LAST WORD
Haptics is ready for standardization
By Yeshwant Muthusamy
Haptic technology is gaining traction, but with increased
adoption comes market fragmentation. The time is now
for the standardization of haptic technology. But what
approach is the right one?
With new use cases in markets such as gaming, Internet of
Things, PC, and virtual reality, there’s an increasing demand for
richer haptic experiences. High-definition (HD) haptics, with effects
ranging from subtle to sharp, textured effects that simulate
different surfaces and sensations, and increasingly efficient
vibration motors, are becoming the norm in many products
already on the marketplace.
As excited as we all are about haptic technology coming into
its own, it’s difficult to ignore a serious problem that comes with
this increased adoption—market fragmentation. Different proprietary
APIs, different hardware-to-software interfaces, and different
motor characteristics effectively create “walled gardens,”
making it difficult for application developers to incorporate
haptics easily into their applications. Worse, they must repeat
the exercise for multiple platforms and devices.
Changes to lower levels of the haptic stack (e.g., replacing
the vibration motor) typically necessitate changes to the upper
levels (e.g., the codecs and APIs used). The high cost of such
changes often discourages OEMs and stifles innovation. This
ultimately hurts adoption by end users, the most important link
in the haptic value chain.
Need for standardization
This is where standardization can help. Standardized APIs,
standardized evaluation criteria for haptics, and standardized
vibration motor performance ranges, to name a few, can only
help harmonize haptic offerings from different vendors—without
compromising vendor differentiation. This, in turn, will incentivize
content and application
creators to incorporate richer
haptic experiences into their
offerings, leveraging the standard
interfaces throughout the
stack.
Current walled gardens will
give way to a flourishing haptic
ecosystem that benefits all
stakeholders. In other words,
the time is indeed right for
standardization across all layers
of the haptic technology
stack (see figure 1).
In Figure 2, the haptic
technology stack is annotated
with the opportunities for
standards at each layer, along with the questions that standardization
Fig. 1: Immersion’s definition
of the haptic stack.
is likely to address. Several international standards
development organizations (SDOs) would be ideal forums for
standardizing various parts of the haptic stack.
However, standardization is really a community-based activity
that goes beyond SDOs. It requires buy-in from all members
of the haptic community across the entire value chain to drive
the standards, regardless of the SDO. A standard that best
reflects the interests of all stakeholders, regardless of their role
in the value chain, has the best chance of succeeding in the
marketplace. To this end, it’s important that the haptics community
provides input on the questions that need to be addressed
in standardization. The list of questions in the diagram should
be considered as just a starting point for further discussions.
Haptic technology stack and the
opportunities for standardization
To be clear, some ratified haptic standards are already in existence.
However, none of them specifically pertain to the haptic
technology stack, which is the focus of this article.
Fig. 2: The proposed questions need to be addressed in the
standardization of the haptic stack.
By creating haptic standards based on the haptic technology
stack, we’re acknowledging the interdependency of the entire
system in order to deliver consistent and high-quality end-user
experiences. This is a shortcoming of existing standards efforts.
Briefly:
MPEG-V: This standard provides an architecture and specifies
associated information representations to enable the
interoperability between virtual worlds (such as in gaming,
AR/VR, etc.). Part 3 (Sensory Information) addresses haptics,
among several other sensory effects.
Yeshwant Muthusamy, Ph.D., is Senior Director of Standards at
Immersion Corp.- www.immersion.com
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