Conference Blogging Fall Behind.

Had a programme of trying to invite friends and then blog about every conference or meetup gone to. But things have simply fallen behind.

Events about - embedded systems, data science, Internet of Things, chemistry, mathematics, virtualization, VR, robotics, toys, communications networks, energy, renewables, climate, big data and cloud computing, model railroads, marketting, fashion, food, beverage, investment, futurism, law, community action and support, blogging, team building, spirituality.

They have all been great. Find that the best things come from the most unexpected (off) topics. It is always a surprise how things and concepts are connected to each other.

Senet Microchip LoRaWAN.

Found out about this from a fortuitous meeting with Steve Ball from Senet at Xively Xperience 2015. Great presentation by Senet and Microchip regarding LoRaWAN on November 2, 2015. Outstanding technicals on how LoRaWAN works. And great demostration of the Senet network capabilities. Especially liked the hands on work with the Microchip RN2903 mote (not to be confused with the RN2843).

When I took my RN2903 kit home, got it working in downtown Boston against the overall Senet and AT&T M2M network. Very straightforward. Kudos Senet. Intrigued by the idea of use of motes in either public (ISP style) networks and private (open) networks. Was then prime for the pitch that the following group is making for TTN The Things Network.

Have a couple of ideas about how to use LoRaWAN to bridge old applications and organizations into the new world of IoT.

Cr... Time. Foods.

Anna and Charlie coming onto textural interest in foods.
Crusty bread. Crunchy apples. Crispy chips.

FutureM 2015 Boston.

Came to FutureM15 for IoT. And not disappointed by David Rose, Eric Snow of PTC, and panel on smart cities. Look for them on Twitter under #futureM15 and #IoT. Interesting to see latest in marketing... and relation to IoT. Background FutureM schedule .

Hayzlett - be bold (perhaps bolder than polite company would require).
Berners-Lee - times they are a changin'.

And okay - this piece is not from futureM - but similar viewpoint.

Xively Xperience 2015 Boston.

Attended Xively Xperience 2015 at Boston Seaport. Usually would run my own notes. But Jeff Engel at Xconomy (noted via Scott Kirsner on Twitter) has a great run down of the Xively gala.

Three scary keynotes:

• Diamantis - little things make a difference.
• James Lyne - security - no one has learned from the past.
• Ray Kurzweil - the exponential future.

Overall themes: Security. Forethought.

The Seven C's of Analysis.

Feeling adrift in the topic of analytics and data science?

There are two types of people in the world - Those who categorize and those who do not. There are many categorizations around analytics. Model based, Predictive, etc...

Five cases or levels of analysis - Decriptive, Diagnostic, Discovery, Predictive and Prescriptive - are often listed. Analyses are done on Big Data, Small Data, Rich Data and so on. Data gets classified by Velocity, Volume, Variety, Veracity and Value (5V).

What is the definition of analysis?
:Examination of structure as a basis for interpretation: is a fair working definition. The process or action definition is tantamount to taking inputs and ideas and turning them into decision and deliverables.

So how does analysis work? In the real and theory world? Past, present and future? Note that even asking the question involves a bit of analysis - deciding that time, space, quality and value are important parameters in our discussion.

Back to the seven C's. (three Chi's and four K's). Three are old:

Cheat: Know the answer for certain apriori. Like the Sting.  Or like doing the Kaggle Titanic competition from a download of the historical list of survivors. Or edX or Coursera students who use a shadow account to get the answers.

Chance: Guess the answer randomly... Not based on any "knowledge".

Chestnuts: Use rules of thumb, experts and one's gut. Experts can be consultants, practitioners, or highest paid person opinions (HIPPO). 

The next four are actually what most would call based in data science.

Coordinations: Statistics and regressions against well known dependent variables like space, time and value. f(t,x,y,z).. Note the nuance versus correlation below.

Correlations: f(v) for any vector v. - emergence - and not just related to time and space connections. Anything can be connected to anything else... in any way.

Crowd: Gather wisdom from many actors and models. Maybe using rule of thumb, or gut or any of the others, but getting it right(er) by law of averaging. Boosting might even be clumped into this crowd - so to speak.

Continuous: Iterate and apply the above in real world. Not quite like the others, this is about how the analytics get generated and acted upon. Most of the above answer the call when the need arises. They do not have "instinct" building (aka a built-in instinct) nor a process per se.

Nova Scotia Omiyage Gift Items.

Trip to Nova Scotia generally means bringing back gift items characteristic of area. Usually go with Coffee Crisp or Aero bars. Or Smarties. Sometimes even Cherry Blossom, Crispy Crunch, or Crunchie.
But if you do not have a sweet tooth there are alternatives:

Green Tomato Chow Chow.

One that has recently come up - good for almost anyone - Dulse.

Ketchup flavoured potato chips are often a favourite.
There are also local specialties like gouda from That Dutchman.
Items from Jost Vineyards.

All in spirit of omiyage.

