We have developed a method to automatically generate a multi-input-adder circuit for an irregular array of partial products. "FASTOOL," an FIR Filter Automatic Synthesis TOOL for an HDL design environment, is proposed for use with this method and with conventional filter coefficient design programs. Filter design from specifications to the structure of Verilog-HDL has been automated. It is possible for a system designer to quickly perform filter LSI optimization by balancing cost and performance.

The concept of a new visual communication environment is proposed. The proposed system is a shared and interactive multi-user virtual space that consists of a CG-based virtual space structure and video-based objects. Human interface design issues are discussed from the view point of creating a new reality for enhanced communication.

The background concepts and methodologies of the knowledge-based program understander ALPUS is discussed. ALPUS understands user's buggy Pascal programs using four kinds of programming knowledge: the knowledge on algorithms, programming techniques, the Pascal language, and logical bugs. The knowledge on algorithms, the key knowledge, is represented in a form of hierarchical data structure called Hierarchical Procedure Graph (HPG). In HPG each node represents a chunk of operations called process," which is consisted of sub-processes. The other knowledge is maintained as independent knowledge bases and linked to associated processes of the HPG. The knowledge about bugs acquired by cognitive experiment is grouped into three categories: bugs on algorithms, programming techniques, and the Pascal language, and connected to associated elements of programming knowledge respectively. ALPUS tries to understand user's buggy programs, detects logical bugs, infers user's intentions, and gives advices for fixing bugs. Program understanding is achieved by three steps: normalization, variable identification, and process and technique identification. Normalization results in improving flexibility of understanding. Variable, process and technique identifications are achieved by knowledge-based pattern matching. Intentions are inferred by means of information attached to buggy patterns. The result of comprehension is reported to a user (i.e., student). Experimental results using Quicksort programs written by students show that the HPG formalism is quite powerful in understanding algorithm-oriented programs. The ALPUS's way of program comprehension is useful in the situation of programming education in an intermediate class of an engineering school. The ALPUS system is a subsystem of the intelligent programming environment INTELLITUTOR for learning programming, which was implemented in the frame-based knowledge engineering environment ZERO on a UNIX workstation.

Object-oriented programming requires different skills from those of traditional structured programming. Thus, a good interactive environment for beginners of object-oriented programming should be provided. We have designed and implemented a visual environment of object-oriented programming for beginners. If a programmer draws a diagram of the tree of the hierarchy of classes visually by using our tool, the relationship between superclasses and subclasses are automatically established. Moreover, in order to prevent careless mistakes to override methods, the prototype environment in the Smalltalk language checks written methods. We conducted an experiment with our tool and evaluated its usefulness.

Most traditional directory systems use tree structure. This structure has revealed some problems, especially in a large system domain like distributed networking environment. These problems are severe constraints on object naming, no support to automatic sharing, and single name space. We proposed a new directory structure called MSD (Multi-Space Directory) to solve these problems. MSD exhibits several outstanding characteristics over tree directory, such as supporting both hierarchical and orthogonal classifications, supporting both vertical and horizontal automatic sharings, providing multiple working environment, and providing a better mechanism for protection and consistency. This paper first analyzed the problems of tree directory and new requirements for directory systems, then describes the structure of MSD in detail and shows its merits over tree directory.

In this study, after focussing on an energy (or intensity) scaled variable of acoustic systems, first, a new regression analysis method is theoretically proposed by introducing a multiplicative noise model suitable to the positively scaled stocastic system. Then, the effectiveness of the proposed method is confirmed experimentally by applying it to the actual acoustic data.

The availability of new technologies in the computer and network industry has allowed us to benefit from a wider choice when building new information systems. This paper presents Japan Airlines' challenge to develop a new information network and management infrastructure based on the new technology. Compared with the existing main-frame environment, the new infrastructure will give us a more comfortable and economic network computing environment. Once we think about network management, there are so many issues to be solved. All existing network elements have their own management consoles with different interfaces and commands. Net managers are swimming in the pool of system consoles looking for the one that exactly tells them what is going on at the user site. The industry standard SNMP offers us a much better environment. However, there is still a long way to go before reaching a world where net managers find a single management console with a single object to manage that is composed of all network elements.

When we design a human interface of a computer-mediated communication (CMC) system, it is important to take a socio-behavioral approach for understanding the nature of the human communication. From this point of view, we conducted experimental observations and post-experimental questionnaires to investigate communicative characteristics in a teleconference using Fujitsu Habitat" visual telecommunication software. We experimentally held the following three kinds of small-group conferences consisting of five geographically distributed participants: (a) teleconference using a visual telecommunication system (Fujitsu Habitat"), (b) teleconference using a real-time keyboard telecommunication system of NIFTY-Serve and (c) live face to face physical conference. Analyses were made on (1) effects of the media on utterance behaviors of conference members, and (2) satisfaction of conference members with communicative functions of the media. Satisfaction was measured by a seven-level rating scale. We found that participants in a telconference held by using Habitat showed significant differences in contents of utterances and the rating of satisfaction with nine communicative functions compared with those of conferences held by using a real-time keyboard telecommunication system and a live face-to-face conference. These results suggest some features that could facilitate multi-participant on-line electronic conferences and conversations.

