Kroger Making Cinci a High Tech Hub

Good information and details here.  Have followed Kroger's efforts since we collaborated with our innovation center. Very impressed at what Kroger is doing now.   I make it a point to visit every demonstration store and report on the tech here.  My clients often comment on what is going on.  Consider also the University centers here as well.  Keep it moving!

 ... If anyone wants to collaborate with me and my blog in helping drive the hub forward,  connect with me on Linkedin and lets talk. ... Franz Dill

Kroger Is Intent on Making Cincinnati a True Tech Hub    By Randy Hofbauer -  in Progressive Grocer

The Kroger Co.'s technology arm is partnering with the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber to attract top technology talent from across the globe and turn the city into a true tech hub.

The effort begins with CincyisIT.com, which is powered by Kroger Technology. The portal will reach new markets through digital outreach, national conferences, career fairs and special events, all while introducing a new audience to Kroger's technology arm and businesses throughout the Cincinnati area.

"CincyisIT.com invites technology talent from our city and around the world to explore career opportunities, engage with regional training events and discover our vibrant community," said Denise Haskamp, manager of human resources for Kroger Technology. "Kroger Technology is committed to partnering with the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber through exciting initiatives like this program to continue designing a region with endless opportunities."

Kroger has been furthering its technological prowess and working hard to put Cincinnati on the map as a major tech hub. Recently, it announced a planned innovation lab within the University of Cincinnati’s 1819 Innovation Hub. Housed within the Uptown Innovation Corridor, the 1819 Innovation Hub serves as a “beacon of community innovation and impact in partnership with higher education,” and is claimed to be the region’s newest destination for “thinking, making, doing, discovery and delivery.” ... "  ... ' 

Security Eyeball Home Hub

Security solutions seem to be in vogue, added to the architecture of the smart home.  Naturally an extention to home control hubs.   Here something unique:

The Moon is a floating eyeball that can control and monitor your house
By Mark Austin  in DigitalTrends   .... "

Intelligent and Secure Learning Hub for the Smart Home

Hubs should learn ... 
" .... With the emerging ecosystem of connected devices – often dubbed the “Internet of Things” – consumers are rightly worried about the security and privacy implications associated with always-on hardware in their homes that listen, watch, observe and then store data in the cloud. Today, a company called Silk Labs, co-founded by former Mozilla CTO Andreas Gal, is launching a device that aims to address those concerns with its smart home sensor dubbed “Sense” that interoperates with your home’s connected devices, and automatically adapts to your needs over time by learning from your behavior and patterns.

At launch, Sense, now live on Kickstarter, will function as something of a digital brain for the connected home, in order to do things like turn on or off the lights, adjust the music or thermostat, and more. But what’s different about how this device operates, versus other smart home hubs on the market today, is that it acts on your behalf by developing an understanding of the people in the home, and their specific needs.   ...  It learns.  ... 

Samsung Family Hub Refrigerator

Samsung continues to move ahead, with smart hubs in standard appliances.  Very expensive appliances.  Such white goods appliances have the problem of dealing of synchronizing with high tech systems, which have historically evolved more quickly.   Quite a wealth of features for refrigerators, even unlikely ones that deliver music like the Echo and Sonos via Pandora and Tunein. And also ....

" ...See inside from anywhere
The Family Hub™ has three built-in cameras that take a photo every time the doors close. You can use your phone* to access photos from anywhere, so you always know what you have and what you're missing.

When it's time to get groceries, order them directly from the touchscreen with apps like Groceries by MasterCard. You can even discover new recipes and receive notifications when food is about to expire. The Family Hub™ makes it easy to stay on top of meals.  ... " 

Explored this for our innovation center, see the Appliance link below.

Samsung Smart TVs as Hubs

Makes sense.  TV as a hub? Historically TVs have long durability?    Is that still the case?  Its intelligence in the cloud?  With what other standards?

