Progressive Web Apps (PWA for short) use web technology to build apps that look like native apps. These apps offer user functionality like working offline, push notifications and can access device hardware traditionally available only to native mobile applications. Why should I care? In contrast to native apps, they cost less to build, since you...
Category: Technology
It’s not Artificial Intelligence, it’s a new level of automation
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is probably the topic right now in computer science. There is a ongoing public discourse whether we’ll see machine overlords in the near future or not. People like Elon Musk spoke of regulating AI to make sure that the human race survives. If you look at the current state of AI and...
The Shopping Avatar
Broadly defined, an “avatar” is a virtual being that represents a user in a virtual environment. This encompasses not only complex beings created for use in online gaming but any visual representation of a user in an online community [1]. However, avatars are most popular in online gaming, since they represent successful feats of users...
How Physical Stores become more like Online Stores
The US retail chain Nordstrom started to experiment with a small concept store that focuses on services and that doesn’t stock any inventory. It is a familiar concept that other many other businesses have used in the past: they created showrooms for their customers to try out their products. What has changed, however, is the...
Smart Environments = Edge Computing + Bots + AI
The concept of smart environments can regarded as byproduct of pervasive computing with a strong focus on the interaction of humans and technology. Generally speaking, a smart environment is a physical world that is richly and invisibly interwoven with sensors, actuators, displays, and computational elements, embedded seamlessly in the everyday objects of our lives, and...
Is EDGE Computing the next logical step in computing?
In the comparably brief history of modern computing (70+ years or so) we went through several transformations. Without making a claim to be complete: we saw large single server systems (mainframe client-server systems) with dumb terminals, witnessed the personal desktop computer revolution in the 1970ies and 1980ies, the rise of the Web in the 1990ies...
The end of the checkout area in brick and mortar stores
With companies like Amazon actively pursing their version of the future brick and mortar store, one thing is certain: a dedicated checkout area will be a thing of the past. The checkout process of the (very near) future won’t require point of sale systems. People will just take the items they want to buy and...
EDGE Computing in Retail
As EDGE computing matures, we will see a broad adoption in retail – actually I’d go as far to say that it is simply inevitably. And here’s why. In times, where timing is everything, businesses cannot afford to miss opportunities to communicate with customers at the right time. Imagine a customer passing your shop. With...
Self-Checkout in Brick and Mortar Stores
A crucial part of every customer journey is the checkout process. Imagine for a minute that the online checkout would mimic the process that customers experience every day in brick and mortar stores. The resulting checkout process would require several steps that are awkward, to say the least. First of all, you’ll have to move...
Why EDGE Computing is hot
If you followed a recent announcements of the big IT companies like Microsoft, Google, Apple, Facebook or Amazon odds are that you heard a lot about Artificial Intelligence, Conversational Interfaces, Natural Language Processing or Augmented/Virtual Reality. There seems to be a consent among these companies that we’ll see intelligent assistants built into all kind of...
