Three years ago I bought a small window air conditioner. It came with the usual front panel controls and a remote. The remote turns it on and off and lets you

Three years ago I bought a small window air conditioner. It came with the usual front panel controls and a remote. The remote turns it on and off and lets you set temperature and fan speed, which is all I expect of a remote. However, it requires an Apple or Android smartphone, their phone app, and internet access to access "extra functions", none of which were described in useful detail in the sparse documentation that came with it. No, I'll just use the remote. An acquaintance was telling me about the new RV she and her husband bought. It has a brake controller for trailer brakes. Not unusual, I have them on two of my vehicles; there's a big lever to manually apply the brakes and a "gain" control to adjust how rapidly they apply. But her RV's brake controller is only controllable through a smartphone, apparently. A few years ago I went to the store to buy a new alarm clock. All the clocks they had for sale were just Bluetooth accessories for a smartphone. Not particularly useful when there's no smartphone to link to it, and ignoring the question of why you wouldn't just use the phone's alarm instead.