SOME HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE ON HOW LANEDEPARTUREWARNING.ORG CAME ABOUT.
Some historical perspective as to how this website came about. I have had some history of going back and forth between academics and professional pursuits for many decades with those pursuits occasionally overlapping. Some of my reasoning for this approach likely stems from something I have heard termed in the automotive industry as 'continuous improvement'. When I was in industry, I regularly found myself wondering as to what other types of technologies were out there and how I could advance my understanding of them supported by academic preparation. When I was going through the academic preparation towards more comprehensive knowledge, I found that academia's sometimes generic version of actual industrial practice led me to look forward to the use of the systems and processes in place in corporate America which were typically achieved through 'latest and greatest' techniques. As part of my journey, I unsuccessfully attempted to achieve full-time employment teaching at the college level but I did do some teaching as an adjunct faculty member at two local southeastern Michigan colleges almost twenty years ago.
Life altering changes and a new direction. Things changed dramatically for me back in 2002 when I experienced a very serious health problem which led to a lengthy hospitalization and some very serious lifestyle changes. Not too long after this health crisis, my compensated professional employment ended and has yet to get back on track. I sought employment in industries including (but not limited to) the automotive and defense sectors but it did not help me to get back into the engineering field and I decided I had to do some other things towards my development. I enrolled in graduate level engineering classes in 2004 which I intended to use to build on my knowledge base in the fields of advanced one dimensional and two dimensional signal analysis and digital signal processing. I continued to try and organize and build on my past experiences towards staying prepared for prospective employment and other opportunities. I continued pursuing technological interests in areas that I had both academic and professional experience in which eventually led to the creation of what I called the 'Preliminary Road Scene Image Processing Software and System'. Information on some of the aspects of this invention are highlighted throughout this site. Since I had extensive knowledge and training in technologies related to automotive safety systems, and a natural interest in how to overcome what I deemed a(n) (un)natural disconnect between academia and industry, I began organizing much of my research into a draft manuscript which I entitled 'Road Scene Image Analysis in Lane Departure Warning Systems'. Some details on this manuscript are included in this site.
Further explanation of the LDW draft manuscript. The manuscript was written to cover some theoretical topics used in the design and development of the Preliminary Road Scene Image Processing Software and System as well as giving 'high level enlightenment' towards how the system works. Consider that this manuscript includes theoretical topics which are covered in varying levels of detail as well as some superficial explanations as to how things could be potentially implemented in the software. Consider that most typical textbooks are heavy on the theoretical information with a fewer number of real-world examples for supporting the theory. This 'book' was written around the design and development of a real-world application and the theoretical concepts were included and explained to elaborate on how certain portions of the system were potentially supported by math and science and computer science and engineering.
Pursuit of publishing options. I investigated possibly publishing this manuscript with several large mainstream publishers but felt that I lacked certain credentials for publishing at this level, most notably a P.H.D. degree. I also saw that there were other tools which were becoming more commonplace in the 'digital age' including self-publishing and through resources such as Google Digital. Because I thought that Google Digital might be worth pursuing, but because I was unsure of how much support it would receive through their 'digital word of mouth', I decided to also investigate the publishing of a website which could be used to both share other technologies I had experience with as well as to provide another means of 'getting the word out'. This website is the culmination of those efforts. It was created to allow the sharing of information over the internet and the World Wide Web. It contains a much more comprehensive representation of information which I believe is relevant to the technologies surrounding my invention. It also provides multiple resources for the viewing of the information to people doing their own exploration on the technology. The site was meant to support one of the justifications for creating the system which was towards the sharing of my invention as a learning resource in an environment with global scope using public domain tools.
Potential application areas for this technology include (but are not limited to): a) Lane (road) departure warning systems based upon vision processing.
b) Lane (road) departure warning systems supported by vision processing.
c) Vehicle guidance systems based upon or supported by vision processing.
d) Backup and parking assist systems based on and/or supported by vision processing.
However, there are areas outside the automotive industry which could potentially apply these principles (including but not limited to):
e) Manufacturing systems related to warehouse delivery systems and related.
f) Defense and/or aerospace systems where longitudinal lines could be used to support tracking or landing systems.
g) Medical systems where the relationships between pattern characteristics and their interrelationships could contribute to recognition of objects. For example, pattern primitives could be other than linear approximations and context could be provided through relationships from texture.
What are the potential areas in which this system might be used as an educational tool? Consider: a) Providing a low cost or free text written to share ideas towards advancing automotive safety in the area of image and vision processing.
b) Having a software graphical user interface developed in Matlab Student Version's GUIDE which was designed with the intention of having a modifiable user interface.
c) Providing an alternative to those standard methods (template matching, squared error methods, etc.) for theoretically implementing these types of systems as well as being evaluated against for merit in an educational setting.
d) A system which could serve as a foundation for real-time road scene vision processing systems for the automotive, defense and aviation industries which could be pursued at institutes of higher education.
Professional and educational acknowledgements. Last but certainly not least, I would like to acknowledge the following, which have enabled the transforming of tens of thousands of hours of thought, programming, writing, designing and engineering into the site (with content) which you are now experiencing. Acknowledgements include (but are not limited to and in no particular order):
1) Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan. When I started there in 1985 it was 'GO PIONEERS'! Now it is 'GO GOLDEN GRIZZLIES'! P.S. Congratulations on the medical school!
2) Matlab Student Version 6.5 Release 13 from The Mathworks (WWW.MATHWORKS.COM).
3) Microsoft, especially for their preconfigured Windows XP mode environment for Windows 7 and Expression Studio 4 Web Professional (WWW.MICROSOFT.COM).
4) Morten Rand-Hendriksen, Microsoft MVP and author of 'SAMS TEACH YOURSELF MICROSOFT EXPRESSION WEB 4 IN 24 HOURS', published by Pearson Education, 2011.
5) Adobe Acrobat Reader DC 2017 (WWW.ADOBE.COM) and Microsoft Word 2010 for their contribution to the Road Scene Images page and its future expansion potential.
6) The Science and Engineering library at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, the WSU MEC and ATEC locations and the MichCard/MILibraryCard program(s) of Michigan.
7) DiscountASP.net, SpamExperts, SiteLock, Bing Webmaster, Google Webmaster, Norton Security, Comcast, SmarterMail & SmarterStats (WWW.SMARTERTOOLS.COM), WonderShare, HP, Corel, Norton Safe Web, DigiCert, Microsoft 3D Maps and TomTom, Chromium based open-source project developer tools, FileZilla, and EZGIF.com.
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