This teal Sonic character design is giving me nightmares.

Hypothetical devices that can quickly and accurately answer questions have become a powerful tool in computational complexity theory.

Whether youre looking for moisture, shine, or both, these hair masks can help your locks look their best.

His remarks never sounded capricious; nor did they seem unwelcome. This is the core of the business: people draw ten versions of a stairway, or a lobby, and agree to develop the best one, and then someonepossibly Lord Fosterstarts to wonder about an eleventh version. Foster is very good at designing. But hes also very good at making others not stop designing.The lengthy profile, likely the longest of Foster's six-decade career, includes testimonials of his management style from former staff members who paint a picture of a "dominant but largely unseen figure" at work more remotely in a late period that nonetheless spurred a record 422 million ($523 million USD) last year. Doing "more with less" apparently entails constant all-nighters and even Christmas workdays. His many critics might say such is to be expected from the man who lately traffics heavily in "exquisite monuments for ultra-wealthy clients."Related Norman Foster news on Archinect:Norman Foster says he has "no power as an architect, none whatsoever" only advocacyNorman Foster skeptical of AI in architecture while championing urban living and cleaner citiesNorman Foster says he still hasn't lost that old, familiar feelingThe Ukrainian architect who showed Norman Foster his Kharkiv

After alleging a new PlayStation State of Play for this month, insider NateTheHate has teased that it could drop around February 14th. In a recent exchange on Twitter, he reaffirmed next month for the showcase, and when asked if its early, in the middle or later, the response was, What does your heart tell you?This seemingly indicates a drop on Valentines Day. If so, expect Sony to announce the same one day prior, alongside details on what to expect. Sucker Punch Productions Ghost of Yotei and Kojima Productions Death Stranding 2: On the Beach are coming this year, which could mean new trailers. Given last years State of Play, expect some third-party announcements.However, Sony has remained fairly mum on other releases, including live-service co-op heist title Fairgame$. With the company cancelling upcoming live-service titles from Bend Studio and Bluepoint Games, it remains to be seen if Haven Studios project will survive. Stay tuned for updates in the meantime.Yes NateTheHate2 (@NateTheHate2) February 1, 2025What does your heart tell you? NateTheHate2 (@NateTheHate2) February 1, 2025

The smart home holds so much promise. It can make life more convenient with lights that turn on as you walk in a room, doors that unlock as you approach, and robots that clean your floors. It can also make your home safer, more energy efficient, and even a little more fun. (Have you tried asking Alexa to beam you up?)But for all its benefits, the smart home can be complicated, confusing, and occasionally maddening. Its also hard to keep up with all the changes. New gadgets are arriving daily, new features come to old products, and there are so many different ways to turn on a smart light bulb.If you need a guide, thats what Im here for.Here, Ill be posting the latest smart home reviews, guides, news, and opinions on everything happening in the connected home. Follow this page to stay updated on what Apple, Amazon, Samsung, Google, and Home Assistant and the rest are doing with their smart home platforms. Ill keep you in the loop on all the newest technologies including Matter, Thread, Sidewalk, UWB as well as the old favorites. And, of course, Ill cover all the news on the latest gadgets and the biggest releases around tech for your home.Today, 31 seconds agoJennifer Pattison TuohyI tried the tech that makes hands-free smart locks actually workImagine walking up to your front door and it unlocks even opens automatically as you approach. It may sound like the stuff of smart home dreams, but it could soon be a reality, thanks to ultra-wideband (UWB) technology arriving on smart locks. With its precise, real-time location capabilities, UWB enables a smart lock to react to the presence of your phone or smartwatch as you approach your door, unlocking it with no intervention on your part. Both the lock and your device need a UWB chip, but this touchless experience means theres no need to pull out your phone, fiddle with keycodes, fingerprints, or, god forbid, an actual key.Read Article >Jan 24Jennifer Pattison TuohyMatter plans to fix your home Wi-Fi.The Wi-Fi Alliance and Thread Group have revealed theyre working with the CSA on several solutions to make sure your Wi-Fi router plays well with your smart home devices:These include features like IPV 6 and multicast discovery, which we want to make sure are consistent and reliable across routers ... The way routers implement their multicast discovery can be broken, and that leads to a pretty bad experience for users ... We need to make Wi-Fi work reliably for all of the IoT use cases.Ive experienced network issues setting up Matter devices and keeping them online, and Im not alone. If Matter can fix Wi-Fi routers, all will be forgiven.Matterwill be better in 2025 say the people who make itJennifer Pattison TuohyJan 23Jan 24Jennifer Pattison TuohyHeres another use for that Thread radio in your iPhone.In an interview with The Verge, Vividh Siddha, director of engineering at Apple and president of Thread Group, shared another use case for the Thread radio in newer iPhones.As well as allowing setup of a Thread device when you dont have a Thread border router, the Thread radio in the iPhone lets you control devices when the power is out:But the other important factor is the ability to use your accessories, and some important ones, like your front door lock when theres a power outage. If you have no infrastructure your Wi-Fi router is down, your Thread border router is down and you still want the ability to get into your house or do other things that might be smart home related. Those are some use cases that its explicitly designed for, but its not limited to that. Matterwill be better in 2025 say the people who make itJennifer Pattison TuohyJan 23Jan 24Jennifer Pattison TuohymmWave tech is set to take motion sensing to the next level in the smart home.The radar-based technology can detect movements as slight as breathing, so it wont turn the lights out on you when youre sitting on the couch.Superior to PIR sensing, mmWave is seeing fast adoption, with Samsung seemingly poised to add it to its appliances. Heres a great explainer from The Ambient on how the tech could help your smart home.What is mmWave, and what does it mean for your smart home?