The Internet of Things revolution started in 2015 and will continue to be strong in 2016. 2015 was the year everyone talked about the Internet of Things. (So was 2014. And 2013.) But unlike before, it was the year everyone started making plans, laying groundwork, and building the infrastructure. Internet of Things is coming. It’s not a matter of if or whether, but when and how. The premise of IoT is that a connected world will offer gains through efficiency.
The Internet of Things (IoT) has been called the next Industrial Revolution — it will change the way all businesses, governments, and consumers interact with the physical world. The Internet of Things (IoT) is an environment in which objects, animals or people are provided with unique identifiers and the ability to transfer the data over a network without requiring human-to-human or human-to-computer interaction. IoT has evolved from the convergence of wireless technologies, micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS)
and the Internet. IoT is also called the Internet of Everything. A critical component for the IoT system to be a success will be secure bi-directional communication, mobility and localization services.
In the future, everything will be connected. It won’t just be our phones that access the Internet; it will be our light bulbs, our front doors, our microwaves, our comforters, our blenders. You can call it the Internet of Things, The Internet of Everything, Universal Object Interaction, or your pick of buzzwords that begin with Smart. They all hold as inevitable that everything, everything will be connected, to each other and to the Internet. And this is promised to change the world. Remember that the objects themselves do not benefit us, but what services and functions they make it possible to obtain. We will enjoy the outcome, hopefully even better quality products, informative and reliable services, and even new applications.
There will be lots of money spend on IoT in 2016, the exact sum is hard to define, but it is estimated that nearly $6 trillion will be spent on IoT solutions over the next five years. IoT is now a very large global business dominated by giants (IBM, Intel, Cisco, Gemalto, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Bosch, GE, AT&T, T-Mobile, Telefonica and many others). I see that because it is still a young and quickly developing market, there will be lots of potential in it for startups in 2016.
There will be a very large number of new IoT devices connected to Internet in the end of 2016. According to Business Insider The Internet of Things Report there was 10 billion devices connected to the internet in 2015 and there will be will be 34 billion devices connected to the internet by 2020. IoT devices will account for 24 billion, while traditional computing devicesw ill comprise 10 billion (e.g. smartphones, tablets, smartwatches, etc.). Juniper research predicted that by 2020, there will be 38.5 billion connected devices. IDC says it’ll be 20.9 billion. Gartner’s guess? Twenty-five billion. The numbers don’t matter, except that they’re huge. They all agree that most of those gadgets will be industrial Internet of Things. The market for connecting the devices you use all day, every day, is about to be huge.
Businesses will be the top adopter of IoT solutions because they see ways the IoT can improve their bottom line: lowering operating costs, increasing productivity, expand to new markets and develop new product offerings. Sensors, data analytics, automation and wireless communication technologies allow the study of the “self-conscious” machines, which are able to observe their environment and communicate with each other. From predictive maintenance that reduces equipment downtime to workers using mobile devices on the factory floor, manufacturing is undergoing dramatic change. The Internet of Things (IoT) is enabling increased automation on the factory floor and throughout the supply chain, 3D printing is changing how we think about making components, and the cloud and big data are enabling new applications that provide an end-to-end view from the factory floor to the retail store.
Governments are focused on increasing productivity, decreasing costs, and improving their citizens’ quality of life. The IoT devices market will connect to climate agreements as in many applicatons IoT can be seen as one tool to help to solve those problems. A deal to attempt to limit the rise in global temperatures to less than 2C was agreed at the climate change summit in Paris in December 2015. Sitra fresh market analysis indicates that there is up to an amount of EUR 6 000 billion market potential for smart green solutions by 2050. Smart waste and water systems, materials and packaging, as well as production systems together to form an annual of over EUR 670 billion market. Smart in those contests typically involves use of IoT technologies.
Consumers will lag behind businesses and governments in IoT adoption – still they will purchase a massive number of devices. There will be potential for marketing IoT devices for consumers: Nine out of ten consumers never heard the words IoT or Internet of Things, October 2015! It seems that the newest IoT technology extends homes in 2016 – to those homes where owner has heard of those things. Wi-Fi has become so ubiquitous in homes in so many parts of the world that you can now really start tapping into that by having additional devices. The smart phones and the Internet connection can make home appliances, locks and sensors make homes and leisure homes in more practical, safer and more economical. Home adjusts itself for optimal energy consumption and heating, while saving money. During the next few years prices will fall to fit for large sets of users. In some cases only suitable for software is needed, as the necessary sensors and data connections can be found in mobile phones. Our homes are going to get smarter, but it’s going to happen slowly. Right now people mostly buy single products for a single purpose. Our smart homes and connected worlds are going to happen one device, one bulb at a time. The LED industry’s products will become more efficient, reliable, and, one can hope, interoperable in the near future. Companies know they have to get you into their platform with that first device, or risk losing you forever to someone else’s closed ecosystem.
The definitions what would be considered IoT device and what is a traditional computing devices is not entirely clear, and I fear that we will not get a clear definition for that in 2016 that all could agree. It’s important to remember that the IoT is not a monolithic industry, but rather a loosely defined technology architecture that transcends vertical markets to make up an “Internet of everything.”
Too many people – industry leaders, media, analysts, and end users – have confused the concept of
“smart” with “connected”. Most devices – labeled “IoT” or “smart” – are simply connected devices. Just connecting a device to the internet so that it can be monitored and controlled by someone over the web using a smart phone is not smart. Yes, it may be convenient and time saving, but it is not “smart”. Smart means intelligence.
IoT New or Not? YES and NO. There are many cases where whole IoT thing is hyped way out of proportion. For the most part, it’s just the integration of existing technologies. Marketing has driven an amount of mania around IoT, on the positive side getting it on the desks of decision makers, and on the negative generating ever-loftier predictions. Are IoT and M2M same or different? Yes and no depending on case. For sure for very many years to come IoT and M2M will coexist.
Nearly a dozen contenders are trying to fill a need for long distance networks that cut the cost and power consumption of today’s cellular machine-to-machine networks. Whose technology protocols should these manufacturers incorporate into their gear? Should they adopt ZigBee, Apple’s HomeKit, Allseen Alliance/AllJoyn, or Intel’s Open Interconnect Consortium? Other 802.15.4 technologies? There are too many competing choices.
Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, two pioneers of the Internet of Things are expanding their platforms and partnerships. Crowdfunding sites and hardware accelerators are kicking out startups at a regular clip, typically companies building IoT devices that ride Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. Bluetooth Special Interest group is expected to release in2016 support for mesh networks and higher data rates.
Although ZWave and Zigbee helped pioneer the smart home and building space more than a decade ago, but efforts based on Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and 6LoWPAN are poised to surpass them. Those pioneering systems are actively used and developed. Zigbee Alliance starts certification for its unified version 3.0 specification in few months (includes profiles for home and building automation, LED lighting, healthcare, retail and smart energy). EnOcean Alliance will bring its library of about 200 application profiles for 900 MHz energy harvesting devices to Zigbee networks. Zigbee will roll out a new spec for smart cities. The Z-Wave Security 2 framework will start a beta test in February and Z-Wave aims to strike a collaboration withleading IoT application framework platforms. Zigbee alredy has support Thread.
The race to define, design and deploy new low power wide area networks for the Internet of Things won’t cross a finish line in 2016. But by the end of the year it should start to be clear which LPWA nets are likely to have long legs and the opportunities for brand new entrants will dim significantly. So at the moment it is hard to make design choices. To protect against future technology changes, maybe the device makers should design in wireless connectivity chips and software that will work with a variety of protocols? That’s complicated and expensive. But if I pick only one technology I can easily pick up wrong horse, and it is also an expensive choice.
Within those who want to protect against future technology changes, there could be market for FPGAs in IoT devices. The Internet of Things (IoT) is broken and needs ARM-based field programmable gate array (FPGA) technology to fix it, an expert told engineers at UBM’s Designers of Things conference in San Jose. You end up with a piece of hardware that can be fundamentally changed in the field.
There seems to be huge set of potential radio techniques also for Internet of Things even for long distance and low power consumpion. Zigbee will roll out a new spec for smart cities in February based on the 802.15.4g standard for metro networks. It will compete with an already crowded field of 900 MHz and 2.4 GHz networks from Sigfox, the LoRa Alliance, Ingenu and others. Weightless-P is an open standard announced by Weightless SIG, which operates at frequencies below one gigahertz. Weightless-P nodes and development cards will be expected to be in the market already during the first quarter of 2016, at the moment Weightless IoT Hardware Virtually Unavailable.
