Tweaking the Truth—A Look at Augmented Reality and Some of Its Applications

Augmented Reality (AR) has been defined as "a composite view that is a combination of a real scene and a virtual scene created by a computer" (webopedia.com). Others call it "an informationally enhanced environment." Take something that's real and augment it. AR is not futuristic but rather something that is happening now (and has been happening for some time). AR is not virtual reality, which replaces the real world with a virtual one. AR is really a kind of mash-up of data of different types. There's no doubt you've already seen Augmented Reality at work, but maybe you just didn't know it's called that.

We'll explore:

Definitions
Examples
Technologies behind it—hardware, software
Applications in various industries—business, medical, government, entertainment, manufacturing, tourism
Future directions

Paul has over twenty-five years of diverse experience in information technology. He is a Certified Data Management Professional (CDMP). Paul currently holds the position of Manager of Data Administration in the centralized IT department for his organization, Johnson County, Kansas. Johnson County has over 500,000 residents and employs over 3,500 persons in 40 different departments. He has worked in applications development, data management, data architecture, strategic planning, budgeting, project and personnel management, systems and data analysis, relational database design, disaster recovery, policy implementation, methodology evaluation, capacity planning, metadata implementations, data security, and scenario planning. He served in the United States Marine Corps. He holds an MPA (Master of Public Administration).