August 20, 2008
A touching sight
By Vanessa Knivett

Weaving my way through the pea soup that is the world wide web recently, I stumbled across something which, whilst not exactly a thing of beauty, had enough of those 'I may want one of those' qualities to compel me to find out more.

The image in question was of one of the Gold winners of this year's Industrial Design Excellence Awards, the Touch Sight camera for the visually impaired. Designed by Chueh Lee at Samsung Design China, it is a digital camera that, instead of the usual LCD, incorporates a lightweight, flexible Braille display sheet that displays a 3D image by embossing the surface, allowing the user to touch their photo. A three second sound recording feature that is activated after the shutter button is pressed enables the user to create a reference that can be used when reviewing and managing photos. Crucially, the touchable photo is saved in the device and can be uploaded to share with others, and downloaded to other Touch Sight cameras.

Whilst it seems unusual, at first glance, to consider that blind and visually impaired people might want to take a photo, Lee and his design team challenge more than just this assumption. Unusually, the Touch Sight isn't something that is critical to daily life " it's a nice-to-have, a criteria that is an unusual starting point for most products for the visually impaired. The Touch Sight is also positively attractive, as well as ergonomic in form. Whilst it is a prototype at present, I feel sure that like the iPod, it could be capable of generating its own momentum in terms of demand for these very reasons.

The Touch Sight seems to tap into what photography is all about. Aren't all photos, however successful, an attempt to encapsulate a moment of a time, a place, a feeling, that we may never experience again? And are those grainy, black and white images of our grandparents any less evocative that those we take today? Whilst I have lots of questions for Chueh - like the extent to which users will be able to judge depth and textures from the Braille display - this is one of the most thought provoking consumer product designs that I have come across in a while, as well as a pretty good example of mixed signal engineering!
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August 08, 2008
Retrofitting in a time of transition?
By Vanessa Knivett

This week, Greenpeace featured some grim new footage showing children in Ghana breaking down and burning electronic waste (follow

Standard obsolescence patterns will be behind the creation of much of this e-waste. This year, for example, analyst firm Gartner expects that approximately 180 million pcs, or 16 percent of the existing worldwide installed base, will be replaced. Only a portion of these devices will be given a prolonged life or be recycled in compliance with environmental standards though. Gartner predicts that some 35 million of these 'used' computers could end up as landfill. Add to this a mass of analog TVs provoked by the digital switchover in a number of countries, and you have case in which legislation may have potentially exacerbated the problem.

Meanwhile, much as biofuels have been touted as a 'solution' to dwindling oil reserves, so a new wave of eco-friendly consumer electronics are being advertised as an answer to cutting energy consumption. Whether or not this is yet having an impact on the rapidity of replacement/renewal decisions for electronic goods is hard to say, but it would be horribly ironic if the West's sudden preoccupation with green technologies began to exacerbate the flood of e-waste to developing nations.

Intellect, the trade association for the UK technology industry, stated in a report published earlier this year: "There is a difficult trade-off between retaining existing stock to extend its lifecycle, and upgrading earlier to new models in order to improve energy efficiency. This is particularly important when dealing with equipment with high materials or energy intensity of manufacture and it reinforces the need to take life cycle aspects into consideration when making these decisions." It added: "After all, people are familiar with 'retro-fitting' older buildings with additional insulation or double glazing to improve energy efficiency, and careful management can have a similar effect with electronic equipment."

From TVs to basestations, cars to industrial equipment, a transition has been taking place towards more energy efficient designs. But during this transition period, there are challenges to be faced on several fronts. Whilst taking responsibility for equipment at end-of-life should be a given (though Greenpeace highlights two manufacturers that, apparently, do not - Philips and Sharp), who should shoulder responsibility for the energy consumption of equipment that is already in use? Is there an opportunity for manufacturers to tackle the energy consumption of existing devices, rather than use 'efficiency gains' as an excuse to ply their latest wares?

Intellect's point is a worthwhile one. But why stop at retrofitting equipment simply for energy efficiency purposes? Much as users of high end test equipment or expensive and long deployed military and industrial systems have become adept at managing lifecycle issues by retrofitting or shifting to modular designs, could the consumer industry be similarly persuaded along the retrofitting road? Could the 'retrofitting' concept become fashionable? Could such an approach, indeed, help to persuade a whole new generation of people to appreciate the inherent value of the technology they possess?

I grant that it's no simple task to persuade generations of people who have been sold products on the basis of what is wholly new, is better, to alter their behaviour. More difficult still is to make the business model fit. But faced with ever more pressing resource issues, it seems inevitable that these are questions that our industry will have to face. So with some of the brightest minds among us, where should we begin?

And if all this seems rather an insurmountable challenge, then perhaps we should go and consult the children who, having never experienced the benefits that technology can bring, are more familiar with the insides of a TV or a computer than our own.
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July 29, 2008
Will EU research contribution scoop recognition?
By Vanessa Knivett

I have just taken a look at the NASA site for an update on the Phoenix mission. The latest news is that the Mars Lander's robotic arm managed to collect its icy soil sample as intended, but will need to adjust its delivery mechanism as most of the sample got stuck in the scoop.

