Will we be able to cope with the invisible computer?
by Paul Anderson, TechWatch
March 2006
Nearly twenty years ago Mark Weiser of Xerox PARC outlined a new vision for computing, one in which the computer disappears from view and becomes pervasive, embedded into our urban environments, our clothes and even our bodies (Weiser, 1991). Mark Weiser died before his dream of a 'calm technology', melting into the background of our lives, could be realised but his vision - ubiquitous computing - has become one of the guiding aspirations of the computing community and has opened up a new frontier for research.
The scale and complexity of the technology involved in ubicomp raises a fundamental question: will we be able to understand it? It is certainly a question exercising Professor Robin Milner, the noted Cambridge computer theoretician. Ubicomp has become one of the six Grand Challenges of computer science that are being overseen by the UK Computing Research Committee (UKCRC). These challenges are key goals in computer science that will take a decade or two of co-ordinated research to realise. This short TechWatch report summarises the recent British Computer Society's Computer Journal Lecture on the Grand Challenge of Ubiquitous Computing which was given by Professor Milner. The report also asks what role education will have in the achievement of these Grand Challenges, and poses its own challenge to the education community - to make sure its voice is heard in these important, preliminary stages.