Yanyan Zhuang, Ph.D.

My research interests include computer networking, security and privacy, systems, and software engineering.

• We received an NSF award “Enforcing Security and Privacy Policies to Protect Research Data” with Yuan Tian (UVA) and Kai-Wei Chang (UCLA).
• Our paper “Tsumiki: A Meta-Platform for Building Your Own Testbed” has been accepted to Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems (TPDS). This is the joint work with NYU and UBC.
• Our paper “Sensibility Testbed: Automated IRB Policy Enforcement in Mobile Research Apps” has been accepted to Mobile Computing Systems and Applications (HotMobile’18). This is the joint work with NYU and UVA.
• Our paper “Understanding Misunderstandings in Source Code” has been accepted to European Software Engineering Conference and the ACM SIGSOFT Symposium on the Foundations of Software Engineering (ESEC/FSE’17). Our paper received ACM SIGSOFT Distinguished Paper Award. This is the joint work with NYU and PSU.
• Our paper “Accelerating software tool adoption and development with Analysis Bots” has been accepted to New Ideas and Emerging Results (NIER) with International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE’17). This is the joint work with Ivan and Mircea Lungu (University of Groningen).
• Our paper “It’s the Psychology Stupid: How Heuristics Explain Software Vulnerabilities and How Priming Can Illuminate Developer’s Blind Spots” has been accepted to ACSAC’14. This is the joint work with Justin, Daniela Oliveira (UFL), Kuo-Chuan Yeh (PSU), and others.
• Our paper “NetCheck: Network Diagnoses from Blackbox Traces” has been accepted to NSDI’14. This is the joint work with Justin, Ivan, Eleni, Steven, Fraidy, and Monzur. Our final version can be found here. NSDI site for our paper is here.

This page is not actively maintained. Please refer to my Google Scholar page.

