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Japanese Firms Create Home (Appliance) Network
JOstrow writes "The Japanese companies Toshiba, Mitsubishi, Sharp, and Sanyo are teaming up to create a standard for home appliances communicating over a network. Usage examples cited are ovens that download recipes and heating systems that can be adjusted remotely with a cell phone. The first products adhering to the standard, called iReady, are expected to be available by next year. The iReady adapter will be ready for use '...not only with commercialized Bluetooth and low powered wireless appliances but also wireless LAN and future transmission media.'"
Seriously though, perhaps we could use peer-to-peer networks to share recipes, with a rating system kind of like what Shareaza uses. I have a cookie recipe that I can share... It would be kind of interesting to join a network of like-minded recipe people and have recipes downloaded each day.
So will this allow my Palm to replace my TV Remote control?
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So, when you walk into a department story are you meant to ask if the appliance is 'iReady ready?"
I have difficulty imagining the usefulness of this, but I'm really glad they're working together to develop a common standard instead of each company doing their own thing. I suspect someone will find something really cool to do with this technology that nobody's thought of yet, now that the framework exists.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Oh, I understand the i-thing now. It shows the generation of neat, but possibly mostly useless or very successfull new personal technology.
e-mail, emac, ecommernce, etc etc... for 1990's technology.
imac, iRiver, iTones, iReady etc for 2000's technology.
So next we have
oMac, oMan, oRobit, oBeowolf/playstation3/cluster etc etc... for 2010,
then
uMac, uBrain, uBenevolentRobotMasters, uMars,
for 2020's technology.
The only question I have is what about "y" and sometimes even "w"?????
Anybody know when they'll be releasing the iWife module?
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As I understand it this essentially X10, except actually feasible.
If you get nervous, just remember that there are a few billion other people who don't really give a damn.
I think some form of A/V network would be more useful than linking appliances. Why can't I just link my TV, VCR, Digital Tuner, DVD, Receiver, etc with a single cable and let them figure themselves out?
:(
Play on DVD tunes the TV to the right input, sets the receiver surround mode, knows to control the receiver's volume instead of TV's, etc. Watching TV, press record and the VCR knows what to do. Let me walk over to the kitchen and continue watching my DVD there. Etc.
A universal remote doesn't really make things that much simpler (constant mode switching, two different volume modes depending on where audio is routed, needing to know what plugs into what, etc). The alternative is an extremely complex/expensive crestron-type system.
Of course, under the DMCA/etc, you'll probably see this as a "what we're allowing you to do" connection instead.
I use Macs to up my productivity, so up yours Microsoft!
Westinghouse has a new line of connected apliances available. They do such interesting things as, your alarm clock tells you if the coffee maker is not filled with water and coffee, when you go to bed. Or you can use the barcode wand on the microwave to scan your tv dinner, and the microwave will look up how to cook it on the internet. They are already available to purchase at Amazon. The appliances are about average for luxury appliances, but the "home hub" (an alarm clock + windows CE pda, the one require piece) is a bit pricy at $500 if you ask me.
The future, as supplied by mega-corporations: More and more of what you need less and less.
Do you really want your toaster to be twice as expensive, half as reliable, licenced instead of owned, and subject to planned obsolescence?
Another use I've heard/read about is a "smart" refrigerator that can tell you, for example, when you need milk. Of course, most homes have solved this complicated problem with the extremely advanced pen/paper system (some VERY rich people substitute a dry erase system, but I've only read about homes so equipped in magazines) combined with opening the refrigerator door.
I really wish manufacturers would come up with something truly useful and unique to do with these appliance-connectivity solutions. I love spending money on mostly unnecessary gadgets, but I need a LITTLE justification.
"Honey, the toaster's been hacked again." *sound of sirens in the background, getting louder* ... Can anyone else think of some appliances that could potentially be broken into and cause damage to someone's home? Hell, no system is perfectly secure. There's always a way in, and always someone willing to find it. So what if some happy-go-lucky hacker finds his way on to the net.appliances with a modified >appliance-of-choice and a laptop? Suddenly your oven's on while you're away being a Salaryman and the little ninjas leave their homework on deadly types of blowfish on the oven, and poof, someone's house goes up. Or an apartment complex.
But maybe I'm just pessimistic.
Jake
Dating: while( 1 ){ call_girl(); get_rejected(); drink_40(); } return 0;
BEFORE:
RIAA or similar: You are hereby charged for downloading copyrighted content from this internet account.
YOU: No no! The Virus did it!
AFTER:
RIAA or similar: You are hereby charged for downloading copyrighted content from this internet account.
YOU: No no! The Oven did it!
RIAA: Did you realize that the recipe for those cinnamon rolls was copyrighted?
YOU: WTF! You can copyright a cinnamon roll recipe?
etc etc etc.. ad infinitum.
(and other possible encounters... too)
There already is a whole raft of standards for home interconnection, and then home to outside world.
How does this new standard add to that?
Look at OSGi, uPnP and LonWorks just to show a few of them
Great instead of war driving there will be war cooking
Rus
Cheap UK and US VPS
Most new "modern" appliances with features that are anything near digital are already too difficult for the run-of-the-mill house caretaker, whether that be a woman or a man.
People want something simple that WORKS....I doubt there will be a widespread acceptance of this until the technology generation, the kids of the 90s, grow old enough to have to use household appliances(and take care of a house/apartment), which won't be for another 10 to 15 years.
Until then, therefore, I predict these things won't catch on too well. But you can never really predict consumer acceptance of a radical new idea, so I guess we'll have to wait and see.