I expect LoRa Technology is expected to be hot in 2016. The LoRaWAN standard enables low-data-rate Internet of Things (IoT) and Machine-to-Machine (M2M) wireless communication with a range of up to 10 miles, a battery life of 10 years, and the ability to connect millions of wireless sensor nodes to LoRaWAN gateways. LoRa® technology works using a digital spread spectrum modulation and proprietary protocol in the Sub-GHz RF band (433/868/915 MHz). I see LoRa technology interesting because lots of activity around in Finland in several companies (especially Espotel) and I have seen a convincing hands-in demo of the LoRa system in use.
It seems that 3GPP Lost its Way in IoT and there is fragmentation ahead in cellular standards. In theory 3GPP should be the default provider of IoT connectivity, but it seems that it has now failed in providing one universal technology. At the moment, there are three major paths being supported by 3GPP for IoT: the machine-type version of LTE (known as LTE-M) and two technologies coming from the Cellular-IoT initiative — NB-IoT and EC-GSM. So here we are with three full standardization efforts in 3GPP for IoT connectivity. It is too much. There will like be a base standard in 2016 for LTE-M.
The promise of billions of connected devices leads everyone to assume that there will be plenty of room for multiple technologies, but this betrays the premise of IoT, that a connected world will offer gains through efficiency. Too many standard will cause challenges for everybody. Customers will not embrace IoT if they have to choose between LTE-M and Sigfox-enabled products that may or may not work in all cases. OEM manufacturers will again bear the cost, managing devices at a regional or possibly national level. Again, we lose efficiency and scale. The cost of wireless connectivity will remain a barrier to entry to IoT.
Today’s Internet of Things product or service ultimately consists of multiple parts, quite propably supplied by different companies. An Internet of Things product or service ultimately consists of multiple parts. One is the end device that gathers data and/or executes control functions on the basis of its communications over the Internet. Another is the gateway or network interface device. Once on the Internet, the IoT system needs a cloud service to interact with. Then, there is the human-machine interface (HMI) that allows users to interact with the system. So far, most of the vendors selling into the IoT development network are offering only one or two of these parts directly. Alternatives to this disjointed design are arising, however. Recently many companies are getting into the end-to-end IoT design support business, although to different degrees.
Voice is becoming more often used the user interface of choice for IoT solutions. Smartphones let you control a lot using only your voice as Apple, Google, Microsoft and Samsung have their solutions for this. For example Amazon, SoundHound and Nuance have created systems that allow to add language commands to own hardware or apps. Voice-activated interface becomes pervasive and persistent for IoT solutions in 2016. Right now, most smart home devices are controlled through smartphones, and it seems like that’s unlikely to change. The newest wearable technology, smart watches and other smart devices corresponding to the voice commands and interpret the data we produce – it learns from its users, and generate as responses in real time appropriate, “micro-moments” tied to experience.
Monitoring your health is no longer only a small group oriented digital consumer area. Consumers will soon take advantage of the health technology extensively to measure well-being. Intel Funds Doctor in Your Pocket and Samsung’s new processor is meant for building much better fitness trackers. Also, insurance companies have realized the benefits of health technologies and develop new kinds of insurance services based on data from IoT devices.
Samsung’s betting big on the internet of things and wants the TV to sit at the heart of this strategy. Samsung believes that people will want to activate their lights, heating and garage doors all from the comfort of their couch. If smart TVs get a reputation for being easy to hack, then Samsung’s models are hardly likely to be big sellers. After a year in which the weakness of smart TVs were exploited, Samsung goes on the offensive in 2016. Samsung’s new Tizen-based TVs will have GAIA security with pin lock for credit card and other personal info, data encryption, built-in anti-malware system, more.
This year’s CES will focus on how connectivity is proliferating everything from cars to homes, realigning diverse markets – processors and networking continue to enhance drones, wearables and more. Auto makers will demonstrate various connected cars. There will be probably more health-related wearables at CES 2016, most of which will be woven into clothing, mainly focused on fitness. Whether or not the 2016 International CES holds any big surprises remains to be seen. The technology is there. Connected light bulbs, connected tea kettles, connected fridges and fans and coffeemakers and cars—it’s all possible. It’s not perfect, but the parts are only going to continue to get better, smaller, and cheaper.
Connectivity of IoT devices will still have challeges in 2016. While IoT standards organizations like the Open Interconnect Consortium and the AllSeen Alliance are expected to demonstrate their capabilities at CES, the industry is still a ways away from making connectivity simple. In 2016 it will still pretty darn tedious to get all these things connected, and there’s all these standards battles coming on. So there will be many standards in use at the same time. The next unsolved challenge: How the hell are all these things going to work together? Supporting open APIs that connect with various services is good.
Like UPnP and DLNA, AllJoyn could become the best-kept secret in the connected home in 2016 — everyone has it, no one knows about it. AllJoyn is an open-source initiative to connect devices in the Internet of Things. Microsoft added support for AllJoyn to Windows in 2014.
Analysis will become important in 2016 on IoT discussions. There’s too much information out there that’s available free, or very cheaply. We need systems to manage the information so we can make decisions. Welcome to the systems age.
The rise of the Internet of Things and Web services is driving new design principles. The new goal is to delight customers with experiences that evolve in flexible ways that show you understand their needs. “People are expecting rich experiences, fun and social interactions… this generation gets bored easily so you need to understand all the dimensions of how to delight them”
With huge number of devices security issues will become more and more important. In 2016, we’ll need to begin grappling with the security concerns these devices raise. The reality of everything being connected can have unintended consequences, not all of them useful – Welcome to the Internet of stupid (hackable) things.
Security: It was a hot topic for 2015 and if anything it will get hotter in 2016. The reason is clear. By adding connectivity embedded systems not only increase their utility, they vastly increase their vulnerability to subversion with significant consequences. Embedded systems that add connectivity face many challenges, of which the need for security is both vital and misunderstood. But vendors and developers have been getting the message and solutions are appearing in greater numbers, from software libraries to MCUs with a secure root of trust.
Bruce Schneier is predicting that the IoT will be abused in conjunction with DMCA to make our lives worse instead of better. In theory, connected sensors will anticipate your needs, saving you time, money, and energy. Except when the companies that make these connected objects act in a way that runs counter to the consumer’s best interests. The story of a company using copy-protection technology to lock out competitors—isn’t a new one. Plenty of companies set up proprietary standards to ensure that their customers don’t use someone else’s products with theirs. Because companies can enforce anti-competitive behavior this way, there’s a litany of things that just don’t exist, even though they would make life easier for consumers.
Internet of Things is coming. It’s not a matter of if or whether, but when and how. Maybe it’ll be 2016, maybe the year after, but the train is coming. It’ll have Wi-Fi and Bluetooth and probably eight other things, and you’ll definitely get a push notification when it gets here.
More interesting material links:
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Tomi Engdahl says:
IBM pimps Watson out to Hilton robot for concierge duty
That’s cute, say Japanese
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/03/09/ibm_watson_hilton_robot_concierge/
Big Blue is making another effort to make a business case for the Watson deep learning system, this time by porting it to a robot concierge in the Hilton McLean in Virginia.
The robot, dubbed Connie after the Hilton founder, is an off-the-shelf Nao machine from French manufacturer Aldebaran Robotics, linked wirelessly to Watson.
The 23-inch (58-cm) robot uses Watson to understand basic questions about the hotel and also links into travel info service WayBlazer to give details of local attractions.
“Watson helps Connie understand and respond naturally to the needs and interests of Hilton’s guests – which is an experience that’s particularly powerful in a hospitality setting, where it can lead to deeper guest engagement.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Analog Devices Rolls MCUs for IoT
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1329118&
Chip maker Analog Devices Inc. (ADI) recently announced a new series of ultra-low power microcontrollers for Internet of Things (IoT) applications.
The ADuCM302x series of MCUs is designed to enable longer battery life and lower operating costs in IoT applications without sacrificing security and reliability, according to ADI (Norwood, Mass.). The devices consume less than 38uA/MHz of current in active mode and less than 750nA in standby mode, ADI said, enabling longer operation between battery replacements or recharging and lowing maintenance costs for devices that utilize them.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Dell Expanding into Industrial PC, IIoT Markets
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1329122&
Personal computer giant Dell is branching out into a new market, the company revealed at Embedded World. It is applying its proven quality, reliability, and global reach to the industrial PC market with the introduction of two purpose-built industrial PC families: the Embedded Box PC 3000 and 5000 series. The ruggedized, fanless PCs are part of Dell’s IoT product portfolio and target Industrial IoT edge computing and gateway applications.
