14 DAY TRIAL // Apparently, there's a trend going on right now: smart devices in your home. I have to admit that I'm one of those people curious about new technology, especially things that you can interact with. You may know them as Internet of Things.
Before attempting to answer the question above, I want to remind you that, if you have a Wi-Fi router and an Android-powered device in your home, then you have at least one or two devices running a Linux kernel-based operating system. Also, I see numerous projects on Kickstarter that are using a Raspberry Pi device as their hardware base and a GNU/Linux operating system as their software base for programming stuff.
A friend of mine has just bought a Smart Home Kit from a New York-based startup called littleBits. The kit allows my friend to make her own electronic creations without the need to know anything about programming or wiring. littleBits is famous for creating an open source library of modular electronics that simply snap together using small magnets. For example, they can be used to open the curtains at sunrise.
How do you feel about smart devices in your home?
Now, I know some of you out there are against having all these "robots" in our home, controlling your lives, but somehow, whether we like it or not, that's the direction we're heading at the moment. And you have to admit that it's fun to have a smart device that can control almost anything in your home, including your TV, coffee machine, smart lights, door locks, etc.
The first device that comes to mind right now is the popular Mycroft, about which we wrote several articles on our website. Mycroft is the perfect example of a smart device that can control almost anything in your home. It aims to be the world's first open-source and open-hardware AI (Artificial Intelligence) device for home users.
It can connect to online services like Netflix, YouTube, or Spotify, and can interact with smart lights, media servers, and any other appliance you might have in your home connected to the Internet. Best of all, it is powered by a Linux kernel-based operating system, which is open source, so you can modify it the way you like it.
Well, I for one was thinking that something like Mycroft is a little bit too much, especially that I don't have smart devices in my home, at least at the moment of writing this article. However, I am thinking of buying my first Smart Home Kit that will turn any household object into an Internet-connected device.
I think that we do need this kind of devices in our homes so that we can free some of our time to do more things that we really like to do, such as read, write, and concentrate more on interesting projects. And being powered by a Linux kernel-based operating system automatically means that they can be trusted, safe, and secure at all times.
So, how many smart devices do you have at home?
What I am curious about is how many of you out there have more than one Linux-powered device at home. And I'm talking here about smart devices, things that you can interact with, that you can control with your smartphone and that you can program to do stuff in your home when you’re away, or when you wake up.
Please drop a comment below and let me and other people know how you feel about smart devices controlling your life, your house. How many smart devices do you have in your home right now, and if you don't have any, are you planning on buying Internet-connected devices in the near future?