Bluetooth is a wireless technology standard used for exchanging data over short distances between devices such as phones, headphones, and computers. It uses radio waves between 2.4-2.48 GHz and has a short range of up to 10 meters. Bluetooth is managed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, which oversees the development of the technology standards and protects related trademarks. Billions of Bluetooth devices are shipped each year, and shipments continue increasing annually.
Bluetooth is a wireless technology standard used for exchanging data over short distances between devices such as phones, headphones, and computers. It uses radio waves between 2.4-2.48 GHz and has a short range of up to 10 meters. Bluetooth is managed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, which oversees the development of the technology standards and protects related trademarks. Billions of Bluetooth devices are shipped each year, and shipments continue increasing annually.
Bluetooth is a wireless technology standard used for exchanging data over short distances between devices such as phones, headphones, and computers. It uses radio waves between 2.4-2.48 GHz and has a short range of up to 10 meters. Bluetooth is managed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, which oversees the development of the technology standards and protects related trademarks. Billions of Bluetooth devices are shipped each year, and shipments continue increasing annually.
Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology standard that
is used for exchanging data between fixed and mobile devices
over short distances and building personal area networks (PANs). It employs UHF radio waves in the ISM bands, from 2.402 GHz to 2.48 GHz.[3] It is mainly used as an alternative to wire connections, to exchange files between nearby portable devices and connect cell phones and music players with wireless headphones. In the most widely used mode, transmission power is limited to 2.5 milliwatts, giving it a very short range of up to 10 metres (33 ft). Bluetooth is managed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG), which has more than 35,000 member companies in the areas of telecommunication, computing, networking, and consumer electronics. The IEEE standardized Bluetooth as IEEE 802.15.1, but no longer maintains the standard. The Bluetooth SIG oversees development of the specification, manages the qualification program, and protects the trademarks.[4] A manufacturer must meet Bluetooth SIG standards to market it as a Bluetooth device.[5] A network of patents apply to the technology, which are licensed to individual qualifying devices. As of 2009, Bluetooth integrated circuit chips ship approximately 920 million units annually.[6] By 2017, there were 3.6 billion Bluetooth devices being shipped annually and the shipments were expected to continue increasing at about 12% a year.[7] In 2021, shipments reached 4.7 billion units, with 9% growth forecast. [8] Etymology[edit] The name "Bluetooth" was proposed in 1997 by Jim Kardach of Intel, one of the founders of the Bluetooth SIG. The name was inspired by a conversation with Sven Mattisson who related Scandinavian history through tales from Frans G. Bengtsson's The Long Ships, a historical novel about Vikings and the 10th-century Danish king Harald Bluetooth. Upon discovering a picture of the runestone of Harald Bluetooth[9] in the book A History of the Vikings by Gwyn Jones, Jim proposed Bluetooth as the codename for the short-range wireless program which is now called Bluetooth.[10][11][12] According to Bluetooth's official website, Bluetooth was only intended as a placeholder until marketing could come up with something really cool. Later, when it came time to select a serious name, Bluetooth was to be replaced with either RadioWire or PAN (Personal Area Networking). PAN was the front runner, but an exhaustive search discovered it already had tens of thousands of hits throughout the internet. A full trademark search on RadioWire couldn't be completed in time for launch, making Bluetooth the only choice. The name caught on fast and before it could be changed, it spread throughout the industry, becoming synonymous with short- range wireless technology.[13] Bluetooth is the Anglicised version of the Scandinavian Blåtand/Blåtann (or in Old Norse blátǫnn). It was the epithet of King Harald Bluetooth, who united the disparate Danish tribes into a single kingdom; Kardach chose the name to imply that Bluetooth similarly unites communication protocols.[14] The development of the "short-link" radio technology, later named Bluetooth, was initiated in 1989 by Nils Rydbeck, CTO at Ericsson Mobile in Lund, Sweden. The purpose was to develop wireless headsets, according to two inventions by Johan Ullman, SE 8902098-6, issued 1989-06-12 and SE 9202239, issued 1992-07-24. Nils Rydbeck tasked Tord Wingren with specifying and Dutchman Jaap Haartsen and Sven Mattisson with developing.[17] Both were working for Ericsson in Lund.[18] Principal design and development began in 1994 and by 1997 the team had a workable solution.[19] From 1997 Örjan Johansson became the project leader and propelled the technology and standardization.[20][21][22][23] In 1997, Adalio Sanchez, then head of IBM ThinkPad product R&D, approached Nils Rydbeck about collaborating on integrating a mobile phone into a ThinkPad notebook. The two assigned engineers from Ericsson and IBM to study the idea. The conclusion was that power consumption on cellphone technology at that time was too high to allow viable integration into a notebook and still achieve adequate battery life. Instead, the two companies agreed to integrate Ericsson's short-link technology on both a ThinkPad notebook and an Ericsson phone to accomplish the goal. Since neither IBM ThinkPad notebooks nor Ericsson phones were the market share leaders in their respective markets at that time, Adalio Sanchez and Nils Rydbeck agreed to make the short-link technology an open industry standard to permit each player maximum market access. Ericsson contributed the short-link radio technology, and IBM contributed patents around the logical layer. Adalio Sanchez of IBM then recruited Stephen Nachtsheim of Intel to join and then Intel also recruited Toshiba and Nokia. In May 1998, the Bluetooth SIG was launched with IBM and Ericsson as the founding signatories and a total of five members: Ericsson, Intel, Nokia, Toshiba and IBM. Wi-Fi, networking technology that uses radio waves to allow high-speed data transfer over short distances.