Anna Talk. Charlie Thoughts.

The development of the kids is always interesting. Anna, two, can repeat almost everything we say (even long complicated sentences with long complicated words). She has memorized the text of books, and can "read"  them. She knows the numbers up to four or five, and can point them out (as the cardinality of a group) or count them out.

  
Charlie, four, is interested in superheros, remote control, and trains. He has started to ask about hard concepts like death, jealousy and social exclusion. He recalls events and dreams, and recounts them understandably.

Data Science. Feature Engineering. Sustainable Value. Seeking.

Had some exposure to data science long ago in undergraduate and graduate school:
Mapping spatial spin dynamics in helium fluids with NMR, studying positron annihilation in CuTi alloys, and coming up with good deposition recipes for making smooth gold substrates (as flat backgrounds against which to do scanning tunnelling microscopy of biologics and large chain molecules) were three that come immediately to mind.

Got some sense of theoretical underpinnings of data science from mentors at the math department at Dalhousie University. See that Dalhouse now has a data science department and will be hosting an international conference KDD-2017.  Physics Department engendered a fondness for a hands on approach. Got exposure to a wide variety of data and modeling techniques at the Condensed Matter Physics department at Cornell. Was away from data science for a long time on pathways of sensors and instrumentation as things in and of themselves. And business issues around production, logistics and customer support (of what amounts to instrumentation software). But analytics of large streams of data (sensors and tags in the Internet of Things) has brought me back to data science.

Have been taking the MIT edX course on data science. Looked at many things that this pointed to. Have become a fan of the materials at kdnuggets. And have been thinking hard about feature engineering. Note the feature engineering article is a very lean in Wikipedia, which belies its importance.

The Machine Learning Mastery article on discovering feature engineering by Jason Brownlee referenced  is well worth reading (well written and math does not overwhelm).

There are many articles about how one can excel at data science (and win Kaggle competitions *grin*) by using some core principles of collecting and understanding the data, feature engineering, applying standard or non-standard data science techniques, boosting (or model combinations).

There are very interesting new companies and business models which leverage the application of data science to seek "treasure". Some have new an wonderful techniques (like Ayasdi) and many have great tools to make a data scientist's life easier like data base stuff from Deep Information Sciences, and automatic model selection and combination like in Azure ML and IBM offers.

Cannot help but think that this all only gets one so far. The value of a model has to be harvested by deploying that model into the real world with real world constituents, and few have ventured there (or have simply taken it for granted). Further a good model often begs more data.

Those are things we have thought hard about in Analytika. One can construct a cycle:

• A. get and understand data
• B. feature engineer
• C. model and transcend
• D. deploy (get ongoing data, get ongoing analytics results)
• E. harvest business value
• F. goto A.

Thinking about how anywhere along the line we might realize a new feature in existing data or ask for....
"Can we get a new temperature sensor?" "Do you have data on turbidity?" "Do you have a flow sensor on x". State of the art is a long way from a computer or AI asking, "Do you have any data on how bright the clothing was for the Titanic survivor? How tall was each passenger?". Human inquiry and framing seems sustainably key. 

Internet of Things. Webservices. Modbus, BACnet, MQTT, AMQP, MTConnect, Sunspec.

Discussion of Internet of Things often brings up protocols and APIs. Will there be universal ones? Many go down a line of reasoning that major users of transaction systems will define the APIs (like Google, Amazon and Apple). Others simply say - RESTful, AMQP, MQTT and CoAP. The former means waiting for everything to settle. The latter are more "Platonic ideals" than things one can actually use or learn from by example. And if one is thinking about actual object and property definitions for actual modeled things or systems, then all above are really at a different level of consideration.

Where is the center? Are there any modeled constructs (for want of a better name) actually in deployment? Such things would have properties of objects like units, types/casts, locations, enumerations, language, etc.
Concept of objects with properties and univeral meta-data related to an interesting piece at Data Central recently about "codes".

Will submit the following for consideration as potentially having modeled constructs:

Modbus (general automation).  Not self describing - properties of objects must be discerned from documentation.

BACnet (building automation).  Watch for new BACnet/IT and related meetings and discussion.

Sunspec (renewables). Note Sunspec has a Modbus and XML form. Both are at least somewhat self describing.

MTConnect (machine tools).

OPC (general automation)  and OPC UA. Somewhat self describing, but overtly general.

NMEA-2000 (and 0183). Imagine Modbus, but with all the interpretation problems for "registers" recast as "strings" problems.

CAN and ODBII (auto). There are standard profiles and methods... and not so.

Then again one can say that structure plus documentation has context with almost all field buses. (Especially in factory/manufacturing, building/structure and energy/flow automation)

Profinet, EthernetIP, EtherCat,...

And then there is protocol and API at other end... IoT platform: ThingWorx, Xively, BlueMix, AT&T.... And the extent to which they provide actual object and property definitions for actual modeled things or systems.

[Why is my location pin at Iskilip, Turkey?]

