Milestone-Proposal talk:TRON Intelligent House

Advocates and reviewers will post their comments below. In addition, any IEEE member can sign in with their ETHW login (different from IEEE Single Sign On) and comment on the milestone proposal's accuracy or completeness as a form of public review.

-- Administrator4 (talk) 13:52, 22 December 2023 (UTC)

Advocates’ Checklist

Is proposal for an achievement rather than for a person? If the citation includes a person's name, have the proposers provided the required justification for inclusion of the person's name?
Was proposed achievement a significant advance rather than an incremental improvement to an existing technology?
Were there prior or contemporary achievements of a similar nature?
Has the achievement truly led to a functioning, useful, or marketable technology?
Is proposal adequately supported by significant references (minimum of five) such as patents, contemporary newspaper articles, journal articles, or citations to pages in scholarly books? At least one of the references from a peer-reviewed scholarly book or journal article. The full text of the material, not just the references, shall be present. If the supporting texts are copyright-encumbered and cannot be posted on the ETHW for intellectual property reasons, the proposers shall email a copy to the History Center so that it can be forwarded to the advocate. If the advocate does not consider the supporting references sufficient, the advocate may ask the proposer(s) for additional ones.
Are the scholarly references sufficiently recent?
Is proposed citation readable and understandable by the general public?
Does the proposed plaque site fulfill the requirements? Is the address complete? Are the GPS coordinates correct and in decimal format?
Is the proposal quality comparable to that of IEEE publications?
Scientific and technical units correct? (e.g. km, mm, hertz, etc.) Are acronyms correct and properly upperercased or lowercased?
Date formats correct as specified in Section 6 of Milestones Program Guidelines? https://ieeemilestones.ethw.org/Helpful_Hints_on_Citations,_Plaque_Locations

Reviewers’ Checklist

Is suggested wording of the Plaque Citation accurate?
Is evidence presented in the proposal of sufficient substance and accuracy to support the Plaque Citation?
Does proposed milestone represent a significant technical achievement?
Were there similar or competing achievements? If so, have the proposers adequately described these and their relationship to the achievement being proposed?

Original Citation Title and Text -- Administrator4 (talk) 17:19, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

TRON Intelligent House

The first TRON Intelligent House built in Tokyo in 1989 was the true pioneer of today's smart houses. It was built based on the concept of Highly Functionally Distributed System (HFDS) proposed earlier in 1987, essentially today's IoT before the term “ubiquitous computing” was coined in 1991. The house provided valuable feedback from its residents about living environment in the IoT framework.

Message from Advocate to Proposers -- Tomohiro Hase (talk) 01:51, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear Proposer. I became the Advocate of your Milestone proposal #2023-28 approved by the IEEE History Committee. I've asked Expert Reviewers to review for your proposal. Best regards, Advocate, Milestone #2023-28

Re: Message from Advocate to Proposers -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 02:02, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

Thank you very much.

I have made a minor change to the proposal document.

These changes will clarify the application.

A paragraph from [GLIM1990] is quoted in the text to show the length of the wires as a whole in the TRON Intelligent House. Way longer than I originally thought.

Two references have been added and proper reference to them are made in the text.

Reference [BRIT2024] added. This is an excerpt from Encyclopedia Britanica Japanese edition made available through a dictionary service. It shows the popular recognition of the TRON Intelligent House in Japan.

Reference [HOUS2017] added. This is a short description of the house of the future (the European Project mentioned in Popular Science magazine.) It clearly shows the house itself was considered more of an exhibiton pavilion than a true house.

There are minor spelling changes, etc.

Thank you again.

Expert Reviewer's Report_1_Oomori uploaded by Advocate -- Tomohiro Hase (talk) 14:07, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear Dr. Tomohiro Hase

Thank you for contacting me. Although this review is a heavy responsibility for me, I am very happy to be working as a reviewer for The TRON intelligent house. I agree with this request and would like to submit a review.

I heard Professor Sakamura give a detailed explanation about The TRON intelligent house at the award commemorative lecture at the Institute of Environmental Art and Design (of which I am vice president) late last year. I also checked the detailed proposal report attached to your email.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Masao Omori Emeritus professor, Kyoto Saga University of Arts, Art director, OOMORIS DESIGN. Vice president, director, Institute of Environmental Art and Design, Chairman of the Academic Awards Committee, Japan Society of Design. http://oomoris.com

(Begin of Expert Review Report)************************************

Review of IEEE Milestone application of TRON Intelligent House

Q: 1) Is the suggested wording of the Plaque Citation accurate?

