Prospective students How to choose a project

Honours degrees at UWC are by coursework and a project. In South Africa, an Honours degree follows on a 3-year BSc in Computer Science. The Honours project takes one year and consists of the following steps: write a project proposal consisting of user requirements and requirements analysis; design a software solution with UML and code a proof-of-concept prototype; implement the code; and test the code.  At each of the four steps, the student must give a presentation to the department in addition to writing a report for each step culminating in a complete project report. Click here for a list of project ideas. We tend to align an Honours project as a lead-in to an MSc, or at least to prepare the student for pursuing advanced postgraduate studies. Have a look at the suggested projects, and also at related BANG publications. Honours projects are chosen in January. Talk to the project supervisor about the project. If you are serious about a project, you formally select a project by filling out a form (see the postgraduate administrator).

MSc and PhD degrees at UWC Computer Science are by research thesis only. There is no coursework. An MSc is supposed to take two years and a PhD takes three. Both degrees consist of the following steps: write a research proposal, defend the proposal to the department, carry out the research by coding a prototype with which to collect data, and finally write up a thesis. We expect and encourage all MSc and PhD students to submit papers based on their work to local and international accredited conferences and journals. A PhD thesis has the additional requirement to be original and innovative work. We expect both MSc and PhD students to generate their own research topic/proposal in line with the research group ongoing activities, and take ownership of the entire process.

Funding

We expect Honours, MSc and PhD students (and post-docs, too) to attract funding for  research activities, including bursaries. For example, South African and SADC citizens can apply for SA government (NRF) bursaries well in advance of intended studies, see www.nrf.ac.za for information and deadlines. Provided we have external funding, and we usually do, we can top up those NRF bursaries by 50%, e.g. an R80k NRF bursary can be topped up by R40k meaning R120k/annum. It’s all tax free, and with no strings attached.  That’s R10k/month in pocket (well, once fees are covered). You can even send money home! One can also search for ‘loaded’ bursaries from SA corporates, e.g. Telkom, or other government agencies. Try the dti, DST and/or Meraka/CSIR, for example. The bottom line is that you are responsible for your academic career, and you must find ways to fund it.

If you are interested doing postgraduate studies, e.g. MSc and PhD with us:

Have a look at related BANG publications. Many of the papers we have published are available for download through the publication source, via Google scholar and/or the UWC Research Repository.

Read our brochure and follow links to projects that show completed theses and also ideas for new projects. That will give you an idea of the kind of work we do.

• Align your own interests to one of these projects.
• Do some serious background reading on the topic
• Write a preliminary research proposal to accompany your application. We recommend you either get a copy of UWC’s research proposal guide and/or Olivier’s most recent book on the same topic.
• Then contact a prospective supervisor and initiate an email conversation about the topic providing that research proposal along with your CV.
• We also recommend you tell us why you want to do a postgrad degree, and why with us. Google the terms “positionality” and “intersectionality”. That’s what we want to know.

UWC now accepts MSc and PhD applications throughout the year. However, we prefer that students commence studies at the beginning of the calendar year. Note that we are especially interested in South African students that studied at other universities, here and abroad. We want fresh ideas to influence the way we conduct research, publish about it and perform technology transfer. The same goes for post-docs. Of course, we will consider qualified international students, as well.

BANG projects for 2017

Depending on the sophistication level and programmng/research balance, most of these projects can be adapted for Honours, MSc or PhD. Honours projects are typically programming and testing oriented, MSc projects typically use a programming effort to collect research data for analysis to answer a research question, and PhD projects do this in order to explore a novel contribution to the field of Computer Science and/or ICT4D. Note that Honours teams can also be convened to address a more complicated (and larger) programming effort. The research group is involved with two community-based research projects: Zenzeleni and SignSupport. For each community project, we list new, ongoing and recently finished projects to provide some context. BANG also has relationships to software development NGOs and social enterprises in the ICT4D space; and a third category of internship-based projects follows. BANG projects can be supervised and co-supervised by supervisors of your choice providing they fit within our funding mandates, i.e. prospective BANG postgrads must fit projects within the funding umbrella in order to receive support to carry out a given task, e.g. bursary, devices, airtime, travel, etc.

Zenzeleni – a solar-powered and wireless rural community network. Click here for more info.

Available projects 

Billing services for data and voice. We have recently added low cost high speed Internet VoIP break in and out services to a rural community-run wireless mesh network.  The network is managed by a co-operative in Mankosi and is physically placed in people’s homes. We are using a homegrown prepaid billing system for VoIP co-designed with the community which uses Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and A2Billing.. We need to add additional functionality to bill various forms of data usage in addition to voice. Note that we also bill for charging mobile phones at solar charging spots. Ideally, an integrated billing platform needs to be worked out with the community: there will be different types of users, e.g. community residents and entities like a backpackers, secondary (junior and senior) school staff and students, clinic and NGO. The project requires understanding the current system, examining similar systems available from the Internet and coming up with a plan to improve functionality and ease of use. The former requires automated function, unit and integration testing, and the latter requires user-centred usability testing.

