Mobile Command Evolution

A dedicated team of senior officers from London Fire Brigade has been involved in developing the command support vehicle project. Having developed an advanced specification, the team drew up and tested designs for the vehicle’s internal layout and the technology suite with which it would be equipped. Strong emphasis was placed on providing sufficient space for collaborative working in a multi-agency environment, both inside the vehicle using a plasma touch screen and using a side-mounted, plasma touch screen on the outside of the vehicle. Tablet PCs, wifi and other technologies will also be used to distribute essential command information to headquarters, incident, operations and sector commanders through mapping, graphics, live imagery and organisational charts.

Original story

In a crisis, the right decision needs to be made quickly. At the core of this is effective communication, particularly in the middle of a major incident. Whilst software delivers the essential communcation tools, it will only work with a stable network and hardware infrastructure designed to cope with the demands placed upon it by the software and it's users.

It's symbiotic, there's little point in having one without the other, which is why we prefer to act as a technology partner with software providers: first understanding the project objectives and the software requirements and working together to deliver a reliable solution that works, especially when there's no margin for failure.

Digital Signage Stands Up

Big is beautiful, right? Well, according to some sources, small is the new big. Signage needn't always be about how big you can go (bearing in mind we're currently working on an installation for three, 100" window projection systems). When you listen hard, sometimes you might just hear what's really needed.

I'm currently developing a display stand that incorporates digital signage, without losing the punch and appeal of the technology.

There are a number of ways to approach the problem, again depending on the client requirement: is a full signage software solution required? Or just a simple device that is network independent and can feed content from flash media or a USB pen-drive?

How about either? Watch this space.

Come and Play!

For the second year running, TECknowledge is proud to support the Summer Show at HMS Sultan near Gosport, Hampshire on the weekend of the 23rd and 24th of June.

It's a traditional summer family event with motor cycle, helicopter and parachute display teams, a circus and lots more besides. We're cramming a heap of technology in to a 12m x 12m tent and having some fun for the weekend. Bring the family along and come and see us - we'd love to see you!

Amongst the technologies, we'll be showing the latest in Full HD Projection and Plasma and LCD flat screens (even weatherproof ones), home cinema, the latest in gaming, D-Link's MediaLounge, and even football and teddy-bear televisions (yes, really).

And if you can't make it, keep an eye on this blog for a full report.

Communication and Motivation

Recently, we were engaged by a business seeking to improve internal communication and motivate some 80 staff in a large, open office space.

Software applications were already in place to manage work-flow and reporting was relatively easy for management to obtain on demand. However, staff weren't always aware of how the rest of their team were performing., let alone the performance of the wider company. Often, this took the form of meetings which took the resource away from it's core objectives.

The solution? A software tool that analyses data in their database in real-time, configured around a set of performance indicators configured to suit.

So how to communicate those stats to staff? Connect in a server to drive the software and to output the resulting dashboard to a display screen: that's where TECknowledge comes in.

Our solution used a number of LCD flat screens to make the information available to all staff on the sales floor. There's an issue here though: you can only reliably run a VGA cable around 15 metres (depending on who you ask!). To overcome this, we proposed the use of VGA extenders, converting audio and video output from a single source to present content on a number of different screens, making use of existing CAT-5 cabling to carry the data before converting it back for screen connection without any degradation of quality of signal.

Peer pressure is an especially powerful force because it is so subtle.

Jim Rohn

D-Link DSM-520 MediaLounge

I've been waiting a while for a product like this. In keeping with the convergence occurring across the IT and AV industries, a number of manufacturers have grasped the nettle and created technology that will enable you to enjoy on your TV and hi-fi, media more often now stored as MP3 or AVI files on the PCs around your home.

It was inevitable wasn't it? Tracks topping the charts on downloads alone proves that downloading is the medium of choice for the market. That being the case, surely you'd want to play those same files through the hifi system you've spent a decent amount of cash on?

Apple has it's Apple TV product, and D-Link has created the DSM-520 Media Lounge (there are others, too). Unlike Apple TV, the 520 doesn't store any media on the device itself, merely streaming content from the devices already present on your network.

To be fair, I was a little dubious about streaming quality, particularly of video. In fact, the unit performed extremely well even though I only connected it using the poor quality composite cables out of the box. I didn't detect any degredation in signal quality of either audio or video, or the constant buffering that occurs when watching video online.

The feature I found most enjoyable though, surprisingly, were the photo functions: using the 520, I played an MP3 album and navigated off to the photos stored on my PC and had the unit play a slideshow. In an unlikely way, the convenience of digital photography also means that most of the holiday snaps and kids' birthday memories are buried out of sight in a directory on the PC somewhere and rarely see the light of day: this unit brought them to life, much like having a 43" digital photo frame in my lounge.

Overall, it delivers what it set's out to and is only let down a little by the user interface which is functional rather than pretty. I expected to see album artwork and thumbnails of pictures and video instead of just a pageable list: I could just imagine the trauma of an extremely large music or movie collection even with the search function. Perhaps that's expecting just a little too much?

A Venue with Quality Values Values a Quality Solution

A local sports club needed to improve the television experience offered to its members.

Core Objective: Quality. It is important to deliver a solution that is compliant with the business objectives: in this case a venue that prides itself on quality.

Pioneer represented the most aesthetically pleasing plasma unit coupled with a commercial, on-site warranty, but needed something a little extra with audio.

Speakers on plasma screens just aren't made to project sound in large spaces, let alone large spaces full of members having a few beers. To address this, our solution included an amplifier, and good quality KEF speakers that could be flush-mounted in the ceiling. Four of these were used to cover a larger area of the bar, rather than project using a single pair.

So why not buy a cheaper consumer plasma? For a screen to be running in excess of 12 hours each day, seven days per week, it is important to choose a screen that is built for the job. Couple that with an on-site warranty that means the client won't suffer the embarrassment of being without a screen for weeks on end in the event of a failure, a consumer plasma really is out of the question.