One more time

Come September 9th, Once again Tim Cook will walk on to the podium and unleash a lot of applause.

Last time, I had guessed Apple TV will be announced, but that was not to be. But this time every one is sure it will be and I am not going to question it.  My request for the features remain  what it was last time, so nothing much to add there.

I am also guessing iOS9 and El Capitan will be available for public. Now, that is a very conservative list. But I am really eager to see what the Apple TV and Homekit will bring to the foray!

View from the top

Branto Orb is a new 360 Degree rotatable and pan-able camera which probably apt to be kept on  the roof to look around for you. This alone is a great feature for a security camera. This indigogo project does not stop at that.
Unlike Canary, they are planning to allow two way communication. Both Audio and video. No, they do not have an inbuilt screen. But they support audio video streaming protocol to channel it to Airplay ready or  Miracast capable devices to stream it up to a TV or audio system.
They also add the capability for this device to send IR signals so that it can control devices in the room. Normally I do not like devices to club diverse features into one since this kills the flexibility big time. This is one exception. Since enabling the dump devices like old TVs and A/Cs which do not have WiFi and Automatable capabilities is a big plus which goes OK with the camera. If you have a security camera in a room where A/C is there or TV is there, or some other device working only with IR only remote control, this brings in the automation to them. And chances are for some time,  this will be the case in many countries.

Second thoughts on Smart things

I always had a bias against Smartthings. May be I did not like the look of it or may be some thing else. But lately I just happened to look in detail about its capabilities and what is coming up in V2.0. I should say I am having second thoughts. The following are the main points which made me re think

1. Integration with SONOS. This is a major one for me.Having committed to SONOS in big way for my distributed audio system. What Smartthings allows me to do is to have my alerts and event responses broadcast-ed via the flexible speaker configurations that SONOS can provide. This can really give a voice to SONOS. SONOS being not very open to all the other vendors at the moment, I am not able to identify any other means this can be achieved cleanly.
2. Integration with other Automation gadgets I have. Philips Hue, August Lock etc are few which are there in the long list. This vast coverage of devices which are leading in their own capabilities is a definite plus for me. August Lock integration will be introduced in the new version of the Hub via Bluetooth. Now that does raise few questions to me as in positioning of my Hub in relation to the door etc. But that will have to wait until the 2.0 hits the shelf. Then there is the possible integration with Roomba using Thinking Cleaner face plate. This is a face plate add on to Roomba which will give WiFi Control to Roomba.
3. Cost. The cost of this hub is minimal. When this is probably not THE reason for me as its only one component we are talking about, it is definitely a reason.
4. Integration to Apple HomeKit Platform. The reason I am holding back on any hub is mainly because I want to know how HomeKit may play in the field and what does it leave open. I find Siri Integration that HomeKit brings forth a definite plus as with this and the SONOS it gives a life and personality to the Home. I am still holding back until the details of HomeKit is out, but this hub does show promise since it has capability to integrate the myriad of gadgets which  may not naively work with Apple HomeKit.

Voice your SONOS

Talked about in Many forums, I finally decided to try SONOS voice app. Its a third party app with a very simple interface and all it does it mute your music for the time you talk through the App. You can play the audio with the flexibility of the SONOS system. Any room, All the rooms or Some rooms. Upto that its sheer bliss.

The only down side I see is that the starting of the app takes a bit of time and the volume for some reason I see as low compared to the music volume.

The app takes almost the same time as the SONOS app takes to start up so you cannot really complain about it. All the discovery of speakers process may be taking time.

Volume is a bit of a let down. At 50% level I can hear the music playing in my bedroom upstairs, standing down stairs where as at the same level the audio is barely audible next room. May be issue with my voice:-)

The final glitch is the feedback. If you try to use the Voice in a room where you are trying to play it, there will be the audio feedback. The developer of the app says something to effect that its to do with  the buffering that SONOS forces on the feeds.

This is where I was wondering why SONOS them selves not updating their app to include voice into it. They have the API which others are using, they have the App. It will give a nice integrated interface. I am not even complaining why they are not giving a Karaoke when they have the technology to control the Vocals (SONOS Bar can boost the Audios and also it can drop the volume of Bass. May be this will work in only 5.1 Channel recording, I am not sure. But even simple apps are there which can identify the vocals and trip down that some what) since I think this may not be a sure hit solution, and they may not want to do a half baked one. BTW, a nice addition could be an integration with some Lyrics server and download and show the Lyrics on the app if that is possible!

So SONOS, I hope you do come up with the Public Announcement Option for SONOS!

