Some kid has hooked up what he calls MIDAS: Multifunction In-Dorm Automation System, which seems to be something to turn on a laser light show at the press of a button. It’s also got CCTV monitoring, touchscreens, web-control and a smoke machine.
You know what? I don’t think anyone would want any of these features in a home automation system, perhaps save the CCTV.
There’s a proposal to have Melbournians use their CityLink eTags for a reverse-toll on public transport by a economist-type guy from Melbourne Uni. I can just see homeless guys making a living by taking sackfuls of eTags around the city on trams while their owners are at work, to make the day’s commute in to work and back again net-free.
It’s an attempt to address the free rider problem of vehicular road use; he’s also proposed that the charging should be demand driven - so road tolls are higher in peak hour, and might be free in the middle of the night. But we have a crude version of this proposed roaduse charge already - it’s called fuel excise. Cars idling in traffic jams keep burning petrol, and thus their owners paying tax, as an added bonus, SUVs/4WDs burn a whole lot more of it. If you want to hike the charges up, I’m all in favour of, say, tripling the excise on fuel. That should make public transport more attractive - especially as there won’t be homeless guys with sacks!
Last night Owen started experiencing the symptoms of his first cold, which prompts me to talk about communications with babies. Newborn babies have only one output mode: screaming. Communicating with the world is a somewhat limited experience when joy, fear and hunger are all exhibited using the same mode of operation. From observation, crying may mean:
Often, context will allow distiction between these options. It’s like a computer system saying “Something went wrong.” I’ve seen computer systems, particularly embedded ones, behave in a similar way. Often through design. Like, if they give you one red / green LED, then you’ve got green - all is good, red - not so good. You might get away with blinking them, and maybe even combining them to form orange, but there’s only so far you can take that (”Hmm, 600ms blink rate - that must mean that ethernet port two has a receive failure - because a 650ms blink rate would mean RAM failure”). That BIOSes doing their Power On Self Test use the PC speaker to report error codes prior to the video system coming online, I think the maximum number of beeps you’d get out of that was eleven… better pay attention and count them out. And a lot of Common Object Model errors are along the lines of “COM didn’t work because something failed”.
Interestingly, often babies don’t care too much that you understand them. They’ll keep on with the output, secure in the knowledge that you’re doing everything you can to determine what it is that they’re trying to say. And servicing one system fault may merely unmask another - a wet nappy may be followed by the need for a feed.
Screeching may also mean:
The point being, the obviously inferior nature of binary output means it’s replaced as soon as possible by something else. Talking, outputing to screen, COM+, whatever. Oh, except COM+.
Cathy and I want to increase the output vocabulary of our son by using Baby Sign Language, mainly as a way of avoiding the expected trantrums: apparently, kids can sign much earlier than they can talk - like, children of deaf parents are signing from six weeks of age. Most excellently, I got given a book on the subject for Christmas, and joy-of-joys it was Australian made, so rather than American Sign Language, it was filled with AUSLAN, meaning it will have some use as a language outside on family communication (6500 Aussies - my perceived use rate is higher, because I work on St Kilda Road - home of the Victorian College for the Deaf). I’m seeing some comprehension from him, but I’m yet to see him generate any signs. Having re-read the Wikipedia article on the subject, I’m going to try to sign with Cathy when he can see us. I’ll let you know how this little experiment turns out.
In the building where I’m currently working, I think I’ve found the first “close doors” button on an elevator that actually does something.
I might have come across one other elevator where the close button causes the doors to close. I’ve heard that it’s always put there, but not hooked up to anything - to provide psychological relief while waiting - to give the occupants a sense of control. Is this true, or are the door close alogorithms such that pressing the button normally has no effect?
I am not alone in considering the door close algolrithms. Apparently having a door close button that works is considered a feature by some lift manufacturers.
The User Interface on elevators is highly variable and most questionable.
And another thing: what’s this fascination with refurbishing elevators, with the shiny mirrors, the inlaid wood panelling, halogen downlights and computerised displays featuring today’s weather forecast - but an ongoing inability to tell which floor they’re on, nor operate in a manner that even the occupants of the elevator can tell is an efficient journey-planning mechanism?
Are elevators something that has preoccupied our readers’ attentions? Do they wish to rant?
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