Pervasive Computing in action

Technology is rapidly changing states faster than speed. It is now inculcated into every aspect of our lives as a basic need of time. It is indeed spectacular how the pervasive environment permits communication between devices everywhere, so the systems become more pervasive in modern world. We are presently engaged in interaction with distinctive devices, gadgets and machines. Pervasive Computing is the technology which relies on the convergence of wireless technologies, advanced electronics and the Internet.

The concept  is based on  Moore’s Law of IC Technologies which states  that with advances in technology,  computing equipment will grow smaller and gain  more power; eventually this would allow small devices to be ubiquitously  and invisibly embedded in the everyday human surroundings and therefore provide an easy access  to a computing environment. The products so involved are connected to the Internet and the data they generate is easily available. The major technologies such as internet, advanced middle ware, operating systems, sensors, microprocessors, and mobile protocols are used to give support for this technology to function.

One of the most important question is how to ensure that a computing system is invisibly embedded in the environment and how to minimize the possible impact of its intrusiveness on a user’s perception.

There are two mutually complementing approaches to solving the problem of unobtrusiveness of a pervasive system: by miniaturization of devices and embedding of the system’s logic into wearable, handheld, and mobile devices, as well as into the environment, and by achieving a level of intelligence of the system that will be able to anticipate the actions of the user in the context of the factors in the environment. As a result, such a pervasive system will appear as a background process.

The Pervasive computing architecture has the following four important areas, they are

· Devices

· Networking

· Middle ware

· Applications

The pervasive environment consists of many different types  of the system devices such as keyboard, mouse, touchpad ,wireless mobile devices, sensors and smart phones, which  these systems use  as an input device The  sensors automatically collect the information about the environment and feed this input directly to the pervasive network.All the Pervasive devices are connected with other pervasive or any other communication devices through the distributed network for the global availability.

Another requirement is the "middle ware kernel” which acts as a communication link  between an end-user and a system the pervasive network should need a middle ware This  may be a web application (Web Page) or set of software-bundle.

The data which are collected through pervasive environment will be processed by the middle ware software and the output will generated based on the present environmental inputs.

Pervasive Computing systems have utilization sensing to watch and react to natural phenomena.  They have numerous potential applications in the workplace, home, health awareness, gaming and open transportation

Applications of Pervasive Computing:

There are many applications of this technology .They are listed as follows:

1. SMART CLOTHING

·         Conductive textiles and inks to print electrically active patterns directly onto fabrics.

·         Sensors based on fabric to monitor pulse, blood pressure, body temperature.

2. INTERACTIVE FLEX POSTERS

Flexes that communicate with the person automatically in a building and then provide him the information about his office and the venue of his meeting.

3. SMART MIRROR

·         A magic mirror that can be used for registration  of users in a conference and can record their details, in addition to its normal physical function

4. PILL CAM

·         Can be used as a diagnostic device with a miniature camera

·         It can be swallowed .Once swallowed it gives the data about the functioning of the vital organs in our body .

5. SMART WATCH

           ·         In the health sector we can focus on wrist watches which will monitor our sugar

6. DIGITRACKER

·         Digi-tickers or implanted heart monitors for heart patients to keep an eye open for abnormalities.

Pervasive Computing will be a challenging area of research for a long time to come. Today we have capable hardware. We have more than capable Software. The major problem today is making a computer act like a human though Interaction abilities are emerging with the sorts of computer systems functionalities which will oblige us to expand this topic on a few ideas. More importantly most of these systems are not everyday affordable. They cost a fortune to make!

Ms. Shweta Ohri

Assistant Professor
Deptt. of Information Technology