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The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

csa-iot.org

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Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#51

Post by nona »

jauntywundrkind wrote: post #6
mcny wrote: post #4

Linked on the same page is the announcement for matter 1.5 In Case you missed it, https://csa-iot.org/newsroom/matter-1-5-introduces-cameras-c... > Matter 1.5 introduces one of the most anticipated additions to the specification: cameras. Developers can now build and certify cameras that interoperate directly with Matter-enabled ecosystems, without the need for custom APIs or integrations. > Matter cameras support li…

I have to say that the Matter Cast standard sounded good, but ended up being an abomination, imo. Instead of ther being a boradly available platform for casting, my crude understanding is that to have Matter Cast work, there has to be some out of band way for an app that wants to cast to have a reciprocal app available on the target device. There's nothing provided to help facilitate this. Where-as with DIAL and for…

> I'd also really like to see affirmations that Matter is usable sans any big network, sans Google Apple and whomever else. That it really is something we can run ourselves.

I'm using Matter (over Thread, mostly) with Home Assistant – in addition to using it with Apple HomeKit, but I could have done it exclusively HA. My devices get an IPv6 ULA from the border router, HA can directly talk to them without any internet or cloud involved. Does this qualify?

It's true that certain non-standardized features are only available through "extensions" ie. the device vendor app. But both Thread and Matter get new revisions, and the devices get firmware updates in a standard way (again, installable via Home Assistant) to take advantage of new features and stability updates. All of this has gotten better with time.

But the best thing about Matter is that I'm not locked into a specific ecosystem or dependent on an app from the device vendor. So, in my view it has been a slow start but with steady improvement. And the right direction IMHO.

Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#52

Post by andsoitis »

sashahilton wrote: post #34

All these new standards looking to become the successor to WiFi/Zigbee IoT devices, yet every single one makes the same mistake - they think that because they find ways to force certification, take away end user control and extract licensing fees, that they’re somehow going to convince people to buy it as the next big thing. I was cautiously optimistic when Matter/Thread was in its early days, but predictably as with…

To succeed, consumers need to be able to rely on standards conformance.

Certification is an obvious way and that costs money.

Is there a way without certification that results in high conformance that consumers can rely on?

Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#53

Post by ajross »

sashahilton wrote: post #34

All these new standards looking to become the successor to WiFi/Zigbee IoT devices, yet every single one makes the same mistake - they think that because they find ways to force certification, take away end user control and extract licensing fees, that they’re somehow going to convince people to buy it as the next big thing. I was cautiously optimistic when Matter/Thread was in its early days, but predictably as with…

FWIW, the "Suzi" thing they're talking about seems like an attempt to compete with LoRa, which while technically an open standard is entirely dominated by Semtech.

It's not clear to me why the manufacturers aren't just making LoRa radios. This feels like an xkcd 927 situation to me.

Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#54

Post by surajrmal »

sashahilton wrote: post #34

All these new standards looking to become the successor to WiFi/Zigbee IoT devices, yet every single one makes the same mistake - they think that because they find ways to force certification, take away end user control and extract licensing fees, that they’re somehow going to convince people to buy it as the next big thing. I was cautiously optimistic when Matter/Thread was in its early days, but predictably as with…

The model seems to work. Is there precedent for the alternative working out well?

Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#55

Post by EvanAnderson »

surajrmal wrote: post #54
sashahilton wrote: post #34

All these new standards looking to become the successor to WiFi/Zigbee IoT devices, yet every single one makes the same mistake - they think that because they find ways to force certification, take away end user control and extract licensing fees, that they’re somehow going to convince people to buy it as the next big thing. I was cautiously optimistic when Matter/Thread was in its early days, but predictably as with…

The model seems to work. Is there precedent for the alternative working out well?

Working well for device manufacturers who want users to forklift out gear every few years?

I have been avoiding "IoT" in my home because I want stable 20+ year lifetimes for protocols and standards. I want to know that the outlets I hard-wire today will be controllable with whatever software I choose in 5, 10, 15 years. I want my thermostat to continue to have all its "smart" features for the lifetime of my HVAC system. I don't want separate "apps" for my washer, dishwasher, automatic water shut off, etc. I don't want Internet connectivity to servers that may be turned off at a manufacturer's whim to gatekeep features (or worse, basic functionality). The market is dysfunctional.

Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#56

Post by EvanAnderson »

andsoitis wrote: post #52
sashahilton wrote: post #34

All these new standards looking to become the successor to WiFi/Zigbee IoT devices, yet every single one makes the same mistake - they think that because they find ways to force certification, take away end user control and extract licensing fees, that they’re somehow going to convince people to buy it as the next big thing. I was cautiously optimistic when Matter/Thread was in its early days, but predictably as with…

To succeed, consumers need to be able to rely on standards conformance. Certification is an obvious way and that costs money. Is there a way without certification that results in high conformance that consumers can rely on?

Certification is desirable to me, so long as it doesn't mandate taking away the freedom of the owners of devices for local control and the ability to install whatever software they want on those devices.

I had no idea that Matter/Thread mandates secure boot. Presumably that's secure boot without end user freedom to load their own keys. That's no good.

Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#57

Post by sashahilton »

andsoitis wrote: post #52
sashahilton wrote: post #34

All these new standards looking to become the successor to WiFi/Zigbee IoT devices, yet every single one makes the same mistake - they think that because they find ways to force certification, take away end user control and extract licensing fees, that they’re somehow going to convince people to buy it as the next big thing. I was cautiously optimistic when Matter/Thread was in its early days, but predictably as with…

To succeed, consumers need to be able to rely on standards conformance. Certification is an obvious way and that costs money. Is there a way without certification that results in high conformance that consumers can rely on?

The standards side of things is true, however this can be largely solved by providing a reference implementation, given that no device manufacturer is going to implement the stack from scratch. Automated testing of firmware would also work. As for high conformance... WiFi and BT devices manage to work well enough by simply buying a tested chipset and building on that, no external testing/fees necessary.

I understand the certification if a manufacturer wants to sell a product commercially as 'Matter Certified'. For hobbyists or smaller players, pulling the reference implementation, loading it onto a cheap MCU, and calling it 'Works with Matter' would suffice.

As it stands, the latter isn't an option, because of the codesigning they've shoehorned into the spec. And for all the noise made about security, once connected to the hub the manufacturer can run whatever they like on it and send data back to their servers with very little visibility to the user.

Thread is arguably the interesting part for low power devices, and doesn't force certification. Matter is little more than a protocol spec, at the tradeoff of locked down devices and annual fees. For Matter over WiFi, I can't see any point whatsoever in using it. And for the costs of Doing Matter/Thread certification most smaller hardware startups will balk at the hundreds of thousands required to do so, and stick with WiFi/BT/Zigbee/Thread + roll their own protocol/app.

Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#58

Post by simonjgreen »

EvanAnderson wrote: post #55
surajrmal wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The model seems to work. Is there precedent for the alternative working out well?

Working well for device manufacturers who want users to forklift out gear every few years? I have been avoiding "IoT" in my home because I want stable 20+ year lifetimes for protocols and standards. I want to know that the outlets I hard-wire today will be controllable with whatever software I choose in 5, 10, 15 years. I want my thermostat to continue to have all its "smart" features for the lifetime of my HVAC syst…

You’re in luck! That’s Zigbee.

(Not IoT)

Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#59

Post by MrBuddyCasino »

microtonal wrote: post #38
eisa01 wrote: post #35

So this will compete with Z-wave, that already operate in the 800-900 MHz space? It's very confusing with a new Zigbee standard when I thought it was being replaced with Thread

It's very confusing with a new Zigbee standard when I thought it was being replaced with Thread And from the same organization that co-designed and promotes Matter. Personally, I'm very happy that Zigbee continues to be developed. I am not very enthusiastic about everything being IP addressable (even if it is just ULA) and the convoluted Thread flow where a bunch of border routers require you to initiate the pairing…

Pairing worked flawlessly with my Tado X thermostats, to add another anecdotal data point.

Re: The Connectivity Standards Alliance Announces Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi

#60

Post by hamdingers »

surajrmal wrote: post #54
sashahilton wrote: post #34

All these new standards looking to become the successor to WiFi/Zigbee IoT devices, yet every single one makes the same mistake - they think that because they find ways to force certification, take away end user control and extract licensing fees, that they’re somehow going to convince people to buy it as the next big thing. I was cautiously optimistic when Matter/Thread was in its early days, but predictably as with…

The model seems to work. Is there precedent for the alternative working out well?

Does a device that provides an interface via a HTTP server need to pass any kind of TCP or HTTP certification?

Maybe I'm making some category error here but I can think of dozens of protocols that do not require certification.

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