For those who are tired doing the laundry, Samsung has found an answer: a washing machine that can tell you when your laundry is done via a smartphone app(application).

    Strange though it may seem — “my wife already does that” was a common response among attendees viewing the device when it was introduced at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) this week — Samsung is just one of many appliance makers racing to install (安装) a large number of internet-connected features in machines in an effort to make them “smart”.

    Last year, it was a refrigerator that tweeted. This year, it's Wi-Fi-enabled laundry machines and fridges that can tell you when your groceries are going bad.

    The washers and dryers, available starting in the spring, connect to any smartphone through a downloadable application. The phone can then be used as a remote control, so the machines can be turned on and off while their owners are at work or on the bus.

    Samsung says it's not just something new — the app connection actually has some practical uses.

     “If you started to dry clothes in the morning and forgot to take them out, you can go to your phone and restart your dryer for the time when come home, so your clothes are refreshed and ready to go,” said spokesperson Amy Schmidt.

    The company also says that with electricity rate(电价)varying depending on the time of day, more control over when the machines are used can help save money.

    Perhaps, but what they will probably really accomplish is what all good technologies do —enable laziness. Rather than getting up to check on whether the laundry is done, users will instead monitor it on their phones while watching TV.