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What project do you wish you had the time, the resources and the knowledge to build?

dougw

This is not a question about what is on your bucket list, since I think of a bucket list as things you might actually do. But you could mention bucket list projects as well. To keep save-the-world mega-projects off the list for now, it should be a project you could do mostly yourself.
Do you want to build an autonomous solar powered boat to take you around the world, how about a solar powered aircraft, how about a completely self-sufficient off-grid dwelling complete with automated greenhouse, how about the ultimate gaming computer with an 18 core i9, or how about a full AI system to discuss politics with, or a robot to do all your chores for you.
Personally I would like to build a humanoid android robot just for the challenge of making it seem human, not trying to make it better than a human.

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  • The year was 2011, near 2012, and I had an idea.

    I was fed up of sitting down and using a monitor, keyboard and mouse. Repetitive strain injury got in the way and I just wanted to use something that felt more organic. Reminiscing about Virtual Reality headsets I'd used before, P5 Gloves and similar, along with full body tracking of Microsoft's Kinect for the XBox 360 and hearing about the Oculus Rift, and the OCZ NIA, I had project ideas.

    image

    What if we tracked the person in the room, and the person supplemented this tracking with muscle readouts using a neural headband.

    image

    Perhaps it'd use cameras in the corners of the room, some fancy maths with the cross-sections could simply work out what it can or can't see, it could also do real-time texture mapping with the cameras if we need to.

    image

    Though there's some overlap here, there'd be far too much data!

    Of course. Time continued and the Oculus Rift came out, and then I hear Valve Software start working on VR - and I notice that they visited my blog (via IP tracking) where I posted these concept images.

    Then there were rumors of a Valve VR headset,

    image

    and HTC steps up with the HTC Vive, which has BASE STATIONS.

    image

    And body tracking!

    image

    And Valve turn-up with finger tracking!

    image

    Meanwhile, Facebook gives up on the brain interface route: https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/07/14/1028447/facebook-brain-reading-interface-stops-funding/ - while squatting on the patents.

    And that leads me to think it hasn't solved the last problem of VR, which is locomotion tracking.

    So that's the project(s) that have sat in the back of my mind. Human-to-VR interfaces, and solving what I call "the keyboard and mouse problem".

  • in reply to cstanton

    That's a widespread problem - a fast, intuitive, high bandwidth, interface between man and machine... the quasi good news is that so many companies and researchers are working on it right now that it will probably get better in the near future. The quasi bad news is that it may be quite a while before it really gets great. I am mandated to stay abreast of these technologies for my job, and I find it amazing how much technology is harnessed to tackle this problem, with pretty limited results.

    I actually have a P5 squirreled away in a cupboard, procured back when I was designing physiotherapy instrumentation, in this case to explore muscle and gesture controls.

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  • in reply to cstanton

    That's a widespread problem - a fast, intuitive, high bandwidth, interface between man and machine... the quasi good news is that so many companies and researchers are working on it right now that it will probably get better in the near future. The quasi bad news is that it may be quite a while before it really gets great. I am mandated to stay abreast of these technologies for my job, and I find it amazing how much technology is harnessed to tackle this problem, with pretty limited results.

    I actually have a P5 squirreled away in a cupboard, procured back when I was designing physiotherapy instrumentation, in this case to explore muscle and gesture controls.

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