Field validation tools. Because Zenzeleni Mankosi is so remote, it is difficult to debug network problems and bottlenecks remotely. We need apps that run on mobile phones to use in the field to debug issues such as signal strength, data throughput, packet loss, jitter (variations in delay) amongst other problems. A couple years ago, we built a mobile app that mimics the functionality of D-ITG to conduct simple Quality of Service (QoS) tests by simulating traffic flows. We would like to build on this work by providing a mobile tool that can operate in the field. Of course, we would want to test the app in a local laboratory testbed (which we have in operation in the BANG lab). The project requires understanding the mobile D-ITG app that we already have, and also looks at mobile field validation tools available online in order to cull ideas to improve functionality and ease of use. The former requires automated function, unit and integration testing, and the latter requires user-centred usability testing.

Simulation of wireless mesh networks in ns-3 or some other simulator. There are mainly three drivers that allow implementation of wireless mesh networks: madwifi, ath5k and ath9k. This project aims to obtain a good understanding of real life implementations of mesh mode, and then review the wireless mesh (adhoc) modules in ns-3, providing, when necessary, patches to allow simulation of the mesh modes with the three different drivers mentioned. This should allow one to configure quality of service (QoS) according to the implementations studied and/or created above. Once a robust and trusted mesh module exists for ns-3, simulations can be carried out to measure performance of a mesh network, and results will be compared with those obtained in a real network. This project can be restricted, e.g. for an Honours, by focusing on a single driver. An MSc would compare drivers.

Back-end traffic shaping and prioritisation/Front-end user information. Given the recent addition of low cost broadband to Zenzeleni Mankosi, we expect an explosion in the use of WiFi-enabled phones on the network. In other words, we expect to add 10’s if not 100’s of WiFi-enabled smart and not-so-smart phones onto the mesh network in infrastructure mode, for use with data and with VoIP. This project endeavors to understand community members’ usage and preferences and prepares a tool that allows shaping and prioritising of traffic accordingly, from the perspective of the routers themselves. This project’s technical aspects delve into traffic shaping and prioritisation, e.g. exploring IntServ and DiffServ approaches for the wireless mesh network, which is currently based on BATMAN-adv; although we are looking toward LibreMesh for the near future, so work with the latter is encouraged. On the other hand, a front-end user-centred approach aims to inform the end-user about which network to use to make a call or surf to a site, based on network conditions and availability, e.g. a choice between GMS/2G/3G and WiFi from the mesh network, or if the mesh network is at capacity, rather refer the user to an available mobile data or GSM connection. This end user app must include a cost analysis, i.e. informing the user about the most cost-efficient and/or battery-efficient way to do what the user wants to do; thus empowering the user to make an informed choice (which, of course, could be automated with appropriate settings).

Work in progress

Mobile battery usage comparison. Compare cell phones using mobile data vs. Wi-Fi to do the same things, e.g. WhatsApp, Facebook, email and voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). This project requires a piece of software to drive the exact same application usage on the same phones in order to compare the battery consumption of mobile data vs. Wi-Fi; with GSM on and off. The hypothesis: Wi-Fi consumes less battery than 3G for the same services. This is in progress by Shree Om (PhD student), Dr Carlos Rey-Moreno and Prof. Blignaut (Statistics).

Impact of WiFi clients on mesh networks: scalability and quality of service. PhD Computer Science. Shree Om (supervised by Tucker) aims to explore scalablity of nodes, clients and the number of calls for a village telco network running batman-adv with a testbed at the university with an eye toward deployment in the field.

Improving performance in mesh networks. MSc. Taha Abdalla (supervised by Bagula) aims to reduce the number of OGMs (originator messages) used by batman-adv to spread the routing table throughout the mesh network.

 Recently finished projects that can be continued

Community Telco: an acceptable solution for providing affordable communications in rural areas of South Africa. PhD. Dr Carlos-Rey Moreno (now a post-doctoral fellow) collected data in Mankosi to examine the acceptability of Zenzeleni in terms of technical, social, financial and legal concerns. The result is South Africa’s 1st and only legally run rural community-owned ISP. We need to collect more data to examine the impact of Zenzeleni in this area and surrounding areas.

Trust and e-billing for voice services on a rural community mesh network. MSc. Josee Ufitamahoro (supervised by Venter, Tucker) conducted participatory design with the local community to design a billing system for voice services. A prototype was implemented with A2Billing and is currently in use in Mankosi by Zenzeleni Network, a not-for-profit community cooperative.

Traffic generation and analysis on a mobile device. MSc cum laude. Ghislaine Livie Ngangom Tiemeni (supervised by Venter, Tucker) implemented a prototype of D-ITG on a mobile phone to enable mobile devices to generate and analyse traffic over a wireless network.

SignSupport – a  mobile communication app for Deaf people. Click here for more info.

Available projects

Authoring tool for SignSupport, a rich communication service. SignSupport is a mobile app that helps Deaf people communicate with hearing people who cannot sign. We currently have three scenarios for SignSupport: a visit to the pharmacy, computer literacy training and diabetes self-management information. We have built a prototype of an authoring tool for SignSupport that an informed end user can use to produce any of these scenarios, and in fact, create their own, e.g. to report a crime at the police station. The problem with our prototype is that it generates output that must be consumed by another app to render the user interface (for the Deaf user). We want to bypass that stage and write the app directly to HTML (more likely HTML5) so that the scenario (output) app can run on any device, in any browser. It would be useful to read up on SignSupport, esp. Sifiso Duma’s thesis before taking on this project.

