Bluetooth babies

I've been thinking all day about an idea I had whilst I was watching the TV yesterday afternoon. There was an advert for Philips' neo-natal baby monitor, and it got me thinking. Parents already have baby "reassurance" monitors, which via a short wave radio transmission, in a simplex "walkie talkie" kind of way, they transmit the babies crying and screaming to a convienient location! But in our mobile phone, laptop, PDA society what is "integrated" about this technology?

Before you laugh at my idea of "Bluetooth babies" or "cat5 kiddies" hear me out ... You can have the kid at nursery and you'll be at work - but you will still be able to see its vital signs! Warning systems for when the baby is asleep can be added - and therefore help against cot deaths? If I make it cheap enough I could see hospital wards employing the same technology (not just for babies!)

Hmmm ... I suppose there is a massive market, especially if the government want everyone to (correct me if i'm wrong) have their own family PC ... but maybe this goes too far past "Server Monitoring" and perhaps i'm opening a whole can of ethical and moral can of worms? Or perhaps i'm onto the one thing that will make me a millionaire?

I'm famous for coming up with crackpot ideas, just ask anyone - the problem is now I have an outlet, an excuse and time. This is, what I predict, the first of many "failed to get off the drawing board" ideas.

In Easy Steps

Instead of being a normal student and using the bank holiday weekend for one continual student night - where day light does not exist, I found myself brain storming and buying books for my project! I suppose this year I have nothing to celebrate (for the first time in 10 years I haven't had exams) hence the "geekyness" of my weekend.

I have brought three books:

Success in Your Project: A Guide to Student System Development Projects - by Philip Weaver (My final year project module leader)
PHP 5 in Easy Steps: Colour (In Easy Steps S.) by Mike McGrath (About my level)
and last but not least:
Ronnie: The Autobiography of Ronnie O'Sullivan by Ronnie O'Sullivan (I've brought this for my nan, she's a big snooker fan - and she's just had an operation - so get well soon!)

My brain storm has thrown some interesting ideas and phrases, most of which on review make no sense but here goes:

Hardware vs Software monitoring
Troubleshooting and first line support
Watching internet traffic / virus protection / hack attempts
Environment monitoring (Temp, humidity etc...)
Wireless monitor
Home user - broadband, Fridge??? Oven alerts! Child/baby monitor
Network traffic!
File monitoring

As I research the brain storm further I will add links to the above like known products, plug ins etc...

Five days later ...

Personally I thought this would be a great idea, but as usual time will tell! Welcome to my blog, where I will document the progress of my Computer Science final year project at University.

I had to make a special visit to University on Tuesday (24/05/05) where I had to pick my final year modules and project supervisor for September, and just five days later I find myself starting a blog on, what I can imagine, will be a roller coaster ride of a year! My project title is along the lines of "Server Monitoring" although naively I never took down the full title, taking it for granted I could access our Project Management System (PMS) outside of University campus!

Well the research begins, I'm on placement at the moment, and I'm trying my best to get onto the server monitoring project using nagios - an interesting bit of software - but should give me some great ideas!