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This special issue, Issues Related to Suo Kokufu, consists of the following: Kazumi Tateno’s Traffic around Ancient Suo, Makoto Sato’s Functions and Facilities of Suo Kokufu, Hiroyuki Kanegae’s Kunizonin and Their Duties in Suo Kokufu, Tomoyasu Kato’s Kokushikan in the Kokufu, Shigeru Watanabe’s Suokoku and the Political Arena in Late Antiquity - with a Focus on the Activities of Tamanooya, and Kenji Kurata’s Restoration and Analysis of Historical Landscapes Using GIS Platforms - the Case of Ancient Suo Kokufu. The issue summarizes the results of the five-year joint research project between Yamaguchi Prefectural University and Hofu City titled Comprehensive Research on Suo Kokufu - the Formative Process of City and Hofu. We expect that the findings we present in this special issue will significantly expand the literature findings on and analyses of the latest excavation results.

This paper is the result of a GIS-based analysis of the characteristics of the ancient Ouchi Basin. In the first half of the paper, we began with the characteristics of settlements and burial mounds, and examined the role of flood control works, etc. In the second half of the paper, based on the results of the first half, the actual conditions of the early activities of the Tatara clan (Ouchi clan), which expanded its power based in this area in the early medieval period, were elucidated based on various historical documents.

Despite the various harmful effects caused by tourism, such as over tourism, there are few concrete measures to promote tourism and community development in an integrated manner. The background to this is that in tourism policies, indicators that are biased toward the evaluation of tourism exchange performance are set, and there is a lack of indicators that question the degree of involvement with the local community. On the other hand, in Europe and other countries, they contribute to the development of sustainable local communities by installing unified indicators (“ETIS” and “DIT-ACHIEV”) for advancing projects while considering tourism and regional formation from multiple perspectives. It should be a great example for Japanese local communities. The purpose of this study: Therefore, in this paper, we will analyze the factors that prevent the establishment and spread of indicators in the current situation, and analyze the method of setting indicators with high versatility based on the current situation. To accomplish these ends, the authors of this paper have tried to do questionnaire survey conducted by mail to 212 DMOs nationwide from November to December 2021. The conclusion of this paper: It was found; 1) Japanese DMOs lack the common purpose of "aiming for sustainable tourism", 2) Data collection for KPI is a burden for each DMO, 3) Relationship between DMOs and local residents is still weak, and in the first place, improvement in this point is desired.

In this article, we discuss the application of image processing to old photographs. As concrete applications, we attempt to enhance the legibility of the characters on a notice board and to improve the quality of the image colored using the existing deep learning-based method. In addition, by using Python for image processing, we aim to complete the process using only open-source software.

Yamaguchi Prefectural University offers a "CG Training" course to help students acquire the knowledge and skills to use CG software. In addition, this university is involved in various initiatives with external organizations as part of a regional cooperation, and the "foster parent system" discussed in this report is one such initiative. This paper reports on the process of the "Foster Care System Awareness Poster" project.

The purpose of this paper is to present the concept of the curriculum design for the General Education Curriculum that started in 2022, and to present the concept of the instructional design for the “Project to Design the Future of Yamaguchi,” which is a comprehensive assessment subject. Up until now this university had designed its curriculum using the so-called “theme-based” method. However, in a new era of unpredictability, the nature of the qualities and abilities demanded of university education by society and university establishers is changing. Therefore, the decision was made to design the new General Education Curriculum using a competency-based method of backward design with the required qualities and abilities set as educational targets. While combining the diverse knowledge they acquired in the first semester, students for mixed teams from all departments in the second semester and based on the design thinking process, generated ideas oriented toward solving problems in the local community. A rubric-type evaluation forms was used to visualize the students’ academic achievements.