Headworx

There are signs of maturing technologies for wireless power delivery. And I don't mean proximity power delivery like Qi, which is present in many Android phones and the latest iPhones. We're talking of wireless power delivery at a distance. 2018 should bring the first products to the market, and I'd expect some announcements as early as at the 2018 CES. What has so far come to my attention: Pi says it has already delivered. It uses resonant receivers. Energous has just received an FCC certification for their power-at-a distance wireless charging systems Power by Proxi (I saw their working demo in 2016) was acquired by Apple . Again, this is based on resonance. One thing that keeps me still a bit skeptical is influence of these power transfer technologies on human health. And here I'm speaking from my own experience. About 30 years ago (mid 1980's) I built my first stereo wireless headset (yes this had been 15 years earlier than the first version of Blueto

2017 has definitely been a year of maturing technologies. From a road warrior perspective this means the gear is less bulky and more dependable. And the gadget bag getting lighter. Here is my personal hall of fame, which also reflects what I carry in my bag on every business trip. Blackberry KeyOne . This is the phone that ended the era of power banks. Depending on usage I charge it every 2 or 3 days and it has never run out of juice. 10.5 inch iPad. Serves as reading, research and entertainment device. I tried the 12.9 inch version which proved to be too bulky to fit in a seat pocket or on an economy class table. But I still use the same self-made kickstand. It also serves as a 2nd monitor for my windows laptop. 512GB memory is the key, as I can carry with me all my music, photos, books, research documents as well as several movies. Offline experience matters when you average 15k miles in the air every month. Logitech MX Anywhere 2S mouse. Ultra responsive and precise on any

One of the promises of the Internet of Things (IoT) is that it allows things to speak. Or even more precisely enables products and services that listen to things. Product maintenance is a great example of a such service. Imagine a lighting system on an airport. There's probably 50 thousand lights installed and statistically around 10 of them may be failing every day. Now having a service that precisely pinpoints the 10 that have just failed (or a single one as it fails) is clearly a value. But this is passive, reactive, poll-type device monitoring. Ping it periodically and once it stops responding, assume it needs to be checked, as it has probably failed. But actually if things can speak, we can shift from passive and reactive to proactive monitoring. A thing may be able to indicate that it will fail. If it is a lamp, it may report it has worked for a given number of hours at full power, so the performance has significantly degraded. If it is a power supply, it may report it

Silicon Labs is buying Sigma Designs , practically the only vendor offering chips and stacks for Z-Wave, the established home automation standard. It is an interesting move and watching what happens next will be even more interesting. Contrary to what the press release says and what other people are saying, I think it is the end of the game for Z-Wave. Z-Wave has been the longest standing and most complete home automation standard. Mainly due to the fact it has been tightly held by a single company (Sigma Designs) who has been defacto the only supplier of silicon and stacks for Z-Wave devices. Achieving interoperability among a family of devices coming from a single vendor is easy. And that is why Z-Wave has been so far the only option for interoperable smart homes. But Z-Wave as a technology has been ageing quickly. It does not scale to cover a home full of smart devices. It has very weak or no security. Majority of Z-Wave devices on the market today speak clear text to each other

The whole concept of mirrorless cameras is they are smaller (and presumably lighter). Which probably is not the case IRL. Yes, theoretically, they can get smaller and lighter but practically they don't. At least in certain configurations. I've been experimenting with window seat photography for some time. Initially I thought a phone camera would do, but quickly realized a telephoto lens was essential. Trying to stay as light as possible, I tried the Sony DSC-HX90V . Beautiful 30x zoom lens in a tiny package, completely useless. Autofocus never worked and manual (software - controlled by the lens ring) was way too slow. On an airplane everything moves. Fast. I ended up with zero "keeps" with the Sony. The next was Panasonic DC-ZS70 . About twice as big as the Sony, but reportedly good and fast autofocus. Did not work either. With the lens extended it was too difficult to keep it steady trying to shoot a plane passing by in an opposite direction. Last week I borr