The real purpose of this book is twofold for you as a reader. First is to give you a grounding in the basics that are required to build any smart device. These fundamentals are universal and will not change because of advances in computers or in new sensor developments. The fundamentals of smart devices are based in scientific laws and basic engineering, so they will be effective tools for you for a very long time. The second purpose is to bring together a background and context for why things are how they are and where smart devices are going. It is fair, and perhaps even an understatement, to say that this technology is changing rapidly. This book is not meant to cover everything ever that is possible, as it could never hope to do so. It will, however, give you the critical grounding in the basics of smart device theory and fundamentals so that even as the tools and capabilities change, you can keep pace with them.

This first section provides a historical context for you to understand why smart devices have developed the way they have and where they came from. This historical background is not explicitly needed of course, but as it is one of the stated purposes of this book, and one of my core beliefs in building materials for educating others, context matters. Understanding what has come before and influenced these developments can help you to understand how to use the results to their best effect.