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Content-Based Fuzzy Search in a Multimedia Web Database

Marina Teresa Pires Vieira Mauro Biajiz Srgio Ricardo Borges Jnior1 2 2 Eduardo Cotrin Teixeira Fernando Genta dos Santos Josiel Maimoni Figueiredo2 {marina, mauro, borges, eduardo, genta, josiel} @dc.ufscar.br Departament of Computer Science. Federal University of So Carlos. So Carlos, SP Caixa Postal 676, Brazil Abstract. This paper presents the mechanisms employed to carry out content-based fuzzy searches in a multimedia applications database. These searches can be carried out through the World Wide Web, allowing for the search for media whose content has a certain degree of similarity with that defined in the query predicate. The imprecision involved in the semantic information that defines the content of the media is treated by means of proximity relations to compare terms established in the query with those found in the database. A description is given of the formulas used to calculate the similarity degree between these terms to allow for classification of the media in the response set, as well as the algorithms used to search through the database to retrieve the media. Keywords: semantic information, fuzzy logic, multimedia database, information retrieval

1 Introduction
Today it is very common to search for information in a large amount of data, which generally involves video, audio and images, among others. These types of data are manipulated by multimedia applications, which are becoming increasingly popular. In a multimedia database it is useful to maintain not only the media's raw data but also information about its content. This information provides greater flexibility for the user to compose his queries. This approach is used in the AMMO environment (Authoring and Manipulation of Multimedia Objects), which has been developed to allow for the creation, storage and manipulation of multimedia applications [1-4]. In this environment, a user can query a multimedia applications database using exact or fuzzy content-based searches on the World Wide Web. The applications are structured using the SMIL standard [5], an XML application [6], which allows them to be executed on the Web with the help of a presentation tool. The user can also manipulate information separately, for instance, by
1 2

MPhil scholarship-FAPESP/Brazil MPhil scholarship-CAPES/Brazil

retrieving a particular scene or even a specific media of a scene. Although the database used in the AMMO environment is based on the SMIL standard, the semantic information involved can be fitted to any multimedia database. This paper discusses the main aspects relating to the conception of the environment. Section 2 describes the set of metadata that represent the multimedia applications and the semantic information stored in the multimedia database. Section 3 explains how queries can be set up in the environment, while section 4 gives details of the query processing, including the set of formulas that allows for classification of the media to be presented to the user. Section 5 lists some of the related work, and section 6 presents our conclusions.

2 Multimedia Database of SMIL Applications


2.1 The SMIL Standard SMIL [5] is a proposal of the W3C for the treatment of multimedia applications. The SMIL standard, whose definition is based on XML, utilizes a set of tags that serve to organize multimedia information for presentation on the Web. The mechanisms supplied by SMIL allow for the composition of presentations combining a variety of media, synchronizing them temporally and spatially. The main tags that comprise a document based on the SMIL 1.0 standard are <smil>, <head> and <body>. The <smil> tag defines a SMIL document and all the other tags on the document are its dependents. The <head> tag defines the spatial arrangement of the document through <layout> and <region> tags. In addition, <head> defines metainformation about the document, using the <meta> tag. The <body> tag contains the tags that, in some way, influence the documents temporal behavior, i.e., the media (<animation>, <audio>, <video>, <img>, <text> and <textstream>), the synchronization tags (<par> and <seq>) and the linking tags (<a> and <anchor>). Shown below is an example of a simplified SMIL document that displays a video simultaneously to the execution of an audio file.
<smil> <head> <layout> <root-layout height="100" width="300"/> <region id="vid1" left="10" top="5" height="80" width="150"/> </layout> </head> <body> <par> <video src="video1.avi" region="vid1"/> <audio src="audio1.wav"/> </par> </body> </smil>

2.2 Metadata for SMIL Applications Figure 1 depicts the current version of the multimedia database class structure of the AMMO environment for the storage of SMIL applications. The purpose of this structure is to offer access to the scenes and media of the multimedia applications, allowing them to be reutilized.
Root id

