HOME AUTOMATION
Home automation is the domestic application of building
automation. Imagine a situation were all the devices in your house could
connect to the Internet? Not just computers and smartphones, but everything: clocks, garage doors,
speakers, lights, doors, windows, window blinds, door bells, water heaters,
appliances, every thing. what if these devices could all communicate, send you
information, and take your commands? No magic; it's the Internet of Things
(IoT), and it's a key component of home automation.
Home
automation is
the use and control of home appliances remotely or automatically.
Early home automation began with labour-saving machines like washing
machines. Some home automation appliances are stand alone and do not
communicate, such as a programmable light switch, while others are part of the internet of things and are networked for remote
control and data transfer. Hardware devices can include sensors (like cameras
and thermometers), controllers, actuators (to do things), and communication
systems. Remote control can range from a simple remote
control to a smartphone with Bluetooth,
to a computer on the other side of the world connected by internet. Home
automation systems are available which consist of a suite of products designed
to work together. These typically connected through Wi-Fi or power line communication to a hub which is
then accessed with a software application
Home automation is nothing more than the ability to control items around the house with a simple push of a button (or a voice command). homes are becoming smarter by the day, we practically on daily bases out phase older technologies with new ones thus bringing together devices that can perform these task. Eventually there is no need to be bothered with the word Automation because it is not actually as difficult as it sounds. there are already a bunch of these devices out there and even within our homes today that can simply be integrated to do cool stuffs at home. Eventually, there is no need tearing down already existing electrical connections for instance in order to outfit them with those that could be automated as there are devices that can be used to bring already existing ones together.
Popular suites of products include X10, Z-Wave, Zigbee and a whole lot more
all of which are incompatible with each other. Home automation is the domestic
application of building automation.
Home-Automation Technologies
Before you buy a bunch of home-automation products, it helps to
understand the technologies involved in setting up and using them.
These products use many different communication protocols. Some are
wired, some wireless, and some are a combination. Try to stick with one
protocol when buying products, or get a hub/gateway that supports
multiple protocols.
X10
This granddaddy of home automation protocols dates back to the 1970s and has gone from power line-based to wireless.
X10
is not known for robust speed or great communication between units on
the home automation network. It is, however, typically inexpensive.
ZigBeeZigBee is a wireless 802 standard from the IEEE, which is to say, a bunch of gearheads came up with it before an outside group (the
Zigbee Alliance)
made up of vendors created products that use it. One of the key
elements in IEEE 802.15.4 (its real name) is that it makes a mesh
network so that most of the devices communicate equally. It's also very
low power. (You may also hear about Thread, a
new wireless protocol that uses the same radio chips and frequency at
ZigBee, and connects up to 250 devices in a home to the cloud.)
Z-Wave
Another wireless home automation protocol,
Z-Wave
is owned by one company, Sigma Designs, which makes all the chips for
other vendors to make Z-Wave-capable products, known as the Z-Wave
Alliance.
Insteon
This
may be the best of all protocols because it combines a wired power
line-based protocol with wireless. Both work as a mesh; all nodes on an
Insteon
home automation network are peers that can communicate when in
proximity. If one fails, the other mesh can take over. You can buy
Insteon devices at Smarthome.com, which is run by SmartLabs, the
developers of Insteon. It's compatible with X10.
Wi-Fi
This
is the networking protocol we're all used to for sharing an Internet
connection among laptops, game consoles, and so much more. It's
super-fast and ubiquitous. So, of course, it's inevitable that some
vendors would make home automation products to take advantage of it. The
other protocols use less power and bandwidth but Wi-Fi's reach can't be
understated, even if it is overkill to use it to turn a lamp on and
off.
Bluetooth A
staple of every PC, smartphone, and tablet, Bluetooth is better known
for connecting items at a short range like keyboards, mice, headphones,
and earbuds. But a lot of new products use the Bluetooth 4.0, aka
Bluetooth Low Energy, aka Bluetooth Smart. It doesn't require purposeful re-connection all the time, making it a good solution for select IoT items.
Applications
- Integration with the smart
grid, taking advantage, for instance, of high solar panel
output in the middle of the day to run washing machines.