“We looked at the IIoT landscape,” said Andy Rhodes, Dell’s executive director of commercial IoT solutions in an interview with EE Times, “and saw that edge gateways were missing in the portfolio of available systems. Also, a lot of things at the edge were embedded PCs, mostly legacy systems that wouldn’t be replaced with something entirely different.” In addition, he noted, the IT departments of companies contemplating the adoption of IIoT technology want to use the same tools they have in IT to manage their OT and edge systems.
Dell saw opportunity in the situation, Rhodes said, despite the existing ecosystem of industrial PC providers offering modular products based on industry standard buses such as PC/104 and compactPCI. “The embedded PC companies can’t supply large volumes quickly,” Rhodes noted, “and it’s hard to validate and certify the final configurations
Tomi Engdahl says:
New IoT technology and Internet issues to find a parking space, easy maintenance, and improve the though of asparagus farming, promising German technology company Bosch. Company IoT technology is already connected to more than five million units in the Internet.
The German company has opened its own cloud service in Germany within the meaning of the use of IoT solutions. The new cloud service is used for applications utilizing IoT Suite platform, which is connected to both devices, end users and businesses to the Internet.
Connected World event in Berlin Bosch listed a few examples of the networked world solutions. Destinations are quite familiar with, from car parking, smart house or to locate objects and things. The German company’s examples may, however, ideas own IoT solutions.
And Bosch is not the only technology supplier but the product supply IoT area is expanding rapidly. For example, the Nuremberg Embedded World 2016 event in a couple of weeks ago, was presented to dozens of hands-on IoT-circuit and software
Secure parking
Where can I find the nearest free parking spot? The new Bosch system provides an answer to this – usually urgent – the question. The pilot project carried out in the years 2016 to 2018 in Stuttgart.
Information is supplied by Bosch cloud service allows for real-time on the map, which can be viewed, as well as through the application and the service provider’s website. When the movement becomes smoother, people are more willing to use public transport and congestion will be reduced.
Bosch plans to offer next summer for logistics and transport companies a service that allows a driver can be reserved secure parking access.
Bosch Industry 4.0 solution can be used to monitor the entire supply chain all the way to the customer.
Bosch start-up Deep Field Robotics has developed a solution, which allows the soil temperature monitoring is easy. Sensors are installed at different depths for measuring the temperature, and the data is sent to Bosch IoT through the cloud service application, the farmer’s smartphone.
The Bosch Smart Home System promises to combine, among other things, home heating, lighting, smoke alarms and home appliances on a common substrate. at the heart of your smartphone or tablet using the pre-programmed system is the control center that connects devices to the Internet.
Bosch TrackMyTools system makes it easier to find things and objects are lost. Bosch small Bluetooth module sent every eight seconds, a signal that is retrieved from a smartphone or tablet app TrackMyTools within a radius of 30 meters.
Source: http://www.uusiteknologia.fi/2016/03/09/asioiden-internet-tulee-parkkipaikalle/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Little card Windows 10 or Linux
Card Manufacturer Aaeon is bringing with Emutexin and Intel’s new platform, which is based on a small credit card sized card processor and operating systems to Linux or Windows. The first cards are already on sale and deliveries will begin in April.
Taiwanese Aaeon announced Nuremberg embedded technology event in a couple of weeks ago for the first UP IoT-enabled card. It is based on the Dutch-UP community, which websites can be ordered from the card without taxes for € 89.
Aaeonin manufactured by UP-card based on the Intel Atom Z8350 processor x5. It supports Android and Linux in addition to Windows 10 operating system.
Aaeon belonging to Asus joined the group at the beginning of February, in addition to the UP community of Microsoft Certified Azure Internet of Things (IoT)
” Certified for Azure IoT strengthen our ability to support the IoT implementations of pre-tested hardware and operating system combinations, ”
Source: http://www.uusiteknologia.fi/2016/03/10/pikkukorttiin-windows-10-tai-linux/
More: http://www.up-community.org/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Christopher Alessi / Wall Street Journal:
Bosch to launch IoT cloud service in Stuttgart, initially for in-house, will open to others in 2017, CEO says company will invest $550.7M annually in new tech
Robert Bosch Launches Own Cloud for Internet of Things
Cloud will allow Bosch to accelerate its efforts to develop smartcars and smarthomes
http://www.wsj.com/article_email/robert-bosch-launches-own-cloud-for-internet-of-things-1457528014-lMyQjAxMTI2MjA0OTIwNzk3Wj
Robert Bosch GmbH said it is launching its own cloud for the Internet of Things, the latest step in the German engineering group’s transition from a traditional industrial company to equal parts manufacturer and information technology group.
The Bosch IOT cloud, located near the company’s headquarters in Stuttgart, will initially be used for in-house purposes and then will be available as a service for other companies starting in 2017. Other data centers for the Bosch IOT Cloud will eventually be located across the globe.
The cloud will allow Bosch to accelerate its efforts to develop smartcars and smarthomes, as well as intelligent manufacturing.
“The Bosch IOT cloud is the final piece of the puzzle that completes our software expertise,” Chief Executive Volkmar Denner said during a conference Wednesday.
Tomi Engdahl says:
IoT HAT for Raspberry Pi Zero and more
https://hackaday.io/project/10080-iot-hat-for-raspberry-pi-zero-and-more
First Wi-Fi + Bluetooth HAT for Raspberry Pi with 40 pins at an affordable price, get rid of your wires, here comes the IoT HAT by RedBear
Tomi Engdahl says:
Advanced IoT network
Secure world wide network of interconnected devices
https://hackaday.io/project/7342-advanced-iot-network
Tomi Engdahl says:
App Control With Ease Using Blynk
http://hackaday.com/2016/03/10/app-control-with-ease-using-blynk/
App development is not fun for everyone, and sometimes you just want to control a device from your phone with minimal work. Blynk appears to be a fairly put-together library for not only hooking up any Arduino or esp8266 to a phone through WiFi, but also through the net if desired.
Install the app onto your iPhone or Android device. Install the libraries on your computer. Next, modify your Arduino source to either pass direct control of a pin to Blynk, or connect Blynk to a virtual pin inside your code for more advanced control.
Blynk
http://www.blynk.cc/
Create an app for any connected project or product based on Arduino, Raspberry Pi, ESP8266 and other hardware
Blynk is not tied to some specific board or shield. Instead, it’s supporting hardware of your choice. Whether your Arduino or Raspberry Pi is linked to the Internet over Wi-Fi, Ethernet or this new ESP8266 chip, Blynk will get you online and ready for the Internet Of Your Things.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Up to Their ARMs in Concrete
http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1329145&
ARM technology is “set” to be deployed in a concrete sensing application.
ARM technology is “set” to be deployed in a concrete sensing application.
The Times said that a scheme starting in London in April “will be the first in Britain to use sensors made by ARM
A spokesperson for ARM confirmed that ARM is working with partners on a construction-site sensing project, but added that ARM is not going to be making or supplying sensors or microcontrollers to process the data. ARM’s business model remains unchanged, the licensing of intellectual property to chip developers, the spokesperson said, while declining to name the project partners.
The spokesperson confirmed that the system involves wires attached to reinforcing bars and these lead to an ARM-based unit that monitors these wires to determine when the concrete poured round those bars has set. At that point the wires are disconnected and left in the concrete and the equipment can be moved to the next pouring site.
ARM strengthens its hand by moving into the concrete jungle
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/business/industries/technology/article4706790.ece
Tomi Engdahl says:
A Warning for Wearables: Think Before You Emote
http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1329149&
An examination of how wearable devices could become the modern equivalent of blogs broadcasting proprietary workplace information directly to the Internet of Things — and beyond.
In 2013, I wrote an article for The Guardian about a woman who owned a wearable device that measured her stress at work. After realizing her anxiety was spiking every day at the same time her oppressive manager checked in at her cubicle, she began tallying her aggregate physiological data for a month. After commiserating with two other colleagues suffering similar tensions with the same manager, all three employees took their data to their boss. Presenting quantified proof to the CEO (time-stamped data correlating to an increase of stress), the employees demanded the negative manager get fired before their health insurance premiums increased.
Put simply, and literally, they also noted: “He’s killing us.”
A Warning for Wearables: Think Before You Emote
http://www.darkreading.com/operations/a-warning-for-wearables-think-before-you-emote/a/d-id/1324605?
Tomi Engdahl says:
The IoT Library: Intelligent Hall-Effect Sensors Open New Application Doors
http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=31&doc_id=1329146&
In the age of ultra-low power, the sub-microamp, intelligent, Hall-Effect sensor may be the smartest sensor around.
