Technical Taxonomy

This page includes information and links to various products that are somehow related to the ACCORD project.

Update April 15, 2003: This page has been replaced with the ProtoBlog. By suing a blog engine it is much easier for us to keep a live version.

Embedded systems

TINI - TINI is a SIMM size Java Virtual Machine that implements almost the full Java 1.1 specification. It supports Ethernet, 1-Wire, CAN and serial ports. As this is Java on a slow processor (37 MHz) it is not doable to create anything that needs any advance computing. It is a perfect device for connecting slow streams of serial data to Ethernet(max 115kbs approx.)  as its support Ethernet, 1-Wire, CAN and serial ports which makes this quite easy.

BasicStamp - A very simple module programmed in Basic from Parallax Inc. There exists a lot of different utilitize for the
BasicStamp and for instance a remote controller reciever, which can be found further down in this document.

PIC - Is a very simple processor but anyhow people has used it to create the smallest webserver. The PIC is good for creating an interface between sensor or other limited devices and a serial port.

Other embedded systems -  There exists a large number of different companies producing embedded systems. These are some of the most interesting ones, LiveDevices, UbiCom, NetSilicon.Using Java in these kind of systems has become popular and others except TINI are, aJile, Origin-J, JPro built on aJile, SaJe and JStamp are two other aJile-based systems from Systronix. There are also some OpenSource solutions beeing developed for real-time embedded systems like, RealTimeLinux, HardHatLinux.

Portable computational devices

Palm - The Palm is a cheap and simple PDA, for which it exists a huge amount of software. There exists a number of different programming environments both free and commersial. CodeWarrior and Gnu are both for C. For Java there exists four different Waba, Jbed, Kada, KJava and IBMs VisualAge MicroEdition that has Java support for the Palm. Waba is not a fully JVM but one writes programs using the Java language but Waba has its own bytecode and graphicroutines. Though Waba is limited a number of extensions exist like SuperWaba. KJava is a fully compliant Java2ME implementation, complient with the Connected Limited Device Configuration.

iPAQ - Is a PocketPC based PDA from Compaq. Waba also exists for PocketPC and also some VMs with extensions like EWE. A very interesting product is the SavaJe Java VM that replaces the whole PocketPC OS on an iPAQ with a Java based one.

Interaction surfaces

Touch surfaces - this is the kind of surfaces used on touchscreens and these can quite easily be manufactured in any size. We have have used both for smaller flat screens 18" and large ones 50". The main problem, atleast for large surfaces is that these surfaces only support one user. Example of producers are Synaptics and MicroTouch.

Tactex - Tactex multi user surfaces can sense any number of interaction points. They are not transparent and the ones you can easily buy are not that large. Used mainly by musicians as a novel input device to synthesizers.

Wacom - Wacom tablets can be used as interaction surfaces for atleast two users as teh tablet support interaction with two pens simultanouesly, also development kits are ready avaialable.

FingerWorks - FingerWorks i is a multipoint interaction surface.

Mimio - Mimio is a pentracking system used to capture what is written on a whiteboard to a computer.

SmartBoard - SmartBoard is another interactive whiteboard system.

Tagging

Barcode tags - There exist a large varity of barcode readers, and there are also barcode printers. One interesting reader is the Cross :Convergence Pen.

Wireless Communication

FM trancievers - Small and cheap radio trancievers have become more and more available. Some people even claim these will take marketshares
where actually blutooth was aimed for since they are both simpler and cheaper which is very likely to happen. There exist both plain transmitters and recievers but also intergrated once. Most trancievers has to be switched between recieving and transmitting and thus has to be handled by the programmer and not supporting full duplex.. Also lower bandwidth and carrier frequencies are used thus a lower data communcation bandwidth is possible. Among the different producers of these chips are BlueChip, RadioMetrix, RF Monolithics Inc. A more finished product is the Virtual cable the lets you connect two serial ports wireless. Inside Out Networks will soon release a USB-Serial wireless device called Wavelynx/S.

