In 2017 my Website was migrated to
the clouds and reduced in size.
Hence some links below are broken.
One thing to try if a “www” link is broken is to substitute “faculty” for “www”
For example a broken link
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Pictures.htm
can be changed to corrected link
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Pictures.htm
However in some cases files had to be removed to reduce the size of my Website
Contact me at rjensen@trinity.edu if
you really need to file that is missing
Bob Jensen's Threads
on Invisible Computing,
Ubiquitous Computing, Nanotechnology, and Microsoft.Net
Bob Jensen at Trinity University
Ubiquitous computing --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubiquitous_computing
" PC makers hope that new ways of interacting with computers will boost
sales" PC makers hope that new ways of interacting with computers will
boost sales," by Tom Simonite. MIT's Technology Review, January 10,
2013 ---
Click Here
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/509751/pc-makers-bet-on-gaze-gesture-voice-and-touch/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130111
Bob Jensen's threads on ubiquitous computing ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/ubiquit.htm
Bob Jensen's threads on gadgets ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob4.htm#Technology
MIT: The Power of Ubiquitous Computing
"Humans and Computers Are Getting Even More Connected." by Brian
Bergstein, MIT's Technology Review, November 2, 2015 ---
http://www.technologyreview.com/view/543106/humans-and-computers-are-getting-even-more-connected/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20151103
The implications of pervasive or ubiquitous computing are still only beginning to be apparent.
What do we want from the smart machines pervading our world—and what do they want from us?
That question framed this morning’s opening of the EmTech conference at MIT, and it’s a useful way to think about where computing is heading.
As MIT Technology Review’s editor-in-chief, Jason Pontin, said in beginning the show, breakthroughs in computer science have made it possible for machines to understand more of the data that our devices and sensors collect “in ways that elude human perception.” As we become ever more reliant on these devices and their software, the companies that capture our data develop a competitive advantage over those that don’t. And in turn, the companies’ need for data collection and the ability of machines to influence our behavior “creates a kind of intimacy between the human and the digital” that makes automated systems even more powerful.
“We know that there is enormous utility in embracing machines that are smart and powerful enough to become part of who we are,” Pontin said. “They have extended our capabilities and enlarged our sense of what it means to be human. But we need to be conscious of what we want from these smart machines, our new intimates. Because sometimes, they are not solely loyal to our interests.”
We’ll explore these issues through Wednesday at EmTech. For more on these ideas and the technologies driving them forward, see “Teaching Machines to Understand Us,” “How Technology Is Destroying Jobs,” and “The Real Privacy Problem.”
Bob Jensen's sadly neglected threads on ubiquitous
computing ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/ubiquit.htm
"PC makers hope that new ways of interacting with computers will boost
sales" PC makers hope that new ways of interacting with computers will
boost sales," by Tom Simonite. MIT's Technology Review, January 10,
2013 ---
Click Here
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/509751/pc-makers-bet-on-gaze-gesture-voice-and-touch/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130111
"Touch Screens that Curve, Bend, and Even Touch Back: New
technology could let the screens on future devices wrap around corners, act like
paper, and sense touch on the rear as well as the front," by Tom Simonite, MIT's
Technology Review, January 11, 2013 ---
Click Here
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/509761/touch-screens-that-curve-bend-and-even-touch-back/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130111
Bob Jensen's threads on ubiquitous computing ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/ubiquit.htm
Bob Jensen's threads on gadgets ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob4.htm#Technology
Ubiquitous computing --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubiquitous_computing
"PC makers hope that new ways of interacting with computers will boost
sales" PC makers hope that new ways of interacting with computers will
boost sales," by Tom Simonite. MIT's Technology Review, January 10,
2013 ---
Click Here
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/509751/pc-makers-bet-on-gaze-gesture-voice-and-touch/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130111
"Touch Screens that Curve, Bend, and Even Touch Back: New
technology could let the screens on future devices wrap around corners, act like
paper, and sense touch on the rear as well as the front," by Tom Simonite, MIT's
Technology Review, January 11, 2013 ---
Click Here
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/509761/touch-screens-that-curve-bend-and-even-touch-back/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130111
Question
Are you old enough to remember Dick Tracy's wrist watch?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Tracy
Also see Alfred Gross ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_J._Gross
"Pebble: A Transitional Form of Wearable Computer: The e-ink
wristwatch is useful precisely because it DOESN’T try to be a full computer–just
a screen," by John Pavlus, MIT's Technology Review, January 11, 2013 ---
Click Here
http://www.technologyreview.com/view/509791/pebble-a-transitional-form-of-wearable-computer/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130114
Bob Jensen's threads on ubiquitous computing ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/ubiquit.htm
Bob Jensen's threads on gadgets ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob4.htm#Technology
"The Paradox of Wearable Technologies: Can wearable devices augment our
activities without distracting us from the real world?" by Don Norman, MIT's
Technology Review, July 24, 2013 ---
Click Here
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/517346/the-paradox-of-wearable-technologies/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130725
"Wearable Devices' Next Design Challenge: The Human Brain," by Sarah
Rotman Epps, ReadWriteWeb, February 4, 2013 ---
http://readwrite.com/2013/02/04/wearable-devices-next-design-challenge-the-human-brain
Wearable devices like the Nike+ FuelBand, Jawbone UP, larklife, and future products like the Misfit Shine and Google Glass have been the subject of much discussion, for good reason: They give us access to information about our physical bodies and the physical environment we inhabit, a phenomenon we call Smart Body, Smart World. (Other people have referred to it as "the quantified self.")
Continued in article
"MILLIONS OF LESSONS LEARNED ON ELECTRONIC NAPKINS," by Rick Lillie, AAA
Commons, January 2, 2013 ---
http://commons.aaahq.org/posts/6040b395eb
Most AAA Commons postings are only available to AAA members. However, this may
be one of the freebies
Bob Jensen's threads on Tools and Tricks of the Trade ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm
Question
"What Is the Raspberry Pi?" by Eric Escobar, Tech Talker,
February 6, 2013 ---
http://techtalker.quickanddirtytips.com/what-is-raspberry-pi.aspx
In the past few months, many of you have sent me questions about the Raspberry Pi. So in today’s episode, that’s exactly what I’ll be covering – the amazing Raspberry Pi! No, I’m not referring to a delicious desert, rather a miniature computer that is about the size of a credit card. You’re probably thinking, how the heck can a computer be that tiny, or for that matter what would you even do with a computer that small?
What Is the Raspberry Pi?
The Raspberry Pi was created with the goal of education in mind. This ultra-tiny computer was designed to be small and cheap so that schools could easily afford them in order to teach students about computers in the classroom. This is great for two reasons, the first is that it provides extremely cheap access to a computer, and second it is a great tool for learning more about computers (student or not)!So how cheap are we talking exactly? Well, there are two versions of the Raspberry Pi, the model A is $25 and the model B is $35. This price point makes it pretty easily available to students, hobbyists, and even yours truly!
Let’s talk about what the Raspberry Pi has on it. In the model B, you get an HDMI out, RCA video out, 2 USB ports, an SD card slot, a head phone jack, and an Ethernet port. The board itself has half a gigabyte of RAM and an onboard ARM processor.
The model A has all of the same features of the model B minus one of the USB plugs, the Ethernet port, and half of the RAM. No matter how you look at it though, it gives you quite a bit of equipment to work with for not being much bigger than a credit card!
How Does the Raspberry Pi Work?
Here’s how it works: An SD card inserted into the slot on the board acts as the hard drive for the Raspberry Pi. It is powered by USB and the video output can be hooked up to a traditional RCA TV set, a more modern monitor, or even a TV using the HDMI port. This gives you all of the basic abilities of a normal computer. It also has an extremely low power consumption of about 3 watts. To put this power consumption in perspective, you could run over 30 Raspberry Pi’s in place of a standard light bulb!Continued in article
"Your Coffee Table as a Computer: Microsoft has announced a touch-screen table that interacts with gadgets placed on its surface," by Kate Greene, MIT's Technology Review, May 30, 2007 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/editors/17612/
Also see the AP account at http://www.technologyreview.com/Wire/18799/
Jensen Comment
First the coffee table then a computer that interacts with objects in your bed,
car, clothing, and whatever.
The beautiful tech futures slide show --- http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/temp/TechFutures.pps
For additional documents, go to most any search engine and search on the exact phrase "invisible computing," "ubiquitous computing," or "Microsoft.Net." Other key terms appear below. For search engine help, go to http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/searchh.htm
Did you ever wonder how strange it is that Microsoft years ago chose the name "Windows" for the most ubiquitous operating system in the world?
The Future of Glass in Ubiquitous Computing
The future is not in HDTV or laptop, tablet, and even smart phone computers as
we know them today
Corning is betting that the future is in glass
Watch the Video ("A Day Made of Glass") ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=6Cf7IL_eZ38&vq=medium
Thanks to my Romanian friend Dan Gheorghe Somnea for the heads up
Jensen Comment
Let your imagination run wild. Imagine smart windows that can see in both
directions for surveillance and Webcams. Imagine windows that will adjust to
light conditions. And imagine having your main computer and cameras being built
into your eyeglasses with headphones on the frames. Imagine being able to watch
your student activities in learning labs around the world?
Imagine seeing exactly what your children are seeing when they are miles from home.
Did you ever wonder how strange it is that Microsoft years ago chose the name "Windows" for the most ubiquitous operating system in the world?
Financial Education: Publisher of The Business School Daily and
Financial Education Daily ---
http://paper.li/~/publisher/229148
About Financial Education ---
http://paper.li/introduction.html
The Financial Education Daily published by Financial Education (131
news spotters today, October 19, 2011) ---
http://paper.li/businessschools
This has a new free subscription service (I subscribed this morning)
Here's a good pickup line at Carnegie-Mellon University
"Are you aware that your PowerPoint is showing?"
Jensen Comment
Even the Presbyterians might approve of mini-skirts used for OmniTouch purposes!
"OmniTouch: a Wearable Projection System," Financial Education Daily, October
19, 2011 linked to the following site at Carnegie-Mellon University ---
http://www.cmu.edu/homepage/computing/2011/fall/omnitouch.shtml
OmniTouch, a wearable projection system developed by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University and Microsoft Research, enables users to turn pads of paper, walls or even their own hands, arms and legs into graphical, interactive surfaces.