Magnetic field sensors lie passively inside electronic systems, on constant alert, making them ideal motion detectors, especially in automotive and consumer applications.
But passive should not imply that magnetic sensors are dumb or idle devices. Not by any means. In the age of ultra-low power, the, sub-microamp, intelligent, Hall-Effect sensor may be the smartest sensor around.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Temperature Sensors Improving, But Buyer Beware
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1329152&
From thermocouples and thermistors to resistance-temperature-detectors (RTDs), temperature sensors are varied and ubiquitous, but it would be wise not to take them for granted. Each type comes with its own set of inherent pros and cons in terms of cost, reliability, linearity, and ease of use. In this feature we will take you through some classics, while also updating you on the state of the art, how to make best of them, and a good example or two of temperature sensor and silicon integration.
Temperature sensors really are everywhere: used in automotive, infrastructure, industrial, military/aerospace, consumer electronics, medical, transportation, power, process control, petro-chemical, and geo-physical, agriculture, and communications applications. When used in combination with other sensors like strain and pressure sensors, they’re making the applications they serve more intelligent, safer, and more reliable. In many systems, temperature monitoring and control is fundamental.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:
Nest launches family accounts and Home/Away feature that will use phones’ locations to tell when house is empty — Nest can now use your phone to tell when you’ve left the house — Nest’s products are about to get better at telling when you’re out of the house and when you’re about to come back home.
Nest can now use your phone to tell when you’ve left the house
http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/10/11188888/nest-now-uses-location-for-home-away-states-launches-family-accounts
Nest’s products are about to get better at telling when you’re out of the house and when you’re about to come back home. An update to Nest’s iOS and Android app today will allow it to start monitoring your phone’s location. When it sees you leaving the house, it’ll be able to set Nest’s Thermostat to its “away” mode, and when it sees you coming back, it’ll be able to start warming things up for you. The feature can be disabled by declining to grant Nest the necessary permissions (or by turning off its out-of-home automation entirely), but enabling it should let Nest’s products do a better job of knowing how and when to get to work.
“Location data is meant to make Nest’s scheduling “more accurate and efficient””
The new feature is called Home/Away Assist, and it’s being launched in conjunction with another new part of the Nest app: accounts for family members.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The ins and outs of embedded databases for the IoT
http://embedded-computing.com/articles/The-Ins-and-Outs-of-Embedded-databases-for-the-iot/
While many facets of the Internet of Things (IoT) are falling into place, some hurdles still exist for the databases that will be used to manage IoT sensor data. In this roundtable with Christoph Rupp of hamsterdb, Sasan Montaseri of ITTIA, Steve Graves of McObject, and ScaleDB’s Mike Hogan we explore the factors currently limiting embedded databases, scaling and securing IoT databases, and the available tools and techniques for managing and analyzing sensor inputs from a sea of connected embedded devices.
Where are the current bottlenecks in embedded databases and database management systems (DBMS), particularly as they relate to the IoT?
Tomi Engdahl says:
Farhad Manjoo / New York Times:
Amazon Echo, initially ridiculed, could be the next must-have gadget
The Echo From Amazon Brims With Groundbreaking Promise
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/10/technology/the-echo-from-amazon-brims-with-groundbreaking-promise.html
A bit more than a year after its release, the Echo has morphed from a gimmicky experiment into a device that brims with profound possibility. The longer I use it, the more regularly it inspires the same sense of promise I felt when I used the first iPhone — a sense this machine is opening up a vast new realm in personal computing, and gently expanding the role that computers will play in our future.
What is most interesting about the Echo is that it came out of nowhere.
But the Echo has a way of sneaking into your routines. When Alexa reorders popcorn for you, or calls an Uber car for you, when your children start asking Alexa to add Popsicles to the grocery list, you start to want pretty much everything else in life to be Alexa-enabled, too.
In this way, Amazon has found a surreptitious way to bypass Apple and Google — the reigning monarchs in the smartphone world — with a gadget that has the potential to become a dominant force in the most intimate of environments: our homes.
If all this sounds over-the-top, read some of the reviews. On Amazon’s site, the Echo has racked up more stars than an Oscars party.
First, it’s simple to learn, and its voice-recognition capabilities are more intuitive than those of many other vocal assistants (like Apple’s Siri or Google Now). More than that, it keeps gaining new powers.
Amazon also worked to make sure the device responded very quickly. “Early on in the product, to play music took eight or nine seconds, and it’s just unusable when it’s like that,” Mr. Limp said. “Now it’s often 1,000 milliseconds or 1,200 milliseconds.”
The speed makes a crucial difference. Compared with the trudge of chatting with Siri, speaking to Alexa feels natural, closer to speaking to a human than a machine — and even when it gets your request wrong, which in your early days with the device will happen often, it doesn’t feel like you have paid a huge penalty for trying.
Makers of digital home devices like Nest are also rushing to make their products compatible with the Echo. Alexa can now control your Internet-connected lights, home thermostats and a variety of other devices. Hardware makers can also add Alexa’s brain into their own devices, so soon you won’t need an Echo to consult with Alexa — you could find it in your toaster, your refrigerator or your car.
Amazon’s open-platform strategy for the Echo calls to mind Amazon Web Services, its multibillion-dollar cloud business that also came out of left field to best competitors. “It is patterned very much off of the successful formula that A.W.S. uses,” Mr. Limp said.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Washing Machine IoT
This is a non-invasive WiFi Washing Machine Monitor
https://hackaday.io/project/6263-washing-machine-iot
So far the ESP8266 Huzzah or ESP8266 nodeMcu board will be the only controller. no arduino. The ESP is more then capable to run all the code. With the current 1.6.4 arduino IDE you can program ESP8266, so i will use that interface to build this project.
This device once completed will monitor the LED’s on a washing Machine and return their current status to the network.
Possible transmission ideas include: GROWL (tested and working), Text Messaging (tested and working). internal Webserver with current status and basic statistics (not started yet) May need external flash memory to store data. Or Develop website with MySQL database and just post all status updates the the internet.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Internet-of-Things Power Meter
https://hackaday.io/project/6938-internet-of-things-power-meter
The second version of the Electricity Usage Monitor, with an ESP8266, OLED screen, SD card for local storage and down-to-minute resolution.
The Internet-of-Things Power Meter (IPM) is a device fixed on top of the regular household power meter that provides detailed information about the electricity usage. Modern power meters have a LED blinking every time a Watt is used, the IPM detects these flashes using a light sensor, counts them, saves the values to an SD card. Later the data is stored to the cloud.
Usually power companies provide very rough electricity usage data, the IPM provides data with a minute resolution. Knowing the household electricity usage allows to extrapolate statistics and can give precise numbers about the costs.
The IPM was made with simplicity of assembly and cost in mind.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Broken RC Car Goes Online
http://hackaday.com/2016/03/14/broken-rc-car-goes-online/
When the remote for your son’s RC car goes missing, what are you going to do? Throw away a perfectly good robot chassis? No, we wouldn’t either. And these days, with WiFi-enabled microcontroller boards so readily available, it’s almost easier to network the thing than it would be to re-establish radio control. So that’s just what [Stian Søreng] did.
Naturally, there’s an ESP8266 board at the heart of this hack, a WeMos D1 to be specific.
On the software side, he implemented control over TCP by sending the characters “F”, “B”, “L”, or “R” to send the car forward, back, left, or right. Lowercase versions of the same letters turns that function off. He then wrote some client software in Qt that sends the right letters. He says that response time is around 150-250 ms, but that it works for his driving style — crashing. (We’d work on that.)
Tomi Engdahl says:
vThing Starter
Lower the entry bar to IOT Development as much as possible
https://hackaday.io/project/9661-vthing-starter
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Vladimir
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hardware
ongoing project
programming iot School ESP8266
This project was created on 02/13/2016 and last updated an hour ago.
Description
The goal of this project is to lower the bar to IOT Development as much as possible and allow a wider group of people to feel the joy of “physical” computing.
Currently I am missing a sub-10$ device, that i can plug to my computer and do some very simple things with Wifi. E.g. IFTTT-Button functionality. Changing colors of a RGB Led or measuring the temperature.
IMO such an integrated and affordable device would help many wanna-be IOT fans join the club. It could even help more children and students that feel intimidated by wires and soldering to start their journey in the world of programming.
Recently i’ve been asked in my company to deliver a training on IOT Development. I announced that I’ll explain how people would learn how to join the IOT Stream using a simple 4$ device (for myself I meant, buying few NodeMCUs or Wemos.cc’s, and letting the people connect some stuff ona breadboard). 200 out of 500 people enrolled. This surprised me quite a lot. Apparently everybody wants be part of IOT (whatever that means for any of them).
http://www.wemos.cc/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Dead Man’s Smartwatch
https://hackaday.io/project/10132-dead-mans-smartwatch
Smart watch with NFC, BTLE, motion and biometric sensors to act as an authentication device with a “dead man’s switch”.
