Papers by Benedita Malheiro
Springer eBooks, 2017
TourismShare is a context-aware recommendation platform that allows tourists to share private loc... more TourismShare is a context-aware recommendation platform that allows tourists to share private locations and videos and obtain recommendations regarding potential Points of Interest (POI), including complementary articles and videos. The user experience is enhanced with the addition audio immersion during video playback and automatic recommendation features. The developed system consists of a distributed application comprising a front-end client module (Android application), which provides the user interface and consumes directly external support services, and the back-end server module, which includes the central database and recommendation service. The communication between the client and server modules is implemented by a dedicated application level protocol. The recommendations, which are based on the user context (user position, date and current time, past ratings and user activity level), are provide on request or automatically, whenever POI of great relevance to the user are found. The recommended POI are presented on a map, showing the timetable together with complementary articles and videos. The audio immersion at video playback time takes into account the weather conditions of the video recording and the user activity level.
Springer eBooks, Nov 20, 2019
Ocean exploration and monitoring with autonomous platforms can provide researchers and decision m... more Ocean exploration and monitoring with autonomous platforms can provide researchers and decision makers with valuable data, trends and insights into the largest ecosystem on Earth. Regardless of the recognition of the importance of such platforms in this scenario, their design and development remains an open challenge. In particular, energy efficiency, control and robustness are major concerns with implications in terms of autonomy and sustainability. Wingsails allow autonomous boats to navigate with increased autonomy, due to lower power consumption, and greater robustness, due to simpler control. Within the scope of a project that addresses the design, development and deployment of a rigid wing autonomous sailboat to perform long term missions in the ocean, this paper summarises the general principles for airfoil selection and wingsail design in robotic sailing, and provides some insights on how these aspects influence the autonomous sailboat being developed by the authors.
IGI Global eBooks, 2022
Ethics promotes collective respect, well-being, and development. Its values drive individual, soc... more Ethics promotes collective respect, well-being, and development. Its values drive individual, social, and environmental conduct and apply to all human activities. Professional ethics or deontology refers to the moral obligations binding professionals to society in the work sphere. These moral obligations are fundamental in professions that, like engineering, are behind technological innovation, given its current daily and worldwide impact. As such, it is essential to train engineers for holistic problem-solving, that is, driven by ethical, sustainability, technical, and economic constraints. This chapter analyses engineering ethics and how it is addressed within the European Project Semester, an undergraduate one-semester international exchange program, focusing on this aspect of engineering education. European Project Semester relies on multicultural teamwork, project-based learning, ethics, and sustainability-oriented design to motivate and prepare global engineers committed to protecting and improving life on the planet.
Expert Systems, Jul 29, 2022
Simulation Modelling Practice and Theory
Handbook of Research on Improving Engineering Education With the European Project Semester, 2022
This chapter aims to introduce the European Project Semester concept and the network of providers... more This chapter aims to introduce the European Project Semester concept and the network of providers together with historical and current data on participants and providers. EPS is a one-semester international exchange program designed for engineering, product designers, and business undergraduates. It embraces student-centered project-based learning and multicultural and transdisciplinary teamwork to help students develop the competencies and skills required for the 21st century. It was created in 1995 in Denmark to prepare future engineers for global challenges, and it combines scientific and technical education, ethical and sustainability-driven problem-solving, intercultural communication, and teamwork. EPS has since been adopted by 19 European higher education institutions, establishing a network of EPS providers across Europe. The network offers international students a wide range of European study locations and cultural insights and, above all, the opportunity to enjoy the EPS l...
Progress in Artificial Intelligence, 2021
In spite of their growing maturity, telecommunication operators lack complete client characterisa... more In spite of their growing maturity, telecommunication operators lack complete client characterisation, essential to improve quality of service. Additionally, studies show that the cost to retain a client is lower than the cost associated to acquire new ones. Hence, understanding and predicting future client actions is a trend on the rise, crucial to improve the relationship between operator and client. In this paper, we focus in pay-as-you-go clients with uneven top-ups. We aim to determine to what extent we are able to predict the individual frequency and average value of monthly top-ups. To answer this question, we resort to a Portuguese mobile network operator data set with around 200 000 clients, and nine-month of client top-up events, to build client profiles. The proposed method adopts sliding window multiple linear regression and accuracy metrics to determine the best set of features and window size for the prediction of the individual top-up monthly frequency and monthly value. Results are very promising, showing that it is possible to estimate the upcoming individual target values with high accuracy.