In other words, there will be no need to find that pen you keep misplacing — or even to dig your smartphone out of your pocket to record a note.
The system employs a depth-sensing camera, similar to the Microsoft Kinect, to track the user's fingers on everyday surfaces.
This allows users to control interactive applications by tapping or dragging their fingers, much as they would with touchscreens found on smartphones or tablet computers.
The projector can superimpose keyboards, keypads and other controls onto any surface, automatically adjusting for the surface's shape and orientation to minimize distortion of the projected images.
"It's conceivable that anything you can do on today's mobile devices, you will be able to do on your hand using OmniTouch," said Chris Harrison, a Ph.D. student in Carnegie Mellon's Human-Computer Interaction Institute.
The palm of the hand could be used as a phone keypad, or as a tablet for jotting down brief notes. Maps projected onto a wall could be panned and zoomed with the same finger motions that work with a conventional multitouch screen.
Harrison was an intern at Microsoft Research when he developed OmniTouch in collaboration with Microsoft Research's Hrvoje Benko and Andrew D. Wilson. Harrison is describing the technology on Wed., Oct. 19, at the Association for Computing Machinery's Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST) in Santa Barbara, Calif.
A video demonstrating OmniTouch and additional downloadable media are available at: http://www.chrisharrison.net/index.php/Research/OmniTouch
The OmniTouch device includes a short-range depth camera and laser pico-projector and is mounted on a user's shoulder. But Harrison said the device ultimately could be the size of a deck of cards, or even a matchbox, so that it could fit in a pocket, be easily wearable, or be integrated into future handheld devices.
"With OmniTouch, we wanted to capitalize on the tremendous surface area the real world provides," said Benko, a researcher in Microsoft Research's Adaptive Systems and Interaction group.
"We see this work as an evolutionary step in a larger effort at Microsoft Research to investigate the unconventional use of touch and gesture in devices to extend our vision of ubiquitous computing even further. Being able to collaborate openly with academics and researchers like Chris on such work is critical to our organization's ability to do great research — and to advancing the state of the art of computer user interfaces in general."Continued in article
The World's Weirdest Portable Computers:
http://technologizer.com/2009/09/07/weird-laptops/
http://www.pcworld.com/article/171687/the_worlds_weirdest_portable_computers.html
http://www.itworld.com/offbeat/77448/slideshow-worlds-weirdest-portable-computers?page=0%2C15
Remember this one --- the weirdest of all
Video: Amazing portable computer ----
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=7H0K1k54t6A
Also See Ubiquitous Computer
Advances ---
click here
http://www.ted.com/talks/pattie_maes_demos_the_sixth_sense.html?utm_source=newsletter_weekly_2010-03-31&utm_campaign=newsletter_weekly&utm_medium=email
"The Internet Refrigerator: Back from the Dead? Whirlpool unveils fridge with attachable modules for a laptop and other electronic devices," PC World via The Washington Post, January 7, 2008 --- Click Here
Questions
Will we soon be able to lecture without opening our mouths?
Can you send a "relational" database file to a friend by simply shaking hands?
Is this the beginning of a whole new definition of human "relationships?"
Can the message of a hug be digital and unambiguous?
New magic in a kiss or two?
Does your database have halitosis or dirty fingernails or a flu virus?
I'd better stop asking questions about this before I get into big trouble!
Japanese firm harnesses the power of human touch
They say you can tell a lot from a handshake. But while
it's usually guesswork, the power of human touch will soon be used in Japan to
transmit data. Telecom giant Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT) is
planning a commercial launch of a system to enter rooms that frees users from
the trouble of rummaging in their pockets or handbags for ID cards or keys. It
uses technology to turn the surface of the human body itself into a means of
data transmission. As data travels through the user's clothing, handbag or
shoes, anyone carrying a special card can unlock the door simply by touching the
knob or standing on a particular spot without taking the card out. "In everyday
life, you're always touching things. Even if you are standing, you are stepping
on something," research engineer Mitsuru Shinagawa told AFP. "These simple
touches can result in communication," said Shinagawa, senior research engineer
at the company's NTT Microsystem Integration Laboratories. He said future
applications could include a walk-through ticket gate, a cabinet that opens only
to authorised people and a television control that automatically chooses
favourite programmes.
PhysOrg, February 21, 2008 ---
http://physorg.com/news122793751.html
Bob Jensen's threads on ubiquitous computing are at http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/ubiquit.htm
The Five Senses of the Future: Threads on the Networking of the Five Senses (Sight, Sound, Smell, Touch, and Taste) --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/senses.htm
Barbra Streisand - He Touched Me (1967) --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO-wPOgVtqg
Hooked on Gadgets, and Paying a Mental Price
You might want to examine the NYT feature while it is still free ---
http://nyti.ms/9EegB2
"Hooked on Gadgets and Happy About It," by Alexandra Samuel, Harvard
Business Review Blog, June 8, 2010 ---
Click Here
http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2010/06/hooked_on_gadgets_and_happy_ab.html?cm_mmc=npv-_-DAILY_ALERT-_-AWEBER-_-DATE
Yesterday's New York Times has a two-page feature, Hooked on Gadgets, and Paying a Mental Price . It's a sign of the growing awareness and concern about how our network-centric lives are not only affecting our work but also our personal lives, and even our bodies — you might say, our souls.
The Times article looks at one wired family to make the point that all these gadgets negatively affect us. "Scientists say juggling e-mail, phone calls and other incoming information can change how people think and behave" the story reads. "They say our ability to focus is being undermined by bursts of information."
This is the same argument made by Nicholas Carr in his recent article for Wired and his new book, The Shallows, released yesterday. It's interesting to learn from Carr that neuroscientists can now illuminate some of what happens in our heads when we go online. But then again, their concerns are not fundamentally different from the worries expressed about the Internet over the past fifteen years.
The Internet is bad for our brains, the argument goes. It's bad for our relationships, our families and maybe (if it stops us thinking creatively or deeply) it's even bad for our careers.
As a pathological gadget and Internet user, I'm not going to join the chorus and argue that network and screen time impoverish our minds, our friendships and our communities. Maybe they do, but so what? Networks aren't going anywhere, nor is our time online likely to decrease. In fact, there's every indication that our time online is going to keep expanding.
What we need are practical strategies for how to reduce the negative impact of the net on our brains, and to magnify its positive effects. The Times article notes one study that showed Internet users "showed greater brain activity than nonusers, suggesting they were growing their neural circuitry," and another study of video gamers showed that games "can improve reaction and the ability to pick out details amid clutter."
I haven't got an MRI machine handy, so I can't document the impact of my net-taming practices at the neural level, but here are some strategies I can recommend for those who want to mitigate the personal and social impact of multitasking, and amplify the benefits:
- Ration your e-mail: E-mail is one of the chief sources of distraction since so many of us feel compelled to check for new messages throughout the day. Different friends have shared their strategies for keeping e-mail at bay, like scheduling a specific two-hour period to process e-mail each day, or checking for new messages only after emptying the inbox. I rely on Gmail filters to support my own system for maintaining an empty inbox and I find that the practice of processing my inbox to zero also helps me focus my e-mail checkins on the moments when I actually have time to respond.
- Structure your monotasking: I'm used to working with a dozen programs and fifty windows open on my computer, and as per the practice reported by the Times, I'm switching windows constantly to follow links or check e-mail. So when I'm trying to write a report or do any kind of focused work, I break my multitasking habit by working on a computer that has very limited memory (so I can only have a couple of applications open at a time), or I restart my main computer and launch only a couple of applications. You could even create another account on your computer that has access to only Word or Excel, and no Internet connectivity, so you can force yourself to monotask.
- Take a tech sabbath: The National Day of Unplugging married the Jewish practice of observing the sabbath with the growing need to get some distance from technology. Try taking one day with no screen time. That means no TV, no Blackberry, no Internet. If you find it creates a useful pause in your wired-up life, consider making it a weekly practice.
- Find hope outside your inbox: Last year I started experimenting with ways to break my constant email and Twitter check-ins. I realized I was looking for that jolt of excitement, the possibility that some sort of good news would come my way with each check-in. When I started exploring other ways to get a little unexpected delight in my day — by talking to a stranger, or visiting a new part of town — I was able to reduce my reliance on the net as the bearer of good news.
- Use your right brain/use your left brain: If you spend your computer time geeking out in Excel or checking Google Analytics, it's time to give your right brain a workout with a browse through Flickr or a film editing project in Final Cut. If you spend your computer time writing poetry or creating collages in Photoshop, it's time to give your left brain a workout with a game of Scrabble or some financial management with Mint.com. The more you vary your online diet with activities that draw on both hemispheres, the more you'll be tapping into the net's potential to grow your brain's circuitry.
If you had to sit through a meeting with me, and watch me take notes in Evernote, tweet, and chew my nails at the same time) you would find that these practices have hardly turned me into a picture of mellow monotasking. But I take some comfort in the fact that I'm still able to focus on a single task for up to 5 minutes at a time. Considering the amount of time I spend online, neuroscientists might call that a miracle.
Bob Jensen's gadgets bookmarks ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob4.htm#Technology
PC World Videos on New Products --- http://www.pcworld.com/video.html
"Computerized Combat Glove: A new glove lets soldiers operate their wearable computer without putting down their weapons," by Brittany Sauser, MIT's Technology Review, April 28, 2008 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/20680/?nlid=1032
Some U.S. soldiers in Iraq are already equipped with wearable computer systems. But the lack of efficient input devices restricts their use to safer environments, such as the interior of a Humvee or a base station, where the soldier can set down his weapon and use the keyboard or mouse tethered to his body. Now RallyPoint, a startup based in Cambridge, MA, has developed a sensor-embedded glove that allows the soldier to easily view and navigate digital maps, activate radio communications, and send commands without having to take his hand off his weapon.