Authoring tool for ODK. We have built a signed language video interface to ODK. Open Data Kit (see https://opendatakit.org/) is a mobile data collection tool out of the University of Washington (UW); and we are lucky to actually know the people (Carl and Yaw) that started this project at UW, and continue to run it as a business called Nafundi. The main input to ODK in order to render a mobile form/questionnaire is a spreadsheet full of questions (and answers/options). This project builds on our instrumenting ODK with signed language videos, to collect data from Deaf people, by crafting an authoring tool with a graphical front end that produces the Excel xls that ODK consumes. The tool is intended to be used by Deaf people who can create their own questionnaires with signed language videos. In other words, instead of having to learn Excel, this tool enables a user to populate an ODK form with a more intuitive graphical user interface, signed language videos, that get turned into text, and then populate the Excel spreadsheet that ODK expects. This will be especially helpful when creating signed language interfaces for ODK forms,  by Deaf signers and/or people working with a signed language interpreter.

Sign language video frame grabber is intended for a sign language user to select a key frame from a sign language video that ‘represents’ the meaning of a video. The intention is to use that selected frame as an icon for the sign language video in an application, perhaps to identify a button or a selection, or to play the full video to clarify the content. In other words, in an app, instead of playing the entire sign language video, we rather allow a sign language speaker to select a frame from the video for that video. A more interesting angle to this would be for the sign language speaker to select several key frames, and animate them in a gif that will suggest more completely the meaning of the clip to a sign language speaker.

Evaluation of SignSupport on low-end smartphones. We have developed and tested the current SignSupport prototype on mid-range smart phones. We know the prototype will work well on later versions of Android. However, we’d like to know if Deaf users will be able to use SignSupport on low-end phones running slightly older versions of Android. This project requires porting SignSupport to such phones and testing them out with Deaf users in order to compare users’ impressions of the application and its performance. This mostly involves the evaluation of sign language video intelligibility, for which  guidelines exist. This project can also involve modification to the way SignSupport handles and stores videos in order to improve performance on lower end phones.

Android bandwidth pricing calculator. In 2012, we built a mobile packet monitor front end and back end to collect and visualise the data consumed by various applications running on an Android device. This project carries that prototype further, possibly based on other tools like Android’s Data usage app, adding support for multiple data plans, a wider array of price visualizations, support for multiple SSID’s on the WiFi interface and calculations to help users decide if they should make a GSM call, VoIP or some sort of breakout, e.g. SkypeOut.

Work in progress

Authoring tool for SignSupport. MSc. Sifiso Duma (Tucker) Thus far we have designed and built three versions of SignSupport for a Deaf person: 1) visiting a doctor, 2) visiting a pharmacist and 3) assisting with ICDL training. SignSupport essentially presents a scripted conversation flow between a Deaf person and a hearing person around a specific scenario. There is no automatic translation. All of the potential sign language videos are stored on the phone. We are generalising the tool to be able to define conversation flows for any given conversation scenario, e.g. visiting the police station, home affairs or library. We would like each scenario to be crafted and loaded onto the phone individually, depending on need. The authoring tool is meant to help domain specialists construct the conversation flow and to aid in populating the context with recorded sign language videos and related text and icons. We have a prototype that needs improvement.

Signed language interface for ODK. Contract programmer (YY Wang, an MSc Computer Science graduate working in local software engineering company) does exactly what the title suggests: provides signed language interfaces, in this case South African Sign Language (SASL) to collect data from Deaf end users with ODK. In addition to populating the interface with signed language questions, and answers (in addition to iconic answers), the enhancement includes call outs to transcription tools such that a SASL interpreter can populate otherwise text-based data for standard ODK tools.

Mobile video relay and security. PhD. Andre Henney (Tucker). This project integrates a real-time mobile relay system based on the MobileASL codec to SignSupport. This app can be invoked on a mobile device when a Deaf person requires interpretation to clarify information surrounding any given SignSupport scenario, and relies on a remote sign language interpreter. This project also addresses the privacy and security of the interpretation service in the context of the South African protection of private information (POPI) bill.

SignSupport field clinical trial in an actual pharmacy. PhD (Pharmacy) Mariam Parker (Bheekie, Tucker) needs to obtain ethics clearance from a national board in order to conduct clinical trials. The goal will be to piggy back on another such effort, e.g. one for diabetes, and also learn whether or not we must adhere SignSupport to telemedicine specifications wrt technical specs like framerate, video size, etc.

SignSupport for diabetes information. PhD (Industrial Design Engineering, TU Delft) Prangnat Chininthorn (Diehl, Tucker). Continuing on her work designing the pharmacy version of SignSupport for her MSc, Prang will look at the best ways to provide diabetes information to Deaf users according to Deaf users’ needs articulated by Deaf people.

Recently finished projects that can be continued

 SignSupport mock clinical trial in an actual pharmacy. PhD (Pharmacy) Mariam Parker (Bheekie, Tucker) is trialled the output of Michael Motlhabi’s version of SignSupport in an actual pharmacy with Deaf participants in Paarl. However, due to ethics constraints, the Deaf participants were not allowed to use SignSupport in conjunction with actual medications.

