Slashdot Mirror
Smart Hotel Rooms in New York City
hc1379 writes "Back in the 90's, Mark Weiser a Xerox PARC scientist envisioned future computing will weave themselves into the background of our everyday life. People will use computing as natural as they use writing instruments. He called it ubiquitous computing (aka pervasive computing). UbiComp was a good research idea, but did not really find its way into the commercial market, at least not in the life time of Mark Weiser, who died in 1999.
One of Harry's blog reports that the Mandarin Oriental in Manhattan has smart hotel rooms that can keep track of guests' preferences and change the room conditions automatically (e.g., adjusting room temperature and lighting conditions based on the guest's preference, and alerting maids when the minibar is running low on soda)."
I try a lot to build computers into whatever I can. Making technology useful for anything and everything, thus simplifying life, is really what technology is all about.
Instead of just making a toaster, why not make a toaster that learns how different people like their toast?
Or, instead of making a set of speakers, why not make a set of speakers that can automatically adjust to prevent distortion, no matter the volume level?
Show this to your friends and family that don't know what a real hacker is
living on the Enterprise-D.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Oh, the minibar was never in danger of running low on soda...
Game... blouses.
Would be amusing to see what one good hacker or software glitch could do with a room like that. As if being able to scan people's important info out of a key card wasn't enough.
When they figure out that I would prefer not to pay and adjust accordingly, then we're talkin.
Honesty may be the best policy, but by process of elimination, dishonesty is the second best policy.
"This is Seth from the Mandarin front desk. The following DVDs have been automatically charged to your account: Drunken Hussies, Backdoor Patrol, and Mona Lisa Smile. Thank you."
For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.
It really took that long to develop this and implement it commercially? Some things seem so slow to markey it's unbelievable.
KeepTrackOfIt.com - Find the lowest gas prices in your area graphically
I would love to know what products the hotel is using. I would like to automate my home.
How about if a respect for grammar were to "weave themselves into the fabric of our everyday life?"
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-fo rm/102-8961702-9548145
It's set mostly in San Francisco in the 25th century, and there's a "Hendrix hotel" that's actually controlled by a self-aware AI inspired by its famous namesake. There's a very violent scene where some thugs attempt to commit a crime in the lobby. Let's just say the hotel had really good security.Quantum mechanics: the dreams that stuff is made of.
Check out the room rates:s p
http://www.mandarinoriental.com/hotel/532000009.a
I had a hotel in italy where the room lights were activated by your room key. This allowed them to know exactly when you left your room. One day we took a nap in the middle of the day, wandered round the town for an hour or so and returned to find that the bed had been remade.
The offered otherwise excellent service (Hotel Panorama, Venice btw) but using technology for a few extra touches makes all the difference.
The Mirage in las vegas had a minibar that was monitored by computer in my suite. I'm not sure if they'd have come and restocked it, but it stops you replacing that $4 bottle of aquafina you took with an inferior quality one from safeway.
My point is that these smart features wont make a craptastic hotel better, but they can make a nice one nicer.
I remember in a hotel (belgium i think) looking at the card with the in-room movie choices. It came with an assurance that your movie choices would not be visible to the staff at the front desk or on your bill, yet hollywood films were 5 euro and porn was 6.
I spent a few days in a hotel in London, around march. The mini-bar in the room was RFID-equipped and would automatically charge your account if an item was removed.
So I guess thats not really new, then.
Powerful is he who overpowers his temptations.
Plenty of OTHER systems open Windows for you, I don't think we need another. *ducks*
My other Beowulf cluster is... er...
...up my expense account, make it concrete, and then I'll read the fucking article. Otherwise, we mouse-drivers over here ain't holding our breath.
When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro. ~~ Hunter S. Thompson
This kind of stuff makes me a little uneasy. On a practical level, the more complicated something is, the more ways it can mess up. Think about how often you have to fix your computer versus your refrigerator.
It also makes me think about how we can use products and gadgets to define ourselves. Your room will "match your lifestyle," it says. How much thought do we really need to perfecting our environments and making everything around us customized for our tastes? Everything from the color of your iPod to the way you drink your coffee is supposed to express your personality, and the world is supposed to be exactly the way you like it.