[The Ambient]Jan 23Jennifer Pattison TuohyMatterwill be better in 2025 say the people who make itImage: Cath Virginia / The VergeMatter launched with a mission to provide a reliable, secure way for smart home devices to connect to and communicate with each other across brands and ecosystems. But two years in, problems have plagued the connectivity protocol.Big players like Apple, Amazon, and Google have been slow to offer broad support for Matter device types, there are ongoing reliability and interoperability issues, and the Thread protocol Matter relies on has seen significant growing pains. Its been a bumpy start. Read Article >Jan 22Jennifer Pattison TuohyHeres the tech that could turn millions of Zigbee light bulbs into motion sensors with a single updateIn development for several years, Sensify is an ambient sensing technology that can turn existing Zigbee-powered lights, switches, and plugs into motion sensors. Image: IvaniLights that turn on when you walk into a room and turn off when you leave are one of the most desirable smart home features. But you need to buy additional hardware like motion sensors to make this magic happen. A new ambient sensing technology called Sensify could make this easier by turning your light bulbs into motion sensors. And it might be landing on a Philips Hue bridge near you very soon.Sensify is a wireless network sensing (WNS) technology developed by Ivani that can turn mains-powered Zigbee devices into motion sensors for controlling your lights with just a firmware update no additional hardware needed. The best part is that it can work on devices already in most homes. There are tens of millions of devices with the base firmware already out there; were just working on the final touches to light up the full experience, Ivani cofounder Justin McKinney tells The Verge.Read Article >Jan 21Jennifer Pattison TuohyThese POE smart shades are the first to work with Matter.SmartWings, one of the first to offer Matter over Thread smart shades, has another first. Today, the company announced its Matter over Ethernet smart shades, which use a single cable to provide power and connectivity no batteries, Thread, or Wi-Fi required.Matter compatibility means the shades, which come in roller, zebra, and woven styles, will work with Apple Home, Google Home, SmartThings, Alexa, and other smart home platforms.SmartWings new Matter over Ethernet shades have a CAT 6A Inline coupler to connect to a port on a compatible router or switch for power and connectivity in one cable. Image: SmartWingsJan 16Jennifer Pattison TuohyYou can now control your LG appliances with Homey.The electronics giant has followed through on its promise to open the APIs for its ThinQ appliances, and Homey, which is owned by LG, is one of the first platforms to implement it.The LG ThinQ app for Homey is available now for both cloud-based and hub-based setups and lets you add connected LG washers, dryers, TVs, and more to Homey and control them directly or with automations.LG appliance integration with Homey allows users to set up automations like this one, which will dim the Philips Hue lights and close the Aqara curtains when the LG TV turns on after 8pm. Image: HomeyJan 15Jennifer Pattison TuohyThe Google Home app will soon support the Nest ProtectImage: The VergeWill the last device leaving the Nest app please turn out the lights? The day finally arrived; Google has announced its transitioning the Nest Protect smoke and CO alarm to the Google Home app. This means youll be able to get alerts and notifications for your alarm directly through Google Home, as well as hush alarms, according to a blog post from Google. This means you no longer need the Nest app for any device, but you can still use it for now, at least.The Nest Protect was the last device that could only be accessed and controlled from the Nest app, following Googles efforts over the last couple of years to fully port its Nest cameras and other devices to the Home app. With this move, Google will finally be able to sunset the Nest app, although the company has said it will keep it in maintenance mode indefinitely.Read Article >Jan 12Jennifer Pattison TuohyRobot vacuums just keep growingRoborocks Saros Z70 looks set to be the first robot vacuum with an articulating arm to come to market. Its designed to pick up light items like socks and tissues. (Not actual size) Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The VergeThere were a slew of innovations in robot vacuums on the CES show floor this year, from arms and legs to extendable mops, movable towers, and new navigation systems.As the industry races ahead in its quest to find the best way to clean our floors, it can be hard to see the function through all the hype. I spent the last week in Las Vegas hanging with our robot friends to find out just how much better theyre getting. Heres a look at all the new tech that came out and how it could help keep your floors sparklingly clean.Read Article >Jan 10Jennifer Pattison TuohyThis mechanical keyboard can control your smart home.ThirdRealitys MK1 Magic Keyboard ($80, launching March) is a Matter smart button. Ingenious!The function keys are programmable buttons. Just press to activate a scene or control smart devices like lights through Apple Home, SmartThings, or Home Assistant. Mechanical keyboard / smart home nerds rejoice!This smart keyboard has RGB lighting, Gateron Yellow switches, and a Matter-over-Wi-Fi chip on board. Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The VergeJan 10Jennifer Pattison TuohyNanoleaf brought smart lighting for the face to CES.So, of course, I had to go try it out. This $150 LED Light Therapy Face Mask is the smart lighting companys first lighting-focused wellness product, and it sounds like there may be more to come. I think its rather fetching ... dont you?Jan 9Jennifer Pattison TuohyThis robovac has an arm and legs, tooThis robot vacuum from Dreame has a robotic arm that can pick up items around your home and small legs that help it navigate over steps. Image: The VergeIll see your arm and raise you an arm and two legs. It was the battle of the bots on the CES show floor as robot vacuum manufacturers Dreame and Roborock each added limbs to their rival robovacs.Dreame launched its X50 Ultra at the show earlier this week, debuting the first robovac that can use its legs to navigate steps and room transitions up to 6cm high. But elsewhere at the show, competitor Roborock was showing off its latest flagship, the Saros Z70, which has an arm that can pick up items like socks.Read Article >Jan 8Jennifer Pattison TuohyThe best smart locks you can buy right nowIllustration: The VergeA smart lock is an easy solution to some common problems. Locked yourself out? Need to let a friend in to water the plants? Your latchkey kid lost their key? Hands are full, and its raining cats and dogs? A smart lock solves all of these problems and more. One of the best smart home upgrades you can make, a smart