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April 20, 1992
BADGES.ASC
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For those of us who are fascinated by some of the REALIZABLE
technologies as shown on Star Trek, the following two items are
paraphrased from COMPUTERWORLD, April 20, 1992.
The first and most interesting is entitled "THE WALK-AND-WEAR
OFFICE, Using a multimedia system and devices that track and
identify people, Olivetti Research is working on the intelligent
office of the future." by Andy Hopper. PP 99-101.
The second is from TECH TALK, Page 25 of the same issue. The
article is entitled "PICTURE THIS" and relates to a video
recognition system for graphic images. It also ties in well with
the Olivetti ACTIVE BADGE system.
ComputerWorld is primarily for IS (information systems managers) but
covers a wide range of subjects relating to computer technology.
Current Subscription rates are $38.95 per year for a weekly paper.
If you wish to subscribe, their address is COMPUTERWORLD, PO Box
2044, Marion, Ohio 43306-4144.
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Pandora and the Active Badge System
The Olivetti Research Laboratory is located in Cambridge, England.
They are currently developing a most interesting multimedia system
called PANDORA in conjunction with devices known as ACTIVE BADGES.
ACTIVE BADGES identify and track people within a building. The
basic system monitors the movement of people and, to a lesser
extent, objects in the building. The badge is currently the size of
a typical office security identification badge. An ACTIVE BADGE
contains an infrared transmitter that every 15 seconds transmits a
48-bit word, which is the wearer's unique ID.
The ID information is held on a central database residing on a
server (controller for a network of connected workstations) and
includes items such as security clearance, preferred computer
interface and applications, right or left-handedness and even how
the user takes his coffee.
Rooms, passageways and workstations are equipped with sensors with
infrared receivers that monitor the presence of a badge. These
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sensors are tied together into a low-frequency network, which is
connected to the server on the main PANDORA network.
A central monitoring program on the server constantly updates a list
of where badge wearers are or where they last came in contact with a
sensor. This information includes what telephone or workstations
they are closest to. Users can call up this list on their
workstation.
Users can make an inquiry to locate a badge wearer in order to
transfer a phone call or send a video message. Olivetti Research is
experimenting with reconfiguring offices on the fly using the
badges.
For example, receivers in the PANDORA system find out from the
database what a user was last working on, enabling a researcher's
work to follow him from computer to computer. Walking away from a
terminal is the equivalent of logging off; approaching another
screen "wakes up" the machine, which configures itself to whatever
the user has specified. The computer even alerts a user to the fact
that there is a video mail message waiting for him.
Sensors can also transmit to badges, and the Olivetti Research
Laboratory ACTIVE BADGE system incorporates paging functions, with
which a user can page a colleague from a terminal.
ACTIVE BADGES have been useful in determining security access. For
example, sensors enable a security door to generate a small magnetic
field. When an authorized badge wearer enters the field, his badge
emits an instant pulse that can be checked for the appropriate entry
permission and trigger the door to open. Or the sensor can
differentiate among a number of badge wearers in the same room,
preventing unnecessary interruptions of meetings.
No one is forced to wear these badges at Olivetti Research
Laboratory or Cambridge University, but the 130 people on the system
do because IT MAKES LIFE EASIER.
There is less time wasted tracking someone down and fewer meeting
interruptions. And with a built-in photosensitive resistor, it is
always possible for a user to turn the badge over and effectively
log off. Furthermore, all users have access to informaton on WHO is
monitoring their whereabouts because inquiry information is logged
and recorded.
An example of how the PANDORA system would work in conjuntion with
the ACTIVE BADGE ;
It is morning, and I walk into the building in which I work and
into an office I know is unoccupied, I make sure I'm wearing my
identification badge, and as I approach the door, he electronic
lock opens, enabling me to enter the darkened room.
The lights brighten, and a workstation on the desk flashes to
life automatically, displaying a document I recognize as the one
I had been working on yesterday. I click onto the screen and my
video mail messages. There is a beep, and a colleague's face
suddenly appears on the screen in another small window. I click
onto that window, and we talk IN REAL TIME about the status of an
upcoming project.
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After we're done, I record a video mail message for another staff
member to brief him on my recent discussion. I then click on the
screen to get a recorded version of the latest television news
and finally find a minute to sip my coffee.
Science fiction? After 3 weeks of work on and use of a multimedia
system called PANDORA and devices known as ACTIVE BADGES that
identify and track people, the lab has been piecing together the
office of tomorrow.
The idea is to create an intelligent, shared office in which a room
can instantly adapt to a user's personal preferences (mouse buttons
reconfigured for left or right handed use or phone buttons
programmed with personal codes) and in which tracking and video
capabilities keep staff in constant contact.
The PANDORA multimedia system consists of a group of networked,
Unix-based workstations that provide real-time and recorded digital
audiovisual information for users. Primary applications for the 20
Olivetti Research workstations included desktop videoconferencing
and video mail.
A PANDORA system contains a video camera, a microphone, a
loudspeaker and the PANDORA processor box, which serves as the
network interface. The current version of this box contains six
processors, which work as embedded controllers with discrete
functions.