What I would like to see from Apple Eco system this year

WWDC is just around the corner and I am sure Tim Cook will not have enough time to re plan just because I published my wish list:-) But I would put in what I would like to see so that in case it aligns with what really happens, I can feel happier:-)

1. Its anybody's guess looking at the graphics  of the WWDC that "Apple TV encircled with many objects" is the theme. So I would safely guess the HomeKit enabled Apple TV will be announced.  Tightening the loose ends on HomeKit and HealthKit will be in the cards. If we have all those individual remotes merging into a unified interface at some place, I will be very happy.
2. I would hope that media streaming options will converge. What I mean is either Apple start supporting some of the other competitions' protocols (My interest specifically on SONOS) or others align with Homekit. When Airplay does look a great way, its not the only way. So I would be happy if Apple opens up a bit here.
3. Workflow being integrated into iOS. With the HomeKit coming up strongly, ability to build up workflows will have to be native to iOS rather than a third party implementation. This way, Apple can also choose to allow certain level of integration with the Phone app and Message app. This will greatly improve the flexibility and scope of automation.
4. Siri will have to develop further. One challenge we face now is that even for operations which can be done locally, we need a connection to be active. This may not be practical if we want to use Siri for Home automation. I may be in basement and may be my WiFi is not working for internet, but I may still want to control the in house appliances; Using Siri:-) The challenge is that Siri requires a net connection to understand me in the first place. Not sure if that can be brought down in to say my Apple TV so that the local functionality can still work with out the internet round trip.
5. Apple should show some love to Indian Crowd:-) Especially in Maps. If they cannot, they should atleast allow user to choose which mapping app should be set as default mapping app. That way we can use google map when we cannot use Apple Maps.Even though I can still start the Google Maps from the App, having Siri to find my way using Google Maps is something I will be grateful to have.
Thats it for now, Tim! I am sure you can manage this! What are friends for afterall?

Know your own power

I had been looking around for a device which can measure the power consumption at home and which can report back as much detail as possible. More than taking away the shock Electricity Bill delivers, I wanted to be aware of the power consumption as it happens and may be some of the event triggers can be utilized too. Like when say the power draw crosses a point when I do not expect it to.

There are solutions which requires you to plug in your appliances via the device into the mains and it in isolation or in conjunction reports the data. These works out cheaper. But then there is no triggering any action based on it. There is no consolidation. And there is the pain of having multiple plugs all to be connected all over the house. With multiple layer of adapters the connections across the house becomes painful.

Then there are other devices which could measure the consumption based on the current drawn from mains using CTs. This was less intrusive and could be done in one place. The device also had ability to set alarms for levels of consumption to alert you of you exceeding quota of usage.

This was a definite improvement to what I started off with. But then came Smappee. A much smarter device which can measure the consumption using the CT like the device I talked about before, but also could report it as triggering actions using IFTTT integration. And it is going to work with Homekit too!

This itself was a big leap for me! But the fun does not stop there. What I was missing in the previous solution of not able to know which device is drawing the power immediately, is taken care of in Smappee! They use some complex algorithm internally to understand the power usage signature of different appliances from the entry point. Then they report the power consumption split into these buckets of appliances. Well, they cannot do it to all individual points, as some DNA of power consumption is indistinguishable, but they can do a fairly good job. (Is it my personal experience? No. I have not used it. Its right from the site and other reviews! But I intend to find out!)

Its available in India, and it can work with Solar panels also! Which means, they can report how the power is being used from the power generated on the Solar end of my supply! That is now the icing on the top. If it all works the way it is stated to work, I will be a happy camper!

Only time can tell!

Ray the remote

There had been universal remotes from quite some time. Some which needs us to map key by key and some which allows us to map using a device ID. There had been some with Digital display and some which were apps lying on your iOS/Android devices.

I have tried a few. Some worked fine with limited capability. Like the STB remote for the Satellite TV which allows me to map my TV remote also into it, and Universal Remote, a device from gear4.

The STB remote worked fine, though with a bit of effort, when I had the TV remote from which the universal remote could learn. But recently when I had to connect to a TV for which the Remote was not working anymore, I ran to a dead end.

The Universal Remote, Unity remote from gear4 would have worked well (even though the app was not very good) provided they had used WiFi in place of Bluetooth. Now the challenge is that the batteries get drained so fast and by the time you are ready to use it ,

I hear there are other remotes which work well, but end of the day I feel the flexibility lacks in a fixed keyboard remote as you have to have a lot of keys there.

This is the area where Ray is relevant. Ray tries to have some of the common functions as physical buttons as volume control etc and the rest all as soft buttons. It also tries to integrate some of the old Google TV into the remote. With support for many STBs including what is in India, they are making it extremely interesting for the subcontinent. So now you can see detailed program guide as well as additional information about the program. It can learn from your choices and suggest more programs for you. (Some of the wish list items I had in another post in this blog:-)

I also happened to see a demo given by Ray to recode which showed some stability issues with the remote which may be a deterrent if that slips into the final product. May be a little too early to start worrying about it.

In India especially the demography of people who watch the TV may find it a little too techie to start with, but if the device really simplifies the remote by adding snap shots of the program and name in native language etc, it can really be an interesting product to have. I will keep a watch on this to see if I want to get one. As I said earlier, a lot may depend on what Homekit finally grows on to be.