Wi-Fi technology has its origins in a 1985 ruling by the U.S.
Federal Communications Commission that released the bands of the radio spectrum at 900 megahertz (MHz), 2.4 gigahertz (GHz), and 5.8 GHz for unlicensed use by anyone. Technology firms began building wireless networks and devices to take advantage of the newly available radio spectrum, but without a common wireless standard the movement remained fragmented, as devices from different manufacturers were rarely compatible. Eventually, a committee of industry leaders came up with a common standard, called 802.11, which was approved by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) in 1997. Two years later a group of major companies formed the Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance (WECA, now the Wi-Fi Alliance), a global nonprofit organization created to promote the new wireless standard. WECA named the new technology Wi-Fi. (Wi-Fi is not an abbreviation for “wireless fidelity”; the name was created by a marketing firm hired by WECA and chosen for its pleasing sound and similarity to “hi-fi” [high-fidelity].) Subsequent IEEE standards for Wi-Fi have been introduced to allow for greater bandwidth. The original 802.11 standard allowed a maximum data transmission rate of only 2 megabits per second (Mbps); 802.11ax, dubbed Wi-Fi 6 by the Wi-Fi Alliance and introduced in 2019, has a maximum theoretical rate of 9.6 gigabits per second (Gbps). Under the IEEE Wi-Fi standards, the available frequency bands are split into several separate channels. These channels overlap in frequency, and therefore Wi-Fi uses channels that are far apart. Within each of these channels, Wi-Fi uses a “spread spectrum” technique in which a signal is broken into pieces and transmitted over multiple frequencies. Spread spectrum enables the signal to be transmitted at a lower power per frequency and also allows multiple devices to use the same Wi-Fi transmitter. Because Wi-Fi signals are often transmitted over short distances (usually less than 100 metres [330 feet]) in indoor environments, the signal can reflect off walls, furniture, and other obstacles, thus arriving at multiple time intervals and causing a problem called multipath interference. Wi-Fi reduces multipath interference by combining three different ways of transmitting the signal (in a method developed by Australian engineer John O’Sullivan and collaborators). The popularity of Wi-Fi has grown steadily. Wi-Fi allows local area networks (LANs) to operate without cables and wiring, making it a popular choice for home and business networks. Wi-Fi can also be used to provide wireless broadband Internet access for many modern devices, such as laptops, smartphones, tablet computers, and electronic gaming consoles. Wi-Fi-enabled devices are able to connect to the Internet when they are near areas that have Wi-Fi access, called “hotspots.” Hotspots have become common, with many public places such as airports, hotels, bookstores, and coffee shops offering Wi-Fi access. Some cities have constructed free citywide Wi-Fi networks. A version of Wi-Fi called Wi-Fi Direct allows connectivity between devices without a LAN. shortwave radio, transmission and reception of information by means of electromagnetic waves about 10 to 80 m (33 to 262 feet) in length having frequencies of approximately 29.7 to 3.5 megahertz. During the early 1920s attempts were made to transmit radio signals over long distances by bouncing them off the layers of charged particles in the Earth’s ionosphere. The success of these experiments prompted the establishment of worldwide shortwave communication by the late 1930s.
Shortwave broadcasts provide the major source of news and
popular entertainment in much of the world except in highly developed regions such as western Europe, North America, and Japan, where government or commercial programming is transmitted within other bands of frequencies. Among the world’s most powerful shortwave broadcasting stations are China Radio International (formerly Radio Peking [Beijing]), the Voice of Russia (formerly Radio Moscow), the British Broadcasting Corporation, and the Voice of America. Besides their use in international broadcasting, shortwave radio frequencies and techniques are utilized to relay telephone and telegraph communications over great distances. Amateur radio stations and portable two-way radios also operate at shortwave frequencies.