BlueTooth - BlueTooth is a promising standard for shortrange wireless communication. BlueTooth uses the same frequency as WaveLan but with much less effect but anyhow some claim that a WaveLan can not co-exist with a fully equiped BlueTooth environment. All the BlueTooth units together will create so much disturbances that the WaveLAN will stop to work. The bandwidth is about 700-800 kbit and has a range of approximately 10 meter. Today BlueTooth chips are available to buy but still quite hard to get hold of due to the tremedous popularity. Though these chips does not implement the full BlueTooth standard as they are the radio part of it. One has to connect them to a processor that implements the BlueTooth stack, though it is fully possible to communcate between the chips without it but it is not BlueTooth compatible.

IrDA - Is the standard for infrared communication. IR interfaces exists on most laptops, PDAs and some mobilephones, though not all of them implement the full IrDA standard. For instance Palm PDAs only implement the IrComm part of IrDA, which means they can send serial data only over the IR interface. The bandwidth for IrDA is 4 Mbit and the range is about 1 meter.

IR - aka remote controls. LIRC http://www.lirc.org/ allows you to decode and send infra-red signals of many (but not all) commonly used remote controls. The package works for several kinds of hardwares, some homebrew systems are described, both transmitters and recievers using both parallell or serial port. Also a large set of commercial solutions are supported and listed. This page http://www.ustr.net/infrared/infrared1.shtml describes how IR for remote controls work, also list simple circuits and sample assemble code. Another page http://home.iprimus.com.au/eddiema/projects/Pir-remote/pir-remote.htm that describes how to control a vcr to record a burgler breaking into your car! The MIT Locust IR tags can be found here http://mevard.www.media.mit.edu/projects/wearables/locust/. From Pacific Neo-Tek comes the OmniRemote software for Palms which makes it into a general purpose Remote Control. Also with the OmniRemote Module even old Palms with out IR can become Remote Controls. Another recording remote control for Plam. General purpose remote control software don't only exists for Palms, heres a page for Windows CE but exists for Palm as well. This page has a huge list of the different protocols used by different brands. Slink-e is a device for sending IR commands from the PC. You can build a simple IR reciever with the BasicSTAMP, see this page. A project on using a PIC and IR for remote control.
More Infrared devices and links:

• Universal Infrared Receiver
• Build a remote control system for your PC
• The Next to Minimal InfraRed Transmitter for PC
• Series IR7000 PC Remote Control
• IRMan
• Infrared Remote Control of your PC is easy!
• Simple IR transmitter circuit
• A Serial-Driven Infrared Remote Controller
• A Universal Infrared Remote Control

Displays

Paper displays

Flat screens Caltron Industries have Open Frame LCD VGA Monitors that are easy to build-in. They also have small size LCD(1.8"-7") with PAL or NTSC input. Kopin Corporation produce also even smaller display, aka MicroDisplays, like their CyberDisplay.

Rotating Displays - A row of LEDs that are rotated is an interesting alternative to traditional display, there are examples of both general purpose display i.e. ROPOD, and more specific ones i.e. Propeller Clock.

Different types of lights - There exists a large amount of different LED on the market, see

Sensors

BoatAlarms - these are large paper surfaces coated with aluminium and between two of these that are wrapped in plastic is a thin layer of foam with small holes. One wire is connected to each sheet of paper and by stepping or pressing on the sensor a closed circuit is created between the two cables. We used normal keyboards and connected each key to one pad which was a very quick way to connect a large number of contact surfaces to a traditional computer. Also these surfaces can easily be cut to any form.

Burglary motion sensors - these are simple and cheap motion sensors used in burglary alarm system, cost appr. $15 each. These were connected to a normal PC either by using the CTS/DTR signaling on a serial port or through the parallell port. ADC-11 is a good system for connecting a number of simple switches to the paralell port on a normal PC and still have teh keyboard avaialble.

Burglary magnetic sensors - these are sensors used to detect if a door or window is opened or closed. They are very simple and robust.

