Providence College DigitalCommons@Providence

Library Faculty and Staff Phillips Memorial Library

June 2000

DataPlay’s High Density Disc and Agilent’s Optical Switch Fabric

Norman Desmarais Providence College, [email protected]

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Desmarais, Norman, "DataPlay’s High Density Disc and Agilent’s Optical Switch Fabric" (2000). Library Faculty and Staff papers. 14. https://digitalcommons.providence.edu/facstaff_pubs/14

This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Phillips Memorial Library at DigitalCommons@Providence. It has been accepted for inclusion in Library Faculty and Staff papers by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@Providence. For more information, please contact [email protected]. c/o Katina Strauch 209 Richardson Avenue MSC 98, The Citadel Charleston, SC 29409 SPECIAL REPRINT ™ VOLUME 12, NUMBER 3 JUNE 2000

ISSN: 1043-2094 “Linking Publishers, Vendors and Librarians”

Innovations Affecting Us — DataPlay’s High Density Disc and Agilent’s Optical Switch Fabric by Norman Desmarais (Phillips Memorial Library, Providence College, Providence, RI)

The quest for increasingly high capacity stor- businessman and scientist who previously helped technology means that readers don’t have to age devices seems insatiable. Yet, the computer develop the 2.5-inch disk drive used in notebook keep transferring e-books from a PC to a industry continues to develop such storage devices computers and the 1.8-inch hard drive used to store memory card for use in a portable reader and while decreasing their size. DataPlay Inc. intro- data on portable PC cards. back again. duced the latest of these devices, called a DataPlay DataPlay discs let customers download e-books Hardware manufacturers in the music and disc, on April 5 at the spring Internet World. The from digital book Websites or go to a local book- digital film industries have focused on “flash” disc’s creators say this new optical medium will store to buy pre-recorded e-books. A single memory. Flash memory is a solid-state storage have 500 megabytes of memory—about the same DataPlay disc can hold several e-books complete medium enclosed in small, plastic cases; but it as a CD-ROM but it will be about the size of a with multimedia features such as sound and pic- is expensive. Sixty-four megabytes can cost quarter. It will be able to record and store informa- tures. One can even listen to an audio book on a $200. A DataPlay disc is inexpensive ($5 to $10 tion just like a computer floppy disk; but it will DataPlay disc. By recording several titles on a a disc retail) and can help address one of the require a microoptical engine (reading device) that disc, publishers can sell a single title and give biggest industry needs for portable digital au- is expected to be incorporated into a variety of con- consumers an option to buy other titles by the dio players: expandable and affordable memory. sumer electronic devices. same author or on the same subject at a later It also offers ways for to enhance DataPlay’s goal is to develop technology and time. Upon payment, the reader can unlock the the storage of their Rio players while spending products that will allow consumers easy access to title and activate it. far less money. Record labels could sell an al- all kinds of content whether downloaded off the DataPlay has also developed bum on the disc and embed five additional al- Internet, prerecorded, or created ContentKey, a tool that allows bums. Consumers could then have the option of by consumers. The company en- consumers to activate prere- paying for the other albums at a later date when visions the DataPlay disc for stor- corded content on a the embedded music would be unlocked and ac- ing electronic books, digital im- DataPlay disc over the tivated. ages, audio, and multimedia Internet without requiring Larry Kenswil, president of eLabs’ Univer- presentations for use in e-book them to download it. A sal Music Group is very excited about this tech- readers or computers, digital cam- reader just clicks on a book nology because of its versatility and portability. eras, portable music players, and title to transfer it to an e- He believes that it will enhance consumers’ ex- portable organizers or personal book reader. If one likes the perience with music because it opens a world of digital assistants (PDAs). book, he or she can just read new possibilities for the recording, storing, and For example, a student can it. One could activate another carrying of content. DataPlay discs are univer- carry an entire semester’s books one of the author’s titles in- sal in that they let consumers download, record, on a single DataPlay disc. A fam- stantly just by going online. and play anything digital—books, photos, ily can take and store photos from Because DataPlay discs games, music, whatever—all on a single disc. an entire vacation. A music lover can are recordable, readers can DataPlay’s technology is compelling; but it carry several albums; or a gamer can highlight text and write notes will have to persuade makers of portable devices carry the latest games. in the margin—perfect for textbooks, cook- to make compatible hardware. The company will DataPlay expects its products to fill the demand books, etc. They can even create and publish also have to persuade publishers, record labels, for easy access to electronic content, a demand their own works on them or use them to store and other content creators to embrace the discs. driven by the proliferation of Web appliances. The computer data, such as word processor files, It will also require its own reading device and company is pursuing strategic relationships with spreadsheets, database data, or computer pro- have to compete with CD, CD-ROM, DVD, and industry leaders in different market sectors who grams much like they use floppy disks. The online delivery formats. recognize the potential of DataPlay’s technology disc’s small size makes it very portable. It can DataPlay expects DataPlay discs containing to bring content and products to a wider audience. easily fit in a shirt pocket for later use with an prerecorded content to be available in early 2001 The company’s chief executive is Steve Volk, a e-book reader or PDA. Permanent recording continued on page 95