Sixth Sense. Polarization. Discover Magazine. Haidinger Brushes.

Impressive gem of article/research/knowledge. Gave a "Wow!" moment. The Sixth Sense You Didn’t Know You Had, Discover Magazine. Juliette McGregor, University of Leicester, July 1, 2015 12:59 pm. Easy to describe. Easy to demonstrate. Relatively easy to replicate experiments. Centers around Haidinger’s brushes.

There are some practical medical applications with respect to Strabismus. [One of our little ones was though to have Strabismus... but not.  Also have old friend who works with such eye conditions.] Brought it up to others and they wondered if there might be other applications?

Putnam Family Tree - Genealogy.

Never made a study of it, but have various threads for Putnam family tree. The Putnam Family Wikipedia article is a good start. The links at the bottom of the Wikipedia article are helpful.

There are fancier versions of the Putnam crest, but this above seems to capture the original flavour. And following back from John of Salem one gets to Puttenham.

My Nova Scotia clan goes down through Nathaniel->Benjamin or Thomas->Joseph (Just above Isreal)... Never really sure because at least a couple of the female forbearers were married to Putnams twice (after one died) and seems the Timothy Putnam who came to Nova Scotia in his teens in 1750s - came with his mother (Elizabeth) who had remarried a Hutchinson (?).

Lines from Timothy can be found in Canadian Census data. My grandparents had a copy of the Fulton Family of Atlantic Canada, which had connected lines with the Putnams.

ReWork.IoT Boston Event - Success Stories - 2015-05-28.

Great Internet of Things success stories at ReWork.IoT Boston Event at Hyatt Regency on May 28 and 29, 2015.
Sensors and such for Smart Cities - Air, Water, Sewer... Trash? Benches?
Smart "toys" - Energy harvesting soccer ball.  Jibo.
Smart self and home - Arghon.  BeON.
Rethink Robotics, Xively platform.
Supporters:  ReWork,  INEX Advisors, Coalition Space, MIT, City of Boston.

State of Massachusetts Internet of Things Day - May 12, 2015.

Morning and afternoon May 12, 2015 event at the MA State House about Massachusett's commitment to Internet of Things - IoT. Organized by Tech Caucus - Senator Karen Spilka with support of MassTLC.

Remarks by Senate President Rosenberg and Speaker DeLeo. Keynote by Chris Rezendes of INEX Advisors. Breakouts on Government, Healthcare, Energy and Transportation.

Hackster Hardware Weekend Boston - Alex, Monica, Adam - ARM and Intel.

Hackster Hardware Weekend May 9/10, 2015 - Boston Black Falcon Pier and Drydock area at MassChallenge venue.

Great presentations by Arrow Freescale, UDOO, Softlayer, Intel Edison and AutoDesk Fusion 360. Leap Motion and 1Sheeld were also highlighted. Microsoft Azure was anticipated, but did not make it. Learned about ARM mbed cloud IDE (Thank you Arrow) and natural full co-processing on the UDOO (Atmel or ARM). AutoDesk presentation sparked 3D ideas. Many thanks to Alex Glow, Monica Houston, and Adam Benzion from Hackster.

ThingWorx LiveWorx PTC - IoT Hackathon, Conference and Bootcamp.

Has been a busy IoT week. Participated in the ThingWorx LiveWorx Hackathon last weekend. Our team (Drip IR) went with the Smart Agriculture track - Freight Farm Modbus interface and FLIR camera via Intel Edison to ThingWorx Mashup. Many thanks to the Thingworx hackathon logistics team - Kevin, Sara and everyone.

Liveworx was great. Appreciated the focus on analytics and end business value. Ideas about digital avatars were great for PLM/SLM. The overall vibe of innovation was irresistible.

Great talks by Heppelmann, Fadel and others.

Great reminiscence talk by Steve Wozniak, and then judging of hackathon. Congratulations to winners: Third - Awesome, Second - Rocket Farms, and First for Accessibility - Smart Signs.

LiveWorx Expo hall had many great companies joining the IoT movement.

Only regrets were things I did not have time for - like the IoT Bootcamp. Trying to absorb the Thingworx IoT ethos and technicals as much as possible.

Option Value of BACnet and Webservices on Xport.

Blogged before about how to make a Modbus device be BACnet. Question came regarding B6131 embedded Modbus to BACnet gateway module in a way only thought about for Analytika legacy metering projects: The B6131 (and its developer kit B6130 boxed version) have a Modbus RTU to Modbus TCP MBAP router embedded inside. One simply has to turn on Modbus TCP in the web GUI. So...
Use the B613x as only a Modbus TCP router? At least as a starting position? That is to say: Use the B613x exactly like any Modbus TCP routers on the market. Notably exactly like Modbus TCP routers from Lantronix and Gridconnect on their XPorts and xPicos (DSTini platform).