Video notification for SignSupport. For the pharmacy SignSupport scenario, we need to add a video notification, containing a sign language video, within the SignSupport application, to remind a Deaf user when to take a given medication. The notification has two parts: first, a picture of the medication, and second, a sign language video that informs the user how to take it. The reminder system needs to be automatically configured and set into motion by the SignSupport application once a pharmacist adds a prescription. The system needs to be able to handle multiple alerts at the same time. It also needs to have a link from the reminder back to the medicine’s entry in the SignSupport system. Another task is to increase the intensity of the phone’s vibration for alerts. A useful add-on would be to track user compliance of actually taking the medication.

Pattern passcode for SignSupport. In 2013, Duma modified the standard Android pattern passcode to allow a user to use a point more than once to enable more complicated patterns with repeatable points. A reused point is colour-coded to how many times it is used. Modifications in 2014 by Bulumko Matshoba include: removing the advance button, adding a pattern reset, enabling the user to lift the finger and skip to another location for disjunctive patterns, and a formal test to see if pattern passcodes really work better with Deaf users than textual passwords and PINs. The main reason why we are interested in pattern passcodes is that many Deaf users are minimally textually literate and since they communicate in signed language, they will prefer visual passcodes. Thus the pattern reset is not as straightforward as a text password reset with email.

Sign language-based data collection with ODK (Open Data Kit) augmented text and paper-based questionnaires with signed language videos. The problem was that we have to have the text-based questionnaires interpreted on the spot. This limits the data collection process because if we have 2 interpreters, we can only interview 2 Deaf people at a time. With a sign language enhanced system, we can collect yes/no and multiple-choice answers, and even free form answers in sign language to be interpreted later. All of the questions are asked in South African Sign Language ont the device. The existing prototype, developed by Sibusio Sibiya, can be improved and tested out with Deaf end users.

Internship-linked projects with local software development NGOs/social enterprise

Android app to collect and visualise data for water safety. SeeSaw has an app called Snapture that takes photos of codes that represent water quality. Theywould appreciate support on the following aspects: Automatic processing of the codes (i.e. shape or colour recognition that does some of the processing automatically and also creates a user-friendly process for picking up errors – as we will never be able to reach 99% processing accuracy); amendments to the web platform upon which the results are visualised – for instance being able to filter the results by time (adding time sliders) – and finding other ways to improve our current visualisation (see screenshot on later page); and possible development of an accompanying Android app (referred to hereafter as eSnapture) which takes the images of these codes and turns them into “push-buttons” on the screen of a smartphone. The idea is to have something that replicates the look and feel of Snapture, but which does not require any processing of codes. The Android app we have sends these photos to our server where we have a rough-and-ready system that allows us to manually process the codes. As we get more codes, we would like this process to be automated and the manual process (that we will still need to verify processing and correct errors or „non-processable‟ codes) to be improved. eSnapture would be a new Android app that would use the codes as images that are pushed on the touch screen. The idea is that this could be used by managers or those familiar with technology. The idea is to keep the look and feel the same as the version where you take a photo of the codes. „Twin apps‟, if you like. Lastly, some improvements to our backend where we show results would be welcome. This is hosted on CouchDB, see (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CouchDB). For more background data, see this overview.

Data visualizer for CommCare: Dimagi makes extensive use of CommCare is an open source, mobile and cloud-based platform designed to support frontline workers globally in gathering and distributing information. Using it anyone can build a mobile application to collect data and perform case management. CommCare has a number of built in reports that allow users to view the activity of the mobile workers however it is does not have any reports that allow the users to perform analysis of the data they are collecting. This project would make use of theCommCare APIs to retrieve data for a project space on CommCare HQ and provide an online interface where a user can do basic data analysis and generate some charts of their data. For example, a CommCare user may be collecting information about children and would like to plot a graph showing the age distribution of the children in their study. In CommCare HQ the data for the children would be stored in Cases which can be retrieved via the Case API. The deliverables for this project would be a standalone web application which retrieves data from the CommCare HQ Case API and provides a web interface where users can view the data and plot basic charts.

BANG Publications

This list is *not* up to date. Please look at Google Scholar  and also check the UWC Open Access Research Repository

Chininthorn, P., Glaser, M., Tucker, W. D., & Diehl, J. C. (2016). Exploration of Deaf people’s health information sources and techniques for information delivery in Cape Town: A qualitative study for the design and development of a mobile health application. JMIR Human Factors, 3(2), e28. ISSN: 2292-9495.

Dearden, A., & Tucker, W. D. (2016). Moving ICTD Research Beyond Bungee Jumping: Practical Case Studies and Recommendations. IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, 35(3): 36–43. ISSN: 1932-4529.

Rey-Moreno, C., Blignaut, R., May, J., & Tucker, W. D. (2016). An in-depth study of the ICT ecosystem in a South African rural community: unveiling expenditure and communication patterns. Information Technology for Development (ITD), 1–20. ISSN: 0268-1102.

Rey-Moreno, C., Sabiescu, A. G., Siya, M. J., & Tucker, W. D. (2015). Local Ownership, Exercise of Ownership and Moving from Passive to Active Entitlement: A practice-led inquiry on a rural community network. The Journal of Community Informatics (JOCI), 11(2). ISSN: 1712-4441.