Application

1..*

1..*

Smil
SMILdocument

1..*

MediaObject name 1..* type mime mediaSource extension

Audio audio

Image img

Text text

Video video

Animation animation

TextStream textStream

Fig.1. SMIL application storage classes The above figure shows the structure of a multimedia application that is composed of a set of SMIL documents, which have a set of media that are generalized through the MediaObject class. Each SMIL document represents a scene of the application and may belong to one or more applications. The SMILdocument attribute stores the documents SMIL code. The content of a media may be stored in the audio, img, text, video, animation or textStream attributes, depending on its type, or its storage location may be indicated in the mediaSource attribute of the MediaObject class. This class also stores general information about the media, such as its name, type, the extension of the file in which it is contained and the information required for its presentation (MIME). A single media may belong to several SMIL documents. The Root class generalizes the characteristics of all the classes that represent a SMIL application. The id attribute of this class identifies an application, a scene or a specific media. 2.3 Metadata for Content-Based Fuzzy Search The fuzzy search employed in this work is based on the similarity between media using proximity relations [7]. A proximity relation , defined over a domain of elements D, is the mapping : D D [0,1], so that the following properties are valid for every x, y and z D: (x,x) =1 (reflexive property) and (x,y) = (y,x) (symmetric property)

In proximity relations, the transitive property defined in similarity relations [8], is not considered. Semantic information about the media, comprising the subjects that describe them and the relationships among them, are stored in order to allow for content-based searches. To exemplify the semantic information that is stored, consider the image shown in Figure 2. This image contains the subjects Hill, Lake, Building, and Bird, among others. The hill may be qualified as High, Without Vegetation, etc.

Fig.2. Image stored in the Multimedia Database Additionally, several associations between the subjects can be found, such as Building near Hill (direct association), Hill behind Building (reverse association), and Lake with Bird, among others. This semantic information is stored in the multimedia database, according to the set of classes illustrated in part (a) of Figure 3. This set of classes is associated to the multimedia application classes through a reference to the MediaObject class of Figure 1 (represented in part (b) of Figure 3). Semantic information can be defined for each media of a multimedia application to permit the retrieval of this media (and, hence, of everything relating to it, i.e., scenes and applications) through a content-based fuzzy search. The SemanticInformation class represents the semantic information of a media. This class keeps the Subjects present in the media (through the subjects reference) and a set of associations (subjectsAssoc) among these subjects. For each subject, the Subject class maintains an identifier and a list of adjectives that qualify it (qualifiers), stored in the Element class. The Association class represents the initial (subjStart) and final subjects (subjEnd) of an association, which are related by means of one or more direct association terms (directAssoc) and one or more reverse association terms (reverseAssoc). The Element class defines the domain (Domain) of the subjects, qualifiers and associations through the ownerDomain reference. The subjectSet and owner references are used to facilitate navigating among the classes involved. The

columnElement

Similarity
rowElemnt directAssoc

value

Element
elementName reverseAssoc subjectSet

ownerDomain

qualifiers subjEnd identifier

elements

proximiltyTable

Association
subjStart

Subject Domain owner

subjectsAssoc

(a)
SemanticInformation

subjects

1 mediaObject semanticInformation 1

MediaObject
mediaSource name type mime extension

(b)

Audio audio

Image img

Text text

Video video

Animation animation

TextStrea textStream

Fig.3. Semantic Information of the Multimedia Database Domain class was created to represent the domains of the subjects, qualifiers and associations, and the proximity relations among them. Several similar terms (elements) are maintained for each of these elements, and a proximity table (proximityTable reference) is stored for each instantiated domain. The semantic information is stored when the multimedia application is created and is defined by the author of the application. The applications in the AMMO environment are created using an authoring tool which was developed for this environment [9].

