Hestia Home Integration

This week several people asked us if we’d seen the video or heard about the Boynton Beach, Florida woman who saw her house being broken into via webcam.  She called 911 while the burglary was occurring, stayed on the phone with the operator while police responded and was rewarded with the satisfaction of watching the alleged burglars get arrested and police enter the house from the webcam on her desk.

Webcam Captures Break In

In subsequent interviews, the subject was asked what triggered her to check her webcam while at work.  The family had suffered an earlier break-in and the webcams were purchased in response.  After several weeks of checking and watching on a regular basis, the homeowner said she didn’t check again from work for three weeks.  On the day of the break-in, she had a funny feeling, logged in and happened to catch the burglary through sheer fortune.

Webcams are regular features in our security installations but useful only if you’re alerted at the proper time and occasion to see the feed.  If a webcam system will be part of your security solution, so should motion detectors.  We calibrate the detectors with the home automation system to send a text or email message immediately if motion is sensed when the system is armed.  In addition to notifying your alarm company if you’ve contracted with a service provider, you can tune into your webcams remotely to check and see what’s going on.

But I want to expand the notion of the functionality and usefuness of wireless webcams in home automation solutions.  They can do so much more than be used for security.  Below are several creative solutions/ideas for integrating wireles webcams into your system:

1.  Front Door Cam - I like to know who’s at the door before I open the door.  And I want my kids to know too.  A front door cam can trigger a pop-out window if watching television downstairs - the window within a window can show who’s at the front door if a motion sensor is also placed at the front door.  I can also check at any of our touchscreen interfaces in the house.   If it’s someone unknown to me or my kids at a suspicious time, we can handle it appropriately.

2.  Pet Cam - We love our pets in the Seattle area and several customers have inquired about webcams that would allow them to check-in and see what pets who are allowed to roam free in the home are doing while the owners are away.  This is especially useful if there’s pet “monkey business” going on while you’re away or you’re working with a specialist on a behavior issue and need to see the behavior that’s occurring when you’re not around.  The beauty of a wireless webcam is it’s portability - experiment with different locations until you capture the footage of Fido that you need!

3.  Weather Cam - Got a place at the beach, the mountains or Eastern Washington, planning to visit this weekend and wondering what weather conditions you’ll drive into?  Set up a wireless webcam to enjoy and monitor weather conditions at second homes.  This is useful if you need to coordinate maintenance with a caretaker or property management company.

4.  Baby Cam - You hear some whimpering and movement on the baby monitor but the audio is only half the story?  Anyone who’s raised children from infancy and worked through the process of teaching children to sleep alone can appreciate that seeing as well as hearing infants and young children is very helpful.  Can Baby settle him or herself back down or do you need to offer some care and comfort?  For older children, when it’s Lights Out, do they stay out or is there some  playing/reading/delaying the inevitable going on instead?

All of these examples are positive and creative web-cam uses.  Hestia Network doesn’t advocate using web-cams in such a way that brings us closer to Big Brother and a future where we’re constantly spying on each other.  We enjoy our web-cams but don’t substitute surveillance for positive and personal relationships with our children and neighbors.

Existing home sales showed an unexpected increase yesterday and new housing starts for February were up last Tuesday.  With low mortgage rates and buyer incentives, especially for first-time homebuyers, lots of property is trading hands.  Hestia has been walking down memory lane, thinking back to 1995 when we purchased our home.  We had an inspection, but there were still little surprises and things we didn’t know about our property until a crisis emerged.  Such as…that circle of concrete in a sunken area of the backyard - is it a decommissioned septic tank or just excess concrete from pouring the foundation that was dumped in the backyard?  Turns out it was the latter.

Fast forward to last summer - our home office and filing system was out of control and I asked a friend for whom personal organization is an avocation for help in sorting, organizing and tossing.  One thing she suggested was purchasing a large three ring binder and several expandable plastic sleeves and organizing all things related to our house in this notebook:  Appliance receipts and warranties, contact information for the contracter and subs who did our remodel in 2000, service records, locations of the natural gas and water shutoff, manuals, etc.  Much easier to flip through transparent sleeves containing documentation than pawing through the two manila folders where all of these items had previously been stuffed.  I was reminded by her idea when I saw this article in the Seattle Times on maintaining a similar notebook with the moniker “house bible.”

House bibles and home integration have a natural convergence.  Access to a house bible would be so informative to the walk-through and job estimation process.  If at all possible, we like to confer and collaborate with previous contractors who were involved at different stages of a home’s evolution.   Similarly, more and more homes will be coming on the market with existing elements of an integrated home control system.  We’re beginning to bid on more and more jobs where we’ll be bringing those elements together into a single control solution.  Here is our integrators’ wish list for what we’d like to find in a house bible and will be adding to our own notebook:

Wiring/Networking:

• A wiring diagram from the builder and eletrical contractor including wiring termination points, especially if CAT5/6 has been pulled
• Name of electrical contractor is wiring/networking has been done recently
• What kind of wiring has been used - we have a combination of Romax and knob and tube that is still in good condition
• Where are the cable drops?  FIOS?  Age of coaxial and telephony wiring?  Age affects performance.
• Does the utility offer a smart meter option?

Security

• Has security coaxial or CAT5/6 been pulled?
• Where are the camera drops?
• Is there an existing security and monitoring provider contract?
• Where is the security pane?  What’s the capacity for termination?