One processor handles video sampling from the camera alongside the
computer. A second acts as a digital video mixer to combine
workstation-generated video with video coming from other PANDORA
boxes. The third processor deals with audio, which is handled at
telephone-quality 8 KHZ and is picked up by a microphone. Data
stream switching is performed by the fourth processor, with two
final devices serving as the I/O processors to the network. In this
way, users can run video applications (controlled by the processor
box) as well as other applications, such as word processing, from
windows on their desktops.
The simplest use of PANDORA is just observation. The staff at
Olivetti Research can view remote offices through video cameras
mounted over each PANDORA station. Although it's perfectly
permissible to peek at the scene surveyed by another PANDORA
station, a user can't listen to that station until somebody at that
end lets him - i.e., accepts the call.
In addition, if a staff member surveys another office, the user in
that office will always get an image of the surveryor on his screen.
In this way, no one can observe without being observed.
In a two-way videoconference, PANDORA handles four streams of
digital video and audio; two incoming and two outgoing. Add one or
two extra people to make a conference call, and the load increases
exponentially. The system has no built-in limits, but as the
processing demand increases, the visual quality drops.
Sound is recorded separately from the video, but it is synchronized
on playback. Because it's better to hear the conversation clearly
than to see it, the video is always sacrificed in favor of audio
Page 3
when data traffic reaches its limits. Typically, any user can have
a four-way videoconferencing displaying five windows and mixing five
audio streams on his terminal without overloading the system.
This load is one reason why PANDORA utilizes an asychronous transfer
mode (ATM) network. ATM allows real-time performance to drop off
gradually (we call this "graceful degradation") as the system
becomes congested without losing the video or audio completely. ATM
networks can chop up data streams very finely and preserve their
real-time attribute.
By far the most successful PANDORA application has been video mail.
This involves recording short messages and sending them to other
PANDORA users - a kind of video fax.
Not only is it a lot faster to record a video message as opposed to
composing and typing a written memo, but video mail is also a very
personal form of communication that can convey expression and body
language.
A message from the boss to drop by his office at the end of the day
may cause panic - but if you see that he has a smile on his face
when he says it, you will probably be less worried.
Video mail is quick and easy to record and play back. Videocassette
recorder-style buttons are provided on the computer window, and the
user can start, pause, stop, rewind and play back the recording at
any time. A cursor or slider control lets him move immediately to a
position in the recorded sequence by using the mouse, rather like
scrolling text up and down in a word processor.
There are cut-and-paste facilities for editing recordings and
creating composite ones in which text and video is mixed. Video
does not have to include only internal video. For instance, the
laboratory has a directory of the latest recorded TV news that can
be brought onto the screen at any time and viewed or recorded.
This broadcast data resides on a server that we receives live TV
relays and automatically records the news for users who want to view
it later.
Video mail digital recording is stored remotely on a bank of
Winchester disk drives, which currently provide about 2.5 Gbytes, or
6.4 hours, or recording.
Because typing a file name and dialogue text detracts from the
simplicity of video mail, Olivetti Research is starting to work on
voice pattern recognition for filing and retrieving video mail. In
this way, a user would simply state the name of the person whose
video mail he'd like to see, and the system would search for and
play back the messages sent by that person. As for filing, a
powerful voice recognition system may eventually enable the system
to produce an automatic transcript of a conversation as it takes
place.
The video mail application is being isolated to run on standard
platforms with a minimum of additional hardware and software.
Researchers can already send and receive videomail from an Intel
Corp. 80386-based personal computer running Microsoft Corp.'s
Page 4
Windows across a standard network. They can also send video mail to
colleagues at Ing. C. Olivetti & Co. in Italy and Digital Equipment
Corp. in the U.S. over standard public networks.
Future advances for PANDORA will include features such as high-
definition color and faster networking.
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PICTURE THIS
There has been plenty of work done on teaching computers to "see" in
such areas as robotics and on storing photographic images
electronically. Now, researchers hope to teach computers to see and
understand digitized images so that users can search database of
photos and other images based on the actual content of the image.
MIT's Media Laboratories and UK-based BT (formerly British Telecom)
have launched a five-year project to develop a method to search
image databases using analysis tools that do not require textual
descriptions of the images.
Alex Pentland, co-director of MIT's Vision and Modeling Group, said
of the project's goal. "For example, a user could show a computer a
person's picture and ask it to find all the images with this person
in them. The computer would then retrieve all the pictures, images
and video files which contain this same face."
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Vangard Notes...
SHADES of 1984!! No doubt such technology offers up tremendous
potential for the invasion of privacy. However, note that one
can step away from the network by removing the badge or covering
up the emitter so that it will not respond.
Ron and I discussed this article and both agree that it would
greatly ease communications in our respective work environments.
Paging over a system wide intercom would be eliminated since the
user would be directly targeted. We have long marvelled at some
of the technologies as shown in daily use on Star Trek with
their personal communicators and long for the day a commercial
system would be available. Well, it looks like it is getting
close to becoming a reality in everyday life.
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If you have comments or other information relating to such topics
as this paper covers, please upload to KeelyNet or send to the
Vangard Sciences address as listed on the first page.
Thank you for your consideration, interest and support.
Jerry W. Decker.........Ron Barker...........Chuck Henderson
Vangard Sciences/KeelyNet
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