3 Content-Based Fuzzy Search


The fuzzy search system permits searches to be made involving the semantic information discussed in the previous section, grouped through AND and OR connectors. An example of a query in this environment is: Retrieve images that contain a High Hill and Blue Lake or a Blue Lake With a White Bird. The user can enter the desired subjects (Building, Lake, Bird), the qualifiers for each of the subjects (Tall, Blue, White), and the associations among the subjects (With). In addition, he/she can enter the minimum desired similarity for each subject and qualifier. Moreover, if desired, he/she can define the importance of each subject and qualifier for the query by defining its

degree of relevance. If the user does not establish similarity degrees, the query is executed as an exact search. The result of the search is the retrieval of a set of media, scenes that contain these media and the multimedia applications that contain these scenes. 3.1 Formulation of Fuzzy Queries The interface of the fuzzy search system allows for definition of the query predicate with any number of elements. The user enters the subjects, qualifiers and associations, together with the desired degrees of similarity and relevance. Consider, for instance, the above query with the following degrees of similarity and relevance for the subjects and qualifiers: Building (0.8, 1.0), Lake (0.9, 0.8), Bird (1.0, 0.9), Tall (0.6, 1.0), Blue (0.7, 0.5) and White (1.0, 1.0). Using the interface shown in Figure 4, the user chooses the subjects to compose the query expression (1), while in (2) he/she chooses their values of minimum similarity (MS) and relevance (R). The subjects can be combined using the AND/OR connectors, or associations such as With, In, Behind, etc. In addition, a combination can be related to other combinations. For example, the query expression of the above query has two combinations, one being (Building AND Lake) and the other (Lake With Bird), which are related by the connector OR, as shown in Figure 4 (3). The two values beside each subject correspond, respectively, to the degrees of similarity and relevance. Combinations of subjects, which are called groups, are classified into subject groups and subject composition groups. The subject groups are those that consist of subjects related to each other by the AND/OR connectors, and the subject composition groups are those composed of two subjects related by an association (Assoc). The groups of subjects are defined using the AND/OR keys shown in part (1) of Figure 4, while the groups of subject compositions are defined through the interface (A) of Figure 5 (activated through the Assoc function - Figure 4, part (1)). To combine subjects through an association, the user must enter the initial subject Lake (part 1 of Figure 5), the connector of the association With (central part), and the final subject Bird (part 2). The interface (B) of Figure 5 enables the user to define the qualifiers of the subjects (e.g., the qualifier Blue of the subject Lake) and their similarity and relevance values. The result of the query presents the media retrieved in decreasing order of classification, together with the links to the respective scenes to which they belong. These media are obtained by comparing the similarity values established for the elements of the querys predicate with the values stored in the proximity tables. The links can be activated to display the corresponding scenes, using a presentation tool.

(2) (1)

(3)

Fig.4. Formulation of queries definition of subjects


(A) (2) (1) (B)

Fig.5. (A) Associations between Subjects, (B) Qualifiers

The media resulting from the query are structured by a SMIL document (Figure 6) to enable viewing. This document is generated automatically and the purpose of its structure is to describe the media found to allow them to be presented in varied forms. Each media obtained as a response to the query is inserted into a SMIL media tag (<img>, <video>, etc.), with its respective id and source attributes, composing the body (<body>) of the SMIL document. The regions <region> where the media will be presented in the SMIL application are defined at the head (<head>) of the document, and each media is associated to its respective region. The total area of presentation of this document is defined through the <root-layout> tag.
<smil> <head> <layout> <root-layout height="420" width="600" background-color="black"/> <region id="r1" fit="meet" left="5" top="5" height="120" width="250" background-color="black" /> <region id="r2" fit="meet" left="5" top="130" height="120" width="250" background-color="black"/> </layout> </head> <body> <par title="Search Result"> <a name=applicationA href=rio-tourism.smi> <img id="ti1" src="../images/img109.jpg" region="r1" dur="indefinite"> </a> <a name=applicationA href=rio-points.smi> <img id="ti1" src="../images/img109.jpg" region="r1" dur="indefinite"> </a> <a name=applicationA href=rio-points.smi> < img id="ti2" src="../images/img118.jpg" region="r2" dur="indefinite"> </a> </par> </body> </smil>

Fig.6. SMIL document generated from the results of the query


RESULT Source: ../images/img109.jpg Scene : rio-tourism.smi Application: applicationA Scene : rio-points.smi Application: applicationA Source: ../images/img118.jpg Scene : rio-points.smi Application: applicationA

Fig.7. View in text mode

The format used to view the scene is obtained by the application of a style sheet (based on XSL) [10], which transforms the document into HTML. Other forms of viewing are available, such as that shown in Figure 7, which is a textual representation of the result and is obtained by the application of another style sheet. The SMIL document can also be kept in its original state, with presentation formatting, for use as a model document for interchanges between applications, or even as a source of data for other applications [11].

