iRobot, Google Team Up To Understand Your Smart Home (zdnet.com) 60
iRobot and Google are looking for ways to integrate the Roomba-maker's home maps with Google Assistant to extend instructions to other gadgets. "The collaboration centers on iRobot's Roomba i7+ vacuum models' ability to map home floor plans and remember room names," notes TechCrunch. From the report: As it is, Google Home users or anyone with Google Assistant can give a voice command like, "Hey Google, clean the kitchen," and a Roomba carries out the task. The integration supports the task across multiple rooms that have been assigned a name, such as the bedroom, living room, and other named areas. According to iRobot, the home-mapping data could also be used to make it easier to set up new smart home gadgets and create new ways to automate the home.
In a statement to The Verge, Google said iRobot's maps could help locate wifi-connected lights and automatically assign names and locations to them within the house. Google stressed that Assistant only learns the names people have given to areas in the home so it can then instruct Roomba i7+ to go to that area. Google doesn't receive information about the layout of the home. Colin Angle, chairman and CEO of iRobot, told the publication that the partnership could help users in future tell Assistant to control other smart home gadgets using the same naming and location information used by the Roomba.
In a statement to The Verge, Google said iRobot's maps could help locate wifi-connected lights and automatically assign names and locations to them within the house. Google stressed that Assistant only learns the names people have given to areas in the home so it can then instruct Roomba i7+ to go to that area. Google doesn't receive information about the layout of the home. Colin Angle, chairman and CEO of iRobot, told the publication that the partnership could help users in future tell Assistant to control other smart home gadgets using the same naming and location information used by the Roomba.
"Hey Google, clean the kitchen" (Score:1)
"Hey Google, clean the kitchen," and a Roomba carries out the task.
Let me know when it gets good at things like cleaning up the glass jar of honey that I just dropped, then I'll consider spending money on this nonsense.
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I dropped an entire jar of green olives on the kitchen floor the other day. We call our Roomba 'Oscar', needless to say Oscar was useless for that as well. The GF just had to have the robot but in general it is useless as a cleaning tool. The rooms have to be hand vacuumed on a regular basis, and steam cleaned a couple of times a month to keep the place clean and smelling fresh. Living in the desert, no matter what you do, sand and dust gets everywhere.
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Anyone who voluntarily lives in a place with chemical-laden crap-pet glued to the floors is an idiot. Hardwood floors, tile, and area rugs or go home.
US is the only country that's crazy enough to have homes with carpet even in the toilets.
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No carpet in the house at all, tile and wood floors. I do have a Persian rug in the den. Oscar, our Roomba does well with the cat hair, but here in the desert the sand and dust get every where and vacuuming it does little but spread it around. I've found that only the steam mop picks up the fine dust and gets rid of that gritty feeling.
Re: "Hey Google, clean the kitchen" (Score:1)
I need google knowing the dimensions and other âoemetadataâ of my home like I need swillden comments. Google can fuck right off.
Surveillance (Score:1)
So people want the governments' (note plural) watchdog to know where everything and everyone is in their homes?
Re:Surveillance (Score:4, Insightful)
2020 Headline: Google admits disclosing home layout and belonging data to SWAT teams for use in planning of raids.
(totally not Big Brother)
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Nearly: 2020 Headline: Google admits analysing air particles and reporting potentially illicit detections to preferential LE accounts.
Timer is better.... (Score:5, Insightful)
My old pre-wifi Roomba cleans the kitchen floor daily thanks to a simple timer. Why would I want to have to verbally command it from another location daily?
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Because burglar-hackers and/or the future totalitarian government would like an accurate layout of your house.
Or something. I'm sure a bad sci-fi author or conspiracy theorist could come up with something more entertaining.
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My old pre-wifi Roomba cleans the kitchen floor daily thanks to a simple timer. Why would I want to have to verbally command it from another location daily?
You have an automatic timer for the whole area the robot cleans, and you can set additional timed cleaning cycles for specific rooms which need it more often... and you can also order an extra cleaning cycle of a particular area when you have some reason to know that it needs it, or some reason that you want it to be extra clean.
The voice command stuff isn't instead of timer-based cleaning, it's in addition to.
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It's not groundbreaking stuff, but once you integrate more things into these smart speaker systems, you kind of get used to it. I played with it a while ago, removed it since I don't want Google listening in on everything that goes on at home, but I did miss it at first. It's handy to just
Google is creepy enough already (Score:5, Insightful)
Why do you want Google to know your homes' floorplan and where all the furniture is?
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Ultimately Google would like to show you ads based on analysis of the available space in your home and what you do (or do not) own.
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Why do you want Google to know your homes' floorplan and where all the furniture is?
Oh, this information could be useful for somebody . . . along with the location of any of your valuables, and the times when you are usually not home.
Then a concerned, unknown, total stranger can stop by when you aren't home, and check up on your valuables to make sure that they are all still there.
As for me . . . it's very practical that my Scooba knows the location of the wolf pits in my home, but it would remove the thrill of the element of "Surprise!" for others, when they discover them accidentally.