Conference papers

• Rory Lewis, Chad Mello, Yanyan Zhuang, Martin Kuo-Chuan Yeh, Yu Yan, Dan Gopstein, “Rough Sets: Visually Discerning Neurological Functionality During Thought Processes”, in Proc. 24th International Symposium on Methodologies for Intelligent Systems (ISMIS’18), Limassol, Cyprus, October, 2018.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Albert Rafetseder, Richard Weiss, Justin Cappos, “Four Years Experience: Making Sensibility Testbed Work for SAS”, in Proc. 13th IEEE Sensors Applications Symposium (SAS’18), Seoul, Korea, March, 2018.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Albert Rafetseder, Yu Hu, Yuan Tian, Justin Cappos, “Sensibility Testbed: Automated IRB Policy Enforcement in Mobile Research Apps”, in Proc. 19th International Workshop on Mobile Computing Systems and Applications (HotMobile’18), Tempe, Arizona, USA, February, 2018 (acceptance rate 29.2%).
• Yu Yan, Martin Kuo-Chuan Yeh, Dan Gopstein and Yanyan Zhuang, “Detecting and Comparing Brain Activity in Short Program Comprehension Using EEG”, in Proc. 47th Annual Frontiers in Education (FIE) Conference, Indianapolis, Indiana, USA, October, 2017.
• Dan Gopstein, Jake Iannacone, Yu Yan, Lois DeLong, Yanyan Zhuang, Martin Kuo-Chuan Yeh and Justin Cappos, “Understanding Misunderstandings in Source Code”, in the joint meeting of the European Software Engineering Conference and the ACM SIGSOFT Symposium on the Foundations of Software Engineering (ESEC/FSE’17), Paderborn, Germany, September, 2017 (acceptance rate 24.4%), ACM SIGSOFT Distinguished Paper Award.
• Ivan Beschastnikh, Mircea Lungu and Yanyan Zhuang, “Accelerating software tool adoption and development with Analysis Bots”, in New Ideas and Emerging Results (NIER), 39th International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE’17), Buenos Aires, Argentina, May, 2017 (acceptance rate 16.5%).
• Richard Weiss, Leon Reznik, Yanyan Zhuang, Andrew Hoffman, Albert Rafetseder, Tao Li and Justin Cappos, “Trust Evaluation in Mobile Devices: An Empirical Study”, in 14th IEEE International Conference on Trust, Security and Privacy in Computing and Communications (TrustCom’15), Helsinki, Finland, August, 2015.
• Daniela Oliveira, Marissa Rosenthal, Nicole Morin, Kuo-Chuan Yeh, Justin Cappos and Yanyan Zhuang, “It’s the Psychology Stupid: How Heuristics Explain Software Vulnerabilities and How Priming Can Illuminate Developer’s Blind Spots”, in 30th Annual Computer Security Applications Conference (ACSAC’14), New Orleans, LA, USA, December, 2014.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Eleni Gessiou, Steven Portzer, Fraida Fund, Monzur Muhammad, Ivan Beschastnikh and Justin Cappos, “NetCheck: Network Diagnoses from Blackbox Traces”, in 11th USENIX Symposium on Networked Systems Design & Implementation (NSDI’14), Seattle, WA, USA, April, 2014.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Chris Matthews, Stephen Tredger, Steven Ness, Jesse Short-Gershman, Li Ji, Niko Rebenich, Andrew French, Josh Erickson, Kyliah Clarkson, Yvonne Coady and Rick McGeer, “Taking a Walk on the Wild Side: Teaching Cloud Computing on Distributed Research Testbeds”, in 45th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE’14), Atlanta, GA, USA, March, 2014.
• Jun Tao, Liang He, Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan and Maryam Ahmadi, “Sweeping and Active Skipping in Wireless Sensor Networks with Mobile Elements”, 55th IEEE Global Communications Conference (GLOBECOM’12), Anaheim, CA, USA, December 2012.
• Maryam Ahmadi, Yanyan Zhuang and Jianping Pan, “Distributed Robust Channel Assignment for Multi-Radio Cognitive Radio Networks”, 76th IEEE Vehicular Technology Conference (VTC’12), Québec City, QC, Canada, September 2012.
• Lei Zhang, Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan, Lovereen Kaur and Hongzi Zhu, “Multi-Modal Message Dissemination in Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks”, 1st IEEE International Conference on Communications in China (ICCC’12), Beijing, China, August 2012.
• Yanyan Zhuang and Jianping Pan, “A Geometrical Probability Approach to Location-Critical Network Performance Metrics”, 31st IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (INFOCOM’12), Orlando, FL, USA, March 2012 (pdf acceptance rate 278/1547 = 17.9%).
• Yanyan Zhuang, Yuanqian Luo, Lin Cai and Jianping Pan, “A Geometric Probability Model for Capacity Analysis and Interference Estimation in Wireless Mobile Cellular Systems”, 54th IEEE Global Communications Conference (GLOBECOM’11), Houston, Texas, December 2011 (pdf).
• Jun Song, Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan, and Lin Cai, “Certificateless Secure Upload for Drive-thru Internet”, 46th IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC’11), Kyoto, Japan, June 2011 (pdf).
• Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan, and Lin Cai, “A Probabilistic Model on Message Propagation in Two-Dimensional Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks”, 7th ACM International Workshop on VehiculAr Inter-NETworking (VANET’10), in conjunction with ACM MobiCom 2010, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010 (pdf ppt) acceptance rate 7/34 = 20.58%.
• Liang He, Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan, and Jingdong Xu, “Evaluating On-Demand Data Collection with Mobile Elements in Wireless Sensor Networks”, 72nd IEEE Vehicular Technology Conference (VTC’10), Ottawa, ON, Canada, 2010 (pdf).
• Yanyan Zhuang and Jianping Pan, “Probabilistic energy optimization in wireless sensor networks”, 45th IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC’10), Cape Town, South Africa, May 23-27, 2010 (pdf).
• Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan and Lin Cai, “Minimizing energy consumption with probabilistic distance models in wireless sensor networks,” 29th IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (INFOCOM’10), San Diego, CA, USA, March 15-19, 2010 (pdf ppt) acceptance rate 276/1575 = 17.5%.

