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Vehicle inspection in repair shops is often still based on paper forms. Information Technology (IT) does not yet support the entire inspection process. In this paper, we introduce a small wearable IT device that is controlled by speech and enables service technicians to wirelessly access relevant data and to perform on-site communication. Users can carry this device in a pocket and use a small headset to enter speech and receive audio feedback. This system provides a completely speech-enabled functionality and thus offers a hands-free operation. After showing the applicability of wearable computers in this environment, we developed a proprietary hardware system consisting of a thin-client connected via a Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications (DECT) link to a standard Personal Computer (PC) that runs a speech engine and hosts a database. Several field tests in garages helped us during the evolution of our prototypes where service technicians critiqued the prototypes.

In this paper we present a hybrid approach to Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) using the case study of an electronically controlled unit injector (EUI), which is a time-controlled fuel injection system. Using the hybrid approach, we are able to quantify environmental information on upstream production processes preceding manufacture at Bosch without the need to gather all supplier data empirically. Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) data based on “conventional” process models are combined with LCI data from economic input-output relations between different industry sectors and associated pollution discharges and nonrenewable resource consumption. The economic input-output-based LCA (EIO-LCA) allows us to quantify indirect environmental impacts of production processes generally neglected in conventional LCA models. As EIO-LCA quantifies environmental impacts on a rather aggregate level, additional process models for LCA are used to account for specific characteristics of the processes investigated.