Apple iSlate the passport to the future of computing

There is speculation that an Apple iSlate tablet computer is to be launched in late January. I am less sceptical of this having spent some time seeing an Apple iPod Touch in use by a family. The smallest reasonable size for the iSlate would be a six inch screen, twice the size of the Touch and and iPhone. This is the same size as the screen on the Amazon Kindle. However, unlike the Kindle, the iSlate is likely to have no physical keyboard and therefore be small enough for a large pocket or handbag.

Visiting a networked family recently, I was struck by how useful their iPod Touch was. The family has a WiFi network, a desktop computer in the study and laptop which tends to sit on the coffee table, next to the controls for the Nintendo Wii. But the gadget that gets used most is an Apple iPod Touch, which tends to be on the kitchen bench or dining table.

The iPod is connected to the home wireless network. The iPod starts instantly, compared to about 20 seconds for the laptop. Also it is much more socially acceptable to use in a group of people, as it looks like a mobile phone. It takes only a few seconds to turn the iPod on, go to the web browser and look something up. The screen is large enough for looking at the bus timetable. This makes prospects for the rumoured Apple iSlate tablet computer very good.

Something like an iPod touch, but with a screen the size of a paperback book would seem to be a winner. Exactly how large a screen such a device should have is an interesting question. The iPod Touch (and iPhone) have a screen which is about size of a credit card, which is one of the standard sizes for international documents (ID-1 format: 85.60 × 53.98 mm).

The next standard size up would be that of a passport: 125 × 88 mm (ID-3 format or ISO B7). This would be about twice the size of the iPod Touch screen and the smallest reasonable size for the Apple iSlate. It would allow for a 6 inch screen, which is the size of the screen on the International Version of Amazon Kindle e-Book reader. A device this size would still fit in many larger pockets and in handbags. This is no coincidence, as passports are the size they are so that they will fit in a pocket or handbag, which is in turn sized to fit a human hand. Making the device this size would also allow it to be held comfortably in one hand. While modern electronics have allowed the size of many devices to shrink, these are still limited by natural units of measure, such as the size of a hand.

Such a small screen will not be suitable for everything. The iSlate will presumably have a USB interface. If plugged into a keyboard and mouse, the iSlate would be usable for entering more text. If interfaced to a large screen, such as a flat screen TV or LCD computer monitor and this would provide enough computing power for a web terminal. Apple may be reluctant to support this as it would undercut sales of their laptop and desktop computers. The iPhone and iPod Touch have a USB interface, but a keyboard is not supported (they also have a low resolution video out).

iPhone Car Radio

Some time ago I suggested a car radio with a socket to hold an iPhone/i-Pod touch. Dual Electronics have now produced such a device with their Dual XML8100. This looks like an ordinary car radio, until the front panel is hinged down revealing an iPhone/touch docking station. This is not quite as simple or low cost as the design I suggested, but looks workable and reasonably priced at around US$100.

The unit is designed to work with older model iPods, not just the iPod Touch and iPhone. The full manual for the unit is available online.

It should be noted that to use the phone functions of an iPhone, the optional Dual BTM60 Bluetooth Interface Module is required. This is designed to clip to the sun visor and includes a noise cancelling microphone. It should be noted that the iPhone doesn't have an external antenna socket and so may not get good phone reception if mounted low on the car dashboard.

While it works with a large range of iPods, this has limited the options for the designer. The older iPods are designed to only be operated when upright, that is in "portrait" mode. The iPhone and iPod touch can also be operated lying down, in "landscape" mode. This is the way I suggested having them in the car, so they fit better with the standard radio slot on the dashboard. With the Dual XML8110 the iPod projects up above the radio slot, where it may interfere with other car controls.

Also the Dual XML8110 has increased complexity and cost due to having two sets of controls and displays: one for when an iPod is not used and another inside when the panel is swung down and the iPod inserted. It would have been simpler and cheaper to have the one set of displays and controls.

In car dash HTC Magic Google Android phone mount?

There appear to be few accessories
for HTC Magic Google Android phone, so far. This is to suggest a simple, low cost car dashboard mount. There are various holders for smart phones on car dashboard, but no one so far seems to have thought to build the mount into the dashboard. Like the Apple iPhone, the HTC Magic can be used in the landscape position. In this position, the screen is about the size and shape of a small entertainment/navigation screen in an upmarket car. Provide a low cost radio and amplifier with a socket for the phone to fit in the standard radio dashboard space and you could have a touch screen communications and entertainment system for under $US100 (not including the cost of the phone).

