Monday, August 21, 2006

Need your ideas...

Hi all,

Been thinking for some time on making use of my limited electronic knowledge to build some kind of tools that would assist the elderly or the handicapped. Maybe I shouldn't sound so noble...let's just say, tools that may help us by automating certain task so as to make our life easier or maybe safer? Ok, this is the objective. Now I need your input on this. Write to me if you have any sort of ideas that we can brainstorm on.

For example -

Tool 1
I have started to use the IDD card to call back home in JB. To me the dialing of all those 1800 numbers with the id is pretty straightforward. But these simple procedure could be pretty daunting for the elderly. So perhaps we can automate this process and provide a single touch button for the parents to make a cheap distant call to the son or daughter. This is still in preliminary, and it may seems not practical too. So need your input on this. Are there any of you that have the knowledge of certain people not being able to make these types of call?

Tool 2
Personal alarm. Perhaps we can make a cheap alarm for the elderly that stays alone in the house. We can think about how the alarm can be activated. Perhaps, by the touch of a button which could be in several places of the house (toilet, kitchen, rooms, etc)? Or it could be activated by motion(lack of) detected in the house for a predefined period? And once activated, perhaps we can think of the method of notification? Let say, through a miss call to a preprogrammed handphone number? Siren? Lights?

Errr... what else? Of course there are many other considerations which may include the cost, its usefulness, and whether I am capable of turning the idea into a finished product (feasibility studies).

Please bear in mind that this is not an attempt to solicit ideas from the public. But it would be great if there are some really good ideas coming from these and some industrious and hardworking entreprenuer happen to pick up the ideas and send it to China to mass produce, resulting in a product 10 times cheaper, why not?

2 anak ayam bother to comments:

Anonymous said...

Hello Kaki Ayam,

This is very thoughtful that you'd such great intention to build some tools that benefit the public. In view that our society safety are so bad, especially snatch thief became the most dangerous threat to our beloved female friend, it could be great if there's tool which can make alert such that people can take earlier prevention before life being threated. My idea is, a tool that can sense or detect sound make by nearby motorbike, for example when the bike approach 10m away, it would alarm the holder such he/she can take precaution. Of course, it can be turn-off when travel on a JB custom to Singapore.

Kind Regards,
P.J.

Chicken Feet aka KaKiaYam said...

Hey P.J, very, very sorry for the late reply. Thanks for your suggestion, technically, this can be done. But I think it's usefulness is pretty limited. Allow me to explain. Technically, it will be easy to detect sound, but to be able to detect only the sound of motorbike will not be easy, considering that different bikes emit different sound types and at varying levels. From my experience, normal(not modified) bikes(scotters) are usually pretty quite. Only scooters that have its exhaust-pipe modified will emit loud, peace shattering noise. Sometimes I wonder, why wasn't that part be banned....

So, to be able to detect the sound of any motorbike 10 meters away is possible but will not be practical as it will result in many false alarm. It will be a compromise between sensitivity and accuracy. But I do agree that, if this tool is made it will be very useful in a very quite road, without much disturbance.

Having said that, the possible alternative will be motion detection instead of sound detection. The accuracy rate will be more acceptable. ehem... i don't have much experience in sound detection, but it shouldn't be any different from what is used in our reverse sensor. In fact, this method is actually much easier to implement that compared to sound detection.

Alright, will do some research on it's viability. Thank you for your ideas!!