New communication devices point to future of industry

New communication devices point to future of industry

By Zatni Arbi

JAKARTA (JP): No need to raise your hand. I know many of you
are already using Microsoft Office 97 today. Indeed, the latest
version of this business applications suite offers plenty of
benefits.

On the other hand, it also causes a problem typical of
software updates. As you might have anticipated, while files
created with Winword 6.0 or Winword 95 can be easily read by Word
97, the reverse is not true since the new version adds Internet-
specific features to its files.

Therefore, if you want to share files with colleagues who are
still using Winword 6.0 or Winword 95, you may want to save your
work in the older file format. Microsoft programmers have chosen
to name it the 'Word 6.0/95' format, while the new one is
misleadingly called 'Word Document'.

To select the older file format is easy. In the 'Save As'
dialog box, select 'Word 6.0/95' as the file type. However, if
you want to make this file format the default (you can choose any
of the file formats that appear in the drop-down list as the
default) just click on the Option button. Then look for the 'Save
Word files as' box. Select the format that you want, and click on
OK. From now on your Microsoft Office files can be shared with
the late adopters.

Too bad making this option permanent is not possible in Excel
97. It's a bit strange that the programmers forgot to add it to
the other Office programs besides Winword.

One feature in Office 97 that I find very useful is the
possibility of disabling the macro facility in Winword and Excel
97 when under the threat of macro viruses, which are now another
fact of life. Unless you really work with macros in Excel and
Winword and swap diskettes with colleagues, just keep the built-
in virus macro protection activated. Click on Tools, Options, and
then General. See whether the box next to this option is checked.

Voice Dial

Here in Jakarta, traffic quite often grinds to a halt because
a certain driver is unable to complete a turn and has to back up
and repeat his maneuver. Upon close observation, you may see that
he has only one hand on the steering wheel and the other on a
cellular phone to his ear. Despite the nimbleness of a car with
power steering, one hand is usually not enough to negotiate the
sharp turns in this city. Yet, many drivers still think that
disrupting traffic is not as bad as interrupting their phone
conversations.

Therefore, I truly hope that, like our neighbors in Singapore,
we prohibit the use of cellular phones while driving. Until our
government realizes the urgency of such a law, perhaps you should
look for this new feature in your next cellular phone: Voice
Dial.

Voice Dial is not be an unusual feature for those who have a
car kit that allows them to talk on their cellular phone and
voice dial a pre-programmed number. Still, the car kit is an
additional cost, and it gives thieves a greater incentive to
break into your car. Philips, the electronics giant that has
suddenly woken up and surprised us with new advanced electronic
gadgets, has incorporated this capability into its tiny new
cellular phone, the Spark.

As you can see in the accompanying picture, the cellular phone
belongs to the GSM front, and it doesn't have too many confusing
control buttons. You can program it to store 20 names and phone
numbers. Then you can assign specific voice tags to the first ten
names on the list. You have to train it in a quiet room to ensure
a high recognition performance. Once the training is done, you
can simply say "Home" and Spark will dial your home phone number,
or any other number attached to the voice tag "Home".

Limitations

There are some limitations, though. Other people may not be
able to use the voice dial facility of Spark unless they can
imitate the recorded voice sample, which means that only the
owner can instruct it to place a call. However, that may be a
positive point, as it prevents accidental commands from people
standing close by.

Other features of Spark includes a long battery life that
allows for more than two weeks of standby time and Duo SIMM
compatibility. Furthermore, it is ultra slim and ultra light. I
just hope that more electronic gadgets are equipped with a voice
activation feature similar to the one in this Rp 1.4 million
(all-in) Spark phone. For people like me who have limited
eyesight and don't like reading LCD panels, this feature helps
simplify life.

Given the level of PC penetration in our lives today, it would
be logical to have a PC in one's car as well. It shouldn't be
surprising, then, that microprocessor giant Intel has been on the
front line developing a PC for the car. They call it, well, what
else? The Connected Car PC.

And it may not be just another redundant piece of equipment.
In today's luxury car, for example, a Global Positioning System,
or GPS, is becoming a standard tool. Even taxis in Singapore and
rental cars in the U.S. are equipped with this device, which
offers multiple benefits. When you enter an unfamiliar area, for
example, you can avoid getting lost by programming the system and
entering your destination. The system will then guide you there
by telling you to turn left or right or make a U-turn.

A car PC will be able to handle the positioning task very
easily. When needed, a PC in the car can function as a game
station, such as the one shown in the accompanying pictures. With
Flash ROMs, universal serial bus, telephony and Internet
connections, the use is almost unlimited. You can use the PC to
run productivity tools while it monitors the performance of the
car's engine.

You can see two displays of the same car PC in the
accompanying picture. To minimize distraction, the screen on the
dashboard has a low resolution, monochrome LCD. However, the one
on the rear is high-quality, full-color screen with video
capability. Of course, the attractive display is intended to keep
the children from getting grumpy after a long ride.

Definitely, one of the most welcome features in the car PC
will be voice command. The good news is, progress in computer
voice recognition has been encouraging. IBM's VoiceType is just
one of them.

PC Videophone

The video telephone, or video phone, is not a new concept. In
fact, back in late 1980s there were already some products on the
market. However, pumping so much audio and video data through the
limited bandwidth of the plain old telephone system (POTS) has
been too challenging to overcome, and therefore the videophone
system never really caught on.

With Internet becoming a daily menu, Internet
videoconferencing tools became available. Intel is not the only
one that provides Internet-based audio and video connection
beyond Internet phone. According to PC Magazine's roundup, there
are at least four other different Internet videoconferencing
packages available from CineCom Corp., Connectix Corp., White
Pine Software Inc., and VDOnet Corp.

However, today, with the help of Intel's MMX technology, your
PC can be turned into a video phone system. In a recent press
outing, Intel gave a live demonstration of its Video Phone system
to IT journalists. Unlike Intel Internet Videophone, the new
system does not rely on the Net to zap the audio and video data
from one end to the other. Instead, it relies solely on the POTS.

During the demonstration, Christopher Gozali, Intel's
Networking Manager for Indonesia, dialed his colleague in
Singapore from the conference room of Carita Beach Resort in
Carita, West Java. Needless to say, the phone line there was far
below today's standards, although it is less than a three-hour
drive from Jakarta. Amazingly, the connection was still
acceptable. Both parties were able to communicate fairly
effectively and the video quality was not so bad.

The key to the new system is the ability of the PCs to
compress and decompress a huge amount of audio and video data
efficiently. This is where MMX technology makes a crucial
contribution. If you read my recent report on MMX capability,
you'd know by now that a single instruction in the MMX-enabled
Pentium handles eight bits of data instead of just one. This
tremendously helps increase the speed of the compression and
decompression process. We can decrease the resolution to increase
frame rate so that the video looks more real life. We can do the
opposite to get better images but jerky video.

The system, which Intel will shortly launch here in Jakarta,
consists of software, a video capture board and an Intel video
camera. You need an MMX Pentium system, though. In addition, you
cannot share files or conduct video conferencing with a third
party. The link is nothing more than the 100-year-old point-to-
point connection.

It's still good news, nonetheless. Although ISDN appears to be
a millennium away from your house, with your next PC you may be
able to communicate both in voice and in smiles on an outdated
telephone line.