I mean, this is neat in theory, but you're going to pay a lot for the service, I'm sure. (I don't know which rooms have it, but the first reservations their site showed me were between $600 and $700 a night.) The question is, are you paying for the convenience, or how important it makes you feel?
Like a 'hotel prefs' wireless usb key ring that worked across all the hotel chains, the room would read and write to it while I were there and but wouldn't store it.
its like that simpsons where homer's house turns into pierce brosnan.
which was like 2001 a space odesey
which was the original
But we must know what they receive on a typical IQ test!
it seems this type of technology is better suited for homes.
the vast majority of people are not repeat visitors to the same hotel...
I stayed one in Rittenhouse in Philly, well almost three years ago.
They had a console by the bed where you could control lights, tv, temp etc.
The best featue is you could set the temp of the shower and it would turn itself on when it got to the promper temp it would notify you.
It also had movies on demand. So my girlfriend and I decided to watch a video on demand. The movie Barcelona. She had never seen it. I told her about it. I got in the shower after the movie started, or was supposed to start.
I come out of the shower and she is seated on the bed with a funny look. And this is a girl who spent ten years working in Turkey and various other countries. Unshakeable.
The automated system had decided to lock on some weird shemale porn flick that was in a loop.
She figured it was glitched, and it wasn't me.
True story...
I thought the automated room would be romantic.
The next day they fixed it and gave us a free night.
True story. Nothing like shem porn to be a mood killer.
Puto
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Let's get our /. submission ready:
Now you too can pass yourself off as Roland Piquepaille!
Enterprise integration with Building Automation Systems is a hot topic. All your major IT integrators are exploring this while the BAS community is actively working on web services standards. Google oBIX and BACnet Web Services. The process control industry also has OPC which is often used in buildings too; OPC is working on their web services spec called Unified Architecture.
http://malfeasance.50megs.com/
I would have thought that every big hotel in the world would have tagged everything by now. Security dude radios main desk " We'eve got Mrs Jenkins from 337 mooving into lobby with 2 towels and a lamp in her bag."...
"Persistance is Fertile" - Me. I can quote myself if I want to.
Information: "I want to be anthropomorphized"
Will it order up an "extra pillow" too?
I actually stayed at the Mandarin Oriental a week or two after it opened - gf got the room free after a work event.
We could not turn of the silly LCD monitor that was showing nature scenes. No off, nothing on the remote, can't unplug it because all the wiring is behing the entertainment center. Made the room to bright to sleep in.
Finally had to resort to throwing a towel over it.
http://slashdot.org/articles/05/11/17/0027255.shtm l?tid=126&tid=99
It's a great video about the technology. They talk about the advtantages and interview Cisco employees and the hotel employees. Check it out.
oops, in my haste i pasted the wrong link. Here's the REAL link to Cisco's video: http://newsroom.cisco.com/Newsroom/flash/evp/?vidi d=955B868E49E525C3AD0F877DF4845507
I'm having trouble remembering the last time I wrote anything longhand.
Off topic nothing. I read the same thing about 5 times over.
I'm not talking about those futuristic IR sensors they build into toilets these days, but one that could open the door to the future.
When it comes to audio, the best way to prevent distortion is to get rid of any computerised anything in the signal chain; keep it pure analog all the way, with as few wires in the signal chain as possible, with good quality, well matched components and listen at levels which represent that which you would expect to hear in a particular venue. Also, the laws of physics will render the computerised speaker concept a non-starter unfortunately. Cheers
Who is this delectable creature with an insatiable love of the dead?
It would be a lot cooler if it could match the room settings to which hooker you have with you that night.
Mark was a friend and is missed. One of his favorite books on the subject was P.K. Dick's Ubiq. Hence the name of the site. Check it out. -- gnet
Seems every other month some ivory tower researcher or technoevangelist with their crystal ball pops up and proclaims we're all going to have pervasive computeting/nanobots in our blood/holographic memory downloads etc etc blah fscking blah. Whether or not these technologies are physically possible (I suspect most are) , what these socially inept ubergeeks fail to
realise is that probably 95% of the population won't want it , so therefor this blade runner type world they keep waffling on about will only ever remain science fiction for the vast majority of the population.
How about:
... my credit card should open the stinking door, and let me activate the elevator. Or at least work a machine that gets me the keycard. ... just charge me for what I owe.
