ANS TechGlance

There must be a variety of leading edge technologies and components required for Smart Grid which is recently assumed as the next generation electric power distribution network. Electric power has been supplied by an electric power company to every building or facility wherever needed. "Internet" is often used as an analogy of Smart Grid since various information generators are connected to the internet . In this context, the electric power supply network has been used as "down load" only while Smart Grid will enable us to download and upload of the electricity for multiple directions as the information traffic flows on the internet . An important difference from Internet , however, Smart Grid has to assure stable and continuous power supply without no delay. No "Best Effort" is allowed on Smart Grid. Smart Grid sounds pretty smart and beautiful as written and pronounce. However a huge amount of new technologies and efforts for standardizat...

There are many companies that focus on assisting people in enhancing quality of life. KGS Corporation founded in 1953 keeps developing and suppying new ideas of products for visually impaired persons. Braille Memo, BM16, as an example, looks an excellent device of portable notebook with which a user can take a memo at anyplace anytime. According to the product description, it equips convenient accessories functions such as a clock, an electronic calculator and a calendar that enable a user to manage indispensable information on daily basis. Electrical communications interface of BM16 is reportedly limited to RS232C. More compact and handy type of Braille Memo Pocket seems to be available now, and it has USB and Bluetooth interfaces, so that wireless communications capability is obviously available between the pocket sized Braille memo device and a personal computer. This type of devices are not showy but very important technology products to help us improve our lives in the so...

A book I recently read reminded me that Dr. Ken Sakamura proposed and had been taking the leadership for Open Architecture, foreseeing the Ubiquitous Computing era, we are now stepping into, for quite a long time up until now. It was, he says in the book, 30 years ago and away back of Linux. In 1984, when he started TRON Project, (TRON stands for The Real-time Operating system Nucleus), he earnestly advocated the concept of Open Architecture. Being in the Ubiquitous or Pervasive computing era, TRON plays key roles in various fields, such as mobile phone systems, consumer electronics, automobile navigation systems, and so on. TRON will be continuously enhanced and applied to more products and systems which will be newly developed in the future. TRON is just one of many things Japanese developed. Believing that new innovation will be continuously made and delivered from Japan, I’m in a happy feeling tonight. I wish if I were an innovator…. 9/26/07