For soldiers carrying a plethora of equipment, finding and using electronic controls on their bodies can be awkward, says Forrest Liau, the president and cofounder of RallyPoint. "We wanted to make a device that would have all the necessary components in a combat-ready way," he says. The Natick Soldier Systems Center in Natick, MA, has a contract with RallyPoint and is currently testing a prototype of the glove, called a Handwear Computer Input Device (HCID), for use with its electronic systems.
A sensor-laden glove for wearable computing is not an entirely new concept. Researchers at MIT, the University of Toronto, and the Georgia Institute of Technology have been working on systems that focus on detecting hand and arm movements by using accelerometers, gyroscopes, and other high-tech sensors. But Gerd Kortuem, an assistant professor of computing at Lancaster University, in England, says that most of these prototypes "don't work reliably and are not robust enough." Microsoft and Sony have also worked on gesture recognition and wearable-mouse technologies, but their research has yet to yield usable devices.
RallyPoint has a "very clever design and has actually created something practical by focusing on a particular domain--the military," says Kortuem.
A typical wearable computer system consists of a helmet-mounted display and hardware the soldier wears around his waist. RallyPoint's engineers have designed their glove so that soldiers can grip other objects, such as their weapons or a steering wheel, and still be able to use their electronic systems. The glove has four custom-built push-button sensors sewn into the fingers near the tips. Sensors on the lower portion of the index finger and the tip of the fourth activate radio communications, a different channel for each finger. Another sensor on the tip of the index finger changes modes, from "map mode" to "mouse mode." In map mode, the fourth sensor, located on the pinky finger, is used to zoom in on and out of the map; in mouse mode, it serves as a mouse-click button.
Continued in article
Jensen Comment
If the glove computer connects to the Internet and allows users to type wearing
the glove (maybe the fingertips can be cut off the glove), this would be a great
boost to writing and research. Users would not have to take their fingers off
the keyboard to view Internet sites on a second computer screen while writing a
paper or a book. Am I getting too Orwellian in my old age?
What is computer living
"reducing" to? Read (well record anyway) a book with the swipe of your hand with the embedded RFID chip? Video advertisements for a hotel chain on a wedding gown or diet pill video commercials on a bikini? Could a quarterback wear bifocal goggles that give him a better view behind taller defenders in his face? Could professors supplement incomes by advertising bookstore sales while lecturing? Why waste time during breaks? "More Strangeness From The Tech Front," by Johanna Ambrosio, InformationWeek Newsletter, November 29, 2005
For even wilder thoughts about adding smells, touch, and taste to visual and hearing senses in computing, go to my older document entitled "Networking of the Five Senses (Sight, Sound, Smell, Touch, and Taste)" at http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/senses.htm
|
Ubiquitous Computing: Shirts of Tomorrow Will Talk Back
Imagine wearing a smart T-shirt or a suit embedded with
tiny electronics that can monitor your heart or respiratory function wirelessly.
When dirty, you take it off and throw it in the wash or have it dry-cleaned.
"Smart Suit Doesn't Miss a Beat," PhysOrg, July 3, 2007 ---
http://physorg.com/news102680259.html
Jensen Comment
One day our shirts will probably talk to each other without our even knowing it.
Imagine teaching students' shirts in class long after they stopped paying
attention.
Microsoft's Office Communicator Web Access
Microsoft's new tool, called
Office Communicator Web Access and introduced at
this week's Interop show, is all about group facilitation. That's a large
potential market for Microsoft, with its bid to become an even bigger player in
the world of enterprise applications. (For more about the company's plans in
this arena, check out this
Q&A with the head of Microsoft's collaboration
software group.) Just like there are limits to collaboration, I feel there's no
such thing as totally foolproof security unless one lives in a locked vault. And
even then, it can be harmful to set up an expectation of such. Along these
lines, there's an interesting story about something going on in Japan, where
technology often debuts long before it's available here. Some children in
Yokohama City are
wearing RFID chips on their clothing and parents
can track the kids as they walk to school. If there's a problem, the kids can
press a call button on the tag to alert parents.
Johanna Ambrosio, "Productivity And Security To The Max," InformationWeek
Newsletter, December 15, 2005
"Understanding T Cells: A nano tool is making it possible to better control the immune system," by Emily Singer, MIT's Technology Review, November 28, 2005 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/NanoTech/wtr_15927,303,p1.html?trk=nl
Scientists have long known that T cells play a major role in orchestrating the body's immune response. But researchers have been unsure exactly how these cells send and receive signals to attack invaders.
One fundamental question has been whether it is the number or the pattern of receptors on the surface of the T cell that controls the response. Understanding this cellular language could, for example, help researchers design better treatments for auto-immune diseases, such as allergies or rheumatoid arthritis, where the immune system has sent a misguided message to attack itself.
In a new experiment, published last week in Science, Jay Groves and colleagues at the University of California at Berkeley designed an artificial membrane that allows them to begin to answer these questions. The membrane has proteins that are constricted in a specific region. When receptors on the T cell bind to the proteins on the artificial membrane, the receptors are constrained to these specific geometric patterns, allowing a closer examination of the effects of the patterns.
Under normal physiological conditions, when a T cell binds to an infected cell, receptors on the surface of the T cell migrate toward the junction between the two cells. Previously, scientists thought that the growing number of receptors triggered a strong T cell activation. But when Grove and his team blocked the migration of T cell receptors by binding them to locked-in proteins on the artificial membrane, which acts like an infected cell, they discovered it was the position of the receptor that actually controlled the response.
"Spatial configuration matters rather than number," says Groves. "It's like realizing when reading a sentence you need to pay attention to the order of the letters to know what the words mean, you can't just count the number of each kind of letter."
To develop the artificial membrane, the Berkeley researchers used electron beam lithography to create nanoscale chrome patterns on a silica substrate, which was then coated with membrane lipids and proteins. Although the proteins normally float freely through the lipid membrane, on the synthetic membrane, they're kept in place by the chrome patterns, which act as barriers.
Other experts say these findings demonstrate the power of nanotechnology for studying cellular processes. "This paper represents a wonderful, rare, and early example of how bringing together micropatterning technology and cell biology can help shed light on interesting questions in biology," says Arup K. Chakraborty, a theoretical immunologist at MIT.
Update on Nanotechnology
Skeptics call nanotech a great collection of small
markets with no killer app. That's probably true in the short term, but even
three years out, some of the things we'll see will be monumentally world
changing. Is the federal National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) helping things
along? One of the industry's ongoing problems is the gap between basic and
applied research. People call it "the valley of death"--too big or long-range
for the VCs to handle, too applied for academics. NNI should be a helpful
bridge.
Spencer Reice, "Can Small Be Big Again?" MIT's Technology Review, August
2005 ---
http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/05/08/issue/forward_small.asp?trk=nl
Nanotech Grows Up
Nanotechnology research and development funding almost
doubled to more than $10 billion in 2004 from the previous year. Most of the
increase was driven by a big jump in corporate and private funding, which grew
by 160 percent, while government and academic research outlays on nanotech R&D
increased by a vigorous, but less outstanding, 37 percent. Japan led the way,
with expenditures approaching $4 billion; the United States, however, was not
far behind, with spending of about $3.4 billion. The expected payoff for all
this investment could be huge, even over the next few years. Nanotech was
already a $10 billion market last year, and that is expected to triple by 2008.
Much of that growth will result from new nanomaterials. By 2008, more than $100
billion in products will likely involve some type of nanotechnology. Still, only
about half of Americans have heard anything about nanotechnology. Much has been
made of the potential nanotech risks, from uncontrollable nanorobots to the
breathing in of nanoparticles. Not surprisingly, public fears are directly
correlated with the amount of knowledge that people have about nanotech: the
less knowledge, the more fear.
Stacy Lawrence, "Nanotech Grows Up," MIT's Technology Review, June 2006
---
http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/05/06/issue/datamine.asp?trk=nl
The confusing state of nanotechnology to date
No doubt, that's where nanotechnology research is
right now. Scientists are learning how to unlock extraordinary capabilities in
commonplace materials by manipulating them on a molecular -- sometimes atomic --
scale. Nanotech has the potential to create everything from faster and smaller
computer chips, to smart medicines, to straight-flying golf balls, and even car
windshields that repel water without wipers (see BW Cover Story, 2/14/05, "The
Business of Nanotech"). But in a field with literally thousands of possible
applications, a huge gap often exists between what's theoretically possible in a
lab and what can be reliably produced for commercial use. For nano-entrepreneurs
and scientists, that gap makes the field especially tantalizing. And it makes it
all the more frustrating when a competitor's press release claims he has jumped
that gap with ease. So how can you tell who's the real deal? The term "nano,"
for the most part, means little more than a size in the range of 1 to 100
nanometers. The width of a human hair, for example, is about 80,000 nanometers.
The technology side of the equation comes into play with research into the
surprising behavior of various materials when manipulated on that tiny level.
"Slugfest in the Nanotech Trenches," Business Week, February 23, 2005 ---
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/feb2005/tc20050223_5725_tc204.htm
Nanotechnology to eradicate hunger and poverty
The experts reckoned that energy storage, production
and conversion would be the top use of nanotechnology in a decade, including
more efficient solar cells, hydrogen fuel cells and new hydrogen storage. Second
was farming, where nanotech devices could increase soil fertility and crop
production. Tiny devices could, for instance, be made to release fertilisers at
a strictly controlled rate. Third came water treatment - nano-membranes and
clays could purify or desalinate water more efficiently than conventional
filters and are a fraction of the size. Singer said the study might give clues
to investing in nanotechnology and contribute to UN goals set in 2000 of halving
poverty and hunger by 2015.
"Tiny devices to eradicate poverty?" Aljazeera, April 13, 2005 ---
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/631354E9-8FA5-442A-BD1F-01F0F43988EA.htm
Have you run out of ideas for
gifts? Here's the possible answer to your dilemma.
Sure, a computing purse and scarf set may seem like the
stuff of science fiction. But these devices, part of next generation of wearable
computers, could become commonplace within a few years. Unit shipments of such
wearable computers -- purses, watches, shirts -- should rise from 261,000 last
year to 1.39 million in 2008, according to the tech research firm IDC.