Journal papers

• Justin Cappos, Yanyan Zhuang, Albert Rafetseder, Ivan Beschastnikh, “Tsumiki: A Meta-Platform for Building Your Own Testbed”, IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems (TPDS), 29(12):2863–2881, December 2018 (pdf).
• Yanyan Zhuang, Aaron Gulliver and Yvonne Coady, “On Planar Tessellations and Interference Estimation in Wireless Ad-Hoc Networks”, IEEE Wireless Communications Letters, 2(3):331–334, 2013 (pdf).
• Albert Rafetseder, Florian Metzger, Lukas Puühringer, Kurt Tutschku, Yanyan Zhuang and Justin Cappos, “Sensorium–A Generic Sensor Framework”, Practice of Information Processing and Communication (PIK–Praxis der Informationsverarbeitung und Kommunikation), 36(1):46, 2013.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan, Vidhoon Viswanathan and Lin Cai, “On the Uplink MAC Performance of A Drive-Thru Internet”, IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology, 61(4):1925–1935, 2012 (pdf).
• Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan, Yuanqian Luo and Lin Cai, “Time and Location-Critical Emergency Message Dissemination for Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks”, IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications (JSAC), special issue on Vehicular Communications and Networks, 29(1):187–196, 2011 (pdf).
• Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan, Guoxing Wu, “Energy-Optimal Grid-Based Clustering in Wireless Microsensor Networks with Data Aggregation”, International Journal of Parallel, Emergent and Distributed Systems (IJPEDS), 2010 (pdf).
• Linfeng Liu, Yanyan Zhuang, Ye Liu, “Study of Topology Control Based on Genetic Algorithm in Wireless Sensor Networks”, Engineering Science, 10(2): 66-71, 2008.
• Lin Niu, Ye Liu, Yanyan Zhuang, Linfeng Liu, “Research and Realization of Computing Power Integration in Structured P2P Networks”, Computer Science, 35(5): 18-23, 2008.
• Linfeng Liu, Ye Liu, Yanyan Zhuang, “Analysis of Model and Design of Routing Algorithm in Energy Efficient Wireless Sensor Networks”, Acta Electronica Sinica (Chinese Journal of Electronics), 35(3): 459-462, 2007.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Ye Liu, Lin Niu, “The Construction of Overlay Network Based on P2P Technology in Grid Environment”, Journal of Southeast University (English Edition), 23(1): 57-62, 2007.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Ye Liu, Lin Niu, “Accelerated Transmission in Peer-to-Peer Network”, Journal of Southeast University (English Edition), 23(2): 226-231, 2007.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Qiang Wu, “Design and Implementation of BIS Mechanism on Linux”, Computer Application and Software, 24(11): 30-32, 2007.
• Ye Liu, Linfeng Liu, Yanyan Zhuang, “An Interactive Service-oriented P2P Networks Architecture Reference Model”, Engineering Science, 9(9): 72-77, 2007.

Workshop papers

• Justin Cappos, Yanyan Zhuang, Daniela Oliveira, Marissa Rosenthal and Kuo-Chuan Yeh, “Vulnerabilities as Blind Spots in Developer’s Heuristic-Based Mental Models”, to appear in New Security Paradigms Workshop (NSPW’14), Victoria, BC, Canada, September 2014.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Albert Rafetseder and Justin Cappos, “Experience with Seattle: A Community Platform for Research and Education”, 2nd GENI Research and Educational Experiment Workshop (GREE’13), Salt Lake City, Utah, March 2013.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Jianping Pan, Guoxing Wu, “Energy-Optimal Grid-Based Clustering in Wireless Microsensor Networks”, the 6th International Workshop on Wireless Ad hoc and Sensor Networks (WWASN 2009) in conjunction with the 29th IEEE International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS 2009), Montreal, QC, Canada, June 22-26, 2009 (pdf).

Technical Reports

• Yanyan Zhuang, Justin Cappos, Theodore S. Rappaport and Rick McGeer, “Future Internet Bandwidth Trends: An Investigation on Current and Future Disruptive Technologies”, Technical Report TR–CSE–2013–04, Polytechnic Institute of New York University, (pdf) 2013.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Ivan Beschastnikh and Justin Cappos, “NetCheck Test Cases: Input Traces and NetCheck Output”, Technical Report TR–CSE–2013–03, Polytechnic Institute of New York University, (pdf) 2013.
• Yanyan Zhuang and Jianping Pan, “Random Distances Associated with Equilateral Triangles”, ArXiv Technical Report, arXiv: 1207.1511 (link) 2012.
• Yanyan Zhuang and Jianping Pan, “Random Distances Associated with Hexagons”, ArXiv Technical Report, arXiv: 1106.2200 (link) 2011.
• Yanyan Zhuang and Jianping Pan, “Random Distances Associated with Rhombuses”, ArXiv Technical Report, arXiv: 1106.1257 (link) 2011.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Vidhoon Viswanathan, Jianping Pan and Lin Cai, “Upload Capacity Analysis for Drive-Thru Internet”, Technical Report, VT-2010-09-4, Waterloo Engine, September 2010.
• Yanyan Zhuang, Energy Model with Distance Distribution (pdf) 2009.