Yes. The citation reads as follows. The first TRON Intelligent House built in Tokyo in 1989 was the true pioneer of today's smart houses. It was built based on the concept of Highly Functionally Distributed System (HFDS) proposed earlier in 1987, essentially today's IoT before the term “ubiquitous computing” was coined in 1991. The house provided valuable feedback from its residents about living environment in the IoT framework. The first sentence of the citation. "The first TRON Intelligent House built in Tokyo in 1989 was the true pioneer of today's smart houses. " TRON House was built in 1989 and this is in the independent reporter's article [NORM1990] and [Saka1990a], [SAKA1990b], and an encyclopedia entry [BRIT2024]. I think it is a pioneer of Today's smart houses because the house offered its residents the automated control of appliances including windows, door locks, window curtains, air conditioning, AV devices, cooking devices, etc. And they acted in a coordinated manner by the exchange of information and the central server's control. (Description in "Coordinated IoT-like Services", [NORM1990], [SAKA1990a], [SAKA1991b], [YOUT-1], and devices in Appendix X.) And other large scale livable house projects which were noticed by Popular Science of that time did not have equivalent feature or vision as noted in "Other similar activities did not have such a grand guiding scheme [GILM1990]. Second sentence: "It was built based on the concept of Highly Functionally Distributed System (HFDS) proposed earlier in 1987, essentially today's IoT before the term “ubiquitous computing” was coined in 1991." Yes, it is true. Dr. Sakamura's HFDS idea was presented in 1987 [SAKA1987d] and Weiser's article [WEIS1991] was presented in 1991. The House was built under the holistic control of HFDS as explained in Appendix X and the description in "Coordinated IoT-like Services" as noted above. Third sentence: "The house provided valuable feedback from its residents about living environment in the IoT framework." People who lived in the house were of different group, and engineers could get enough feedback to improve the design as noted in "55 persons in 11 groups lived there after the house was visited by about 10,000 visitors during open house period and was then closed for internal experimentation. [SAKA1991]" in "People lived in the house for prolonged time section."

Q: 2) Is the evidence presented in the proposal of sufficient substance and accuracy to support the Citation?

Yes. It supports the citation.

Q: 3) Does the proposed milestone represent a significant technical achievement?

Yes. The significance is explained in my results below.

Q: 4) Were there similar or competing achievements? If so, have the proposers adequately described these and their relationship to the achievement being proposed?

Yes. The innovation and technical maturity of the TRON intelligent house stands out when compared to the smart houses developed in the U.S. and Europe at the time. In the U.S. project, software and hardware were not fully in place until the late 1990, and the overall design concept of the HFDS in the TRON intelligent house had not been seen. On the other hand, the European project did not reach the practical level of the TRON intelligent house, as the project leader commented that "It's unlikely that the family home of the future will resemble our project," and it is unclear whether a design philosophy such as HFDS ever existed. It looks like the house built for a European project is a pavilion for exhibition purposes, and gives the impression that it was constructed by engineers for engineers only, without considering the needs of the occupants.

My peer review results are as follows I rate the TRON intelligent house as worthy of IEEE Milestone recognition. The reasons for this are explained below. Ubiquitous computing was a term widely used in the early to mid-2000s in general media advertisements, and then the term IoT became visible around 2010. Thus, the feat of proposing the vision and actually integrating numerous computers to build a smart house long before the concept of IoT, which has become a buzzword today, was proposed, is a very remarkable achievement. Furthermore, it should be noted that the architectural innovations were human-centered, with computers and sensors not being prominent, in order to make the house habitable for people over the long term. The architect's approach to designing a house without the presence of computers at the forefront is an important suggestion for the building industry. The TRON intelligent house strived for sustainable energy use by avoiding unnecessary heating and cooling and utilizing outside air whenever possible. This is connected to the current energy saving goals in accordance with the SDGs. Furthermore, TRON intelligent House deserves credit for its attempt to achieve this energy efficiency in an unobtrusive way through an approach called Calm technology. In addition, the efforts of the TRON Intelligent House to embody the bleeding edge technological functions into a futuristic design with a high degree of perfection have strongly stimulated various art and design fields and increased public interest and empathy. I highly commend the TRON Intelligent House for its influence on the creation of this living environment.

Today, many smart houses in Japan have adopted a similar approach, and the pioneering work of TRON Intelligent House has played a leading role. In this aspect, TRON intelligent House is a breakthrough in its field.

Respect for traditional Japanese architecture also adds value to the project, which incorporates an IoT approach and balances computerized convenience with human-centered ease of use from an architectural perspective. This seems to have been far ahead of similar approaches in the US and Europe that were being researched and developed at the time. Based on these points, I believe that the TRON Intelligent House deserves the IEEE Milestone for its achievements in creating a highly complete and practical home based on the HFDS concept, which was the first to propose the concept of the IoT to the world, using the technology of the time. I believe that the IEEE Milestone is well deserved.

(End of Expert Review Report)************************************

Expert Reviewer's Report_2_Haller uploaded by Advocate -- Tomohiro Hase (talk) 14:11, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear Dr. Hase,

Thank you for the invitation to review this application. Here are my answers:

1) Is the suggested wording of the Plaque Citation accurate?

Yes, it is accurate. Personally I would suggest to rephrase the wording a little to make it better English, e.g., "The first TRON Intelligent House, built in Tokyo in 1989, was the true pioneer of today's intelligent houses. Built based on the concept of a Highly Functional Distributed System (HFDS), proposed in 1987, it realized IoT and ubiquitous computing before the term was even coined in 1991. The residents of the house provided valuable feedback on how to live in an IoT environment and contributed to its further development."

