Microsoft shows off Home Automation OS
Microsoft Research is working on a home automation operating system that it calls HomeOS.
In a paper accepted by the highly regarded Network Systems Design and Implementation (NSDI) conference, the firm details that it has already deployed HomeOS among trial users and programmers, with the researchers claiming the operating system will ensure that "all devices in the home appear as peripherals connected to a single logical PC".
Microsoft's goal is for different devices to act as inputs to control other systems, so for instance a Microsoft Kinect sensor array could be used to control the lights in a room.