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Google 'Beacons' Brings An Open-Source Option To Apple On The Internet Of Things

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Google has added another set of nuts and bolts to the mechanics of the Internet of Things (IoT) with the launch of its Eddystone technology. Named after the Eddystone Lighthouse off of the English coast in the county of Cornwall, Google’s Eddystone is an open source cross-platform Bluetooth LE (BLE) beacon format. Apple’s iBeacon technology for iPhones and other iOS devices, which sits in the same BLE space technically, is a comparatively closed platform.

Beacon, like a lighthouse, get it?

Google describes beacon technology thusly, “A platform for marking up the world to make your apps and devices work smarter by providing timely, contextual information.”

Or in other words… beacons can be thought of as battery or electricity-powered Internet of Things source transmitters with enough intelligence to know where they are and what they are supposed to be doing within their defined and prescribed role.

When users get to connect with IoT beacon technology they can get what the industry likes to call ‘better proximity contextual experiences’. The Eddystone specification itself includes a number of ‘broadcast frame’ types (or data payloads, if you prefer) including Eddystone-URL, which the firm says is the backbone of the Physical Web.

The Physical Web is another related IoT Google project and is an approach to allow people to be able to just walk up to any smart device - a vending machine, a poster, a toy, a bus stop, a rental car - and not have to download the appropriate corresponding app first. “Everything should be just a tap away,” says the firm.

How IoT beacons work

Beacon transmitters like those ascribing to the Eddystone format broadcast one-way information via Bluetooth to smartphones or tablets (it’s not usually going to be a laptop) typically while users are mobile on foot.

“Beacons can be deployed at fixed places such as airports, museums, and bus stops, and also to movable objects such as bicycles and taxis,” says Google.

The data may be ‘absorbed’ by the user’s device via direct user-initiated connection or by more passive ‘always on’ connection if the user’s device is set up to establish a more constant relationship. Stores and shops could use beacons to send out promotions, special event locations could send out directions and warnings, travel locations could send out transport news, timetables or alerts and so on. Basically, it’s the way you imagine the truly connected Internet of Things world to work when it all does.

Technology website Ars Technica were able to speak to Eddystone's product manager, Matthew Kulick and the project’s engineering director Chandu Thota. The pair claim and assert that ‘existing solutions’ only partially address what is being asked for by users (and their devices) today -- so for that you can logically think about Apple and its iBeacon technology. The difference of course is that Google is making Eddystone open and Apple is (obviously) keeping a fairly closed shop on iBeacon.

Use the beacon force wisely Luke

Google reminds developers looking to implement this technology to use its power wisely and responsibly, “As you build proximity-based experiences for your users, you might collect and manage user information through your apps. For example, some of the information that you collect may allow you to infer a user's location or activity. Your users trust you to do the right thing with their data. It's your responsibility to do so.”

As we start to see more Internet of Things beacons put in place, questions will be thrown up regarding beacon performance, connectivity, cross-platform openness and the wider health of beacons themselves.

We will start to be concerned about the welfare of battery life in beacons that are unable to tap into an external power source. Software application developers in the Internet of Things space will need start adopting monitoring tools (both Apple and Google provide these) in order to assess parameters such as battery level (and predicted death), the amount of time the beacon has been active and whether the beacon is suffering from unusually low detection rates.

Today it’s just a question of what app are you using on what device, tomorrow it will be a question of what app are you using on what device to tap into which IoT beacon format?

 

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