MACCS (Mobile Access for Converged Communications) provides mobile, hands-free access to communications for workers whose job tasks, which are not done at desks or in meeting rooms, require them to be mobile within the enterprise. These workers, sometimes known as “corridor cruisers”, “campus roamers” or “people in uniform”, typically do not have an office, a desk, or a phone. Examples of the kinds of workers that could benefit by MACCS are: doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers in the hospital environment, sales and stock people at retail stores, and line workers in the manufacturing, warehousing, and shipping industries. MACCS uses small, lightweight wireless headsets connected to wireless access points. Users interact with MACCS completely by spoken commands using WiVA (Workspace Intelligent Voice Agent), an always-available, always accessible, intelligent voice agent. The Users Panorama stores all the information by, for and about users such as presence, location, availability, accessibility, roles, groups, areas of expertise, organization rules and polices, as well as individual users’ preferences. This context information is used by WiVA to intelligently manage users’ communications. Roaming and handoff software enable the headsets to maintain continuous audio connections while users move about the enterprise, even if they are in a phone call. This software is also used to signal the presence of headsets and track the location of users. A prototype MACCS system was built in our laboratory using Bluetooth technology, however the MACCS architecture allows for any wireless technology to be used, provided suitable endpoints are available. Click here for video: http://pubs.research.avayalabs.com/videos/maccsv1.mpg Contacts: Lynne Shapiro Brotman, Edward Peebles, Michael Sammon, Dorée D. Seligmann
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