lock gives you remote control over access to your house from anywhere, plus easy, key-free ways to unlock and lock your door. Smart locks also remember everything that happened, so they can tell you when and sometimes who unlocked your door.Read Article >Jan 7Jennifer Pattison TuohyThe best budget robot vacuumsIllustration: The VergeTodays robot vacuums are becoming a bit like cars: with all the features, upgrades, and fancy trimmings available these days, its easy to forget that they can just be simple machines that get us from point A to point B. Yes, some bots blow hot air on their bums (mop pads) and deftly navigate dog poop, but there are plenty of basic budget robot vacuums that just do a decent job of cleaning your floor autonomously as long as you tidy up first.While higher-priced, higher-powered robot vacuums clean better, budget bots do a perfectly good job, especially if you run them regularly. The biggest downside of cheaper models is they get stuck on cables, socks, shoelaces, and other paraphernalia you leave lying around. If youre home and can untangle it, great, but if youre not, then it will just sit there stuck until its battery dies, and you have to charge it up again before it will clean your floors. Read Article >Jan 7Jennifer Pattison TuohyThis cat tree is also an air purifierLGs AeroCatTower is designed to keep your kitty cozy and your air clean. Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The VergeWhat if your cat tower could weigh your furry friend, monitor its health, and help keep their pesky dander spores out of your air? Thats the idea behind LGs new AeroCatTower, an air purifier with a cat-friendly dome-shaped seat on top for your feline to curl up in.The company showcased the gadget at its CES 2025 booth this week, complete with some rather creepy-looking fake cats.Read Article >Jan 7Jennifer Pattison TuohyLGs new smart speaker has heart eyes.This cute little guy is all over LGs CES booth, winking at people and offering them popcorn.The LG On-Device AI Hub (great name) is a smart speaker with a 4-inch screen, built-in camera, and microphone. Designed to be a satellite to the ThinQ ON home hub, LG says its a concept product, so theres no price or release date.1/3The speaker has a circular LCD screen that shows animated eyes. Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The VergeJan 7Jennifer Pattison TuohyYes, Im taking a picture of Vee with a door lock.Locklys latest smart lock, the Vision Prestige, shows your visitor through a built-in camera. Its a neat concept, but bending down to see whos at the front door feels a tad awkward.The video was also quite dark, and the screen was tiny, but it showed the visitor instantly not always the case when pulling up a feed from a video doorbell on your smartphone.The Verges Victoria Song poses for a picture through a door lock. Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The VergeJan 7Emma RothNarwals latest mopping robovac keeps corners cleanImage: NarwalNarwal, the company behind our favorite mopping robot, just announced a new flagship robovac called the Flow thats capable of cleaning closer to walls and corners. The Flow comes with a track-driven mop pad that extends to reach the edge of walls, while also using dual water tanks to keep the mop clean and remove dirty water.It sounds similar to the extending, self-cleaning roller mop we saw on Ecovacs Deebot X8 Omni Pro robovac. The Flow comes with an anti-tangle side brush that extends to reach corners and a brush cover that sits closer to the ground and automatically increases suction up to 20,000Pa on surfaces like carpet.Read Article >Jan 7Jennifer Pattison TuohyEurekas new robot vac can tackle wet messesThe J15 Max Ultra uses infrared technology to identify wet messes and clean them without damaging the robot. Image: EurekaMost robot vacuum mops can tackle mopping your floors and maybe scrub up a dried-on stain, but let them trundle through a puddle of spilled milk or juice, and theyre likely to smear the liquid around. If they do suck any up, it could seriously damage the robots internals robot vacuums are not wet / dry vacs.Robot vacuum manufacturer Eureka claims to have solved this problem with its new J15 Max Ultra ($1,299). According to the company, this robot vacuum and mop, debuting at CES 2025, can accurately spot liquids and automatically rotate its body to tackle wet spills with its mopping pads.Read Article >Jan 7Andrew LiszewskiEufys new robovac transforms into a handheld vacuumThe Eufy E20 might be the first robovac that cleans more than just floors. Image: EufyEufy is making it easier to splurge on a robot vacuum with a new model that can clean more than just your floors. The Eufy 3-in-1 E20 has a unique design that transforms from an autonomous robovac to a manual stick or handheld vacuum by removing a unit containing the motor, dust bin, and battery and then attaching other cleaning accessories.The E20 is available for preorder starting today for $499.99 through Eufys website with a $50 discount. It will officially be available starting on February 10th through additional retailers, including Amazon and Best Buy, for its full price of $549.99.Read Article >Jan 7Jennifer Pattison TuohyLGs side table grow light is also a speaker.For the ultimate in multitasking, this Indoor Garden from LG is a grow light, accent light, and a speaker all in one.Its still a concept product, but it can auto water your garden while it grows and also play it some tunes from the 120 watt, 4.1 channel sound system.The Indoor Garden from LG. Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The VergeJan 6Jennifer Pattison TuohyThis robot vacuum has legsDreames newest robot vacuum can climb up a step. Its a start! Image: DreameFirst, they sprouted arms; now, robot vacuums are getting legs. The latest bot from Dreame has two small legs that can push it up and over a step as high as 6cm (about 2.5 inches).The Dreame X50 Ultra robot vacuum uses a system called ProLeap, which the company first demoed at the IFA tech show in Berlin, Germany, last year. Dreame calls the devices appendage a motorized swing arm that enables step navigation up to 6 cm in height. But theyre clearly legs.Read Article >Jan 6Allison JohnsonLifx made its first smart lampThe Lifx Luna Smart Lamp offers user-controlled colors. Photo: LifxSmart lighting brand Lifx is introducing its first smart lamp at CES 2025: the Lifx Luna. It uses Matter over Wi-Fi, so itll integrate with an existing smart home setup easily or its a low-stakes way to add some smarts to your non-smart home. The Lifx Luna Smart Lamp includes 26 controllable color zones and offers up to 1,000 lumens of brightness. There are four built-in buttons that can control not just the lamp but also other Matter-connected Lifx lights or smart devices. Its designed to sit on a tabletop or attach to a wall with an optional