Visual Module

DefaultVisualModule6 provides most of the visual functionality found within the lisp equivalent. It provides a fully extensible system for adding new feature maps (for visual searches), visual encoders (for converting percepts into chunks), and filters (for search time prioritizing). The time it takes to find or encode visual objects is also configurable.

Those wishing to add new functionality to the system will typically implement the following delegate interfaces or their abstract implementations:

  • IPerceptualEncoder or AbstractVisualEncode : Provides methods to determine whether or not a particular percept (IAfferentObject) is relevant. If so, it is responsible for creating the chunk, updating it, and marking it as invalid if it changes too much.
  • IFeatureMap, AbstractVisualFeatureMap, or AbstractSortedVisualFeatureMap : Provides a new feature map to be searched by the visual system. The class is responsible from pulling features out of a percept, indexing them, and providing search results.
  • IIndexFilter, or AbstractVisualLocationIndexFilter : Responsible for normalizing requests (i.e., resolving module dependent values like nearest=current), defining a weight (relative to other filters) for prioritizing, and filtering out other visual-locations.

To add any of these, merely provide the full class name of the implementor as a parameter name, and set its value to true. Setting the value to false will remove the named class.

Significant Divergences

(from the lisp)

  • visual-location.screen-x/-y are in visual degrees, not pixels.
  • origin of the visual field is in the center, increasing up and to the right (as opposed to the screen based upper-left corner, increasing down and right)
  • object tracking is automatic, so long as the percept does not exceed movement tolerances.
  • visual errors will set the visual buffer's error slot to provide more detailed information as to why the failure occurred. (error-nothing-matches, error-nothing-available, error-changed-too-much, error-no-longer-available, error-invalid-index)

Parameters

  • VisualEncodingTimeEquationClass: class name of implementor of IVisualEncodingTimeEquation. (default: DefaultEncodingTimeEquation).
  • VisualSearchTimeEquationClass: class name of implementor of IVisualSearchTimeEquation. (default: DefaultSearchTimeEquation)
  • EnableVisualBufferStuff: should new visual locations be stuffed into the buffer w/o a search. (default: false).
  • VisualFieldWidth: width in degrees of the visual field (default: 140)
  • VisualFieldHorizontalResolution: How many visual degrees separate unique visual-locations (default : 1)
  • VisualFieldHeight: height in degrees of the visual field (default: 90?)
  • VisualFieldVerticalResolution: How many visual degrees separate unique visual-locations (default : 1)
  • NumberOfFINSTS: how many finsts are available (default: 3)
  • FINSTDurationTime: how long does a finst last (default: 4)
  • NewFINSTOnsetDurationTime: how long does a new finst remain marked as new (default: ?)
  • MovementTolerance: How many visual angles must a percept move in a single interval before it has moved too much. (default: ?)
  • EnableStrictSynchronization: force the architecture to process all incoming perceptual messages before attempting to do a search or encoding. (default: false)