High-Tech Service for Hotel Guests

"Clocky," the elusive, perky robotic alarm clock, is just one of the gadgets getting a workout at the University of Delaware and Courtyard of Marriott's Teaching Hotel. Clocky's pesky behavior notwithstanding, the goal in creating the experimental guest room (X-room) is to develop technologies that make traveling easier for an increasingly demanding clientele.

Among the features you may find in tomorrow's accommodations:

• Digital peephole: A video camera captures the view of your visitor at the door and displays it on an LCD screen inside.

• High-resolution digital photo frame to keep your family's smiling faces close by.

• In-room workout with Wii, Nintendo's popular exercise gaming system.

• Bedside room-environment control panel allowing you to turn up the heat or turn down the lights.

• An air-powered shower head and an ionic hair dryer that save water and energy.

• Flameless electronic candles for romantic ambience.

• Lights that turn themselves off after sensors inform them that you've left the room.

The X-room's features are being tested by actual guests and hotel staff, according to Cihan Cobanoglu, associate professor of hospitality information technology. "Our goal is to determine the acceptance levels of these technologies and the impact they make on guest satisfaction and staff efficiency," he says.

Source: Cihan Cobanoglu, University of Delaware, Hotel, Restaurant, and Institutional Management, 14 West Main Street, Raub Hall, Newark, Delaware 19716. Web site www.cihan.org.

Adorable but annoying: "Clocky," the robotic clock, gives a hotel guest one chance to wake up when the alarm goes off. If the guest presses the "snooze" button, Clocky will jump off the nightstand and rush around the room looking for a place to hide. The next time the alarm goes off, the guest has to find the clock to turn it off.--Cynthia G. Wagner

Source: Cihan Cobanoglu, University of Delaware, Hotel, Restaurant, and Institutional Management, 14 West Main Street, Raub Hall, Newark, Delaware 19716.

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Technology
March-April 2008 Vol. 42, No. 2