Projects

The overall goal of this project, also named Sakai Vanille, is to promote the use of information and communication technologies in the development of distance training solutions for French institutions and communities across Canada.

The project is based on Sakai, a distance learning and collaboration platform, which has been adapted to the French Canadian environment at a lesser cost through joint efforts (based on the open source software development model). Sakai is an open standard platform that ensures open access to content and a resulting content that is reusable and interoperable with other platforms developed under the same standards.

This project was made possible thanks to financial contributions from the Francommunautés virtuelles (“Virtual French-Speaking Communities”) program from Industry Canada.

As experts, CRIM personnel are frequently called on to evaluate technological settings. After several interventions in the health services field, our specialists understood the need of formalising the practices that ensure adequate use of technologies and information systems in life critical services. Code18 is therefore a compendium of best practices that will guide organisations that must use technology in their business process. Two versions of the model are currently available for download (available in French only):

• The health model
• The generic model

Sakai-Quebec was a non-profit organization working to promote the Sakai collaboration and digital learning environment and to foster the development of open code source-based freeware meeting educational standards in the areas of online training and skills development.

The POLLES project, developed over an 18-month period, has comprised the efforts of 14 partners based in Maghreb (Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia) and Canada. It pertained to the implementation of open source software platforms in higher education environments.

The primary objective of POLLES was to provide the academic and student communities and school personnel with premium services and new sources of information that facilitate access to the administration. The general objectives of the project were as follows:

• Strengthen regional universities’ technological structure
• Develop standardization tools for better management
• Manage connection capacities
• Enhance human competencies and provide local players and researchers with the technological means to handle and process information for economic and socio-cultural development purposes

CRIM was involved in implementing an online training solution adapted to life in Maghreb through the development of an Arab language version of Sakai and in personalizing graphic interfaces according to university requirements.

The goal of the MILLE project was to develop an open source infrastructure model for educational purposes, and to demonstrate that the proposed model was achievable and viable in the educational setting, and that it provided economic advantages.

The CRIM team assembled all necessary competencies for the development of computer applications required for the successful completion of the project, including: the acquisition, analysis and synthesis of needs; the preparation of the specifications; feasibility study; choice of technologies, etc.

Project partners included: the following school commissions: Laval, Affluents and De la Seigneurie des Mille-Îles; as well as: Collège Montmorency; Industry Canada/SchoolNet; Ministère de l'Éducation du Québec; Treasury Board Secretariat - FAI; Société GRICS.

MILLE generated several sub-projects:

• État de l'art (State of the Art) – open source software review 
• Bureau Virtuel (Virtual Office) – a portal based on the uPortal model for primary and secondary school students and teachers 
• Clients légers (Light Clients) – workstations for schools 
• Colibris (Hummingbirds) – distribution of open source software for Windows and Mac  
• Middleware open source in computer services 
• Évaluation (Evaluation) – to measure the financial benefits of MILLE

The objective of the E-Inclusion Research Network is to develop audio-video processing tools and provide guidelines for content producers in order to deepen the multimedia experiences of people with auditory or visual impairments.

The team contributes to the Network’s ongoing development through the deployment of both a private and public Website in order to disseminate the Network’s activities and enable research partners to exchange information. The project is financed in part by Heritage Canada

The team was mandated to completely overhaul the Caisse d'Économie Solidaire Desjardins Website by reorganizing its content, instituting a new graphic charter and implementing OpenCMS, a content management tool.

The purpose of this project was to develop the model for a large-scale application based on MS Access and SQL Server technologies, as well as mentor the organization in its choice of technologies. The team developed a technique to detect inter-modular dependencies, screens, reports, scripts and application tables. A report describing the links between each of these components, to be used during eventual modification operations or data migration applications, was then generated.

A new version of the Béati Foundation Website was created to provide this organisation with a more professional look and improved quality of its visual content and structure though the initial objective of the project that was to facilitate site management through the implementation of a content management system.

The robotics group of the space technologies division at CSA developed Symofros, software that was developed to generate models, and simulate and control robotic systems in real time. To simplify the work of Symofros users, the team developed a user-friendly and customizable graphic interface that enables modifications to the data structure of robotic models.

The team implemented a robust XML-based software architecture, including validation methods for mathematical expressions, which provides significant flexibility in terms of eventual changes to the data model or client needs.

The goal of the C³GRID project (Closed-Captioning Computing GRID) was to generate real time closed captioning using speech recognition. The statistical models used for this operation required vast quantities of data, hence the use of a computing grid (several computers across different geographic locations).

The team implemented the grid infrastructure, data warehouse and grid management functionalities (computers, operations, administration, maintenance). Several partners joined efforts on this project, including: the House of Commons (Canada), the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia (LABC), Groupe TVA and the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). The Speech Recognition and Vision and Imaging teams also collaborated on this project.

The Québec Institute of Graphic Communications (QIGC) needed a Web application to complete a proprietary validation and authorisation system for ink samples.

The CRIM team developed the application that enabled the transmission of analyses to a server managing certification and collection of transaction data. The challenge was to link this Web application to the existing proprietary application. The resulting application is completely configurable according to the QIGC client type (printers, ink manufacturers).

The NFB has requested CRIM’s involvement on several evaluation, mentoring and development projects over the years. The most recent NFB project focused on the development of the Mediasphere application.

Project development revolved around the following elements: deployment of the portal and history manual, and modification of the multimedia catalogue to meet the new application requirements. The tight timeline for the project necessitated the use of an Extreme Programming approach, which, in turn, required that NFB personnel be introduced to this new technique.

RAP, a concerted effort among several CRIM teams, was aimed at facilitating access (primarily for the deaf and hard-of-hearing) to debate content from the House of Commons of Canada using speech recognition technologies and semantic information processing.

The Development and Internet Technologies team developed a system for the computer-assisted general indexation and automatic generation of hansards (transcriptions of parliamentary debates). Additionally, an advanced search engine that enables the mining of the resulting semantic information was also developed.

L'Institut de Recherche Robert-Sauvé en Santé et en Sécurité du Travail (IRSST) asked CRIM to assist with the design approach needed for its Website and to provide technical support.

The Website was completely ovehauled based on .NET programming and included the integration of dynamic content management and synchronization with corporate databases. The team developed the following elements (among others): a module for the automatic generation of Web management forms, and an automatic site generator based on XML structure.

This project emphasized the positive interrelationship of usability tests and heuristic evaluations during the Website design process. It is also addressed the increasing demand from industry for Website usability assessments, particularly for Websites with e-commerce options.

The efforts deployed in this project produced an ergonomic design and evaluation guide for Websites. This evaluation kit contains recommendations from the Web’s most recognized information sources and identifies best practices, presenting the information in a concise manner.

In 1997, the Telecommunications Directorate launched the first version of government Intranet, whose portal was the Business Centre. In 1998, the Politique de l’Autoroute de l’information (Information Highway Policy) assigned responsibility for the overhaul of the government Intranet to the Sous-Secrétariat aux Inforoutes et aux Ressources Informationnelles (SSIRI). The CRIM’s mandate was to accompany the Treasury Board in its efforts to ensure that the process was undertaken properly.