4 Evaluation of Queries
A query is evaluated in three stages. First, a preselection is made of the media, based on the subjects involved in the query expression. The o (mediaObject) value of each preselected media, which represents the degree of pertinence (or similarity degree) in the response set, is then calculated. Finally, the media are classified in decreasing order of the o values. The o function represents a proximity relation defined as o : P M [0,1], where P represents the set of all the possible media that satisfy the query predicate and M represents the set of media stored in the database at a given instant. These stages are described in detail below.

4.1 Preselection of Media A preselection is made of the media that contain the subjects requested in the query expression, or similar subjects (satisfying the minimum similarity established for the requested subjects), which are combined in the same form as that defined in the query expression. Only the media of the types indicated by the user are preselected (image, video, text or a combination of these types). This stage has been divided into the steps discussed below, and the following query predicate serves as an example to illustrate the discussion.
(Building AND Lake) OR (Lake With Bird)
Group 1 Group 2

Step 1: Obtain subjects that are similar to each subject of each group. The first step consists of making a preselection of subjects similar to the subjects indicated in the query expression. The subjects that are similar to a requested subject are those with similarity degrees higher than or equal to the requested subject. Consider Figure 8, where SQ1 (subject 1 of the query) represents Building and SQ2 represents Lake. The similar preselected subjects are shown in level 1 of the figure (S1, S4 and S9 are similar to SQ1 while S2 and S5 are similar to SQ2). Step 2: Retrieve the media that contain similar subjects This step consists of retrieving the media that contain subjects found in the previous step and that are of the same type as that requested by the user. Each subject may be present in several media. In the example of Figure 8, the retrieved media are indicated in level 2. Step 3: Combine the collections of media for each group The sets of media relating to the subjects of each group are combined according to the groups operator (level 3 of Figure 8). Thus, if the subjects of the group are combined by the connector AND, an intersection of the sets of media is made, obtaining the media

that contain all the subjects of the group. If the connector OR is used, these sets are joined, resulting in the media that contain at least one of the subjects of the group. When the group consists of an association of two subjects (such as group 2 of the example), the sets are combined by the connector AND, since the two subjects must be present in the media.
(SQ1 AND SQ2)

{S1, S4, S9}

{S2, S5}

Level 1 (Step 1) Level 2 (Step 2) Level 3 (Step 3)

{M1}, {M2, M3}, {M5}

{M1,M6}, {M3}

{M1,M2,M3,M5}

{M1,M6,M3}

{M1, M3}

Fig.8. Preselection of media based on a group Step 4: Combine the collections of media of all the groups of the query predicate The purpose of the last step is to combine the set of media that satisfy each group according to the connector and the precedence of the groups in the query predicate. In the example given here, where {M1, M3} is the set of media that satisfies group 1 and assuming that {M3, M7, M9} is the set that satisfies group 2, the result of the search is {M1, M3} {M3, M7, M9} = {M1, M3, M7, M9}. 4.2 Calculation of the Similarity of the Media After the preselection is made, the degree of similarity ( o ) of each preselected media is calculated. The degree of similarity establishes to what extent the media belongs to the response set. To calculate the value of o , the Gj groups involved in the query expression are considered, and how they are related to each other (AND/OR connectors). The Gi (similarity degree of the Gj group) is calculated for each Gj group according to its composition. The calculation of the groups of subjects related to each other by the connector AND is different from the calculation of the groups of subjects related by the connector OR, which, in turn, is different from the subject composition groups. The similarity degree of the subjects with qualifiers is calculated differently from those without qualifiers. The formulas for these calculations and examples of their use are given below.

