Shape-Shifting Mobile Devices Unveiled 53
An anonymous reader writes in with news about shape-shifting mobile devices unveiled by researchers from the University of Bristol's Department of Computer Science. "Prototype mobile devices that can change shape on-demand will be unveiled today and could lay down the foundation for creating high shape resolution devices of the future. The research paper (Pdf), to be presented at one of the world's most important conferences on human-computer interfaces, will introduce the term 'shape resolution' and its ten features, to describe the resolution of an interactive device: in addition to display and touch resolution. The research, led by Dr Anne Roudaut and Professor Sriram Subramanian, from the University of Bristol's Department of Computer Science, have used 'shape resolution' to compare the resolution of six prototypes the team have built using the latest technologies in shape changing material, such as shape memory alloy and electro active polymer."
Shape Shifting (Score:4, Funny)
The Dominion wants to be paid royalties
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So does Hasbro
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So does Larry Niven [wikipedia.org], darn it. (And you don't want to mess with someone who's on speaking terms with tnuctipun).
-Gareth
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The Dominion wants to be paid royalties
They prefer to be called Changelings.
Re:Unintelligible summary (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually describing what the new technology does? That doesn't seem important... What we need in this summary is technology buzzwords.
Perfectly clear to me (Score:4, Funny)
did you not understand? ;-)
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Must be on /.
What the fuck are you talking about? A clam phone? T1000 liquid metal alloy?
the paper is on a .fr and doesn't load.
it must be some new french jackets.
seriously though. it seems they've come up with a wire that can contract if electricity is put through to it and stay that way? there's a video on the first link. so eh, it's about jackets. I guess it might be cool and all, but I keep wondering that why the demos are so lame and if it had some new property as an actuator, why the fuck waste it on cardboard and not use it for industrial purposes?
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to further clarify, it's not about flexible displays or new flexible conductors or stuff that those "morphees" actually need to get invented to be shape shifting mobile devices like a phone that you could roll on your wrist(or well, in that case it would be the element that causes it to roll up, but somehow I never saw that as the big hurdle).
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Given your handle, I'd like to say "clear as gl4ss" , but I'm not sure I have much more of a clue after reading your posts than I did after reading the summary ;).
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It's another UI prototype about paper-thin hardware; in this case it bends when you touch it. It's not a finished product, though. "Prototypes" in this case means "we wired up a piece of cardboard and a projector to simulate what we think this one day might be like, maybe, just so we could explore interface design questions."
For the past several years HCI research has been pursuing various paper-thin interactions (another example [queensu.ca], from my alma mater.) As a general rule they're very novel and creative ideas,
arrgh (Score:2)
Behold... The Flip Phone! (Score:2)
Amazing! A phone that shifts shape from a small lump, to a flat bar! Wow! If only we had had these kinds of phones in the late 1990s and early 2000s, it would have revolutionized the cell phone industry.
What will they think of next, phones without physical buttons???
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more than meets the eye... (Score:1)
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meh... they're probably robots in disguise.
And they run the Android OS.
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they're a mimetic poly-alloy
title is a bit off (Score:3)
The article is a survey of a number of different approaches to reconfigurable materials as applied to mobile devices, and proposes some criteria for how to quantify the "resolution" of the reconfigurability along a number of axes, like morphology and curvature and area and whatnot. I have not read it in enough depth to determine how useful it is as an analytical tool, but it's essentially proposing an analytical tool to use to understand this area and guide further developments.
Incidentally, if you're interested in such materials, you may also be interested in self-reconfiguring modular robots [wikipedia.org].
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Boo this man
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No, the youtube video is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVE-7x9Usvw [youtube.com]
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Can I have one that turns into a mongoose?
My cellphone turned to a newt. It got better!
Better Summary (Score:3, Insightful)
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The AC nailed it. If I had a mod point it would go here. I would expect customized interface (i.e buttons/keyboards) to be high on the list of wants, but this was mostly about small changes to the global shape of a flexible phone case. It's hard to extrapolate an actual USE for the current subject, beyond a simple novelty.
flying mobile devices! (Score:2)
Bah, who cares about shape shifting mobile devices. What about flying mobile devices? I prototyped that yesterday when I knocked my tablet off the table. Flying mobile devices must be just around the corner!
Researcher names (Score:2)
"The research, led by Dr Anne Roudaut and Professor Sriram Subramanian, from the University of Bristol's Department of Computer Science"
Now, we have a French name and an Indian name. It's a continuation of a trend I've been seeing for the last 10 years, with US-based researches being lead by (arguably) non-US citizens (as in: people not born in the US or born of immigrants).
So I have to ask: where are all the US-based great minds? Working for these researchers? Just wondering.
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Even worse, University of Bristol, is not even in the US, how dare they have foreign researchers at a foreign University.
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HUH, I'm a noob, I skimmed over the name and have read "Boston" :)
Fair enough, but my question then broadens to cover UK as well, because even there I have seen the same trend.
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Oh no, I totally agree, but I'm thinking... given the extra steps a foreign scientist needs to take to reach research ownership in a different country, compared to "local" scientists, maybe this indirectly tells something, as in "local scientists are being surpassed by foreign scientists in terms of knowledge and dedication".
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Or maybe it's simply that the UK and US have the most successful university systems in the UK and so foreign researchers are happy to flock here because they recognise that.
There are far more "foreigners" than there are Brits or Americans, so if we allow the best and brightest in from other countries it makes sense that we're going to be outnumbered.
Personally I welcome it. More intellect in our society is a fantastic thing.
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I was being flippant, but....
As migration of people around the world increases, surely there's bound to be more incidents of "foreign" names appearing in various places. Doesn't this just reflect the state of the "Global Village" we all find ourselves in?
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"The research, led by Dr Anne Roudaut and Professor Sriram Subramanian, from the University of Bristol's Department of Computer Science"
Now, we have a French name and an Indian name. It's a continuation of a trend I've been seeing for the last 10 years, with US-based researches being lead by (arguably) non-US citizens (as in: people not born in the US or born of immigrants).
So I have to ask: where are all the US-based great minds? Working for these researchers? Just wondering.
Why cant they have good 'Murican names like Einstein, Fermi, Heisenberg and Von Braun.
Why? (Score:2)
Great, let's increase the number of moving parts.. (Score:2)
It's always been an engineering rule of thumb: reducing the number of moving parts generally increases reliability and decreases maintenance. You may or may not be able to get as good a performance out of the end result, but at least there's less potential for random, fatigue-based breakage...
The reverse? *sigh* Landfills cringe at the thought...
Oh great! (Score:1)
I just love it when companies add points-of-fai... sorry, I mean 'mechanical features' to my electronic devices.
So Decepticon Soundwave (Score:1)