1) no check-in. I pre-paid with my credit card
2) While we're at it, maybe the machine can show me all the rooms available in my reservation class and let me pick the one I want, so I don't have to argue about it with the desk clerk.
3) automated tracking of expenses, on the hotel's web site, that I can get to over the in-room ethernet. Or make the stupid tv thing work more reliably, no matter how I reserved (hotels.com).
4) No check-out. Why, why, why do I have to check out of a hotel? It's on my credit-card
I can get on and off a plane now without talking to a single desk agent. What's with hotels?
Who the hell drinks the pricey water and soda in a hotel room?! That too in NYC!?
Where's my free iPod!? Until then, I'll settle for a kiss...
Hotels have been setting room temperatures for years now. They save $$ by not heating/cooling rooms until the guest checks in. Then while they are on their way, they blast the room until it comes up to the temperature the guest set the room the last time they came. Its more about financial savings than new technology. Ok, so having your minibar automatically refilled might be cool but who can afford that anyway?
I feel the term "ubiquitous computing" could be a huge big misnomer, the term suitable, for what's described in this article at least, is ubiquitous automation. When everyone can code in lisp or such stuff and can customise whatever device they come across, or at least the devices would allow it, THAT i'll consider ubiquitous computing, but a "smart" car is really nothing more than a dumb car with some additional automated functions. Unless I can compute, and the device can give me a command line interface and an interpreter prompt, there's no ubiquitous computing in being surrounded by "smart" devices, which I, again, would actually call dumb devices with some more automatied features.
I just stayed at the Hilton New York, and my room had floor lighting activated by passive IR (PIR) sensors. So when you got up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, the floor lighting would come on, and then when you were done, it would slowly dim out.
The room also made a lot of use of white LED arrays for reading lights above the bed.
My room had a flat panel LCD TV as well. Unfortunately, it was jammed into an improper aspect ratio (4:3 content was stretched to 16:9, making the ladies in the Victoria Secret show look actually healthy and normal). The TV also took a few seconds to go between channels, yuck!
Intresting Thought... why don't you go to the room... set the temp, check the minibar, make the bed, clean the floors, clean the bathrooms, oh and uh, do this simply with human muscle? isn't that what employees are paid to do? Go check the room before someone uses it? hmm I know, stupid idea... I'll shut up now :P
Working to make this world a darker place...
Hi, there's a video (from Cisco):i d=955B868E49E525C3AD0F877DF4845507&topic=Customers &subtopic=ALL
http://newsroom.cisco.com/Newsroom/flash/evp/?vid
wolruf@gmail.com
a long time ago.
1990 - The last car to use a carburetor sold in the US is the Subaru Justy. The 91 model uses fuel injection, which requires an ECU. Last time I checked, cars are still part of our everyday lives.
The median hotel room price in NYC is around $250 with double digits fairly rare. I think its location rather than fancy amenities. With this large cash flow, they can experiment with luxury business travel.
1) Give me a room that is QUIET when I want to sleep. I don't want to hear the AC whooshing, I don't want to hear the domestic dispute in the room next door, I don't want to hear the ice machine in the hall gurgling all night long, I don't want to hear the night club at the pool. It amazes me how noisy some brand-new hotels are
2) Give me enough frikken electrical outlets! Run a power bar next to the desk. I don't want to have to unplug the desk lamp just so I can plug in my laptop. And I don't want to have to charge my cell phone in the bathroom.
3) Get rid of the damn armchair. If your hotel room is the size of a handicapped bathroom stall don't put a damn armchair in there. I'd just as soon have a place to put my suitcase.
I wish they would mention the underlying systems that make all this possible. Mandarin was one of the toughest installs our company ever did and we built our system custom to a point fo rthem to run about 60% of the hotel, and then you have articles like this come out that don't mention the backend systems at all that make this possible. Eh Oh well. Most of the hotels mentioned by people in this use our PMS systems, and they are the backbone to all this and the innovation in them is what makes most of this possible.
I can't believe its not butter!
My boss can afford my mini-bar tab. Actually I can too, if I'm careful. Yes $5 for a $1 candybar is expensive, but when you work til midnight and just need something now to get you to breakfast (that is you are too tired for a good meal even if you don't factor in jet-lag) it is worth it.
Just be careful.
I knew somebody'd slip up.
All this stuff is what the BUTLER is for, isn't it?
+++OK ATH