Readforks(läsgafflar) is a very simple way of detecting some kind of motion, e.g we have built a simple floater in Lego that was put in a coffee machine to detect when the brewing process was finished. A piece of tape was put on a straw that went in the space in the readerfork.

Light resistors can be used to detect the amount of light, not possible to get absolute values.

Ways of connecting sensors
Parallell port interfaces - ADC-11 Supports 11 different A/D inputs

1-wire - 1-wire is standard from Dallas Semiconductors that make is possible to connect a large number of simple chips to a 1-wire net. The 1-wire net uses only two cables, one ground and one for both power and signaling, which makes it very easy to deploy. Example of existing chips: Uniqie Serial ID(a small device that includes only a uniqe ID and can be used to identify switches), Serial A/D converter, Adressable switches, Thermometer

Keyboard - Normal PC keyboards can be taken a part and used to interface different switches, e.g. the above mentioned boat alarm sensors.

Accelerometers - There exists a number of different chips one can buy with accelleration sensing. AnalogDevices has one tha is quite cheap, ADXL202 and the is also an evaluation kit available that makes it possible to connect it directley to a serial port. Also Memsic has a nice accelerometer.

Compasses - There are also a number of chips that implements a digital compass.

Other orientation systems - Advanced Orientation Systems

Rotation - MicroStrain has a nice chip, 3DM, that can sense rotation around 3-axis.

Tracking

The main differences in the following three systems are based on the different media of communication. Radio waves propagetes unidirectional in stright lines from the center of transmission, the antenna. Walls and other constructions damp the radio wave and with lower frequencies(approx. less then 100 Mhz) there are no reflections. IR which is a type of light propagate in one direction from the source. The light is reflected on none transparent surfaces. Sound does also propagate in one direction from the source, the speaker, but bounce much more effectively then light. Also sound does bounce on transparent surfaces as glass.
Light, radio and sound are all waves and follow the same math. The effect is reduced with the square of the distance. The difference is how they propagate in different media.

FM radio - small radio devices that can transmit both data and a unique identification code. Used for instance in the Pirates game developed by Nokia and the Play studio at the Interactive Institute.

IR -  A number of commersial systems exists, e.g. location of doctors in a hospital. A small badge with an IR transmitter is worn and recievers are placed in the roof for detection. Can only be used for transmitting a unique identification code.

UltraSound - works in a similar as IR but uses UltraSound instead to transmit identification codes. The first versions of the ActiveBadge system used IR but later use ultrasound. VTT in Finland have developed a Ultrasonic Rader system called the BatBox and also Ultrasonic postioning system.

Different systems
IR and Ultrasound beacon.

Traditionel VR interfaces as Ascensions Flock of Birds, usually magnetic sensors in a megnetic field, that can detect both position and rotation.

PinPoint 3D-iD Indoor Location Positioning System - PinPoint 3D-iD Indoor Location Positioning System uses RF tags to read up to 200 feet from antennas, with an accuracy of +10 feet.  The system sends @ 5.8GHz + receives @ 2.4GHz.  The fact that the system uses the same band to receive as WaveLAN causes problems.  Apparently, PinPoint walks all over that band, so much so that, with the system on, no packets get through on the WaveLAN network.

Hexamite Multidimensional Omni Directional Indoor Guidance System - Hexamite Multidimensional Omni Directional Indoor Guidance System uses modulated ultrasound and consists of sonic beacons and pilots. Pilots can determine own position, relative to beacons and other pilots.  I have no experience of this system.  However, the effective use of ultrasound in positioning systems, such as the Pinger (developed at Bristol) and Active Bats, suggests that it may be worth considering.

SurfBoards

3Com - Audrey
Ericsson - Screen Phone
ePods Inc - ePodsOne
Sony - Airboard (Japanese or Press Release)
ScreenMedia - FreePad. An article on the FreePad

Picture Frames

Sound systems

Invisible Stereo uses the walls as loudspeakers.

Cameras

Interesting Materials

Other interfaces

Other good resources