Except the B613x has the option to later install BACnet templates under the existing BACnet device, and use the web for data access. The B613x unit comes with excellent defaults preset and is re-configurable via the HTTP web GUI. Further there are OEM optional "add-ins" for REST webservices, advanced auto-setup and discovery, buffered data, and so on. Where the OEM or end-user has already designed in an XPort/XPico this is exceptionally straightforward.

Littlebits Smarter Than Your Home Challenge - BaseBits - #shapebits

Basebits - #shapebits - Put your things on a smart pedestal - for Littlebits Smarter Than Your Home Design Challenge.

Concepts: Internet of Things (littlebits cloudbit). Shapeways 3D printing. Something ubiquitous at home.

Thoughts were about toys. Or more directly the kind of activities kids do at home. Got to thinking about the age old project of growing a bean plant. That led to flower pots and vases. Usually one puts a water tray under the grow container. How about making that "pedestal" a smart connected thing with a cloudbit in it? And just maybe it can be more flexible than that...

Concept:
Low height pedestal with shallow depression in top. Clear and white plastics. Clear for esthetics and peek through for some sensors. Primary sensors motion, light, water (humidity). Pedestal has place in bottom to snugly mount place a cloudbit and the required sensors. Put in a color LED bit for some feedback. Track the progress of growing online. Send reminders for watering. Integrate other features via IFTTT.

Mockup:
Get two used clean hummus or dip containers. Clear one for water tray on top. Translucent one for cloudbit and electronics on bottom. Tape the bits into the base. [Insert Photo - cloudbit + motionsensor + containers]

Realization:
Shapeways used either for total realization or components to make whole. Or use available parts for tray and base and aggregate them using 3D printed parts. The 3D aspect is for esthetic and affordance of function. Cloudbit additions will be modular - any littlebit could be considered for integration into the overall Basebit "platform". The software is likewise modular. Features could be afforded via IFTTT. Concept suggests a new littlebit for moisture sensing.

Extension:
Same pedestal (slightly smaller) for kids items in the refrigerator. Will fit tightly under a round or rectangular leftover container. Then one can track temperature, light, motion. When is a leftover too old? When is my juice box cold enough after putting it in the refrigerator? (send an alert)

Generally the pedestal Basebit could be used for making anything a smart trackable thing. Just put something on it to see who might move your stuff. Or just see what is happening to or around your object of interest.

NASA Space Apps Challenge - Bouncy Ball - Zero G Bee.

NASA Space Apps Challenge in Cambridge over weekend of April 11. See tweets @AlbertPutnam. Many thanks to: Binnovative for heading. Hack/reduce for hosting. IBM for facilitating. Local sponsors for supporting. NASA and ESA overall. Sorry other events and logistics had to share the time.

Looked at doing something with space craft thermal power consumption, but could not find way to data at ESA Venus Express. Seemed like a great place to use some data mining tools from IBM BlueMix.

So instead chatted with people about other ideas, and after awhile came to this Bouncy Ball project for the Zero G Bee challenge.

The Bouncy Ball approach is sort of a hack within a hackathon. Namely a reframing of the problem really: Roadie in space. Social model of robot which needs help. Padded with Zorb.
 

The core work is not about electronics or code, so it made it "difficult" to submit that. But the expression of target intent needs facilitation and that is where a screen module packed inside the ball with the payload would come into play, with input UI using natural language ala Watson, and output UI using facial expressions and language/text like other social robots.

Some one suggested that there would not be enough humans onboard the space station to make social forwarding work... Maybe not. Then the problem could be converted to stewards or doorman bots (arms) at the interconnect points within the station to help the bouncy balls (or anything) along.

The Pivot to IoT. Rainmakers, Recipes, Fungibility, Sensors.

Saw this announcement about Pivotal, Benjamin Black and foray into IoT. The competitive landscape gets set out in the article with PTC, IBM, Cisco, Citrix, GE and others. Scroll down to the paragraph with "sensors aren't fungible" for the central issue in IoT, the nature of sensors and their natural environment, in a nutshell.

Interesting concept fungibility. And while one is on the topic of sensors and IoT... here is Oak Ridge Sensorpedia. And here is a sensorpedia recipe. Blogged before about great IBM IoT recipes... $3B investment in new division is quite an IBM announcement. Will this make IBM the rainmakers?

Make a Modbus Device be BACnet.

Suppose a mature Modbus device which one wants to be BACnet. The device has a clear and static Modbus register map and uses standard Modbus throughout. One mostly wants the device to make its data available via BACnet and other web services to clients and participate in the Internet of Things wave.
The device is not completely static. Future revisions are expected and these want to easily integrate into new systems. The device is not solitary. It must function and thrive withing a system of its peers or devices from other vendors.

• Cimetrics B6130 Modbus to BACnet IP can be added to mature project and works great. Exactly where most start.
• Cimetrics B6131 module for a new unit works great. Exactly where most end up. Think of the B6130 as the development kit for B6131.

B613x has all the following concurrently and transparently at run time - probably have to see this to completely absorb the implications:

• BACnet/IP (we also have a BACnet MSTP RS485 version if you use a Lantronix/Gridconnect xPico).
• Modbus TCP.
• Web GUI.