2) Is the evidence presented in the proposal of sufficient substance and accuracy to support the Citation?

Yes. The proposal lists quite well all the new technological concepts (as well as social innovation) that were integrated in this house. But the house is more than just a technological showroom or research prototype, it is based on underlying concept that anticipated modern ideas of sustainable houses, and people actually lived in it and provided feedback.

3) Does the proposed milestone represent a significant technical achievement?

Definitely yes. The house is an excellent example of a smart house using ubiquitous computing and IoT. These terms didn't even exist when the TRON Intelligent House was designed and built (ubiquitous computing goes back to Mark Weiser in 1991, and IoT to Kevin Ashton in 1998). Using more intelligent smart homes is also a later development. It is impressive that Ken Sakamura was able to get many companies behind the project to build a real house where people could and did live in. This is for more than what we often see today in smart home and smart city research. The learnings from this first house were then also used in follow-up projects.

4) Were there similar or competing achievements? If so, have the proposers adequately described these and their relationship to the achievement being proposed?

Not to my knowledge. I heard the first time about some partially similar concepts in the mid-90ies, when I was working for Matsushita Electric Works in Osaka.

Regards,

Prof. Stephan Haller

Bern University of Applied Sciences Institute for Public Sector Transformation Brückenstrasse 73, CH-3005 Bern Switzerland

https://www.bfh.ch/ipst https://www.bfh.ch/en/stephan-haller https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephanhaller/

Expert Reviewer's Report_3_Isshiki uploaded by Advocate -- Tomohiro Hase (talk) 07:45, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear Dr. Tomohiro Hase

Thank you for your email. I’m honored to be asked to review the TRON Intelligent House for IEEE Milestone Proposal 2023-28. You requested feedback on review:

IEEE Milestone Application Review: TRON Intelligent House, 2023-28

1. Is suggested wording of the Plaque Citation accurate? 2, Is evidence presented in the proposal of sufficient substance and accuracy to support the Plaque Citation?

Yes, I explain the accuracy using the sufficient and accurate evidence from the application document. Sentence by sentence review.

"TRON Intelligent House built in Tokyo in 1989 was the true pioneer of today's smart houses."

TRON Intelligent House was built in Tokyo in 1989 [BRIT2024], and it is explained in Sakamura's articles in [SAKA1990a][SAKA1990b], and in Popular Science article [NORM1990], Today's "smart" house ought to have computer-controlled automation. Prior to the home bus standard efforts in the 1980s and 1990s, no proposed standards could match the breadth of coordinated control of devices shown in the TRON Intelligent House because of the lack of bidirectional communication capability.

TRON Intelligent House built in 1989 used wire LAN and serial connection to achieve the bidirectional control and signaling of devices and central computer explained in 'Protocols of internal bus inside the houses and buildings'. This made it possible to control devices as a group consisting of sensors and actuators for coordinated action instead of just a device at a time independently.

So it is a pioneer of today's smart house.

“It was built based on the concept of Highly Functionally Distributed System (HFDS) proposed earlier in 1987, essentially today's IoT before the term “ubiquitous computing” was coined in 1991.”

Yes. Sakamura's article appeared in 1987 [SAKA1987d] and Weiser's ubiquitous computing article appeared in 1991 [WEIS1991]. HFDS was proposed in 1987 and it was before Weiser's article in 1991.

"The house provided valuable feedback from its residents about living environment in the IoT framework."

There were people who lived there.[SAKA1994] I believe the engineers obtained valuable feedback to improve on HMI and other features. HMI improvement is mentioned in Appendix X.

3. Does proposed milestone represent a significant technical achievement? Yes. As explained below.

4. Were there similar or competing achievements? If so, have the proposers adequately described these and their relationship to the achievement being proposed?

For comparison with other similar projects of that era, the American CEbus-based smart house approach and an experimental European project are discussed and their differences are noted. As we will discuss later, we imagine that the American CEbus-based houses were basically limited to attaching unidirectional audiovisual devices, and could never have become houses with interactive, sensor- and computer-controlled systems like the TRON Intelligent House.

Yes, I agree. An appropriate explanation was given.

As for the European project, it reads as an unplanned exploration of attaching devices, with no evidence of significant later impact, and not a sustainable approach that was followed by subsequent projects like the TRON Project intelligent house.

The following is my overall opinion of the evaluation.

From the perspective of home automation, my field of expertise, the 1980s, when TRON Intelligent House was designed and built, was a time when the IT industry was experimenting extensively with automation in the home. However, the focus at that time was on the control of audio-visual equipment, and the predominant network was unidirectional, with attention simply focused on exchanging signals and attaching power supplies. As noted in the submitted application, ideas for networks connecting home AV equipment were proposed in the U.S., Europe, and Japan, but these ideas had not yet led to the concept of using sensors to collect data and computers to send commands to actuators to control non-AV equipment. However, they did not reach the concept of using a computer to send commands to actuators to control devices other than AV equipment.