An example of this approach is the Eclipse AVN2210P: a dashboard media hub, with a removable TomTom navigation unit. This system got mixed reviews, some good and some bad. This is a large unit, so it will not fit some cars and it is designed to provide a CD and MP3 player, even without the TomTom installed and so is large and expensive. But a similar device, smaller and cheaper, could be made for a phone.

The HTC Magic is 113 x 55 x 13.65 mm ( slightly shorter and narrower, but deeper than the iPhone at 115×61×11.6 mm). This is 5mm taller than the standard slot in a car dashboard for a radio: 180 x 50 mm (the so called "DIN car radio size" DIN 75490 ISO 7736). The phone could be accommodated in a double DIN (180 x 100 mm panel) slot (as used by the Eclipse) or simply by having the phone protrude 5 mm outside the slot (the average car radio has a surround a few mm bigger). The unit could be made for a single DIN slot and be provided with spacers to fill a double DIN slot. The phone is 67 mm shorter than the DIN slot, leaving enough space for a volume control , digital display and some radio controls.

When the phone was not in place, the car would still have a working radio. With the phone plugged in there would be phone, MP3 and other functions provided via the touch screen. The car unit could be made at very low cost with simple analogue electronics, with all the sophisticated functions provided by the phone.

As the dashboard unit would only contain a minimum of electronics, it could be made about 5 mm deep and so could also be mounted on a flat surface or on a dashboard top mount, when a dashboard slot is not available. The unit could be made as a removable head, like some car radios. The same unit could then also be used as a desktop dock for the phone in the home or office, with some low cost speakers and a power supply attached.

See also:

• HTC Magic and accessories
• Books about Google Android

iPhone computer music concert, Canberra, 8 April 2009

The Australian National University will be hosting an experimental interactive computer music concert, using iPhones, 8pm, 8 April 2009. This is in the famous Room N101, CIST Building, ANU, North Road, Canberra:

As part of their projects in the area of Live Coding for Computer
Music, two of our PhD students will be presenting a concert tomorrow
evening (Wednesday 8th April) in N101 of the CS&IT building. This will be
the first in a series of concerts, tentatively badged as the "iMates"
series. Part of the concert will be a technical trial of audience
participation in music generation and, if you have an iPhone or iPod you
will be able to download software on the night and participate in this
event.

All are welcome. Enquiries to Ben.Swift(a)anu.edu.au

Just to clarify a few points:

- the concert starts at 8pm
- the series is tentatively called "inMates"
- you need to have an iPhone or an iPod Touch. Make sure they are fully
charged
- even if you don't have an iPhone or iPod Touch, the concert should be
interesting and enjoyable

Dr Henry Gardner
Reader and Head,
School of Computer Science
College of Engineering and Computer Science
Australian National UniversityCanberra ACT 0200 Australia
ANU CRICOS # 00120C

Parrot RK8200 iPod car radio

With "In dash iPhone for Car?" I suggested having a dashboard car radio with a slot for an iPhone. Parrot have done something like this with their RK8200 car stereo / Bluetooth hands-free kit. This looks like a dashboard media unit with a small colour screen and removable head. But underneath where you would expect to find a blank panel, there is a slot to put an iPod, MP3 player or mobile phone.

The iPod or phone is plugged into the Parrot with a short cable, the iPod is then slipped into the cavity in the dashboard unit and the control unit placed over the top. The iPod or phone is then operated via the Parrot's front panel controls. The unit includes a Bluetooth handsfree unit for calls and music can be played via the car's speakers.

This is a lot more complex and expensive that I was proposing. The Parrot RK8200 is £278.10 on Amazon UK. What I had in mind was a simple car radio which could use the display and controls of the iPhone for complex functions. Instead of this the Parrot provides its own controls, display and MP3 functions. This makes it a better integrated device, but increases the cost by about ten times.

Another problem with the Parrot is that a mobile phone may not work well when inside a slot in a car dashboard. It is not clear if the Parrot has provision for an external antenna and units such as the iPhone have no provision for one. A phone may not be able to connect to a base station inside a box in the dashboard.

