Group discussion on research challenges 

Between 14 and 16 March 2018, the Department of Systems and Control Engineering held a workshop on sketch-based interfaces and machine interpretation of sketches. The workshop was held with the support of the Malta Council of Science and Technology through the International Partnership Scheme. The workshop included a mix of senior researchers, research students and masters students, and saw the participation of Paul Rosin and Juncheng Liu from the University of Cardiff, Wales; Metin Sezgin, Piril Canturk and Alican Akman from Koc University, Turkey; Johann Habakuk Israel, Florian Hermuth, Patrick Fehling and Tom Landwehr from Hochschule für Technik und Wirtschaft Berlin, Germany; Alfredo Ferreira, University of Lisbon, Portugal and Kenneth Camilleri, Philip Farrugia, Alexandra Bonnici, Stefania Cristina, Natasha Padfield and Gabriel Calleja from the University of Malta. The workshop also saw the participation of four industrial participants, namely James Attard Kingswell from Toly Products, Stefania Mercieca and Maria Bezzina from Daaa Haus and Ronald Cristina from Playmobil.

During the workshop, researchers were given the opportunity to present their various work in relation to sketching interfaces and the machine interpretation of sketches as well as discuss open challenges in the field. The industrial participants provided insightful knowledge on the use of sketches in an industrial setting as well as the various workflows used in industry. This helped the workshop participants to highlight potential technological gaps.

The three days of the workshop served as a means to strengthen ties between the five institutions involved, giving participants the opportunity to explore joint research and teaching opportunities.