94 Against the Grain / Special Reprint — June 2000 and ATM, require customers to package data in Innovations Affecting Us the proper protocol before sending it. They must “Linking from page 94 also transmit it at the rate of the service they have bought. Publishers, Vendors along with DataPlay-enabled consumer elec- Agilent’s technology uses tiny bubbles in- and Librarians” tronic devices. Blank DataPlay discs will be stead of the microscopic mirrors that Lucent available at local stores to download Internet- uses in its all-optical switches. The bubbles re- published content and for use in DataPlay-en- ceive light from optical fibers and divert it di- abled consumer electronic devices manufactured rectly to any other fibers attached to the same by major companies in the digital camera, digi- switch fabric. A waveguide, which is a glass tal music, PDA, and consumer electronics in- channel that confines the light, guides light from dustries. Any or all of these appliances will be an incoming fiber through the switch fabric and able to use a single prerecorded or blank Uncommon ... directs it down a defined path. The light can also DataPlay disc. pass straight through the switch without being Against the Grain is your key to Another technology to watch is Agilent diverted. However, the switch temperature must the latest news about libraries, Technologies’ optical switch fabric which be 65 degrees Celsius to work properly. publishers, book jobbers, and promises to increase network bandwidth and The bubble-jet heaters can set up a switch subscription agents. ATG is a speed data throughput. Agilent Technologies is path in less than 10 milliseconds which is con- unique collection of reports on the a spinoff from Hewlett-Packard. Its optical siderably faster than the 50-millisecond limit issues, literature, and people that switch fabric, which will be available next year carriers set on acceptable network failures. Cus- impact the world of books, journals, for building all-optical networks, can handle 32 tomer applications running across a network will and electronic information. input and 32 output optical fibers on a chip the not be able to detect a failure if the network can size of a dime. It uses bubble-jet printer tech- be restored within 50 milliseconds; so the switch nology and a vapor bubble to switch light sig- could be used to route traffic along an alternate nals from one optical fiber to another without path around a broken fiber. first converting the signals to electrical impulses. The switch has no moving parts; so it is theo- The switch fabric will allow vendors to retically less susceptible to failure. However, switch light directly without first converting it micromirror optical switching technology is still to electrical impulses. This will make it pos- Unconventional ... young; and nobody knows how well it will stand sible for service providers to sell high-bandwidth up over the long term. It is also unclear how well ATG is published six times a year, in wavelengths to customers. Customers will then the bubble-jet heaters will stand up when used con- February, April, June, September, be able to put any traffic of any protocol at any tinuously for months or years. This could be the November, and December/January. A bit rate onto a wavelength because the entire con- case in certain switch configurations. six issue subscription is available for nection between points in the network will be only $40 U.S. ($50 Canada, $70 optical. Conventional services, like frame relay foreign), making it an uncommonly good buy for all that it covers. Make checks payable to Against the Grain, LLC and mail to: Katina Strauch 209 Richardson Avenue MSC 98, The Citadel

Charleston, SC 29409

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