Blake, E., Tucker, W., & Glaser, M. (2014). Towards communication and information access for Deaf people. South African Computer Journal, (54), 10–19. ISSN: 1015-7999.

Meeran, M. T., & Tucker, W. D. (2014). An analysis of voice over Internet Protocol in wireless mesh networks. In Proc. Wireless Communications, Vehicular Technology, Information Theory and Aerospace & Electronic Systems (VITAE) (pp. 1–5). Aalborg, Denmark: IEEE. ISBN: 978-1-4799-4626-6.

Rey-Moreno, C., Tucker, W. D., & Simo-Reigadas, J. (2014). Optimisation of SlotTime for a single-radio Mid-Range Multi-hop Wireless Mesh Network. In R. Volkwyn (Ed.), Proc. SATNAC (pp. 49–54). Port Elizabeth, South Africa: Telkom. ISBN: 978-0-620-61966-0.

Rey-Moreno, C., Ufitamahoro, M. J., Venter, I. M., & Tucker, W. D. (2014). Co-designing a Billing System for Voice Services in Rural South Africa: Lessons Learned. In Proc. ACM DEV-5. San Jose, CA, USA: ACM Press, NY, NY.  ISBN: 978-1-4503-2936-1. (in press)

Tiemeni, G. L. N., Venter, I. M., & Tucker, W. D. (2014a). Rural Wireless Mesh Network Analysis on Mobile Devices. In R. Volkwyn (Ed.), SATNAC (pp. 307–312). Port Elizabeth, South Africa: Telkom. ISBN: 978-0-620-61966-0.

Tiemeni, G. L. N., Venter, I. M., & Tucker, W. D. (2014b). Performance Evaluation of a Wireless Network using a VoIP Traffic Generator on a Mobile Device. In Proc. SAICSIT (pp. 297–303). Centurion, South African: ACM Press, NY, NY. ISBN: 978-1-4503-3246-0.

Tucker, W. D. (2014). Beyond traditional ethics when developing assistive technology for and with Deaf people in developing regions. In M. Hersh (Ed.), Ethical Engineering for International Development and Environmental Sustainability (Chapter 10). Springer: London. (in press)

Tucker, W. D., & Westerveld, R. (2014). ICT4D and Local Access. In H. A. Peng & R. Mansell (Eds.), International Encyclopedia of Digital Communication & Society. Wiley-Blackwell. (in press)

Ufitamahoro, M. J., Venter, I. M., Rey-Moreno, C., & Tucker, W. D. (2014). A participatory design for a billing system: A South African case study of a community based telephony system. In Proc. SAICSIT (pp. 270-275). Centurion, South Africa: ACM Press, NY, NY. ISBN: 978-1-4503-3246-0.

NJ Bidwell, MJ Siya, G Marsden, WD Tucker, M Tshemese, N Gaven, … KA Eglinton (2013). Walking and the Social Life of Solar Charging in Rural Africa. ACM Trans. Comput.-Hum. Interact., 20(4 September), Article 22, 33 pages.

HR Mauwa & WD Tucker (2013). Security of a Mesh Potato Network in Ad Hoc Mode. In R. Volkwyn (Ed.), Southern African Telecommunication Networks & Applications Conference (pp. 431–432). Stellenbosch, South Africa: Telkom.

AJ Henney & WD Tucker (2013). Information Protection in Video Relay Services. In 4th Annual Symposium on Computing for Development (DEV-4) (Article 24, 2 pages). Cape Town, South Africa; New York: ACM Press. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2537076&CFID=281222496&CFTOKEN=48554176, http://hdl.handle.net/10566/1117

MB Motlhabi, M Glaser, M Parker & WD Tucker (2013). SignSupport: A Limited Communication Domain Mobile Aid for a Deaf patient at the Pharmacy. In R. Volkwyn (Ed.), Southern African Telecommunication Networks & Applications Conference (pp. 173–178). Stellenbosch, South Africa: Pretoria: Telkom. http://hdl.handle.net/10566/1120

MB Motlhabi, WD Tucker, M Parker & M Glaser (2013). Improving Usability and Correctness of a Mobile Tool to help a Deaf person with Pharmaceutical Instruction. In 4th Annual Symposium on Computing for Development (DEV-4) (Article 13, 10 pages). Cape Town, South Africa; New York: ACM Press. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2537063&CFID=281222496&CFTOKEN=48554176, http://hdl.handle.net/10566/1102

GLN Tiemeni, IM Venter, C Rey-Moreno & WD Tucker (2013). A Mobile Platform Traffic Generator for Network Performance Evaluation. In R. Volkwyn (Ed.), Southern African Telecommunication Networks & Applications Conference (pp. 447–448). Stellenbosch, South Africa: Telkom. http://hdl.handle.net/10566/1119

MJ Ufitamahoro, IM Venter, WD Tucker & C Rey-Moreno. (2013). Unmasking Community Trust Issues in Rural Field Work. In 4th Annual Symposium on Computing for Development (DEV-4) (p. Article 23, 2 pages). Cape Town, South Africa; New York: ACM Press. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2537075&CFID=281222496&CFTOKEN=48554176, http://hdl.handle.net/10566/1109

