YTechnology

This September, the Star Trek television series debuts with Enterprise. I happen to like all the Star Trek series because it describes optimistically what could be in our future. It's not just about advances in technology, but also in medicine, philosophy, and the human spirit. Returning to the present, it reminds me how much work needs to be done to improve our society as a whole and in computing in particular. The late Michael L. Dertouzos, director of MIT labs for Computer Science, believed access to information should be as seamless as breathing, hence MIT's futuristic computing infrastructure named Oxygen. Details can be found on MIT's Lab For Computer Science website . An excellent article also appeared in the August 1999 issue of Scientific American . Basically, Oxygen involves eight novel technologies: a handheld computer, wall and trunk computers, a novel net, built-in speech understanding, knowledge access, collaboration, automation, and customization. The bind...

There are three words in the English language that end with 'gry.' One is hungry and the other is angry. What is the third word? So went the riddle. Pulling out my Palm VII, I tapped on the Merriam-Webster Palm Query Application (pqa) and searched for "*gry." Wirelessly, the pqa delivered not three, but only two words: "angry" and "hungry." Humph. Riddles shouldn't be taken literally. My wife and I were shopping at Crate and Barrel where she spied a book on cooking. "It would make a perfect gift for a co-worker," she said. Pulling out my Palm VII, I tapped on the Amazon pqa and searched for the book by title. A few moments later, I said "Look. It's cheaper from Amazon.com." She bought it at Crate and Barrel anyway, saying something about shipping charges and needing to give the gift the next day. During an eye exam, the ophthalmologist dilated my pupils. This blurred my vision and made my eyes sensitive to light -- effec...