Ideally based around something like Nordic’s nRF52 Cortex M4F+BTLE SoC, this smart watch would be a simple standalone device (that could also function with a smartphone or a computer with BT) for security purposes. It would store cryptographic keys on board (using the SoCs security features), and communicate via BTLE or NFC to devices to pass on generated tokens (modern laptops are starting to come with NFC equipped in the palm rests).
The biggest feature? If the watch is removed without disabling security, and it ceases to see a pulse, it wipes the keys.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Internet-of-Things Power Meter
https://hackaday.io/project/6938-internet-of-things-power-meter
The second version of the Electricity Usage Monitor, with an ESP8266, OLED screen, SD card for local storage and down-to-minute resolution
The Internet-of-Things Power Meter (IPM) is a device fixed on top of the regular household power meter that provides detailed information about the electricity usage. Modern power meters have a LED blinking every time a Watt is used, the IPM detects these flashes using a light sensor, counts them, saves the values to an SD card. Later the data is stored to the cloud.
Usually power companies provide very rough electricity usage data, the IPM provides data with a minute resolution. Knowing the household electricity usage allows to extrapolate statistics and can give precise numbers about the costs.
Tomi Engdahl says:
NXP wants to speed up the wearable smart devices in new product development and Hexiwear WaRP7-developing systems. The company introduced new platforms Nuremberg Embedded World event.
Kinetis controller based on ARM Cortex-M4 core. It is KW40Z radio chip that supports Bluetooth BLE’s. It also has a processor and a power management circuit in addition to three MEMS sensors: 6-axis accelerometer and magnetometer, three-axis gyro sensor and a digital pressure sensor.
In support of the development is available FreeRTOS, Kinetis SDK and Kinetis Design Studio IDE development system.
Source: http://www.uusiteknologia.fi/2016/03/14/kehityskorteilla-ja-linuxilla-alya-pukeutumiseen/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Finnish iLOQ launches the world’s first smart lock that gets power from smart phone. iLOQ NFC presents the world’s largest technology trade fair CeBIT. The technology allows the phone becomes the key to without having to smart lock needs no external power supply.
Innovation in the background is the company’s long experience without batteries and cables operating smart locks. In 2007, iLOQ launched the world’s first and only electronic locking system, which receives electricity from inserting of the key. In recent years, the opportunity to use your smartphone as a key has become more common.
iLOQ NFC lock is opened by touching a door knob phone. Turning knob is released for translation, if your phone has access to the right to lock. It is suitable for almost all the markets locking cylinders, padlocks and furniture locks.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4121:suomalainen-alylukko-saa-virtansa-alypuhelimesta&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
Bluetooth range is made for 400 meters
According to the current Bluetooth devices, radio reaches about 50 meters. However, Cypress Semiconductor has introduced a low-current ble technology (Bluetooth Low Energy) to support the module, whose range reaches as high as 400 meters.
Silicon Valley in Santa Clara held World event presented the Bluetooth module base Cypress PSOC programmable-system circuit. The module is also the industry’s first solution that comes with the new Bluetooth 4.2 standard, the key new features. These include, for example, required for IoT applications improved security.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4125:bluetoothin-kantama-venyi-jo-400-metriin&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
CitizenWatt and the Power of Community
http://hackaday.com/2016/03/15/citizenwatt-and-the-power-of-community/
Depending upon where you live in the world, the chances are that your national or local government, or your utility company, has smart meters on their agenda. The idea is that these network-connected energy meters for your gas and electricity supply will allow greater control of energy usage and lead to lower costs through more efficient use of that energy. Bold plans have been advanced for meters that exert control over your higher-power appliances such as water heaters, washing machines, or home heating systems, able to turn them off or on depending on the time of day, spot price of energy, or load on the grid as a whole.
These devices are not without controversy though. Privacy concerns for example, centred on the amount of information about individuals that could be gleaned from the data they collect. Or security, that a vulnerability in an internet-connected electronic device fitted to millions of homes and with control over high-power appliances could be catastrophic if successfully exploited.
In a small area of Paris, they are trying to reap some of the benefits of smart meters for a community without some of those risks. CitizenWatt (French language, Google Translate link) is an open-source smart energy monitor that provides some of the benefits of a smart meter while allowing its owner to retain control of the data it generates by sharing data only with their consent.
The CitizenWatt system comprises an electricity sensor and a base station. The sensor is a simple battery-powered device that takes the output from a current transformer clamped onto the electricity supply cable and feeds it via an ATMEGA8 microcontroller to a 2.4GHz RF link. The base station is a Raspberry Pi which retrieves the data from the RF, stores it, and allows the user to view it through a web interface. Both the sensor code and hardware files, and the files for the Raspberry Pi base station are freely available on GitHub.
https://github.com/CitoyensCapteurs/CitizenWatt-sensor
Tomi Engdahl says:
MEMS Grand Challenge Debuts
IoT contest fosters innovation
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1329203&
Simplfying and popularizing microelectromechanical system (MEMS) design is the goal of the MEMS Design Contest announced yesterday (March 16) at the conference titled Data Automation and Test in Europe (DATE 2016, March 15 to 17, Dresden, Germany). More specifically, the contest encourages chip designers to add MEMS blocks to a chip design, using tools designed for the purpose.
Sponsored by Cadence Design Systems, Coventor, X-FAB and Reutlingen University, the contest will feature a special process design kit (PDK) that the winners will use to fabricate their MEMS chip at X-Fab. If interested attend the DATE session Launch of the Worldwide MEMS Design Contest.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Presenting the Internet of Trash Cans !
http://hackaday.com/2016/03/17/presenting-the-internet-of-trash-cans/
This was gonna happen – sooner or later. [matthewhallberg] built a “Smart” trash can that is connected to the Internet and can be controlled by its own Android App. We’re not sure if the world needs it, but he wanted one and so built it. He started it out on a serious note, but quickly realized the fun part of this build
A servo motor helps flip the lid open and close. This is triggered by an ultrasonic ping sensor, which responds when someone waves a hand in front of the trash can. A second ping sensor helps inform the user when it is full and needs to be emptied. A Leonardo with the Idunio Yun shield helps connect the trash can to the internet. An mp3 shield connected to a set of powered computer speakers adds voice capability to the trash can, allowing it to play back pre-recorded sound clips. Finally, a Bluetooth module lets him connect it to an Android phone and the companion app controls the trash can remotely.
Temboo account,
OpenTrashCan: A Smart Internet Connected Trash Can
https://hackaday.io/project/10289-opentrashcan-a-smart-internet-connected-trash-can
OpenTrashCan connects to your wifi network and sends you an email when its full, talks to you, and even has it’s own Android app.
matthewhallberg
Tomi Engdahl says:
Skateboard Speedometer by inventED
Bluetooth Skateboard Speedometer in a 3D-printed housing, communicating with an Android App made with Processing.
https://hackaday.io/project/10286-skateboard-speedometer-by-invented
Tomi Engdahl says:
SkyLight
SkyLight : Get beyond TV’s ambient light
https://hackaday.io/project/10380-skylight
SkyLight is an advantage of the TV’s ambient light, extending to smart wireless light bulbs such as MiLight, LimitlessLED and Easybulb. SkyLight is developed on RF based wireless bulb because the cost is reasonable than Wifi build-in bulb in this time. SkyLight is based on raspberry pi main processor that drive LED strip via arduino board, of course arduino is a key to develop the control signal of the wireless bulbs. If you already have a DIY ambient light TV system such as lightberry, this is a good time to apply Skylight to your system.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cortana as a companion for elders
https://hackaday.io/project/10381-cortana-as-a-companion-for-elders
When I first knew about Cortana…I was very eager to try Windows 10…But I had to wait till now to get my hands on it. When I was using it, I thought about what cortana could actually do…the first thing that came to my mind was Home automation…I started my work on it…but I was very late…many of the enthusiasts out there made it already!
