Pervasive Computing (Wearable Computers): Wearable computers breaking the paradigm of desktop computing

A Visio-Haptic Wearable System for Assisting Individuals Who Are Blind

Individuals who are blind rely on their sense of touch for perceiving their proximal environment. Unfortunately, this modality is limited to the extent of one’s reach, thereby limiting haptic perception of objects in the distal environment. This system proposes a wearable system to estimate Haptic (tangible) features from visual data (i.e., visio-haptic information analysis or simply visio-haptics) to enable users to feel objects from a distance.

Source: Center for Cognitive Ubiquitous Computing (2006) http://delivery.acm.org/10.1145/1200000/1196151/p12-mcdaniel.pdf?key1=1196151&key2=6481497711&coll=Portal&dl=GUIDE&CFID=21326057&CFTOKEN=38652514

M.F.M Shameer

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Wearable Displays

Microvision is developing Color Eyewear: a see-through, high-resolution display platform that enables lightweight and fashionable eyewear displays for mobile devices. By combining the Integrated Photonics Module with the company’s revolutionary ultra-thin optical design, Microvision enables a new class of wearable display products that can meet stringent fashion and performance requirements, enhancing the usability and visual experience of mobile devices.

See who’s calling you without reaching in your pocket
Read text messages and emails while heading to your destination
Access navigation and GPS-enabled services while looking at the outside world
Stay connected to mobile social networks and check out who’s around you

Source: Microvision (2007) http://www.microvision.com/wearable.html

M.F.M Shameer

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Personal Contextual Awareness through Visual Focus

A considerable amount of research exists in the areas of hand-based user interfaces and Computer-vision techniques used to locate and recognize hand gestures. Data gloves, magnetic trackers, and optical sensors can all be used to obtain hand orientation. In these cases, however, the hand acts solely as an input device. We designed Handel (hand-based enhancement for learning) to rely on hand movements to trigger an augmented-reality overlay onto the user’s hands during piano practice. Essentially, Handel creates a “hands-up” display instead of a heads-up display.

Source: IEEE intelligent system http://wearcam.org/ieeeis/wearable_ai_sample_article.pdf

M.F.M Shameer

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A mobile pet wearable computer and mixed reality system for human–poultry interaction through the Internet

In modern cities and societies, it is often difficult to maintain contact with pets, particularly for office workers. Following image describe a novel cybernetics system to use mobile and Internet technology to improve human–pet interaction. It can also be used for people who are allergic to touching animals and thus cannot stroke them directly. This interaction encompasses both visualization and tactile sensation of real objects.

The interaction between the human and the chicken is through a mobile wearable computer system on the chicken and a tangible interactive system for the human.

The system benefits both the human and the poultry in an equal partnership. As shown in the user study, people like to be able to touch their pets when they are out of home and their pets are alone, and they had a feeling of presence for the remote pet with our system. As for the pet, the experimental results confirmed that the proposed system is pleasurable for the pet too. The system is specifically designed for sentient beings.

Source:Pers Ubiquit Comput (2006)

http://portal.acm.org/ft_gateway.cfm?id=1149823&type=pdf&coll=Portal&dl=GUIDE&CFID=21326057&CFTOKEN=38652514

M.F.M Shameer

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Intelligent Assistant

developed, in Georgia Tech, in use for over 13 years.

It's a system which consist in:

camera attached to one side of the glasses
head-up display magnetically attached to the other side, can be simply removed
headphone with incorporated microphone
joystick attached to wrist to control some of the computer functions

The computer can see and hear what user does.

"The computer would remind the user of appointments, automatically schedule meetings, and open relevant notes and documents as the user talks about different topics."

Intelligent agent is able e.g. to redirect incoming call and record the message if the user is busy with a conversation or can simply display who is calling to give user possibility to decide how urgent it is.

Thanks to head-up display user has all the information and data just in front of him, which can access by handy joystick just next to his hand. "Wearable computers are good for getting to pieces of information in two seconds, anything longer than two seconds becomes an undue burden on the user, and he won't bother using it. Being able to get to your keyboard or screen so quickly that it's so easy to take down a memory or a quotation is incredibly valuable.”

Source: http://www.gatech.edu/innovations/wearable/index.php

W. Plesiak

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One area in which wearable computers are breaking the paradigm of desktop computers is mediated /Augmented reality. This is the ability for a computer to enhanced presentations of reality or additional information to the user. One idea that is currently being explored is using a camera and face recognition linked up to database so that if you meet someone you are instantly given information about that person. One application for this would be for business people at conference's which avoid them having to introduce them self's over and over again. A more scary idea would to equip police officers with this type of system that could recognise known criminals with outstand convictions etc

Another area in which wearable computers break the paradigm of desk top computers is Mediwear which is embedded computers in clothes that closely monitors the wearers body functions. When any of these body functions becomes critical either the wearer or a predefined database could be notified . This could be useful for the armed forces so that they could monitor their personal when out in the field, this linked up to GPS could mean that rescue teams could automatically be deployed to a injured person.

Reference http://about.eyetap.org/library/weekly/aa060100a.shtml

M.Shannon

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Wearable Display on Informal Face-To-Face Communication

Wearable computers have the potential to support our memory, facilitate our creativity, our communication and augment our physical senses but, like email and cellphones, they also have the potential to interrupt, displace or downgrade our social interactions. I found a research which presents the results of a simple laboratory-based study which examines the impact of a xybernaut head-mounted Shimadzu display on conversation between two people. We hypothesized that the wearable, by reducing eye-contact and attention in the wearer would have a detrimental effect.