What is the perfect first draft of a base system for an aio? Well, much of the design is dependent on the type of inputs and outputs. But all devices will have the same architectural requirements. So first I can nail those down. Then, I might be able to come up with a simple set of inputs and outputs that would cover a range of prototype devices.

One thing I should do is list ten or twenty device ideas and see if I can find a common hardware definition to support them all.

What about a USB MINI-B connector, and a Zigbee radio? This is pretty complicated. But it would allow one to use the system with a PC, or without. With a local control system, or with a network control system.

On the other hand, if I set a requirement that every system requires an Ethernet gateway device, then the Ethernet solution could also be used in either way.

And this would lower the cost and complexity of the individual devices. But it would limit the system from the user’s point of view. Some users want peripherals, some want ambient objects.

One argument is that a radio device could sit on your desk as easily as a USB peripheral. But it has the added advantage that it could just as easily sit anywhere else in your home.

The disadvantage of the radio/ethernet solution only is that a minimum solution is always two devices.

• I think radio is key. This should be all about radio.
• Radio opens up the possibility of battery-powered devices. Complex relationships between devices.
• Possibly even a headless meta-device, though that might take a fundamental rethinking of the whole system?
• So, can I possibly support a USB solution, a radio solution and an ethernet solution, all at the same time? Probably not.
• I imagine that three interfaces on each device would be way too complicated. After all, these are supposed to be cheap, simple.
• Maybe I can create two different types of gateways, a USB and an Ethernet flavor.
• Maybe all devices are not capable of being gateways.
• Maybe it isn’t as simple as I would like, from a user’s point of view, that all they have to do is plug things in.
• I think that a USB solution could provide its own driver? I have heard about systems which intialize as a simple universal device, HID or flash drive perhaps, then install a driver. Don’t know if this approach still works under Vista.
• If an Ethernet solution, how does a local or remote control system find the gateway? With a USB-serial system, software can pretty easily poll all possible ports until it gets an expected response.

What about a system which, instead of requiring an Ethernet connection and an internet connection, uses the cellular network for data transmission, for example SMS? This is a simple, two-way, text-based messaging system that should be relatively easy to take advantage of, except for the cost.

I suppose this is why people haven’t done this type of system more. I know this must be a thought process that Ambient went through a decade ago. And countless others, I’m sure. I guess that I need to accept that most everyone interested in the type of device I propose, has an internet connection, so this is free. And on the other side of the coin, there is as of right now, a commercial cellular model in the US where, though everyone has a phone, voice minutes are free but data bytes cost a fortune. Silly, and completely unnecessary, but true.

Cellular providers could take over the world if they got their minds around offering their networks for data communications. But, at this moment, I don’t think there is any way to support this. Until such time as I can send and receive data for free, or buy a data-only plan in addition to my voice plan, with an additional SIM, for my device network, forget it.

Is a gateway just a gateway, or can it be used as a standalone a device? If the latter, are all devices Ethernet-enabled? This would be a waste of hardware, right? If not, are the devices with Ethernet also devices on their own, allowing someone to have just one device? Would they ever have just one device?

And if they did, would this be better than a USB device? It would work even with the computer down, right?

I can see that I should do some fundamental architecture decisionmaking. I need to rank all the desired features, and see what is the best solution both short and long term.

Desired features, advantages and disadvantages

1. plug and play, no drivers: Ethernet, or USB as flash drive
2. USB: no power conn needed
3. Ethernet: no USB; power conn needed
4. radio: all devices have
5. local computer control (no internet needed): USB or Ethernet
6. Ethernet-internet control (no local computer needed): Ethernet

Proposed architecture

1. Ethernet
2. Simple power conn (switching supply for efficiency)
3. Radio

Could all devices have both ethernet and radio? This would mean, from a both Zigbee and an aiosphere network perspective, that they should be able to be both net master/gateway.

I know from looking at some of the common Zigbee modules that this is not as easy as simply having fixed roles. So, for my first system draft, I think I will take the easy route and have some devices, which cost more, which are gateways, and others which are simple radio devices.

Next decision: do I make the gateway be a device, itself? On the one hand, this is attractive, as in my system there are no ugly appliances, only interesting and useful objects. On the other, it would mean that I would either need to force all users to have one particular type of device as their gateway device, or offer a range of devices with gateway capability.

To have a single gateway, which does nothing else, would tend to help avoid a situation where a user would plug more than one gateway in (because they both have desired features). Which would avoid my having to have some complex negotiation between two gateways, to decide which would act as a gateway and which would act as a simple device, ignoring its gateway capability.

Lunch with my friend Ed today, another of many discussions over the years about the aiosphere. He is of the opinion that the whole thing is simple. I am of the opinion that the whole thing is hard. I guess it might be because we have different ideas about what “the whole thing” is. He favors mocking up a pair of hardware objects, and throwing together some scripts and PHP code to make small amounts of data flow between them.

Thing is, I know that people have been doing this exact thing for over a decade now, and reinventing the wheel each time.  I believe that what is missing is a universal architecture; hardware, firmware, software and script; which supports both the rapid creation of new hardware, and the easy creation of new linkages and behaviors for existing hardware. A universal ambient gadget system. This is the aiosphere.

But the distance between our perspectives simply serves to highlight the fundamental problem with my concept: I cannot easily articulate it, describe it, define it, its scope, its shape, its size. This, I think, will be my biggest challenge. I keep telling Ed, making objects is easy; coding point to point communications is easy. Making a demo from those ingredients is easy, and people do it every day.  But creating a new protocol, that overlays the global information network, and provides dead-simple connections between objects in different places, that is the grail (and I will be happy if it turns out to be easy too, but I’m not counting on it).