Olga Kharif, "Wearable Computers You Can Slip Into The latest generation of
these ever-smarter garments look like ordinary clothes, not something only a
cyborg would don," Business Week, March 8, 2005 --- http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/mar2005/tc2005038_5955_tc119.htm
"Deloitte's Top Tech Trends," SmartPros, January 19, 2005 --- http://www.smartpros.com/x46612.xml
Deloitte's Technology, Media and Telecommunications (TMT) industry group announced its predictions for the global technology industry in 2005, forecasting a number of advances in technology, along with some serious challenges.
"In 2005 Internet use will continue to proliferate, with the Web browser playing an increasingly important part in our lives," said Eric Openshaw, a Principal with Deloitte Consulting LLP and Americas Group Leader, TMT industry group. "Nanotechnology will become increasingly mainstream, enabling a wide range of new and improved products. And ethanol-based fuel cells will hit the market, providing portable power that lasts for days, weeks or even months."
In addition, Openshaw said electronic forms of personal identification will proliferate as a way to improve security. He warned that viruses, worms and other malware will multiply and spread to connected mobile devices, frustrating the public and costing companies billions in lost data and downtime."
Three key trends identified in the report are:
Nanotechnology becomes mainstream. Nanotechnology -- one of the most talked about, yet least-understood technologies of the 21st century -- will become increasingly mainstream in 2005. Nanotechnology is already quietly revolutionizing a wide range of products -- from computer hard drives and sunblock cream to car tires -- and will soon become a cornerstone of every manufacturing industry. Advances will increasingly be driven by the world's largest companies and nanotech companies will generate substantial revenue for the very first time. Potential uses will include using nano-spheres to deliver a drug directly to its intended target; employing nano-scale manufacturing processes to make smaller and faster processors and storage devices; and using nano-scale properties to make stain resistant, crease-free fabrics, and garments that resist bacteria.
Electronic viruses run rampant. Massive growth in connected technologies -- from PCs and mobile phones to PDAs and gaming consoles -- will cause a corresponding leap in electronic viruses and other malicious attacks. Nuisances such as unsolicited e-mail (SPAM) and unsolicited instant messages (SPIM) will continue to proliferate. More harmful intrusions, such as viruses, worms and malware (malicious software), blue-jacking (attacks on Bluetooth-enabled devices) and VoIP SPAM will become common, and increased use of mobile phones, remote working and WiFi will give hackers more access to private, corporate and government networks. The trend will cost businesses worldwide billions of dollars in lost data and downtime; at the same time, it will reveal vast opportunities for companies that sell IT security, and new lines of business will spring up from mobile operators, handset makers, service providers, and systems integrators.
Electronic identification vs. Digital crime. Governments around the world will move to replace paper-based IDs with digital products. These new forms of electronic identification will be used in passports, ID cards, bank cards and credit cards, and will include information such as the individual's name, address, nationality, digital photo and even biometric data. Electronic identification will be principally designed to curb fraud and identity theft, but will also speed up the process of identification and authentication. In spite of these measures, identity theft will continue to rise dramatically -- particularly for people and organizations that do business online. It will be imperative for all companies doing business online to spend the money to create more secure methodologies to protect themselves and their customers.
Question
What are fullerenes?
Answer
Fullerenes, those soccer ball–shaped carbon
molecules also known as “buckyballs,” have generated outsized expectations
ever since their discovery in 1985. Scientists think they could eventually be
used in chemical sensors, fuel cells, drug delivery, cancer medicines, and smart
materials. Yet while commercial demand for fullerenes is gradually emerging, so
are fears that these molecules, which measure only a few billionths of a meter
across, pose serious health and environmental hazards.
"Mitsubishi: Out Front in Nanotech," by Stephen Herrera, MIT's Technology
Review, January 2005 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/05/01/issue/herrera0105.asp?trk=nl
To some, however, fullerenes’ potential is too great to ignore. Mitsubishi Corporation, which holds a number of key patents and licenses on fullerenes, began laying the groundwork for their commercialization in 1993, and company executives say they realized from the beginning that they would need to do voluntarily what many companies won’t do until forced: consider the concerns of stakeholders in academia, government, the environmental community, and the public.
In 2001, Mitsubishi Corporation and Mitsubishi Chemical, one of its sister firms in the Mitsubishi group, created Frontier Carbon to manufacture fullerenes. Today Frontier produces only a small amount of fullerenes for its 350 Japanese customers. But already it can make 40 metric tons of fullerenes a year and will eventually expand that capacity to 1,500 metric tons per year. No other producer comes close to these volumes. In fact, nanotechnology industry observers say the two Mitsubishis are taking a big risk by powering up fullerene capacity before there’s a market. They are, in one nanotechnology pundit’s words, “putting the cart, the barn, and the farm before the horse.”
And then there are the health concerns. It’s well known that fullerenes suck up loosely bound electrons from neighboring molecules. Inside the body, this phenomenon releases free radicals that can wreak havoc on cell chemistry. And in a possible confirmation that fullerenes produce this effect, a highly publicized study described at an American Chemical Society meeting last March found that bass fish exposed to the molecules developed brain damage.
Counteracting such fears won’t be easy, since Japan, along with most of the industrialized world, lacks a government-approved system for monitoring, testing, or certifying nanotechnology products. But thanks in part to the efforts of Mitsubishi Corporation, Mitsubishi Chemical, and Frontier, Japan is well on its way to becoming the first nation with such protections, which could help inoculate its companies against a nanotech backlash.
Bob Jensen's threads on nanotechnology and accounting are at http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/310wp/310wp.htm#_The_Chaotic_Future
March 2, 2004 message from Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]
In "2004: The Turning Point" (UBIQUITY, vol 4, issue 46, January 21- 7,
2004) Stephen Downes makes some predictions based on what he thinks is "driving the hearts of those who will make the final decisions on the future of the Internet, those who use it." He believes that the "deluge of spam" will be addressed in the near future, although not without mass marketers going to court to block anti-spam legislation.
Some other predictions: We will begin to see more personalization of Web browsing environments "so that all a person's essential Web reading (and very little non-essential Web reading) will be available through a single application." We will also see the resurgence of videoconferencing in the form of IP videoconferencing. And learning objects will gain and reach their potential outside traditional education settings. The complete article is available online at http://www.acm.org/ubiquity/views/v4i46_downes.html
Ubiquity is a free, Web-based publication of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), "dedicated to fostering critical analysis and in-depth commentary on issues relating to the nature, constitution, structure, science, engineering, technology, practices, and paradigms of the IT profession." For more information, contact: Ubiquity, email: ubiquity@acm.org; Web: http://www.acm.org/ubiquity/ For more information on the ACM, contact: ACM, One Astor Plaza, 1515 Broadway, New York, NY 10036, USA; tel: 800-342-6626 or 212-626-0500; Web: http://www.acm.org/
For more predictions, see "Roundup of Articles Predicting IT Trends," CIT INFOBITS, issue 67, January 2004; http://www.unc.edu/cit/infobits/bitjan04.html#1
Nanodot: Nanotechnology News and Discussion of Emerging Technologies http://nanodot.org/
Update in February 2003
Nanotechnology backlash feared as ethics think-tank calls for caution
Big trouble for tiny technology," By Nick Farrell, VNUNET --- http://www.vnunet.com/News/1138782
Nanotechnology, the science of building systems at a molecular level, could be hit by the same backlash that has dogged genetically modified crops, according to a medical ethics think-tank.A study by the Joint Centre for Bioethics at the University of Toronto, Canada, published in the UK journal Nanotechnology, has warned that the science of the very small could be derailed if the ethical, environmental, economic, legal and social implications of it do not catch up with its technical developments.
Innovations in nanotechnology include single-molecule transistors, an enzyme-powered bio-molecular motor with nickel propellers, and a tiny carrier able to travel from the blood to the brain to deliver tumour-fighting chemicals.
The report said that although the emerging knowledge has the power to revolutionise society, its power to exploit the potential of extremely small-scale systems is outrunning our capacity to digest its implications.
It cautioned that without more thought for ethics there could be calls for a ban on nanotechnology developments.
"Voices in Your Head? Check That Chip in Your Arm," by Matt Richtel, The New York Times --- http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/10/technology/10SLAS.html
INUSCULE mobile telephones, tiny electronic organizers and portable DVD players are nice. But they'd be so much less cumbersome if they were surgically implanted under your skin.
Paving the way is a company in Palm Beach, Fla. called Applied Digital Solutions, which recently started a program to implant subdermal microchips based on the same radio-frequency identification technology used in E-ZPass.
The chip, called the VeriChip, is about the size of a grain of rice, carries a number that identifies you and, the company says, may eventually provide a way to make sure that only the right people gain access to secure sites, corporate offices or even personal computers. The chip could also carry access to personal data, like medical information. Implantable microchips have already been used over the last several years to track pets.
The company is still developing the applications, yet there has been no shortage of critics, who assert that this is an example of technology run amok. They apparently aren't grasping how fashionable, and useful, an electronic bar code can be. Besides, think how much easier John Ashcroft's job would be with such an electronic database.
The critics are apparently overlooking another reason to act now.
"It's cool to have one," said Matthew Cossolotto, the spokesman for Applied Digital Solutions, and one of the few people to already have a chip implanted under his skin. Who wants to be the last person on the block to get the latest in piercing?
There is more good news. This nascent fusion of corpus and computer may pave the way for further integration of circuitry and self. After all, things can become only so convenient if we wear or carry tiny headsets, radios, televisions, phones and pagers.
If silicon, not silicone, becomes the favored implant of the future, we could bridge the final divide that keeps us from being truly wired. Think of the applications: e-mail transmitters lodged under your skin; remote controls that let you change the channel with a thumb click; global positioning systems that tell you, your spouse and your government where you are at every moment.
"You're taking me down a road I've never speculated about," Mr. Cossolotto said when asked to consider future possibilities.
Indeed, the answers may not yet be clear, but once we give away our bodies to silicon, the potential is endless:
THE VIRUS SCAN Few things are more frustrating than watching your computer screen lock up for no apparent reason. But what happens when your arms freeze up?Computer chips, of course, can mean viruses. Maxi Virus Scan will protect you against the common bugs, like the nasty "I love you" virus, which causes you to utter intimacies while in the express aisle at Safeway.