Garmin nüvifone

Garmin have announced the "nüvifone", which is a sort of iPhone for sailors, with a 3.5-inch touchscreen GPS navigation and 3G mobile phone in a handheld gadget. It has a camera which will tag images with the latitude and longitude of where the photo was taken (but not what direction the camera was pointing). This can then be interfaced to Google’s Panoramio photo search. There are not a lot of specifications released about the unit, but I expect it will be much thicker than the iPod Touch (which is so slim I found it hard to hold). Also I expect we will see a lot more gadgets of this sort of device.

iPhone as a desktop PC replacement?

The Apple iPhone and iPod Touch both have DVI output and USB from the connector socket. In theory at least it should be possible to have a connector costing less than $100 to plug the Apple iPhone into a standard USB keyboard, mouse and VGA screen. This would allow the iPhone to be used as a web terminal. From the blogs I have read, the iPhone software doesn;t currently support standard keyboards and mice, .

Automatically Adjusting Web Pages for the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch

About a year ago I wrote about how to adapt web pages for devices, such as the iPhone for emergency management. One problem pointed out was that the iPhone does not think it is a handheld device and so does not activate a stylesheet intended for such a device (using media="handheld"). Daniel K. Appelquist quoted Apple's suggested code for using a special stylesheet for and iPhone:

link media="only screen and (max-device-width: 480px)" href="small-device.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet"

As he points out, this will not just detect iPhones, but any device with a screen width of 480 pixels or smaller. Few mobile devices have web browsers which support the media query syntax. Presumably this will work with an iPod Touch.

I have now included this in my code for "Adapting web pages for the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch". If someone would like to try that on an iPghone or iPod Touch, I can then advise the Sahana developers if they should include it in their system.

In dash iPhone for Car?

There are various holders for iPhones and iPod touches in cars, but no one so far seems to have thought to build it into the dashboard. Unlike the average smart phone or PDA, the iPhone and touch can be used in the landscape position. In this position, the screen is about the size and shape of a small entertainment/navigation screen in an upmarket car. Provide a low cost radio and amplifier with a socket for the iPhone to fit in the standard radio dashboard space and you could have a touch screen communications and entertainment system for under $US100 (not including the cost of the iPhone).

An example of this approach is the Eclipse AVN2210P: a dashboard media hub, with a removable TomTom navigation unit. This system got mixed reviews, some good and some bad. This is a large unit, so it will not fit some cars and it is designed to provide a CD and MP3 player, even without the TomTom installed and so is large and expensive. But a similar device, smaller and cheaper, could be made for an iPhone.

An iPhone is 115×61×11.6 mm and the iPod touch is 110×61.8×8 mm. This is a bit taller than the standard slot in a car dashboard for a radio: 180 x 50 mm (the so called "DIN car radio size" DIN 75490 ISO 7736). The iPhone could be accommodated in a double DIN (180 x 100 mm panel) slot (as used by the Eclipse) or simply by having the iPod/iPhone protrude a few mm outside the slot (the average car radio has a surround a few mm bigger). The iPhone is 65 mm shorter than the DIN slot, leaving enough space for a volume control , digital display and some radio controls.

When the iPhone was not in place, the car would still have a working radio. With the iPhone plugged in there would be phone, MP3 and other functions provided via the touch screen. The car unit could be made at very low cost with simple analog electronics, with all the sophisticated functions provided by the iPhone.

As the dashboard unit would only contain a minimum of electronics, it could be made about 10 mm deep and so could also be mounted on a flat surface or on a dashboard top mount, when a dashboard slot is not available. The unit could be made as a removable head, like some car radios. The same unit could then also be used as a desktop dock for the iPhone in the home or office, with some low cost speakers and a power supply attached.

The iPhone does not have a GPS receiver built in. However, the connector on the iPhone includes a USB interface and so the docking unit could pass these signals through to a USB connector for use with an inexpensive external USB GPS receiver. Alternatively a Bluetooth GPS receiver could be used (the iPod touch lacks Bluetooth, but has USB).

See also:

• Eclipse AVN2210p CD receiver with detachable TomTom portable navigator
• Books about the iPhone
• iPhone and iPod Touch Accessories
• iPhone Car Mounts
  
• iPod Touch Car Mounts