Wearable Computers
From: London Financial Times - March 21, 2001
By: Geof Wheelwright

Wearable computers are finally coming out of the computer science lab and
into the mainstream commercial and industrial world even if they are not
quite yet a fashion item. 

You might classify anything from a Palm Pilot to a fully-loaded digital watch
as a wearable computer, but this particular brand of personal mobile device
is typically very different from the conventional handheld computer. 

It commonly includes a headset that allows users not only to see the tiny
screen in one eye (through a special head-mounted display) while typing on an
arm-mounted keyboard, but also the ability to broadcast by wireless what the
user is seeing to a website. 

According to Jackie Fenn and Alexander Linden, who conduct research about
this technology for Gartner Group's advanced technologies and applications
unit, the most significant drivers of 'always on' wearable computing include
entertainment (video, audio and realtime games) and health monitoring. 

"The wearable computing environment will (eventually) resemble a mobile phone
more than it will today's computers," concluded Ms Fenn and Mr Linden in a
recent research note, in which they also suggested that wearable computers
would be commonplace by 2010. 

"One likely configuration will be a small device with processing, storage and
transmission capabilities, linked wirelessly to an ear-mounted speaker and
microphone, that provides interaction through voice recognition," they said. 

One example of such a device is Fairfax, Virginia-based Xybernaut's Mobile
Assistant IV TC a variant of which was recently used by Insight on the News
and World Tribune.com to provide live streaming audio and visual coverage of
US President George W. Bush's inauguration parade and parties, as well as the
inauguration address itself. 

Despite being small enough to wear, the Xybernaut Mobile Assistant IV TC is
no slouch when it comes to processing power, memory or storage. It includes
an Intel Pentium III 400 MHz processor, room for up to 192Mb of SDRam memory,
and up to 32Gb of internal hard drive storage. Price varies depending on
specification. 

The significant amount of maximum on-board storage and memory gives this
wearable computer the capacity not only to handle wireless webcasting (if you
have a wireless internet connection with enough bandwidth), but also to
digitally store lots of video on the hard disk for later editing. 

But Xybernaut is not alone in this market. One competitor is Burnsville,
Minnesota-based ViA, which has announced development of a wearable computer
based on the new low-power Crusoe processor from Transmeta, Intel's
arch-rival. And this wearable computer will do battle in arenas other than
just the high-tech marketplace. 

Field tests 

ViA says development of the new system was funded by the US Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency (DARPA), so it should come as no surprise that the
first versions of ViA's wearable PC are being used by the US Army Military
Police in field tests at Fort Polk, Louisiana and elsewhere. 

According to Henry Girolamo, program manager of the US Army Natick Soldier
Center, in Natick, Massachusetts, wearable computers can be an important part
of the modern soldier's arsenal. 

"ViA's Crusoe-based computer has the potential to be a central component in a
soldier's weapon system, providing communication and information management
in critical combat situations," he said in a statement issued by the company. 

ViA says companies such as Northwest Airlines, Nabisco and General Dynamics
in customer service, distribution center, inspection and maintenance
applications are also using its wearable computers. 

The company says its next generation of wearable computers will incorporate a
700MHz Crusoe microprocessor and will run Windows 2000. The body-worn PC is
now available in beta preproduction form with full commercial availability
scheduled for August. 

Much of the work being carried out by commercial wearable computing companies
is based on making better use of existing technologies to create new devices.
Some of the more interesting work in this sector is still going on in
research labs. 

Take, for example, the work of Andy Hopper at the AT&T Laboratories in
Cambridge, UK. He is professor of Communications Engineering at the
University of Cambridge Engineering Department and - at last year's
International MobiCoin Conference in Boston he presented a plan for
development of what he calls "sentient computing". 

This is where computers are able to create "a detailed model that mirrors the
real world and an environment where the interface is everywhere, everything
can be controlled and nothing ever gets lost". 

This plan is based on the 'Active Bat' ultrasound location technology
developed at AT&T Laboratories, Cambridge which, it claims, will allow people
and objects to be tracked with an accuracy of three centimetres. The
technology works by relaying information from small Bat devices and combining
it with information from many different types of sensors, telemetry systems,
data sources and computing devices to build a real-time model with details of
location, identity, properties and resources. 

Prof Hopper and his research group suggest that this technology could be
valuable by allowing video-phones, for example, to track conference
participants as they walk through a building, such as an office or hospital,
by automatically selecting the camera with the best view. 

He says that this wearable technology will allow users to create their own
"real world" interface with technology. 

"We will harness information from the world around us and our personal
preferences to enhance the way we interact with each other, the environment
and the increasing number of computing and mobile devices in our homes and
offices," says Prof Hopper. "We will in effect create an interface that is
everywhere."  

Meanwhile, at Boston's Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Media
Laboratory, researchers have developing something they call "MIThril" as a
research platform for "context aware wearable computing". 

Developers say this device combines small, light-weight RISC processors
(including the popular StrongARM processor), a single-cable power/ data "body
bus" and high-bandwidth wireless networking in a package that they claim is
nearly as light, comfortable, and unobtrusive as ordinary street clothing. 

MIThril's "body bus" (which allows extra devices to be plugged into the
wearable computer) provides supports for both the USB and 12C standards,
which developers predict will allow a wide range of custom and off-the-shelf
sensors and peripherals to be used with it.


http://www.xybernaut.com/
http://www.flexipc.com/
http://www.maximumpc.com/content/2000/11/09/12188
http://www.uk.research.att.com/~ah/
http://www.uk.research.att.com/spirit/
http://www.uk.research.att.com/bat/
http://lcs.www.media.mit.edu/projects/wearables/mithril/