One part of this which is definitly novel is the talk of using appliance networks to minimize environmental impact. Not a bad idea. Thats the ECHONET they talk about in the standard.
A blog about stuff.
Let's see now, my garbage disposal locks up, causing a buffer overflow in my toilet. Meanwhile, my Smart Car fails to map my driveway and crashes.
Welcome to the brave new world.
Scruting the inscrutable for over 50 years.
"Hacker burns down womans house with cell phone" "Malicious user ruins families turkey" "Woman not amused by recipe for 'Cooked lart'" "Top 10 ways to keep your refrigerator from BSODing"
Setec Astronomy
I just hope these folks think a lot about security; I had to configure my Apple Base Station to use MAC address for all my wireless devices (two iMacs, a G4 PowerBook and two 5450 iPaqs) since the little bastards across the hall took to fucking with it whenever they could see it.
For once I'm actually glad someone is just a PC user; if they were using Linux or OS X and knew about Kismet or KisMAC I'd have an ongoing problem.
Why can't kids just do graffitti throw rocks through windows like I used to?
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So of course this tech will wait until we find that one great use. But until, then there's plenty of druggery to be avoided:
You finish the orange juice, and scan the SKU. OJ is added to your shopping list, which your spouse can sync to their palm at work and use at the market on the way home.
Upon returning from shopping, you scan stuff as you put it away, or punch in produce codes (we all get jobskills as checkers as a side-effect). If you're like me, you buy some tomatoes, throw them in the crisper, and discover them three months later. A nice alert could be handy.
You plan out a couple meals, and the ingredients are added to your shopping list and you're alerted when mealtime comes what you had planned. On some random morning, you ask what you can have for breakfast and based on a recipe list and your current stock, you're given a set of choice. Choosing one, your fridge tells you to take out the milk and four eggs, and the cabinet tells you to take out the bread. (I'm not a cook-- we're making french toast). The stove tells you to turn it on medium and put battered bread on a skillet.
Obviously, for simple recipes this is useless and for complicated ones it doesn't save you anything more than looking back at a recipe, but if anything, we're a lazy population. More importanly, this could all be done with one standalone appliance with a barcode reader (kitchen pc, anyone?) But just because there's another way doesn't mean it can't catch on. People have powered toothbrushes and use the full-service pump at gas stations. We pay for others to wash our cars and change our oil, and buy lap dances rather than trying to pick up women and take them home. There may be a market for automating your grocery stock.
What a bloody awful name.
STOP WITH THE i PREFIX, PEOPLE. IT'S NOT BIG OR CLEVER.
Apple should have excusive rights to the i prefix so they can use it tastefully.
One of the best things that this technology could do is
to standardize on how devices talk to their control panels.
This implies that the control panel is separate and distinct
from the device it controls. A washing machine's panel
for example isn't necessarily hard-coded and hard-wired
to the washer itself. Now, it would be possible for grandma,
who can hardly see, to have just three big buttons for the
washer, with loud audio feedback. But the slashgeek could
have the mega-LCARS interface that sets the washer based
on the rfid tags on the clothes that are tossed in, along with
woolen-color vs. cotton-whites incompatibility warnings.
Big, simple interfaces for seniors is overlooked by most
device makers these days. Lots of tiny, low contrast buttons
with nested menu structures only confuse most non-geeks.
Downside of this will be that you'll need a monthly subscription
for -everything- and selecting interfaces will also be an additional
charge, like cellphone ring tones.
What I gained from connecting these systems under one roof was
The biggest difficulty in setting up the system was not technical, but administrative. Although I had to write a device driver and some custom software, these proved to be relatively stable once debugged. The problems were in correctly specifying our living requirements, translating them into specifications, and testing the result. The first friends to visit us after I installed the system rang the doorbell and were greeted by the answering machine message (oops!) Now the system is very stable, but I would never think of modifying its configuration less than a month before leaving for a vacation.
Diomidis Spinellis - Code Reading: The Open Source Perspective
#include "/dev/tty"
A time server would be a really handy thing to have in a home network, imagine all the clocks in the appliances having the same, correct time all the time.
Sure beats the blinking 12:00 syndrome.
Serivice Rep: "Hello, this is customer service."
Guy: "Yeah, I uh, think my microwave is broken."
Service Rep: "Yes sir. See it right here. It's broken."
Guy: "What do I do to fix it?"
Service Rep: "Buy a new one."
Guy: "I just bought this a month ago."
Service Rep: "Actually it was thirty eight days sir, according to this, and on September 25th you put something metal in there, and that is your problem that caused the failure according to the info it sent. The machine locked itself up automatically for "safety" purposes, it's a child lock feature, you know, litigation and all these days, oh, and it really is broken. If you would have read the manual like it told you to, which is under menu 72-d on you microwave's display, you would have noticed that you just voided the warranty, and your unconditional, money back guarantee just expired eight days ago... (Like a chipper jerk) anything else I can do for you?"
Guy: "Uh, I, uh..."
Service Rep: "Thank you for calling our service line." (Click)
Everytime someone gets excited about a "home appliance network" (which seems to be every year, like clockwork, for the past 20 years or so), I ask myself: "Why? What does my toaster have to say to my lamp? What does my microwave have to say to my toaster?"
Other than a very few uses (your PC talking to your A/V components, for example) this is a technology in search of a problem.
Do that many people really spend so much time using their appliances that they need to have their own network? And, of course, this is just one more thing to break - maybe it's a conspiracy by appliance manufacturers to reduce the reliability and "it-just-always-works" nature of most appliances.