"Hello, this is Acme Appliance Service. I'm here to repair your refrigerator." "There must be some mistake. I didn't call for service, and my refrigerator is working fine." "No, your refrigerator called us. The compressor is failing and will likely break down next week. Its sensors detected the problem and contacted the manufacturer for warranty service."

Many manufacturers are now researching the use of embedded computer chips within appliances to monitor and adjust the unit's performance. Several computer companies are developing communication protocols to permit these appliances to communicate with each other and with remote monitoring stations via the Internet. Sun's Java is the leading technology, although Lucent and Microsoft are each developing competitors to Java.

Sun's Java Initiator (Jini) may be particularly valuable for higher education. Jini embeds within each device the logic needed for it to interact with other devices over a computer network. Thus, when a Jini-enabled device connects to the network, it instantly learns about all of the other devices and exchanges drivers and other communication information automatically. Similarly, when a device becomes disconnected, the communication information is discarded automatically.

At this point, Jini is mainly vaporware since the code has only been released to developers and manufacturers have yet to installed it in their smart devices. Nevertheless, it has attracted much attention and many groups have announced their commitment to integrate Jini into their products. Jini-enabled appliances should soon begin appearing in the marketplace.

Two unique features characterize Jini. The first is that its code lies within each device and the network, without the need for a central server or computer. This displaces Microsoft's strategy to make all peripherals dependent on a central Windows computer. The second is that each device learns about the other available devices automatically without any user intervention such as inserting an installation CDROM or rebooting the machine.

How Jini might be useful to higher education:

• Jini in the science laboratory.
• Jini in the humanities classroom.

Who needs an intelligent appliance?

Jini continues to evolve, but it has not yet manifested itself as intelligent appliances. At present, most manufacturers have set more modest goals through the use of embedded processors within their products. These embedded processors act as stand-alone computers that enhance the appliance operation but do not generally communicate with other systems. Just as it took several years for desktop computing to transition from stand-alone units to networked desktops, it will likely be a number of years before Jini-like services become commonplace.