Word boundary ambiguity in word segmentation has long been a fundamental challenge within Thai language processing. The Conditional Random Fields (CRF) model is among the best-known methods to have achieved remarkably accurate segmentation. Nevertheless, current advancements appear to have left the problem of compound words unaccounted for. Compound words lose their meaning or context once segmented. Hence, we introduce a dictionary-based word-merging algorithm, which merges all kinds of compound words. Our evaluation shows that the algorithm can accomplish a high-accuracy of word segmentation, with compound words being preserved. Moreover, it can also restore some incorrectly segmented words. Another problem involving a different word-chunking approach is sentence boundary ambiguity. In tackling the problem, utilizing the part of speech (POS) of a segmented word has been found previously to help boost the accuracy of CRF-based sentence segmentation. However, not all segmented words can be tagged. Thus, we propose a POS-based word-splitting algorithm, which splits words in order to increase POS tags. We found that with more identifiable POS tags, the CRF model performs better in segmenting sentences. To demonstrate the contributions of both methods, we experimented with three of their applications. With the word merging algorithm, we found that intact compound words in the product of topic extraction can help to preserve their intended meanings, offering more precise information for human interpretation. The algorithm, together with the POS-based word-splitting algorithm, can also be used to amend word-level Thai-English translations. In addition, the word-splitting algorithm improves sentence segmentation, thus enhancing text summarization.

The sense of presence, that is, the sense of the website being psychologically transported to the consumer, has been identified as an important factor for bringing back the feeling of sociability and physicality that is lost in online shopping. Previous research has investigated how visual content in the design can influence the sense of presence in a website, but the focus has been limited to the domestic electronic commerce context. In this paper, we conduct an experimental study in a cross-border electronic commerce context to evaluate the effect of country-related pictures on the perception of country presence, visual appeal and trust in a foreign online store. Two experimental conditions were considered: country-related pictures and generic pictures, each one evaluated for Thai and Singaporean websites. It was hypothesized that country-related content in pictures included in the design of the foreign online store would result in a higher level of country presence, and that this would in turn result in higher visual appeal and trust in the website. We conducted a survey among Japanese online consumers, with a total of 1991 participants obtained. The subjects were randomly assigned into four groups corresponding to the combination of country-of-origin of the website and picture condition. We used structural equation modeling in order to analyze the proposed hypotheses. The results showed that for both the Thai and Singaporean websites, country-related pictures resulted in higher country presence, and visual appeal was positively influenced by this increase in country presence. However, country presence did not have a direct effect on trust; this effect was completely mediated by visual appeal. We discuss these results and their implications for cross-border electronic commerce.

In this paper, we propose a new online authoring tool for e-Learning system to meet the social demands for internationalized higher education. The tool includes two functions – an authoring function for creating video-based content by the instructor, and a viewing function for self-learning by students. In the authoring function, an instructor creates key markings onto the raw video stream to produce virtual video clips related to each slide. With key markings, some parts of the raw video stream can be easily skipped. The virtual video clips form an aggregated video stream that is used to synchronize with the slide presentation to create learning content. The synchronized content can be previewed immediately at the client computer prior to saving at the server. The aggregated video becomes the baseline for the viewing function. Based on aggregated video stream methodology, content editing requires only the changing of key markings without editing the raw video file. Furthermore, video and pointer synchronization is also proposed for enhancing the students' learning efficiency. In viewing function, video quality control and an adaptive video buffering method are implemented to support usage in various network environments. The total system is optimized to support cross-platform and cloud computing to break the limitation of various usages. The proposed method can provide simple authoring processes with clear user interface design for instructors, and help students utilize learning contents effectively and efficiently. In the user acceptance evaluation, most respondents agree with the usefulness, ease-of-use, and user satisfaction of the proposed system. The overall results show that the proposed authoring and viewing tools have higher user acceptance as a tool for e-Learning.