John Boxall's blog

CeBIT closed its doors a few days ago. Simultaneously, Hannover let out a collective sigh of relief as the throngs of red-eyed, sleep deprived exhibitors and business people who had taken over the city departed in mass. Now that all the fuss is over, it’s time to sit back and reflect on what we saw and didn’t see at this year’s CeBIT and make some predictions about the future.

This year’s CeBIT saw the evolution of handsets to support better existing carrier services. Texting and music based handsets were very popular. Better texting handsets will result in more text messages. Better music phones will result in more music downloads. By making revenue generating services easier to use carriers stand only to benefit. Carriers will undoubtedly clamor after the handsets which best implement these services. Similarly the new generation of TV and navigation based handsets hope to make the introduction of these services both painless and obvious to the consumer to spur their adoption. The growth of the handset markets showcase both the strength and diversity of the industry as wildly exotic designs flourish next door to traditional candy bars and sliders. Overall, CeBIT was very positive news for carriers and manufactures.

Handset makers at CeBIT presented mobiles which specialized in many areas. TV, cameras, texting and music, all were present in numbers. Another area of phone specialization targeted specific age demographics. In Canada we’ve already seen a number of phone models designed for kids, like the FireFly. But what about the fastest growing segment of the population? What about phones for the elderly? How about a phone for my Grandma?

The Austrian company Emporia thinks they’ve found my answer. Their over-sized Life phone offers friendly buttons (read you can see them on Google Earth), a monochrome screen and clear text, supports calling, texting and little more. My Grandma would probably be right at home with the phone. The only problem I can see with it is that my Nokia from 1999 does the exact same things. And in the exact same way. And has Snake. It honestly might as well be the same phone in a different case. I’m willing to bet my Grandma would just as happy using it as Emporia’s latest creation.

Moving low-risk patients out of hospitals and back into their homes has been a goal of the health care system for some time. Studies have shown that patients who placed back into their home recover faster and the beds they this relocation frees up in hospitals can be used to better treat high risk patients. Still, low-risk patients moved back into their homes require medical supervision ensure they become no risk patients or at least remain low risk. Costs prohibit providing care worker supervision for in-home patients 24/7 and patients can go weeks without in-home visits by professionals. Mobile medical technology offers one solution for providing in-home patients with better service while reducing the need for care-worker visits.

From public displays to cellphones and everything in between, touchscreens are in at CeBIT this year. On hand was what might be the first to market consumer touch cellphone, the LG KE-850 Prada. Alone with the phone for a precious few minutes, I took the opportunity to test its text messaging implementation. Given touchscreen technology and the ability to do anything you wanted on it from a software perspective, how would implement text messaging on a high-end consumer phone?

LG has bravely decided to emulate the standard numeric pad. Ouch (fashionistas don't worry, it still looks good).

A standard outliving its usefulness? Yes. The interface for text messaging we see today is a poor compromise between design and the limitations of a numeric keypad. Just to make our clunky method of inputting text work we are forced to implement ingenious but unfortunately unintuitive hacks like T9. Without the hardware limitation of a keypad why design cellphone software like we need a crutch keypad? Touch screens allow for complete context aware input. In the context of creating a text message, a numeric keypad does not make sense. So why provide one? If it sticks, the move to touchscreens on mobiles will force a re-evaluation of every standard on mobile phones. Things will have to be shaken up. New standards, created by the unique opportunities and limitations that touch-screens provide are already being created in the first wave of touch based devices.

Vista's tablet support is trying to introduce new touch screen standards based on real world motions. Testing out Vista on a tablet laptop for the first time I initially found writing words difficult. Frustrated, I scribbled them out with the stylus unconsciously. To my pleasant surprise the words and the scribbles disappeared. That's context aware input. Microsoft would like to term these actions are flicks but they are better understood as gestures or context aware motions . Not be be outdone, Apple's iPhone contains support for a number of multi-touch gestures. Steve Jobs specifically demoed two in his iPhone introduction showing gestures to zoom into and away from images by pinching or spreading fingers across the iPhone's screen. Even Apple's laptops have included support for gestures on their trac pad for some time. Moving two fingers along the pad is interrupted as a scrolling action.

Standards exist to minimize the learning curve across different situations. If actions like writing with a pen or erasing can be emulated on a touch-screen why not implement them? What better standards exist than those we find every day in the real world? Implementing touch screen gestures based on real world actions will ensure a smooth transition to from numeric pads to touch screens.

-jb

    Walking through the Samsung or O2 booths at CeBIT is a bit like cutting your way through a jungle. These over-sized retail stores offer a glimpse at the latest handsets. If you can get to them. Push past the gadget hungry crowds and armies of conscripted sales reps and you'll find the reason we came. Future Parc is the ugly duckling of CeBIT. Conveniently located at the absolute end of the conference grounds, Future Park casts aside the glitz and glamour of the main halls for real innovation (not the kind written on 500 foot banner ads).

    Perhaps the most relevant to Vancouver's mobile scene, Compass2008 is a digital travel guide to Beijing developed by the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence and the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology in conjunction with a number of other partners. Compass is essentially a pocket translator, built to allow for basic tourist conversation (where is? how much? etc) while providing some helpful cultural hints along the way.

    Our stranded tourist begins by selecting a phrase in their native language (currently supported are English and German). The device then speaks the equivalent phrase aloud in Chinese and also displays it on the screen in written Chinese. The tourist then hands the device to the Chinese speaker who can then select a response from a list of displayed Chinese options. Since most tourist conversation follow a linear structure (Is there a free table? Can we order food? Can we pay?) the application arranges phrases in a manner such that the conversation can continue naturally without hunting around menus for the next phrase.  Though limited, this form of conversation helps anxious tourists get their barrings. Additionally, Compass tries to facilitate deeper cultural understanding, advising tourists to be experimental in ordering food by providing hints about Chinese dishes through filtering menus (Are you looking for sweet or sour food? Chicken or Pork?). It provides a list of recommended establishments serving said meals. Similarly tacked on are basic information about shopping, landmarks and maps of the city.