Features of existing B613x base:

• Excellent long track record Cimetrics BACnet stack.
• Defaults designed to make installs and device additions or reconfigurations easy and painless for first time or advanced users, of 1-100 units,  as system, or within other systems.
• Quick time to market, with levels of effort tailored to OEM and end-user needs.
• JIT supply chain with Ethernet firmware load.

Wrote and blogged before about making a small device BACnet via Modbus.

And got some questions about how to test BACnet... There are a couple of generic templates in the B613x kit (even before the template creator) which would allow one to "peek" around a generic Modbus device.

For testing the BACnet side externally, usually Cimetrics' clients use BACnet Explorer or BACnet OPC server. Demo versions in each case can be found by going to the Documentation tab (roughly mid page) (usually 20-40 MB).

Intel IoT Roadshow Boston. Greentown Labs, Somerville.

Very much enjoyed the Boston Intel Iot Roadshow weekend of March 15 at Greentown Labs in Somerville.

That is me in the center. Always enjoy it when my picture features prominently like at MIT OHS2013 *silly-grin*.

Many thanks to Stewart Christie, Daniel Holmlund, Ajay Mungara and the whole Intel ioT Roadshow team.

Intel Edison kits and Seeed Studio Grove accessories were great. Wished could have more effectively used Mashery and could do something with the advanced release Grove Agricultural Sensor kit.

And here are the hackathon results. Great stuff overall. The winning entries truly were fun.

Our team was the "Drips" was supposed to be "Know Drips" and was actually more about larger flows then drips... but hey.

Anna and Charlie - Talking about Snowflakes.

Anna: Why are all snowflakes different? [Scientist]

Charlie: No they are not. Snowflakes are all made of water, white, small and hexagons (or clumps of such). [Engineer] 

Internet of Things Recipes and Cookbooks. IBM. IFTTT. Arduino.

IBM has some great Internet of Things recipes.
Cookbooks and recipes go back through the ages.

Particularly like the Aldus Leaf Fleuron on Apicius. Much like on Physical Review.

Amoung IBM Recipes:

• TI CC2650 Sensor Tag.
• Arduino

Search for Internet of Things recipes generally gets you to IFTTT which crosses many domains and combines many things.

IFTTT appears in this top ten list of Innovative IoT companies.

BACnet and Internet of Things for Systems Managers.

How are BAcnet, Internet of Things, and their requirements, features and users, related? Apologies to Toby Considine. Just cannot get over Internet of Things.

In building automation who does one try to serve? When one goes through the list - owners, operators, and occupiers - it usually comes to the facilities managers - and being a bit more general about what automation we might be talking about - systems managers. System managers are beset by fear. Fear of disruption from all sorts of directions. System managers crave stability and reliability foremost. Efficiency and optimization comes after that. Systems managers are faced with monumental tasks.

In the Internet of Things wave, almost every facet of how a systems platform goes together are up for consideration... security, manageabilty and interoperation are current hot topics. Alan Messer of Samsung showed a great list at a recent MIT IoT event.

Turns out BACnet, as a lingua franca for building automation, has many of the facets well under control.
Especially well covered: clear semantics, great model and defaults, topology definition, simplicity with extensibility, system setup strategies part of architecture (like discoverability).

And there are things BACnet can be served well by from watching and following IoT. Especially techniques in:

• Location awareness.
• Wireless communications.
• Energy harvesting.
• Social information input.
• Raw simplicity (dumb things, simple networks).

BACnet and IoT presentation at Cimetrics.

Power Cord User Interface Design.

Using the power cord as a user interface, UI, from the MIT Tangible Media Group, is interesting in many ways:

• Transparent design ala Norman.
• Energy monitoring and such (why not also put in a current monitor?).
• Microcontrollers and embedded systems. Related to IoT

Have always been in favor of cables... Like 802.3af Power over Ethernet, Standard USB power.

Motivations - Monetary Rewards, Morals, Social Pressure.

Found this in Greentech Blog about how monetary rewards trump morals.

Always interested in a contrarian position. The above thesis flys in the face of many recent findings regarding the mechanics of social interactions.

So which is a better model of reality? Perhaps they both are because there is a subtle difference. They make different assumptions at the outset. Morals are perhaps more of a personal construct or rule of thumb amassed from societal pressures internalized by the individual. Pure raw local group pressures are perhaps more direct. And morals (with a very narrow definition) might lag pure group pressure. That is perhaps not saying it with all the nuance needed. Alexander Pentland's book Social Physics maybe is a good place for an overview of the raw peer pressure point.

In brief - moral suasion directed to the individual as in the Japanese study cited by Greentech is perhaps orthogonal to pure direct peer pressure. And there are issues with the Japanese study regarding "top down control" of the programme, versus the local social aspects of how communities might apply pressure locally.

So there are perhaps three ways to motivate: (in the order they seem most effective).

