If you’ve been reading up on some of the organizations and companies working on iBeacon technology, most have used Apple’s Bluetooth LE standard to beam notifications and context-aware data to users that come in contact with iBeacon hardware in retail and event environments. They are already rolling out at retailers and being used in event spaces, but now a new app called “Placed” aims to bring iBeacons into the home (via TechCrunch).
Rather than sending a notification to your device via iBeacons like retailers and event planners, at home you’ll want to use the tech for another purpose. The main function of the app is to allow you to setup rules for quickly launching apps based on your proximity to any given iBeacon you’ve placed in your home. That means any app on your phone can become context aware allowing Netflix, for example, to automatically launch when entering the living room, or a cooking related app to automatically launch upon entering the kitchen.
The Placed app essentially gives you the software you need to make iBeacon hardware useful in the home, but the company won’t be providing the hardware itself. For that you’ll need to hack together your own iBeacons using iOS devices or other hardware, or purchase the beacons from a company that’s already selling them like Estimote or Beaconic.
The Placed app is available on the App Store now for $2.99.
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The concept was good, but the execution is awful and way too complicated. Pairing with beacons should be easy (and it is, in my development experience). Also, I don’t want Netflix to launch EVERY time I go to the living room. “Context-aware” isn’t just “location-aware”.
Hi Matthew. Here’s Bernd (the developer of Placed). Unfortunately pairing is currently only *easy* when you can assume the correct UUID of your iBeacon which for some vendors is the same. However we wanted to allow you to use any kind of iBeacon. But I agree, it’s definitely an area for significant improvement. Stay tuned :) … this blog post we just wrote has some more details on this challenge http://blog.awwapps.com/blog/2014/03/19/casual-ibeacon/
What I’d really love my iPhone to do would be to switch orientation lock as soon as I go to bed and switch it off again, when I get up. Reading in bed is the only time I use orientation lock but I do that each and every day. My not trigger this with a BT beacon?
I have this same problem. I wish they would just let us lock the orientation in iBooks instead of making it be a system wide setting. At least notification center makes it a little easier… I used to keep my phone locked in portrait mode at all times because it was such a hassle to change.
This is something that the iWatch could fix. If it could determine your position it could offer ‘smart’ or auto orientation lock.
anyone care to look back at Apple’s Airport and Time Capsule routers to see if iBeacon hardware is already built in, waiting for the mothership to send out an update to unlock this feature for the home?
Great post on the ‘Placed’ app, now ‘Launch Here’. It definitely stands out among the iBeacon apps available at the moment, for its use of ease and great UI. We recently made a list of 5 best iBeacon apps and obviously this was the first on the list: http://bit.ly/1vJvcRT