A monthly column of technology rambling, rumination and reality

By: Jud Early, Corporate Vice President, Research, [TC]²

January 2005

Hello faithful readers, and Best Wishes for a prosperous new year!

Thanks also to those who kindly sent comments on the last Technology Corner. I appreciate your feedback.

Technology Toys

As we explore the topic for this issue, you may decide that I spent my holidays and vacation watching re-runs of The Jetsons! I didn't, but having time away from the office, and absent the daily routine of handling “things”, I was able to enjoy some time to quietly think about the future and how some technology toys may affect our future work lives.

Before we get to the toys, a short discussion of robots is in order. Industrial robots, as used by automakers for welding, painting and assembly, are really semi-intelligent systems that can be programmed to do the same repetitive tasks in a consistent, reliable manner. Metal die-casting machines and injection molding machines for plastics pose huge hazards to human hands, and are interlocked with sliding guards to ensure that humans are not harmed by the closing of dies and molds. The time lost in closing and opening guards reduces productive time, so robots have been employed for years to load and unload, with only electrical interlocks to prevent crashes. The operation is made much faster, and the rare occasion in which a die closes on a robot arm causes no permanent disfigurement or amputation. Robots of this type, which can pick and place certainly have industrial uses. The potential of robots with cognitive capability and subjective reasoning lean more toward an autonomous robot. A mobile machine that can sense and react to changing conditions brings greater value in implementation. More than twenty years ago, a robotic sewing project was sponsored by [TC]², an indicator of the forward thinking industrialists who, at the time set the research agenda.

Now in its third generation, Aibo is a robotic dog, developed by Sony in Japan . The furless, four legged creature is able to recognize more than 180 voice commands, and with four legs, and infra-red distance sensors in its snout and chest, can navigate a room without bumping into anything, and will avoid tumbling downstairs. Digital images from its camera eyes can be retrieved by remote PC, and with a LED panel in its face, will be able to communicate feelings and expression. Can a robot have feelings? With a memory of 32 Megabytes (Aibo Mind), it will respond to voice commands, recognize images from cards, and perform instructions from visually recognizing commands on the cards. It is reported that thousands of these automated pets have been purchased by space and time constrained buyers. Some are reported to have purchased Christmas gifts for their Aibos. The factory in Nagano Japan was originally set up to produce 60,000 of these critters each month. Visit a Sony web store if you have about $1900 to spend.

Asimo is a bipedal robot. Honda has developed this humanoid – style robot and has just announced the new design objectives for the next generation. Going back to 1986, the first laboratory experiments resulted in a robot known as E0. 1987 -1991 brought E1,E2, and E3. 1991-1993 brought E4, E5 and E6. Also beginning in 1991 was P1, followed by P2, and P3. All these are detailed to demonstrate that this is no flash-in-the-pan project. Significant millions of Yen/dollars have been spent to advance the ability for a two-legged robot to interact with people, and to be able to dance, converse, and respond to commands, while maintaining balance, grip, and motor control over 26, (soon to be 34) degrees of freedom in its head, arms, legs, feet and torso. The new Asimo has gained two additional degrees of freedom in its neck. Standing 120 CM tall, and with ability to grasp, lift and carry items, Asimo can open doors, turn on and off light switches and other controls, and carry on a most impressive conversation with its handler. It also sings! I use the term “it” instead of he or she, since the robot must be presumed to be of neutral gender. Some of you may have seen Asimo during its 2003 tour of the United States . On-line forums devoted to Asimo discussion have postings that recognize this as a remarkable technical achievement. Others make light of the claim that Asimo can run at a speed of 3 km per hour, saying that running requires that two feet be off the ground at once, which Asimo does not do. Running, walking or just fetching at a discrete speed is still remarkable for a biped robot.

So, what do these fancy toys have to do with our daily work? First, there is the element of computational and cognitive power. Asimo handlers will not reveal the architecture inside, but will say that it has twice the power of the most powerful laptop computer today. In order to recognize voice commands, or to navigate obstacles, many simultaneous computations must be made, and control elements energized to maintain balance, mobility and reach, while responding with voice replies to questions and commands. The robot is not fully autonomous as of this time, but future versions will be able to respond to commands such as “Answer the door”, or “Fetch my slippers”. Taking that capability to routine work tasks, a pattern maker might command “Nest these parts into a marker”. The system, in reply, would ask, “Do you have all the parts here?” “Do you want to combine this style with the last one in a single marker?”. While the CAD operator is doing another task, the marker is being made, and with fabric width known, will speak with the operator, indicating that the task is finished, the marker length is XX inches, and efficiency is XX percent. It may also ask if further optimization is necessary, or might suggest that since we have time, let's optimize the marker by doing another iteration. Such in-built intelligence should serve as an adjunct to the human operator, assisting and reminding where needed, and performing routine tasks without supervision.

