It sounds like science fiction, but one Boston man, Chad Barraford, has created a “virtual butler” whose almost as good as the real deal. “Jarvis,” which shares its name with a similar system in the “Iron Man” movies, doesn’t have a body, but he has full control of Barraford’s apartment’s lighting and climate controls, he keeps an eye on Barraford’s Netflix queue, makes sure the pantry is stocked with groceries, keeps Barraford up to date on breaking news from CNN and tracks packages through FedEx. Jarvis even keeps an eye on whose entering and leaving the apartment with a webcam aimed at the interior of the apartment. He keeps his “boss” updated on all of these things through text messages.
Jarvis also takes care of Barraford when he isn’t feeling well. Barraford suffers from migraines, and when he’s having an episode Jarvis knows how to dim the lights, send out emails to people who need to know Barraford is sick and update Barraford’s Facebook pages so his friends know why he’s offline.
Barraford is a 27 year old tech support worker who lives in a pretty ordinary life or, at least, it looks ordinary until the young man arrives home and swipes his ID tag through a sensor on his computer. Then Jarvis comes to life. ”Welcome home, Chad,” says a voice that flows from a wall speaker as the lights flick on. Jarvis can also recognize Barraford’s dog, Miles, and his close friend, Megan Templehof, when she comes to visit.
Smart home technology is a booming market, projected to be a $3 billion dollar industry in as little as two years. Compared to many other systems out there, Jarvis is a bargain. Built on a 4 year old Mac Mini with voice recognition technology, Jarvis is basically just a collection point for all of the online resources in Barraford’s life. To date, the system cost Barraford $691.98, which is almost all hardware costs. Maybe someday we won’t have to be Tony Stark to have a Jarvis of our very own!
