SURE IoT Blog

SURE Universal

August 2017

30 Aug 2017

All You Need to Know About Amazon’s Alexa

Alexa is the digital assistant that answers your commands and controls your smart home devices. Let’s look at what else Amazon’s Alexa can do.

Amazon’s Echo device made its debut in 2014. It wasn’t until December 2016 that the world sat up to pay attention. Amazon has been cagey about sales figures, but Consumer Intelligence Research Partners estimate that the company has sold almost 11 million Echo units.

The Echo’s voice-based assistant, Alexa, is the real star of the Amazon show. Helping users to order an Uber, get directions, play music, or even perform mathematical calculations, Alexa was inspired by the Star Trek computer on board the Enterprise.

Asking Alexa to navigate a course to the nearest star system might be beyond her right now. But she learns fast, and she keeps earning fans with her ever-expanding AI system.

Let’s look at what Amazon’s Alexa can do.

Read More

23 Aug 2017

Do You Know the Smart Devices Privacy Issues?

All technology has the potential for security and privacy concerns. Let’s investigate some of the potential privacy issues associated with smart devices.

More people are bringing smart technology into their home. The technology usually comes in the form of smart devices to help people save energy, monitor health problems, entertain the kids, and protect their property while they’re away.

All technology has the potential for security and privacy concerns, but the privacy issues are more obvious with certain types of devices like voice assistants.

Voice assistants such as the Amazon Echo or Google Home provide ways to integrate these smart solutions. They also dispense with the need for multiple controllers for an array of products. The devices integrate with other systems. So you can install Amazon’s Alexa within your SURE Universal remote to control the app – and your smart devices – using your voice.

But the devices also pose their own problems.

The voice assistants aren’t autonomous like Iron Man‘s Jarvis. But they are always listening, ready to pick up on any cues to swing into action. Google’s Home assistant, for example, wakes up when it hears “Okay, Google.”

Yet the “always listening” aspect of many devices leads some to worry about who else might be listening.

Let’s investigate some of the potential privacy issues associated with smart devices.

Read More

17 Aug 2017

Is Fiber Internet Connection the Future of Smart Home?

What will be the next solution to the crowded internet space as more people set up smart homes?

Since the days of dial-up access, the internet connection comes into the house at a single point. Back in those days, a length of telephone wire connected the family computer to the outside world. The switch to WiFi and broadband didn’t change much, except households now connect their wireless router to the outside world – still through a cable.

All your devices connect to the internet through that central hub. In a typical house, you might have a Roku box, a laptop or two, the family’s smartphones, and an Xbox hooked up to the router.

In a smart home? You’ll have a lot more devices than that. Think light switches, thermostats, smartphones, surveillance systems, media streamers, medical devices, smart kettles, and maybe a Roomba.

The more devices connected to the network – and ultimately the internet connection – the slower the speeds become for each device. Think of those annoying “video is buffering” messages. Or choppy music playback through wireless speakers. Some devices might not work at all.

The increasing number of WiFi networks in your neighborhood also make the problem worse. The radio bands get crowded, and interference causes its own issues.

That’s not something you want in a world where things like wearable medical devices will need a stable, reliable internet connection.

What’s the solution to this crowded internet space as more people set up smart homes?

Fiber internet. 

Read More

09 Aug 2017

­China’s Tech Scene and the Internet of Things

Is Beijing set to rival Silicon Valley as China’s tech scene continues to grow?

When you think about technology and the places it stems from, the most obvious location that springs to mind is Silicon Valley. The name was first coined in 1971, so the area holds a lot of history alongside its list of success stories.

Forty-six years later, Silicon Valley is no longer the only player on the technology block. Other cities, like London, Berlin, Tokyo, and Tel Aviv, have thriving tech scenes producing exciting innovations.

But what about China? We’ve seen Samsung from South Korea, HTC from Taiwan, and countless companies from Japan. Is the growing popularity of Huawei any sign of China’s booming tech scene?

Read More

02 Aug 2017

Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) as the New Standard

What is Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) and is it really the “New Standard”?

If you’ve ever used Bluetooth on a device, you’ll know how frustrating it can be sometimes. Your battery drains faster than usual. If you move mere inches out of range, your connection drops. And that’s if the devices will pair in the first place.

What may be an annoyance for you is a big problem for the Internet of Things (IoT) community. Bluetooth is a protocol available for connected devices – in other words, Bluetooth is a language devices can use to speak to one another. It’s also predicted to be used by 60% of all devices by 2021. Users won’t rely on systems if they can’t move freely while using devices, and if communication between devices is unpredictable.

The adoption of Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE or Bluetooth LE) as the new standard looks set to fix many of the old issues of Bluetooth.

Originally marketed as Bluetooth Smart, BLE’s main aim is to operate at a lower cost and with drastically reduced power consumption. That’s not to say you’ll lose communication range. Far from it – BLE aims to offer four times the same range as Bluetooth 4.2.

BLE dates back to 2006, first introduced as Wibree by Nokia. Adopted into the Bluetooth standard as part of the 4.0 spec in 2010, BLE already appears in today’s mobile operating systems.

Read More

Ready to Try?

Ready to Try?

googleplayamazonstoreappstore

Social

Follow us

app-in-phone