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Wearables From IBM Japan
Justin Time sent us linkage to another device that could put us one step closer to gargoyle land. The screen is monocle that displays a 10 inch screen. Runs Win98 (ick) and has 3 hours of battery life. Definitely looks like it has some potential.
>>I'm worried about this. Three buttons, in all permutations can only create 6 actions, which is just enough for a 2-buttoned mouse.
I count 7
00x
0x0
x00
xx0
0xx
x0x
xxx
Where x is when a key is pressed and 0 is when a key remains unpressed.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Let me guess what the 3 buttons are.
Control, Alt and Delete?
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"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
Anyway, eyestrain is obviously an issue here, so making the material semi-transparent with a variable "depth" would be uber-cool, as it would allow for (limited) 3d visualization as well as other interesting features. It would also aleviate the eyestrain problem.
How does one use a computer without a keyboard? Clicking icons can only get you so far. -
Someone just needs to develop the killer app for it
Killer app ? Not sure about that, but this is amusing. It's a new slant on putting the personal touch into eCommerce; get a few gargoyles on rollerblades and have them skate around a Paris department store checking out the merchandise for you.
We also have a wearable project here at HP Labs. It's called the predictable, but still cringe-making "BlaserJet".
Is it really necessary to say "ick" (or something similar) every time a MS product is mentioned? I think most of the folks visiting Slashdot know enough about software to have our own opinions of, say, Win98. Hopefully, most of us can also see both the bad and the good in such products, and don't need CmdrTaco coaching us.
Bottom line: It's juvenile, and it makes Slashdot look bad.
-- Brian
The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
Linux could be ported to anything, so it doesn't say much about compatibility to say that Linux runs on a new machine.
What they're saying is that this is a PC, not some totally oddball proprietary thing, so you can run PC-standard software on it.
A monocular display like the one in the story is used by keeping both eyes open. The effect is like having a transparent monitor floating in front of you. You don't get headaches, and you don't have to worry about a laser being beamed directly at you retina (something tells me that no matter how safe such a system would be, you would have a hard time getting consumers to buy into it).
-Vercingetorix
"Necessitas non habet legem." -St. Augustine
The current bottleneck in all the mobile/wearable devices is battery power. Batteries are too heavy and last too short a time. The superslim notebooks -- ones that you can actually carry around -- survive for 2-3 hours at most without an electric outlet. A variety of PDAs can go through the day without recharging, but they all lack decent keyboards and tend to be quite limited in what they do.
Basically, for wearable computers to take off, batteries have to become much lighter.
Kaa
Kaa
Kaa's Law: In any sufficiently large group of people most are idiots.
How about we have little sensors implanted into the back of our teeth, and we could type with our tongues? Of course eating anything would wreak havoc on the computer, what happened if we accidently chewed a rm -rf /* while logged in as root?
Actually it's the very same technology that MicroOptical uses in their displays. In this case, you're looking at the non-translucent prototype that has been encased in hard plastic for durability. IBM also has a translucent model. Look for the 800x600 color display sometime early next year.
LouZiffer
Wearable computers have been out for a while, in various forms
;-P
Sure wish I could find one..
Someone just needs to develop the killer app for it, something that would give people a reason to actually want to use one on a constant basis.
I'd say first, someone has to SELL an affordable one. The *only* versions I've seen for sale cost upwards of 5,000$ a unit..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
The headset is way too damned clunky... What about the ibm thingy a few months ago that had that tiny slit like display? It was small and not so clunky. The point of a wearable computer is to have a computer you treat like your discman/minidisc player just shove it in your pocket and put it on when you need it... therefore it has to be small and fast to use/put on.