Version 2.0 will update your internal clock for daylight saving time.
Continued at http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/10/technology/10SLAS.html
Wearable computers allow Pentagon reconstruction supervisors to log their activities and share info while on the move --- http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,54988,00.html
There are implications of wearable computers for cost accounting. Years ago I proposed that technicians in a medical testing laboratory provide work sampling reports at randomly-signaled times in order to account for their time spent on the varieties of tests performed. Wearable computers will make that type of reporting easier and more efficient. This is especially the case now that users need only speak into the computer.
Before the days of wearable computers, a doctoral student and I outlined the work sampling statistical formulas for time reporting of employees based upon a study of my wife working in the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital medical laboratory. See "Statistical Analysis in Cost Measurement and Control," (with Carl T. Thomsen), The Accounting Review, Vol. XLIII, No. 1, January 1968.
University of Arizona researchers are fine-tuning a nanotechnology that could allow soldiers to see field maps on the fabric of their fatigues --- http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,55528,00.html
By donning fatigues made out of special fabric and a pair of nighttime goggles, soldiers could discreetly view detailed field maps as infrared images on the surface of their uniforms.
The military suit is one of the real-world applications of a technology project at the University of Arizona, where a team of scientists is designing electronic pictures that can be printed onto flexible, organic nanofilm. The process enlists a regular inkjet printer and a charged battery.
The nanofilm is made out of layers of conduction polymer containing light-emitting polymers (LEPs) that glow green when excited by a charge.
"You start with a layer of the conduction polymer," said Ghassan Jabbour, associate research professor of optical sciences at the university and member of the design team. "You need an electrode layer to connect to the positive side of the battery. You put this layer into the inkjet."
Instead of plain ink, however, Jabbour uses an organic solution. The chemicals in his ink react with the conduction polymer to print the desired design onto the material.
"We're able to print the patterns by modifying the conductivity of sections of the conduction polymer," Jabbour said. "Where there is no pattern printed it won't work as an emitter of light -- the polymer cannot receive the current so cannot emit light."
Continued at http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,55528,00.html
Ubiquitous Computing and Micro Robotics
This page contains some rather neglected threads on ubiquitous computing (small
computers embedded in most everything we use in life, including some body
parts). Xerox Parc (the place where the mouse and GUI interfaces were
born) has focused much of its research in recent years on ubiquitous
computing.
My August 20, 2000 additions include the introduction of tiny computers in clothes that Europeans can purchase soon. See "E-Clothes Here" by Joyce Slaton at http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,38288,00.html
Futuristic thinkers have long predicted the rise of wearable computers able to do everything from communicate body temperature to a room's air conditioning system to diagnosing certain medical conditions.
Those predictions may become reality next month when the world's first commercially available electronic clothing hits the European market.
Along with it come concerns about potential health dangers.
The first designs from the ICD+ line, a collaboration between European electronics giant Philips and American clothes manufacturer Levi's, are four jackets equipped with a Philips-made GSM-standard mobile phone, MP3 player, and a remote-control device to power both.
"We're looking at a very targeted audience -- the new nomads who are constantly on the move and need to be connected constantly to technology," says ICD+ spokesperson Neil Stevens. "This is aimed at the very technologically sophisticated and urban customer who wants functionality, convenience, and simplicity in technology."
That functionality comes at a high price: from US$600 to US$900, costly enough to render them an interesting oddity to all but a few moneyed geeks. Accordingly, ICD+ is producing only 600 of the jackets and sprinkling the units in select retail stores in Italy, France, Great Britain, Sweden, Germany, and Greece.
But it was the potential bodily effects of tech-integrated clothing that has elicited the most controversy on geek discussion boards and mailing lists. Some people are concerned about the potential for electric shocks, a hazard Stevens insists is baseless due to the jackets' waterproof construction.
Yet a more nagging risk lingers. In the wake of reports and studies that link mobile phone usage to cancer, concentration lapses, and long-term memory loss, many experts are concerned that devices worn in constant proximity to the body may prove even more dangerous.
Tiny robots are also on their way into our lives. See "Big Promise in Thinking Small" by Kendall S. Powell at http://www.latimes.com/business/cutting/20000817/t000077240.html
Researchers are building tiny robots in hopes of opening exciting new frontiers in medicine, computing and many other fields.
The idea: Armies of robotic insects.
The possibilities: Farmers "infest" crops with thousands of sensor ants to report soil and weather conditions in the farthest reaches of the fields. For the espionage-oriented, deploy electronic dust motes to cross enemy lines on the wind, unnoticed. Or, more mundanely, plant one on little Jimmy's sneaker and know where he is at all times.
The world of MEMS, or microelectromechanical systems, is progressing toward self-sufficient micro-robots. On an even smaller scale, NEMS, the nanoscale equivalent, are popping onto the scene and gaining national attention.
Researchers are convinced that these small devices, particularly nanostructures, will open new frontiers in medicine, sensor technology and computing and even change how we control matter.
Last month, the National Science Foundation announced a Nanoscale Science and Engineering initiative to provide an estimated $74 million in funding for nanotechnology research. President Clinton has requested up to $495 million for nanotechnology research in his fiscal 2001 budget. He acknowledged in a speech at Caltech in January that, "Some of our research goals may take 20 or more years to achieve, but that is precisely why there is an important role for the federal government."
In June, graduate student Edwin Jager and his colleagues at Sweden's Linkopings Universitet unveiled the first micro-robot--actually an arm--to operate underwater, an important feature for biological uses.
In fact, by design, the tiny limb must operate in salty water containing electrolytes, similar to body fluids. By making ions--electrically charged particles--flow through its miniature "muscles" and "joints," the scientists cause shrinking or swelling that correspond to contracting or extending a tiny arm, wrist and hand.
Jager constructed the arm--no bigger than this dash--using photolithography, a.k.a. microchip-building technology.
Talented hands and chemistry created a flat version of the arm by applying layers of gold and a conducting polymer on a silicon wafer in specific patterns and then etching out desired shapes. Then a "glue" layer was dissolved to release the 3-D functioning arm. Using this process, 140 arms were made on one quarter of the 10-centimeter wafer: Each arm consisted of an elbow joint still attached to the wafer, a wrist joint and two to four finger joints, each independently controlled.
Each arm can lift and move a "boulder-sized" glass bead--relatively speaking, of course. It can sort beads onto conveyor tracks. Although there is not a huge market for sorting of teeny-tiny beads, the movements could be applied to human cells one day, Jager said.
"It's always been science fiction, you know, robots in the body . . . and now it's real. This is one step, one demonstration of the possibilities of microsystems technology," Jager said.
Scaling down to the parts of a cell, for repairing individual cells or DNA, requires thinking even smaller, down to the nanometer. The concept of "nano" has crept into everyday slang as in, "give me a nanosecond," but to scientists "nano" means working on the scale of one billionth of a meter. For reference, a nanoparticle used in the lab compared with a paper clip stood on end is like a ladybug compared with 20 stacked Eiffel Towers.
"I worked at the micron scale [before], and the jump to nanoscale is a whole new way of working. It's a frontier," said Sheffer Meltzer of USC's Laboratory for Molecular Robotics.
Our faculty expert on robotics is Kevin Nickels in the Department of Engineering Science at Trinity University.
Other ubiquitous links of interest include the following:
Phone Fears: Malignant or Benign?
These Boots Were Made For Talking
I Spy With My Super Eye
Tinker around with Gadgets and Gizmos
Discover more Net Culture
Persuasive, Pervasive Computing Project Oxygen's New Wind Remembering Technology's Humanist Virtual Farm Aid Step Into Your New Browser Work the Problem, People Internet2: The Once and Future Net Writable Web The Cricket Indoor Location System MIT A.I. Lab
"Persuasive, Pervasive Computing, by Eric Brown, Technology Review, February 25, 2002 --- http://www.techreview.com/articles/brown022502.asp
In 2000, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology launched an ambitious project to transform the way the world uses computers. The old model: a box, a monitor and keyboard. The new: computers as pervasive and invisible as the air we breathe. They called it Project Oxygen.For an overview of the Project's goals, and a Q&A with its founders, see "Project Oxygen's New Wind".
Now, nearly two years out, the first technologies are rolling out of the labs. Project leaders—Laboratory for Computer Science chief Victor Zue, associate director Anant Agarwal and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory director Rodney Brooks—insist that Project Oxygen is about an idea, not products. But corporate sponsors—among them Hewlett Packard, Nokia and Philips—eagerly await their results. Technology Review went into the labs to get a sneak peak at three facets of Oxygen that show particular promise: Cricket, a location-aware computing system; the Intelligent Room, an high-tech office that doubles as a vision-interface research lab; and the Raw microprocessor, a low-power, ultra-programmable chip designed to power the handheld devices of the 21st century. Together these technologies, their creators say, will put computers everywhere—and nowhere.
A Raw Deal
Handheld computers have come a long way since Apple unveiled its Newton in 1993. Once little more than a glorified Rolodex, handhelds today rival the performance and range of applications of desktop PCs. But higher speeds and multiple, specialized processors have made them power-hungry, and battery life continues to be a limiting factor. To address the power problem, Oxygen researchers, led by Agarwal, are building a more flexible, less power-intensive chip they call the Raw Architecture Workstation, or Raw. "Today, people build custom [chips] for video, graphics, networking and so on," says Agarwal. "We have a single processor that can do all these things."
Not only does this optimize performance—especially for tasks like video processing, which bog down in memory—but it saves power, an essential feature for any small, battery-powered device. And the programmability extends not only to integrating discrete functions. It could open up exciting breakthroughs in areas such as software radios, which can easily switch between multiple cellular protocols.
By making the data paths highly programmable, Raw avoids centralized memory and register systems. "In a typical processor you may have to bounce a piece of data around. But with Raw, it goes straight to where I want it to go," says Agarwal.
The Raw architecture resembles a network of tiles, each containing features for instruction, switch instruction, data memory, logic units, registers and a programmable switch. "We pay a lot of attention to the interconnect, to the wires," says Agarwal. "If you expose the interconnect to the software you can customize how data flows through the chip. You can orchestrate the flow of data. Now my software can match up the hardware with the application."
