Using The Wearable Computers In The

Construction Industry
ES SAM BE N - A SHOU R
AHME D ZURG A N I
HES HA M R I ZQ

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Index
•Introduction
•Wearable computer
•Xybernaut corporation
•Wearable computer in construction industry
•Issues of the constructor industry
• constructor industry attributes
•Objective of the research
• results of the research
•Comparison
•conclusion

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 Introduction
•Wearable computer: is a computer that can be worn on human body .

•Wearable computers could be anything from a small wrist mounted system to a

bulky head mounted display .

•The mobility and functionality has made it useful in many places where regular
computers could not be carried .

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 Wearable computer
•The term of wearable computer has been defines in several ways :

• According to MIT wearable computing lab , wearable computer is a computer that

should be worn much as “eye glasses or clothing” and interact with user based on the
context of the situation .

• NASA (National aeronautics and space administration) used the term body wearable
computer (BWC) which is battery-powered computer system worn on the user’s body
that has attributes like hands-free or limited hands on operation and provides features
for example head-mounted displays and speech input .

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 Wearable Real World Examples
•Medical (blood pressure , temperature , etc.)
o The device that monitors blood pressure is called “personal mobile hub” .

•Military (soldier Navigator Equipment which provides GPS and map display)

•Travel (city maps , GPS , etc.)

•Textiles (fabric keyboard , music player jacket)

•Jewelry / watch (rings ,necklace, watch)

•Construction industry (smart glasses , smart hard hat)

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 Xybernaut corporation
Xybernaut Corporation is a provider of wearable/mobile
computing hardware, software, and services. Its products included the
Atigo tablet PC, Poma wearable computer, and the MA-V wearable
computer

MA-V wearable computer Poma wearable computer Atigo tablet PC

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 Wearable computer in construction
industrial
•FIATECH : is a Research and Development firm that intends to
introduce wearable computer to the construction industry .

•FIATECH recorded the Activities of people in the field to understand

how their work is done and how it can be improved by using wearable
computers .

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 Issues in the
construction industry
•One of the major issues with the construction industry is that the site locations frequently change .

•This make IT support and integration for the construction industry more Difficult .

•Communication between the participants on a job site is difficult due to large number of
participants

•However , these kind of issues that make the wearable computer a very effective , efficient, useful
and beneficial tool for construction

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 Construction industry Wearable
computer attributes
•Devices must be accessible

•Light weight

•Easy to use

•Withstand all types of weather and environmental conditions

•Impact resistant

•Rechargeable batteries

•Etc .

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 The idea of
virtual site visit
•Two authors (mills & beliveau) proposed the idea virtual site visit using wearable computers .

•Virtual site visit : is a visit to a construction site in order to observe, evaluate, clarify , correct actions and
activities

•It occurs without the individuals actual physical presence .

•This is of great benefit because it :

1. Reduces the travel time
2. Increase project knowledge

3. Reduce cost to the owners , contractor , designer .

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 Objective of the research
•The objective of this research project is to test the wearable computers in a real life
situation .
•To see how this new technology could help construction professionals .
•For example comparing the different time required to perform the same amount of
work under different methods including :
1. By hand
2. By palm pc
3. By wearable computer

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 Wearable computer
used in the research
•It came from the department of building science .

•The Xybernaut computer or the mobile assistant will contain :

• 500 MHz intel Celeron processor
• 128-MB of RaM
• 2GB hard drive

•This technology can be worn in a vest or on a belt

•It will be able to run all major pc operating system (windows 2000 , Linux , etc.)

•The interaction with the computer will be made via a wrist-worn keyboard , touch screen or voice recognition
software

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 Results of the research
1) In the field testing : the electronic drawings are around 20 MB in total. This was not a big issue for our
wearable computer, which has two hard drives (2 GB in total storage capacity).
•But it was a huge burden for our Palm PC, which only has 8 MB storage.
2. Data access : with wearable computer , the electronic drawing were loaded as well as electronic version of
checklist to the wearable computer .
• the idea of electronic drawing didn’t apply to the palm pc at all since it doesn’t have the power to manipulate
electronic drawings , also the drawing view tool will take more than 4 MB and the palm pc has a storage of only
8 MB .
3. Date processing: wearable computer don’t require special applications loaded in order to process data , but
palm pc require special software to perform the same tasks .
•Password-protected digital signature was added to wearable computer , but with palm pc the document was
converted to word pad text file and all the macros were lost .
•In addition , the software installation process is also more complicated for palm

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 conclusion
•Wearable computer could be made smaller in size , easier to carry and having lighter cpu .

•the application of wearable computers in construction industry could offer improved

efficiency.

•the future researchers and developers should improve the performance and practicability
of the technology before it is widely accepted by construction industry professionals.

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