"Runs Win98 (ick)"
The question was posed earlier on the message boards here as to whether or not Win98 is the OS of the future. I do not think this is the case. I would rather propose that the reason this wearable computer runs win98 is this: Obviously there is limited input with any kind of portable/wearable computing systems. The best input to use would be voice recognition (although the earlier story about thought activated computing would be a solution in the [near?] future). At current, such software exists only for Win9x/NT based systems. So /. folks, don't bash the d00dz at IBM for using Win98 at the platform for their wearable prototypes, instead lobby the developers of ViaVoice (also an IBM product) and Dragon NaturallySpeaking to make *nix/BeOS/Other based speech recognition products.
Deitheres
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
That commercial was the first thing I thought of when I saw the picture. The computer in the commercial has two major features that will probably need to happen before anyone can make money selling wearable computers. First, the commercial computer is voice controlled. Even simple commands like the ones you see him doing in the commercial are better than giving up a hand to control a ball mouse. Second, people will probably want a see through display. Binocluar vision keeps us from walking into large stationary objects (usually). Nature never intended for us to cover one eye with a computer display. It appeared that the monacle display in the article was opaque, but I might be wrong. The battery life probably isn't that big a deal. People are used to notebook computers with 3 hour battery lives. I don't remember the article mentioning wireless networking, but that's not too difficult to add.
-Barry
You're definatly right about the lack of a good interface and the lack of a killer app. I feel asthetics needs to enter into the mix as well when considering wearable computing. Right now they're big and kind of wierd looking. People don't want to look like a freak. (Of course this is the very thing people said about the walkman when it was introduced 20 years ago.)
As killer apps go, I'm a big fan of augmen ted reality and remembe rance agents. This could be the killer app once the technology improves.
Now for my spiel on interfaces. Each computing device, whether it's desktops, PDS, or wearables are used in fundamentally different ways. For a desktop, the desktop-document metaphore works because it's primarly used for "desk work". But for a PDA it doesn't make sense. That's why WinCE failed. People use a PDA like a notepad so a notepadesque interface is the best (like PalmOS). Same thing goes for wearables. People aren't looking for wearables to replace desktops any more than people looked for PDAs to replace desktops. Therefore a new interface needs to be developed. Personally I'd like to see something like the interface used in ohnny Mnemonic. You just need finger/head tracking. No real devices. That's the interface I think people want to use.
And you only ever need 3 buttons in 'doze anyway -- as long as they've got CTRL-ALT-DELETE covered, that should be all you ever need.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
So this is kind of long, but i'm trying to get a lot of background information accross... The subject sums up my point pretty well.
years and years ago when I was an undergrad at CMU, I did software design for wearable computers.
To the best of my knowledge wearables started out as darpa/NSF funded University research projects, with the main two centers being CMU EDRC and MIT Media Lab. Having worked at one and seen lectures by the other, the MIT boys seem to be driven by how much oompf you can put into a box and the effects of living with/in one on life, and the CMU boys are driven by industrial mission specific design. Both are valid and necessary areas of research.
I am not an expert in the field, nor do I claim to be. I do, however, have more experience with it than 99% of the population.
The key job of the wearable computer is, and always will be information access.
Will someone find a way to run quake 5 on one? Probably. But that is a secondary or tertiary concern.
The largest problem facing the wearable is the physical user interface. Everyone seems to be tossing faster hardware and more software against the usability problem, and I feel this is the incorrect approach. The OS really does not matter at all.
In my opinion the correct process should be: Industrial Design and then GUI.
I am completely unimpressed with IBM wearable. Why? I saw essentially the same interface on the Vu-Man 1 at CMU in 1993.
One of the best designs that I have seen was the Vuman-2r and 3 (which I coded for), which involved three buttons spaced around a large dial. The idea was you used the buttons to select, and the dial to scroll through information and select options to further direct your search. The dial was big, designed so that it could still be used if you were wearing work gloves and the wearble was *inside* the side cargo pocket found on miltary fatigues. The ID guys came up with the design, the software guys were left out of the process becuase they couldn't think outside the box.