mount. Itll launch in March 2025 and cost $69.99 exclusively from The Home Depot either in-store or online.Read Article >Jan 6Jacob KastrenakesOh yeah, thats a smart dog door with custom RGB lightingPawports indoor smart door with a wood finish. Image: PawportThe Pawport might be the most elaborate way to let your dog enter and exit your home. The smart dog door connects to a Bluetooth tag that straps to your dogs collar. When your dog approaches, its double doors swing open to let your pet in or out of the house. Naturally, theres also a glowing LED strip underneath the doors, for no purpose other than to add some more RGB lighting to your home. You can customize it to whatever color you want.Pawport has been working on its titular smart pet door for a few years now, with the product launching on Kickstarter back in 2021. But the device is back at CES this year, and the company says its finally going to start shipping. The door will be available starting at $499. The company is also announcing a new weatherproof model that goes outside your house and pairs with the indoor version. That model starts at $399 but must be paired with an indoor unit.Read Article >More Stories

Imagine walking up to your front door and it unlocks even opens automatically as you approach. It may sound like the stuff of smart home dreams, but it could soon be a reality, thanks to ultra-wideband (UWB) technology arriving on smart locks. With its precise, real-time location capabilities, UWB enables a smart lock to react to the presence of your phone or smartwatch as you approach your door, unlocking it with no intervention on your part. Both the lock and your device need a UWB chip, but this touchless experience means theres no need to pull out your phone, fiddle with keycodes, fingerprints, or, god forbid, an actual key.I got to demo the first locks to support the wireless communication protocol at CES last month, and I am ready for my hands-free smart lock future.Fast, easy, and frictionless, hands-free unlocking is the kind of convenience the smart home needsI test a lot of smart door locks and havent used a house key in a decade. But unlocking my front door still isnt a frictionless experience: fingerprint readers are fast but can be finicky, Home Key is smooth but limited to Apple devices, keycodes slow me down, and palm readers and facial scanning still feel like overkill.Turning a device thats almost always on me, such as my phone or watch, into a key that can magically tell my door its me, without my having to lift a finger or stare awkwardly into a camera, feels as frictionless as it can get.Apple and Samsung appear to agree with me; both are adding support for UWB unlocking at the OS level for their smartphones and watches. Apple introduced it with iOS 18, and Samsung says its wallet feature will support Digital Home Keys using NFC and UWB later this year. Both companies also plan to support the upcoming Aliro standard that will provide a secure handshake between the lock and your phone (more on Aliro shortly).This is a good sign that this technology is set to go mainstream. All we need now are some smart locks that work with it.RelatedAt CES, I tried out two UWB-powered locks, the Ultraloq Bolt Mission and the Schlage Sense Pro. Even in the RF hell that is the show floor, both unlocked automatically as I approached. Carrying a phone in my hand in one instance and in a bag in another, the locks responded a few seconds before I arrived at them, which, in the real world, would make it simple to then turn the handle and walk in. How far away I was from the lock when each unlocked was down to how the manufacturer implements the UWB technology. For the Ultraloq demo, the Bolt Mission activated at one meter (about three feet). The Schlage Sense Pro responded to my velocity, opening based on how quickly I approached.The Schlage Sense Pro is the companys first lock to support UWB unlocking. Other entry methods include a digital keypad and tap-to-unlock over NFC. The company says the lock will support the Aliro standard when it launches later this year. Image: SchlageThe company says this is due to its proprietary algorithm, Schlage Converge, which unlocks the door at the right moment based on your velocity i.e., whether youre running (which I wasnt able to do in a Venetian hotel suite) or ambling up to the door.Both locks have alternative methods for unlocking, supporting NFC for tap-to-unlock with your phone or watch, Matter for integration with smart home platforms, and, of course, theres an app for controlling the lock. The Ultraloq also has a physical keypad and a keyway, and the Schlage has a touchscreen keypad but no keyway.The crucial difference with UWB compared to all the other unlocking solutions is that you dont have to wait a beat or two at the door for it to unlock. Fast, easy, and frictionless, hands-free auto-unlocking is the kind of convenience the smart home needs. Effectively, its your home responding to you. And while its not technically hands-free you still have to turn the doorknob the future where your door unlocks and opens may be here sooner than youd think.It knows exactly where you areA UWB lock can communicate with a UWB-equipped phone or smartwatch to unlock automatically as the device approaches. Image: UltraloqCurrently used in digital car keys and Apple products, including AirTags and AirPods, UWB is a radar-based technology that can accurately locate devices down to a few centimeters. Using active ranging between two UWB radios for example, a lock and your smartphone it sends wideband radio waves over high frequencies to identify the position and angle of approach of a device in real time. When youre carrying your compatible phone or wearing a compatible smartwatch in range of a UWB smart lock, the lock will first connect to the device over Bluetooth, then activate its UWB radio to identify your precise position and your angle and direction of approach.This precise proximity unlocking means the lock should only unlock as you walk toward the door from the outside, not as youre walking away, not if you pause before you get to the door, and not if youre approaching from the inside. Similarly, if youre crossing back and forth while, say, mowing the lawn or playing soccer in your front yard, the lock should stay locked. This is a significant improvement over existing auto-unlocking technologies.UWB gives us that precision within literally inches of the door. We think that delivers a more secure hands-free unlock experience.Auto-unlocking is not a new concept for smart locks it was a flagship feature of August smart locks when they launched in 2013 and has since been used by several other manufacturers. However, these implementations use a trifecta of radios (Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, GPS) combined with an app that needs to be running in the background on