[Brian]

Originally Posted by Unregistered

I wanted to point out a couple of recent features that are quite "context aware" on the Treo 650.

Using a third party software, the Treo 650 is able to alter the brightness of its screen based upon the user's current ambient light level. Using the camera it detects the light level of the users surroundings and increases or decreases the screens brightness to fit the user's needs.

A second, similar feature is the abilty to adjust the phone's volume based on the background noise level. Context awareness takes the form of noting you are at you quite desk and decreasing the ringer's volume or alternatively noting the subway car your riding on is quite loud and you'll need a louder alarm and ringer.

The user also has the option to adjust the future ringer's volume while scheduling a meeting. The volume will automatically be adjusted up and down according to your needs. While it does require your forethought to include an activation code, it could well be added to a future version of a datebook application as a simple check option or setup as a preference for meetings.

These are albeit small, but none the less powerful, steps in the direction of context awareness and intelligent assistance.

Thanks for the information. I wasn't aware of those applications. If you or anyone else could provide links or names, that would be great for Treo owners who are interested in making their device more context-aware.

Originally Posted by cervezas

Great editorial, Brian. I found myself saying "gee, I wish I'd written that." ;-)

Thanks David!

For a computer to understand the context of a situation well enough that it can predict things like intentionality, it seems to me it needs not just good pattern recognition, but access to pretty rich data about the environment. It needs a nervous system, not just a neocortex. The "senses" an intelligent device might have need not correspond to the five human senses (GPS is a good example) but whatever they are they will involve some kind of continuous monitoring and processing. That means intelligent devices will likely include sensor technologies that mobile devices don't have today (maybe ones that don't even exist today) and it also means there are likely to be much larger power demands on a usefully intelligent device. Power has been a bottleneck for mobile device innovation in the past, and is likely to continue to be one for some time.

Good points. The examples mentioned in the previous post show how context-aware applications can take advantage the Treo 650's camera and microphone, and they could also use a mesh network of IP-based sensors which are likely to grow over time.

There's another thing: I expect it to take a while before HMT will be good enough not to be annoying. There may be a certain charm and fascination about your device misinterpreting a situation and making a goofy response to it, but that appeal is shortlived. An "intelligent" device will have to reach a certain threshold of correct interpretations before that kind of charm will be something you're happy to live with in a device you depend on and carry with you everywhere. The nice thing about "dumb" PDAs is that they are predictable. Add just a little intelligence to them and you may get some intriguing new functionality out of them, but you also lose some of the reliability you're accustomed to demanding of them. You may be able to get your puppy to bring you your slippers when you sit in your favorite easy chair, but that same level of mental capability also makes him likely to mistake them for small animals sometimes and chew them into small pieces. :-)

Agreed. It's a fine balance that will be difficult to "get right", and it would also be a good idea to give the user the power to over ride these features or turn them off entirely.

I really do believe that Hawkins is on to something, I just think it may take many years, and even after it comes out it will probably be relegated to novelty status for quite a while. But even before we get to HTM, I wholeheartedly agree that there are big opportunities to make software that better predicts the behavior we really want from it and GPS is one of the best resources to enable this kind of intelligence. You've got me thinking about it!

I hold the same belief myself, and based on some of his comments it sounds like the brain research has already paid off, but to what extent, I guess we won't know until products incorporating HTM and Numenta Technology reach the market. Some of the ideas and examples I mentioned in my article could be accomplished through software that mimics intelligence, much like the Newton Intelligent Assistance, and I hope more software developers think of new ways to mimic intelligence and use context in their applications. It's great to hear that you're thinking about it!