The first device the chip will power will be Oxygen's model handheld, what they call the Handy 21. Prototype Handys integrate voice recognition, wireless communications and video—power-hungry applications that would benefit from Raw's all-in-one design. A prototype of the Raw processor, being developed with IBM Microelectronics, is expected to arrive sometime this year.
Cricket Chirps Up
At Project Oxygen, researchers believe a mobile computer can be more helpful if it knows where it is, and what's around it. Enter the Cricket Indoor Location System, a network of wireless transmitters that provides mobile devices such as Handy 21s with information about their physical location, which they can use to find static devices such as printers or exits as well as other people.
Location-tracking is a hot topic now in light of the Federal Communications Commission's "Enhanced 911" requirements that call for 95 percent of all cell phones to include automatic location identification technology such as the Global Positioning System by the end of 2005.
The goal, says LCS associate professor Hari Balakrishnan, is to develop an indoor alternative to satellite-based GPS tracking, which rarely works inside buildings and often fails outside near tall buildings.
Inside buildings, multipath and magnetic interference disrupt traditional locational devices. "Getting something to work indoors is particularly challenging," says Balakrishnan. "The goal for us is to get linear distances of within a few centimeters so you can tell where you are within a foot or so."
Cricket's trick is to have each beacon continually transmit two signals: one radio and one ultrasound signals. Because radio zips along at the speed of light and ultrasound pulses travel at the speed of sound, the Cricket software that governs the listening device built into a piece of hardware can calculate the timing difference between the two to determine location. "So if there's a gap of ten milliseconds…then you're about ten feet away," says Balakrishnan.
The low-cost, battery-powered Cricket beacons can be "slapped" on ceilings quickly without calibration, thus making for easy scalability. They're placed so any listening device can receive signals from three or four devices at once to further localize position. Cricket beacons can also send other information beyond location coordinates, for example, transmitting the identity of key resources in its purview.
The Oxygen team is also working on a "Cricket Compass" prototype that can determine which direction the listening device is facing. By equipping each listening device with several ultrasound receivers placed very closely together, they can compare the minute differences between the reception times, thus determining orientation. This capability could help direct a computer to send information to the nearest facing display, or it could enhance informational and point-of-sale applications. For example, shoppers could point their handheld toward a store display to find out about nearby sales, or museum visitors could download information on a nearby exhibit. Cricket is not wed to a particular radio frequency, and Balakrishnan says they may switch to Bluetooth if the technology takes off. Sensitive to Cricket's big-brother undertones, researchers are also designing intricate protections for user privacy.
Cricket's greatest impact may come in embedded systems that track not people in an office, but parts through a warehouse. In fact, Balakrishnan's group is experimenting with a wired library, in which every book features a radio tag tracked by a Cricket-like system. Better tracking of goods throughout their manufacture and delivery could save billions in theft, loss and inefficiency, while avoiding the privacy worries attendant to the tracking of people.
The Intelligent Room
If, as LCS director Victor Zue suggests, Project Oxygen is a "big playground," then the Intelligent Room is the cool new jungle gym in the middle. The room hosts a variety of projects exploring new collaborative tools and audio/visual interfaces. For Oxygen, the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory is focusing on voice and vision recognition technologies that will help to shape Oxygen's Enviro 21, a room-controlling device that lets users interact naturally with the computer.
At first glance, the Intelligent Room looks like a typical meeting room, albeit with a surfeit of computer projected "live board" displays on the wall. You interact with the displays via voice, light pen, gesture, or, if all else fails, a touch panel. The ceiling is studded with an array of 32 microphones, two standard video cameras and two stereoscopic video cameras.
A basic goal is to improve communications between microphones and cameras so that the computer can determine who to pay attention to. The task of identifying speakers is important both for controlling videoconferences and for letting the computer respond to user commands without getting confused. Eventually, such communications, which are orchestrated via Oxygen's innovative networking software, Metaglue, will also help the computer customize responses for each individual.
"In traditional vision systems you have mono cameras trying to detect objects by extracting the prerecorded background, but changing the lighting fools the camera," says Krzysztof Gajos, an A.I. Lab research scientist and technical director of the Intelligent Room. "With the stereo cameras, we can not only record the background image, but the background shape. It's much more robust."
Oxygen is also interested in what people are looking at, for example to help the computer decide which displays to use for optimal viewing. Software tracks the way a user is looking by combining face-recognition software with the 3D information provided by a stereo camera. To identify orientation, the head-post algorithm keys in on how facial features change during movement. Among other applications, the researchers hope to mount the tracking system on robots to improve navigation.
Researcher Harold Fox demonstrated SAM, an animated computer display that shows different emotions to reveal its state. Instead of prefacing commands by saying "computer," which can be confusing in meetings, the user just looks at the graphic, and Fox's prototype knows to listen up. When the user looks away, SAM disengages.
Whether SAM or Cricket or Raw ever find their way into the conference rooms, hallways and handhelds in everyday business is a question that will not be answered for years. But one thing is for certain: the concepts they inspire undoubtedly will.
Gates 'bets the company' on
Microsoft.Net strategy By Anne Knowles, eWEEK June 22, 2000
http://www.zdnet.com/eweek/stories/general/0,11011,2592662,00.html
REDMOND, Wash. -- Microsoft Corp. today outlined its plans for Microsoft.Net, a future platform that the software giant hopes will extend its Windows dynasty into the Internet era.
The architecture is designed to deliver software as a service -- through the browser and to a range of computing devices -- but its core will still be Windows.
"You could call it a 'bet your company' strategy," said Bill Gates, Microsoft's chairman and chief software architect, at the launch Thursday here at the company's headquarters.
Microsoft.Net is the final name for Microsoft's NGWS (Next Generation Windows Services) architecture.
According to Gates, the architecture's foundation is already being laid with services and products such as Passport and Exchange 2000. But the real promise of Microsoft.Net, as Gates described it, won't be fulfilled for at least two more years.
Sometime in 2002 or later, Microsoft plans to ship a new version of Windows known today by its code name Blackcomb. Gates didn't disclose any details about how the new OS would differ from today's client and server versions, but he did say it would offer the full new user experience, or interface. Next year, the company will release the first version of Windows.Net, essentially as an upgrade to Windows 2000 now known as Whistler.
Also, in what Microsoft calls the "2002+" timeframe, the company will deliver Windows.Net server, as well as a hosted version of its flagship productivity suite called Office.Net.
Gates also highlighted what he called building blocks, which he said were analogous to APIs and were typified today by Passport, Microsoft's Internet authentication service. Microsoft has slated three or four new building blocks for next year to be followed in 2002+ by what the company calls "full offer, corporate federation."
Gates spared no hyperbole describing Microsoft's intentions to reinvent the company and reposition its products over the next several years.
He likened the introduction of the .Net foundation to the transition that occurred when the company moved from DOS to Windows. One slide Gates showed during his hour-long presentation read: "We are on the brink of a new computing revolution."
The new architecture relies heavily on XML and natural language interfaces while introducing several new terms into the computing lexicon, such as Universal Canvas, Information Agent and Smart Tags.
"Universal Canvas is the idea that you no longer leave the browser," said Gates.
** How Will Microsoft.Net Impact Products?, InformationWeek Online, June 26,
2000
by - Aaron Ricadela
So, Microsoft wants to turn its PC operating system into a Web operating system. What does that mean for the software everyone knows and loves? Plenty. The company last week laid out plans to virtually rebuild its whole product line to create a software environment that can be sold, distributed, and managed over the Web.
The new strategy, called Microsoft.Net, refers to a future generation of software capable of supporting an application on PCs, corporate networks, Internet servers, wireless devices, and set-top boxes, with Microsoft technology keeping track of changes to programming objects and replicating data across multiple systems.
Here's how Microsoft's Web initiatives could affect key products:
- Windows: New interface would allow interaction with a PC through voice commands and blend elements of Web browsing, E-mail, word processing, and spreadsheet calculations into a single view. The Active Directory would automatically authenticate users for online services such as customer management and storage, and replicate information among various devices.
- Office: Companies could use XML to make corporate data more easily available through Excel and other applications. Users could interact with apps using voice commands, as well as dictate text.
- Visual Studio: Future versions will include more features that let developers deploy applications across mobile computers, PCs, and corporate servers. Microsoft will also bring out rapid-application-development tools for its new generation of Windows DNA enterprise servers.
- MSN: Small businesses and consumers could create a secure online identity that lets them access E-mail, data, photos, video, and music from a variety of client devices.
Recall my earlier links on eBras, etc. at http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/book99q3.htm#smut
Computers in e-Bra straps and other unmentionable places (for computers that is) are being seriously studied in the MIT Media Lab. See "Get 'Em in Their Underwear," by Harry Bruinius in NewMedia, August 1999, pp. 28-36." The online version is at http://newmedia.com/newmedia/99/08/feature/In_Their_Underwear.html You won't believe this one.
"Things That Think" -- that's what the MIT Media Lab is calling its current set of Internet "smart" gadgets. But the TTT Consortium doesn't just want these gadgets to think on their own -- they want them to think together in a flexible hive network.
"The big 'aha!' in the last five years was the World Wide Web," says Michael Hawley, a professor at the Media Lab and a participant in the TTT Consortium. "The big surprise in the next five years will be the ground swell of 'capillary networks' -- a new web of threadwork connecting appliances, toys, cars, phones, and more." The Media Lab is calling this education of toasters and toys "think and link," to describe how these gadgets will anticipate and then meet the needs of their users.
Among the projects at the Lab are smart clothes that respond to the wearer, smart screws on plane wings that tell the network when they're coming loose, and Web search "assistants" that, far beyond doing a keyword search, know exactly what information a user needs. "One of my personal favorites is still the Heart Throb brooch we designed with Harry Winston," says Hawley. "It's a $500,000 diamond and ruby brooch, plus a special bra and clutch purse. The bra contains a sensor and mini radio link. The rubies glow with every heartbeat, and the purse transmits the data to the Internet." The Lab is also investigating many smart toys. "Think of Furby with an invisible network link," says Hawley. To link these household appliances, PDAs, clothes, and other wireless gadgets, the Lab is going deep into the gadgets'...DNA. MIT recently announced a partnership with Motorola to establish a Digital DNA Lab at the Media Lab.
