Smart Appliance

A smart appliance, is a home or office appliance – an electronic device – which has sensors integrated into it, and a connection to a computer system powerful enough to make sense of the data, and that of other devices in the area. This allows the appliances to work together in intelligent patterns.

Such a network of smart appliances is a type of sensor web, and is a type of domotics. An example would include a refrigerator that detects via pressure plates that the weight of the milk container is getting low, and places a standing order on the shopping list for more milk. A second example might be a home CCTV camera that detects movement at the front door, and sends that data to the house where facial recognition software determines a person is there, and the nearest TV screen to the house resident lights up with a picture from that camera.

Both are examples of smart appliances – appliances essentially thinking for themselves and interfacing with other appliances in intelligent ways.

See Also: Home Automation, Building Automation, Domotics, Sensor Web, Ambient intelligence

Below, we offer a selection of links from our resource databases which may match this term.

Invisible Computing Sensor Web Smart Appliance

Smart Appliances

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Large Image Display: The Stepford Wives: Smart Home Interface
Here we see Claire, acting in her guise as spokeswoman for Stepford, showing off the smart house system. In a manner so eagerly aped in our world by electronics firms from all developed nations, Stepford has been striving to create a truly smart house, in which all appliances are networked together, controlled by a central brain, making the house 'smart'.

A Literal Sensor Web Comes into Its Own
It was only a matter of time before someone took the concept of a sensor web literally, and created a smart mesh web that could cover an object and detect when and where any breaches in the web occur. That wait is now over, and the first such smart fabric now exists.

Will chatting smart cars become a reality soon?
A BBC article looking at the rise of the smart car – AI driven cars that will soon be able to communicate with cloud services for traffic control, communicate with the humans on board, and work in flocks to drive themselves with consideration (and a degree of literal mind-reading) of each other's positions and goals.

Podcast: John La Grou plugs smart power outlets
This podcast comes from TED 2009, where electronics inventor John La Grou shows off the capabilities of a sensor web of smart power outlets in every home, where the outlet knows what is plugged into it, and how much power the device is consuming, and when it consumes it.

Large Image Display: The Stepford Wives: A Cash Machine Spouse
In the film, this is the first time we meet one of the cyborg women for what they really are - what they have become. Almost mindless, controlled robots. This repeats the message that any upgrade, or augment to the body and to the brain must always be consented to by the person receiving it, with full implications understood. If it is not, you risk turning a person into what is seen here: An appliance of convenience.

Large Image Display: The Stepford Wives: Remote Controlled Human
Here we have a remote control, used to control what was originally a human, now just a glorified appliance. If the idea of a remote being used to control a human seems preposterous, remember GVS.

'Smart' NPC's in Interactive Fiction
A look at what is, and what isn't possible in NPC intelligence.

Smart Fabrics ? Wear your Augmented Interface

Woven cicuitry turns your clothing into the interface for your life. Just add your phone or ipod, and let that program your clothes for you.

Connected cars
An article from the BBC on the coming convergence of smart grid computing and augmented reality for motoring - cars that know what is ahead and react to changing conditions.

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