Check out our latest AI/ML-systems and quantum computing results for FCAI AI day.

ESE group will present the recent research results in FCAI day on November 16, 2022. See the following contributions that will be there:

Talks:

  • Lalli Myllyaho, Jukka K. Nurminen and Tommi Mikkonen: Node co-activations as a means of error detection—Towards fault-tolerant neural networks
  • Kai-Kristian Kemell and Ville Vakkuri: ECCOLA – A method for implementing ethically aligned AI systems

Posters:

  • Ilmo Salmenperä and Jukka K. Nurminen: Hyperparameter Optimization of Quantum Annealing Boosted Restricted Boltzmann Machines
  • Juha Mylläri: Augmenting the Student-Teacher Feature Pyramid Matching Method for Better Unsupervised Anomaly Localization
  • Juhani Kivimäki: Uncertainty Estimation with Calibrated Confidence Scores
  • Jussi Steenari, Lucy Ellen Lwakatare, Jukka K. Nurminen, Jaakko Talonen and Teemu Manderbacka: Mining port operation information from AIS data
  • Yumo Luo, Mikko Raatikainen, Lalli Myllyaho and Jukka K. Nurminen: From Misbehaviour and Fault Tolerance in ML system towards dependable and self-improving MLOps (edited) 

 

The final seminar of the AIGA (AI governance) project 13.10.2022 Online&Turku

Artificial Intelligence Governance and Auditing (AIGA) project, which ESE is a participant, will have its Final Seminar. We will present the key results of the project. We will also host more general discussions about the latest developments around responsible AI. Both researchers and industry representatives will share their views in the open seminar, and the program ends with an informal networking event.

The final seminar will take place on 13.10.2022 at the Turku School of Economics. A live stream is provided for remote participation. Please make sure to register before 5.10. (16:00).

For further information, please visit our event website: https://ai-governance.eu/final-seminar/

Register as a participant: https://konsta.utu.fi/Default.aspx?tabid=88&tap=13197

Testing of AI or Testing with AI – Poster Session of IVVES ITEA project Sep 13th at 9-11 at the University of Helsinki Main building

IVVES https://ivves.eu/ is one of the major machine learning engineering projects we are running. Come and see the key results of the project. No registration, just walk into the University of Helsinki main building (Unioninkatu 34), grab a cup of coffee, walk around, and chat with the experts presenting the posters.

Further details here: IVVES_Poster_Session_Invitation

New IST publication: Undulate: A framework for data-driven software engineering enabling soft computing

To see the paper (open access): https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infsof.2022.107039

Highlights

  • We constructed Undulate, a novel framework for systematically collecting data from software and business processes, storing the data in a dimensional database, thus creating a basis for data-driven software engineering.
  • We defined the general principles of how soft computing can be used to exercise automated control on and provide decision support for software engineering processes, such as continuous experimentation.
  • We extended and applied a multilevel modelling language to define key concepts in software experimentation to provide a scientifically rigorous conceptual basis for the Undulate framework.

Abstract

Context. Especially web-facing software systems enable the collection of usage data at a massive scale. At the same time, the scale and scope of software processes have grown substantively. Automated tools are needed to increase the speed and quality of controlling software processes. The usage data has great potential as a driver for software processes. However, research still lacks constructs for collecting, refining and utilising usage data in controlling software processes.

Objective. The objective of this paper is to introduce a framework for data-driven software engineering. The Undulate framework covers generating, collecting and utilising usage data from software processes and business processes supported by the software produced. In addition, we define the concepts and process of extreme continuous experimentation as an exemplar of a software engineering process.

Method. We derive requirements for the framework from the research literature, with a focus on papers inspired by practical problems. In addition, we apply a multilevel modelling language to describe the concepts related to extreme continuous experimentation.

Results. We introduce the Undulate framework and give requirements and provide an overview of the processes of collecting usage data, augmenting it with additional dimensional data, aggregating the data along the dimensions and computing different metrics based on the data and other metrics.

Conclusions. The paper represents significant steps inspired by previous research and practical insight towards standardised processes for data-driven software engineering, enabling the application of soft computing and other methods based on artificial intelligence.

Quantum software development is growing

Quantum computing is a hot topic. The big question is how do we map real-life problems to quantum computers. A new kind of thinking is needed for the creation of quantum software. A successful approach by one of our doctoral researchers Valter Uotila
https://www.helsinki.fi/en/news/quantum-technology/new-applications-quantum-computing-sought-hackathons.

We would be welcome new industrial use cases or challenges. 

IML4E and VesselAI project meetings

Last week we had project meetings on two of our European machine learning engineering projects IML4E and VesselAI. It was amazingly useful to meet the partners face to face after all the video conferences we have had during covid times. Lots of new ideas, clarity of collaboration, and fun being together. Now there is even more potential for useful work on bringing AI into real use. 

GREEN ICT FOR GREENING

Green ICT is not a new concept. However, for many reasons it has recently started attracting increasingly both software researchers, industrial software companies and public sector IT organizations. In particular, since many organizations and industrial sectors have announced their targets to become carbon neutral by 2030 or even sooner, there are clear motives and interests to develop and utilize green ICT. In general, sustainability goals call for green ICT.