Direct and immediate social pressure from your immediate local peer group. This has been found to stick. Even after the "setup", "message" or "incentive" is removed. It "becomes" morality. It is like a sort of ghost memory of the motivation pressure. And are apparently roughly a half order of magnitude more effective than monetary rewards.

With monetary rewards the problem is that morality and social pressures kick back in after financial incentives are removed. Monetary rewards are effective while they are ongoing, but their imprint fades (and sometimes even goes negative) after the incentives are removed. There is conditioning for expectation of reward. Rewards do not, by themselves, create morality.

Moral suasion or suggestions based on existing moral baselines. Again if the suggestions are removed, then individuals revert to their easy self serving behaviour. We forget. We rationalize.

The keys seem roughly as follows:
Socially based best practice approaches are self serving. If you serve the group well, if you give well, then the rewards to the self are socially large. Monetary or economic incentives come next. And they are followed in effectiveness by appeals to an existing general (perhaps somewhat nebulous) moral framework.

So how might this translate into practice? Back to the Japanese example there should have been four groups in the study: The three cited - control, moral suggestion, and monetary as well as one more. The last is slightly more tricky to construct - but not much more. It is an incentive based on feedback of how well six to ten of your immediate neighbours are doing. You are given "value" (okay generally monetary, but it could simply be praise or goodwill) based on how well your peer group does in aggregate. And there are constraints. You have to regularly communicate face to face with your "neighbours". From this point of view your neighbours may not be physically adjacent but a group formed of your co-workers or firends (or family) (with similar target infrastructure of course) with whom you interact every day.

Pentland's tidbits on social physics are rather thought provoking. Ineffectivness of loose social network pressure (Facebook) was a shock, but not exactly a surprise once one thought about it a bit. Moral pressure, loose nebulous social pressure, and direct local peer pressure are often lumped together,
but can be very different things.

Toys, Open Source Hardware, Littlebits.

Seems like new important technologies can often get a beach head in toys or playthings. Batteries, Energy harvesting, AI and Watson... Regardless - toys are fun.

It is said there are five proto-toys - seen from the earliest times: ball, doll (including animals), stick/stylus, string/rope/cord, musical-instrument (like wind and percussion instruments) .

Magnifying glass, magnets, and telescopes are some nice more "advanced" toys. Blocks and vehicles come along too. My personal favorites are classic construction toys.

The modern age has brought electronics and tablets as toys. Especially electronic toys and kits. Brings to mind the venerable first handhelds.

At the OHS2013 at MIT was introduced to Littlebits. They gave away a small sample kit. Very intriguing.

And the idea has gotten legs. Search for littlebits pops up many things. There is an Internet of Things connection with the cloudbit.

So it seems littlebits is becoming the Internet of Things construction toy. They want to be an app store for hardware designs with the bitlab.

Littlebits are in many ways "perfect"... though one caveat is cost (for a toy)... but it is understandable. And it leads one to think of alternatives (and a marketplace) - which has its ecosystem benefits (for littlebits and others). Might come back to that in a later blog entry.

For now thinking of ways that the deluxe Popular Science kit might be used -(sorry)- played with *grin*.

IoT, PTC, LiveWorx, Analytika.

Notices are starting to circulate about PTC LiveWorx 2015. Attended Axeda Connection and PTC LiveWorx last year. Been watching Internet of Things (IoT) in pursuance of making Cimetrics' offerings like Analytika more conformal. Year started with meeting some people from ThingWorx at M2M Miami. Watched as ThingWorx and Axeda started melding into PTC. Attended local events regarding the PTC Smart Connected Products programme.

Good friend of ours, from the energy efficiency and buildings modeling space, joined PTC. Went into high gear regarding analytics, and Cimetrics is now in the ThingWorx partner program. 

The Analytika piece for PTC is mostly about consuming and delivering data for mashups. But there are data connector pathways too. Connections had been a topic we were looking at with Axeda before the acquisition by PTC. Seems everyone is trying to understand how it all fits together. Here is an image from the connectIOT project:

And Cimetrics is still actively pursuing IoT pathways.

Early Failures Sour Future Efforts. Energy Efficiency. 3D Printing.

That early failures sour future efforts is almost self evident. Mentioned in piece about 3D printing that failures (or weak successes) often sour further exploration. Various are working on getting barriers to success lowered. Better tools. Better examples. Better materials. Here is a Greentech article with a similar sentiment, on how low hanging fruit in energy efficiency might actually poison worthwhile efforts.

Cimetrics Introduces Analytika for Internet of Things.

Analytics for Internet of Things... Previously.

Picked up by

- CNBC.
- BusinessWire.
- Automation.com

Analytika for IoT extends existing analytics capabilities to address the needs of designers, manufacturers, owners and operators of all kinds of “things”. And provides a variety of cost saving and revenue-enhancing value propositions for the Internet of Things.

MBTA Green Line Government Center Routing - Suggestion.