Calculations of the subject groups with AND, OR connectors and of subject composition are carried out through formulas 1, 2 and 3, respectively. Examples of their use are given following the presentation of the formulas, while section 4 contains a discussion of these formulas.

Gj

( rlv )
Si Si i =1

(groups with connector AND)

rlvS
i =1

(1)

Gj

= max{Si rlvSi, i

= 1, ... , p ,

} (groups with connector OR)

(2)

( Si rlvSi ) + ( Si + 1 rlvSi + 1) + simj , if Si , uSi +1 0 rlvSi rlvSi + 1 + 1 (composion groups) Gj = 0, otherwise

(3)

where: Si, i = 1, ..., n, are the similarity values of the subjects Si of Gj; rlvSi is the relevance degree of the subject Si ; Si, Si+1 are the two subjects of the composition group; simJ is the similarity of the association of group Gj, of the requested one with that found in the media; rlvSi e rlvSi+1 are the relevance degrees requested. The similarity of subjects without qualifiers is calculated through formula 4, while that of subjects with qualifiers is calculated using formula 5. , where tlr = simrequired * rlvSi (subjects without simS se sim Si = 0, sei , simSi <Sitlrtlr (4) qualifiers)

Si

( sim rlv
Qj j =1

Qj

(subjects with qualifiers) (5)

rlv
j =1

Qj

where: Qj, j=1,...,n, is the set of qualifiers of the subject Si; simQj is the similarity degree of the qualifier Qj;

rlqQj is the relevance degree of the qualifier Qj supplied by the user; simSi is the similarity found for subject Si; tlr is the tolerance value; simrequired and rlvSi are the values corresponding to the similarity and relevance supplied by the user for a subject Si ; The tolerance value, tlr, which is applied to allow subjects with similarity close to that of the desired subject to also be selected in the search, reduces the required degree of subject similarity. The o of the media is calculated recursively, using the intermediary values (interm) obtained through expression (6) for groups connected with OR and expression (7) for groups connected by AND.

interm

= max{Gj} , j = 1, ..., n, where n is the number of groups connected with OR

(6)

interm

G
j =1

, j =1,...,n, where n is the number of groups connected with AND

(7)

Example Let us assume that the user wishes to retrieve media that satisfy the query expression (Tall Green Building AND Lake) OR (Lake With White Bird), with the following values of similarity and relevance: Building (1.0, 1.0), Lake (0.8, 0.8), Bird (1.0, 0.9), Tall (0.8, 1.0), Green (0.7, 0.8) and White (1.0, 1.0). Let us, further, assume that a media was found containing the following degrees of similarity with those established in the query: Building (1.0), Lake (0.9), Bird (1.0), Tall (0.8), Green (0.9) and White (1.0). Based on these values, the following similarity degree of the groups is obtained. Calculation of G1 : (Tall Green Building AND Lake)

TallGreenB uilding Lake = sim G1 =


Lake

simTall rlvTall + simGreen * rlv Green 0.8 1.0 + 0.9 0.8 = = 0.844 rlvTall +rlv Grenn 1.0 + 0.8 ( sim Lake sim required rlv Lake = 0.9 0.8 = 0.72) 0.844 1.0 + 0.72 0.8 = 0.788 1.0 + 0.8

= 0.9

TallGreenB uilding

rlv Building + Lake * rlv Lake

rlv Building +rlv Lake

Calculation of G2 : (Lake With White Bird)

WhiteBird G 2 =
Lake

simWhite rlvWhite 1.0 1.0 = = 1.0 rlvWhite 1.0

rlv Lake + WhiteBird * rlv Bird + 1.0 0.72 0.8 + 1.0 1.0 + 1.0 = = 0.92 rlv Lake +rlv Bird + 1.0 0.8 + 1.0 + 1.0

Calculation of the similarity degree of the media (o): (Tall Green Building AND Lake) OR (Lake With White Bird).

= max{G1, G 2} = max{0.92,0.788} = 0.92 .

