The issue focuses 1.4.2 specifications on stability and platform cooperation

to topicThis year was never about new, cheerful features. In addition to supporting security cameras, which I hear should finally arrive this fall, 2025 revolves around reform problems. With Issue 1.4.2It is announced today, that Smart Home Standard takes an encouraging step forward.

Once again in January, Tobin Richardson, President and CEO of the company Call standards alliance (The organization that runs a mission), she told me that this year will be everything “Focus on fixing these reliability and performance problems.” Now, more than the middle of the road until 2025, CSA is finally looking to achieve goodness on this promise, and show signs that they are ready to push the platforms difficult to work together and adopt these new specifications sooner.

Issue 1.4.2 brings further standardization, so the devices themselves behave whether you use Amazon Alexa, Apple Home, Google Home or any material platform; Improvements on how devices communicate, which must mean less random interruption and faster responses; And paying great reliability.

Where does reliability begin in the smart home? With your Wi-Fi router.

Home routers and access points have been added to Issue in 1.4And the latest specifications lay the foundations for the ecosystems of the material to improve the router settings automatically to help your tools to connect and stay in contact with your network. This includes things such as multiple traffic management (method of communication devices via a network) and storing the networking network accreditation data to help the devices Contact the correct thread network.

Although there are no credit devices yet, the capabilities here are huge. The router settings are one of the most common causes that the device does not connect to the network, and the user is usually left to find out. With this feature, your smart home platform can be It is possible to fix these problems Before you grow up.

The specifications of the new lower standards for the number of devices can support the router, including at least 150 theme devices and 100 Wi-Fi devices. It also adds support to Object waking time To help the battery -powered devices to maintain energy.

Another big change is that 1.4.2 brings the Wi-Fi assignment only. Currently, Bluetooth is the only way to develop a device for importance, so each device should have a Bluetooth radio issue that can only be used during preparation. With the assignment of Wi-Fi, manufacturers will not need to create Bluetooth in each device, which may mean cheaper tools. Onboarding experience will be the same, although: Wiping the material icon in applying your ecosystem.

It will be some time to see manufacturers benefit from this, such as Article control units -which you need to add a device to importance and can be smart speakers or higher squares such as Apple TV-you need to upgrade fixed programs to support Wi-Fi on the plane.

Many network management modifications should help in 1.4.2 to maintain online devices and communicate more efficiently. These updates include the number of times and why the devices need “check -in”, which should help reduce traffic. This can prolong the battery life of some devices and means faster response times for all devices, as they are not fighting to hear them. The tools that do not need to be reported should be often, such as a water leakage sensor, are now able to stay “asleep” for a longer period without the network being dropped.

Safety updates with 1.4.2 Bring protection to Anxiety in the Internet of Things: cloning. “We have added the ability to cancel the unique identity of each issue,” explains Steve Hanna from Infineon. This means that if you try to add a device that is determined as cloned or fake, you will get a warning that it is not safe.

MATTER MATTER control units will also be able to check their encryption that they are what they say, again to ensure lack of fraud and perhaps dangerous that can reach your material network. “This is the best practices in the industry,” says Hanna. “We haven’t seen this in the wilderness, but we focus on being proactive.”

Specifications also add new safety features to material orientation devices, including arrival restriction lists (ARLS). Although platforms can now access the settings on your router, this limits them from what they can do, which perfectly prevents them from filling the Netflix flow.

There are also some updates of the quality of life for users in the new version, which focuses on unifying the experience through smart home environmental ecosystem platforms.

Better scenes: The material scenes now have a unified method of platforms to activate them. This means that you can create viewers using only MATTER devices in your Smart Home app, and you must respond faster and still work when the Internet is broken, compared to scenes that contain devices on other protocols. The viewer also supports time -based procedures. So, for example, you can create a waking scene where the lights can slowly light up more than 30 minutes.

Determination of the cleaner: The material platforms will learn when a device is added to it twice – for example, through a cloud connection and through the material – and it will be shown once in its application. Multiple functions, such as the power bar with four smart ports or a multi -capacity sensor, will be selected more reliable through ecosystems.

Automatic addition: 1.4.2 Standardization of how to inform the devices with an ecosystem about their existence or new capabilities. Therefore, if you add a new light to the Hue Bridge, or if you receive a new tool a new feature of updating the fixed program, your smart home application can alert you to the new device/possibility automatically without any additional setting.

The behavior of the unified robot: Another update to make things run the same, regardless of the application of the ecosystem that you use, vacuum orders are updated. Now, the job will not have to be canceled before a new start.

Although all of this seems encouraging for smart home standards, these improvements depend on ecosystems and hardware manufacturers offered updates or build new devices (there are still supported Wi-Fi routers).

One The biggest problems in the article The slow adoption of the new specifications was By some of the main playersWhich in turn prevents manufacturers from investing in new updates and devices. Topin Richardson told me that CSA has developed rapid track programs that make it easier, faster and cheaper in updating to the latest code, which may lead to faster absorption.

When the article was launched Nearly three years ago, hope seemed to be that the big players here – Apple, Amazon, Google and Samsung – will take it and manage it. This was not the case. The resulting and slowdown setbacks have caused both customers and manufacturers to thwart.

Issue updates 1.4 as a whole are taken, and focusing clearly on pushing ecosystems forward, giving them better tools to facilitate them to create better experiences. Let’s hope they use it.