In this paper we explore how to enhance our presence in Second Life by utilizing Web Services in meaningful compositions (mashups). After discussing the technical requirements that must be met, we discuss possible applications of mashups in Second Life, including serious games, and delineate a behavioral model that allows for tracking the behavior of visitors of our world. Taking our requiremen...

Definitions of software architecture abound. We’ve been collecting definitions from visitors to our Web site (http://www.sei.cmu.edu/architecture/definitions.html) and already have received dozens. However, we are interested not only in understanding the term “software architecture” but in clarifying the difference between architecture and other related terms such as “design” and “implementatio...

Application layer Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks are recognized as one of the most damaging attacks on the Internet security today. In our recent work [1], we have shown that unsupervised machine learning can be effectively utilized in the process of distinguishing between regular (human) and automated (web/botnet crawler) visitors to a web site. We have also shown that with a sli...

Recent advances in wireless network technologies create the potential to significantly enhance the experience of a visit to a museum. On the exhibit floor, visitors carrying wirelessly connected portable devices can be given opportunities for exploration, sharing, explanations, context, background, analytical tools, and suggestions for related experiences. When these devices are part of a Web-b...

When planning a Web site, designers should have not only a clear understanding of user’s profiles and site objectives, but also an asserted knowledge of the way users will browse site pages. Analysis of a site visitors’ behavior is a powerful tool that can be used to gather invaluable hints about how well the site is reaching its goals. Such analysis involves transformation and interpretation o...

By applying web mining tools, significant patterns about the visitor behavior can be extracted from data originated in web sites. Supported by a domain expert, the patterns are validated or rejected and rules about how to use the patterns are created. This results in discovering new knowledge about the visitor behavior to the web site. But, due to frequent changes in the visitor’s interests, as...

Navigational behavior of website visitors can be extracted from web access log files with data mining techniques such as sequential pattern mining. Visualization of the discovered patterns is very helpful to understand how visitors navigate over the various pages on the site. Currently several web log visualization tools have been developed. However those tools are far from satisfactory. They d...