NASA engineers had carried out the required soil scraping activity using a rasping tool. The scooping action had been performed and there was enough Martian soil collected to fill the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyser (TEGA), a tiny oven cell. However, images returned from the lander show that much of the soil remained lodged in the robotic arm's scoop after several attempts to coax the sample into the TEGA.

What if the NASA engineers don't manage to fix the scoop mechanism? Will the secrets within that icy soil sample be lost? Well, no, is the answer. It appears that thanks to the Robotic Arm Camera (RAC), quite a bit of information will be able to be retrieved from the close-up colour images taken of the soil sample before and after scooping.

The camera in question employs a charge-coupled device (CCD), and has sets of red, green, and blue light-emitting diodes positioned just above and below the lens to illuminate the target area. Other notable features include a double Gauss lens system and, in a first for an interplanetary spacecraft, an adjustable lens focus thanks to a motor that can set it from 11 mm to infinity. Another motor opens and closes a transparent dust cover.

A team at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany, developed the RAC in collaboration with researchers at the University of Arizona. Though originally built for the Mars Surveyor 2001 Lander mission, which was cancelled in 2000, the RAC was dusted off (metaphorically, as it had been stored in a clean-room) and re-activated for use on Phoenix in 2005.

CCDs have traditionally provided the performance benchmark in terms of image quality in photographic, scientific, and industrial applications but cmos cameras have been playing catch up. And whilst CMOS imaging developments have concentrated on achieving an image quality comparable to CCDs, CCD designers have worked on minimising power requirements and pixel sizes.

In this case the RAC can focus down to 11mm and provide image resolutions of 23 microns per pixel, enabling it to show details 'much finer than the width of a human hair'. Combined with its colour reproduction, its images should be detailed enough to allow scientists to better judge the nature of the soil and water-ice in the trench being dug by the robotic arm, and also to determine any fine-scale layering that may result from changes in Martian climate from images of the trench floor and side-walls.

Interestingly, the Max Planck Society largely financed the RAC's development and integration and the German Space Agency (DLR) has supported the operation of the instrument during Phoenix surface operations since 2007.

European image sensor developments have played a part elsewhere in the Phoenix mission. British company e2v's CCD image sensors were aboard NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and captured an image of Phoenix suspended from its parachute as it arrived on Mars. It was a first time that a spacecraft has captured an image of another spacecraft landing on a planetary body.

For the general public, it is these images from the Phoenix mission that have really caught the imagination and kept the mission in the headlines (albeit well after Amy Winehouse's latest exploits in UK papers).

In a speech by NASA Administrator Michael Griffin to the French National Assembly's Parliamentary Group on Space recently, he emphasised the value the US places on multilateral cooperation in space research. Let's hope then that current European research contributions to NASA's programmes get the recognition they deserve.
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July 18, 2008
Mired in connection limbo
By Vanessa Knivett

It was good news to hear that BT is considering rolling out fibre-based ultra-fast broadband across the UK. BT's £1.5billion proposed investment would serve approximately 10million customers with direct fibre or 'fibre to the kerb' by 2012. There are significant regulatory hurdles to be overcome, but the move would in some part silence critics who have suggested that the UK's broadband infrastructure is in danger of falling behind the rest of the world, leaving businesses and consumers unable to take advantage of the next internet innovations.

As John Walko notes in BT plans major boost to broadband speeds, the UK has been slower to invest in fast broadband than other European countries. Some subscribers across Europe already have access to fibre-to-the-home. For example, France Telecom's Orange and Free began installing a fibre-optic network in Paris last year, and there are fibre-optic projects planned for numerous other French cities. Research firm Point Topic says that interest in fibre is high in the US, UK, France and Germany, but that low availability is hampering growth.

Whilst such infrastructure investments deserve applause, recent personal experience would suggest that certain broadband providers aren't capable of rolling-out existing broadband services yet. My concern is that more needs to be done to improve customer service within the sector, before any additional technology capability is brought into effect.

As a freelancer, I spend enough high days and holidays in France to have justified signing up to a permanent home broadband package. On arrival this time though, I found the service had been summarily cut - no explanation, and yes, I had paid the bill! After days of ploughing through the molasses that is France Telecom's customer service department, including several two hour treks to their nearest shop, it was clear that getting the line reconstructed in time for my latest Analog DesignLine missive was like asking for the moon on a stick. In desperation and assured of immediate connection, I purchased a 3G card from them ... five days later and I still haven't received the activation code. Fortunately, not all 'service' providers are created equal and SFR subsequently provided me with a 3G card that worked out of the box.

I know that France Telecom is not alone; I have heard similar tales of woe on both sides of the English Channel and involving various broadband providers. One element of the problem could be the sheer popularity of broadband services. But if my experience is being replayed across throughout the country (and the disgruntled queue in the FT bureau suggested it is); and from land to land; then its not just a mountain of abandoned broadband routers and 3G cards that are being left in the wake. Poor service provision breeds brand distrust, and with huge fibre-optic investments planned, it seems a bad time to get a reputation for taking your customers for mugs.
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