Asimo can recognize the faces of up to thirty different people. In an environment where multiple operators use a common CAD system, the system could recognize the person approaching the workstation, reset the chair height, call up files of previous work, or ask if the operator is beginning a new job. No log-on or log-off would be required, since that would be a function of facial recognition. If another person approaches the workstation, the current operator can be asked in a pleasant voice if they are leaving the station, or if the new person is a visitor. I'm sure those of you who work at design and development tasks can think of lots of small routines that are time consuming and repetitive, and would like to off-load. Why not to a non-human helper? If Aibo can recognize cards with commands on them, why can't an intelligent system recognize where you are in the work flow and ask if it can take over some of the more mundane work?

Honda is not developing dancing partners for those lonely hearts that cannot get a date. The ability to have a robot dance is a technology exercise in simultaneous processing and control. The ability to do these things in rapid-fire sequence also builds knowledge of how to control machines while anticipating and reacting to elements that change as a result of the process. Admittedly, Asimo is small by human standards, and has the liability of short battery life. It will find the nearest outlet and recharge when needed, but what if you need the help just as Asimo needs a recharge? I'm thinking of a recent factory visit, where large rolls of fabric are loaded onto a roll handling mechanism. There were three people doing the job, two on the floor, and one operating a forklift. It might be a bit disconcerting to be one of the people on the floor, watching as a forklift driven by Asimo bears down on your location, but why not the other way around? If an operator driving a forklift needed an extra hand to assist in positioning the roll for loading, the robot, which had been a passenger on the forklift, would disengage from the forklift where it had been recharging, and position itself to guide the roll into position. After loading, the robot would resume its position as rider on the lift, and go to the next point where a lift was needed. Yes, this seems a bit extreme, but injury to a human can often result in loss of productivity or high medical costs. Robot parts are likely to have a high cost, but in the event of damage, can be replaced, without litigation.

Short-run digital printing of fabric is labor intensive. Even with many files of different patterns batched for printing on the same substrate, the loading of fabric supply rolls, and unloading of the printed fabric, and the subsequent steps of preparing the fabric for post-processing could be taught to a robot that is able to learn from an experienced person. Even visual inspection could be a part of the robot's job. Of course, visual inspection by robot may be subject to false positives or misinterpretation, but with the ability to learn what is expected, should improve with each task completed.

Admittedly, this technology is not yet ready for prime time, but many of the elements could be adapted in the near future. Will it happen? Probably not. As long a humans are willing to perform tasks that often are boring and repetitious, and as long as employers have a steady supply of people, there is little incentive to add the cost and complexity of non-human assistants. However, it's fun to think about and maybe at some point in the future we'll look back on this time, as having spawned a whole army of helpers and assistants that will make our lives easier.

More on Browsers

In a recent column I plugged the Firefox browser, encouraging all to try it. That recommendation was based on my evaluation of a Beta version, downloaded and installed to my office computer. Released in version 1.0 in November, Firefox downloads reached ten million by December 14, and now has been downloaded more than 13 million times. I have made it my default browser, and have installed it on my home machines, as well as selected users within our company. Reports are that they really like the browser. News reports tell of Microsoft adding one hundred programmers to its Internet Explorer development team after seeing the popularity of Firefox explode. I spoke at a conference in May of last year, in which I cited the 96%+ market share for IE. Today that share is less than 89%, and Mozilla, the parent organization of Firefox, has its sights on a better than ten percent share. If you have not experienced the real utility of tabbed browsing, and the automated blocking of pop-ups, with option to allow or remain blocked, you need to try this browser. I have no stake in anything related to Firefox, just want our faithful readers to be up on the latest, and to my way of thinking, best browser yet. Something that works so well and which is free is rare, indeed.

Footnote: For those of you who are too young to remember, or who may live in countries where the re-runs have not been shown, “The Jetsons” was a mid-sixties television cartoon program, positioned at a future time, in which almost every element of life was done by robotic assistants. Now that I have dated myself, it's time to sign off until next month.

Rosie the Robot from "The Jetsons"	Aibo by Sony

Asimo 2004 by Honda

Take care, all,

Jud