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Toys Article - October 2000 - [HTI Home Page] |
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With Strings, single-purpose appliances, such as "phones" or "televisions," are transformed into multifunctional appliances that can access virtually any type of multimedia content. Any appliance that is connected to a network and running Strings, becomes part of a "virtual appliance", whose capabilities and intelligence far exceed the sum of its individual parts. |
BeComm Corporation develops software for appliances that manage the flow of content across disparate networks, processors, media formats, applications and appliances. BeComm's technology enables appliances that are faster, leaner, smarter, and can be built with fewer resources, allowing manufacturers to go to market quickly with low-cost appliance solutions. For the most up-to-date company and product information, visit www.becomm.com . |
Have you ever wondered what your home media environment will look like in 5 years, or even next year? Everyone imagines a home suited to his/her specific technology needs. There are those technology savvy folks that dream of a house with a stereo system hooked to the Internet that will play any song available for download at anytime. And for those who'd like to have an office away from the office, their dream is of a house with a webpad, a television and a handheld acting as video phones to make working from home a reality. But everyone agrees that a home where every appliance is inter-connected in a seamless environment, where you can access the content of your choice on the device of your choice in the format of your choice -- is the best choice.
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With Strings, single-purpose appliances, such as "phones" or "televisions," are transformed into multifunctional appliances that can access virtually any type of multimedia content. Any appliance that is connected to a network and running Strings, becomes part of a "virtual appliance", whose capabilities and intelligence far exceed the sum of its individual parts. Strings allows appliances to leverage the capabilities of other appliances within the network. For example, a user can listen to an MP3 on a PDA by accessing the processing power of their PC to decode the MP3, or viewing the HTML from a Webcast TV program on a handheld appliance. Strings-enabled appliances are faster, leaner, smarter and more efficient. They run on fewer resources, thus delivering significant cost savings to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs).
But what does it all mean to you?
With Strings controlling your home network, you decide where and how to receive content. For example, you are participating in a video conference call with your relatives in Colorado on your television and you want to move upstairs to your den, you can route that picture and sound onto your webpad with just a few clicks. Strings then determines, behind the scenes, that the color must be stripped out and sent over an RF link to the pad and shrunk to fit the smaller screen. Strings dynamically assembles the required feature set needed to enable this functionality instantaneously and transparent to you.
In addition to routing content from one appliance to another across the network (e.g. routing video from the computer to the TV), Strings will also automatically and intelligently transform the content into the appropriate format based on the resources of the target appliance. Examples of this capability range from automatically converting audio to text using speech recognition software, to stripping the color information from a video stream before sending it to a bandwidth and display-limited appliance such as a PDA.
This combination of routing content and data transformation capabilities is very powerful. Appliances no longer need to understand the same content format in order to share content. As long as at least one appliance understands the format and is able to convert it into other formats, any appliance on the network can access that content. For example, if a single appliance on the network is connected to the Internet, all appliances on the network can share that connection, without each appliance needing to understand the underlying protocols used in Internet communications.
What will tomorrow's home look like? Will it be completely automated with a Jetson's like robot maid, probably not. However, with Strings technology built inside the home appliances, you can get the technology you need to do what you want, how you want, wherever you want, and that we know for sure.
