Ben Heck goes hands-on Android ADK
The Android Open Accessory Development Kit was announced back in May as a way for Android to interact with hardware through USB and a special development kit. In the latest episode of his show, Ben Heck goes hands-on with the new system and shows off a few things that it can do – as long as it’s in the right hands of course. Ben Heck aka Benjamin Heckendorn is a rather famous modder who’s made headlines on various tech blogs for the last decade with his mods, which normally concern making game consoles portable. He recently got his own online show through Revision3 and Element14 and take on various projects every other week.
It’s quite interesting to see the system in action. The bottom line is that the system can allow Android devices to interface with microcontrollers which in term control basically anything you can think of. Personally I’m thinking a door lock that you plug your phone into an run an app that makes it unlock, just to save that hassle of carrying a key.
iOS has had a similar system built in for ages, which is why products like iOS controlled blood pressure monitors exist, so this is essentially the kit that allows the same sort of accessories to be made for Android. It’s also a lot more modder friendly so you don’t have to be a big company to play around with it.
[Element14]
