Code4lib Pre-Conference: Microsoft Research (MSR)

Future Technology

So the first half of the tour was the non-disclosure, confidential part but the group that I was part of basically got information on how Microsoft research trends and some of their results. We then got to play with some of the prototypes they have been working on, which is technology they see as coming into the market in 5-10 years. To get a general sense of what might have been included, take a look at the Future Productivity Vision video they released recently:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6cNdhOKwi0

Microsoft Research (MSR) at Building 99

The research division focuses on core computer science research of fundamental aspects of computing. A lot of the products of their research include papers, patents, and prototypes. They supplement staff and resources with scholarly research by partnering with academia. The focus is mostly on applied projects.

ChronoZoom

  • to be released in March
  • working with Berkeley and a couple of other universities
  • prototype to help in research and teaching cross-discipline
  • no details beyond that as we were told to keep this one under wraps, but check out the link for more information

F#

  • practical, functional-first programming language that allows you to write simple code to solve complex problems
  • in the .NET family, fully supported by Microsoft Visual Studio
  • multi-paradigm: can used different models, e.g. object-oriented
  • interoperable: doesn’t work in isolation, can use all of .NET framework

Simplicity: Functional Data

  • simple code, strongly typed
  • Example 1: let swap (x, y) = (y, x)  vs. (in C#) Tuple<U,T> Swap<T,U>(Tuple<T,U> t) { return new Tuple<U,T>(t.Item2, t.Item1) }
  • Example 2: let reduce f (x, y, z) = f x + f y + f z vs. (in C#) int Reduce<T>(Func<T,int> f,Tuple<T,T,T> t) { return f(t.Item1) + f(t.Item2) + f(t.Item3); }

Simplicity: Functions as Values

  • can define function inline
  • can define own units of measure, and enforce conversions

Example:

  • type Command = Command of (Rover -> unit)
  • let BreakCOmmand = Command(fun rover -> rover.Accelerate(-1.0))
  • let TurnLeftCommand = Command(fun rover -> rover.ROtate(-90.0<degs>))

Some Other Features

  • built-in run parallel and asynchronous
  • can use traditionally, compile and run OR interactively, execute on the fly
  • x |> f – apply f to x

There was more, but I honestly couldn’t copy that quickly and didn’t understand every detail, but if you’re interested you try F# through a browser which includes an interactive tutorial, or download it from tools and resources. To learn more about what people are doing with it, take a look at F# Snippets.

F# 3.0

While 2.0 excels at analytical programming, solving computationally complex problems, 3.0 is an accelerator for data-complex problems by bringing information to your fingertips.

Basically, you can load a database (through URI) and while you program, you can see a full list of all the data elements that are available.

For example, after defining a type by loading the netflix database, in typing “netflix.” you would at this point get a list of the fields (e.g. Movies) from the database

Layerscape

  • geoscience tool
  • can download and run for free
  • have the ability to bring a lot of time-sensitive data and use GPU to create visualization
  • talk to worldwidetelescope (WWT) through API
  • also has a custom ribbon plugin for excel to view in WWT for non-programmers
  • can also create custom tours including text and audio, which then exports into videos. Note: The data is included in the tour so that people can see the data – check out the Seismicity Samoa and Tohoku example video we saw (requires Silverlight)

Microsoft Audio Visual Indexing Service (MAVIS)

  • keyword search in audio/video files with speech
    • speech recognition technologies used to ‘crack’ audio files
  • Microsoft Research technology: world-level lattice indexing
    • 30-60% accuracy improvement over indexing automatic transcripts – right now, 80% of content, 85%+ accuracy
    • can provide closed caption which can also be edited later
    • index word alternatives – robust to recognizer errors
    • index timing – navigate to exact point in video and provides timeline of where the phrase is spoken
    • tune-able – queries from ‘give me something’ to ‘dig deeper to find it’
  • computer intensive speech recognition done in Azure
  • no need to invest in H/W infrastructure
  • front end user search integrated with SQL server
    • search infrastructure is the same as full text indexing in SQL
  • SOAP based API
    • allows integration of media search results in other applications e.g. text search
  • need at least 500 hours of transcribed data in order to train the program for other languages

MAVIS Architecture

Great for library and archives in order to pull content from digitized audio and video of formats becoming obsolete or degrading.

Microsoft Academic Search

  • free academic search engine
  • structure unstructured data
  • 38+ publications including non-public data
  • can search or browse by domain to see top authors, publications, journals, keywords, organizations
  • for recognized terms e.g. Bone Marrow can see term occurrence, definition context from full text indexes, top authors, conferences, journals, etc.
  • can search for person and see their publications, but then with disambiguation, and then a profile with list of publications, citations, visualization of coauthors, citers
  • can see organization profiles and how they compare to others including Venn diagram of publication keywords
  • can pull most of the visualizations and embed into a website
  • RSS feed for each element
  • full API also available and get results in JSON or XML via SOAP
  • site interface allows crowd sourcing to edit information e.g. if disambiguation of publications is wrong (though right now, only with Live account, working on OpenID)

This strikes me as Google Scholar but with more functions, visualizations, and linked data. Right now, not a lot has been indexed, but I can see this as a much better version of Google Scholar.

Being Green > Swag You’ll Probably Throw Away

Finally, at the end of the night, one of the staff presented on why he’s anti-swag, so instead of giving MS swag away, we got the opportunity to take home an epiphyte complete with care package. Unfortunately, I can’t take it home across the border so I found someone to adopt it.

Epiphyte complete with care package