The many-user networked virtual world system InterSpace" is described. This system's main purpose is to enhance the user's communication activities. In InterSpace, the real world information is embedded in the shared virtual world as a combination of video and CG images. Users can ovserve and access this information by simply looking and approaching embedded images. The concept of InterSpace and a prototype system of this service are introduced.

There has been an increasing demand for telecommunication services that satisfy individual users' requirements such as personal telecommunication services and intelligent network services. This demand for advanced telecommunications services is having a great impact on the control architecture and mechanism. In this paper, we propose a new representation of processing power for telecommunications services, using TPS (Transaction Per Second), instead of BHCA, which has been the most commonly used parameter for conventional telephone networks. In developing an IN benchmark, telecommunications services are compared with the TPC-A (Transaction Processing Performance Council-A) benchmark model based on TPS. This benchmark is then used to estimate the requirements for processing power, which, in turn, indicate the necessity for a distributed control. A layered architecture, compatible architecture, and control mechanism for user services are employed to adapt to the distributed network environment.

We are developing GENESIS, a new seamless total environment for designing, developing, installing, and operating various types of telecommunication networks as extremely large distributed processing applications in the future network integrated by ATM. Similar uniform architectures for quick introduction and easy management of service or operation applications have been proposed, such as by TINA, but there has been insufficient study on how to operate and con figure those applications. This paper discusses the implementation model and execution environment in GENESIS from the viewpoint of flexible operation according to network conditions. The implementation model can describe detailed configurations under various conditions on design or operation, independently of the execution environment. To achieve the goals of GENESIS, our execution environment provides message handling functions and a transparent interface for controlling network resources independently of the configuration, and dynamic reconfiguration functions that are independent of the execution. This paper also reports the prototype system GENESIS-1. The GENESIS-1 message handling mechanism and the effect of the reconfiguration functions are described.

Among the problems that face ITS designers, the problem of measuring the student knowledge state after concept learning in order to initially adapt a skill acquisition session according to a student's own necessities is a hard one. Typical approaches are the use of some sort of test to assess the student knowledge and choose an initial set of parameters for a session, or use, regardless the particular necessities of a student, a pre-defined set of initial parameters. We consider the fromer to be disrupting for learning and the latter too simple to deal with the broad possibilities that are faced. It is known that students show different behaviors during concept learning depending on the experience, background and actual understanding (the way a student is understanding a concept) during concept learning. Our approach here is to classify the different behaviors through fuzzy proposition and link them with a student model through fuzzy rules to use in an expert system, and with it, select the most suitable problem-solving strategy for each particular student in order to clear his misunderstandings and facilitate the learning of problem-solving skills. The use of probabilistic reasoning (i.e. Bayesian statistics) instead of fuzzy logic is not suitable for the present situation because of the rigidity and precision of the rules that do not allow a proper manipulation of the vagueness involved in the student behavior. We apply this idea to a circuit analysis ITS where the concept learning session is carried out on a Hypertext environment and the skill acquisition session on an interactive problem-solving environment. By tracing the student use of the Hypertext environment we can know the student behavior and use it as a premise in the fuzzy inference.

In the actual acoustic environment, the stochastic process exhibits various non-Gaussian distribution forms, and there exist potentially various nonlinear correlations in addition to the linear correlation between time series. In this study, a nonlinear ARMA model is proposed, based on the Bayes' theorem, where no artificially pre-established regression function model is assumed between time series, while reflecting hierarchically all of those various correlation informations. The proposed method is applied to the actual data of road traffic noise and its practical usefulness is verified.

We study robot navigation in unknown environment with rectangular obstacles aligned with the x and y axes. We propose a strategy called the modified-bian heuristic, and analyze its efficiency. Let n be the distance between the start point and the target of robot navigation, and let k be the maximum side length among the obstacles in a scene. We show that if k=(o(n) and if the summation of the widths of the obstacles on the line crossing the target and along the y axis is o(n), then ratio of the total distance walked by the robot to the shortest path length between the start point and the target is at most arbitrarily close to 1+k/2, as n grows. For the same restrictions as above on the sizes of the obstacles, the ratio is also at most arbitrarily close to 1+3/4n, as n grows, where is the summation of lengths of the obstacles in y axis direction.

This paper surveys the researches on biological and electeromagnetic environments in RF (radio frequency) and microwave regions in Japan. Publicized research reports on biological objectives, evaluation of exposure rate, electromagnetic environments and guideline for the protection from radio wave nuisances are briefly introduced. Some researches on the evaluation of the exposure rate caused by the near field effect of portable radio transceiver are reviewed. Radio frequency exposer protection guidelines in Japan are also described.