your phone to determine your location.In my experience, the existing hands-free auto-unlocking is spotty and frustrating to use, and I dont recommend relying on it. Ive tested it on several locks from different manufacturers and found that it will sometimes activate when Ive been standing at my door for a few seconds, sometimes fail completely, and at other times, attempt to unlock after Ive walked into the house. Rarely does it unlock as I approach.As a local radio-to-radio communication, UWB promises to be faster, more secure, and crucially more accurate. Theres a lot of variability when youre using Bluetooth signal strength to auto unlock the lock. You could, in one setting, be three feet away, and it will unlock or you could be 10 feet away, Tim Eskew, director of residential electronic products at Schlage, told me. Theres too much variability from our perspective in that solution, whether thats Bluetooth or Wi-Fi or geofencing with GPS.This graphic shows how a UWB-powered smart lock first connects to a phone or device over Bluetooth, enabling the UWB radios active ranging to trigger the door unlocking sequence. Image: Fira ConsortiumBecause of these flaws, Schlage is one of the few smart lock companies that hasnt implemented an auto-unlock feature on its smart locks until now. UWB gives us that precision within literally inches of the door. We think that delivers a more secure hands-free unlock experience, he says.Of course, I wont know for sure how accurate it is until I get to test these locks in the real world, but the companies Ive spoken to about the tech seem confident that its speed and accuracy are game-changers. RelatedThe downside of UWB technology is that you need a phone or watch with a UWB chip built in, along with a smart lock that supports it. While there are several of the former, there are very few of the latter. In fact, only three have been announced, and you cant buy any yet. When they do go on sale, theyre going to be expensive. So far, the cheapest is the Lockly Secure Pro UWB Duet Series at $380, which was announced at CES and is slated to arrive in Q4 of this year. The Ultraloq Bolt Mission UWB I demoed, which the company says will ship this quarter, costs $400. The Schlage Sense Pro doesnt have a price or release date yet other than this year but its not going to be cheap.NFC first, UWB soonApple Home Key tap-to-unlock uses the NFC chip in your phone or watch and in the lock to unlock your door. Photo by Dan Seifert / The VergeWith integration in the operating system of phones and smartwatches, UWB in smart locks will see wider adoption within the next year. This will be driven by a new industry standard called Aliro.Being developed by Apple, Samsung, and Google, along with major lock and chip manufacturers, Aliro is a communication protocol that enables a secure, local credential exchange between your phone or watch and your smart lock, regardless of manufacturer. The initial spec will support NFC and UWB unlocking, and bring security for your smart lock to the system level of your phone.However, its early days for Aliro, and the spec hasnt even launched yet. Only Schlage has confirmed that its Sense Pro will support the standard (its parent company, Allegion, is one of the founders of Aliro). Lockly has said its lock will work with Android phones at launch, with support for iOS devices coming later.Aliro will bring Apples Home Key experience to Samsung and Google phones and smartwatchesUltraloqs Bolt wont support Aliro at all, but the company plans to release a lock later this year that will. We saw an opportunity to deliver an experience that supports Android and iPhone and be the first to market, Matt Brown of Ultraloq told me. With these standards still evolving or not quite here yet, our view is we cant let that slow down innovation.The Aliro spec should arrive this year, according to companies I spoke to at CES, and it should be a big step toward turning our phones and watches into secure keys for our homes, no matter who made them. Assuming that all of the mobile platforms adopt Aliro, its going to give a broader choice of either the tap-to-unlock experience or the unlock-on-approach experience, says Eskew.Tap-to-unlock is Apples Home Key, where you tap your watch or phone on the lock for access. It uses NFC but is currently limited to Apple devices and a handful of locks (Schlages Encode Plus being one of the best options). Aliro will standardize tap-to-unlock and bring it to Samsung and Google phones and smartwatches. We are excited that Aliro will broaden that capability and bring that experience to more users across mobile platforms, says Eskew.RelatedIf youre not sold on hands-free unlocking or want a backup, tap-to-unlock will be a good option. In fact, initially, Aliros main focus is cross-platform NFC support. According to Matt Lovett, director of engineering at Assa Abloy the worlds largest lock manufacturer and active in developing Aliro the current way the standard is evolving indicates Aliro will require locks to support NFC, but UWB will be an optional feature. As the newer, more expensive technology with less existing hardware support, UWB being optional makes sense for the nascent standard. However, bringing support for NFC in smart locks to more phone manufacturers and broadening the adoption of tap-to-unlock will also drive the adoption of UWB. If you find tap-to-unlock super handy, imagine how handy youll find not even having to tap.Ultimately, UWB and NFC work similarly, with both technologies acting as location verification, says Lovett. Aliro then provides the secure credentials, authenticating that this device is authorized to unlock this door. The main difference between the technologies is that UWB removes the physical interaction.Of course, if you dont have a device on you, or if you want to give someone else access to your lock, youll need a third unlocking option, such as a keypad or NFC tag, fingerprint reader, or yes, maybe even a traditional key.Hands-free for real one dayThe Halo Select is Kwiksets latest smart lock. It supports Matter and Thread for smart home control. The Halo Select Plus, with NFC support, is coming in 2025, and the company hinted it is working on a UWB lock, too. Image: KwiksetAssa Abloy owns Kwikset, which, along with Schlage, is one of the most popular residential lock brands in the US. At CES, Jeff Sandoval, director of marketing at Assa Abloy, told me that Kwikset is planning to bring a UWB lock to market as the technology matures. They plan to take a slow and steady approach to the new technology, as they did with launching a Matter-over-Thread smart lock. The fact that two of the largest lock brands in the US are looking to UWB over some of the other solutions weve seen in smart locks is a strong signal that this is the future of smart locks. Most interestingly, Sandoval hinted that Kwikset sees an in-stride unlocking experience as the ultimate goal where the door not only unlocks but also opens as you approach. Smart lock maker Nuki offers a completely hands-free experience in Europe, with GPS-based unlocking on a lock that can control multi-turn latches so it effectively turns the knob as well as unlocks the lock. While bringing this truly hands-free experience to US deadbolt locks will require a different solution, Sandoval says there are existing technologies that will get us to that Star Trek moment. And it all starts with UWB. See More:

Agentic AI gains much value from the capacity to reason about complex environments and make informed decisions with minimal human input. The first article of this five-part series focused on how agents perceive their surroundings and store relevant knowledge. This second article explores how that input and context are transformed into purposeful actions. The Reasoning/Decision-Making Module is the systems dynamic mind, guiding autonomous behavior across diverse domains, from conversation-based assistants to robotic platforms navigating physical spaces.This module can be viewed as the bridge between observed reality and the agents objectives. It takes preprocessed signals, images turned into feature vectors, text converted into embeddings, sensor readings filtered for noise, and consults existing knowledge to interpret the current situation. Based on that interpretation, it projects hypothetical outcomes of possible actions and selects one that best aligns with its goals, constraints, or rules. In short, it closes the feedback loop that begins with raw perception and ends with real-world or digital execution.Reasoning and Decision-Making in ContextIn everyday life, humans integrate learned knowledge and immediate observations to make decisions, from trivial choices like selecting a meal to high-stakes considerations such as steering a car to avoid an accident. Agentic AI aims to replicate, and sometimes exceed, this adaptive capability by weaving together multiple computational strategies under a unified framework. Traditional rule-based systems, known for their explicit logical structure, can handle well-defined problems and constraints but often falter in dynamic contexts where new and unexpected scenarios arise. Machine learning, by contrast, provides flexibility and can learn from data, but in certain situations, it may offer less transparency or guarantee of correctness.Agentic AI unites these approaches. Reinforcement learning (RL) can teach an agent to refine its behavior over time by interacting with an environment, maximizing rewards that measure success. Meanwhile, large language models (LLMs) such as GPT-4 add a new dimension by allowing agents to use conversation-like steps, sometimes called chain-of-thought reasoning, to interpret intricate instructions or ambiguous tasks. Combined, these methods produce a system that can respond robustly to unforeseen situations while adhering to basic rules and constraints.Classical vs. Modern ApproachesClassical Symbolic ReasoningHistorically, AI researchers focused heavily on symbolic reasoning, where knowledge is encoded as rules or facts in a symbolic language. Systems like expert shells and rule-based engines parse these symbols and apply logical inference (forward chaining, backward chaining) to arrive at conclusions.Strengths: High interpretability, deterministic behavior, and ease of integrating strict domain knowledge.Limitations: Difficulty handling uncertainty, scalability challenges, and brittleness when faced with unexpected inputs or scenarios.Symbolic reasoning can still be very effective for certain narrowly defined tasks, such as diagnosing a well-understood technical issue in a controlled environment. However, the unpredictable nature of real-world data, coupled with the sheer diversity of tasks, has led to a shift toward more flexible and robust frameworks, particularly reinforcement learning and neural network-based approaches.Reinforcement Learning (RL)RL is a powerful paradigm for decision-making in uncertain, dynamic environments. Unlike supervised learning, which relies on labeled examples, RL agents learn by engaging with an environment and optimizing a reward signal. Some of the most prominent RL algorithms include:Q-Learning: Agents learn a value function Q(s, a), where s state and a action. This function estimates the future cumulative reward for taking action a in state s and following a particular policy. The agent refines these Q-values through repeated exploration, gradually converging to a policy that maximizes long-term rewards.Policy Gradients: In place of learning a value function, policy gradient methods directly adjust the parameters of a policy function (). By computing the gradient of expected rewards for the policy parameters , the agent can fine-tune its probability distributions over actions to improve performance. Methods like REINFORCE, PPO (Proximal Policy Optimization), and DDPG (Deep Deterministic Policy Gradient) fall under this umbrella.Actor-Critic Methods: Combining the strengths of value-based and policy-based methods, actor-critic algorithms maintain both a policy (the actor) and a value function estimator (the critic). The critic guides the actor by providing feedback on the value of states or state-action pairs, enhancing learning stability and efficiency.RL has demonstrated remarkable capabilities in environments ranging from robotic locomotion to complex strategy games. The synergy of RL with deep neural networks (Deep RL) has unlocked new frontiers, enabling agents to handle high-dimensional observations, like raw images, and learn intricate policies that outperform human experts in games such as Go and StarCraft II.LLM-Based Reasoning (GPT-4 Chain-of-Thought)A recent development in AI reasoning leverages LLMs. Models like GPT-4 are trained on massive text corpora, acquiring statistical language patterns and, to some extent, the world itself. This approach offers unique advantages:Contextual Reasoning: LLMs can parse complex instructions or scenarios, using a chain of thought to break down problems and logically arrive at conclusions or next steps.Natural Language Interaction: Agents can communicate their reasoning processes using natural language, providing more explainability and intuitive interfaces for human oversight.Task Generalization: While RL agents often require domain-specific rewards, LLM-based reasoners can adapt to diverse tasks simply by providing new instructions or context in natural language.Yet, challenges remain. Hallucinations, where the model confidently asserts incorrect information, poses risks, and purely text-based reasoning may not always align with real-world constraints. Nevertheless, combining LLM-based reasoning with RL-style objective functions (such as reinforcement learning from human feedback