Tomi Engdahl says:
AutomaTales
Tales on my home automation project
https://hackaday.io/project/10227-automatales
Tomi Engdahl says:
Teardown: Amazon Dash Button keeps you connected
http://www.edn.com/design/consumer/4441569/Teardown–Amazon-Dash-Button-is-the-ultimate-in-consumer-convenience?_mc=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_review_20160311&cid=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_review_20160311&elqTrackId=e58291d65b4d47ba951fccdb4d7c5989&elq=edb7f6f382274515a39af3649a9c4383&elqaid=31272&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=27344
On the last one, you’ll note that (for privacy-preservation reasons) I’ve blurred out both the UPC and alphanumeric sequence associated with my unit’s DSN (Dash Serial Number). This code, as its name implies, is device-specific; in conjunction with your pre-configured Amazon account information, it indicates to Amazon’s servers what class of product is being ordered (Gatorade sports drink, versus any of the other items on the already-numerous and steadily growing list of consumables that the Dash Button service supports) and who’s ordering it.
Still to be configured upon initial product setup are your residence’s wireless network SSID and encryption password, and exactly what product you’re interested in button-press ordering (Gatorade flavor, for example, and packaging size and quantity). Stay tuned for more details on how both objectives are hardware-accomplished.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Why Use Windows 10 IoT?
The Internet of Things (IoT) has split manufacturing businesses wide open, blurring the distinction between hardware and software and creating once in a lifetime opportunity for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). For OEMs who have experienced cost and commoditization pressures, the news couldn’t be better. Finally, they have the tools and ability to reinvent their businesses. This paper explains how IoT will change everything.
Source: https://assets.emediausa.com/research/limitless-how-device-manufacturers-are-building-a-new-future-with-smart-connected-devices-34339
Tomi Engdahl says:
Licence-Exempt Network Has High Ambitions
http://hackaday.com/2016/03/20/licence-exempt-network-has-high-ambitions/
It’s safe to say that the Internet of Things is high on the list of buzzwords du jour. It was last seen rapidly ascending towards the Peak of Inflated Expectations on the Gartner Hype Cycle, and it seems that every startup you encounter these days is trying to place an IoT spin on their offering. Behind all the hype though lie some interesting wireless technologies for cheaply making very small microprocessors talk to each other and to the wider world.
UKHASnet is a wireless network developed from within the UK high-altitude ballooning community that uses cheap licence-exempt 868MHz radio modules in Europe and 915MHz in the Americas. The modules they are using have a surprisingly usable power output for licence exempt kit at 100mW, so the system has been designed for extensibility and bridging through nodes mounted on balloons, multirotors, or even seaborne buoys.
All UKHASnet packets are sent as human-readable plaintext ASCII, and the system borrows some of the features of amateur radio’s APRS.
Building a node is a simple process, requiring only the radio module, a microcontroller, and a battery.
https://ukhas.net/wiki/building_a_ukhasnet_node
UKHASnet
https://ukhas.net/
A simple wireless network aimed for use with low power licence exempt wireless modules. Ideally to be used for a local ground network for example for remote temperature sensing however will also be designed to allow for high altitude communications such as via meterological balloons.
The modules used are extremely low cost, and the routing algorithm incredibly simple, to encourage widespread development and deployment.
Plaintext ASCII-encoded Packets are human-readable. Zero-memory re-broadcast repeating borrows a lot from the APRS system used in Amateur Radio.
eg.
Packet transmitted from Sensor: 1mT18.7H72.9V4.55[S01]
Packet repeated by another Node: 0mT18.7H72.9V4.55[S01,R01]
A simple RF standard of 2kbps FSK on 869.5 MHz allows the choice and interoperation of several cheap and easily available ISM Transceiver Modules. Combined with low power ARM Cortex Microcontrollers, you can easily build a simple AA-battery powered node for under £10.
With 65km LOS range proven at EMF 2014, with wire antennas and nodes built the same day, the only way is up!
Tomi Engdahl says:
Bluetooth Smart update brings major changes
http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/eye-on-iot-/4441626/Bluetooth-Smart-update-brings-major-changes-?_mc=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_today_20160314&cid=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_today_20160314&elqTrackId=85f200208f0f427bb870a8b3f1ebfa61&elq=8d2e2f788c9b4c2a802adedc8d2500aa&elqaid=31294&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=27364
At first sight the recent update of Bluetooth Smart to version 4.2 does not look that significant. Don’t be misled by the 0.1 release change from the previous version. For a point release it has major ramifications not just for Bluetooth, but for wearables and the Internet of Things (IoT).
The changes signal a big shift in the way that ultra-low-power devices communicate with the Internet and open up not just new applications but make others much more convenient and easier to deploy. They enable what researchers a decade ago referred to as “ambient intelligence,” where electronic devices cooperate to make our lives easier, safer, and smarter.
Some changes will make it easier to deliver software upgrades to sensors nodes, to improve their functionality and keep them safe from hack attacks. Although the sensors normally transmit very small amounts of data each time, updates require better bulk data rates, which Bluetooth Smart 4.2 now delivers. The biggest changes come with other security-related enhancements and the ability of Bluetooth Smart devices to interact with what is likely to be the other key component for the IoT: 6LowPAN. It means Bluetooth wearables and beacons will be able to take advantage of the mesh networking technologies needed for ambient intelligence.
In addition to the security changes, the ability for Bluetooth Smart devices to access the Internet through 6LowPAN will give wearables more autonomy.
The user won’t have to carry a smartphone to get the features of a wearable app as the devices can opportunistically access data from other 6LowPAN networks to which it has access.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Home> Community > Blogs > Now Hear This!
Control robots with your ESC Boston badge
http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/now-hear-this/4441625/Control-robots-with-your-ESC-Boston-badge?_mc=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_analog_20160317&cid=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_analog_20160317&elqTrackId=97874a58132643f191947de88d30f315&elq=f01abba99a2d47fdaa27eedf6c30d0af&elqaid=31371&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=27421
As you’ll see, we’ve mounted one of the “Hello There!” badges on the robot. All of the badges come equipped with Arduino-footprint headers that allow them to interface with Arduino shields. In this case, we’ve plugged in a standard motor-control shield.
Once you’ve paired your personal badge with the one on the robot, you can control the beast by simply gesturing with you hand.
At the same time, the badge will communicate your desires wirelessly to the robot, which will respond by illuminating its own LED display and activating its motors. T
Tomi Engdahl says:
Eclipse tackles Java API for IoT
http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/eye-on-iot-/4441640/Eclipse-tackles-Java-API-for-IoT?_mc=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_today_20160317&cid=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_today_20160317&elqTrackId=b769f44a136741b6b0dfe1fec2483e56&elq=926b7c1d3720474d91005dc17a2bfbe4&elqaid=31375&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=27425
Getting to the 20 billion IoT devices by 2020 that analysts predict is going to require a lot of developers to work really fast. One way to help speed that development is to abstract the application side from the hardware side so that many different end products can come from just a handful of hardware platforms. The Eclipse Foundation has opened a project that promises to do just that: Eclipse Edje.
The Eclipse Edje Open Source IoT Project, announced at EclipseCon last week, will define a set of application programming interfaces (APIs) for resource-constrained devices that provide the basic services essential to IoT applications. It aims to deliver a standard library that forms a hardware abstraction layer (HAL) for key microcontroller functions such as GPIO, PWMs, LCDs, UARTs, and the like. The project will initially utilize code contributions from MicroEJ but welcomes and encourages new contributors to work through the Eclipse Foundation.
Currently, the Edje project is targeting 32-bit ARM processor implementations. This means that processors from companies like Microchip, NXP, Renesas, and STMicroelectronics will be readily usable in an Edje implementation. Some of the initial reference hardware mentioned in the MicroEJ presentation of the project include the STM32F746G DISCO board and the Raspberry Pi 2. These examples – a 200 MHz, 16M Flash machine to a 900 MHz, 1 GB machine – reflect the range of applicability for the HAL – in part. The project aims to support 32-bit devices with as little as 32 kB of RAM and 128 kB of Flash running at 16 MHz, such as Cortex-M0 products.
Edje
https://projects.eclipse.org/projects/iot.edje
The edge devices connected to the Cloud that constitute the Internet of Things (IoT) require support for building blocks, standards and frameworks like those provided by the Eclipse Foundation projects: Californium, Paho, Leshan, Kura, Mihini, etc.
Because of the large deployment of Java technology in the Cloud, on the PC, mobile and server sides, most projects above are implemented in Java technology.
Deploying these technologies on embedded devices requires a scalable IoT software platform that can support the hardware foundations of the IoT: microcontrollers (MCU). MCU delivered by companies like STMicroelectronics, NXP+Freescale, Renesas, Atmel, Microchip, etc. are small low-cost low-power 32-bit processors designed for running software in resource-constraint environments: low memory (typically KB), flash (typically MB) and frequency (typically MHz).