For the study of the biological effects of ELF (Extremely Low Frequency) electric fields, the perception mechanism of ELF electric fields was analyzed. When a human body is exposed to an electric field, the hair on the body surface moves due to the electric force exerted on the hair. In theoretical analysis, it was shown that the force is approximately proportional to the dielectric constant of hair and the spatial gradient of the square of the electric field at the hair. The dielectric constant of hair was measured with different temperatures and humidities of the surrounding air. A technique was developed to estimate the electric force exerted on a hair during the field exposure. After experiments with model hair, the technique was applied to a body hair of a living human being. It was found that the force increased with field strength and relative humidity. The variations of the force agreed well with those expected from the theoretical analysis and the measurement of hair dielectric constants. These results explain the cause of the reported variation in the threshold of biological effects of an electric field. The results will help to establish a practical safety standard for the held exposure.

We consider a class of unknown scenes Sk(n) with rectangular obstacles aligned with the axes such that Euclidean distance between the start point and the target is n, and any side length of each obstacle is at most k. We propose a strategy called the adaptive-bias heuristic for navigating a robot in such a scene, and analyze its efficiency. We show that a ratio of the total distance walked by a robot using the strategy to the shortest path distance between the start point and the target is at most 1+(3/5) k, if k=o(n) and if the start point and the target are at the same horizontal level. This ratio is better than a ratio obtained by any strategy previously known in the class of scenes, Sk(n), such that k=o(n).

This paper presents a hypermedia English learning environment, called HELEN (Hypermedia Environment for Learning ENglish), which integrates traditional methods of learning English, audio-visual facilities for both listening and watching and intelligent tutoring functions for suitable advice to each learner based on natural language understanding. HELEN consists of an authoring stage and a learning stage. In order to support multimodal learning, at the authoring stage HELEN gets voice and video scenes from a video disc and text sentences from an image scanner, then analyzes the sentences both syntactically and semantically by a natural language processing module so that necessary information for conversation, error identification and example sentence retrieval may be extracted. Thus at the learning stage, HELEN is able to aid learners to learn hearing, reading, writing, watching, consulting and noting. Besides these facilities HELEN also supports two facilities for tests in English: One is the test facilities of dictating sentences and the other is QA (questions and answers) facilities to make learner's comprehension state clear. According to the results of these tests, HELEN identifies learner's illegal usage of syntax or semantics, and piles them in a student model. The illegal usage in the model is used as resources for generating questions, treating errors, determining topics, etc. The main part of this paper concerns with the representation method for syntax and semantics of correct and incorrect sentences.

This paper presents an experimental environment of an intelligent tutoring system called EXPITS. In this environment, users learn functions and the structure of the intelligent tutoring system and characteristics of knowledge processing. EXPITS provides facilities for investigating internal processes and internal states of the intelligent tutoring system. These facilities include visualization tools and controllers of internal processes. Because the internal states and behavior of ITS depend on student's understanding states, one cannot get total understanding of ITS without information about student's knowledge states. To solve this problem, we introduce a pseudo student which simulates a human student in order to visualize explicitly all information which affects ITS behavior. Target users of EXPITS are school teachers, who are users of intelligent tutoring systems, university students who are studying artificial intelligence and postgraduate students who are specially studying intelligent tutoring systems. We have designed EXPITS to achieve different learning objectives for these three kinds of users. The learning objective for school teachers is to understand the differnce between intelligent tutoring systems and traditional CAI systems. University students are expected to understand characteristics of knowledge processing and rule based systems. Lastly, EXPITS provides postgraduate students who are studying intelligent tutoring systems with a test bed for examining ability and efficiency of the system in different configurations by changing parameters and by replacing constituents of the system. To achieve these purposes, EXPITS has experimental facilities for the following four themes; relationship between the domain knowledge representation method and teaching activities, the selection method of teaching paradigms, relationship between problem solving processes and teaching activities, and student modeling.

This paper describes the current situations and future directions of intelligent CAI researches/development in Japan. Then necessity of intelligence in CAIs/Educational systems are thought over corresponding to the model of teaching and the cognitive model of human learning like the situated learning, knowledge construction and so on. Originally, the main aims of ITSs/ICAIs are to tealize the high level environment of individual teaching/learning. So it is the most important to incorporate the intellectual function of teaching into the system. Whatever kinds of teaching purposes ITSs have, they have the quite complex structure which consists of the domain knowledge base (Expert system), student model, the tutoring knowledge base, the powerful human interface, and sophisticated inference engine with plural functions by artificial intelligence technology. In this paper, the technological and educational points of view are discussed, surveyed and summarized based on intelligent teaching functions of ITSs/ICAIs. Moreover, the meaning of new paradigm from ITSs to ILE are mentioned under the new technology of networking and multi-media.