C Rey-Moreno, Z Roro, MJ Siya & WD Tucker (2013). Community-based solar power revenue alternative to improve sustainability of a rural wireless mesh network. In Sixth International Conference on Information and Communications Technologies and Development (ICTD) (Vol. 2, pp. 132–135). Cape Town, South Africa; New York: ACM Press. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2517899.2517912&coll=DL&dl=GUIDE&CFID=281222496&CFTOKEN=48554176, http://hdl.handle.net/10566/1103

C Rey-Moreno, WD Tucker, & J Simo-Reigadas (2013). Tuning a mid-range rural WiFi-based mesh network. In 4th Annual Symposium on Computing for Development (DEV-4) (p. Article 30, 2 pages). Cape Town, South Africa; New York: ACM Press. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2541914&CFID=281222496&CFTOKEN=48554176, http://hdl.handle.net/10566/1114

C Rey-Moreno, WD Tucker, NJ Bidwell, Z Roro, MJ Siya & J Simo-Reigadas (2013). Experiences, challenges and lessons from rolling out a rural WiFi mesh network. 3rd Annual Symposium on Computing for Development (ACM DEV). Bangalore, India: ACM. http://hdl.handle.net/10566/676

Tiemeni, G., Venter, I. M., & Tucker, W. D. (2013). A Mobile Tool for Rural Wireless Network Performance Analysis. In South African Institute for Computer Scientists and Information Technologists Conference (SAICSIT) Masters and Doctoral Symposium. East London, South Africa.

Ufitamahoro, M. J., Venter, I. M., Rey-Moreno, C., & Tucker, W. D. (2013). Promoting Trust for Billing of Services on a Rural Wireless Mesh Network. Southern African Telecommunication Networks & Applications Conference. Poster. Stellenbosch, South Africa.

 Z Chitedze & WD Tucker (2012). FHMIPv6-based Handover for Wireless Mesh Networks. South African Telecommunication Networks and Applications Conference (SATNAC 2012). George, South Africa.

M Motlhabi & WD Tucker (2012). A Limited Communication Domain Mobile Aid for a Deaf patient at the Pharmacy. South African Telecommunication Networks and Applications Conference (SATNAC 2012).

Z Roro, C Rey-Moreno, WD Tucker & MJ Siya (2012). Socio-Economic Aspects of Voice-over-IP Technology in Rural SA. South African Telecommunication Networks and Applications Conference (SATNAC 2012). George, South Africa.

C Rey-Moreno, Z Roro, MJ Siya, J Simó-Reigadas, NJ Bidwell and WD Tucker (2012). Towards a Sustainable Business Model for Rural Telephony, Proc. III International Workshop on Research on ICT for Human Development, Pisac, Peru.

P Chininthorn, A Freudenthal, M Glaser and WD Tucker (2012). Mobile Communication Tools for a South African Deaf Patient in a Pharmacy Context. Proc. Information Society Technologies – Africa (IST-Africa 2012), Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

HI Kobo and WD Tucker (2012). Situation-aware routing for wireless mesh networks with mobile nodes. Proc. Information Society Technologies – Africa (IST-Africa 2012), Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

T Reitmaier, NJ Bidwell, JS Masbulele, WD Tucker and G Marsden (2012). Designing an Asynchronous Oral Repository for Rural African Communities. Proc. Information Society Technologies – Africa (IST-Africa 2012), Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

HI Kobo, WD Tucker and XM Liu (2011). Situation-aware Routing Based on Link Quality for Static Mesh Networks with Mobile Nodes. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2011), East London, South Africa, 299-304.

Z Chitedze and WD Tucker (2011). Mobile Vertical Handover between Infrastructure and Ad Hoc Wi-Fi Networks. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2011), East London, South Africa, 355-360.

EH Blake, WD Tucker, M Glaser and A Freudenthal (2011). Deaf Telephony: Community-based Co-design. In Rogers Y, Sharp H & Preece J (Eds.), Interaction Design: Beyond Human-Computer Interaction. (3rd ed.), John Wiley & Sons, 412-413.

EH Blake, WD Tucker, M Glaser and A Freudenthal (2011). Deaf Telephony: Community-based Co-design. For Rogers Y, Sharp H & Preece J (Eds.), Interaction Design: Beyond Human-Computer Interaction. (3rd ed.) website: http://www.id-book.com/casestudy_11-1.php.

NJ Bidwell, M Lalmas, G Marsden, B Dlutu, S Ntlangano, A Manjingolo, WD Tucker, M Jones, S Robinson, E Vartiainen and I Klampanos (2011). Please call ME.N.U.4EVER: Designing for ‘Callback’ in Rural Africa. Proc. International Workshop on Internationalisation of Products and Systems (IWIPS 2011), Kuching, Malaysia, 117-137.

WD Tucker and EH Blake (2010). Abstractions for designing and evaluating communication bridges for people in developing regions. Proc. First Annual Symposium on Computing for Development, (ACM DEV 2010), Royal Holloway, London, UK.

Z Chitedze and WD Tucker (2010). Wireless Mesh Network and General Packet Radio Service Interworking. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2010), Stellenbosch, South Africa. Poster.

RTL Hoorn, IM Venter and WD Tucker (2010). Comparison and evaluation of mass video notification methods used to assist Deaf people Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2010), Stellenbosch, South Africa. Poster.

