An open furniture catalog on the fl oor and a cam era phone in our hands that s all it takes for us to see how the new easy chair would blend in with the existing décor of our living room Digital technolo gies like augmented reality AR enhance the real world by providing additional digital information However a deeper immersion in these new digi tal worlds requires an additional technology It s called virtual reality VR and is often mentioned in one breath with AR Now data glasses are com ing into the picture They beam users into a com pletely virtualized world Industry experts expect AR and VR to enable in novation leaps and new ways of working together The automotive sector alone is planning to invest more than 11 billion euros in such technologies by 2021 worldwide according to a joint survey con ducted by Accenture one of the world s leading technology consulting fi rms and the German As sociation for the Digital Economy BVDW Taking smartphones to new levels In 1968 computer graphics pioneer Ivan Suther land presented an initial form of data glasses that projected three dimensional images directly in front of the user s eyes The contraptions they required were so large and heavy that they had to be suspended from the ceiling Today smart phones are playing a key role in connecting the en vironment and users with digital knowledge With GPS motion sensors and WLAN the devices are equipped with everything it takes to deliver the desired information Mobile AR browsers enhance the surroundings the user views through the cam era with data from the internet information about historic events real estate that s up for sale in the vicinity the way to the next ice cream parlor or to the street corner where we parked our car How ever when using smartphones for this purpose we still don t have both of our hands free A few years ago Google s augmented reality de vice billed as Google Glass fl opped In the aftermath of this failure work on refi ning the tech nology tended to be done without much fanfare Subsequently Microsoft for instance launched its HoloLens product as a form of mixed reality glass es They expand reality for their users by animated three dimensional elements AR and VR rolled into one in a manner of speaking The glasses weigh ing almost 600 grams 21 ounces can be operat ed by means of gestures voice commands or head and eye movements Hardware and software are directly installed in the headset Maintenance made easy As a result use cases in the industrial environ ment have increased within a very short period of time The technology facilitates distributed team work i e team members working at diff erent lo cations and even non experts are able to perform specifi c jobs without any specialized knowledge AR applications already provide on site service technicians with step by step explanations of how to replace and repair components NASA tests of HoloLens have shown possible uses in the main tenance and repair sector as well during diffi cult repair jobs in outer space the technology not only enables video conversations with technicians on Earth but can also project additional information as holographic illustrations directly into the astro naut s fi eld of vision By Oliver Jesgulke Microsoft s HoloLens refl ects animated three dimensional elements into the wearer s fi eld of vision 81 Outlook

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