[StarTech] TechViews – Future phones to read your voice & gesture

http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=73470

According to a report by Priya Ganapati of Wired Dot Com, buttons on Cell Phones are pretty much on their way out. Five years from now, it is likely that the mobile phone you will be holding will be a smooth, sleek brick a piece of metal and plastic with a few grooves in it and little more.

Like Apple’s iPhone, it will be mostly display; unlike the iPhone, it will be much more than just a touchscreen – it will respond to voice commands and gestures as well as touch.

Specialists predict that Mobile interface design has to mimic the touch, sight, gesture and auditory feeds that we use to interact with our environment. That means speaking to your phone rather than typing, pointing with your finger instead of clicking on buttons, and gesturing instead of touching. You could listen to music, access the internet, use the camera and shop for gadgets by just telling your phone what you want to do, by waving your fingers at it, or by aiming its camera at an object you’re interested in buying.

Over the last few years, advances in display technology and processing power have turned smartphones into capable and smaller versions of computers. As a result, phones have gone beyond traditional audio communication and texting to support a wide range of multimedia and office applications.

The one thing that hasn’t changed, until recently, is the tiny keypad. Sure, there have been some tweaks, such as T9 predictive text input that cuts down on the time it takes to type, a QWERTY keyboard instead of a 12-key one, or the touchscreen version of a keyboard found on the iPhone. But basically, the act of telling your phone what to do still involves the use of your fingers, specially your thumbs!

Experts say the industry needs a new wave of interface technologies to transform how we relate to our phones. The traditional keypads and scroll wheels will give way to advanced speech recognition and motion sensors.

In the future, instead of a single large screen that is fragile and smudged by fingerprints, phone designers could create products with multiple touch screens.

Users could also interact with their phone by simply speaking to it using technology from companies such as Massachusetts (USA) based Vlingo.

Vlingo’s application allows users to command their phones by voice. That could enable you to speak the URLs for web pages or dictate e-mail messages!

Natural speech recognition has long been a challenging affair for human-computer interface researchers. Most devices with speech-recognition capabilities require users to speak commands in an artificially clear way. They also tend to have high error rates, leading to unpopularity.

Unlike conventional voice-recognition technologies, which require specific applications built to recognize selected language commands, Vlingo uses a more open-ended approach.

User voice commands are captured as audio files and transferred over the wireless connection to a server, where they’re processed. The technology personalizes itself for each individual user, recognizing and training itself based on the individual user’s speech patterns.

“If you say Boston and it shows up as Austin you can correct it on screen,” says Vlingo CEO Dave Grannan. “And when you make the correction you are training the system.”

This new technology would also mean there is absolutely no need to memorize a list of commands or change the way you speak!

Information Source: Wired.Com

[University World News] BANGLADESH: Private universities meet demand

http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20090122194001148

The system of private universities is a relatively new concept in Bangladesh. Because of the ever-growing demand for education at the university level, and the fact that existing public universities could not meet the need, the government passed a Private Universities Act in 1992. Starting with a handful, the number of private universities has grown rapidly and stands at 54 to date, compared with 21 public universities.

Part of the reason is that Bangladesh has one of the fastest-growing populations in the world, increasing from 45 million in 1971 to more than 145 million today. But private universities are also popular because the public institutions could not offer enough places in courses of high demand so students opted for lesser-known universities rather than study a subject which might not have good job prospects.

The private universities have capitalised on this situation by limiting what they offer to a few disciplines such as business, computer science, engineering, medicine and so on which are very much in demand in the job market.

A University Grants Commission report says the standard of education in most of the public universities is not up to the mark. The reasons include student politics, irregular and interrupted classes and examinations, unsatisfactory teacher-student ratios and so forth. In contrast, most of these problems are non-existent in the private universities.

Prior to their introduction, most students were not able to enrol in the esteemed public universities and had few options left to them. Some went abroad to study, the majority going to India and a few to the US, UK and Australia.

Eventually, Bangladesh began to suffer from the loss of huge amounts of hard-earned foreign currency, and also the loss of many of its then highly qualified citizens – the brain-drain factor.

So the private universities have directly helped in saving foreign currency as well as reducing the brain drain. Many scholarships are also available for students with brilliant academic results although they are also popular with those who face financial constraints. Critics say more need-based scholarships should be available to create opportunities for a higher number of deserving candidates.

Although some of the universities have come under fire for failing to deliver what they had promised, it has to be remembered that Bangladesh’s whole system of higher education is still in its development stage.

In the US, as well as in many other countries around the world, private universities and colleges are as good as the public ones, if not better at times. MIT, Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Dartmouth are all private institutions. In Bangladesh, many private universities are also excellent education institutions.

