Interactive mirrors on the horizon

US retailers are adding interactive mirrors for use outside fitting rooms that will stream high-definition video of shoppers modelling clothes to their friends' computers or mobile devices, reports HomeTownLife.

The technology will allow friends to comment on the outfits and to select other designs in the collection for the shopper to try.

Christopher Enright, CTO at IconNicholson, which designed the interactive mirror, calls it "social retailing".

Standards for Technology in Automotive Retail, the IT standards body for the North American retail automotive industry, has published an improved version of the "Dealership Infrastructure Guidelines". It is designed to help facilitate the standardisation of an open, common IT infrastructure for all automotive dealerships, reports Auto Industry.

The technology reference manual provides information on Internet access, security, local area network design, PC hardware, and other IT components.

The 2007v1.0 version of the Dealership Infrastructure Guidelines has several updates, including the addition of a new chapter on business continuation and disaster recovery.

NCR has introduced the NCR RealPOS 80XRT point-of-sale (POS) workstation, designed to extend POS capabilities without slowing mission-critical transaction processing.

Featuring architecture with support for Intel vPro technology, the NCR RealPOS 80XRT delivers power, scalability and systems management capabilities to the point of service, reports Computerworld.

"The RealPOS 80XRT Workstation is ideal for all markets, especially Australia and New Zealand, where stores are rapidly expanding their chains," said Andrew Regan, VP, South Pacific Asia, NCR Retail/Hospitality and Self-Service Solutions.