So what is actually “green ICT” — and, conversely, what is then perhaps not so “green”? There are many aspects of “green” and, consequently, different definitions emphasizing different features of sustainability. In general, resource consumption (especially energy efficiency) is addressed. In current software systems environments, dependencies on various platforms and infrastructures (networks, data centers) make it complicated to realize the actual net effects. An apparently short piece of source code may actually require a lot more — thus being less “green”.

Nowadays ICT and software are increasingly utilized in most every industrial sector in many different ways. It has even been said that all companies are becoming “software companies”. In many cases, ICT is an enabling technology for “greening”. For example various equipment manufactures can embed software systems into their products to optimize energy consumption. Product development companies can use software tools to analyze the products under development to design-for-green.

Ultimately, a combination of utilizing green ICT for greening could be ideal. In such constellations, the ICT solution itself would not be a “problem” and it would provide solution possibilities to sustainability problems.

For us as software engineering researchers, the aforementioned developments introduce many intriguing research problems and aims:

  • How to specify “green” software products and systems?
  • How to design and develop them?
  • How to measure the products and their development with respect to “green”?

and

  • How to identify ICT opportunities for greening in different (non-ICT) industry sectors and application domains?

New MOOC on AI in Society

Yesterday we launched a MOOC on AI in Society. It is a result of interdisciplinary work involving computer scientists, social scientists, philosophers, law researchers, and cognitive scientists from three universities: the University of Helsinki, Edinburgh, and Paris 1.

The MOOC aims to be an introduction to AI and its impact with a strong emphasis on the intersection between AI and other fields, such as ethics, healthcare, politics, and law. There is a need to understand how AI is changing the landscape of different sectors and the effects it has across societies. With this knowledge, it is possible to understand the potential that AI has.

The MOOC has a modular structure and additional modules e.g. on AI and democracy, robotics, and health are planned to be released later this year.

Students can study at their own pace and schedule, as well as select the optional modules based on their interests. The MOOC is available at https://ai-in-society.mooc.fi/

ESEM in Helsinki, September 19–23, 2022

The 16th ACM/IEEE International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement (ESEM2022)
19-23 September 2022
Helsinki, Finland

The ACM/IEEE International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement (ESEM) is the premier conference for presenting research results related to empirical software engineering. ESEM provides a stimulating forum where researchers and practitioners can present and discuss recent research results on a wide range of topics, in addition to exchanging ideas, experiences and challenging problems.
The theme for this year’s ESEM is “A new normal in Software Engineering!?”, which refers to the times we have after the pandemic. The theme essentially asks how the research, education or practice of Software Engineering may have changed for good. However, there is also the question of how much is new, or is it all just normal Software Engineering, perhaps something being applied more extensively? In addition to regular submissions, we encourage all kinds of contributions addressing the theme, be it vision papers, case reports, industrial experience reports, surveys, and so on.
Details on the topics of interest, the submission procedures, as well as all co-located events, are available at the conference website: https://conf.researchr.org/home/esem-2022

Important Dates

(All dates are end of the day, anywhere on earth)

Technical Papers and Emerging Results and Vision Papers

Abstract submission: April 25, 2022
Paper submission: May 2, 2022
Notification: June 17, 2022

Journal-First Track

Submission: July 7, 2022
Notification: August 15, 2022

Industry Forum

Submission: August 13, 2022
Notification: September 1, 2022

Registered Reports Track

Submission: June 30, 2022
Initial Reviews: July 26, 2022
Notification of Stage 1: August 25, 2022

Doctoral Symposium

Submission: June 22, 2022
Notifications: July 22, 2022

Conference Organization

General Chair

Casper Lassenius, Aalto University, Finland

Program Co-Chairs

Tayana Conte, Universidade Federal do Amazonas, Brazil
Tomi Männistö, University of Helsinki, Finland

Emerging Results and Vision Papers Co-Chairs

Paris Avgeriou, University of Groningen (RuG), Netherlands
Marco Kuhrmann, University of Passau, Germany

Journal First Chair

Dietmar Pfahl, University of Tartu, Estonia

Industry Talks Co-Chairs

Tommi Mikkonen, University of Jyväskylä
Niko Mäkitalo, University of Helsinki, Finland

Registered Reports Co-Chairs

Maria Teresa Baldassarre, University of Bari, Italy
Neil Ernst, University of Victoria, Canada

Doctoral Symposium Chair

Maria Paasivaara, LUT University, Finland & Aalto University, Finland

Proceedings Chair

Fernanda Madeiral, KTH Royal Institute of Technology (Sweden)l

Social Media and Publicity Co-Chairs

Adolfo Neto –  Universidade Tecnológica Federal do Paraná (UTFPR), Brazil
Nelly Condori Fernandez – University of A Coruña/ Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Local Organizing Chair

Fabian Fagerholm, Aalto University, Finland

Conference Organizer

Mary-Ann Alfthan, Aalto University, Finland

Web Chair

Bettina Lehtelä, Aalto University, Finland