Inside the tech of Thread
The HomePod mini and Apple TV 4K support it… but what is Thread?
`HOW IT WORKS
YOU WILL LEARN Why Thread could be the tech which brings your smart home together at last — and could potentially unify the Internet of Things.
THE THREAD SMART HOME
COMMS PROTOCOL OPERATES
VIA A WIDELY KNOWN AND UNDERSTOOD
STANDARD
KEY FACT
No Thread border router handy? Just want to get down and dirty with full control of your Thread devices? You can build your own, with a browser– based interface, using nothing but a Raspberry Pi and a little ingenuity. You’ll find all the details you need by visiting openthread.io.
THREAD IS A tech designed to solve a problem. The Internet of Things, as it grows, is starting to creak at the seams. It’s packed with protocols that just aren’t up to scratch, communication methods which rely on archaic tech, and nodes which have poor security. And given that everything on the IoT needs to be individually addressable to be effective, the diminishing pool of potential IPv4 addresses may soon cause serious problems for the IoT and for the internet at large. If your smart home devices are to keep running into the future, they need a more modern protocol. The solution to N competing standards is absolutely not N+1 competing standards — but Thread is a little different, and it doesn’t necessarily leave those older devices out in the cold.