1 . Forecasting the technological future is difficult at best. Back in the 1980s,the thought of carrying around a small, portable phone seemed to belong in the world of science fiction. Then in the 1990s, imagining a phone that would allow you to surf the Internet something that didn't even exist until 1990was unheard-of. Today, smartphones can surf the Web, run applications and play games, and those with a near field communication (NFC) chip can act as away to make purchases. Oh, and they can still make phone calls, too.

So what will phones look like in 2050? Based upon phone customer behavior, I imagine the future phones will rely more on combining our physical lives with our digital lives. They probably won't be similar to the ones we’re reusing now. They’ll be built into other devices and products. Imagine a pair of glasses that can display a digital overlay on top of your physical surroundings.

I don’t think video chat is taking off despite services like Skype and FaceTime. Rather, the trend seems to be toward asynchronous(非同步的）communication. That means the two or more people in a conversation complete а discussion over time.

We might even see the phone part of phones disappear. Recent phone customer behavior suggests that texting is a more popular way to communicate than telephone calls. Future phones will need a way to display messages but don’t necessarily include voice communication.

Since we’re talking about 2050 here, there’s even the possibility that research into brain-computer interfaces(脑机接口) will have reached a point in which we won’t need a physical screen or microphone at all. Electronics could be built into clothing. You’d link the devices to an interface connected to your brain and post messages just through thought. It’d be a form of telepathy(心灵感应).

But what do you think? Will we be wearing devices that let us communicate easily? Or will we be carrying around the iPhone 47 and answering texts between games of Angry Birds? Let us know your predictions.

3 . Your options for an ego - friendly home may seem somewhat limited now—solar panels, rain barrels, and maybe a small garden—but as the world of green technology advanced, there is a rise in the number of smart, ego-friendly home improvements. Some of them are available now.     1     Read on to see how you can improve your home now.

A home thermos tat (恒温器) can automatically adjust the temperature for you, making sure your house is warm when you get home and reducing energy waste during the day. For example, a thermos tat called Nest Learning Thermos tat learns your heating and cooling preference and automatically adjusts itself.     2     , without ever having to remember to adjust the I temperature.

Years ago, recycling paper and plastic was the most you could do to save resource.     3     recycling everything from Christmas lights to wine corks (瓶塞). And where do the post-recycling-process materials end up? Back in your home, in the form of recycled-paper counter tops (台面) and recycled plastic carpets, to name a few.

    4     . But if you're ready to take your heating, cooling and electricity system into the future, then you'll want to start with alternative new energy source, like solar panels or wind power. Solar panels are additions you can make to your own house, but if you don't have the time or money, you can also choose alternative energy sources through your regular supplier.

In 2009, The Wall Street Journal asked four architectural firms to imagine the future of green homes.     5     They designed what they call the “Incredible Edible House”, covered in green in the form of plants and gardens that provide food for the home owners, absorb heat to keep the interior cool, and are watered from a rooftop that catches rain.

Your new smart TV might be your pride and joy today but they will pale into insignificance compared with the technology expected to fill homes by 2030.

And now experts at Rightmove have    1     what this home of the future will look like.

In just two years’ time, a temperature-changing mattress(床垫) will come into being that warms up in the winter and stays cool in the summer.Self-cleaning fabrics(布), truly waterproof materials and personal climate control are all being     2     now, and are also shown in the house in 2021.

Fast forward to 2023, a “smart window” appears in the bedroom that    3     as a screen; while in the bathroom, there’s a flexible     4    that’s also a shower curtain meaning users could check social media while washing in a shower that recycles water.

A smart mirror, which is actually a screen with an integrated computer, could even make polite outfit (服装）    5    to act like a personal stylist.

And by 2025 the experts predict there will be self-heating towels.

While in 2030 the home will seem like an incredibly hi-tech space, with    6     changes seen in every room.All homes will have an “AI console” in the living room, described as “the living brain of the modern home” that controls security, lighting and temperature, monitors energy usage and orders groceries, among other    7    .

Perhaps most excitingly, there’s a 3D printer that could be used to print everything from tools and electronics to food and clothing using just    8     material blocks and “recipes” downloaded from the Internet.

And the experts predict that by 2030, the machines will be as popular as televisions.Pocket-lint’s Stuart Miles said that every single electronic device in the home will be     9    to the Internet, including the doorbell.

Tim Danton, Editor of PC Pro magazine thinks smart phones will     10    to the point that we’ll be able to control nearly everything in the house with them--even if we’re not home

10 . It’s 6 A.M., and the alarm clock is ringing earlier than usual. It’s not a malfunction (故障): the smart clock scanned your schedule and adjusted because you’ve got that big presentation first thing in the morning. The electric car is ready to go, charged by the solar panels on your roof. When you get home later, there’s an unexpected package waiting. You open it to find cold medicine. Turns out, health sensors embedded (嵌入) in your bathroom detected signs of an upcoming illness and placed an order automatically.

That, at least, is the ideal design of the smart home that exists 10 years out. But a decade from now, we’ll dip into the Internet of Things (IoT) totally.

A range of technological developments will drive smart—home technology well beyond what’s available on store shelves today. Innovations in AI stand to change almost everything in our lives. You might already be using some kind of AI—powered voice—assistant device to get the latest news or weather forecast every morning. IoT company Crestron, for example, is working on software that follows a person’s habits, like which music they want to hear in the morning or which lights they want to be on at a certain time of day. Then, once it gets the hang of a user’s preferences, it automatically plays just the right playlists or makes the lights less bright before bedtime.

All this learning that the smart home of the future will be doing may raise privacy concerns. In 2016, hackers took over hundreds of thousands of secure IoT devices, then used them to send fake Internet traffic, the incident broke Internet connections for a moment throughout parts of North America and Europe. A bill put forth by Virginia Senator Mark Warner would push the government to set up minimum security requirements for smart devices used by federal agencies; such requirements could eventually become standard for the industry at large.

You’re more likely than not to end up in a connected home one day, whether you mean to or not. Ultimately, people will come to see smart—home technology as essential as electricity, refrigeration or air-conditioning. People will rely on it.