Android @ Home will consist of a series of open source libraries which developers will be able to use to create home automation apps on the Android platform. Any device plugged into an Android @ Home receiver will work with Android’s automation API’s. Imagine carrying your tablet or phone around the house, and if you forgot to shut off a light or appliance, you can do it remotely by tapping a button on your screen. Or, imagine your house turning into a giant, Android-powered media streamer.
Google Tungsten combines the Android @ Home framework with the Google Music cloud, resulting in system of audio streamers in the hope that function much like Sonos or Airplay-enabled devices. In the demo at Google IO, they showed off a little glowing box connected to speakers. Using your Android device, they pushed music to the device from Google Music, and theoretically could do the same for as many connected audio zones as you need.
Standalone devices that used to do this in the past seemed too gimmicky and pieced together to have a place in our daily lives. But because Android @ Home works these ideas into a device that we use all the time, it makes the idea of a smarthome alluring. [Google IO]
Ash
Wednesday, May 11, 2011 at 11:27 AMAll sounds good but this is at least 5 years away from being useable, and probably a decade away from being affordable to the average joe with a mortgage.
Dave
Wednesday, May 11, 2011 at 10:53 PMYeah Google TV sounded great too. Look how well it’s done for all of google’s partners. Also imagine your house being hacked (alarm turned off, unlocked.)