HomeOS was the working title of a home automation operating system being developed at Microsoft Research in the early 2010s.
[1][2] Microsoft Research announced the project in 2010 and abandoned it in 2012.
[4][5][6] Microsoft's slogan for their HomeOS project was "Enabling smarter homes for everyone.
"[7] Microsoft's HomeOS development team has written three sample applications that make use of multiple devices, including a "sticky media" app that plays music in parts of the house that are lit up, but not other rooms; a two-factor authentication app that uses audio from smartphones and images from a front-door camera to turn on lights when a user is identified; and a home browser for viewing and controlling a user's access to all devices in a home.
[8] Some staff who worked on the project cited Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's focus on enterprise applications, productivity software, and cloud computing as the reason for the stalled development.