Coming to a cloud near you: dirty laundry Panasonic has announced an Android application to control home appliances. The only catch: users also have to be prepared to shuffle their data through a cloud service for it all to work. The Panasonic Smart App will be available from September, and the company says it will be able to control devices as diverse as air …
Amusing point regarding loading the wretched thing. However, I would like the option of tinkering with the cycle, why do we accept only a few options on this and dishwasher programmes, when we have so much control and choice over other machines. Whether this is used to save water, or clean better, why not allow user recipes?
For instance a low temperature wash is very green, but you need a blast of heat every few washes (or just for one of the fills) to kill bugs like S. Aureus.
Do you really enjoy washing or something? Tinkering with the program is way to much hassle.
My machine has 5 programs, 2 of which have three temperature variations, there are two modifier buttons which can be combined with any of those programs to tweak them slightly.
From this amount of control I use a grand total of 2 different programs.
The Evil empires...... Once agin the future is very exciting, having apps and devices running your home, hell I seen a youtube vid with a iphone app controlling a Porche....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZOqhPbj7rs&feature=youtube_gdata_player.....Coolest iPhone App Ever - iPorsche Remote - Must See !!!
If you can get it to play from this link..... The problem with all this is yes, the data swirling around in the cloud, hackers, online privacy constantly under fire takes the appeal out of it. But as long as they don't hack into your homes camera system and hold an online auction of all your goods on ebay, and by the time you get home you've got a moving crew pulling everything out the house going to the highest bidder we might have a good deal..... but do proceed with caution.I feel crime is going to look a whole lot stranger in the next few years........
Does anybody REALLY need a toaster with an IP address? And what kind of numpty needs their telephone to remind them to do laundry? Much less what's in their refrigerator/cupboards/deep-freeze/larder/root-cellar?
And storing all this personal minutia on the snake-oil "cloud", where a multi-billion-dollar multi-national can access the info, AND sell the collected data to anyone with a couple bucks[1]? That somehow legitimizes this nonsense?
The mind boggles ... it's the post-Nintendo iFad generation at work. Thank gawd/ess I don't need 'em to fund my retirement ...
[1] Read the contract, Meat.
I would like to be able to control my oven remotely. I’d like to be able to switch it on before I get home, so that I don’t have to wait for it to get hot, or perhaps heat something up that I’d put in it that morning before leaving the house so it's ready when I arrive. I never really know when I’m going to leave work in the evening, so a simple timer isn’t really enough.
Why on earth are we attempting to proceed down a path of LESSER automation, and GREATER intervention?
Will the person reporting on phone control of a Porsche please tell us all if that extends to disabling the automatic transmission and reverting to phone control of a clutch pedal and manual transmission?
It's obvious that evolution is a crock - we are going backwards not forwards.
Lots of people may want to turn their washer on and off when they are out so they know it will be finished for when they get in without the clean washing sitting festering for most of a day..
Also being able for the thing to be automatically turned off when you leave the house may appeal to some people.
And for me, getting an alert (SMS, email, tweet whatever) when the cycle has finished would be really useful
Not happy about it needing to go though a cloud service though - that bit is daft - give it an IP and have a web based control panel, like you get for routers, and networked printers
"Lots of people may want to turn their washer on and off when they are out so they know it will be finished for when they get in without the clean washing sitting festering for most of a day.."
Buy a washer/dryer and not only will it be clean when you get home, it will be dry. Didn't need the phone
I've actually rigged up an unashamedly Heath Robinson-esque way of turning on my air conditioner remotely using android. Can't see much point in it for the UK, but with most of the year being towards the Hades end of the heat scale being able to turn on my air con when 20 mins from home rather than when I get in the door provides a lot of comfort.
There's a self timer, but that's only useful if you know what time you'll walk in the door.
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