or RLHF) can yield more reliable and aligned decision-making processes.The Decision-Making PipelineRegardless of the specific algorithmic approach, the decision-making workflow in an agentic system often follows a common pipeline:State Estimation: The module receives processed inputs from the Perception/Observation Layer, often aggregated or enriched by the Knowledge Representation system. It then forms an internal state representation of the current environment. In robotics, this might be a coordinate-based view of the agents surroundings, or in text-based systems; it might be the current conversation plus relevant retrieved documents or facts.Goal Interpretation: The agent identifies its objectives, whether they are explicit goals set by human operators (e.g., deliver a package, maximize conversion rates) or emergent objectives derived from a learned reward function.Policy Evaluation: The agent consults a policy or processes reasoning based on the internal state and recognized goals. This step might involve forward simulation (predicting outcomes of possible actions), searching through decision trees, or sampling from an LLM-driven chain of thought.Action Selection: The agent chooses the deemed optimal or at least satisfactory given constraints and uncertainty. Under RL paradigms, this is guided by the highest Q-value or policy output. At the same time, LLM-based agents might rely on the models next-token predictions contextualized by instructions and examples.Outcome Assessment & Learning: After the action is executed (physically or virtually), the agent observes new feedback, rewards, error signals, or human responses and updates its policy, knowledge base, or internal parameters accordingly. This closes the loop, enabling continuous improvement over time.Balancing Constraints and Ethical ImperativesA purely self-improving agent guided by one objective, like maximizing speed in a robot courier scenario, can produce unintended or dangerous behaviors without constraints. It may, for instance, violate safety guidelines or ignore traffic lights. To circumvent such problems, developers introduce additional logic or multi-objective reward functions that place safety, legal compliance, or ethical considerations on par with primary performance metrics. When these constraints are coded as unbreakable rules, the agent must always respect them, even if they reduce short-term performance.Ethical and social imperatives also come to the fore in conversational systems. A purely RL-driven chatbot might learn that generating shocking or misleading statements can capture more user attention, achieving higher engagement metrics. This is not desirable from a moral or reputational standpoint. Consequently, constraints such as do not produce hateful or harmful content or always cite credible sources when providing factual statements are built into the chatbots design. Techniques like reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF) refine the language models output, nudging it to adhere to guidelines while still responding dynamically. Integrating these value-driven constraints is central to fostering public trust and ensuring that AI remains a positive force in real-world applications.Applications and Real-World ImplicationsThe Reasoning/Decision-Making Module underpins numerous real-world use cases. In industrial robotics, a learning policy might coordinate a fleet of robots collaborating to assemble complex products on a factory floor. These agents must carefully time their movements and share data about parts or production lines, orchestrating tasks in tandem. In autonomous vehicles, the module is responsible for lane keeping, adaptive cruise control, and obstacle avoidance while handling the countless variables of real-world driving. Rule-based guardrails ensure compliance with traffic laws, while learned policies adapt to local conditions such as unexpected road closures.Conversational agents leverage reasoning and decision-making to provide consistent, context-aware responses. A customer service chatbot can interpret user sentiment, recall policy details from the knowledge store, and seamlessly transition between general conversation and specialized troubleshooting. By chaining together knowledge retrieval, short-term memory context, and LLM-based logic, it can handle escalating levels of complexity with minimal developer intervention. Emerging fields such as personalized healthcare and financial advisory also explore leveraging advanced decision-making in AI. In healthcare, a decision support system might analyze patient vitals and medical records, compare them against a knowledge graph of evidence-based treatments, and propose a course of action that a clinician can approve or modify. In financial services, an AI advisor might use RL to optimize a portfolio under multiple constraints, balancing risk tolerance and return targets while factoring in compliance regulations coded as absolute constraints.ConclusionThe Reasoning/Decision-Making Module is the beating heart of any agentic system. It shapes how an AI interprets incoming data, projects possible futures, and selects the most appropriate path. Whether the agent relies on traditional symbolic logic, state-of-the-art reinforcement learning, large language models, or some synergy, this module imbues the system with its capacity for autonomy. It is the juncture where perception and knowledge converge into purposeful outputs.Agentic AI can rise above reactive computation by considering constraints, rewards, ethical guidelines, and desired outcomes. It can adapt over time, refine its strategies, and respond sensibly to predictable and novel challenges. The next article will illuminate how decisions are translated into tangible actions through the Action/Actuation Layer, where theoretical plans become physical motion or digital commands. As the agents hands and feet, that layer completes the cycle, turning well-reasoned decisions into real-world impact.Sources:Also,dont forget to follow us onTwitter and join ourTelegram Channel andLinkedIn Group. Dont Forget to join our75k+ ML SubReddit.(Promoted) Asif RazzaqWebsite| + postsBioAsif Razzaq is the CEO of Marktechpost Media Inc.. As a visionary entrepreneur and engineer, Asif is committed to harnessing the potential of Artificial Intelligence for social good. His most recent endeavor is the launch of an Artificial Intelligence Media Platform, Marktechpost, which stands out for its in-depth coverage of machine learning and deep learning news that is both technically sound and easily understandable by a wide audience. The platform boasts of over 2 million monthly views, illustrating its popularity among audiences.Asif Razzaqhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/6flvq/Meta AI Proposes EvalPlanner: A Preference Optimization Algorithm for Thinking-LLM-as-a-JudgeAsif Razzaqhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/6flvq/Yandex Develops and Open-Sources Perforator: An Open-Source Tool that can Save Businesses Billions of Dollars a Year on Server InfrastructureAsif Razzaqhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/6flvq/NVIDIA AI Releases Eagle2 Series Vision-Language Model: Achieving SOTA Results Across Various Multimodal BenchmarksAsif Razzaqhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/6flvq/Qwen AI Releases Qwen2.5-VL: A Powerful Vision-Language Model for Seamless Computer Interaction [Recommended] Join Our Telegram Channel

