Inside Apple's Plan to Automate Your Home
Image: Mashable, Lance Ulanoff
If you think of all your home's lights, climate controls and automation gadgets as a sort of Russian Nesting Doll, you start to understand Apple HomeKit and its database-driven approach to home automation.
During a HomeKit introduction session at Apple's World Wide Developer's Conference ( WWDC) in San Francisco on Tuesday, an Apple engineer described how virtually every home, room, device, function and setting would have a name in the HomeKit system and how Siri, Apple's intelligent voice assistant, could recognize and let you control it all thanks to a common database.
Apple's overarching goal is to bring 'some rationality to home automation,' said the Apple engineer. To do so, the HomeKit iOS 8 app and API both guide the user through the distinct naming of every room and device, but can also, if the accessories support Apple's Home Automation Protocol and iOS devices, intuit home automation device capabilities.
According to Apple, the company put a lot of effort into defining a common home automation language, but is well aware that not all devices will speak it. In that case, it'll be up to the manufacturer to make their smart home products work with the HomeKit Platform.
To work with HomeKit, a user might start by defining her home. If she has multiple homes, each will need its own name. The rooms in each house will have names, as well. You can name 'Living Room' in both your house and summer cottage, but cannot have two 'Living Rooms' in one of those houses.
Inside the house and each room, there could be a variety of HomeKit-controllable devices, which could be discovered and configured through an accessory browser on the iPhone. They, too, get their own names and, just like the house names, those names are recognized by Siri. The same is true of the services provided by each accessory. In the case of a smart light, 'Dim' might be a named service. Characteristics are in the HomeKit framework, as well, though, since they're really information about the state of the device (is it on or off, running at high or low), they're seen but not controlled by the end user.
With so many named rooms, objects, services and characteristics inside the home, it might get a little overwhelming. However, HomeKit will also let the user group services. If, for example, all of the lights in your home have a Dim function, you could dim them all at once with a named command (spoken through Siri). The grouping paradigm also extends out into what Apple is calling Action Sets or Scenes. Say 'goodnight' to HomeKit and , if that's the name you've given your 'I'm going to bed' scene, all the actions connected to it - locking the doors, turning off lights, locking the garage door and turning down the heat - will all be executed at once. There is no defined order here.
Sadly, Apple's introduction to HomeKit didn't feature any home automation hardware. Instead the engineer showed developers how they could test their apps with the HomeKit accessory simulator.
HomeKit will also allow users to control devices when they're not at home. To protect users' privacy and security, Apple provides end-to-end encryption between accessories. To further ensure security, HomeKit APIs can only be used when developer apps are in the foreground. 'This enables us to have security so that accessories can't be misused and user privacy can be maintained. It's not good enough to be sort of private,' said the Apple engineer.
Taking this nesting data approach to home automation may, as Apple hopes, bring more people to the smart home table, but there still remain some big questions. While Apple has lined up partners, like Cree Lighting, Philips and Kwikset lined up, other home innovators like Nest, which is owned by Google, may steer clear. I'd ask Siri if HomeKit flourish in the face of competing platforms and standards, but she doesn't know what HomeKit is, yet.
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