(The rest of this undercover sidebar is at http://newmedia.com/newmedia/99/08/feature/Device.html )
You may also like Harry's discussion of Internet Appliances at http://newmedia.com/newmedia/99/08/feature/Appliances.html.
The elite of computer science researchers are focusing on "invisible computing" (no e-Bras mentioned in this one, but computers may be in the wallpaper) as described at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/1999/07-16summer.htm. The two major problems in advancing technologies of both wireless and invisible (ubiquitous) computing are batteries and heat. Who wants an overheated e-Bra or wall paper that catches on fire? I mentioned previously that my new Rocket e-Book weighs 22 ounces. The reason is mostly the hefty size of the battery needed to run the device for 30 hours. It is not possible to have relatively high powered devices run on tiny batteries. Lighting the viewing screen of wireless devices such as e-Books requires a serious amount of power from batteries. Computer science researchers point out that technology in batteries and heat dissipation is behind the pace of new technology in computing.
Wearables Lab at Stanford University --- http://wearables.stanford.edu/
Fifty years ago, a computer with less computational power than a modern pocket calculator filled a whole room, and ran programs consisting of only a few hundred instructions.
In the intervening decades computer hardware has continued to shrink while software functionality has continued to grow, so that today we can fit the whole Linux operating system used to drive this website into a World Wide Web server the size of a box of matches.
Computers are getting faster and smaller. With desktop PC's, the main trend has been greater speed, with the size remaining the same. The same is true of laptops, where the size is determined by the 12" screens and 19 mm pitch keyboards demanded by the market. By giving up functionality, PDA's can be shrunk to fit in a pocket or purse. However, the emphasis of our project is a complete PC, in the least possible space, usable on the go.
Goals of the Wearables Lab include design of highly wearable general purpose PCs such as our Matchbox PC, and improved technologies for the human interface to wearable computers, including research into speech I/O and the development of Thumbcode, a device independent digital sign language for typing on wearable computers.
Note the "invisible
computing" links at http://www.research.att.com/~amo/doc/networks.html
Andrew Odlyzko's Papers on Communication Networks and Related Topics
Especially note the following:
The visible problems of the invisible computer: A
skeptical look at information appliances, A. M. Odlyzko. First
Monday 4(9) (September 1999), http://firstmonday.org/
[Abstract]
[PostScript]
[PDF] [LaTeX]
[text] [First
Monday version]
The future is said to belong to information appliances, specialized and easy to use devices that will have the car tell the coffee pot to brew a cup of coffee just in time for our arrival home. These gadgets are supposed to eliminate the complexity and resulting frustrations of the PC. The thesis of this essay is that while information appliances will proliferate, they will not lessen the perception of an exasperating electronic environment. The interaction of the coffee pot, the car, the smart fridge, and the networked camera will create a new layer of complexity. In the rush towards the digital era, we will continue to live right on the edge of intolerable frustration.
The paradox of information appliances is that while they are presented as products for a mature market, their main effect will be to unleash a tidal wave of innovation. When technology changes rapidly, greater ease of use serves to attract more users and developers, creating new frustrations. The most we can do is ameliorate the spread of the information appliance products and services. To do this, it appears necessary to recognize that flexibility and ease of use are in an unavoidable conflict, and that the optimal balance between those two factors differs among users. Therefore systems should be designed to have degrees of flexibility that can be customized for different people. It will also be essential to provide for remote administration of home computing and networking.
Update on invisible (ubiquitous, wireless) computing http://www.internetwk.com/lead/lead091099.htm
A Think-Tank Vision: More Comfortable Connectivity
By ELLIS BOOKER
InternetWeek Online, September 10, 2000Those pocket-sized wireless digital assistants hitting the market are just the first wave of a network-connected world that's taking computing beyond the office and the home.
Future computing devices likely won't even resemble the equipment associated with today's networks. Consider a network-attached refrigerator that continually inventories its contents and accumulates ads from grocery services. Or maybe you'd prefer a "virtual house" that updates its contents whenever you buy merchandise on the Net or in person, and that you can walk around in with the aid of a virtual reality headset.
It may sound far-fetched, but one day the wallpaper in your home may act as a computer display, alerting you to incoming messages or news as you walk between rooms.
Such scenarios fall under the category of "pervasive" or "ambient" computing, and it's not just gee-whiz thinking. IBM's Pervasive Computing Division, MIT's Media Laboratory, Andersen Consulting's Center for Strategic Technology Research and Microsoft's Hardware Devices Group are some of the outfits trying to figure out this future of computing, based on trends in software, hardware and, above all, networking.
All are zeroing in on the implications of a world in which there are perhaps a trillion network-connected devices, in which "mobile computing" is anachronistic. Computing will be everywhere, embedded in all sorts of man-made things.
"Computers in the Wallpaper? 40 Top Researchers Explore "Invisible Computing" at Summer Institute Hosted by the University of Washington and Microsoft Research," July 16, 1999 press release from Microsoft Corporation --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/ubiquitous.htm
SEATTLE, Wash., July 16, 1999 -- Watch carefully: Now you see them; now you don’t. If some of the nation’s leading computer scientists are correct, personal computers are about to become invisible. No, they’re not actually going away -- quite the contrary -- but computers will become less obtrusive as they become simpler and more natural to use. In many cases, computers literally will become invisible, being hidden within pens, shoes, wallets, refrigerators and other common objects, where they’ll operate on our behalf, often without any conscious intervention on our part.
A computer-in-a-pen might send copies of your handwritten notes or letters to your desktop PC without you having to synch-up the two devices. A computer-in-a-shoe might track your aerobic activity or emotional state based on your speed, gait, body temperature and galvanic skin response. And future computer displays might be printed as a part of the wallpaper covering the walls in your home or office, activated by a minor electrical charge so that the displays are visible only when needed, disappearing when not in use.
Such invisibility is a far cry from today’s trend in consumer computing, in which PCs take on stylish designs and colors that call more, not less, attention to themselves. But it may not be so far-fetched, or very far away, according to Dr. Turner Whitted of Microsoft Research and Prof. Gaetano Borriello of the University of Washington’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering. On behalf of their respective institutions, these two scientists are co-chairing the "University of Washington/Microsoft Research Summer Institute: Technologies of Invisible Computing," to be held July 19-23 in Seattle.
"New shirt or cloth keyboard?" by Matthew Broersma, ZDNet News, July 25, 2001 --- http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2798015,00.html?chkpt=zdnnp1tp02
.U.K. startup ElectroTextiles has demonstrated a keyboard made out of a soft, water-resistant cloth--something the company claims could be a breakthrough for mobile computing and text messaging. The fabric, called ElekTex, can receive and transmit electronic impulses without wiring or circuitry, and it can be folded and put into a pocket. The cloth construction also means that it is lightweight -- 28g -- and damage-resistant.
"People's first impressions are, 'Whoa, it's fabric, it must be a little flimsy.' But it's very durable," ElectroTextiles co-founder Chris Chapman told journalists.
The keyboard, initially for handheld computers, had its preview at the New York Museum of Modern Art and the IT Expo in France this week, and will be on sale by the end of the year.
ElectroTextiles is planning a mobile phone handset that can be squashed and dropped, and a car seat that automatically adjusts to fit its occupant. The company is based at Pinewood Studios, outside of London.
Related Links:
> Mobile
Resource Center
> Wearable
patents take off
> Suit
yourself with a wearable computer
> Goodbye
wristwatch, hello wrist-top computer?
"New shirt or cloth keyboard?" by Matthew Broersma, ZDNet News, July 25, 2001 --- http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2798015,00.html?chkpt=zdnnp1tp02
.U.K. startup ElectroTextiles has demonstrated a keyboard made out of a soft, water-resistant cloth--something the company claims could be a breakthrough for mobile computing and text messaging. The fabric, called ElekTex, can receive and transmit electronic impulses without wiring or circuitry, and it can be folded and put into a pocket. The cloth construction also means that it is lightweight -- 28g -- and damage-resistant.
"People's first impressions are, 'Whoa, it's fabric, it must be a little flimsy.' But it's very durable," ElectroTextiles co-founder Chris Chapman told journalists.
The keyboard, initially for handheld computers, had its preview at the New York Museum of Modern Art and the IT Expo in France this week, and will be on sale by the end of the year.
ElectroTextiles is planning a mobile phone handset that can be squashed and dropped, and a car seat that automatically adjusts to fit its occupant. The company is based at Pinewood Studios, outside of London.
Related Links:
> Mobile
Resource Center
> Wearable
patents take off
> Suit
yourself with a wearable computer
> Goodbye
wristwatch, hello wrist-top computer?
Also see Bob Jensen's Threads on Invisible Computing, Ubiquitous Computing, and Microsoft.Net --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/ubiquit.htm
"Wearable computing comes off the peg," by Will Knight, New Scientist.com, July 27, 2001 --- http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99991086
The Wearable Internet Appliance (WIA) consists of a 300 gram (11 ounce) palm-top-sized computer and a head-mounted screen. The display is manufactured by a Japanese company called Shimadzu and fits over one eye like half a pair of sunglasses.
The viewable screen is then equivalent to a 33 cm (13 inch) monitor, according to Shimadzu. A small handheld controller allows the user to scroll around the screen and make selections.
The miniature computer will be powered by Hitachi's new 128 MHz RISC processor, providing power close to that of a desktop computer. It will run Microsoft's CE operating system for handheld computers, which features cut-down versions of email and word-processing applications.
Geek chic
Wearable computers been the preserve of hobbyists and computer science researchers for a number of years. This is the first attempt to market such equipment to general consumers.
Hitachi has signed a deal with Xybernaut, a US company that specialises in wearable computer products, to market the computer.
It plans to release the product around Christmas 2001 for roughly $2000, depending on the configuration. Xybernaut will also integrate the computer system with mobile phone technology to provide a range of wireless internet services.
A 1-1/2-year-old computer in Israel is being reared to learn the same way children do -- with the hopes of being the first machine to pass the so-called "Turing Test." http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,46171,00.html
I build his world on a daily basis," explained Treister-Goren.
