Pin & Play: Bringing Power and Networking to Wall-Mounted Appliances

Van Laerhoven, Kristof and Villar, Nicolas and Gellersen, Hans and Hakansson, Maria (2002) Pin & Play: Bringing Power and Networking to Wall-Mounted Appliances. In: 5th IEE International Workshop on Networked Appliances, 1900-01-01.

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Abstract

The classic obstacles in the digital augmentation of everyday objects and appliances are usually situated around batteries, communication, size, and weight. Wired communication is often not possible, changing or charging batteries is generally considered a nuisance, and augmenting an appliance is usually not worth it if it means increasing its size or weight. For the subclass of devices and objects that are typically attached to surfaces such as walls and boards, we consider surface augmentation to address this problem. We present several implementations where low-cost wallpaper, consisting of insulated conductive layers, provides both power and a networking bus to common devices like pins on a notice board, wall switches, lights, and thermostats. They can be placed and replaced at will in any orientation, while the attachment to the wall supplies power and networking as a bonus. Moreover, our prototypes show that this doesn't affect familiarity of the objects, which makes interaction with them a breeze.

Item Type:
Contribution to Conference (Paper)
Journal or Publication Title:
5th IEE International Workshop on Networked Appliances
Uncontrolled Keywords:
/dk/atira/pure/researchoutput/libraryofcongress/qa75
Subjects:
?? cs_eprint_id656 cs_uid1qa75 electronic computers. computer science ??
ID Code:
12191
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
25 Jun 2008 10:50
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
10 Jan 2024 00:01