Degree Theses

• A Geometrical Probability Approach to Location-Critical Network Performance Metrics (Ph.D link), March 2012.
• Research and Implementation of Energy-Aware Routing Protocol in Wireless Sensor Networks (M.E.), November 2007.
• Implementation of BIS Mechanism Based on Netfilter (B.E.), May 2005.

Projects

• Sensibility Testbed: Sensibility Testbed is a post-desktop version of the Seattle cloud computing platform, which is now ported onto smartphones, including Android, iOS, Maemo, and other mobile operating systems. Today’s computing is no longer a term for desktop computers—smartphones can do the same, and with more embedded sensing capabilities. There is a lot for us to explore with regard to what we can do. We not only want to push a secure, lightweight data sharing service to edge devices, but also allow users have full control over the data they want to share. With our blend of herbs and spices that leverage sensor capabilities, performance isolation and security mechanism, Seattle Sensor will bring benefit to people-centric computing services and society, leading to a digital ecosystem in harmony.
• NetCheck: NetCheck is a tool that determines the cause of a failure in a networked application. NetCheck takes as input application traces collected at the interface between the application and the operating system and detects problems such as packet filtering issues, NAT, DNS problems, and semantic differences in the network API implementation between operating systems. The goal is to allow the application developer to identify where the issue lies. NetCheck relies on blackbox tracing mechanisms, such as strace, to automatically collect sequences of network system call invocations generated by the application hosts. NetCheck performs its diagnosis by (1) totally ordering the distributed set of input traces, and by (2) utilizing a network model to identify points in the totally ordered execution where the traces deviated from expected network semantics.
• BlurSense: Modern smartphones and tablets are equipped with a plethora of sensors that enable a wide range of interactions. However, some of these sensors can be used by malicious apps to surreptitiously learn about user location, mobility, and even keyboard input. Today’s smartphone OSes typically expose resources in a global way. For example, apps in ​Android use install-time manifests to request access to resources; once granted, the installed app has permanent access to the requested resources. Such permissions are often much more than necessary, and can open a door for malicious apps to surreptitiously learn about the user and their behavior. BlurSense allows fine-grained, richer sets of privacy control. For a particular sensor, a BlurSense filter might perform an action such as blurring the resolution of photos and video taken by the camera, removing access point information from WiFi scans, or omitting the motion sensor data completely.

Paper Reviews

• INFOCOM 2009-2012, WiSARN 2011, ICME 2010, ICC 2009-2012, WCNC 2009-2010, CCNC 2010, GLOBECOM 2009 and 2011, MASCOTS 2009, ICDCS 2009, ICNP 2011.
• IEEE Transaction on Intelligent Transportation Systems 2012, IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology 2011-2012, EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking 2011, IEEE Transaction on Intelligent Transportation Systems 2011, Computer Networks 2011, IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications (JSAC) 2010, Springer’s Journal of Wireless Personal Communications 2010, International Journal of Ad Hoc and Sensor Wireless Networks (AHSWN) 2010.

