It did let me drop the Eufy app when their cameras were pulled in, that app was doing even worse with the ads than the iRobot one.
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Apple Nudges HomeKit Robot Vacuum Support Rollout to Next Year
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The whole development of Apple products is becoming strange. They surely aren’t at the forefront in development anymore. They’re following the famous hockey puck where it goes instead of being there where it’s supposed to go as they did years ago. It’s getting harder and harder to defend the premium prices for tech that’s already available many years and what has been implemented by competitors for years.
Sometimes I’m wondering if there is only a handful technicians and software developers available because it seems they can only handle one product category at a time instead of working on them simultaneously.
Strange for a tech company with billions and billions to spend and invest.
It will be Matter. Apple stopped developing non Matter HomeKit APIs a few months ago. The were articles about it.
It would hope manufacturers would try to build Thread vacuums, but i think it 99% will be Wi-Fi, even though the higher bandwith probably wont be needed.
Rumors say Apple is suppose to get serious about Smart Homes in 2025 and part of that is going full steam ahead with Matter. In my experience HomeKit is more stable than Google Home or Alexa when it comes to Matter. I have tried over and over again to use Alexa and Google with my Matter devices but it just does not work. Matter with HomeKit has worked like a charm for me. It is frustrating though with how slow Apple moves.
When Apple introduced HomeKit there was a mifi chip required to make it work with HomeKit. Of course Apple would make money off that chip but manufacturers didn’t want to pay that so initially HomeKit had very little options. This forced Apple to drop the chip and it’s very obvious since then Apple has stopped caring. It’s no longer about the eco system and making the best stuff so people want to buy your devices, it’s about how can we nickel and dime as much as they can. Same reason why they took so long to put usb c on iPhones but had no problem forcing it on Mac’s very early on
Undoubtedly because of some delay with some Matter-enabled vacuum…
Apple has quietly tweaked its Home app webpage to indicate that its upcoming robot vacuum control feature will now arrive in early 2025 rather than later this year, as previously advertised.
When support is added, Apple device users will be able to start a robot vacuum via HomeKit automations and scenes, or ask Siri to clean a specific room. Apple says the Home app will support the "core functionality" of robot vacuum cleaners, such as vacuuming, mopping, power control, cleaning mode, and charge status.
Apple said at WWDC in June that the iOS 18 feature would arrive later in 2024 – presumably with iOS 18.2, due this month – but that's apparently no longer the case. Apple tweaked a footnote on the Home app webpage in early November, signaling the delay. When it does arrive, controlling robot vacuums with Siri will initially be available in English (U.S.) only.
Article Link: Apple Nudges HomeKit Robot Vacuum Support Rollout to Next Year
Apple is falling behind once again, so many devices need supporting. I have a Netatmo weather station that does the basics in HomeKit like temp/humidity, but it can't read things like how much rain I've had, or what the real time wind speed is, and I'm still waiting for 4K CCTV support Apple, 1080p is not good enough.
Thanks for your input. Why do you hope that manufacturers will engineer their vacuums to use Thread instead of Wi-Fi? Is Thread technically superior for the purposes of IoT in general or vacuum robots specifically?
And why, despite your hopes, do you think that manufacturers will nevertheless mostly use Wi-Fi instead of Thread?
They didn’t “force” USB-C onto Macs — since Macs were so much more powerful than phones, and have the capability of supplying sufficient power to run USB-C peripherals, it made tons of sense to put USB-C Connectors on Macs. Plus, the USB-C connector supports the much faster transfer rates available via Thunderbolt 3 and later.
That didn’t make sense for iPhones until recently. While people talk about the EU, the reality is that until the last couple of years, iPhones (and phones in general) didn’t have processors and internal storage that justified / could take advantage of the faster data rates. Plus, the far more energy efficient processors in the iPhone 15 and 16 lines make it possible to have the phone power peripherals, like USB drives for recording ProRes video in Log format.
In home automation, in case you haven’t noticed, the emphasis has very strongly moved away from vendor-specific solutions, like devices that are only enabled for HomeKit, or for Google Home, or for Alexa, or Smarthings, and instead the industry as a whole has turned to interoperability, in the form of Matter-enabled devices that work with all of them. There aren’t a lot of Matter-enabled robotic vacuums yet, though, and I suspect that robotic vacuum support is being pushed out as a result of a delay from some vacuum manufacturer, most likely, iRobot, which has been expected to start adding Matter support to its vacuums at the end of this year. With the turmoil that iRobot is going through, following their failed attempt to merge with Amazon, it wouldn’t surprise me if they’ve pushed the Matter update for the i10 into 2025, causing Apple to also push out the update to support it.
