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Rockbox mail archiveSubject: The Natural Evolutionary Path For Personal Electronic PackagesThe Natural Evolutionary Path For Personal Electronic Packages
From: LoveLearn <LoveLearn_at_iw.net>
Date: Tue, 23 Sep 2003 17:53:24 -0500 Skip or Delete this post if long notes annoy you. If you reply, PLEASE DO NOT repost this entire note in your copy. Selective clips would serve discussion needs better. The accuracy of everyone's historical views is limited by information available to them. Information known by average 10 year olds from 100 years in our future would enable any of them to greatly alter our history if they could communicate their limited world understanding to people living today. Without unavailable future information, future views by even the most informed and enabled people eventually appear silly as history unfolds revealing how wrong they were. Knowing how silly this is likely to appear when considered from future perspectives, here's my current view of ** The Natural Evolutionary Path For Personal Electronic Packages ** Most useful human Input/Output capabilities are limited to: Listening with 2 ears Seeing with 2 eyes Controlling with 2 hands Speech from 1 mouth Carrying and simultaneously controlling several personal electronic packages is difficult, inconvenient, aggravating and inefficient. Many people currently choose between alternative Personal Electronic Packages because they don't want to appear silly from carrying the number of devices currently necessary to provide all functions they want. Even if that minimum number of devices were carried, trying to simultaneously control them would occasionally overwhelm user I/O capabilities with conflicting and competing demands. Managing those overwhelming demands while performing some common activities like driving would be dangerous. These separate functional systems belong together because to be gracefully used together they must be integrated into single packages. Only one power supply, computer system, amplifier, display panel, control set and enclosure case are required to serve all functions that most people want personal electronics packages to perform. Graceful integration will require an automated control system which assigns control-priority between competing information flows according to a pre-considered circumstance-decision-tree rule set. Market demand will begin shifting from personal electronic devices which provide minimal functional capabilities as soon as a well integrated product emerges which widely demonstrates that buyers no longer need to choose which commonly desired functions their selected device(s) will omit. After a fully integrated product which simultaneously manages all widely desired functions begins to capture market share, competitive forces will compel other Personal Electronic Package makers to begin offering integrated products which gracefully manage all widely desired functions in a single package. An automatic system will assign human I/O interface control based on demand priority. Competing functions are listed by increasing priority which is likely to be opposite compared to most frequent usage order. 1) Internally stored and generated information flows (low priority) 2) 1-way receiver information flows (low priority) 3) 2-way I/O transceiver information flows (high priority) 4) Personal environment sensor information flows (top priority) These functions will be served by the following four IC (integrated circuit) classes. Each of these will progressively evolve into smaller universal integrator IC packages with ever-increasing capabilities. 1) Digitized A/V/E (Audio/Video/Extended Inputs) record/play IC packages. Encoding/decoding algorithm capabilities will evolve, becoming more compact for any reproduction accuracy level. They will add an extended stream to encode time/date, GPS data flow, impact accelerations, magnetic readings, and eventually olfactory sensible data. As data capture/storage costs continually decline, adding all potentially useful sensor flows will become expected. Police/security A/V/E captured data flow integrators are already addressing some extended data streams. MP3 file support is an early step in this evolution. 2) AM/FM/AB (alternate bands) broadcast receiver IC packages. 3) Transceiver IC packages including cell phones as a subset. Security, convenience, marketing power and legal requirements may cause GPS integration into transceiver packages. 4) Combined personal environment monitoring, intrusion detection and warning circuits are a new emerging IC class mainly used in military, security and robotic research applications. First generation personal electronic information systems included no personal environmental space sensitivities, so their use generally interferes with users' local environmental space awareness. Personal environment insensitivity will first be replaced by systems which mimic natural heightened personal space awareness. Later evolutions will extend sensitivities and interpretative powers far beyond natural human abilities. They will continuously monitor and interpret the local environment without requiring continuous personal attention, quickly reporting potential threats. These capabilities will be enabled by continually increasing CPU power applied to data streams from a diverse array of environmental sensors. Extended frequency range sensors will detect inputs from low frequency mechanical vibrations through ultra sonics, through electro magnetic and radio fields, and include emissions below infra reds through visible light spectrum beyond ultra violets. These sensor arrays are equivelant to an extended frequency range camera system producing data streams which increasingly powerful CPUs will process with adaptive real-time AI software. That processing system will report moving environmental component speed, direction, position, size, and classification estimates. Digitized extended range image classifications of approaching masses will be reported by intuitively understandable terms like man, woman, child, dog, cat, motorcycle, truck, car, train or plane. John "LoveLearn" ****************************************************************** Fred wrote, "I already carry a bag to work with the Archos, the power supply, the USB cable, the headphones, a Handspring Visor, Springboard expansion modules for same (memory expansion, GPS, and cell phone), wireless headset for cell phone module, and spare batteries. The last thing I need is a dedicated remote control. I want to consolidate functions, not lug additional devices around." ***************************************************************** "Michael Lasky, senior editor of PC World, said many more companies are striving to achieve technology convergence because consumers want multi-functional products." http://money.cnn.com/2003/09/16/news/companies/tech_gadgets/index.htm?cnn=yes "For example, Nokia in August announced a wireless phone -- the Nokia 3300 -- for music lovers. It has a built-in FM radio and MP3 player. The phone also comes with a keyboard that users can use to send text messages and e-mail, as well as play games over the Internet." Received on 2003-09-24 Page template was last modified "Tue Sep 7 00:00:02 2021" The Rockbox Crew -- Privacy Policy |