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"We're about 20 minutes away from the point where Clarke's law kicks in and technology becomes indistinguishable from magic."
- Peter Watts

Clothing Size Scanner  
  A device that scanned a living person to determine clothing sizes.  

Depahli De is interested in a particular suit; is it available in her size?

"If you'd like to step into our scanner, please?"

The department's scanner raced red lights up and down her form, penetrating her sari to take her measurements.

Technovelgy from Sagramanda, by Alan Dean Foster.
Published by Pyr in 2006
Additional resources -

The first example of the use of technology to determine size without the need to take clothes off became popular in the 1940's and 1950's. Most shoe stores had an x-ray machine that would show the outlines of the shoe, and the bones of the person's feet, thus ensuring a proper fit. It has been estimated that over 10,000 of these machines were in operation. At the time, the hazards of indiscriminate x-ray use were not known; these machines were outlawed in most states by 1970.

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Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from Sagramanda
  More Ideas and Technology by Alan Dean Foster
  Tech news articles related to Sagramanda
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