The calculation of similarity of a media involves various aspects, which are discussed in the next section. 4.3 Considerations 1 The value of Si of expression (5) is calculated through the weighted average of the similarity values of the qualifiers, using relevance as a weight. The weighted average was chosen in order to compensate for the influence of the terms in the calculation of similarity. Thus, the greater the relevance of a qualifier for a subject, the stronger its influence on the value of Si. In the theory of fuzzy sets, the intersection operation (AND operator) between the elements of two fuzzy sets is done by obtaining the minimum values of the elements involved. However, for the nature of the information manipulated here (semantic information in multimedia data), it was found that the weighted average of the values of similarity of the subjects applies more adequately. This can be verified through the following example. Supposing that media were requested containing the information Tall Building AND Blue Lake AND White Bird, and that two media were found containing the following similarity degrees for the three terms considered (0.9 AND 0.9 AND 0.3) and (0.35 AND 0.35 AND 0.35), and relevance 1 for all of them. By applying the minimum operator, the value calculated for the first media would be 0.3, while for the second it would be 0.35, classifying the latter value as the closest to the requested one. However, intuitively, one perceives that the former media is closer to satisfying the user than the latter. The same reasoning applies to expression (1). 2 In the composition of subjects, it is assumed that the degree of relevance of the composition is 1.0 (represented by the value 1 in the denominator of expression 3). When defined in a query expression, these compositions are considered obligatory and, therefore, the retrieved media must contain them.

3 The similarity of subjects with qualifiers is calculated by means of expression (5). However, the calculation is only made if the similarity between the subject that was found and the one requested is 1.0. This is due to the possibility of obtaining distorted results. Supposing the user wishes to retrieve High Hill with the following similarity and relevance values: Hill (0.8, 1.0) and High (0.9, 1.0). Supposing a media has been found that contains High Mountain, and that the similarity between Mountain and Hill is (0.9). Even though the subjects are very similar, the similarity between High Hill and High Mountain may not correspond to the real semantics intended by the user. For the user, it may be that a High Hill is significantly more similar to a Low Mountain. Hence, when qualifiers are defined for subjects with similarity degrees different from 1.0, the user is required to choose from among the possible combinations involving similar subjects and values of qualifiers from the same domain in question (High Mountain, Medium Mountain, Low Mountain, etc.).

5 Related Work
Several studies have focused on the use of fuzzy logic to represent and manipulate imprecise information in databases. These approaches are employed both in systems based on the relational model [7,12-14] and in systems based on the object-oriented model [15-22]. Lee [12] proposes an extension to the relational database model that represents the imprecision of the data with the use of probability distribution. Medina et al. [13] proposed a generalized model of a fuzzy relational database that integrates the use of several models in a same framework, such as the use of a similarity relation, proximity and possibility distribution. George et al. [15,16] present an extension of the object-oriented data model to improve different types of imprecise data. Buckles and Petri [14] propose an approach to introduce imprecision in a relational database, in which the attributes of a tuple can have, as values, subsets of a set of domains, and a similarity relation is defined for each set of equivalent domains. Shenoi and Melton [7] extended the approach proposed by Buckles and Petri, substituting similarity relations for proximity relations by eliminating the transitive property. This change was introduced to allow the users greater freedom to insert similarity values among the elements of the domains of an application. The system presented here uses proximity relations applied to an object-oriented database of multimedia applications to retrieve media similar to those requested in a query. The fuzzy information that is manipulated refers to the content of these media and must be treated differently to the approaches used in the above-mentioned studies.

6 Conclusions
This paper discussed the approach that is being used in the AMMO project for the retrieval of multimedia information based on the semantic content of the stored media. The use of fuzzy logic, as presented herein, has proved to be appropriate for the retrieval and classification of media. Tests carried out in the environment have confirmed that the formulas defined to calculate the similarity of the media are appropriate for the nature of the semantic information. This system was developed using Java and Jasmine ii Object-Oriented Management System [23]. XML and SMIL 1.0 standard language resources are used to present the media and the scenes of the multimedia applications via the Web. Ongoing studies are directed at meeting the requisites defined by version 2.0 of the SMIL standard [24].

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