Just posted regarding train shuttle operation on Orange Line. Praise for MBTA flexibility and trying new things. Another suggestion. While Green Line station construction is ongoing at Government Center why not run almost all the trains to North Station and turn around there?

Would seem like

- a nice perk to the ridership for the inconvenience of the closure.
- a more effective rerouting for the connections to Blue and Orange Lines and North Station Commuter Rail.
- just as easy to turn trains around at North Station (maybe easier).
- central management of reroute at North Station.

MBTA Orange Line Train Shuttle - Kudos.

MBTA deserves a compliment. With Orange line delays lately, and the uproar about weather and maintenance, it was a pleasant surprise to have the MBTA doing a very sane thing using train shuttles between Wellington and Oak Grove. The one track shuttle is a great idea...

- Only one track has to be kept running.
- Switches need less operation.
- Signals can be minimized (one train just goes back and forth).

There were minor delays. There was some confusion. Though the confusion seemed unwarranted and somewhat frivolous from the ridership. Riders standing in the door at Malden asking "does this train go to Boston?" seemed almost comical. The anonymous answers "Eventually." and "Just get on, its frigid out there!" seemed very appropriate. The only real confusion was at Wellington with announcements saying to get on for Oak Grove on the "South" side (aka Inbound or Boston-bound track, or the Westside track, or the track farthest from the busways, or the track nearest the MBTA Orange Line repair shops).

The delay from train change at Wellington seemed to be mostly due to holding for the outbound shuttle to fill. Always a somewhat dubious decision (rather then setting a schedule), but is nonetheless understandable.

Staying on Track Blogging.

Stay on Track Blogging 2015 by thoughtlight, LLC, Thursday, February 5, 2015 from 6 to 8 PM.

Great group, presentation and ideas. At 50 Milk Street at new(ish) CIC Boston. Visit to the space worthwhile. Takeaways:
- schedule regular blogging
- images always worthwhile (even a little relevance is fine).
- okay to curate or review.

So as a part of the scheduling "exercise": Editorial calendar : (and maybe this has some tongue in cheek spirit *grin*):

Thousand blogs by end of main career (next two decades). Smoothed average: four to five blogs a month.

Current feature: IoT. Ongoing emphasis: Energy and metrology. With a mix of hobbies, book reviews, sociology, robotics, manufacturing, design, toys, transportation, travel, science, engineering and so on.

LED Nobel Prize 2014. LEDs.

Have met more than my fair share of Nobel Physics Laureates. Much saddens to think of the great minds and hearts who have passed on.

Have written about LED technolgy (toys and practical) before. Enjoy telling story of my friend, Kyle, showing me one of the first blue LEDs (via Cree) at Cornell pre-2000. 

Missed writing about 2014 Physics Nobel Prize for LEDs. Have family near Nagoya in Okazaki. Wonder if should stop by sometime?

LEDs are more important and ubiquitous than one might imagine.

LEDs go hand in hand with the stories around solar photovoltaic production, advanced storage systems, and better efficiency (especially insulation).

3D Printing MIT Introduction.

Was at a short bootcamp regarding making and 3D printing at MIT.

The introductory presentation was very direct. Context: subtractive (cutting) and additive manufacturing contrasted. Then the types of additive described... including... 3D printing. There are many resources from which to get your fill of details regarding 3D printing.

The panel discussion was great - if somewhat MIT project and offering centered. But why not? The event was hosted at MIT after all. And there are indeed some great offerings from MIT or started at MIT... There are too many to list.... but
Hint: Edgerton Center Saturday Thing.
Hint: Fablabs.
Hint: Affiliated hackerspaces.

One panel question stood out in my mind. To paraphrase:
What is needed to make 3D printing (CAD making) go forward (more quickly)?

And the answer was two fold....
- Better materials (and materials science).
- Simple design environments (aka design software).
The panelists and audience generally seemed to agree.

The issue is how to make it easy for anyone to design 3D objects. Maybe said "environment" will be an evolutionary step from existing CAD design tools? Maybe something revolutionary will come?

It is not exactly "design", but design market places (or sharing places) are already starting to make things easy. The paradigm parallels "there is an app for that" taking it to "there is a model existing for that" and maybe the best design is little to no design at all, but more modification or mashups of existing designs.

3D printing has an interesting landscape. The small players are abundant. From printers or machines to makerspaces to environments.

But larger players are starting to notice. Solidworks (Dassault) seems to be trying to be what is needed. Autodesk: Spark Ember, Autodesk 123D, spaces in San Francisco and Boston.

It was mentioned in passing that it is unclear what people want to create. And in many cases a created object failure sours people to the technology. Maybe the area is waiting for a "killer model" for people to create? Have heard it kicked around that most people print phablet cases, trinkets or parts for printers. And there are always "issues".

Toys always seem a good place to start. How about adapters for various sizes of construction blocks? They largely already work by allowing larger series to stack on smaller series. What one really needs is to go the other way. To allow smaller details to be affixed to larger constructs (based on larger units). Project from F.A.T. (warning - unfortunate acronym).

