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Windows 7 Sensors Framework interview from PDC
During my time at PDC, I managed to speak with many people knowledgeable about various aspects of Windows 7. One of these people was Dan Polivy, a lead on the team behind the new Windows 7 sensors framework which was mentioned a number of times during the old days when Windows 7 speculation was rampant. Dan and I carried an informative interview regarding a number of functions of the Windows 7 sensors framework, including topics such as how easy it might be for a user to receive sensor data from sensors which are plugged into the framework as well as what one could do with various forms of sensor data, such as locational input from WiFi triangulation and GPS signals.
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You can catch 720p and 1080p download links as well as an embedded version (via Vimeo) after the break. All videos are x264/MP3 in AVI containers.
Update (Sunday, Nov. 8, 2008): If you have yet to see the interview, a… “reasonably good incentive” embedded within the video is now live.
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Tags: Exclusive, Interviews, PDC, Polivy, Sensors, Windows 7
November 5th, 2008 at 5:05 am
[...] Video [...]
November 5th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
[...] everything from its touch support, to its ability to interact directly with sensors using a new Sensor software development kit. Sinofsky showed off the Device Stage feature of Windows 7, which is aimed at making it easier for [...]
November 7th, 2008 at 1:25 am
actually in my online pursuits i found a program that quite literally turns any windows mobile 5 or 6 phone with built in gps module into a visible gps unit for a windows computer (as in one you could use with streets and trips or any other gps program) so this would effectively kill the need for the windows 7 goodness he spoke of in the driver model stuff, however it would also mean that windows 7 exposes a lot more power with the use of a gps than earlier versions of windows that didn’t have all the cool location api’s.
http://franson.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3968
Also more relevantly on topic I once read about a guy at Microsoft who had his email and computer tied to his presence. It would monitor his keyboard, webcam and microphone and if he was away for a set period of time it would auto reply back to emails or forward them to his cell or even give a reply with his cell phone number if it was someone he replied back to a lot (looked at frequency) this is just one of the many things i imagine these api’s would be good for.
November 7th, 2008 at 6:28 am
Well, Nexus, maybe Dan Polivy didn’t articulate that well, but:
there are lots of problems with existing GPS devices connected to Windows:
1. as these devices are (not all but mostly) using NMEA proprietary format to provide information, apps need to pay for NMEA and know its different implementations which leads to increasing costs of dev/support/licensing
Windows Location Platform gives free open APIs standard for all APIs eliminating need for end-apps to know NMEA and lots of it implementations
2. as these devices are connected via COM, only one app can use location data at one time
Windows Location Platform enables concurrent access to several apps at the same time
3. for now, only GPS devices are widely used, without GPS location-aware apps do not work
in Windows Location Platform we have support for different location sensors (read providers):
GPS
IP Geo Location
Wi Fi Triangulation
Cell Tower Triangulation
and virtually any new kind of a location provider
and if you do not happen to have any of the below solutions, you can still use “Default Location Provider” which enables user to enter his location into one place where it will be then used by every app
I think these arguments are enough to understand why Location Platform is an innovation for Windows versus just NMEA-custom implemented devices.