MS Mobile Platform Devices

The Advanced User Research Annotation System (AURA) from Microsoft Research (still in beta) is a dispatch loop manager for mobile devices that can work with a variety of sensors to collect data.

Accelerometers, Bluetooth beacons, cell towers, GPS devices and RFID tags are all examples of sensors that can provide data to a mobile device for consumption by a central application. The AURA project’s goal is to give developers an application framework that can forward the collected data and metadata to a central server, for monitoring or archival purposes.

The prototype is a Web application that allows users to scan product bar codes on a Windows Mobile Phone, which then contacts the Web services that identify the product. The Web service collects the available metadata and launches a browser window on the device that provides the user with more information about the product. They can then provide their own feedback on the item through the AURA community Web site, or view the comments of others.

Potentially AURA extends far beyond supply-chain management. Oil exploration is one example of an industry that had particularly acute requirements for interactive mobile data collection. Discrete manufacturing, processes industries, environmental sampling, mobile testing of any kind, insurance adjustment, and security & defense could be other arenas for this platform.

The AURA client is available at the project Web site, at aura.research.microsoft.com/Aura; registration is required to use the prototype application.

But I could not register - I am apparently unable to type in the code on the registration page correctly. But I could download the client. However, since I do not have access to a smart phone or WIN-CE device I could not get much out of it.

There is a PDF file available @: AURA Demo Application