You rush home from your local appliance store, excited to try out your new universal remote control. Of course this isn’t just any ordinary remote for controlling your TV and DVD player. It’s “universal” in that it controls and facilitates all aspects of your life. In fact, it looks more like a hand-held PDA than a remote control, but in reality it is both and so much more.

The first thing you do when you get home is make sure it really can run your TV and DVD player. Click. The TV goes on. Click, the DVD begins to play. Click, the picture-in-picture box displays on your TV. Wow! You didn’t even have to enter any special program codes for the remote to work with your brand of TV or DVD player.

You’re about to check out its ability to control you stereo system when the phone rings. Okay, now this will be the real test. Click. The TV mutes and you say hello into the remote’s receiver. It’s your boss and he wants the latest figures on your sales report. Click. The figures display on the remote’s screen. Your boss says he needs them in hard copy. Click. You tell your boss that you just sent the sales reports and charts to the color printer outside his office. “Great!” says your boss. Click. You hang up, the shutters on your windows close, the TV volume comes back on, and you lay down on the couch to enjoy one of your favorite movies.

What enables this truly “universal” remote to integrate so easily and work so fantastically with your home network? The answer; the platform independence and cross-protocol support of Salutation service discovery make it all happen.

The universal remote control in this example utilizes Bluetooth wireless to communicate with the home controller from any room in the house, front yard, backyard, or garage. The home controller communicates over the home’s 1394 backbone directly with the TV, DVD player, stereo, and not too mention the security system and host of other members of the home network. The home controller also interfaces with the home’s PBX system enabling phone calls to be passed directly to the universal remote. With its ties to the PBX system, at promptings from the universal remote, the home controller is able to use a second phone line to initiate a phone call that connects your remote to your office network’s files system, printers, and other resources.

With Salutation service discovery, the universal remote doesn’t require any special programming or complicated registration process before it can be used. The universal remote uses Salutation to discover the capabilities of all the devices internal and external to the home network. Likewise, these same devices and services can automatically discover the capabilities of the universal remote.

Even though this scenario may take in a variety of different protocols—such as Bluetooth, 1394, PBX protocols, TCP/IP and perhaps more—Salutation manages to facilitate the interaction between all the different networked devices and services. In all these instances, Salutation doesn’t care what communication protocols are being employed. It can easily and automatically cross all protocol and platform boundaries, making Salutation truly the only real “Universal” service discovery protocol.

In each issue of Greetings! the “Salutation Scenarios” section highlights potential uses for the Salutation Architecture.  We aim to prod your thinking as you visualize how Salutation might benefit your business.

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