In contrast, the TRON intelligent house was based on the HFDS concept proposed earlier and used the hardware technology available at the time to construct a control network with sensors and actuators that could exchange data and signals in both directions. The construction of a serial network that spanned over 10 km was the culmination of the belief that it was possible to construct a smart house based on the HFDS philosophy, and the efforts of the engineers of that era.

While the sensor and actuator networks were integrated in the original standard data format, the TRON Project promoted open architecture, and an open home network was designed that could also attach to the Home Bus proposed in Japan and the ISDN lines that were important for external connections at the time. Such an approach with the philosophy of open architecture is important in modern research and development, and is commendable in this respect.

It took until around 2010 for the industry to accept the idea of a network utilizing sensors and actuators, but nevertheless, the fact that an intelligent house with such a network was made a reality 35 years ago, and was complete enough to actually be tested for comfort, is something that should have been more widely recognized.

The technical innovation, the design based on the IoT philosophy of HFDS, which was unique at the time, and the fact that it demonstrated to the industry sector that it could be realized, the fact that it was actually lived in and its practicality was widely publicized through the media, and the significant impact it had on subsequent projects, make the TRON intelligent House an achievement worthy of IEEE Milestone recognition.

Best regards, Masao Isshiki

From the proposer: Editing a few places to avoid single subheadings. -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 02:48, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear advocate and reviewers,

I edited a few places to avoid the SINGLE subheading. By adding a preceding or succeeding subheadings, or changing the level of a subheader, the logical structure becomes clearer. I also edited the paragraphs near the headings to go with the addition and changing the level of the subheadings. No substantial change of content itself is done.

The affected place in the original TOC is as follows.

  3.1.2.1 HFDS under different names, Computing Everywhere, Computers Everywhere, etc.
3.3.1 Lighting sources were hidden and controlled finely
3.5.1 Technology Transfer/Enlightening the public in Taiwan
5.4.1 TRON Intelligent House: bus protocol

They now look the like this. 3.1.2.1 now has become a heading. "Popularization of HFDS under different names -Computing Everywhere" 5.4.1 has become a heading, "Notes on the protocols used in TRON Intelligent House"

    3.1.1 What is HFDS?
   3.1.2 Similarity of HFDS and the IoT
   3.1.3 Background History of HFDS
-> 3.1.4 Popularization of HFDS under different names -Computing Everywhere

 3.3 Architectural significance from the viewpoint of building a house
   3.3.1 Computers ought to be invisible
-> 3.3.2 Lighting sources were hidden and controlled finely

 3.5 Regional Impact outside Japan: Taipei u-home 2009
   3.5.1 Tapiei u-home
-> 3.5.2 Technology Transfer/Enlightening the public in Taiwan

 5.4 Protocols of internal bus inside the houses and buildings
   5.4.1 Home bus standards of the day dealt only with audito visual devices
   5.4.2 IoT Sensor network in the TRON Intelligent Home
-> 5.4.3 Notes on the protocols used in TRON Intelligent House

Regarding the avoidance of single subheading. Reference: "Subheads" from online version of Chicago Manual of Style. https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/qanda/data/faq/topics/Subheads/faq0001.html

From the proposer: Editing a few places to fix spelling mistakes and added [YAMA2024] -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 09:20, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear Advocate and reviewers,

This is the proposer.

I have fixed a few spelling mistakes and typos that crept in.

I also added a reference [YAMA2024]. I wanted to include an English article about acoustic field creation done by YAMAHA. But I could not find an English article. However, when I searched Japanese article, I found the current YAMAHA web page which refers to AFC (Active Field Control), which is now in their consultation business. Its web page uses the almost the same diagram used in [YOUT-1] video, thus, YAMAHA has been offering the acoustic field creation system used in the TRON Intelligent House to general customers. It shows that a prototype implemented or showcased in the TRON Intelligent House is now reaching mass market albeit in a specialized market.

I may add a few more editorial changes, not substantial changes except that I may want to change/shorten the synopsis at the beginning of each section, Significance, Obstacles and Features that set this apart from others.

Thank you for the review, and guidance again.

Expert Reviewer's Report_4_Kuma uploaded by Advocate -- Tomohiro Hase (talk) 02:25, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear Prof. Tomohiro Hase,

I would like to express my sincere gratitude for entrusting me with reviewing the proposal for the IEEE Milestone. Attached to this email, you will find my review report. I have responded to your four questions and included an overall evaluation. Please review it at your earliest convenience.

Sincerely, Kengo Kuma

(Begin of Expert Reviewers’ Report)*********************************

TRON Intelligent House Milestone Application Review

1) Is the suggested wording of the Plaque Citation accurate?

Yes. Please see the detailed discussion in the answer to the second question.

2) Is the evidence presented in the proposal of sufficient substance and accuracy to support the Citation?

Yes. This is the citation.