She heads the training department at the Israeli-based Artificial Intelligence (AI), where she inputs information and language ability through conversations with Hal and works with computer experts who fine-tune his algorithms to enhance his performance.
The privately owned company, run by Israeli tech entrepreneur Jack Dunietz, aims over the next 10 years to develop Hal into an "adult" computer program that can do what no program has ever done before -- pass the Turing test.
The father of artificial intelligence, British mathematician Alan Turing was also one of the founders of computer science. More than 50 years ago he predicted the advent of "thinking machines."
But in Turing's time, computers were slow and cumbersome devices, utterly incapable of fulfilling his vision.
Turing, who died in 1954, left behind the benchmark test for computer intelligence: A human interrogator questions two entities via computer terminal; one entity is also human, while the other is the smart computer. If the computer aces the test, it fools the interrogator into thinking it is human. No computer program has done this -- yet.
If -- or when -- a computer passes the Turing Test, it will open a Pandora's box of ethical and philosophical questions. After all, if a computer is perceived to be as intelligent as a person, what is the difference between a smart computer and a human being?
Today's chatbots -- computer chat programs that have personas and names -- are incapable of dealing with changes in context or abstract ideas, and succeed only at momentarily tricking people by regurgitating pre-programmed answers.
But Hal has fooled child language experts into thinking he is a toddler with an understanding of about 200 total words, composing short, infantile sentences using a limited 50-word vocabulary.
"Ball now park mommy," Hal tells Treister-Goren, then asks her to pack bananas for a trip to the park, adding that "monkeys like bananas," a detail he picked up from a story on animals in a safari park.
The idea is to educate Hal gradually, the way a child learns, through trial-and-error and rewards when he performs well.
When Hal was "born," he was hardwired with nothing more than the letters of the alphabet and a preference for the rewards received for a positive outcome, over the punishments meted out for a negative one.
The pre-programmed preference for rewards makes Hal strive for a correct response. Treister-Goren corrects Hal's mistakes in her typewritten conversations with him, an action Hal is programmed to recognize as a punishment, which he avoids repeating.
For the rest of the article, go to " http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,46171,00.html
See
also:
The
Truth Behind A.I.
A.I.:
Unraveling the Mysteries
A.I.
Can't Yet Follow Film Script
Computers
Learn to Play By Rules
Stephen Hawking warns that machines could take over the world --- http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20010905S0004
Nobody took Arnold Schwarzenegger seriously when he showed us the dangers of artificial intelligence in the "Terminator" movies. Likewise Keanu Reeves in "The Matrix"--you thought that was just a cool kung fu flick, didn't you? But now no less a respected source than Stephen Hawking is sounding a warning about humankind being overrun by computers. "In contrast with our intellect, computers double their performance every 18 months," warned the genius physicist in a recent interview with the German newsmagazine Focus. "So the danger is real that they could develop intelligence and take over the world." Hawking, the wheelchair-bound author of the best-selling book "A Brief History Of Time," serves as the Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge University, a post once held by Isaac Newton.
But don't panic just yet--there's still hope for mankind. To prevent a "Terminator"-style standoff against the machines, Hawking advises us to improve our intelligence through genetic engineering, or perhaps by wiring ourselves to the computers directly. Said Hawking, "We must develop as quickly as possible technologies that make possible a direct connection between brain and computer, so that artificial brains contribute to human intelligence rather than opposing it."
The FEI Research Foundation has a newsletter called TechKnowledge. Issue #15 on August 14, 2002 contains the following modules:
THE FUTURE OF DIGITAL IDENTITY
A "digital identity" allows an Internet user to perform a single sign-on then move between sites seamlessly, eliminating the need to log on to each unique website. This idea is being realized two ways.
Microsoft Passport, which allows the user to move seamlessly to Passport-participating web sites, provides for the digital identity to be maintained and stored by Microsoft. The option to Passport is a group called the Liberty Alliance ( http://www.projectliberty.org/ ), whose mission is "to establish an open standard for federated network identity through open technical specifications." Liberty Alliance introduced their version of standards for digital identity on July 15, 2002. Using Liberty's version, all websites that conform to the standards can read the digital identity. So, the standard digital identity would be stored by each subscriber to the standards.
In 2001, Gartner, Inc. asked consumers which features were most important from an online service provider. Making online credit card use safer was the top pick of 24% of respondents, while 26% answered increased privacy. Only 19% answered single sign-on. However, as a more Net-savvy population evolves, the expectation for ease of use through one time log-on may increase. Executives will need to follow the trend, always being cognizant of the security issues resulting from consumer convenience.
HAVE YOUR OBJECTS CALL MY OBJECTS
The following executive summary was reprinted from the June 2002 Harvard Business Review. The author is Glover T. Ferguson, chief scientist for Accenture.
At the Star City Casino in Sydney, Australia, thousands of employees wear a huge variety of themed garments. The wardrobe department-which launders and reassembles each of these 80,000 outfits-may be the most prosaic of corporate functions, but it runs smoothly because of some very glitzy technology. It relies on radio frequency identification (RFID) chips--so called smart tags--sewn into each garment. Tough enough to withstand repeated washing, the tags give each item an identity that can be tracked by wireless readers. The occasional gambler may still lose his shirt at Star City, but the employees don't.
Object-to-object communication has become practical for a vast number of uses, enabling a "silent commerce" that requires no human interaction. Companies are rapidly adopting smart tags to reduce costs, enhance security, and help customers. But the technology is capable of even more: RFID tags working with sensors can report on whether products have been kept at specified temperature, for example; as sensors improve, tags will be able to take action, such as triggering temperature controls.
Object-to-object technology can have darker implications, primarily the potential compromise of privacy. When does helpfulness become obtrusiveness? For CEOs, the best response is to first consider the social environment in which the company is operating then incorporate the sensitivity into the design of new applications.
As RFID systems advance, new business models, including entirely new ways of offering products and services, will emerge out of applications that, in simpler forms, are already in place. It's no exaggeration to say that a tiny tag may one day transform your own business. And that day may not be very far off.
For further information on smart tags, there are several sites available. The Auto ID Center http://www.autoidcenter.org/index.asp represents a partnership between several universities and corporations offering the latest in research related to RFID systems. Other sources: RFID JOURNAL: http://www.rfidjournal.com/
PC World Videos on New Products --- http://www.pcworld.com/video.html
"Project Video, Photos from a Phone PowerPoint decks in your pocket,"
Business Week Video, November 2008 ---
http://feedroom.businessweek.com/?fr_story=32c50be245fe235d42a0895cec076331c8bda821
The gadget comes from Microvision ---
http://www.microvision.com/
"GPS: More Features, At Lower Prices: Whether you want just good basic navigation or lots of extra features, these portable in-car GPS units won't cost you an arm and a leg," by Liane Cassavoy, PC World via The Washington Post, November 13, 2008 --- Click Here
In most cases, though, the more you pay for a GPS, the more features you'll get. The chart-topping, $425 Magellan Maestro 4350 and the second-place, $480 TomTom GO 930 are the two most expensive systems we tested. And they do offer lots of extras, like hands-free calling with Bluetooth, FM transmission (so you can hear turns announced over your car stereo), and built-in audio and video players. But they also truly earned their leading positions due to their excellent navigation features: These two devices consistently found the quickest, most convenient routes.
The Navigon 2200T landed in our third spot, followed by the Garmin Nuvi 265T. Rounding out our Top 5 was the $220 TomTom One 130 S--a very basic, but still capable, navigator. All three of these devices will get you where you're going without a problem. They all sport 3.5-inch screens, which seems cramped compared to the 4.3-inch screens found on the Magellan and the TomTom GO 930. But they prove that you don't have to ante up the big bucks to get a reliable navigation device.
In fact, paying more doesn't mean you're necessarily going to get better navigation advice. The Sony NV-U94T, which missed the cut, lists for $400 (you can find it online for about $375)--and it provided some of the worst directions we've seen. In one case, its route was so far off that I was convinced I had entered the destination incorrectly (I hadn't). In another instance, I asked it to avoid toll roads, and it sent me on--you guessed it--a toll road.
Continued in article
"Manufacturers Give a Sneak Peek at Next Year's Gadgets," by Eliot Van Buskirk, Wired News, November 13, 2008 --- http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/11/2009-gear-previ.html
The economy might be flattening your wallet, but consumer electronics manufacturers are hoping they can still successfully tempt you with an array of nifty new gadgets.
How about a pocket projector that you can use for impromptu screenings of the favorite movies on your iPhone? A secure hard drive that requires you to enter a passcode on a keypad before anyone can access the data on it? Or a tiny GPS for tracking your teenager's whereabouts?
These gizmos are just a few of the new and upcoming products on display at the Consumer Electronics Association's Tuesday preview of its upcoming Consumer Electronics Show, or CES.
The consumer electronics industry, like every other industry, is worried about its prospects for 2009. A shrinking economy, vanishing jobs and an imploding financial system cast long shadows over the coming year. But there are few bright spots on the horizon for CE manufacturers, according the Consumer Electronics Association, mainly involving green technology, next-generation input methods such as multitouch screens and motion sensors, and embedded internet access.
Consumer electronics is "the only industry that has a growth rate of over 7 percent" despite the economic climate, says the CEA, possibly because some of its products can replace other, more expensive entertainment options.
If the economy continues to decline, CE manufacturers harbor a hope that consumers will react by "cocooning" in their homes, surrounding themselves with electronic comforts like HDTVs, Blu ray players and videogame consoles instead of blowing their discretionary income on SUVs and trips to Tahiti. While it can be expensive initially, the homebody lifestyle pays dividends by cutting down on activities outside the home (movies, restaurants, bars, travel, concerts and so on).
So, what new gear will you be willing to plunk down your hard-earned (or -saved) money for, come 2009? Here are some of our favorites from Tuesday night's CES preview in New York.
Continued in article
Bob Jensen's threads on gadgets are at http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob4.htm#Technology
New wireless and mobile technologies --- http://www.thinkmobile.com/
Click here to return to Bob Jensen's Threads at http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.htm