Home truths

The vision of the 21st-century smart home, bristling with hi-tech gadgetry and humming with embedded computers, typically conjures images of slim models in chic designer clothing, elegantly lounging amid classy minimalist surroundings.

For those with enormous amounts of money, the technology already exists to make this hi-tech dream a reality. But for the vast majority of us, devices that deliver regular mobile updates on the temperature of our ice cubes are fripperies we can do without.

The real challenge for technologists, therefore, lies not in developing increasingly intelligent devices but in making their systems palatable and deploying them in such a way that your granny would instinctively take to them.

A large integrated consortium of businesses and academics has been working over the past five years to change the perception of smart home technology by targeting the commercialisation of systems that consumers actually want. The Application Home Initiative (TAHI) has been developing ways of making the intrusion of technology into the home a little more palatable for those who are not yet convinced of its worth.