The first TRON Intelligent House built in Tokyo in 1989 was the true pioneer of today's smart houses. It was built based on the concept of Highly Functionally Distributed System (HFDS) proposed earlier in 1987, essentially today's IoT before the term “ubiquitous computing” was coined in 1991. The house provided valuable feedback from its residents about living environment in the IoT framework.

First sentence: > TRON Intelligent House built in Tokyo in 1989, ...

The house itself is referred to in [BRIT2024] (online excerpt from Brittanica). The house detailed is explained using referenced Sakamura's article [SAKA1990a] [SAKA1990b], and in Popular Science article [NORM1990]. The cover of the issue of Popular Science in which the article appeared is the photo of TRON Intelligent House.

> ... was the true pioneer of today's smart houses.

It all boils down to the one's definition of smart house. Wiki's entry to "smart house” refers to "home automation". And in the "home automation" entry, it says the following. The phrase smart home refers to home automation devices that have internet access. Home automation, a broader category, includes any device that can be monitored or controlled via wireless radio signals, not just those having internet access. When connected with the Internet, home sensors and activation devices are an important constituent of the Internet of Things ("IoT").

In 1989, there was no easy-to-access commercial Internet, and easy-to-obtain wireless technology (No Wi-Fi, no Bluetooth, for example. Wi-Fi was introduced in 1997. Bluetooth was introduced in 1995.)

TRON Intelligent House built in 1989 predates both the commercial Internet and even popular wireless connection. But it automated various components of the house and under the vision of HFDS. It was built way before the easy-to-obtain wireless connection and the commercially available Internet access.

The collaborative automation behavior of the house is explained in the section of 'Coordinated IoT-like Services' using Sakamura's [SAKA1990a] [SAKA1990b[SAKA1991b], and Popular Science's [NORM1990] articles. Also, some actions are visible in YouTube video [YOUT-1]

It *IS* a pioneer of today's smart house.

> It was built based on the concept of Highly Functionally Distributed > System (HFDS) proposed earlier in 1987, essentially today's IoT before > the term “ubiquitous computing” was coined in 1991.

Again, this was clearly demonstrated by Sakamura's article and Scientific American article. HFDS was proposed in 1987 [SAKA1987d] and it was before Weiser’s article in 1991 [WEIS1991].

That the house was controlled under HFDS framework is demonstrated in ‘Coordinated IoT-like Services', and explained in Appendix IV (on device side) and in 'Features that set apart this from others'.

>The house provided valuable feedback from its >residents about living environment in the IoT framework.

Sakamura's article explains the number of people who lived there. [SAKA1994] The improvement of HMI standard guideline proposed to IEC benefited from such feedback. (See the explanation of appendix X TRON Intelligent House description in [TRON1994c], toward the end. It reads as follows.

"In order to find out what kind of impression residents have of the TRON Intelligent House, what kind of cooperative behavior should be performed, and what features are perceived differently by individuals, a trial occupancy experiment was conducted by volunteers of the TRON Intelligent House Study Group members. The overall impression and design of the house were generally highly evaluated. In particular, impressions of the interior, living room, semi-outdoor space, and bathroom were very high. In addition, many of the residents would like to return for another trial move-in. In addition, the in-home LAN and operation methods were examined. The results, especially with regard to the operation method, were reflected in the TRON Electronic Equipment HMI Study Group's "TRON computerized living HMI Specifications".

3) Does the proposed milestone represent a significant technical achievement?

Yes. Please see my overall impression I write at the end.

4) Were there similar or competing achievements? If so, have the proposers adequately described these and their relationship to the achievement being proposed?

The comparison of the American and European projects was covered based on Popular Science magazine articles and the editor's column, and the differences between the TRON Intelligent house were well explained.

My overall evaluation follows.

I am involved in new architectural projects all over the world.

The integration of architecture and technology is evolving rapidly today. The following elements are essential to this progress. The first is international collaboration, the second is the application of digital technology, and the third is a re-evaluation of the architectural and cultural context. I am currently engaged in a joint research project between a homebuilder and a university, in which these elements are actually incorporated.

Reference: [ International Architectural Education Platform SEKISUI HOUSE KUMA LAB, (https://ut-iaep.net/about/)]

As an architect, I am interested in the digital archiving of buildings of the past, but I am also naturally interested in exploring better uses of digital technology within buildings.

Of particular note here is the TRON intelligent House, which emerged in the late 1980s. This project, based on the concept of a Highly Functionally Distributed System (HFDS), was a collaboration of 18 companies that foresaw the use of computers in everyday life through intelligent objects that would become commonplace in the future. This innovative vision and the high degree of perfection of the TRON Intelligent House in a real-life setting are commendable.

The breadth and impact of the project can be seen in the work done to standardize not only the GUI on the PC desktop, but also the human-machine interface (HMI) for the actual operation of physical switches and other physical objects, and in the development of HMI guidelines based on post-occupancy experience. The project's scope and influence can be seen in the development of HMI guidelines based on post-occupancy experience. As noted in the application, the project also succeeded in developing new building components for commercial construction, which may have contributed to the development of the smart house as we know it today.

