The computer for the 21 ^st century

Abstract

Specialized elements of hardware and software, connected by wires, radio waves and infrared, will be so ubiquitous that no one will notice their presence.

Cognitive Enhancement: Methods, Ethics, Regulatory Challenges

“…This can be achieved through mediation, embedding the human within an augmenting ''shell'' such as wearable computers (Mann 2001;Mann and Niedzviecki 2001) or virtual reality, or through smart environments in which objects are given extended capabilities. An example is the vision of ''ubiquitous computing'', in which objects would be equipped with unique identities and given the ability to communicate with and actively support the user (Weiser 1991). A well-designed environment can enhance proactive memory (Sellen et al 1996) by deliberately bringing previous intentions to mind in the right context.…”

Leveraging Semantic Technologies towards Social Ambient Intelligence

“…"The Computer for the 21 st century" (Weiser, 1991) has become a foundational paper for following works in this domain, introducing his vision in which "ubiquitous computers" are simple communicative devices and appliances that are suited for a particular task and know where they are while fading into the background. For example, paper sheets could be replaced with flexible screens, bringing any information of the web as an independent element of your real desktop, an element that you can stack into piles, stick on a wall, lend to a colleague or take with you for lunch.…”

“…Our usage of technology is moving towards the vision of "Ambient Intelligence", derived from the vision of "Ubiquitous computing" in which "the most profound technologies are those that disappear" (Weiser, 1991) and thus access to information is not longer limited to personal computers and the web browsing paradigm. This vision brings many technological and psychological challenges (Streitz & Nixon, 2005) that are considered in several research domains, including:…”

Adaptive user interfaces in complex supervisory tasks

“…As the name implies this kind of computation, also called "everywhere computing" and primarily targets on the mobile devices. This idea was first started in Xerox PARC and led by Mark Weiser in the late 1980's [73,74]. The ultimate goal of ubiquitous computing is to create a computer infrastructure that permeates our physical environment so much that we do not notice the computer any more.…”