[StarTech] TechSpotlight – Banks get tech smart

http://www.thedailystar.net/pf_story.php?nid=71473

Photo: Syed Zakir Hossain

The commercial banks in Bangladesh are fast catching up with the rest of the world in terms of the use of the most advanced technologies. Starting from online banking and SMS banking, we have also seen the arrival of innovative technologies like the mobile ATM and many more.

Also, experts are of the opinion that the level of use of e-commerce in Bangladesh is not satisfactory enough due to different bureaucratic and policy constraints. This week in Star-Tech, we will try to have a look at where the banks in Bangladesh currently stand in terms of the use of technology in their systems.

Credit/Debit Cards: Once a status symbol, the use of Credit/Debit or ATM Cards has now become an absolute necessity for the urban folk of Dhaka and other major cities of the country. With most of the commercial banks offering card services and with relative ease of making one compared to earlier times, Cards have become immensely popular for account holders ranging from university students to CEOs of corporate firms. Risks of carrying heavy cash, ease of withdrawal/disposal, availability of ATM booths in all neighbourhoods and the acceptance of VISA/Mastercard cards at more and more shops mean that a higher number of people are now opting for ‘plastic money’.

DBBL (Dutch Bangla Bank Limited) has the highest number of ATM booths all across the country, and with the launch of the Mobile ATM booths, the first of its kind in Bangladesh, the bank has made access to its ATM booths even easier.

Online Banking: Internet/Online banking application of different banks address the needs of small, individual and corporate account holders. These applications provide a comprehensive range of banking services that enable the customers to meet most of their banking requirements over the Internet, thus avoiding the hassles of having to physically travel to the bank for each and every monetary transaction/update. The services generally seen in different banks offering online banking services include:

(1)Account Operations and Inquiries

(2) Fund Transfers and Payments: The customer can choose to transfer funds by selecting different mode of transfers. Funds can be transferred between accounts of the corporate, to a third party account or to other banks using prevalent payment systems.

(3) Utility Bill Payment (Electricity, Gas, Telephone and Water) from the Customers’ Savings or Checking Accounts

(4) Deposits

(5) Loans

(6) Other services: This includes monitoring up to date information about the different transactions (deposits and withdrawals) of the account instead of having to wait for the normal printed summary that comes once in every three months!

In this regard, we took an interview of Shahadat Hossain Shohag, the FVP (First Vice President) and Head of Cards of UCBL (United Commercial Bank Limited). Following are the excerpts:

Star Tech (ST): What is the current state of the use of technology in different banks in Bangladesh?

Shahadat Hossain Shohag (SHS): Currently the use of technology in banking industry is very huge. The second and third generation private sector banks are leading in terms of using technology in banking practice and services. First generation banks are not so far behind either. For example, UCBL has the largest online network connecting its 84 branches through out the country. Also the government sector banks are coming forward, slowly but steadily to taste the comfort of technology.

ST: What is the total number of plastic cards (debit/credit/ATM) currently in Bangladesh and at what rate it is growing?

(SHS): At present, up to 25 banks are in card businesses in Bangladesh. Number of credit cards is approximately 300,000 with 200,000 debit cards. There are around 500,000 ATM cards currently in use in the country. New banks are coming in card business but growth rate is still medium, standing at approximately 30-40% now.

ST: UCBL is considered to be one of the pioneers in the dual currency credit cards? How popular has this project been in Bangladesh?

(SHS): UCBL has made the venture of dual currency credit cards a success in Bangladesh. All the older credit card issuing banks are introducing dual currency credit card to emulate the success of UCBL in card business. The banks that are interested to enter card business are thinking of dual mood in almost all cases.

ST: How would you evaluate the current state of e-commerce in Bangladesh?

(SHS): To be honest, I am not convinced with the current status of e-commerce in Bangladesh. This is available in a very small scale. But the matter of hope is that banks are showing interest on this issue. Hopefully within some months UCBL will introduce e-commerce.

I do not see massive activities on e-commerce in Bangladesh. Till date all efforts are seemed to be not so efficient. But respective people have started to realise that it is a demand of time. So, I believe that in the near future we will be able to see remarkable development in e-commerce business.

ST: What services is UCBL offering which uses the new methods of technology (Plastic Cards/Online Banking/SMS Banking)?

(SHS): UCBL is getting richer in providing technology based services. Presently it has credit card business, online banking and SMS banking. Very shortly it is going to introduce debit card, ATM card, prepaid card & ATM services.