Oh I had no problem with them putting usb c on Mac, but being among the first and then making it the only port obviously caused problems. I guess they got some good dongle sales tho. When they got rid of the audio jack on the iPhone usb c would have been a natural change since that’s the new standard for headphones, who’s buying headphones with a lightning connector? As for data speeds and power they could have done it quite a few years ago and even then just changing the port to type c doesn’t require those additions anyway
The whole industry is shifting to the use of Matter in order to enable interoperability. A key part of adopting Matter is the use of Threads.
Threads *is* superior to the use of Wi-Fi for IoT devices, for a few reasons. Most notably, Threads enables devices and hubs to communicate directly with each other, while the traditional home automation configurations require the use of Internet-based services to act as intermediaries. Also, Threads is an extremely low-power, IP-based network, that can be used by devices to run and be connected literally for years on the power from a single coin sized battery.
Additionally, the use of Wi-Fi for IoT devices can quickly overwhelm the capabilities of home routers, which often are limited on the number of connected devices they can support. Since Threads is an IPv6 based mesh arrangements, you can have hundreds of devices in a Threads network with little to no impact on your home network capacities.
This page has a good discussion of Threads/Matter, with a useful diagram: https://www.howtogeek.com/838377/matter-explained-controllers-bridges-border-routers-and-more/
The HomeKit team have to fight for staff with the team doing the Maps Look Around feature. Which seems to be a part time disabled retiree and his dog. Globally.
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As a wise man once said about Apple:
What happened at Apple, to be honest, over the years was the goal used to be to make the best computers in the world. And that was goal one. Goal two, we got from Hewlett-Packard actually which was "we have to make a profit". Because if we don't make a profit we can't do goal one. So, yeah, I mean we enjoyed making a profit, but the purpose of making a profit was so we can make the best computers in the world. Along the way somewhere those two got reversed. The goal is to make a lot of money and well, if we have to make some good computers well ok we'll do that... 'cause we can make a lot of money doing that. And, it's very subtle. It's very subtle at first, but it turns out it's everything. That one little subtle flip... takes 5 years to see it, but that one little subtle flip in 5 years means everything.
I thought I would look and see how many robot vacuums support matter. Here is the deal from The Verge:
Only four robot vacuums are currently Matter-certified: the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra, Deebot’s Ecovacs X2 Combo, and the SwitchBot S10 and K10 Plus (through a separate SwitchBot hub)
Flagship end for the time being, or a bit of a joke if it needs a proprietary hub.
Only four robot vacuums are currently Matter-certified: the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra, Deebot’s Ecovacs X2 Combo, and the SwitchBot S10 and K10 Plus (through a separate SwitchBot hub)
Flagship end for the time being, or a bit of a joke if it needs a proprietary hub.
myatmo is the app that Netatmo/Legrand should've produced, and it shows live data as well as 24-hr traces and heat maps of historical data. Plus, myatmo has a widget and an Apple Watch complication. Yes, I worked hard to integrate Netatmo sensors into HomeKit, to the extent possible, but it wasn't worth the effort because I never look to HK for data.
A previous philosophy at Apple would have had HK running like a top and so embedded in the house and our lives that we wouldn't even notice it. That was the dream, products that integrated and made our lives more enjoyable. It would be integral to our household. Too bad current philosophy is more about money than it is innovation.
My guess is that the home integration with various manufactions and matter intergration is more difficult than any of us realize. Apple does well within their own ecosystem. Should their be more a focus from their part, but other company’s have been slow to intergrate to matter. And very few company’s are putting out thread/matter devices. Give it 2 years and it should be better.
Especially if the rumors are true for Apple going in in on a home hub monitor thing next year. I can’t see them doing that without a major upgrade to HomeKit.
Especially if the rumors are true for Apple going in in on a home hub monitor thing next year. I can’t see them doing that without a major upgrade to HomeKit.
This is where I have high hopes for Matter. Because Apple is committed to supporting Matter, it can no longer just take its own time drip-adding support for new device types - instead it's now going to be forced to integrate them as they become part of Matter standards and Apple adopts them. Think in terms of Apple having to add support for new emojis whenever the Emoji Consortium adds any. Of course, Apple is a key player in the Matter Consortium, but there's other big players (who seem more committed to home automation) in there to help drive them along.
The difference is between just an app (iRobot) allowing you to control your Roomba using voice as an alternative to tapping the app's interface, and integration into HomeKit which allows control independent from the iRobot app and allows automation of the device by whatever triggers you want to set up, e.g. "If no one is at home, vacuum the kitchen every Tuesday at 10:00", or "If someone arrives home, stop the vacuum cleaner", or especially helpful for Roombas that don't have IR/LIDAR - "After sunset, if the robot starts cleaning, turn on the kitchen light" etc.
Because controlling robot vacuums via your home app is THAT important? It’s a neat feature i would use but i fail to see how it has anything to do with Apple being better or not.