ML Iraba, IM Venter and WD Tucker (2010). Using inexpensive mobile technologies to empower rural farmers. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2010), Stellenbosch, South Africa. Poster.

A Kerchhoff and WD Tucker (2010). Rationalisation of Heterogeneous Rural Internet Protocol Networks to Achieve Sustainability. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2010), Stellenbosch, South Africa. Poster.

HI Kobo, WD Tucker and M Norman (2010). Internet protocol-based push to talk. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2010), Stellenbosch, South Africa, 243-248.

HI Kobo and WD Tucker (2010). Quality of Service-aware Routing for Static Mesh Networks with Mobile Nodes. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2010), Stellenbosch, South Africa. Poster.

M Mutemwa and WD Tucker (2010). A mobile Deaf-to-hearing communication aid for medical diagnosis. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2010), Stellenbosch, South Africa, 379-384.

YY Wang and WD Tucker (2010). Browser-based sign language communication. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2010), Stellenbosch, South Africa, 71-76.

D Zulu and WD Tucker (2010). Call capacity for voice over Internet Protocol on wireless mesh networks. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2010), Stellenbosch, South Africa, 505-506.

M Mutemwa, WD Tucker and M Norman (2009). Cell phone notification via Bluetooth for Web 2.0 applications. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks and Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2009), Swaziland, 115-120.

A Poroye, WD Tucker and M Norman (2009). Secure contactless smart card transactions on mobile devices. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks and Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2009), Swaziland, 471-472.

WD Tucker and M Glaser (2009). ICT for Deaf users in developing countries. Proc.  Conference and Workshop on Assistive Technologies for Vision and Hearing Impairment (CVHI 2009), Wroclaw, Poland. (CD-ROM publication)

YY Wang and WD Tucker (2009). Browser-based video communication for Deaf people. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks and Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2009), Swaziland, 489-490.

L Yi and WD Tucker (2009). Automatic voice relay with open source Kiara. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks and Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2009), Swaziland, 143-148.

FN Daniels and WD Tucker (2008). Reliable Communication Across Ad Hoc Networks. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks and Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2008), Wild Coast Sun, Eastern Cape, South Africa, 449-454.

ZY Ma and WD Tucker (2008). Adapting x264 to asynchronous video telephony for the Deaf. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks and Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2008), Wild Coast Sun, Eastern Cape, South Africa, 127-132.

WD Tucker and EH Blake (2008).  The Role of Outcome Mapping in Developing a Rural Telemedicine System. in Cunningham P & Cunningham M (eds) Proc. IST-Africa 2008, IIMC Int. Information Management Corp.

L Yi and WD Tucker (2008). Kiara: an open source SIP system to support Deaf telephony. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks and Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2008), Wild Coast Sun, Eastern Cape, South Africa, 537-538.

WD Tucker, EH Blake, G Marsden, M Pearson and R Westerveld (2007). Reflection on three years of rural wireless Internet Protocol communication research and fieldwork. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2007), Mauritius, 452-457.

ZY Ma and WD Tucker (2007). Asynchronous video telephony for the Deaf. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2007), Mauritius, 134-139.

E Blake and W Tucker (2006). Socially Aware Software Engineering for the Developing World. Proc. IST-Africa 2006, IIMC International Information Management Corporation, Eds. P. Cunningham and M. Cunningham.

EH Blake and WD Tucker (2006). User Interfaces for Communication Bridges Across the Digital Divide. AI & Society, Springer-Verlag, 20(2), 232-242.

A Maunder, G Marsden and WD Tucker (2006). Evaluating the relevance of the ‘Real Access’ criteria as a framework for rural HCI research. Proc. 5th Conference on Human Computer Interaction in Southern Africa, CHI-SA 2006, Cape Town, South Africa, ACM Press, 75-78.

K Adesemowo and WD Tucker (2005). Instant Messaging on Handhelds: An Affective Gesture Approach. Proc. SAICSIT 2005, White River, South Africa, ACM Press, 244-251.

MA Hersh and WD Tucker (2005). Ethics and Mono-disciplinarity: Positivism, Informed Consent and Informed Participation. Proc. 16th IFAC World Congress, Prague, Czech Republic.

E Julius and WD Tucker (2005). Guaranteed delivery of semi-synchronous IP-based communication. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2005), Drakensberg, South Africa, I-407-412.

A Maunder, WD Tucker and G Marsden (2005). Usability evaluation of the MuTI rural telehealth system. Proc. Southern African Telecommunications Networks and Applications Conference, (SATNAC 2005), Central Drakensberg, Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa. Poster.

W Tucker (2005). Case study: Internet Protocol-based tele-consultation: A VoIP Project. VoIP World Africa 2005, Johannesburg, South Africa, 34-39.

W Wu, A Radovanovic and WD Tucker (2005). SIP Presence Location Service. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2005), Drakensberg, South Africa, I-371-378.

K Adesemowo and WD Tucker (2004). Affective Gesture Feedback Instant Messaging on Handhelds. Proc. Fifth International Conference on 3G Mobile Communication Technologies (IEE 3G 2004), Savoy Place, London, United Kingdom, 499-503.

KA Adesemowo and WD Tucker (2004). Instant Messaging on Handhelds: Affective Feedback, Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2004), Stellenbosch, South Africa, II-295-296.

