CIB W116—Smart and Sustainable Built Environments - Test Input

economical situation and a location within a metropolitan area. At the beginning the related costs are
elevated and it needs the standardisation to guarantee its access by the majority of individuals. More
than including plenty gadgets and technology into a home, it is important to define what is really
important towards health, safety and comfort of users. This sense of comfort is provided not only
because the user can be informed about possible intrusions inside the house (which can be more a
sense of constant concern than a sense of well being) but also by the communication between
different technologies to recognise and react to occupants’ routines. On this matter different research
projects exists, however it is important to mention two of them: AMIGO because of its involvement
with industry and the Making Smart Homes Smarter because it is an academic research project with a
curious interpretation of Smart Homes concept; both can illustrate how academia and industry have
the same research interests, and how users can gain from a closed collaboration.
AMIGO was funded by the European Commission which aims to “develop open, standardized,
interoperable middleware and attractive user services, thus improving end-user usability and
attractiveness”. The concept of networked home or connected home permit that home appliances,
such as heating or lighting systems and personal devices, such as mobile phones are linked into the
home network in an interoperable way. The big issue is the effort made to focus the project on users,
questioning, answering and validating the data throughout a user-centre design process. (AMIGO,
2008)
Making Smart Homes Smarter, is a research project developed at Ulster University, conducted by Dr
Juan Carlos Augusto which aims to develop technology to improve the assortment and the quality of
services that buildings can offer for their occupants. “The architecture of a house can be enriched with
different sensors to detect movement and identify the cause of the movement. The technology can
also be used to gather medical information which could be vital for people who live alone...One
example would be to help older people by spotting when they get into difficulties. It could also
improve security around buildings detecting unexplained movements or to help diagnose health
problems before they become serious”. (PressOffice, 2005)
From these two projects it is easy to understand and envisage the interesting and useful direction that
this area of knowledge is pursuing. In fact, home should not be a project made by investors and
architects (and another technicians from construction cluster) where their concepts or preferences
overcome users’ requirements; nor a technologic experimental depot, where the continue experience
can lead to technological evolution yet forgetting the user that perceives dwelling environment with
his/her senses, mobility capacity and daily life routines.
“In this technological vision of the future, our homes would need to provide spaces that can be
programmed for work, education, and entertainment. New forms of interactive space will be needed
rather than the traditional rooms in which activities are dictated by the needs of various biological
functions. Rooms could provide sites where:
… bits meet the body – where digital information is translated into visual, auditory, tactile, or
otherwise perceptible forms, and conversely, where bodily actions are sensed and converted into
digital information” (Mitchell, 1995: 105).
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