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Why do you want Google to know your homes' floorplan and where all the furniture is?
From the summary:
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From the summary:
Rest assured that this will be changed with a forced update of the ELUA ("Accept or your Roomba will stop working").
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From the summary:
Rest assured that this will be changed with a forced update of the ELUA ("Accept or your Roomba will stop working").
I'll bet you $1000 that this never happens.
I was considering getting an iRobot product... (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, that plan is canceled.
Bugs (Score:2)
The first version of the mapping feature of the 900 series was a bit buggy and got lost.
It cleans okay (still able to reach almost everywhere using the random walk of classic roombas) but has no fucking clue where the home base is and how to reach it back (it just keeps running around aimlessly until battery runs out, whereas classic roomba run aimlessly around until within reach of base station and then IR to engage the "tractor beam" feature).
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I have had iRobot for somewhere around a decade, spanning over 2 vacuum models and a mop cleaner.
I have never used any "app" or had my devices connected to a network.
Isn't this a common trend for "smart" home devices? Just don't use the app or connect the device to the internet.
Even my lawn mower comes with some fancy app that I can control it with, but why would I ever need it? It does its job just fine without ever being connected to anything but its power station.
Firmware updates (Score:2)
The Wifi and app are only a hard requirement for:
- firmware update (it's not done with a serial dongle anymore) to weed out bugs (the first version of 900 had navigation problems)
- setting time and timers (there are buttons on the device utself anymore. Apparently "blinking twelve" is still a problem with people too stupid to press buttons).
Separate cloud connection is required for the creepier features
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Oh, I didn't know they removed buttons from the 9 series and upwards.
I'm assuming you can program it through a Wifi end-to-end kind of thing, not requiring a internet connection.
Local wlan (Score:2)
I'm assuming you can program it through a Wifi end-to-end kind of thing, not requiring a internet connection.
Yup.
At my brothers' first setup was done with a direct wifi peer-to-peer connection, then over the local network for subsequent timer settings.
Connection to iRobot's cloud is only used for keeping an archive of maps of finished jobs, all this weird "make a map of wifi coverage" useless features, permanent floor maps for TFA's "go clean the kitchen" jobs, etc.
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What he says is the truth. Mine only needs a light projected on the ceiling, I love my little mop.
Optionnal feature (Score:2)
- Not all Roomba are even Wifi enabled to begin with.
Even Wifi enabled Roomba, work without wifi.
Even if you activate the Wifi access, you can also use only for firmware update and otherwise only talk to your smartphone directly over the local network (or optionnally to your home server running on some raspberry pi).
( ^at that point you already have 99% of features people want, including local tiled maps on navigation-cam featuring models like the 9x0 serie)
This thing aditionnally requires you to connect i
Entire house is automated, google has been banned. (Score:3)
I have my entire house automated, down to controlling air flow to individual rooms. I bought both the Amazon Echo and Google Home. Google Home work at first and it's voice recognition is much better than the Amazon Echo. Google being Google decided to start limiting functionality, example local Google Home,Harmony Emulator, which makes home control MUCH MUCH faster , ie local network,Google Home, Cloud-,local network,home controller than going local network,Google Home,Google Cloud (Voice Recognition) ,Home Controller Cloud,Local network,Home Controller. Yes it does make a difference especially when you are giving multiple commands in a row. Adding 2-5 seconds between commands, vs 1 second pause is just one reason the Google Home product is now just in the closet.
Google allowed local harmony access at first, allowing adding all of them with one button click.If you have 80+ devices or even 20+ devices , manually adding each one and giving it name is major PITA. Google then removed adding new local harmony devices, only allowing grandfathered devices, then they just removed all local access to push their own api called google actions.
Actionis looks pretty good but Google will cancel it in a few years leaving you just with your G Home "It looks like those lights have not been set up yet, just go to the Google Home app", which will involve a new home controller or google home version X.Y.Z or most likely both. Yep they remove the Home part and leave you with a voice activated google search with no screen.
Will Google ever leave something alone (Score:2)
Time to sell the Roomba. Back to the good ole vacuum.
It's amazing the number of things I used to use that I gave up on because Google bought the company that made it to data-rape the user base. The richer Google gets, the more ubiquitous it gets, and the harder it becomes to avoid interacting with this leech of a company...
Googles to map your home (Score:2)
iRobot has been doing this for a while... (Score:2)
iRobot has been building floor plans for years (it was covered on /. when they announced it). That Google is buying access to it is... well, to be expected. iRobot is publicly traded. That means that someone is going to eventually sell/lease the data to the big data companies.
Roomba Hunter-Killer Edition (Score:2)
With new RoachScan and AntScan technologys.
It sits in the corner of your kitchen waiting for its prey to appear. With one red beady Eye like the HAL 9000.
Hey, google, when will the residents be out? (Score:2)
Burgler: Hey, google, let me know when they leave."
Idiot16yrold down the block: Hey, google, have irobot dump its contents into the sink."
Asian company: hey, google and robot, let me know when they're in their bedroom.
Not, IoT: "the Internet of Gratuitously Connected Insecure Things" - Carla Schroder