Internet of Things Applications

Every morning it’s not my buzzing alarm clock that jiggles me out of my dreams; it’s a sweet notification that will keep repeating itself until I am out of my bed, quite similar to what my mother does. And then there are little devices around me which help me stay fit; whether it’s my treadmill, or the health band around my wrist tracking all my calorie intake and utilization; I feel like being surrounded by well-wishers all the time. While learning about IoT I came across different opinions and each was equally convincing in its own way. However, what excites my inquisitive mind is that will the Internet of Things be able to amaze its users i.e. in this case the worldwide population; simply because the audience these days cannot be fooled with propagandas. They will reject your concept if it does not fit into their User Experience. A lot of changes are being anticipated with the evolution of IoT and it promises a more organized method of device interactions. For those closely following the developments, the big moment is somewhere around. See more at: netsolutionsindia.com

First there was 'the internet of things', denoting the abundance of cost-effective technologies that can be applied to almost anything in order to collect data. Then, towards the end of last year, the phrase 'the internet of customers' was coined by Salesforce as a prompt to marketers that individual consumers should be the focus, rather than technologies. The brand was certainly successful in generating a buzz, which was surely a motivating factor behind creating the expression. Added to this, it is key to remember that, over recent years, the art of marketing has picked up speed in terms of technology; Gartner has predicted that by 2017 a brand’s CMO [Chief Marketing Officer] will be spending more on IT than its CIO [Chief Information Officer]. But what does this really teach us, asks Bo Mattsson, CEO of Cint? The new phrase serves as a reminder that technology and big data are not the be-all and end-all of a marketer’s activity and this warning may have come at the perfect time if Gartner’s study is accurate. There is a danger that this proliferation and sprint to have the biggest, best or newest tools or apps means that spending is not carried out with the true end goal in mind: how will it assist customers, improve products or services and is there a beneficial ROI to be had from implementing the said technology? See more at: biz-works.net

Smart appliances that communicate with each other and share information using the internet are already available. Indeed, the Internet of things has featured on lists of game-changing technologies for years, and is arguably one of the most hyped tech innovations around. With sensors getting cheaper by the day, more and more physical objects are becoming part of a network of things changing the way we live and work. For businesses of the future, this should lead to a huge cut in costs since these new tools help us see exactly what is going on where. “The Internet of things – which is really about the connecting of devices and the acquisition of data – ultimately creates much more visibility: the visibility of the performance of the grid, visibility of where we lose energy, and where the savings potential really is,” says Gerd Kortuem, professor of ubiquitous computing at the Open University and energy leader for Milton Keynes’ smart city initiative. See more at : theguardian.com

The internet of things – are all the great things we read about real or hype? Can this be compared to when cloud appeared on the scene, and everything changed being “in the cloud”? We invited some industry experts to discuss a number of questions that are commonly asked. Here are their opinions. See more at ee.co.za

THE INTERNET OF Things means different things to different people. To vendors, it’s the latest in a slew of large-scale trends to affect their enterprise customers, and the latest marketing bandwagon they have to consider. To enterprise organizations, it’s still a jumble of technical standards, conflicting opinions and big potential. For developers, it’s a big opportunity to put together the right mix of tools and technologies, and probably something they are already doing under another name. Understanding how these technologies work together on a technical level is becoming important, and will provide more opportunities to use software design as part of the overall business. See more at: wired.com

UX design is a unique mix of art, craft, and science. Designing the interaction between a human and software requires intuition, attention to detail, and an analytic approach that facilitates both gathering and interpreting data. Until recently, app designers and developers only had to consider what’s happening on the screen of a device. With the advent of beacon technology, contextual computing, and the Internet of Things, it’s becoming much more complex. This post only scratches the surface of how location-based services will impact interaction design. Beacons are still a fresh technology and Internet of Things is in early stages of mainstream adoption. New best practices and principles of UX design for the physical spaces and contextual computing will emerge and become more visible as projects and apps go live. We’re eager to see ideas and rules we wouldn’t have thought about otherwise. So if you have any in the works or simply on your mind, share them with us! We’re waiting for your comments and will be happy to answer them. See more at: uxmag.com