The goal of the Edje project is to define a standard high-level Java API called Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) for accessing hardware features delivered by microcontrollers such as GPIO, DAC, ADC, PWM, MEMS, UART, CAN, Network, LCD, etc. that can directly connect to native libraries, drivers and board support packages provided by silicon vendors with their evaluation kits.
To achieve this goal, the Edje project also defines the minimal set of API required for delivering IoT services, leveraging largely-deployed technologies, and meeting performance and memory constraints of IoT embedded devices. Edje defines the Edje Device Configuration (EDC).
Tomi Engdahl says:
Poachers beware: The drones are watching
http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/anablog/4441662/Poachers-beware–The-drones-are-watching?_mc=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_analog_20160317&cid=NL_EDN_EDT_EDN_analog_20160317&elqTrackId=99fc413f65b6434eb57dccf51a052afc&elq=f01abba99a2d47fdaa27eedf6c30d0af&elqaid=31371&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=27421
Animal poachers are the scum of the Earth.
But take heart, engineers are coming to the rescue!
Various methods using science, mathematics, satellites, and drones are being effective in stopping the poachers, even from far remote locations.
By mathematically recreating the environment in which poachings have historically occurred, scientists can get very good idea of when and where poachers are likely to strike.
24-hour surveillance is possible
Another project provides a solution to battery life in a drone and the need to land and re-charge
The introduction of a 24-hour surveillance capability prevents poachers from hunting at night or at odd hours.
It has been observed that in areas patrolled by drones, poaching has dwindled to zero in most cases. More drones mean fewer poachings.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Zerynth Framework: programming IoT with Python
http://www.open-electronics.org/the-zerynth-framework-programming-iot-with-python/
ZERYNTH, formerly known as VIPER, is a software suite used for the programming of interactive items, that are ready for the cloud and the Internet of Things. ZERYNTH enables the development in Python, on the most widespread prototyping platforms, and by using paradigms and features that are typical of a high level programming.
A part of the difficulties hindering the development of the IoT lies in the “linguistic” barriers between man (who wants to prototype his ideas in a simple and flexible way) and hardware (that requires specific instructions). The real problem is that it would require “advanced” information technology competences, far too advanced for the market these electronic boards refer to. On the other hand, if we want interactive items, we have to try hard to create devices that are capable of executing many activities at the same time. This requires the learning of paradigms such as the real-time, the interrupts, the callbacks, that are not very simple to learn and manage.
ZERYNTH, available for the download as open source: is a multiplatform (Linux, Windows and Mac) work suite that enables the programming of the greatest part of the 32-bit boards actually available on the market: from the professional boards used in the industrial field to the most well-known prototyping boards for hobbyists, such as Arduino DUE, UDOO, Particle and ST Nucleo.
In detail, ZERYNTH is composed of:
• ZERYNTH STUDIO: a multiplatform and browser-based development environment, with cloud synchronization and storage of the projects;
• ZERYNTH VM: a Virtual Real-Time Machine for 32-bit microcontrollers, written in Python 3, with multi-threading support.
It is compatible with all the boards upon the 32-bit ARM chip, such as Arduino Due, UDOO, Particle, STNucleo.
• the ZERYNTH Library: a set of modules including the CC3000 of Spark Core’s Wi-Fi and Adafruit’s Wi-Fi shield, the Adafruit/Sparkfun thermal printer, the NeoPixel LED ring, the RTTL smart melody player, a signals library of the Streams kind, as well as the TCP and UDP protocols.
• the ZERYNTH APP: an app, available for both iOS and Android, that acts as an interface to drive the boards that have been programmed by means of ZERYNTH, without having to use switches or potentiometers. The command interface can be customized for each single project, since technically the app is a HTML client that displays the templates defined by the Python scripts inside the ZERYNTH Objects’ memory.
Zerynth Studio is a powerful IDE for embedded programming in Python that enables the IoT
Free to download, Free to use
http://www.zerynth.com/zerynth-studio/
Tomi Engdahl says:
BBC Micro:bit officially launches as 29 partners join forces to get kids coding
It’s official: 11- and 12-year-olds can finally play with their bits
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2452039/bbc-micro-bit-officially-launches-as-29-partners-join-forces-to-get-kids-coding
THE LONG-AWAITED BBC Micro:bit officially became a thing today after months of delays.
The barebones mini-computer is being distributed to 11- and 12-year-olds (Year 7) in the hope of inspiring a new generation to learn to code while they’re still young.
Unlike similar machines such as the INQ award winning Raspberry Pi, the Micro:bit has been designed to connect to an existing computer over Bluetooth, meaning that children don’t need to rely on a separate mouse and keyboard, but rather a web interface.
It can even be set up to work from an Android device using a dedicated app. The board itself includes a micro USB connector, optional battery connector, Bluetooth LE antenna and a 32-bit ARM Cortex M0 CPU running at 16MHz and with 16K of RAM.
One million Micro:bits are being sent to teachers for distribution in a tie up between the BBC, ARM and Samsung along with nearly 30 other contributors.
With the use of add-ons, the Micro:bit is a fully fledged IoT device limited only by the skills and imagination of the user.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Industrial Internet groups agree to align architecture efforts
http://www.controleng.com/single-article/industrial-internet-groups-agree-to-align-architecture-efforts/92514d51827f6ae8925755bdcdca9701.html
Representatives of Platform Industrie 4.0 (I4.0) and the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) agreed to align their architecture efforts and have agreed to create a clear roadmap to ensure future interoperability.
Representatives of Plattform Industrie 4.0 (I4.0) and the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) agreed to align their architecture efforts—respectively, the Reference Architecture Model for Industrie 4.0 (RAMI4.0) and the Industrial Internet Reference Architecture (IIRA). Both sides recognize the complementary nature of the two models and an initial draft mapping showing the direct relationships between elements of the models, and a clear roadmap to ensure future interoperability. Additional possible topics included collaboration in the areas of IIC Testbeds and I4.0 Test Facility Infrastructures, as well as standardization, architectures & business outcomes in the Industrial Internet.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Enabling IIoT requires communication protocol translation
http://www.controleng.com/single-article/enabling-iiot-requires-communication-protocol-translation/25a7fbe2d7d0e8c2cf825a685dc91ca5.html
As implementations of Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and Industrie 4.0 frameworks commence, network communication protocol translations are needed; Hilscher is providing network gateways and other communications from the plant floor to the enterprise and cloud for manufacturing data analysis, as company executives explained to Control Engineering, Plant Engineering, and Oil & Gas Engineering publications recently.
Implementations of Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and Industrie 4.0 frameworks are progressing, and translations of major industrial network communication protocols enable the flow of data that becomes actionable information with analysis.
“Hilscher netX network controller translates 22 protocols, transfers, and converts data. It can connect with everything,”
The goal is to get machine builders, system integrators, and end users “Out of the network wars, and allow them to connect easily to as much as they need.”
he netHost has software-based programmable logic controller (PLC) masters for slotless systems, and netSCADA offers view and control capabilities with a web browser.
“These devices help IIoT get data off the wire. Products are vendor independent and legacy proof,” Marshall noted. “You don’t have to retrofit the control system to get data to the cloud,” he said, noting Hilscher can do that for existing and future PLCs, without touching or adding communications responsibilities to PLCs.
Pühringer said customers can:
Use existing infrastructure in plants
Deploy reference architectures from Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) and Industrie 4.0, vetted for all implementations
Use cyber-physical systems as a virtual twin
Leverage standards and start again, in a cycle of continuous improvement.
The IIC Reference Architecture includes an edge tier with devices such as actuators, scanner, sensors, motors, controls; a platform tier; and connections to the enterprise and cloud. Field includes existing real-time infrastructure, Pühringer said, and the edge bridges information technology (IT) and operational technology (OT), then connects to higher level systems. This is a valid model, laid out in great detail for all test beds, Pühringer said.
Industrie 4.0 uses a three-dimensional RAMI 4.0 model, where functional layers are in line with plant floor people, and physical objects enable IIoT functions.
The models can be put on existing wire in the plant without disturbing the PLC, using presently available protocols such as OPC UA (Unified Architecture), DDS, and MQTT, as well as TSN (Time Sensitive Network), an emerging Ethernet standard designed to bring one real-time Ethernet structure to the many-flavored protocol soup of today.
“We see OPC UA gaining momentum. MQTT is expanding quickly beyond its IBM origins,” Pühringer said, as IIoT is bringing new standards for engineering and to cloud-based architectures, with vertical integration from sensor into the cloud.
