Tech Leaders Allign To Create The Internet Of Everything
Bryan P. Carpender for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
Imagine living in a house equipped with a system that was capable of turning off the heat or air conditioning when it senses that nobody is home. What if that same system could detect that the homeowner’s car was a few blocks away and then turn on the lights, crank up the heat and automatically open the garage door?
It sounds like science fiction, but it may soon be science fact, thanks to the AllSeen Alliance, a new consortium of technology leaders announced today by The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organization dedicated to accelerating the growth of Linux and collaborative development.
The new AllSeen Alliance is designed to advance the innovation and adoption of what’s referred to as the Internet of Everything (IoE) which is based on the idea of connectivity between devices, systems and objects which would allow for greater sharing of information and coordinated and intelligent operations across all of them.
In other words, your home appliances, computers, cars and mobile devices would all be able to communicate with each other and be interoperable, thanks to a shared open source framework.
For example, this framework could allow users to easily connect their various digital music devices to nearby compatible wireless speakers, regardless of the fact that they might be from different manufacturers.
If the makers of both products are part of the AllSeen Alliance, these devices could communicate seamlessly without having to go through a cumbersome and tedious pairing process. Today, such a thing is difficult, as manufacturers tend to design their products to communicate and interact only with their own proprietary applications and software.
But the AllSeen Alliance could drive a paradigm shift within the industry, thanks to its founding members, which include such big names Haier, LG Electronics, Panasonic, Qualcomm, Sharp, Silicon Image and TP-LINK. Contributing community members including Canary, Cisco, D-Link, doubleTwist, Fon, Harman, HTC, Letv, LIFX, Lite-on, Moxtreme, Musaic, Sears Brand Management Corporation, Sproutling, The Sprosty Network, Weaved and Wilocity.
Its membership roster reads like a “Who’s Who” of technology innovation. These companies represent some of the world’s leading technology enterprises, innovative startups and chipset manufacturers, as well as home appliance manufacturers, service providers, retailers and consumer electronic manufacturers.
“Open source software and collaborative development have been proven to accelerate technology innovation in markets where major transformation is underway,” said Jim Zemlin, Executive Director at The Linux Foundation. “Nowhere is this more evident today than in the consumer, industrial and embedded industries where connected devices, systems and services are generating a new level of intelligence in the way we and our systems interact. The AllSeen Alliance represents an unprecedented opportunity to advance the Internet of Everything for both home and industry. We are very happy to host and help guide this work.”
The members of the AllSeen Alliance will contribute software and engineering resources as part of their collaboration on the open software framework, which allows ad hoc systems to seamlessly discover, dynamically connect and interact with nearby products regardless of brand, transport layer, platform or operating system.
Qualcomm originally developed this open source framework as a project called AllJoyn and has contributed the code for AllJoyn, which will enable to framework to run on various software platforms such as Linux, Android, iOS and Windows.
The code is now available to developers who can start working with it and its application programming interfaces (APIs), fostering an environment of collaboration and innovation.
“Once the APIs that comprise the interoperability layer are opened up, there will be all kinds of opportunities to add services on top,” Zemlin explains.
This level of collaboration is truly essential, as no single company can accomplish the level of interoperability required to support the Internet of Everything and address everyday, real-life scenarios. A united, cross-industry effort is needed to deliver new experiences to consumers and businesses through various technology touch points.
And the industry is wasting no time embracing this new alliance. “Engineers already are implementing this code in products being sold today. We look forward to more product announcements at CES,” Zemlin said.
Source: http://www.redorbit.com/news/technology/1113024602/creating-the-internet-of-everything-121013/
