By Stephen Chin
Stephen Chin talked shortly about the future of the Internet of Things. The number of devices per person will explode in the coming years. At this moment, the average number of devices connected to the internet is more than 2 per person. It is expected to be more than 6 devices per person by 2020.
The challenge for hardware is that chips need to be very small, to fit in any object and have super-low battery usage. Devices need to be able to run for years, without changing batteries.
Software for these devices will be mostly Java based. It is already largely used for embedded devices. Java 8 is even more suited and aligns Java SE and Java ME in both API and language.
The larger part of the presentation was a magic show demonstrating a Makerblock robot that was programmed to drive over a line and a grab a ball to bring it to the end of the track. Stephen Chin also talked about 3D printing and demonstrated the Ultimaker 2.0.
Unfortunately his co-speaker was unable to attend, so some parts of the Magic show could not be demo’d.