Tomi Engdahl says:
IoT gateways: Industrial automation’s path to Industrie 4.0
http://www.controleng.com/single-article/iot-gateways-industrial-automations-path-to-industrie-40/29f70d1b0ea04bbc588eb1b418c6f958.html
IIoT gateway connections: Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and Industrie 4.0 connect industrial automation devices and equipment, or “things,” with cloud-based systems to harvest information faster and to drive business value by providing new services to customers.
The ever-expanding Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), sometimes referred to as IoT for applications beyond industrial automation, brings a vast communications infrastructure to the process, factory, and building automation industries; one that is far beyond anything these industries have typically used. With cloud communications services available from several companies spread across the planet-including Microsoft, Amazon, and others—it has never been easier or more cost-effective to connect even the smallest and least expensive devices to a network—and not just to a local network, but to one that spans the globe.
oT carries vast amounts of processing power to the process, factory, and building automation industries. This processing power, which can also be found in the cloud, is scalable from one CPU with limited memory and disk space to a large array of CPUs or servers.
Many organizations embarking on their IoT initiative seek “off-the-shelf,” scalable software applications to enable monitoring, visualization of data, real-time analytics, and much more. Because of the openness and standardization in emerging communications protocols, many of these applications are serviceable with minimal configuration and with little or no middleware.
Achieving these benefits requires the availability of low-cost bridging devices called “IoT gateways.” IoT gateways communicate to the exiting sensors and automation controllers called “edge devices” and provide the bridge between an on-premise communications network and cloud-based computing power and visualization. IoT gateways must have the ability to interface with industry standard protocols such as OPC UA (Unified Architecture), BACnet, Modbus, Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP), or web services, but can sometimes use proprietary communications protocols as well.
IoT gateway
Connectivity is key. Without being able to connect edge devices from behind firewalls and securely publish data to cloud-based applications, organizations will not be able to achieve the promises of advanced analytics through computing power in the cloud. A premium IoT gateway, for instance, should be able to communicate with Microsoft Azure or third-party applications using the most popular transport protocols. Once the IoT gateway is online, it can register with the IoT Hub in the Azure cloud through a secure Advanced Message Queuing Protocol (AMQP) so that it can authenticate, send, and receive data. Acting as a secure message broker, the IoT Hub can allow for remote device management, provisioning, and configuration.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Visible Things
http://silica.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/en/silica/visible-things
Propel your next design from Edge-to-Enterprise. In one minute.
Targeting a wide range of industrial markets, Visible Things is a highly flexible and comprehensive evaluation and development platform for edge-to-enterprise IoT projects.
The platform delivers tested, proven, secure and integrated hardware and embedded software to connect smart sensors and embedded devices via gateway solutions or low-power wide-area (LPWA) networking technologies, right through to the cloud and enterprise software applications.
Visible Things is developed based on best-in-class technology regarding function, cost and long term availability.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Demos Helsinki hallway is a red button. When it is pressed, a message that says someone in the hallway think tank appears on the intranet. The app is not just a greater purpose.
“This reflects well the current Internet of Things massaging” of the future researcher Roope Mokka says with a laugh.
Things on the Internet is all about transformation that will bring internet connection in the refrigerator. The world is full of buttons and sensors. They measure everything and transmit messages. Network switches into the physical world. Mocha believes that the Internet will gradually merge into an integral part of our lives so that it disappears completely.
“Ten years after the Internet does not exist anymore,” Mocha claims.
He emphasizes that it is not a predictor of future research. In practice, it is a fact that the Internet will become as commonplace part of all the steel beams inside the building.
“We do not think any more buildings in all technology. Engineers and companies will provide them ”
The whole world is changing to be programmed, when things are connected to the network. At the same time companies business models become more complicated.
ow the prevailing digitalization hype is only the first step. We are heading towards a phenomenon that Mocha calls the Internet of things well. It can be moved freely to any non-Internet.
“Uber shows how much for a single sensor can be made. Do not expect that the world is full of sensors, before going to the market”
In the future, sensors are much more. The sensors are so small and inexpensive that they can be installed anywhere. A large part of the devices connected to the network also takes care of their own energy needs. Then the electricity grid at all will no longer prevent their spread.
One third of the people’s money flows to housing, over a tenth of movement and about one-sixth of the food. This accounts for more than half of total consumption. In addition to the production of energy pulsing world’s largest market, which can still be shaken.
“It will be interesting to see innovative startups that come from areas such big money.”
At the same time the traditional technology companies expand their business in the physical world. For example, Apple and Google are developing self-targeted to the car. Apart from the above the Samsung and Microsoft are competing at the same time as to who can get forward on mobile devices also checkouts tasks fees.
“In Finland, always ask for permission before you operate in. Here needed creative lawyers. ”
He also needs to Finland in the community, which would leave to take forward any non-technology related to the Internet. We need a driving force corresponding to the demoscene was once the Finnish game industry. Upon which the Community could rise, Mocha does not know how to say.
Source: http://www.tivi.fi/Kaikki_uutiset/taman-takia-internet-katoaa-6535252
Tomi Engdahl says:
TechCrunch:
Google opens access to its speech recognition API, going head to head with Nuance
http://techcrunch.com/2016/03/23/google-opens-access-to-its-speech-recognition-api-going-head-to-head-with-nuance/
Google is planning to compete with Nuance and other voice recognition companies head on by opening up its speech recognition API to third-party developers. To attract developers, the app will be free at launch with pricing to be introduced at a later date.
We’d been hearing murmurs about this service developing for weeks now. The company formally announced the service today during its NEXT cloud user conference, where it also unveiled a raft of other machine learning developments and updates, most significantly a new machine learning platform.
The Google Cloud Speech API, which will cover over 80 languages and will work with any application in real-time streaming or batch mode, will offer full set of APIs for applications to “see, hear and translate,” Google says. It is based on the same neural network tech that powers Google’s voice search in the Google app and voice typing in Google’s Keyboard.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Tizen is a Linux-based operating system, which has its roots in both the Nokia Maemo and Meego through projects. Now, Samsung is developing a new stripped-down Tizenistä Real-time Internet of Things active devices.
Samsung has promised to be held next month in San Francisco developer meeting about the new “open source RTOS platform IoT devices”. The company has not confirmed the information, according to which it is called Micro Tizen operating system.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4178:samsung-riisuu-tizenin-iot-laitteisiin&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
Hardware cryptographic acceleration and secure storage for TLS in IoT apps
http://www.electronics-eetimes.com/news/hardware-cryptographic-acceleration-and-secure-storage-tls-iot-apps
Atmel has disclosed a hardware interface library for TLS stacks used in Internet of Things (IoT) edge node applications. Hardening is a method used for reducing security risks to a system by applying additional hardware security layers and eliminating vulnerable software.
Atmel’s Hardware-TLS (HW-TLS) platform provides an API that allows TLS packages to use hardware key storage and cryptographic acceleration even in resource constrained edge node designs.
OpenSSL is a general-purpose cryptography library that provides an open-source implementation of the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) and TLS protocols. wolfSSL is a cryptography library that provides lightweight, portable security solutions with a focus on speed and size. Atmel’s ATECC508A-OpenSSL and ATECC508A-wolfSSL are available for immediate download at their respective software distribution repositories, offering seamless adoption of more secure elements without disruption to the developer workflow.
Secure hardening for both OpenSSL and wolfSSL is made possible with HW-TLS which allows those TLS software packages to interface seamlessly with the Atmel ATECC508A CryptoAuthentication co-processor.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Push is on to bring standardization to the Internet of Things
http://www.zdnet.com/article/push-is-on-to-bring-standardization-to-the-internet-of-things/
Industrial Internet Consortium works with Object Management Group and other bodies to open up the world’s devices to communication and data exchange.
The chairman/CEO of the Object Management Group (OMG), which led the way in standardizing many of the web services seen in today’s enterprise architectures, has set his sites on the next great frontier: the Internet of Things (IoT). He is also now executive director of the the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC), a two-year-old organization which seeks to bring order and sanity to the chaos we associate with IoT.
The IIC is not a standards organization in itself, but rather, a facilitator of testbeds for bringing together major technology providers and manufacturers to collaboratively design, build and measure industrial-strength IoT solutions.
IIC’s testbed partners are a who’s-who of Industrial IoT advocates — including Bosch, Cisco, EMC, Fujitsu, GE, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, IBM, Infosys, Intel, and National Instruments. To date, IIC now oversees nine testbeds, covering smart grid, predictive maintenence, tracking and controlling tools and components, and machine-to-machine communications.
The challenge with IoT — and by extension, the Indusrial IoT — is achieving standardization on a network scale.
Middleware is familiar ground for OMG, he adds. “OMG’s DDS and CORBA middleware standards are deployed in literally billions of systems today