[Wireless Technology to Transform the World] Part 1, Harald, the blue-toothed king

While we are quite familiar with it today, 'wireless' was an unfamiliar concept just a few decades back. ‘Wires’ were just an accepted part of being connected: wired telephones, wired earphones, wired speakers, wire electronic appliances. On the other hand, today in 2020, ‘wired’ has become synonymous with ‘needlessly complicated’ and ‘cumbersome.’ Wireless freedom has the development of wireless communication technologies to thank. Wireless communication is a term referring to communication technologies that transmit data remotely without wired connections. These technologies are able to transmit signals, code, images, voice, and other data without lines, and include antenna technology, radar technology, mobile communication technologies, and near-field wireless communication technologies.

Among these, near-field wireless communication technologies link wireless communication devices with electronic devices to exchange information. While there are a host of near-field wireless communication technologies out there, today we’ll take a look at ‘Bluetooth’, perhaps the most widely used in our daily lives. With Bluetooth-enabled products such as speakers and earphones entering the mainstream, our everyday lives have become a great deal more convenient. But where does the name come from? What does the symbol mean? How does it work? The grand vision of a unified wireless technology standard Bluetooth is based on wireless technology research started by Swedish communication equipment manufacturer Ericsson in 1994. Its development was begun in earnest in 1998 through the non-profit ‘Bluetooth SIG (Special Interest Group)’. As for the name, it comes from the nickname of Harald Blåtand Gormsson, a king of Denmark and Norway who unified Scandinavia around the 10th century CE. It's said that 'Bluetooth SIG' decided to name the near-field wireless communication technology they had developed as 'Bluetooth', hoping this would unify all wireless communication standards out there.

There are two theories as to why King Harald was referred to as Bluetooth: That he was fond of blueberries and his teeth were always stained blue or that he had a set of blue dentures. The Bluetooth symbol is actually made up of King Harald’s initials: ᚼ and ᛒ from the Scandinavian runic alphabet, standing for H, Harald, and B, Bluetooth, respectively. Frequency hopping: Bluetooth’s little secret Bluetooth technology makes use of a total of 79 channels in the 2402 to 2480 MHz ISM bandwidth range allocated for industrial, scientific, and medical use. The ISM band is universal, meaning there’s no need to acquire permission to use the band in every single country. But it’s for this very same reason that signal interference is a very real possibility, and this is why Bluetooth technology uses frequency hopping. Frequency hopping is a technique where a device quickly switches among a large number of channels according to a specific pattern, transmitting small amounts of data through each. Bluetooth hops among the 79 allocated channels some 1,600 times per second, minimizing signal interference. Easy as pie! How to pair your Blutooth devices

Connecting Bluetooth-enabled devices to each other is called ‘pairing’. And Bluetooth pairing is more simple than you’d expect. First, you need to have a master device and a slave device, both Bluetooth capable. For example, when you’re trying to connect your smartphone to a pair of wireless earphones, the phone is the master and the earphones, the slave. Turn the wireless earphones on, then switch your smartphone’s Bluetooth on. Your phone will find all Bluetooth devices nearby. Simply tap on your earphones in the list, and you’re connected! If the smartphone or laptop you wish to use as the master does not provide native Bluetooth support, you can connect it to a Bluetooth dongle. Bluetooth dongles are usually installed into USB ports, but depending on your device you may need a different type of dongle. Bluetooth: a still-evolving pioneer of the wireless communication age The first Bluetooth standard was announced in 1999, and since then, this pioneering technology has been consistently improved. Every new version has brought with it enhanced specs, boosting data transmission speeds, improving power consumption, and extending reach. The latest version, 5.0, has four times the reach and twice the transmission speeds of version 4.2, which it replaces. Key changes we can expect from the next generation of Bluetooth include greater range, even faster transmission speeds, and mesh networking to allow Bluetooth devices to share data amongst themselves. Bluetooth Mesh was announced by the Bluetooth SIG in 2017 as a means to connect multiple devices using Bluetooth mesh networking. While conventional Bluetooth devices only connect on a one-on-one basis within relatively short distances, the next generation of Bluetooth aims to expand into the IoT (Internet of Things) market. This includes applications such as building automation and sensor networks. Bluetooth is continually evolving, and it’ll be exciting to see what better changes the technology will bring to our everyday lives. This series explores the many wireless communication technologies that make our lives as convenient as they are. In the first part, we explored the story of Bluetooth. Coming up: Wi-Fi, NFC, and other key technologies that have brought wireless into the mainstream. Stay tuned! See Related Content [Wireless Technology to Transform the World] Part 2, The long-distance runner of wireless technology: ‘RFID’