Actually, I hate all wires. Especially when I consider the constant battle involved in keeping mobile devices charged. Personally I use 5 battery operated devices in my daily life (two phones, two tablets and a laptop). They use four different types of chargers and it is a constant battle when I am on the road to keep them charged and working.
So you can understand why I hate wires of any sort. Cut them I say ...
So what about wireless technology then?
Well WiDi turned out to been one of those game changing technologies that just never got enough traction. The fact that I could be a teacher operating in a classroom with a tablet and have full HDMI-equivalent control of my projector or television screen in the classroom seems like a brilliant solution.
I mean, consider that you could:
- Better manage a classroom by being present and mobile
- Better address the challenges of direct instruction
- Provide immediacy in student feedback (I remember the joy the first time I took a picture of a student piece of work and annotated it on the screen for all to see)
- Speed up the logging in and logging on processes of going into multiple classrooms
Ultimately, however, WiDi just hasn't taken off with most practitioners. There are innumerable reasons why, but many of them are issues to do with the complications and limitations of wireless technology. However, in the second half of this year the wireless world is going to change just a little when it comes to these wireless technologies
Here are two trends and the reasons why you might want to watch this space:
Wireless standards - many of us know of 802.11ac, the new (faster) iteration of the longstanding 802.11 wireless standard. Broadly speaking, 802.11ac offers significant bandwidth improvement over 802.11n (the most common standard). However, it is the new 802.11ad standard which I am interested in. This standard is also known as Wireless Gigabit (WiGi) connectivity. WiGi operates in different bandwidth (60Ghz) than the other 802 standards. And it has a specific purpose - wireless docking. Wireless docking will be an interesting new tool for teachers battling the cable. Consider this scenario:
Abby arrives in Industrial Technology (Multimedia) class and pops her tablet on the table. She syncs wirelessly with her allocated work station, equipped with a large format monitor, full sized keyboard and mouse. She is able to use these to work on her major project for her her HSC course.
So what? We've now made docking a simple single solution that requires hardware specific to the chipset rather than the device manufacturer. This means that you can dock any device that is 802.11ad compliant with a 80211ad compliant dock. Like WiDi it is likely that the dock will be the key, with desirable features like password protected docking being favoured over open devices. This has the potential to save hundreds of dollars in cabling, as well as the concurrent clutter and potential electrical dangers.
- Wireless charging - I've used Qi wireless charging for a few years now on my Nokia Windows Phones. It was great to simply drop my phone on my desk and have it charge without worrying about wires or cables. However, QI isn't the only solution on the market with another interesting offer being Rezence . Rezence is a wireless charging solution promising amongst other things - fast and efficient wireless charging, real world charging (i.e. ignoring cases, keys, other devices, etc), multi device charging. More importantly, almost all the big chipset manufacturers are on board for this standard. Consider this scenario in schools:
Jane goes to her desk. She puts her tablet on her desk as it wirelessly docks (see scenario above). As she does, the tablet starts to wirelessly charge via the wireless charging mat on her desk. Within a few minutes it has quickly restored the bulk of her batteries potential thanks to efficient charging techniques.
Abby's tablet battery is low as she forgot to charge it the night before. At recess Abby goes to a special charging station in the playground, a solar assisted gazebo with a wireless charging surface. She, like other students, spend recess charging their devices at the solar-powered charging station. While she eats her recess her tablet quickly gains
So what? Charging has been a misshapen and haphazard affair with multiple cables and requirements. If Rezence or one of the other formats can become standard, we can simplify charging down to a wireless desk space. This will improve safety and reduced cabling costs.
Where to next? Well, WiGi offers some tantalising future potential. Here is just one scenario.
Jane is a teacher of Industrial Technology Multimedia and although her tablet does a good job at most tasks, it struggles with the processing required be some of the software she uses. However, when Jane gets to her desk her tablet wirelessly docks with an external graphics processing unit which houses a fast desktop-oriented graphics card. Also connected is a large format screen and other input peripherals. Jane now has the capabilities of a high power desktop unit, utilising her existing tablet. All the while the wireless charging pad keeps her tablet topped up.
Abby likes playing computer games, but her mother doesn't like her playing them in her room. Abby's tablet isn't powerful enough to run the games itself, but when connected to the WiGi dock in the family study she is able to use the dock to boost her tablet's processing power and enable her to play her favourite MMORPG game. All the while the wireless charging pad keeps her tablet topped up.
Get me point? How long before our phone is our access point and different physical locations are designed for different purposes. I can sit at my desk and without removing my phone answer communications and collaborate with others. I can then move to a workshop and use the increased processing power and input peripherals to design and create. My device never changes, but uses other technology to boost its capabilities for the purposes of that task.
It's a brave new world kids! Now ... where did I put my wirecutters...
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