Oddvar Lovaas

In this session we will focus on gathering, processing & visualising data from various IoT and human sources, reviewing the various technologies available to unify the data whilst providing a deep dive into the Matrix.org decentralised data ecosystem.

After an introduction to the problem space and available solutions, we will focus on introducing Matrix's architecture and its open source, Apache-licensed reference client and server implementations.

This session will show how to actually build an entirely open and dentralised IoT platform using open source software. Together we will start from scratch, check-out the code and first get a Matrix webclient running. We will use this as a dashboard to collate and visualise data from a variety of connected devices and services, federated together in an open ecosystem via Matrix. We will then add services on top to further aggregate, process and route the data.

We will also discuss exactly how you could extend the platform for advanced features and for your own specific needs. We will look at some examples (wearable computing, drone control/telemetry/video, robotics) that we and the community have implemented during various hackathons and projects - and show how IoT data may be bridged into non-IoT communication platforms such as IRC or Slack via Matrix.

Matrix is a new, pragmatic HTTP-based clean-room alternative to XMPP, SIP, IRC and other messaging/VoIP technologies. It consists of an open standard defining RESTful HTTP APIs and open source, Apache-licensed reference implementations for creating and running your own real-time communication infrastructure.

Our hope is to make VoIP/IM as universal and interoperable as email, and build an open ecosystem that people can use for a multitude of purposes.

We believe that real-time communication is fundamentally broken and fragmented on today's internet. XMPP and SIP tried to solve this, but haven't taken off as they might have done, leaving the internet dominated by closed proprietary islands of communication like WhatsApp, Facebook, Hangouts, etc.

Enter Matrix: a set of pragmatic RESTful HTTP JSON APIs as an open standard, intended to be implemented on a wide range of servers, services and clients, letting developers build messaging and VoIP functionality on top of the Matrix ecosystem rather than adding yet another closed/proprietary solution.

In Matrix, every user runs one or more Matrix clients, which connect through to a Matrix "homeserver" which stores all their personal chat history and user account information - much as a mail client connects through to an IMAP/SMTP server. Just like email, you can either run your own Matrix homeserver, which means you own and control your own communications and history - or you can use one hosted by someone else (e.g. matrix.org) - there is no single point of control or mandatory service provider in Matrix. In fact, there is no single point of control over conversations in Matrix at all - conversation history is a first class citizen, with room state replicated over all participating servers, avoiding single-points of failure or control as you get in XMPP MUCs.

In the end, we hope Matrix will crack the problem of a widely successful open federated platform for communication on the internet, and provide a worthy alternative to the PSTN. You should be able to use your favourite app to communicate via Matrix - and your recipients should be able to reply through the app of their choice!