Feedback on mobile applications survey 2

Written by: Jonathan Briggs

February 22, 2005 [2957 views]

A good participation rate of over 65% for this week’s survey in which I asked students to consider five scenarios and consider which technologies would be most suitable.

I think the overall quality was better than in the previous week, which is good. There is still a huge range of effort put into the answers from single words to well considered explanations. You need to learn to write short pithy paragraphs (or bullets) that contain sufficient information to help me understand and cover the key ideas. Don’t assume that the person evaluating your idea will have the same understanding of the idea as you do.

In general you seem to be sorting out the main differences between the alternative mobile technologies but some people are still confused.

The questions this week were of varying difficulty and I was glad to see that many of you questioned the use of mobiles in certain environments or building new mechanisms where existing methods work fine.

Q1 Alerting doctors in hospitals to major emergencies
Most of you suggested text or voice calls but some of you pointed out that mobiles are generally banned in hospitals. This made this a hard question. Many of you pointed out that doctors already carry bleepers (safer than mobile) but these don’t distinguish between minor and major calls.

A few of you imagined new “receive only” GPRS devices. I don’t think these would be allowed in most hospitals either. A WiFi device did seem like a good idea – this would work inside the hospitals and could push information out to handheld (or pocket) devices. In an examination you would have been given marks for making such a suggestion.

Whichever technology you chose you needed to think about the backend system. Where would it be and how would it be used? Those of you would mentioned databases of doctors, their rotas and ways of linking the database to the mobile devices would have scored highest in an exam.

A couple of you did choose GPS and you need to think about changing modules!

Q2. At-home diabetes monitoring measuring changing insulin levels
The best answers thought through all the components of the system: a device for measuring blood sugar levels that is carried or used by the patient connected via Bluetooth to a transmitting device such as a regular GSM/GPRS phone that passes data back to the hospital/consultant who can then communicate back to the patient over text or voice.

WiFi is also a possibility but this seems an idea Bluetooth application. Some of you mentioned RFID but how many patients are going to be in one house? RFID is good for confirming identity.

Some of you were much less clear in what you were suggesting - “sms text could be sent to alert patients of their insulin levels”. From where would the message come and how would the system measure their insulin levels?

When you are asked to be a consultant you will often not have the full story and have to make judgements and assumptions. Some of you clearly get this and state your assumptions clearly (and even offer options). Don’t be paralysed by a lack of information, just show how you have come up with your options.

Some of you suggested video over 3G. I’m not sure how this would help measure blood sugar levels although a conversation with a consultant could be an option. Make sure that you answer the question being asked or state how you are reinterpreting it.

Q3. House arrest monitoring with alerts to security services
House arrest means that someone is ordered to stay in one location. It is being proposed to replace illegal detention of people without trial (and for this purpose may still be illegal itself). It is sometimes used by the courts to enforce curfews or anti-social behaviour orders (ASBOs).

There are two components here: monitoring (use RFID) and alerting (use SMS or telephone connection). I’m not sure that there is any role for GPS inside the home. Read the question carefully. GPS will measure the location outside the home to within 100 metres and I suppose could continue to track the prisoner after they had escaped but is really not good inside buildings.

A few of you abandoned the question and wrote nothing because you said that you did not understand the question. That is fair enough but in an exam situation (or an interview) you would be better to guess. What else could the question be about? What do you imagine “house arrest” means?

RFID needs to be thought about a little more carefully. Some of you wanted the RFID tag to send the alert. An RFID is an identity encoded into an antenna imbedded in a bracelet or ankle etc. It has no power to communicate. Instead it is the RFID gates or readers than could be hooked up to a communication device or alarm. Many applications would use a standard telephone line as the cheapest communication channel.

Q4. Allow passengers to check in for flights simply by passing through security gates
This sounded easy and was hard! Most of you correctly identified that RFID could be used but how would you know that the passenger had not given their card/tag/identity to someone else. Those of you who identified this as a problem would be rewarded with more marks in an examination. What we need is a system that checks at least two components; like an ATM card plus a PIN number – that’s why CHIP and PIN is being introduced. Currently British Airways require me to have my Executive Club card, the credit card I used to make the booking and I still have to show my passport to prove it is me. What we really need is an RFID tag inside the passport (plus random photo idea checks) or RFID linked to mobile phones in which a message is sent to the phone and has to be acknowledged with a PIN.

Of course you could implant a chip like the “pet passport”. How to bring your Ferret into the UK?

Some of you wanted to use WiFi but it was very unclear how this would work. Who would own and issue the devices? Always think about the cost of implementation.

Q5. Enabling mobile phone users to print photographs from a retail kiosk
Using Bluetooth is definitely the easiest method although not all phones have Bluetooth yet. Most of you recognised this. The alternative seems to be to send an MMS to a specified email address and have the kiosk read the MMS print the photos and charge the customer via reverse billing (sending an SMS and charging the recipient).

How would 3G work? We know that 3G means faster transfer of data but how will this talk to the kiosk? Will the kiosk have a built-in 3G terminal? Do think about a charging mechanism.

Many of you spotted that removable memory cards make this easy and you should always look for the easiest solution. Of course fewer phones have memory cards (at present) than have Bluetooth. But this is the solution already in operation in stores.

I hope that the GPS suggestions were not being serious but just testing my sense of humour.

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