14 DAY TRIAL // There’s an entire army of HomeKit-enabled appliances being demonstrated at CES this year, all of which have one thing in common: in order to control them from outside the house using Siri voice commands, they require an Apple TV.
“HomeKit is a framework in iOS 8 for communicating with and controlling connected accessories in a user’s home. You can enable users to discover HomeKit accessories in their home and configure them, or you can create actions to control those devices. Users can group actions together and trigger them using Siri,” according to Apple.
It isn’t clear why there’s an extra hardware requirement for turning the lights on or off, opening the garage door, or turning up the heat using voice commands before arriving home. According to sources speaking on condition of anonymity, the set-top box is indeed mandatory.
HomeKit hardware at CES
Companies like Elgato, Insteon and Incipio are all demonstrating HomeKit gear at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The framework is still a work in progress, according to these people, and Apple has yet to set in place a certification process similar to the MFi (Made for iPhone) program.
Another aspect previously known by only a handful of people was the Apple TV requirement. These vendors confirmed at CES that the box is needed to control HomeKit automation hardware from outside the house using Siri. However, the Apple TV is no longer required to control the appliances if the customer chooses to use the vendor’s app (each HomeKit product has one).
Insteon has an app that can actually control any HomeKit appliance, not necessarily just Insteon gear.