CS8113C: PROJECT SUGGESTIONS

As I mentioned in class today (April 9), please put together a project proposal (1-2 pages) and give it to me on Tuesday (April 14). I would like you to do something in keeping with the theme of the course. To make your project fun, useful and worthwhile beyond this course, I strongly encourage you to align your project with the media server effort we already have underway. We have several ideas on what needs to be done, so if you are unsure just ask me or Ivan. Ivan has defined an API for content creation, creating spatial and temporal associations between objects, and playback and is currently populating this API with Java code.

The current version of the API (PDF) is here. (Internal document - Only viewable from CoC machines - Please do not distribute.) Note: the exact details of the API calls are subject to change - especially those dealing with associations. Please use this document as a high-level function reference only. Any questions about details should be directed to Ivan.

There are a variety of things that can be done both above and below this API:

• write a capture application (along the lines of Classroom 2K) using this API
• look into distribution of objects in a cluster server setting (this will build on the naming scheme in Ivan's API), and implement a distributed name server not unlike the directory server we saw in Media banks
• look into replicating objects for both availability and reliability (not unlike the ideas we saw in the ITV paper) incorporating schemes for load balancing creation and playback requests for object replicas
• look into caching objects in the nodes of the cluster to avoid disk I/O, getting cached copies of objects from remote nodes when possible
• look into synchronizing multiple media strands, both at the server end as well as at the client end, taking into account the variable bandwidth that may be available at the client end
• look into ways of extending Ivan's API for e.g. to allow objects to be unravelled en route from server to the client (along the lines of what is being done in Media Banks)