iRobot, Google Team Up To Understand Your Smart Home (zdnet.com)

iRobot and Google are looking for ways to integrate the Roomba-maker's home maps with Google Assistant to extend instructions to other gadgets. "The collaboration centers on iRobot's Roomba i7+ vacuum models' ability to map home floor plans and remember room names," notes TechCrunch. From the report: As it is, Google Home users or anyone with Google Assistant can give a voice command like, "Hey Google, clean the kitchen," and a Roomba carries out the task. The integration supports the task across multiple rooms that have been assigned a name, such as the bedroom, living room, and other named areas. According to iRobot, the home-mapping data could also be used to make it easier to set up new smart home gadgets and create new ways to automate the home.

In a statement to The Verge, Google said iRobot's maps could help locate wifi-connected lights and automatically assign names and locations to them within the house. Google stressed that Assistant only learns the names people have given to areas in the home so it can then instruct Roomba i7+ to go to that area. Google doesn't receive information about the layout of the home. Colin Angle, chairman and CEO of iRobot, told the publication that the partnership could help users in future tell Assistant to control other smart home gadgets using the same naming and location information used by the Roomba.

Comments

Timer is better....

[magarity]

My old pre-wifi Roomba cleans the kitchen floor daily thanks to a simple timer. Why would I want to have to verbally command it from another location daily?

Google is creepy enough already

[Kohath]

Why do you want Google to know your homes' floorplan and where all the furniture is?

I was considering getting an iRobot product...

[LostMonk]

Well, that plan is canceled.

Re:Surveillance

[bill_mcgonigle]

2020 Headline: Google admits disclosing home layout and belonging data to SWAT teams for use in planning of raids.

(totally not Big Brother)