It is only natural that the TRON intelligent House should be mentioned first when discussing the history of smart houses in Japan.

And the spirit of this project continues today through university-led smart building research and development projects with outside parties.

I am convinced that TRON intelligent House deserves the IEEE Milestone award for its historical importance, technical perfection, attention to usability in design, and the way it blends in with traditional Japanese architecture.

(End of Expert Reviewers’ Report)*********************************

Advocate’s Recommendation -- Tomohiro Hase (talk) 03:04, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Advocate’s Recommendation for the IEEE Milestone #2023-28 “TRON Intelligent House”

April 5th, 2024.

Dear IEEE History Committee.

I’m honored to be an advocate to review for the Milestone Proposal, “TRON Intelligent House”, #2023-28.

(1) Expert Reviewers:

I asked following four independent experts in the field of the proposal to conduct a detailed review from a technical point of view.

(a) Stephan Haller:

Stephan Haller is a professor at the Institute Public Sector Transformation of the Bern University of Applied Sciences (BFH) teaching about e-government, enterprise architecture and project management. His main research interests are in the areas of Internet of Things (IoT), Open Data, and Smart City. https://www.bfh.ch/en/about-bfh/people/2t4ia4cakcb6/

(b) Masao Isshiki:

Masao Isshiki is an institute professor of Kanagawa Institute of Technology. He specializes in home network for home appliances, and promoted ECHONET home network protocol in Japan. Research Map web page of Professor Isshiki (in Japanese): https://researchmap.jp/masao_isshiki

(c) Kengo Kuma:

Kengo Kuma is a distinguished professor of the University of Tokyo. He is an architect. He has designed many buildings around the world including the sport venue used for the opening of 2020 Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games. His design office web URL: https://kkaa.co.jp/selected-projects/

(d) Masao Omori:

Masao Omori is an emeritus professor, Kyoto Saga University of Arts, and is an art director of his own design office, OOMORIS DESIGN. He is a vice president, director, Institute of Environmental Art and Design, and is the chairman of the Academic Awards Committee, Japan Society of Design. His web URL: http://oomoris.com/pro%ef%ac%81le/

(2) Four Expert Reviewer’s Report:

I’ve upload four Expert Reviewer’s Reports to ETHW website as following URL: https://ieeemilestones.ethw.org/Milestone-Proposal_talk:TRON_Intelligent_House

As far as I can tell from reading the four Expert Reviewer Reports, they all have received positive ratings that are appropriate for Milestone.

(3) Advocates’ Checklist:

Following <Yes> is my check for lists.

Is proposal for an achievement rather than for a person? If the citation includes a person's name, have the proposers provided the required justification for inclusion of the person's name? <Yes>.

Was proposed achievement a significant advance rather than an incremental improvement to an existing technology? <Yes>.

Were there prior or contemporary achievements of a similar nature? <Yes>.

Has the achievement truly led to a functioning, useful, or marketable technology? <Yes>.

Is proposal adequately supported by significant references (minimum of five) such as patents, contemporary newspaper articles, journal articles, or citations to pages in scholarly books? <Yes>.

At least one of the references from a peer-reviewed scholarly book or journal article. The full text of the material, not just the references, shall be present. If the supporting texts are copyright-encumbered and cannot be posted on the ETHW for intellectual property reasons, the proposers shall email a copy to the History Center so that it can be forwarded to the advocate. If the advocate does not consider the supporting references sufficient, the advocate may ask the proposer(s) for additional ones. Are the scholarly references sufficiently recent? <Yes>.

Is proposed citation readable and understandable by the general public? <Yes>.

Does the proposed plaque site fulfill the requirements? Is the address complete? <Yes>.

Are the GPS coordinates correct and in decimal format? <Yes>.

Is the proposal quality comparable to that of IEEE publications? <Yes>.

Scientific and technical units, correct? (e.g. km, mm, hertz, etc.) Are acronyms correct and properly uppercased or lowercased? <Yes>.

Date formats correct as specified in Section 6 of Milestones Program Guidelines? <Yes> https://ieeemilestones.ethw.org/Helpful_Hints_on_Citations,_Plaque_Locations

(4) Advocate’s Comment and Conclusion:

I received the satisfactory peer review results from four experts in the field of proposals. These expert reviewer’s reports and discussions were very useful for my decision as an advocate for Milestone 2023-28.

Citation:

Four expert reviewers responded that citation is accurate, judging by the answers to question Q1. They also reported that they confirmed that the contents of the citation are supported by evidences, judging by the answers to question Q2. As an advocate, I have the same judgments as reviewers, too.

Technical significance and historical value:

Four expert reviewers gave me detailed reviews of the answers of Q3 and Q4.

Advocate’s Conclusion:

All four expert reviewers gave the proposal strong recognition and support that it deserves the IEEE Milestone certification. I have considered carefully both the proposal and the expert reviewer’s reports, and have the same thought as expert reviewers. In conclusion, I strongly recommend this proposal to the IEEE Milestone as an advocate.

