Information apparatus specifications that include voice activated command functions are disclosed and enabled. The information apparatus may include a touch sensitive screen, a digital camera, a wireless communication unit, an operating system, a graphical user interface, an e-mail application, an Internet browsing application, and an application for playing audio or video content. The information apparatus operating system supports an application programming interface (API). A user can install additional applications. The information apparatus may further include a microphone and a speaker for interacting via voice commands with the user. In some examples, the user may take a picture with the digital camera included in the information apparatus and transfer or synchronize the picture to a wireless output device. In other examples, the information apparatus may further wirelessly play, print, stream, or mirror digital content, via the touch sensitive screen, to an output device.

A method for capturing and outputting digital content is herein disclosed and enabled, the output system includes an information apparatus, a server, and a client device. The information apparatus includes at least a digital camera and a wireless communication module (e.g., IEEE 802.11 or Bluetooth). The server is accessible by the client device over a network. The information apparatus, using the digital camera, captures digital content and transmits, over the Internet and using the wireless communication module, the digital content to the server for storage. The server generates output data from at least part of the digital content stored at the server, and provides the generated output data from the server to the client device that has security or authentication information for accessing the server. The client device outputs or plays at least part of the digital content at an output device associated with the client device.

Output devices (or output controllers connectable to an output device) that establish a wireless connection with an information apparatus are herein disclosed and enabled. An output device may be an audio output device, a printer, a television, a projector, or a display device. The output device may include one or more chips or chipsets that are compatible with Bluetooth or IEEE 802.11 standards. The output device is operable to: wirelessly announce its availability for the information apparatus to wirelessly discover the output device when the information apparatus is within a limited physical distance to the output device; wirelessly transmit one or more device attributes related to the output device from the output device to the information apparatus that has wirelessly discovered the output device; and wirelessly receive, from the information apparatus, output data that is in accordance, at least in part, to the one or more device attributes.

A system and computer-implemented method for efficiently developing and testing home automation systems is provided. The system comprises one or more robotic modules configured to interact with home automation systems under test and home devices and appliances, wherein the one or more home devices and appliances are monitored by the home automation systems. The one or more robotic modules are further configured to execute test scripts received from a test automation framework in communication with the one or more robotic modules and initiate workflows based on the executed test scripts. Furthermore, the one or more robotic modules facilitate at least one of: the home automation systems and the connected home devices and appliances to perform actions based on the initiated workflows. The one or more robotic modules also forward results of the performed actions to the test automation framework for generating a report of the executed test scripts.

Systems and methods are presented for crowdsourcing generalized smart home automation scenes. One embodiment takes the form of a method comprising: receiving a first scene definition comprising a first plurality of destination states for a first plurality of home automation devices, the home automation devices being associated with a location in a first home; for each of the home automation devices: determining a location in the second home corresponding to the location in the first home; identifying an analogous home automation device at that location in the second home; and determining an analogous destination state for the analogous home automation device in second home; storing a second home automation scene comprising the analogous home automation devices and respective analogous destination states; and causing the analogous home automation devices in the second home to operate in the respective analogous destination state upon user selection of the second home automation scene.

Methods, systems, and media for detecting the presence of a digital media device on a network are provided. In some embodiments, methods for detecting a presence of a particular type of digital media device is provided, the methods comprising: identifying cached device details for devices previously associated with the network; performing a simple device discovery protocol (SSDP) on the network, and substantially concurrently sending a unicast message to an address associated with the identified cached digital media device using hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP); and indicating the presence of a digital media device on the network in response to either (i) receiving a response to the unicast message, or (ii) determining that a type of a device discovered using SSDP is the same as the particular device type.

Digital content services provided over the Internet for transmitting or streaming protected digital content to client or output devices are herein disclosed and enabled. The protected digital content is encrypted and device dependent or specific for rendering or playing at a limited number of devices, including smart phones, information pads, audio players, wireless controllers, televisions, printers, etc. To illustrate, a client may include an application for accessing digital content from a subscribed content service or store over the Internet. To access the digital content, a client application may send, to the content service or store, authentication information, subscription information, and/or a reference to selected digital content. The service then generates encrypted device dependent output data, related to the selected digital content and associated with a device previously registered with the service, for transmitting or streaming to the client or output devices (e.g., smart phones, television controllers, speakers, printers) for rendering.

Example techniques involve control of playback queues. A computing device may display a media controller that includes a queue area. When representations of one or more audio tracks are moved into a particular location within the queue area, they are added to the queue. The audio tracks are added to the beginning of the queue, end of the queue, or at a specific position with the queue based on the particular location within the queue area.

There is provided an information processing apparatus to allow a user to use a device network by a natural and simple operation by automatically selecting a device for providing a response to a request, the information processing apparatus including: a request acquiring part configured to acquire a request to a system; a response determining part configured to determine a response to the request; a device selecting part configured to select, on the basis of at least an attribute of the response, a device that provides the response among devices included in the system; and a device controller configured to perform control that causes the selected device to provide the response.

A set of media playback and device settings data from each home appliance of a first set of home appliances is stored on a central server and/or sent to a remote control device upon initiation of a suspend command by a user. The stored media and devices states may be used at a later time to control the first set of home appliances, or a user may, after relocating to a second set of home appliances, initiate a resume state command whereupon media playback and device settings data from the central server and/or remote control device controls each home appliance in the second set of home appliances to bring about the same or substantially similar media and device states as in the first set of home appliances.