I was surprised by the lack of responses in the Amazon Echo thread the other day and was wondering about other people’s general attitude to home automation. Most of us take for granted the heating coming on at the programed time and I suspect many of us also have timers on a light or two. But has anyone gone any further? If so, is it because of (perceived) security, convenience or maybe even a disability. I’m currently investigating skirting round the edges and putting together rather Heath Robinson solutions as anything all encompassing is going to be very expensive. Ideally, I’d like to be able to draw the curtains in the living room and switch a few lights on when I out or on holiday but, unless I go for something like the Belkin or Philips lights, I’m either stuck in the past with X10 or I have to get the lighting circuit rewired (you really need a neutral at the switch and most UK homes don’t have it). Any solutions, experiences? My current task is seeing up a raspberry pi based system that will check if there’s a connected wifi signal available in the house and automatically reboot the » Continue Reading.