Conference Presentations and Posters

• “A Geometrical Probability Approach to Location-Critical Network Performance Metrics”, the 31st IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (INFOCOM’12), Orlando, FL, USA, March 2012.
• “Multi-Modal Message Dissemination in Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks”, the 2nd Networking Networking Women (N2 Women) Workshop, in conjunction with IEEE INFOCOM, Orlando, FL, USA, March 2012.
• “Geometrical Probability and Wireless Networks”, PANDA/CAG joint seminar, University of Victoria, BC, Canada, September 2011.
• “Probabilistic Distance Models and Applications in Wireless Communication Networks”, the 3rd Annual Graduate Students’ Workshop On Networks Research, Edmonton, AB, May 2011.
• “Real-Time Inferring Network Traffic Patterns”, the 8-th Consumer Communication & Networking Conference (CCNC’11), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, January 2011.
• “A Probabilistic Model for Message Propagation in Two-Dimensional Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks”, the 7-th ACM International Workshop on VehiculAr Inter-NETworking (VANET’10), in conjunction with ACM MobiCom, Chicago, Illinois, USA, September 2010.
• “Message Dissemination for Highway Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks”, the 1st Networking Networking Women Workshop in conjunction with ACM MobiCom, Chicago, Illinois, USA, September 2010.
• “Minimizing Energy Consumption with Probabilistic Distance Models in Wireless Sensor Networks”, the 29th IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (INFOCOM’10), San Diego, CA, USA, March 2010.
• “Teaching Computer Networks in a Real Network, the Technical Perspective”, the 41st ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE’10), Milwaukee, WI, USA, March 2010.
• “Data Collection and Energy Optimization in Wireless/Mobile Sensor Networks”, VIAFest/Idealinx, Vancouver Island Technology Park, January 2010.
• “Energy-Optimal Grid-Based Clustering in Wireless Microsensor Networks”, the 6th International Workshop on Wireless Ad Hoc and Sensor Networking (WWASN) in conjunction with the 29th IEEE International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS’09), Montreal QC, Canada, June 2009.
• “NCPP: A Network Control Programmable Platform of Trustworthy Controllable Network”, the International Workshop on Next Generation Network Architecture (NGNA) in conjunction with the 29th IEEE International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS’09), Montreal QC, Canada, June 2009.
• “Resource Management Model Based on P2P Technology in Grid Environment”, the 4th International Conference on Cooperative Internet Computing (CIC’06), Hong Kong, China, October 2006.

Volunteer and Community

• Computer Science Volunteer Program (CSVP)
• Women in Engineering and Computer Science (WECS)
• UVic New Student Orientation (NSO)
• Hoppers, Grace Hopper Celebration 2010 (GHC 2010)

• NSF award 1920462: “CICI: RDP: Enforcing Security and Privacy Policies to Protect Research Data,” sub-contract with the University of West Virgina, 2019-2022
• NSERC Postdoctoral Fellowship, University of British Columbia, 2014-2015.
• Frank Roberts Teaching Award, University of Victoria, 2013.
• INFOCOM Student Travel Grant (by IEEE Communications Society and IBM), 2012.
• Student Travel Grant for N2 Women Workshop and INFOCOM, Orlando, FL, USA, 2012.
• N2 Women Fellowship for INFOCOM, Orlando, FL, USA, 2012.
• Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Self-Financed Students Abroad, 2011.
• Travel support for Fields-MITACS Workshop on Probabilistic Methods in Wireless Networks, Ottawa, ON, 2011.
• Jarmila Vasta Von Drak Thouvenelle Graduate Scholarship, 2010.
• CRA-W Student Travel Grant for N2 Women Workshop and MobiCom/MobiHoc, 2010.
• Google Anita Borg Scholarship Finalist, 2010.
• University of Victoria Ph.D. Fellowship, for academic years 2008-2009 and 2009-2010.
• University of Victoria Graduate Student Travel Grant, Faculty of Graduate Studies, 2009 (Montreal, QC), 2010 (Chicago, IL).
• Outstanding Leadership for a strong commitment to providing Computer Science Outreach to seniors, 2009.

Fall 2019

• CS4500: OPERATING SYSTEMS
• CS1150: PRINCIPLES OF COMPUTER SCIENCE

Summer 2019

• CS1150: PRINCIPLES OF COMPUTER SCIENCE

Spring 2019

• CS4500/5500: OPERATING SYSTEMS
• CS4930/5930: PRIVACY AND CENSORSHIP

Fall 2018

• CS4500/5500: OPERATING SYSTEMS
• CS1150: PRINCIPLES OF COMPUTER SCIENCE

Summer 2018

• CS1150: PRINCIPLES OF COMPUTER SCIENCE

Spring 2018

• CS4500/5500: OPERATING SYSTEMS
• CS4930/5930: PRIVACY AND CENSORSHIP

Fall 2017

• CS4500/5500: OPERATING SYSTEMS

Summer 2017

• CS1150: PRINCIPLES OF COMPUTER SCIENCE

Spring 2017

• CS4500/5500: OPERATING SYSTEMS
• CS5530: MOBILE/WIRELESS SYSTEMS

Fall 2016

• CS4500/5500: OPERATING SYSTEMS