ECMS 2017 Proceedings edited by Zita Zoltay Paprika, Péter Horák, Kata Váradi, Péter Tamás Zwierczyk, Ágnes Vidovics-Dancs, János Péter Rádics, 2017
Based on historical user information, collaborative filters predict for a given user the classifi... more Based on historical user information, collaborative filters predict for a given user the classification of unknown items, typically using a single criterion. However, a crowd typically rates tourism resources using multi-criteria, i.e., each user provides multiple ratings per item. In order to apply standard collaborative filtering, it is necessary to have a unique classification per user and item. This unique classification can be based on a single rating-single criterion (SC) profiling-or on the multiple ratings available-multicriteria (MC) profiling. Exploring both SC and MC profiling, this work proposes: (ı) the selection of the most representative crowd-sourced rating; and (ıı) the combination of the different user ratings per item, using the average of the non-null ratings or the personalised weighted average based on the user rating profile. Having employed matrix factorisation to predict unknown ratings, we argue that the personalised combination of multi-criteria item ratings improves the tourist profile and, consequently, the quality of the collaborative predictions. Thus, this paper contributes to a novel approach for guest profiling based on multi-criteria hotel ratings and to the prediction of hotel guest ratings based on the Alternating Least Squares algorithm. Our experiments with crowd-sourced Expedia and TripAdvisor data show that the proposed method improves the accuracy of the hotel rating predictions.
The goal of this project, one of the proposals of the EPS@ISEP 2014 Spring, was to develop an Aqu... more The goal of this project, one of the proposals of the EPS@ISEP 2014 Spring, was to develop an Aquaponics System. Over recent years Aquaponics systems have received increased attention due to its possibilities in helping reduce strain on resources within 1st and 3rd world countries. Aquaponics is the combination of Hydroponics and Aquaculture and mimics a natural environment in order to successfully apply and enhance the understanding of natural cycles within an indoor process. By using this knowledge of natural cycles it was possible to create a system with the capabilities similar to that of a natural environment with the benefits of electronic adaptions to enhance the overall efficiency of the system. The multinational team involved in its development was composed of five students, from five countries and fields of study. This paper covers their solution, involving overall design, the technology involved and the benefits it could bring to the current market. The team was able to achieve the final rendered Computer Aided Design (CAD) drawings, successfully performed all the electronic testing, and designed a solution under budget. Furthermore, the solution presented was deeply studied from the sustainability viewpoint and the team also developed a product specific marketing plan. Finally, the students involved in this project obtained new knowledge and skills.
Ninth International Conference on Technological Ecosystems for Enhancing Multiculturality (TEEM'21), Oct 26, 2021
The European Project Semester (EPS) offered by the Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto (ISE... more The European Project Semester (EPS) offered by the Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto (ISEP) provides engineering, business and product design undergraduates with a project-based learning experience in a multicultural and multidisciplinary teamwork environment. This paper reports the research and development of a reconfigurable and ergonomic three-level desk, for people who live in small spaces, by a multicultural and multidisciplinary team of five students. The main objective of the project was to integrate ethics- and sustainability-driven practices in the design, simulation and test an ergonomic, transformable desk. The FREE desk proposal aims to create a comfortable and dynamic working environment for people while providing a transformable space for different daily activities. This goal was pursued by designing a reconfigurable product, a smart desk that offers the user three levels of adjustability: bench level, sitting desk level, and standing desk level. The desk includes a folding light-sensor lamp into the table top and an integrated battery, in order to create a proper working space. The selected materials have a low environmental impact. The solution comes with different options regarding the table top lifting mechanism. This paper describes the state-of-the-art research, the ethics, sustainability, and marketing analyses, the design and simulation of the FREE desk as well as the obtained results.