In CNet:  Samsung to add new Smart TVs to its Internet of Things platform, SmartThings ... All of Samsung's SmartTVs and SUHD TVs for 2016 will be compatible with the company's Internet of Things  ... " 

LG Announces Smart Home Hub

Looks like an Echo cylinder with a small screen and speaker.  But is not voice activated. AI / Cognitive?  In the past have been impressed by LG's experiments with smart appliances, we used and tested several in innovation settings.  before they could be networked.  Note the use of the Alljoyn system,  which has been mentioned for inclusion in Windows 10.   More next week at CES.

In the Verge: 
" .... The hub, announced today ahead of a demonstration at CES next week, is visually similar to Amazon's Echo, and like that device, features a large built-in speaker that can stream music. But where the Echo is only gradually moving from cool curio to useful gadget, LG is pitching the SmartThinQ as the "gateway" to your automated home, connecting to smart refrigerators, washing machines, and air conditioners, and displaying their information on a 3.5-inch color LCD display. ...  The hub uses the open AllJoyn "internet of things" platform, connecting to other appliances — both smart and conventional — via Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, or Zigbee ....  " 

Free NYC Gigabit Wifi Hubs

Saw a proposal for this quite a number of years ago.  Finally NYC putting public Wifi into many old 'phone booths'.  In the Verge.    " ... The full network will install more than 7,500 public hubs throughout the city, each replacing a pre-existing phone booth. Once completed, the hubs will also include USB device charging ports, touchscreen web browsing, and two 55-inch advertising displays. The city estimates that ads served by the new hubs will generate more than $500 million in revenue over the next 12 years. ... " 

Amazon Echo as Smart Home Hub

Have been following the Amazon Echo work for some time.  In particular its implication for other connections in the Smart Home.   Our own brain stormed discussions quickly led to the point that it was meant to be much more than a voice activated speaker system. Connectivity to Amazon Dash, which links in sensors and 'people as sensors' is also in the mix.  Now how will it coexist with other proposed standards in the Smart Home?  More in Wired.

Your Phone as an IoT Hub

In GigaOM:   The implications?    " ... Broadcom’s new Wi-Fi chip turns your phone into an IoT hub ...  While our phones can use Wi-Fi to connect directly to other devices such as wearables or home appliances, they can’t do so while maintaining their own uninterrupted connection to a Wi-Fi router. This will solve that problem, which is becoming increasingly bigger as smartphones insert themselves into the internet of things. ... " 

Sample Naive Bayes Text Classification in Python

Via O'Reilly: Nice Python example of using Naive Bayes for text classification.  With actual code, and links to talk and slides.

" ... Full repo here: https://github.com/arnicas/NLP-in-Python
This is an example of going from labeled text to machine classification, first with NLTK and then the Python machine learning library scikit-learn. Examples updated from my OpenVis Conf talk here, which is more entertaining: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f41U936WqPM and slides: http://www.slideshare.net/arnicas/the-bones-of-a-bestseller
Warning: Rated NC-17. Using text samples from "50 Shades of Gray"! (Because spam is boring.) ... " 

Integrating Smart Devices

In CWorld: Testing Hubs, a case and physical study:

" .. Testing the Internet of Things: Can smart devices be united into an integrated whole? ...  We try out the Revolv hub to see if it can really make independent smart devices work together intelligently. The results? Mixed..... "  

KNext: Knowledge in Texts

Jim Spohrer Writes about KNext:
Len Schubert (U Rochester) has developed KNEXT http://www.cs.rochester.edu/~schubert/projects/world-knowledge-mining.html -- more triples than ConceptNet, and apparently designed with inference in mind - I need to check it out more. (Len's was the next to last talk at AAAI, and I was lucky enough to share a cab ride with him to the airport and got a chance to chat with him) .... "

Microsoft Surface Hub

Saw a demonstration of this last week,  Microsoft Surface Hub, with the aim to make it useable from phones to large touch screens using the upcoming Windows 10.  Beyond conferences, can be used to deliver data directly to multiple decision makers that need process synchronization. Saw a presentation of this when it was being delivered by Perceptive Pixel.   And more in CWorld.

