Conventional automatic doors cannot distinguish between people wishing to pass through the door and people passing by the door, so they often open unnecessarily. This leads to the need to adopt new systems in both commercial and non-commercial environments: smart doors. In particular, a smart door system predicts the intention of people near the door based on the social context of the surrounding environment and then makes rational decisions about whether or not to open the door. This work proposes the first position paper related to smart doors, without bells and whistles. We first point out that the problem not only concerns reliability, climate control, safety, and mode of operation. Indeed, a system to predict the intention of people near the door also involves a deeper understanding of the social context of the scene through a complex combined analysis of proxemics and scene reasoning. Furthermore, we conduct an exhaustive literature review about automatic doors, providing a novel system formulation. Also, we present an analysis of the possible future application of smart doors, a description of the ethical shortcomings, and legislative issues.

The ROSCon 2019 conference kicked off with a keynote from Selina Seah from Changi General Hospital and Morgan Quigley from Open Robotics. In their talk, they outlined the need for robotics and automation in hospitals. To support robotics, the Open Robotics foundation works actively to create tools to support multiple robotics platforms, fleets working together, and tools for QA and simulation. Currently, and in the future, there will be multiple challenges in healthcare: there is an aging population, a shrinking workforce due to this aging population, and a rising healthcare cost due to people expecting more of their healthcare. This makes the market for automation and assistance in elderly care potentially very large, as it is a skilled trade that requires a long training time (a nurse spends four years in school, and two years on the job, before considered skilled enough).

Amputees and others with accessibility needs might soon have an easier time hopping into cars. Jaguar Land Rover has created a'mobility door' that uses a mix of current keyless entry tech and motion sensors to automatically open when you approach. You might only have to swing in when you're ready to drive. You can press buttons both overhead and on the infotainment system to open or close doors, and there's radar to prevent the door from smacking another car or a lamp post. The company is currently testing the door on a modified Range Rover Sport with athlete and former commando Mark Ormrod (above) giving it a full shakedown.