Intro to the Internet of Things and this blog

Hey to all the tech nerds, geeks and wizards fascinated with computer science, engineering and of course Information Technology. Apologies for the corny name calling in my greetings but as you all know, we grew up with main stream media calling people with an avid interest in anything computer or technology related being labeled as a geek or any such name, so I say wear the hat proudly because they say if the shoe (or hat) fits, then wear it....I for one am proud to be called such names because they have no personal bearing on me, I am just a guy crazy in love with anything computers and if that makes me a geek, then so be it. I've created this blog or platform to share knowledge on what has been termed as the Internet of things.It is my earnest belief

that this branch of computing and engineering is the very definition of the FUTURE.I believe that your input and insights on this topic and many others to be discussed on this platform will be invaluable, so feel free to comment or to send any of your comments or articles to me for posting herein.

Now to the heart of the matter, the internet of things introduced:

The Internet of Things is definitely a hot topic in the industry we are currently training for and operating in, but it’s not a new concept. Those with the know how posit that, in the early 2000’s, a man (gentle or not) Kevin Ashton was laying the groundwork for what would become the Internet of Things (IOT) at Massachusetts  Institute Technology's (MIT) AutoID lab. Ashton was one of the pioneers who conceived this notion as he searched for ways that Proctor & Gamble (A big firm) could improve its business by linking RFID information to the Internet. The concept was simple but powerful. If all objects in daily life were equipped with identifiers and wireless connectivity, these objects could communicate with each other and be managed by computers (sort of like the livestock identification system we are currently using in Botswana). In a 1999 article for the Radio Frequency Identification Journal Ashton wrote: “If we had computers that knew everything there was to know about things using data they gathered without any help from us , we would be able to track and count everything, and greatly reduce waste, loss and cost. We would know when things needed replacing, repairing or recalling, and whether they were fresh or past their best. We need to empower computers with their own means of gathering information, so they can see, hear and smell the world for themselves, in all its random glory. RFID and sensor technology enable computers to observe, identify and understand the world—without the limitations of human-entered data.”

At the time, this vision required major technology improvements. After all, how would we connect everything on the planet? What type of wireless communications could be built into devices? What changes would need to be made to the existing Internet infrastructure to support billions of new devices communicating? What would power these devices? What must be developed to make the solutions cost effective? There were more questions than answers to the IOT concepts in 1999. Today, many of these obstacles have been solved. The size and cost of wireless radios has dropped tremendously. IPv6 allows us to designate a communications address to billions of devices. Electronics companies are building Wi-Fi and cellular wireless connectivity into a wide range of devices. ABI Research estimates over five billion wireless chips were shipped in 2013. Mobile data coverage has improved significantly with many networks offering broadband speeds, mobile phone & device penetration in Botswana is said to be at the 170% mark and 90% mark for bandwidth coverage. While not perfect, battery technology has improved and solar recharging has been built into numerous devices. There will be billions of objects connecting to the network with the next several years. For example,Cisco’s Internet of Things Group (IOTG) predicts there will be over 50 billion connected devices by 2020.

IOT describes a system where items in the physical world, and sensors within or attached to these items, are connected to the Internet via wireless and wired Internet connections. These sensors can use various types of local area connections such as RFID, NFC, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Sensors can also have wide area connectivity such as GSM, GPRS, 3G, and LTE. The Internet of Things will: 

1. Connect both inanimate and living things: Early trials and deployments of Internet of Things networks began with connecting industrial equipment. Today, the vision of IOT has expanded to connect everything from industrial equipment to everyday objects. The types of items range from gas turbines to automobiles to utility meters. It can also include living organisms such as plants, farm animals and people. For example, the Livestock Tracking Project known as the Botswana Animal Information and Traceability System uses data collected from radio tags to monitor information on Cattle and to trace their movement to prohibit ills such as Stock theft. Wearable computing and digital devices, such as Smart Watches are examples of how people are connecting in the Internet of Things landscape. Cisco has expanded the definition of IoT to the Internet of Everything (IoE), which includes people, places, objects and things. Basically anything you can attach a sensor and connectivity to can participate in the new connected ecosystems. 

2. Use sensors for data collection: The physical objects that are being connected will possess one or more sensors. Each sensor will monitor a specific condition such as location, vibration, motion and temperature. In IOT, these sensors will connect to each other and to systems that can understand or present information from the sensor’s data feeds. These sensors will provide new information to a company’s systems and to people. As much as the list is infinite some of the projects that can be implemented using IOT include the following: Auto Irrigation using soil moisture sensors, Street light automatic intensity controllers,Accident Identification and alerting projects,Agricultural Robot Project, IR Lighting Controllers  and lastly a Wireless Surveillance Robot Controlled by PC.

3. Change what types of item communicate over an IP Network: In the past, people communicated with people and with machines. Imagine if all of your equipment had the ability to communicate. What would it tell you? IOT-enabled objects will share information about their condition and the surrounding environment with people, software systems and other machines. This information can be shared in real-time or collected and shared at defined intervals. Going forward, everything will have a digital identity and connectivity, which means you can identify, track and communicate with objects. IOT data differs from traditional computing. The data can be small in size and frequent in transmission. The number of devices, or nodes, that are connecting to the network are also greater in IOT than in traditional PC computing. Machine-to-Machine communications and intelligence drawn from the devices and the network will allow businesses to automate certain basic tasks without depending on central or cloud based applications and services.These attributes present opportunities to collect a wide range of data but also provide challenges in terms of designing the appropriate data networking and security. 

There are of course many more applications of the Internet of Things, for now the objective of this piece was to introduce you to this fascinating and indeed thrilling field. As noted, I still have a lot to learn so feel free to throw me a comment, a message or email (tlotlopilane32@gmail.com), Till we chew on the next IOT topic friends.

Yours in Computing,

Tlotlo Pilane (Mr.)

Sources: Lopez Research LLC( 2013), https://www.cisco.com/c/dam/en_us/solutions/trends/iot/introduction_to_IoT_november.pdf

https://cyberlearn.hes-so.ch/pluginfile.php/875486/mod.../1/Introduction-IoT.pdf