help students self-assess their learning effectiveness.

Members (From Left):

Duong Thach

Luu Pham

Advisor:

Dr. Venkat Gudivada

Lockout Project

Project Homepage: (Shelton)

Project Description:

We plan to develop a browser extension for the Google Chrome browser and OS using JavaScript and HTML 5. The JavaScript will analyze keystrokes by measuring “dwell time” on each key press and “transfer time” or the time between each keystroke. Each sample will be a pair of key presses. It will record the dwell time on the first key and transfer time to the second key. The application will record each occurrence of that specific key combination into the database. It will build a confidence rating based on number of samples and standard deviation from the mean values measured. Once that particular combination reaches a specified confidence threshold, it can be used for authentication. When a keystroke combination is determined to have a high degree of variance from the recorded data of sufficient confidence, it will be flagged. Once a sufficient number of flagged keystrokes are recorded the web-page will be blocked and the user will be asked for a private identification number that was set up earlier.

Members (From Left):

Warren Shelton

Stephen Turley

Advisor:

Dr. Hyoil Han

MUBuddy

Project Homepage: (Rappold)

Project Description:

Ever had your phone ring during class or thought you could get there in time but actually got there 20 minutes late? Us too. That’s why we chose to develop an Android application entitled MU Buddy which will automatically silence your phones sound profile when you enter class and revert back to your original settings when you leave class. In addition, the application will have a dynamic alarm system that will send you alarms based on your location from the phone’s GPS. Lastly, the application will incorporate an automatic class locator based on the Course Reference Number (CRN) the user enters when they finalize their schedule. The application will be available for download to all Marshall Students.

Members (From Left):

John Lilly

Cecil Rappold

Advisor:

Professor Jonathan Thompson

Marshall University Cyber-Security Research and Education System (MU CRES)

Project Homepage: (Jackson)

Project Description:

Disaster, emergency, and crisis; these are all words that are used to describe the current cyber-security situation prevalent in the US and this is alarming. It is critical to address that cyber-security is not getting enough emphasis in computer science curriculums, leaving graduating students unprepared when they enter the workplace. Similarly, many IT professionals currently in the workplace learn on the fly, creating a catch-up scenario that can leave their systems vulnerable.

The Marshall University Cyber-security Research and Education System (MU CRES) framework is designed to remedy these issues. MU CRES introduces a new, versatile way of learning about and performing research in cyber-security techniques that facilitates training for various scenarios and user levels. MU CRES was initially tested as an education system earlier this year. A series of labs was created using the system to educate participants about different aspects of cyber-security, which were used during a controlled team-based hacking event. The participants had to use the cyber-security techniques they learned in the labs to defend their servers from malicious attacks during this event, as well as perform counter-attacks.

The first live hacking event was a success which led to a great wealth of user input for future versions of the framework. There are a few issues that were discovered during the event. One of the main issues is that the network cannot handle the load from the attacks being performed by people participating in the event. Future iterations of MU CRES will include miniature versions of the live hacking event. MU CRES is an effective way of introducing cyber-security techniques to current computer science students as well as providing an easy to use research framework for IT professionals.

Members:

Eddie Warnick

Seth Jackson 

Advisor:

Dr. Paulus Wahjudi

MuWeLETTAS

Project Homepage: (Shannon)

Project Description:

Laboratory technicians often face a simple, but tedious problem, inventory control. In a growing field, such as engineering, it becomes essential for a lab technician to maintain, update, and track each and every piece of lab equipment. Many lab technicians choose to employ a simple spreadsheet; with good intentions to keep it up to date and distributed to all individuals that require its information. The issue that arises here is that spreadsheets become large and cumbersome as time passes. As the spreadsheet grows, so goes the ability to quickly and easily find information in the document.

In addition to inventory control, school laboratory technicians also combat ensuring the safety of their students and the students’ respective equipment being used. Again, this is quite the drudging task. Manuals and readmes are often not coupled with their host equipment and are not always readily available for the students. Also, lab technicians cannot always be conveniently located in the lab to assist the students with their problems. The problems above can be solved with a more “automated” way of handling things.

MuWeLETTAS, or Multimedia Web-based Lab Equipment Training and Tracking Application System, is a web application that offers a simplistic visual representation of a laboratory and the equipment that it holds. With the floor layout of the laboratory, MuWeLETTAS will help faculty, administrators, and students alike locate equipment they are seeking out in the laboratory. With this sensitive information in mind, MuWeLETTAS bolters a login-based system that defines privileges based off of the user. Student users are also able to use MuWeLETTAS to view pictures, videos, readmes, and manuals that coincide with the equipment they wish to use. An optional feature that is built off of the idea above is to allow students to take quizzes on the operation of these pieces of equipment. The hope is to have a system in place that makes the lives of lab technicians and students just a bit easier.

Members:

Klay Shannon

Devon Albrecht 

Advisor:

Professor Jonathan Thompson

Sponsor:

Mickey Dial, Lab Technician

RSS with TTS

Project Homepage: (Carrol)

Project Description:

RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, is a collection of web feed formats that allows users to aggregate frequently updated online content. Examples of information that can be distributed via RSS include: news headlines, blog entries, updates from social networking sites, podcasts, videos, and many others. Essentially, RSS streamlines the communication process between publishers and readers. As the number of mobile devices continues to grow, this form of syndication is becoming increasingly useful for the end-user. Many RSS reader applications exist for the Android platform, however none currently implement text-to-speech. TTS is an essential feature for users who would like to hear the content of their feeds while not actively reading from their device screen. This project will encompass the development of a full-featured RSS reader with emphasis on text-to-speech functionality.

Members (From Left):

Matthew Ferguson 

Mark Carrol 

Advisor:

Dr. Venkat Gudivada

Spotection

Project Homepage: (Hall)

Project Description:

Spotection is a parking spot detection system that will help students find parking spaces in a quick and efficient manner by providing them with a graphical representation of the parking lot in question through a web application, which will highlight parking spots that are free . This type of system has been done before; however, there is no unified technique or algorithm for determining which sport are free and which spots are not, and those existing systems implement complex algorithms that would be difficult for anyone trying to build upon them to understand. Our plan is to design a simple algorithm to determine which parking spots are free and which ones are not to work with inexpensive hardware to create a simple, easy-to-use, and cost-effective parking spot detection solution. To accomplish this task, we plan to process the images from a video feed of a webcam that is focused on the parking lot in question and use Open CV with C++ to process the images, followed by displaying the results in the web application for users.

Members (From Left):

Nitish Garg

Tim Hall 

Advisor:

Dr. Paulus Wahjudi