Integrated Computer-aided Engineering, Dec 28, 2021
Explainable recommendations enable users to understand why certain items are suggested and, ultim... more Explainable recommendations enable users to understand why certain items are suggested and, ultimately, nurture system transparency, trustworthiness, and confidence. Large crowdsourcing recommendation systems ought to crucially promote authenticity and transparency of recommendations. To address such challenge, this paper proposes the use of stream-based explainable recommendations via blockchain profiling. Our contribution relies on chained historical data to improve the quality and transparency of online collaborative recommendation filters – Memory-based and Model-based – using, as use cases, data streamed from two large tourism crowdsourcing platforms, namely Expedia and TripAdvisor. Building historical trust-based models of raters, our method is implemented as an external module and integrated with the collaborative filter through a post-recommendation component. The inter-user trust profiling history, traceability and authenticity are ensured by blockchain, since these profiles are stored as a smart contract in a private Ethereum network. Our empirical evaluation with HotelExpedia and Tripadvisor has consistently shown the positive impact of blockchain-based profiling on the quality (measured as recall) and transparency (determined via explanations) of recommendations.
Expert Systems, Jul 18, 2023
Crowdsourced data streams are popular and extremely valuable in several domains, namely in touris... more Crowdsourced data streams are popular and extremely valuable in several domains, namely in tourism. Tourism crowdsourcing platforms rely on past tourist and business inputs to provide tailored recommendations to current users in real time. The continuous, open, dynamic and non‐curated nature of the crowd‐originated data demands specific stream mining techniques to support online profiling, recommendation, change detection and adaptation, explanation and evaluation. The sought techniques must, not only, continuously improve and adapt profiles and models; but must also be transparent, overcome biases, prioritize preferences, master huge data volumes and all in real time. This article surveys the state‐of‐art of adaptive and explainable stream recommendation, extends the taxonomy of explainable recommendations from the offline to the stream‐based scenario, and identifies future research opportunities.
IEEE Transactions on Education, May 1, 2020
Contribution: An analysis of the extent to which sustainability is present in the syllabi, projec... more Contribution: An analysis of the extent to which sustainability is present in the syllabi, project briefs, report templates, and student final reports of the three Iberian European project semester (EPS) providers, over a five-year period. Background: EPS is a one-semester capstone project framework that adopts project-based learning and multicultural, multidisciplinary teamwork. Educating engineers for sustainable development requires fostering critical and ethical thinking and a desire for equity, solidarity and preservation of natural resources, and cultural and genetic diversity. Existing engineering capstone design programs emphasize solving real world problems, hands-on training, and soft skills, but few focus on sustainability aspects of engineering design. The three Iberian EPS providers adopt project-based learning and teamwork methodologies, promoting the development of transversal skills and addressing sustainability in a multicultural and multidisciplinary background. Intended Outcomes: To show that the three Iberian EPS providers follow these recommendations and contribute to raising students' awareness of sustainable development. Application Design: The proposed sustainability learning assessment method collects evidence from syllabi, project briefs, report templates, and final reports to extract faculty and student perspectives. The sustainability-related terms collected were processed into word cloud format, allowing a simple and intuitive interpretation of students' understanding of sustainability, and in co-occurrence network format, to understand if sustainability has a pervasive or confined presence within the reports.
EDULEARN proceedings, Jul 1, 2022
Electronic Commerce Research and Applications, 2019
Wiki-based crowdsourced repositories have increasingly become an important source of information ... more Wiki-based crowdsourced repositories have increasingly become an important source of information for users in multiple domains. However, as the amount of wiki-based data increases, so does the information overloading for users. Wikis, and in general crowdsourcing platforms, raise trustability questions since they do not generally store user background data, making the recommendation of pages particularly hard to rely on. In this context, this work explores scalable multi-criteria profiling using side information to model the publishers and pages of wiki-based crowdsourced platforms. Based on streams of publisher-page-review triads, we have modelled publishers and pages in terms of quality and popularity using different criteria and user-page-view events collected via a wiki platform. Our modelling approach classifies statistically, both page-review (quality) and page-view (popularity) events, attributing an appropriate rating. The quality-related information is then merged employing Multiple Linear Regression as well as a weighted average. Based on the quality and popularity, the resulting page profiles are
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Papers by Benedita Malheiro