What to program for a gadget that can deduce what I'm doing? The ultimate life-hack?

Question

This isn't really a programming question, more of an ideas question. Bear with me.

My sister gave me a well-used Nokia N95. I don't really need it, but I wanted it to do some programming for it. It supports a few languages, of which I can do Python.

My question is this: what to do with it? If I think about it, it has a lot to offer: i can program the GPS, motion sensor, wireless internet, sound and visual capture; it has a lot of hard disk space, it plays sound and video and so on.

The combinations seem limitless. The way I see it, it is a device that is easily always on me, has access to a huge data repository (the internet, and my personal data in it) and can be aware if I'm sitting at home, at work, or moving about somewhere. It could basically read my google calendar to check if I should be somewhere I'm not -- perhaps give me the bus schedule to get to where I should be. It could check if it's close to my home and therefore my home PC bluetooth/wifi. Maybe grab my recent work documents from my desktop computer, along with the latest Daily Show, for the bus journey to work. It could check my library account to see if any of my books are due, and remind me to take them with me in the morning. Set up an alarm clock based on what shift I have marked in my google calendar.

Basically I have a device that can analyze my movements in time (calendars with my data etc) and space (gps, carrier cell ids). By proxy, it could identify context situations -- I can store my local grocery store gps coordinates or cell mast ids and it could remind me to bring coffee.

Like I said, the possibilities seem limitless, and therefore baffling. Does anyone else have these pseudofantastical yearnings to program something like this? Or any similar ideas? How could this kind of device integrate into -- and help -- your life?

I'm hoping we could do some brainstorming :)

Answer 1

"Gotta Leave" - A reminder that figures out the bus time, how far you are from a stop on your bus and shows a countdown till you "Could" leave (green), "Should" Leave (yellow), "Must" leave (orange), and "Gotta Run to get there" (red).

As inputs it needs what bus number you want to ride. You turn it on, it finds you, finds your closest few bus stops, estimates your walking speed at 2/mph and calculates when you need to leave where you are to get to the bus with 5 minutes waiting or less.

Answer 2

This is the same problem I face with the android (albeit java instead of python). The potential is paralyzing :)

I'd recommend checking out what libraries have already been written for doing cool stuff on that phone, and then building off of them- It's a system that provides inspiration, direction, and a good head start. For instance, on the android side, I'm fooling around with "zxing", a library that lets you read barcodes via the cellphone's camera. That's it's own sub-universe of possibilities, but at least it gives me a direction to go. "do cool things with information about products physically nearby"

Answer 3

You should just pick any one and implement it.

It doesn't matter where you start, more that you actually do start. Don't concentrate on the destination, take a step and see what the journey holds.

Do it for a laugh to start and your expectation will be set right for both when you do find your killer app and when you don't.

Answer 4

"Late for Work" - Determines if you are not at work, buzzes you with a reminder and preps the phone to call into the sick line. Could be used if you are going to be late as well.

Inputs: Your sick line number. Time you should be at work. Where your home is, where your work is

Optional:

• Send a text message
• Post to an online in/out board
• If you are still at home, sound an alarm
• If you are still at home, call in sick, if you are not at home sent a "I'm going to be late" message

Comedy Option: - If you don't respond to ten alarms, dial 911

Answer 5

"Phone home" - an interface to report home if you send a message to your phone that it is lost / stolen. Must be a silent operation from the phone holder's perspective

Options:

• Self destruct mode to save your data from prying eyes
• Keep calling with it's location every 10 minutes until an unlock is sent indicating the phone is found.

Answer 6

To add on to what others have said, come up with some kind of office-GPS (via WiFi maybe? Does it have WiFi?) and tell you when you need to go to a meeting.