Best regards, Dr. Tomohiro Hase, IEEE Fellow. Advocate #2023-28, IEEE History Committee.

From the proposer: Fixed minor timing issues of reference to YouTube video [YOUT-1], and addition of subheader. -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 03:42, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear advocate and reviewers,

I have edited the minor timing issues (the reference to YouTube video [YOUT-1]) in the URLs that are used in the application so that the direct references to the particular scenes start better with the intended video positions. (It seems that we cannot write a sub-second specification. So the scene starts a bit early in most cases.)

I also added a subsection to better explain the description in the Japanese bath in Appendix.

Thank you again.

From the proposer: Changing the citation per the suggestion from Dr. Haller -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 01:55, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear advocate and reviewers,

Based on the input from Dr. Haller, I changed the citation to the following. (69 words)

The first TRON Intelligent House, built in Tokyo in 1989, was the true pioneer of today's intelligent houses. Built based on the concept of a Highly Functional Distributed System (HFDS), proposed in 1987, it realized IoT and ubiquitous computing before the term was even coined in 1991. The residents of the house provided valuable feedback on how to live in an IoT environment and contributed to its further development.

Thank you for your attention on this matter.

From the proposer: Changing of Title? -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 01:59, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Hi,

There has been a suggestion to change the title from the current TRON Intelligent House to something that shows the nature of the house. I think Pioneer of Smart House - TRON Intelligent House, 1989 or True Pioneer of Smart House - TRON Intelligent House, 1989

(I forgot to add the year number which was stipulated in the submission form. Thus I added it.)

What do people think?

Chiaki Ishikawa

Re: From the proposer: Changing of Title? -- Tomohiro Hase (talk) 22:08, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear Proposer. Regarding your question, "Is it permissible to change the title?". I'll ask the History Committee, so could you please wait for a little. Best regards, Advocate

Re: Re: From the proposer: Changing of Title? -- Bberg (talk) 22:35, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

It is OK to change the proposed name at this time. However, "Smart" and "Intelligent" are very similar words, and using "House" twice is very repetitive. These 2 possibilities are each unacceptable to me, as Milestones Subcommittee Chair. However, the word "pioneer" is not repetitive, and is used in the first sentence of the citation. As such, I suggest that a better new title would be "The Pioneering TRON Intelligent House, 1989" - which adds 2 new words.

Re: Re: Re: From the proposer: Changing of Title? -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 01:18, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for your comment. I will change the title to "The Pioneering TRON Intelligent House, 1989"

From the proposer: Minor editorial changes -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 13:09, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Hi,

I applied the following changes based on some feedback from the a reader who read the application, also from what I found in the last few days.

1. Wrong reference name of Editor-in-chief comment of Popular Science corrected: I mistook the assistant editor's name as EIC's name.
2. Several minor word changes,
3. fixing of plural/singular mistakes,
4. Japanese character codes for "(", ")" crept in. They have been corrected into ASCII "(", ")",
5 missing articles added (a, an, the),
6. other spelling errors fixed,
7. the table for installed devices were updated to include three more rows, and the characters were enlarged a bit,
8. a few expressions were modified to be more descriptive and/or clear.

They should clarify and tighten up the description somewhat.

Thank you again.

Submitter

From the proposer: English translation of diagrams from [SAKA1990a], and the captured screen of BTRON OS Desktop circa 1987 -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 03:09, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Hi,

The last several edits inserted a few things. - English translation of diagrams of networks in the TRON Intelligent House taken from the reference [SAKA1990a].

 English translation (meaning the in-illustration captions are now translated into English) follows the Japanese version. 
 A few acronyms used in the figures may not be unfamiliar to people outside Japan or may not ring a bell in the minds of the current engineers (LD for Laser Disc for example), so I added a few lines to explain acronyms.

Since the original was from a photocopy of 34 years old magazine, and the original Japanese characters were not very large, it was hard to read. The overlaid English captions are much easy to read.

- I inserted a BTRON Desktop desktop screen circa 1987 at Matsushita corporation (now Panasonic) I realized there is a good sequence of screen operations to show its advanced state in 1987 in a video uploaded to youtube and so I added a screenshot that shows the BTRON OS Desktop. The video is from an NHK broadcast in 1987 (NHK is a nation wide network like PBS of U.S.A) and so I added a reference, [NHK1987] and a couple of paragraphs about it. The video is in Japanese, but the screen operation is rather straightforward and you can see that a video of flying Jumbo Jet can be embedded in a circular clock face. The video was from Laser Disc or from VHS video tape. This OS and desktop operation was available in 1987. But as noted in the main application page, the laser disc or video support was done by respective hardware makers (in this case, Panasonic). I was astounded to realize that some coordinated behaviors of devices which were implemented in the TRON Intelligent House was part of the video aired in 1987. They were obviously simulated in the 1987 broadcast. That part of the program is not outdated at all.

