Scudware Mobile:支持可穿戴设备间数据及服务协同的移动中间件

随着计算泛在化日益深入,软硬件一体化成为个人电子消费领域的重要趋势,可穿戴设备正成为目前学术界与工业界的研究热点。这些设备虽然具有一定的传感、计算和服务能力,但其接口各异且设备间的协同能力很弱。这就一方面造成了计算和感知能力的浪费,另一方面也无法提供丰富的服务。针对此问题,提出一个支持可穿戴设备间数据及服务协同的移动中间件——Scudware Mobile。Scudware Mobile汇聚了可穿戴设备的数据和服务,并以统一的接口提供给应用层,且引入了设备协同机制。在Scudware Mobile上,实现了两个应用:个人数据门户和shaking ecard。     

Smart sustainable cities – Exploring ICT solutions for reduced energy use in cities

This article explores the opportunities of using ICT as an enabling technology to reduce energy use in cities. An analytical framework is developed in which a typology of ICT opportunities is combined with a typology of household functions, i.e. all the activities that require energy. The energy used for household functions is calculated using a consumption-based lifecycle perspective. The analytical framework is intended to be of use to researchers, city and regional authorities and ICT companies interested in acquiring a better understanding of how ICT investments could contribute to reduce energy use in cities.     

Using electronic textiles to implement an acoustic beamforming array: A case study

Highly-automated textile manufacturing equipment has the potential for integrating electronic components into fabric in a low-cost process. These electronic textiles (or e-textiles) have a wide range of potential applications in wearable computing and large-area applications, including medical monitoring, assistance to the disabled, and distributed sensor networks. This paper discusses the design and implementation of a large-scale e-textile that functions as an acoustic beamforming array. The paper conveys the implementation experience and gives results gathered from the prototype. Further, the primary implementation issues and guidelines for future development are identified.     

Forecasting smog-related health hazard based on social media and physical sensor

Smog disasters are becoming more and more frequent and may cause severe consequences on the environment and public health, especially in urban areas. Social media as a real-time urban data source has become an increasingly effective channel to observe people׳s reactions on smog-related health hazard. It can be used to capture possible smog-related public health disasters in its early stage. We then propose a predictive analytic approach that utilizes both social media and physical sensor data to forecast the next day smog-related health hazard. First, we model smog-related health hazards and smog severity through mining raw microblogging text and network information diffusion data. Second, we developed an artificial neural network (ANN)-based model to forecast smog-related health hazard with the current health hazard and smog severity observations. We evaluate the performance of the approach with other alternative machine learning methods. To the best of our knowledge, we are the first to integrate social media and physical sensor data for smog-related health hazard forecasting. The empirical findings can help researchers to better understand the non-linear relationships between the current smog observations and the next day health hazard. In addition, this forecasting approach can provide decision support for smog-related health hazard management through functions like early warning.     

Disseminating trust information in wearable communities

This paper describes a framework for managing and distributing trust information in a community of mobile and wearable computer users. Trust information in the form of reputations are used to aid users during their social interactions with the rest of the community.     

Social weight: designing to minimise the social consequences arising from technology use by the mobile professional

This paper defines the concept of social weight as a design consideration and presents the e-SUIT, a social weight research platform incorporated covertly within a traditional business suit. The e-SUIT allows its user to strike a balance between a given technology's derived benefit and its social consequence. As the e-SUIT is designed for research within a business context, it is built upon commercially available enterprise software. This work is a first step towards subjecting the empirical social interactive phenomena of wearable technology to quantitative design analysis. Proof of concept testing shows access to commercially available enterprise applications with a distinct, user selectable, strata of social weight.     

Knowledge spaces and places: From the perspective of a “born-global” start-up in the field of urban technology

The success of cities increasingly relies on its capacity to capitalize on its knowledge base, but also on its potential to anchor external knowledge and the strategies of knowledge-based firms. In this paper we analyze how a “born global” start-up firm is linked to different types of places, and how it explores and exploits different territorial innovation potentials. Our case company—i.e., Living PlanIT—develops, tests and sells smart city software to processes real-time information collected through sensors embedded in a city’s buildings and infrastructure towards energy savings and manifold efficiency gains. The paper illustrates how the interaction with different places and knowledge-based cities provides unique resources for the technology development, search, experimentation, market formation and societal legitimation. Beyond focusing on a place’s fixed knowledge assets, the paper empirically assesses the innovation functions of different types of knowledge-cities and temporary “non-places” such as international high-level events.     

Issues in the design and use of wearable computers

Wearable computers are fully functional, self-powered, self-contained computers that allow the user to access information anywhere and at any time. In this paper, design issues for wearable computers are discussed, including power considerations, use of input devices, image registration, and the use of wearable computers for the design of smart spaces. Application areas for wearable computers are presented, including medicine, manufacturing, maintenance, and as personal assistants. Finally, future research directions for wearable computers are indicated.     

Intentions to use social media in organizing and taking vacation trips

This work proposes a theoretical model to explain the factors determining the intentions to use social media when organizing and taking vacation trips. Understanding the antecedents of the tourists’ use of these technologies is considered to be crucial for organization managers and destination policy makers. This use of social media technologies determines which elements of the trip might be used by the tourist thus having a great impact on the market. The model and its hypotheses have been tested by means of an approach based on structural equations with the PLS technique. The study was conducted on a sample of 404 individuals who normally use the Internet and had traveled on vacation in the previous 12 months. The conclusions of the study reveal that the intentions to use social media are directly influenced by the perceived benefits of that use (functional, psychological and hedonic and social); however, the costs do not significantly affect the predisposition to use such technologies. It is also shown that there is a series of incentives such as altruism, availability, individual predisposition or trust in the contributions of others which facilitate and promote the use of this type of technology when organizing and taking tourist trips.