Sun has unveiled Project Sun SPOT, a battery operated platform for development of wireless sensor networks, robotics and personal consumer electronics. Project Sun SPOT, which will be demonstrated at Sun's 2006 Worldwide Education & Research Conference this week. Powered by a small Java 2 Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME) virtual machine written almost entirely in Java, Project Sun SPOT provides a way to quickly build Java-based sensor applications that run directly on the central processing unit (CPU) without any underlying operating system.
"This announcement will allow Java -- just as it did with cell phones and the Internet -- to play a pivotal role in enabling the coming wave of sensor driven computing.", said Glenn Edens, senior vice president for Communications, Media and Entertainment, Sun Microsystems.
The Sun Labs Project Sun SPOT technology evaluation kit will include three Sun SPOTs: two stand-alone devices and one base station. All three Sun SPOTs include a processor board with 32-bit ARM9 CPU, 512 KB RAM and 4MB Flash memory, 2.4 GHz radio and USB interface. Each stand-alone Sun SPOT also includes a 3D accelerometer, temperature and light sensors, 8 tri-color light emitting diodes (LEDs), six analog inputs and 8 general purpose I/O ports for controlling relays, stepper motors and servos. The kit also includes a J2ME virtual machine, NetBeans(TM) 5.0 and a USB cable.
Scheduled for release in May 2006, Project Sun SPOT will initially be sold to universities, research organizations and hobbyists to allow them to experiment with the myriad of possible applications for this new technology.
