engineering

IvanAnywhere

IvanAnywhere is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand IvanAnywhere rather than just read about it. In short: IvanAnywhere is a simple, remote-controlled telepresence robot created by Sybase iAnywhere programmers to enable their co-worker, Ivan Bowman, to efficiently remote work. The robot enables Bowman to be virtually present at conferences and presentations, and to discuss product development with other developers face-to-face.

Key takeaways

IvanAnywhere belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect IvanAnywhere to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of IvanAnywhere from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

IvanAnywhere is a simple, remote-controlled telepresence robot created by Sybase iAnywhere programmers to enable their co-worker, Ivan Bowman, to efficiently remote work. The robot enables Bowman to be virtually present at conferences and presentations, and to discuss product development with other developers face-to-face. IvanAnywhere is powered by SAP's mobile database product, SQL Anywhere.

IvanAnywhere evolution Ivan Bowman has been a software developer at Sybase/iAnywhere/SAP since 1993, and now is an Engineering Director at SAP Canada. In 2002 his wife received a job in Halifax approximately 2,000 km (1,200 mi) from his place of work in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, North America. His employers allowed him to remote work initially via email, instant messenger, and phone. Using speakerphone during meetings was less than ideal because Ivan could not see his co-workers' visual communication clues, or what they wrote on the white board. The first solution was a stationary webcam with a speaker, which was kept in the corner of the office. The problem with this method was that the webcam was just that – stationary. Ivan could not see people if they were not standing near the webcam. More frustrating, perhaps, was that Ivan could hear distant conversations through the webcam's microphone, but was unable to contribute to the conversation if the impromptu meeting did not take place in his visual range.

Proof of concept In November 2006, iAnywhere programmer Ian McHardy and Director of Engineering Glenn Paulley (Ivan’s immediate manager) conceived the idea of IvanAnywhere after Glenn saw a television commercial for a remote controlled toy blimp. In January 2007, after considering different possible designs and getting through a number of deadlines related to iAnywhere releases, Ian started working on a proof-of-concept: a tablet computer and webcam mounted on a radio-controlled toy truck. In February 2007, even though the truck was challenging to drive and the webcam was only a few inches above the floor, Ivan was able to successfully drive the proof-of-concept from Halifax.

Full version In May 2007, Ivan started using Ian's full version daily. The full version of IvanAnywhere consists of a wheeled base with 24-volt SuperDroid Robots motors. The motor and wheel assemblies support "tank drive" so that Ivan can negotiate through doorways and meeting rooms more easily. Above the motors sits a box filled with wires, various electronics, and batteries which power the robot for a full work day. The entire robot weighs approximately 40 kg or 88 Pounds. A 1.5 meter (5 foot) aluminum bar supports a webcam with a gray foam ball mounted above it. The robot is equipped with a webcam, speakers, microphone, and a tablet computer with a live feed from Bowman's webcam to help coworkers to communicate with him more naturally. Infrared proximity sensors keep the robot from bumping into walls and cubicles. The tablet PC mounted on IvanAnywhere runs a SQL Anywhere database server. One of the tasks of the SQL Anywhere database is to retain monitoring statistics on a wide variety of controls and sensors on the robot. This is so that Ian can monitor how far the robot travels in any particular period, how many times the proximity sensors have halted the robot's motion, the robot's network connectivity uptime, and other related statistics. Ivan "drives" the robot from his home office in Halifax using a two-joystick PC gaming console. One joystick controls the webcam, the other the robot's drive system. In October 2007, a digital camera was mounted on the bar so that Ivan could take high-resolution pictures of whiteboards, presentation slides, and overheads, or just look out the window. The robot needs to be recharged at the end of every work day. Until recently, this required a Waterloo co-worker to plug it in before leaving for the night. In May 2008, Ian constructed a charging bay out of lumber that Ivan "drives" into - copper bars attached to the robot connect to copper springs on the charging unit which are directly connected to the battery charger and enabled through a relay circuit so that the charging bars are not live unless the robot is in the bay. The charging bay permits Ivan to recharge the robot at his convenience, and without assistance. IvanAnywhere is very popular with other people in the building and the SAP Engineering floor has become a regular stop on visitor tours of the SAP building.

Challenges of Being a Robot Although most of Bowman's colleagues treat IvanAnywhere as one of their own, people who aren't used to the robot are sometimes uncomfortable talking to it instead of a human being.

See also Computer-supported collaboration Homeshoring

References

Bibliography THE GLOBE AND MAIL, Careers section, July 11, 2008 Christian Science Monitor: Send Your Robot To Work YES Mag - Featured in the "Robot replacement" article (p. 7) of Jan/Feb 2008 edition of YES Mag The Record: Meet IvanAnywhere Guardian Unlimited: The Worker You Have to Plug In The Chronicle Herald: Ivan the mobile

External links IvanAnywhere's YouTube channel Video: Episode 1 - 2008: A Sybase Odyssey Video: Episode 2 - IvanAnywhere gets a puppy Video: Episode 3 - IvanAnywhere meets Ivan Video: Episode 4 - IvanAnywhere's Performance Review Video: Techwave 2008 'From the Inside' competition CBC Radio: Nora Young interviews Ivan on 6 September 2012 Design Engineering Archived 2010-12-27 at the Wayback Machine SuperDroid Robots Annotated image of IvanAnywhere

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with IvanAnywhere

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what IvanAnywhere claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to IvanAnywhere before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about IvanAnywhere ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of IvanAnywhere

In research: IvanAnywhere appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses IvanAnywhere in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: IvanAnywhere is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Biorobotics, Prototype robots, Telecommunications equipment, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for IvanAnywhere outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study IvanAnywhere in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what IvanAnywhere means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain IvanAnywhere out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is IvanAnywhere in simple terms?

Why does IvanAnywhere matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study IvanAnywhere?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on IvanAnywhere.