When the 5080 launched, I thought, "Buying an RTX 5080 for 1440p gaming is like buying a Ferrari to do the school run." Sure, it's fast and powerful, but you're spending way more than necessary for performance you'll never fully use. The RTX 5080 is a 4K powerhouse, but that power is going to be wasted unless you're rocking a 240Hz 4K monitor.Forget RTX 5080, Get A RTX 4070 Super UK Deal And Thank Me LaterI decided to buy an RTX 4070 Super (The MSI model below specifically), which is amazing for 1440p gaming in my gaming rig. It delivers buttery smooth performance at nearly half the price, efficiently handling 1440p at over 150 FPS in modern games. You save a fortune, and guess what? You won't notice the difference in real-world gameplay either. MSI GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER 12G VENTUS 2X OC Gaming Graphics Card579.98 at AmazonASUS GeForce RTX 4070 Super 12G DUAL EVO OCASUS ROG-STRIX RTX4070 SUPER O12GPalit GeForce RTX 4070 Super Dual 12GB GDDR6X/PCI Express 4.0549.98 at AmazonRTX 4070 Super vs RTX 5080 Specs BreakdownGPURTX 4070 SuperRTX 5080CUDA Cores7,16810,752VRAM12GB GDDR6X16GB GDDR7Memory Bus192-bit256-bitBoost Clock2.48 GHz2.7 GHzTDP220W360WMSRP5991,099+Yes, RTX 5080 is the better card on paper, but here's the catch 1440p doesn't need that much raw power. The 4070 Super is more efficient, cheaper, and still crushes high-FPS gaming at 1440p. That 150+ FPS doesn't account for DLSS 3.0 either, which means even more frames when activated.RTX 4070 Super Benchmarks 1440p PowerhouseBenchmarkFPSScoreMax FPSUnigine Heaven 4.0180.64,551399.1FurMark GL17610,587N/AUnigine Valley198.58305327.4Let's talk real-world numbers. The RTX 4070 Super dominates 1440p, comfortably pushing past 150 FPS in demanding games. This is insanely good performance, and the RTX 4070 Super does it while sipping power, meaning lower temps, less noise, and lower electricity bills. These results have been achieved by overclocking the MSI RTX 4070 Super OC 12GB model using MSI afterburner. GPU runs at 2760MHz and Memory at 10501 MHz with a temperature limit of 84C. Don't you need that many frames? You can undervolt this graphics card and get nearly the same results. Suppose you're not sure about using MSI Afterburner. In that case, there's an option for Nvidia software to assess your gaming PC and automatically overclock RTX 4070 for you. These benchmarks were done alongside a well-balanced gaming setup featuring a 13th Gen Intel Core i5-13400F processor, a 10-core, 16-thread CPU that delivers solid gaming performance without breaking the bank. Paired with 64GB of Corsair Vengeance DDR4 RAM.Why RTX 4070 Super Makes More Sense for 1440pRTX 4070 Super perfectly matches 1440p 144Hz gaming, delivering high FPS without unnecessary overkill. It also costs nearly half the price of the RTX 5080 while offering almost identical real-world performance at 1440p. It runs cooler, quieter, and more efficiently thanks to its lower power draw, which means better thermals, less noise, and a longer lifespan. Plus, you're still getting next-gen AI features like DLSS 3, Frame Generation, and AI-powered upscaling, so your games look smooth and sharp without needing to brute-force raw performance.Christian Wait is a contributing freelancer for IGN covering everything collectable and deals. Christian has over 7 years of experience in the Gaming and Tech industry with bylines at Mashable and Pocket-Tactics. Christian also makes hand-painted collectibles for Saber Miniatures. Christian is also the author of "Pokemon Ultimate Unofficial Gaming Guide by GamesWarrior". Find Christian on X @ChrisReggieWait.

According to Bloombergs Mark Gurman, Apple will be launching a new events and invites service as part of iCloud. This new service will differ from calendar, and will launch as early as this coming week.The report describes Confetti as a new way to invite people to parties, functions and meetings. According to Bloomberg, Apple has been aiming to revamp the calendar app for years, and this is just the beginning of those efforts.Gurman also adds that this new Confetti launch is tied to iOS 18.3, which begun rolling out to iPhone and iPad users late last month. This means that the service could be activated at any moment. Other than that, the report is light on details.Last month, we exclusively reported this new invites service on 9to5Mac after discovering it in iOS 18.3 beta code. Heres how my colleague Filipe describes the effort:After analyzing the code, we believe that the app is designed to help users organize meetings and in-person events. Although Apples Calendar app can already be used for this purpose, the new Invites app will likely have some additional features.Code suggests that the Invites app will integrate with iCloud and will even have a web version oniCloud.com. The new app also integrates with a new iOS 18 daemon called GroupKit, which manages database models for groups of people. This daemon has been present since the first release of iOS 18.0 and hasnt been used by any Apple apps so far.Essentially, the app will show you a list of the people invited to that event and who has already confirmed their attendance. Its unclear whether Invites will actually be a stand-alone app or whether Apple has plans to integrate it with other parts of the system (such as a mini iMessage app). Presumably, the app will have a more fun interface than what the Calendar app currently provides for inviting someone to an event.Personally, Im quite excited for this upcoming service. Ive long felt that there could easily be a way to simplify calendars, and Im glad that Apple is taking a step in that direction.What do you think of Apples upcoming invites/events service in iOS 18.3? Let us know in the comments.My favorite iPhone accessories on Amazon:Follow Michael:X/Twitter,Bluesky,InstagramAdd 9to5Mac to your Google News feed. FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.Youre reading 9to5Mac experts who break news about Apple and its surrounding ecosystem, day after day. Be sure to check out our homepage for all the latest news, and follow 9to5Mac on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn to stay in the loop. Dont know where to start? Check out our exclusive stories, reviews, how-tos, and subscribe to our YouTube channel