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Radar for Your Wrist

posted by martyb on Monday May 20 2019, @09:19PM   Printer-friendly
from the watch-it! dept.

Phoenix666 writes:

IEEE Spectrum:

Tired of trying to tap icons on small smartwatch screens? Some day you could just swipe right through the air above them thanks to miniaturized radar technology and its accompanying gesture recognition technology in development at imec, the Belgium-based R&D center.

Imec's radar chips operate at around 145 GHz, well above the bands used for car radar. That high up in the electromagnetic spectrum, the chip can take advantage of a full 10 gigahertz of bandwidth, which leads to millimeter-scale resolution, its inventors say.

"Gestures allow a lot of capabilities where screens are becoming too small for fine movements," says Kathleen Philips, program director for IoT at imec. "Radar is great for measuring movement; this particular radar is great for measuring micromovements."

If they combine this technology with a wand that must be swept in precise patterns, they will be richer than God.

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday May 20 2019, @09:29PM

    by fustakrakich (6150) on Monday May 20 2019, @09:29PM (#845646) Journal

    8mm right for "stun"
    9mm left for "kill"

    Better be careful when firing this thing.

    --
    La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..

  • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 20 2019, @09:36PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 20 2019, @09:36PM (#845650)

    ... at imec, the Belgi**-based R&D center.

    Have you no decency?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 20 2019, @10:32PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 20 2019, @10:32PM (#845659)

      You know that was only in Prudish America don't you? In the rest of the world the "Rory" is the award for The Most Gratuitous Use of the Word Fuck in a Serious Screenplay.

  • (Score: 2) by MostCynical on Monday May 20 2019, @10:24PM

    by MostCynical (2589) on Monday May 20 2019, @10:24PM (#845656) Journal

    at least they learned something from the Wii, making it like a watch.

    Remember to take it off, if you don't want to draw sine waves on a monitor..

    --
    "I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex

  • (Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday May 20 2019, @10:27PM (4 children)

    by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Monday May 20 2019, @10:27PM (#845657) Journal

    Why would radar be better than lidar, especially at infra-red wave lengths? And IR should miniaturize more readily.

    There might, however, be other use cases, where radar would be more appropriate.

    --
    Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 20 2019, @10:38PM (3 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 20 2019, @10:38PM (#845661)

      Imagine how this thing will drain your battery since it will be running all the time.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 20 2019, @11:04PM (2 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 20 2019, @11:04PM (#845665)
        No matter. It's useless because human hands are not precise enough, especially at the wrist. Nobody is going to wear this thing, and there won't be receivers for its signals. At best this could be rebuilt into a scanning radar for the blind.

        • (Score: 3, Interesting) by bob_super on Tuesday May 21 2019, @12:57AM

          by bob_super (1357) on Tuesday May 21 2019, @12:57AM (#845685)

          Amputees, degenerative diseases, quadraplegics ... there's a decent number of applications for fine motion tracking, which seem useless/cumbersome/tiring to the people with ten fingers.

        • (Score: 3, Funny) by takyon on Tuesday May 21 2019, @01:27PM

          by takyon (881) <{takyon} {at} {soylentnews.org}> on Tuesday May 21 2019, @01:27PM (#845788) Journal

          Amputate both arms. Replace with robot arms. Embed smartwatch into robot arm with big battery.

          --
          [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by takyon on Tuesday May 21 2019, @02:14PM

    by takyon (881) <{takyon} {at} {soylentnews.org}> on Tuesday May 21 2019, @02:14PM (#845807) Journal

    Without a holographic screen or projection, it still sucks. Give it a virtual 10-inch screen instead of 1.5 inch.

    --
    [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 22 2019, @12:53AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 22 2019, @12:53AM (#846003)

    Gestures allow a lot of capabilities where screens are becoming too small for fine movements

    Oh great, more changes in web UI frameworks. Just when I get used to Bootstrap, Wristrap comes along.

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