Like this Lego Duplo Primo adapter or kit.

FLIR Thermal Survey of House.

Late last year on a cold dry night did a FLIR E4 survey of my house. Will not include the photos. A google image search for FLIR will get stuff much more interesting visually than I could present. Some online FLIR images even tend toward art.

Issues found:
- Massive kitchen heatleak. Wall too thin behind radiator. Unfortunately no gap whatsoever into which to insert a batt of Spaceloft.  Thinking about a tiny under window greenhouse or exterior adhoc insulation.
- Big heat leak on inner corner of front porch where radiator pipes go to second floor. Insulation has probabbly fallen down around pipe. Unfortunately hard to get to. Again thinking about something adhoc on exterior. Looking at ComfortBatt wrapped in Tyvek.
- Exposed basement cinderblock wall. Thought our 12" thick basement blocks (with air core) would do fairly well. But the whole thing is uniformly warm. Considering stryofoam rigid panels - dig down to allow 2' height, UV protect with thin water and vermin resistant sheathing (maybe Tyvek again), regrade... will have to wait until snow gone, and ground thaws.

Places I thought there would be leaks - but there were none:
- Basement sills - suprisingly tight.
- Basement windows - had installed secondary glazing on most.
- Upstairs windows - have storm windows and they seem to do a good job.
- Attic floor - thought the rockwool had been distrubed to thin here and there, but good overall.

FLIR is about to update the FLIRONE .
And it addresses a couple of big issues with first version
A. Any device with Lightning or Andoid micro USB.
B. Consolidated App for everything.

Micro management of your lawn becomes a real possibility. See my previous post on Big Data in Agriculture. Here is something a bit "farther out" from NASA. And a bit more down to earth from IsraelAgri.

Analytics for Manufacturing - MTConnect Insights.

Have been looking around for analytics applied to manufacturing processes. View to how to optimize business value of the manufacturing process (aka ROI, efficiency, etc.). [And optimization can be about consumables, parts, energy - usually uptime and reliability are key concerns.]
Found an approach with the following components:
Protocol or language: MTConnect. Wrote about MTConnect before.
Tools: Systems Insights VIMANA and their partners like Autodesk and Yamazaki Mazak.
Then apply model based analytics ala Analytika.

Postscapes IoT Awards 2014.

Had mentioned search for best IoT Blog. Postscapes just announced 2014 awards for lots of different categories of IoT. And here are the Postscapes awards for 2013. PTC Thingworx seemed very happy with taking about a third of the awards.

Third Industrial Revolution - Rifkin.

Started reading Jeremy Rifkin's Third Industrial Revolution, TIR. Not exactly what expected, but in many ways what was long sought. Chiefly about renewables distributed generation supplanting old central models.

Five pillars of TIR:

1. renewables.
2. micro-power at buildings.
3. storage - hydrogen emphasized, but arguments works just as well for any way of storing electrons or converting electrons to storage.
4. Internet of Things, IoT, for energy grid.
5. transportation to take advantage of new electron sources and storage.

O'Reilly Blog and Internet of Things.

Glaring omission in my recent tale of seeking best Internet of Things blogs. O'Reilly should be therein. Found this recent article on Internet of Things problems facinating. Great O'Reilly Blog. Really want to try to get to one of their Solid conferences. Always have been a fan of Make and their events and blogs.

Best Internet of Things IoT Blogs.

Went looking for a list (even if just opinion) of the best blogs for Internet of Things, IoT. Had criteria that it be reasonably outward looking, agnostic and current. Did not exactly find what sought. But some related things...

Best IoT Twitter accounts from Link Labs. Postscapes seems to come up often. Some general trend watchers have some good IoT materials like PSFK. There are some personal opinions, which sometimes lead back to trend watchers and consultants like McKinsey. Big companies, of course, come up on search for best IoT blogs - Microsoft, Intel, IBM, Cisco, Bosch, PTC, and so on. Some smaller entities come out too like Stephenson (local in Massachusetts), Adafruit (prototyping supplier).

IoT Infographics.

Intel Platform Transforming data into insight is the essence of analytics.
Libelium Smart world and the connectedness of all things.
IoT World Landscape and Players in IoT. Matt Turck, First Mark Capital.
Microsoft Azure IoT Platform Slides page 11 most notably - but see also lead-in material.

Playing Restaurant.

Latest development with Charlie and Anna is playing restaurant together. Charlie is chef. Daddy is waiter. Anna is customer. Daddy delivers menu (cardboard box top) to Anna on sofa. Anna places order for "fries and cookies". Charlie says "coming right up" and goes off to corner of living room and prepares food (small stand with door to act as oven). After some minutes he brings back the (invisible) food cupped in his hands. "Here you go". Places it in on an overturned sand bucket in front of Anna. Anna accepts with cupped hands and comments "mmm", makes chewing noises or somesuch. Repeat.