[StarTech] TechSpotlight – Sci-Tech 2009: What to look forward to

http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=69567

2009   promises to be yet another promising year for the world of Science and Technology. 2009 has already been declared the ‘International year of Astronomy’ and many other high tech gadgets, automobiles and electrical appliances, due to hit the markets all through the year, promises a great year ahead of us.

We at StarTech, tried to find out what 2009 promises us and the following is a sneak peek of the year ahead of us:

The International Year of Astronomy 2009
The International Year of Astronomy 2009 is a global effort initiated by the International Astronomical Union and UNESCO to help the citizens of the world rediscover their place in the Universe through the day- and night-time sky, and thereby engage a personal sense of wonder and discovery.

The vision of such a declaration is to ensure everyone realizes the impact of astronomy and other fundamental sciences on our daily lives, and understand how scientific knowledge can contribute to a more equitable and peaceful society. IYA2009 activities will take place locally, nationally, regionally and internationally. National Nodes have been formed in each country to prepare activities for 2009. These nodes will establish collaborations between professional and amateur astronomers, science centres and science communicators to prepare activities for 2009. Already now, 135 countries are involved and well over 140 are expected to participate eventually.

To help coordinate this huge global programme and to provide an important resource for the participating countries, the IAU has established a central Secretariat and an IYA2009 website (www.astronomy2009.org) as the principal IYA2009 resource for all interested.

Cell Phone as Credit Card!
Behold! If you happen to live in Canada, by Mid-2009, you can wave your mobile phone for the ultimate freedom to purchase all you need at supermarkets, restaurants and anywhere else for that matter. Visa (International Credit Card Company) and Rogers Wireless (Canada) have come together for the next phase of the mobile phone payment pilot, which will ultimately allow Canadians the flexibility to make purchases securely at the point of sale with a wave of their mobile phone. The customer phase of the mobile phone payment pilot is expected to launch in mid-2009, following a brief employee pilot.

Designed to be a fast and convenient way for customers to pay for small purchases, pilot participants will be issued specially-equipped mobile phones that can simply be waved at Visa payWave-enabled checkout readers at select retail stores and quick-service restaurants in Toronto’s downtown core.

As part of the pilot, Motorola mobile phones outfitted with Near Field Communication (NFC) contactless chips will enable customers to make purchases using the Visa payWave feature just as they would with a contactless RBC Visa card. The functions tested in the pilot will include the secure delivery and storage of account information to the mobile phone and the security of mobile payments at retailers.

African Industry Boom
Africa is by definition an outlier. It’s a whole continent that, for the most part, is completely decoupled from the world economy and subsequently peoples expectations of what it can contribute. People here are looked at as offering very little, if anything, to the world community especially when it comes to technological innovation. 25 of the poorest nations on the planet are all in Africa and the world economic crisis is only compounding that fact. What this means is the world isn’t paying attention to Africa…at all. It’s up to Africans to capitalize on this underestimation. Malcolm Gladwell, in his most recent book OUTLIERS, writes about jewish lawyers who were the industry outcasts of the early twentieth century in New York. Fast forward a few years and the entire landscape changed, making those who were marginalized early on were subsequently placed in the perfect position to dominate an entire industry. Could the same thing happen to Africa? Definitely, the mobile phone market here is proving to be successful beyond most expectations just five years ago. Other industries are also predicting growth in 2009.

Cumulus Solutions for Developing Countries
‘The cloud’ is an elusive technological beast that happily thrives in the world of billion dollar data centers in the west. But there are currently about three billion people untouched by the internet across Asia, South America and Africa. Look for a number of CDN(Content delivery network)’s to try to penetrate these emerging markets by offering mobile services, alternative energy powered data centers and hyper-local hosting solutions.

Innovations in Water Technology
The one resource that the world needs more than anything else on the planet is being strained by over population, pollution, and global warming. Researchers speculate that in 2009, we’ll see a tipping point of innovations in water technologies. Whether it’s simple solutions like the Water Cone (http://www.watercone.com /product.html) or more advanced things like Max Water (http://www.waterunlimited.com.au/).

Predictions On Google
ZDNet’s Garett Rogers: Google’s Chrome browser will grab as much as 15 percent of the browser market as it begins being preinstalled on new PCs. Google will also see solid financial gains as its sharemarket value is likely to soar high.

- Psychic Celia: Google’s going to grow three times bigger. “There’s a company that’ll get involved with Google that will make it go that much higher this year. It will be a company that advertises.”

- Psychic Shaun: Google’s growth is going to slow — unless it finds the right new idea. “They need to come up and do something that’s going to knock it out of the ballpark.”