During the updates to the main, there was a few hours when the update that took place on HTHW wiki server cut short the tail of the sections Significance, Obstacles, Features that set this apart, and Bibliography. I think it was due to the WIKI server having an overflowing of temporary file storage. if someone looked at the page during that time frame and wondered what happened, that was the story behind it. I tried updating again and it is OK now.

Proposer Chiaki Ishikawa

From the proposer: Added a reference to newspaper article in TAIPEI TIMES [CRYS2018] -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 16:26, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Hi,

I found an English newspaper article in 2018 about a smart house project in the city of Hualien and that mentions Ken Sakamura, the leader of the TRON Intelligent House project as someone who is guiding the project. So I put a description in the section of TAIPEI u-Home to affirm the later effect o technology transfer of smart house and smart city in Taipei.

Proposer Chiaki Ishikawa

Proposed New Citation and Expansion of Date in Title -- Bberg (talk) 14:00, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for this very interesting proposal! I have a proposed new citation at 70 words which I believe better explains the technology used to implement the TRON Intelligent House:

The first TRON Intelligent House was based on the concept of a Highly Functional Distributed System (HFDS) as proposed in 1987. Built in Tokyo in 1989 using about 1,000 networked computers to implement Internet of Things (IoT), it used a human-machine interface (HMI) to provide “ubiquitous computing” before that term was coined in 1991. Feedback by TRON’s residents helped mature HFDS design, showing how to live in an IoT environment.

You may want to expand the date in the title from 1989 to 1987-1989.

Thank you. Brian Berg, Milestones Subcommittee Chair/History Committee Vice-Chair

Re: Proposed New Citation and Expansion of Date in Title -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 14:54, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the improved citation. I will go along with it, and given the significance of HFDS, having "1987-" in the title is a good idea, too.

I will modify the proposal as suggested.

Chiaki Ishikawa, Proposer.

Re: Proposed New Citation and Expansion of Date in Title -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 07:04, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Dear Mr. Brian Berg,

After re-reading the citation multiple times, now I feel that

"... it used a human-machine interface ..." may be better modified to read

"... it used advanced human-machine interface ..." or

"... it used consistent human-machine interface ...".

I wonder if such a change makes sense. Problem is that if I want to add "an/a", the citation goes beyond 70 words.

Chiaki Ishikawa, Proposer

Re: Re: Proposed New Citation and Expansion of Date in Title -- Bberg (talk) 05:26, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

I suggest (1) replace "it used a" with "its advanced" and (2) replace "to provide" with "provided" for a total of 68 words.

Re: Re: Re: Proposed New Citation and Expansion of Date in Title -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 00:05, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I changed the citation as well as the title mentioned below. Thank you for the comment.

Re: Proposed New Citation and Expansion of Date in Title -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 02:03, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Today I made a short presentation of the proposal including the new title and the citation to IEEE Tokyo section chair and a few others.

I had a feedback as follows from the people at the presentation.

- The expression "1987-1989" in the title gives the impression as if the house existed between 1987 and 1989. (No. the house was completed in 1989 and existed for five and half years approximately.)

- 1989 is the date when HFDS was proposed as noted in the citation. So why don't we put HFDS in the title?

Some suggestions were

a. The Pioneering TRON Intelligent House (1989) based on Highly Functionally Distributed System (1987)

b. Highly Functionally Distributed System (1987) and its application, TRON Intelligent House (1989),

c. ...

The title becomes rather long, but the point was we may want to clarify the meaning of 1987 and 1989 in the title itself although the citation is clear about the year 1987 and 1989.

However, the title alone is used very frequently in web pages and other publications. Thus we want a clear indication of what the year 1987 stands for when the title is used independently of the citation.

This was the reason behind the suggestions, and I had to concur. And come to think of it, given the importance of HFDS, it merits the mention in the title, too.

I am sure there will be comments from historical committee members to this discussion.

Thank you again for your detailed attention on the title and the citation.

Re: Re: Proposed New Citation and Expansion of Date in Title -- Bberg (talk) 05:32, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

In looking back, I realize that only 1989 is needed in the title. So, you should only change "1987-1989" to "1989" and leave the rest of the title as it is now.

Re: Re: Re: Proposed New Citation and Expansion of Date in Title -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 18:15, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

I see. I will remove the "1987-" from the title. Thank you for the clarification.

From the proposer: BBC video that covers TRON Intelligent House -- Zephyrus00jp (talk) 05:10, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Hi,

I finally could locate a news video of BBC that covers the TRON Intelligent House in 1990. The video is [BBC1990] and you can see the two minutes coverage at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wo5b0EpChH8&t=417s The video quality is much better than the TRON Intelligent House video [YOUT-1]. I added the description in "Ten thousand visitors experienced the TRON Intelligent House" section. I have not been able to locate any CNN video clip about the TRON Intelligent House.

I made a few changes including - the Acronym list to the network table in the "Features that set this apart from others" section is now in alphabetical order, and I added BTRON entry. - The note to the network diagram now mentions HEMS (Home Energy Management System). The term did not exist in 1989, but the power meter monitoring was essentially a crude from of HEMS.

Chiaki Ishikawa, Proposer