The software was then designed around these capabilities. And it worked. form design, interface and software were designed from the ground up for the specific tasks and environment where the wearable would excell.
According to a work aquantance of mine, comdex the info kiosks were apparently run by people with wearables. He is convinced that he could have found information faster in a book, than by asking the wearable info centers.
Voice recognition seems to be the holy grail of wearable interfaces, but people seem to spend more time on it than on the industrial design of the box. A good physical interface will always be faster and cheaper than voice recognition. If it were not, then why do we still have hot keys so many years after the mouse was debuted?
IBM has a commerical out with a guy sitting in a public square in europe trading stocks and navigating through excel using voice recognition. Apparently he does quite well in the market that day. I wish I could have been sitting next to him so I could hear exactly what his personal private business was.
"You want to kiss the sky? Better learn how to kneel." - U2
"It was like trying to herd cats..." - Robert A. Heinlein
Sig:
Barbeque is a noun. Not a verb.
Think Nicolas Cage in that helicoptor movie. They spend a whole bunch of time getting him to get information from a monacle.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
That device is interesting.
But there's something else that I am looking for - a small, very light portable box that includes standard PC hardware, but that is not a laptop.
It should be just a little box with connectors for keyboard, screen, mouse, network, period.
Why? Well, for one, whereever I go, keyboards, screens and mice are already there. Also, most laptops make a lot of compromises for the sake of including everything in one box. Yet, a "normal" PC, even one in a portable case, is not light or portable enough.
Does anyone know where to find such a box?
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You may like my a cappella music
The MIT Technology Review (May-June 99 issue) covered systems like this, although from the photo it would appear that Olympus/IBM have reduced the form factor still more. The magazine has an article about Steve Mann's work on wearable computers.
:)
Steve's gear is actually built into his clothing and displayed via a pair of heavy glasses. He makes use of wireless networking where-ever he goes so his computer can assist him with info, etc (even to the point of setting up his own transmitters, etc if he's in a convention). With the aid of his system, he can appear to know about almost any topic. Fascinating stuff that's really taking you into Gargoyle land...
The system referred to in the BBC article is still a little too obtrusive/clunky for my liking. Much better than the old Compaq "Portable" that was my first mobile, however
I left my body to science, but I'm afraid they've turned it down...
Well, it looks like we have a use for that neural interface technology that the doctor doesn't want us to have.
Being able to move a phantom finger over a phantom keyboard sounds pretty useful here, I wonder if you could do better. I know I have some neurons that are wired to touch-type, could we learn how to do the same sort of thing, without the fingers, and stuff? I'd be pretty happy if I could use my brain as a fast keyboard.
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pb Reply or e-mail rather than vaguely moderate.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Palms run a graphical, intuitive operating system that takes many of its touches (both at the user and system level) from the Macintosh OS. What the original poster was talking about was how consumers will not buy a PDA that runs a command-line OS, which I agree with. After all, DOS-based organizers never caught on big-time, and Linux just can't compete with something like PalmOS that's designed from the ground up to work with portable systems.
I stand by my assertion that Linux is no better suited for a PDA than Windows is. Use the right tool for the right job.
For more information, click here.
IBM's page on the wearable is at http://www.jp.ibm.com/esbu/E/wpc/index. html.
Notably, it uses a 233MHz MMX Pentium, uses 64MB RAM, has a 340MB disk, NeoMagic 128XD video chip set, and the screen resolution is 320x240 (with a note that the SVGA version is under development).
Has anyone seen the IBM commercial with the guy using one of these with voice control and wireless connection? -- very neat!
That's the eyepiece. Frankly, the idea of a wearable computer doesn't thrill me all that much--as it stands, I try to avoid using my mouse as much as I can, and a computer without a keyboard strikes me as just useless. Give a wearable computer a keyboard, and you'uve suddenly got a laptop with a strap.
