The IEEE today announced the kickoff of a new draft standard aimed at uniting "hybrid" home networks.
IEEE P1905.1 "Draft Standard for a Convergent Digital Home Network for Heterogeneous Technologies" is intended to provide a common, protocol-neutral interface to increase the performance and simplicity of hybrid home networks that use powerline, Ethernet, Wi-Fi and MoCA technologies.
The standard will primarily allow these different network technologies to interoperate and coexist. But it will also dynamically manage packets among them to maximize network bandwidth and reliability.
A Working Group has been formed and is holding its inaugural meeting in Paris, France, this week. Projected completion date for the standard is May 2012.