" ... Microsoft wants Windows 10 to run on everything—phones, tablets, PCs, and even whiteboards. The Surface Hub is its take on the interactive whiteboard—a collaboration tool for businesses that combines Skype for Business, a 4K HDTV, and the largest capacitive Pen/touch display on the market.

I got some hands-on time with the product at Microsoft's Windows 10 launch event, and came away with one thought—we have to get one of these for the Labs.

I tried the 84-inch and 55-inch versions of the device. Standing next to the 84-inch version, you really get the sense you are standing in front of an enormous blank canvas. The screen runs at 120Hz, which is double what competing whiteboards can deliver.

If you are familiar with Perceptive Pixel, the display company Microsoft acquired two years ago, the Surface Hub will seem familiar, too. In fact, this is the same technology you see on most broadcast news shows. But Microsoft has made some important changes. ... " 

Stream Computing

Systems, devices, and people now generate vast streams of data.  How do we understand that data in real time?

" ... Remember the blackout during Super Bowl XLVII in February 2013? Nabisco certainly does. The company that makes Oreo cookies made history “winning the super bowl blackout” with its tweet, “You can still dunk in the dark.” That tweet resulted in tens of thousands of likes and retweets in real time—not bad considering that most advertisers pay approximately USD4 million/commercial slot during this event. Visit the Big Data & Analytics Hub to read the blog posting, “Reflections and Predictions for Stream Computing in 2015,” to see what Kimberly Madia, worldwide product marketing manager, InfoSphere Streams, at IBM, has to say about the impact that real-time data can have in today’s world. ... " 

Adding Smart Home Devices with a Scan

In Engadget:  Nice idea to add to the internet of things for the home.  " .... D-Link's latest smart home hub lets you add devices with a scan .... "  

Baking Intelligence into the Network

In CWorld: 
" ... A well-known problem in the Internet of Things is that many connected devices operate in silos. Your Fitbit doesn't communicate with your Nest thermostat, for example.

One way some companies are trying to solve this problem is to create a hub, like Revolv. The idea is for all devices to connect to the hub, which serves as a central point for users to control all the devices and allows certain events to trigger activity in different devices.

Neura, a startup chosen as part of Microsoft Ventures' accelerator program, has a novel approach to the hub concept. "The phone and potentially in the future the watch is how we treat a hub," said Gilad Meiri, CEO of Neura. .... ".       Baking intelligence into the network.   Novel approach.

Nanotech Assembly Lines

Used to follow nanotechnology for potential product manufacturing applications.  Less so now, but there are some areas where breakthroughs are key.  Now a new one:  " ... To develop a productive nanosystem for molecular manufacturing/atomically precise manufacturing it would be very useful to have a nanoscale assembly line. A month ago we posted here about a proof of principle for one such assembly line based upon biomolecules. This month Christine Peterson sends word of an assembly line for complex artificial organic molecules. An article on SingularityHUB led to this news release from the University of Bristol “Chemists create ‘assembly-line’ for organic molecules“: ... "

Hub for Data Analysts and Scientists Launched

A Hub for Data Scientists.

It will serve two main purposes:

1) It will promote sharing of models and code publicly or privately across a company to save Data Scientists and Analysts from “reinventing the wheel” every time and increase access to explore data among employees that need it.

2) It will also become a popular place to show off your data science work to potential hiring managers, which is often critical to landing that first great gig for new, post graduates of Master and PhD programs. ...  " 

Ohio Aerospace Hub

Was introduced to the Ohio Aerospace Hub.  Whose vision is to " ... Become the magnet for aerospace entrepreneurs, innovators and business owners seeking opportunity in a live-work-play-learn environment that fosters creativity and growth ... " 

The New Digital Medicine

In the CACM:  How Digital Medicine is changing health care.  And a caution:  " ... Despite the pace of technological development, experts caution all these devices and digital platforms will not force major change quickly. "I do believe that this is the future of healthcare, but you can't just throw the technology out there and hope it will cure everything," says Steinhubl.  ... "It's going to take a really concerted effort of payers and providers and industry support to say we're going to totally reengineer health care and take advantage of this technology." ... "