EH Blake and WD Tucker (2004). Bridging Communications Across the Digital Divide. CTIT Proceedings of the 3rd Workshop on Social Intelligence Design (SID 2004), Enschede, The Netherlands, 29-38.

M Chetty, W Tucker and E Blake (2004). Developing Locally Relevant Applications for Rural Areas: A South African Example”, Proceedings of SAICSIT 2004, Cape Town, South Africa, 239-243.

M Chetty, W Tucker, E Blake (2004). Telemedicine using VoIP combined with a Store and Forward Approach. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2004), Stellenbosch, South Africa, II-53-56.

M Glaser and WD Tucker (2004). Telecommunications bridging between Deaf and hearing users in South Africa.  Proc.  Conference and Workshop on Assistive Technologies for Vision and Hearing Impairment (CVHI 2004), Granada, Spain. (CD-ROM publication)

M Glaser, WD Tucker and D Mashao (2004). Preparation of Deaf end-users and the SoftBridge for semi-automated relay trials. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2004), Stellenbosch, South Africa. II-255-256.

EP Julius and WD Tucker (2004). Guaranteed delivery of semi-synchronous IP-based communication. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2004), Stellenbosch, South Africa, II-329-330.

T Sun and WD Tucker (2004). A SoftBridge with Carrier Grade Reliability Using JAIN SLEE. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2004), Stellenbosch, South Africa, II-251-252.

WD Tucker (2004). Connecting Bridges Across the Digital Divide. Proc. ACM SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2004), Vienna, Austria, 1039-1040.

WD Tucker, EH Blake and G Marsden (2004). Open User Interconnect and Quality of Communication. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2004), Stellenbosch, South Africa,  II-261-262.

X Vuza and WD Tucker (2004). An IP based Multi-Modal Semi-Synchronous Rural Telehealth Service: Adding Video Messaging and Conferencing to MuTI. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2004), Stellenbosch, South Africa,  II-289-290.

KA Adesemowo and WD Tucker (2003). Handheld Fast-track Feedback Instant Messaging. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference  (SATNAC 2003), George, South Africa, II-289-290.

E Benjamin and WD Tucker (2003). Floor Control Arbitration for a Hybrid Voice/Text Web-board. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2003), George, South Africa, II-301-302.

M Chetty, W Tucker and E Blake (2003). Using Voice over IP to Bridge the Digital Divide – A Critical Action Research Approach. Proc.  South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2003), George, South Africa, II-291-292.

J Lewis, W Tucker and E Blake (2003). SoftBridge: A Multimodal Instant Messaging Bridging System, Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2003), George, South Africa, I-235-240.

WD Tucker (2003). Social Amelioration of Bridged Communication Delay. 8th European Conference of Computer-supported Cooperative Work (ECSCW 2003), Doctoral Colloquium Helsinki, Finland.

W Tucker, E Blake and M Glaser (2003). Building Bridges for Deaf Telephony in South Africa: A Community-centred Approach. IFIP Working Group 9.4 Newsletter, 13(2), November 2003. http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/egov/ifip/nov2003/nov2003.htm

WD Tucker, M Glaser and J Lewis (2003). SoftBridge in Action: The First Deaf Telephony Pilot. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2003), George, South Africa, II-293-294.

J Lewis, W Tucker and E Blake (2002). SoftBridge: An Architecture for Building IP-based Bridges over the Digital Divide. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2002), Drakensberg, South Africa, 383-386.

J Penton, W Tucker and M Glaser (2002). Telgo323: An H.323 Bridge for Deaf Telephony. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2002), Drakensberg, South Africa, 309-313.

W Tucker, M Glaser and J Penton (2002). A Bridge for the Problem of Deaf Telephony. Science in Africa, June 2002. http://www.scienceinafrica.co.za/2002/june/deaf.htm.

W Tucker and G Hearn, “Integrating Tools into KEWL”, Knowledge Environment for Web-based Learning (KEWL) 1st Annual User-Developer Workshop, University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, June 28, 2002.

M Glaser and WD Tucker (2001). Web-based Telephony Bridges for the Deaf. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2001), Wild Coast Sun, South Africa, 672-677.

M Jeffries and WD Tucker (2001). An Interoperable Signalling Solution between SIP and H.323. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2001), Wild Coast Sun, South Africa, 689-693.

VD Naidoo and WD Tucker (2001). Policy-based Network Management of Legacy Equipment in Next Generation Networks. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2001), Wild Coast Sun, South Africa, 602-606.

M Jeffries and WD Tucker (2000). An Interoperable Signalling Solution for IP-based Next Generation Networks. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2000), Stellenbosch, South Africa. (CD-ROM publication).

VD Naidoo and WD Tucker (2000). An Internet Paradigm Approach to Policy-based Management of VoIP Services in Next Generation Networks. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2000), Stellenbosch, South Africa. (CD-ROM publication).

TM Paulse and WD Tucker (2000). A Framework and Toolkit for the Collection and Analysis of QoS Statistics for Voice Traffic in Next Generation Networks. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 2000), Stellenbosch, South Africa. (CD-ROM publication).

W Tucker and D Keats (1998). Grafting an ATM Network onto an Existing Ethernet Network. Proc. South African Telecommunications Networks & Applications Conference (SATNAC 1998), Cape Town, South Africa, 485-494.

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