Have we finally got a truly viable eyepiece as output device? If so, that's the part I like. The savings in battery usage on a laptop would be significant, dual eyepieces provide 3d (of course)...if they're good enough, I might even consider using one on my desktop.
I'd certainly consider them if they could be made of transparent plastic and switchable (so I could look through them as needed.)
Reality has a conservative bias: it conserves mass, energy, momentum...
My iMac only has USB ports and it can run Linux. USB support for LinuxPPC was developed because it was necessary to make it work on an iMac. If PCs or wearable computers come out with only USB ports, I'm sure Linux will eventually be able to work with them.
The future is going to be dictated by two things, software and interface. The biggest reason wearable computers aren't "human efficient" yet are the interfaces. The point of wearables is lost if you have to break out a keyboard in order to enter data, or need a flat surface to run your mouse on. The pistol grip mouse controller this new machine has is a step forward, but the lack of random character input hinders its usefulness. There are TV ads for wearables that are voice-controlled, but these interfaces are not optimal due to the simple fact that people sitting next to you on the bus simply do not want to hear you controlling your computer.
There exist some palm-held keyboards that work on a chording principle, I believe some of the gargoyle cyborgs at the MIT Media Lab use these; with only five buttons, you can chord together all the keys on a keyboard. The major problem with this reaching mainstream is that it is a completely different mechanism that would have be learned & practiced. There were some ergonomic keyboards that took advantage of the chording concept (to prevent having to move your fingers all over the place), but these didn't take off for much the same reason.
What, then, is going to drive the industry towards wearables? IMHO, it's software. People were apparently willing to learn the Graffiti system for the Palm because that line of PDAs provided the right kinds of software in a very portable fashion. The software was mostly read-only, data entry is not its strong point, but neither was it intended to be. That's the kind of thing that a wearable computer could be useful for -- the keyboard isn't so necessary if all you're doing is displaying data.
Of course, you don't need a Pentium to display data! Which means a heads-up Visor (hmm... fate? ;) could just as easily be the next big thing. As well, perhaps it's not the machine we should be impressed with, so much as the headset -- I can think of many more uses for a head-mounted, your-eyes-only, just-like-a-monitor display, even with conventional laptops -- on a plane, bus, train, for security reasons and/or for space limitations.
I love the idea of wearable computers. Someone just needs to develop the killer app for it, something that would give people a reason to actually want to use one on a constant basis.
--
If it's not important, you can probably find it in...
If it's not important, you can probably find it in...
Project Galactic Guide (
I am a true believer in the wearable PC. Consider what a technologically interested person might carry on him when he leaves the house nowerdays:
- Mobile phone. Complete with email gateway-ed messaging, and possibly wap based web surfing.
- PDA with a good interface and a bunch of flexible applications
- Portable mp3 player with multimedia capacity and as much as 100 mb (or 4.8 gigs for that new Compaq one) of memory space.
- Gameboy for that much needed Tetris fix.
And more are on the way, such as city navigating GPS units, those digital book readers, etc etc. Can one possibly imaging these things NOT going to converg?
What is important to me though is that it is truly a wearable PC. I don't want an extended mobile phone with a bunch of embedded services, but a computer on my person that gives me as much freedom as my computer at home (and yes that means Linux). I don't want to put myself in the hands of hardware makers and other making programs that serve there interest. For example, the new GRPS (packet data over GSM) enabled phones here will be crippled to not allow voice data over ip/grps, since that would be cheaper than using the GSM service per minute fees. And the hardware music players will start limiting what songs I can play by obeying the SDMI iniative.
If someone could combine the virtual freedom of the PC with the physical freedom of a wearable device, that would be a true killer. Go get rich somebody.
-
We cannot reason ourselves out of our basic irrationality. All we can do is learn the art of being irrational in a reasonable way.
I use to work at Allina Health Systems. Some of the surgeons would use wearable computers when performing rare surgeries. They would use it to quickly get information. They used a cord keyboard that works by pressing multiple buttons to get a letter.