Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

MIThril Jacket Showcases Wearable Computing

Posted by simoniker on from the but-does-it-translate-entish? dept.

Codeine writes "The Seventh Annual International Symposium on Wearable Computers (ISWC), to be held later this month, will again feature members of MIT's Media Lab showing off the group's MIThril jacket. Taking its name from J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy, the jacket combines body-worn computation, sensing, and networking in a clothing-integrated design, according to the project." According to a new paper (PDF link) to be presented at the conference, the latest version of this long-evolving system uses a Sharp Zaurus running Linux.

2 of 162 comments (clear)

  1. Don't know if I would "wear" computing by Arciryon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Integration is all good, but as for integrating functions into clothing I believe it can be at the expense of flexibility. I would much rather have a lot of functions integrated in my mobile, and be able to bring those functions with me in situations that I might choose another attire.

  2. Re:Would you want this? by Lumpy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    so you would rather have to dig out your cellphone and dial from it instead of having you cellphone as a device on your belt and you simply say "dial steve at office" to dial steve's office number and then talk to him through the bluetooth headset?

    what you want is EXACTLY a wearable computer. just make the "cellphone" a black box with no buttons or silly microphone + speaker, oh and give it a decent processor, ram, storage, etc...

    nahh give me a wearable computer with a cellphone attachment.. think pcmcia card here...

    90% of the hardware you see is power and battery management. and that is the biggest problem. batteries today are a complete and utter joke compared to everything else... almost no power and life for a gigantic size.

    wearable computing is very cool, I used to be faster at typing on my handykey twiddler one handed keyboard than a regular keyboard. do I still do the wearable computing thing??? nope. but I'm not in college anymore with thousands of hours to spend on my projects (or get credit and funding for my projects!)

    but wearable computing is going that way... It's that you call it a cellphone and think of the phone as the central piece where as the "phone" really is a small accessory to the main computer.

    the thing holding it back is dirt cheap bluetooth and batteries that dont royally suck.

    --
    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.