HVAC

• Is there a gas fireplace insert with electric ignition/switch?  Who installed the insert?
• Where are the thermostats located?  Will existing wiring work for swapping in networked thermostats?
• Are there dampers in HVAC for creating climate zones?

Irrigation

• Irrigation system installed outside?

Window coverings:

• Blinds or shades - who was the installer?
• Is there wiring in framing around windows for serial connection to controller?
• Is there power run into framing for motorized window coverings?

Entertainment:

• If speaker wire was run for music zones, wiring diagram
• Speakers installed in ceilings, walls or exterior - manufacturer?
• Is home theater room wired for 5.1 surround (the new digital standard in audio)?

A post to CE-Pro this morning about underrated revenue generators for integrators in today’s challenging market included a paragraph devoted to motorizing and automating blinds and window coverings.  We had a half story attic remodeled in 2000 into a master suite, home office and bathroom.  The home office faces west and south - if I had it to do over again, I’d have had the electrician run wiring into the window framing to enable installation of motorized blinds that could be automated now.

We’re frequent travelers to Central Oregon, specifically the Sunriver planned community in Oregon’s High Desert.  The development is mainly single family homes that are owned by private homeowners who lease their properties to vacationers who come to the Sunriver to golf, bike, hike, ski, river raft, fish, etc.  The high temperatures in summertime average in the 90-degree range.  Yet, we’ve not leased a home yet that central or room air conditioning.  Instead it’s typical to find a placard posted on a wall that explains how residents work with the high desert climate, window coverings and quality windows to control temperature inside the homes.  Visitors are encouraged to close all windows by 9:30 am, when the house is still filled with cool night and morning air, and all blinds and window coverings to keep infrared rays from heating the interior.  After the sun begins to go down and the high temperature has been reached around 4:00 pm, people begin opening window coverings and windows to usher in cool high desert night air.  Summer low temperatures can be in the 40s and 50s; houses cool off very nicely and quickly.  One qualifier is it is a “dry” heat - but homeowners undoubtedly save significant money on energy bills by avoiding air conditioning through intelligent and purposeful use of window coverings.

Back to our upstairs office - we rarely see highs in the 90s in Seattle during summer time but nice summer days with temps ranging from the high 70s to 80s do heat up the upstairs space significantly.  We have quality windows but automating motorized blinds with heat and ambient light sensors could go a long way to regulating temperature upstairs.  We do have motorized blinds that are automated in our home theater downstairs.  One setting is for the blinds to descend when we activate the “movie” scene to reduce glare on the screen and aid in creating an optimal light level.  The blinds also descend when the house is shut down at night and when we leave for added security - would-be thieves can’t see into the basement and see the home theater equipment.  It was a significant modification to take down molding and run Romex into the window framing for installation and then the serial cable to the home controller for automation.

If we had the option for motorized blinds in our home office, we’d integrate sensors for temperature and light so the blinds would lower and raise in response to pre-programmed settings.  We’d also work with one of our window coverings partners - we did a much better job of selecting shades that were appropriate for our window covering goals downstairs, but we could have done better with the coverings in the home office.  Even when down, the existing coverings don’t do a very good job of filtering infrared and UV rays, definitely not as good as our Draper shades downstairs.  One of my favorite things about our home theater shades is they’re one way visible - we can see out from inside when they’re down but they’re completely opaque to someone looking in from the outside.  It doesn’t feel so much like a cave when the shades are down and brings some of the outside in.

A colleague was demonstrating a new app on her iTouch the other day.  She downloaded an app called Urban Spoon.  When connected to a Wifi network, Urban Spoon allows her to search for local restaurants according to price, cuisine and other variables.  The interface resembles the windows on a slot machine or “one-armed bandit.”  An especially interesting feature is when she shakes her iTouch, the windows spin like they would on a slot machine and she gets new results that fit her search criteria on a randomized basis.  Another colleague came along, extolled the virtues of Pandora and she quickly downloaded that and began using it.  These colleagues were women in their 50s who delighted in the ease, versatility and customization of their iTouches.  Not typical “early adopters.”

The iPhone and iTouch have potential to be the true breakthrough devices that will bring home control to portable devices as has been promised for the last several years.  Coupled with a truly easy interface and the fierce loyalty of iPhone and iTouch owners to their devices will open markets outside of the entertainment ecoysystem and “early adopters.”

One use that iPhone and iTouch users will appreciate is trasnforming their devices as the universal remote for audio/visual equipment such as set-top cable boxes, televisions or displays, DVRs, receiver/tuners and home controllers.  Universal remotes can be cluttered, unwieldy, and confusing.  Combine universal remote control with the ease and intutitiveness of the iPhone/Touch interface and you truly have a breakthrough use for a product customers love.  Both Lagotek and Control4 offer iPhone/iTouch universal remote capability as well as providing control of other automated systems that can be installed in later phases of an installation.

I wrote a post a couple months ago with several questions I’d ask a builder if I were shopping new construction.  One of the things I’d look for is a network drop in the place where I’d plan to mount my flatscreen tv.  Here’s further evidence in a CE Pro survey published this week that I’m not barking up the wrong tree.  Builders, remodelers and electricians…you’ve begun installing outlets and coaxial connections above fireplace mantles and at a mid-wall level in great rooms and home theaters; it’s time to add a wired network with a CAT6 drop for televisions.

A publication came out from CABA at CES  this week that explored various theories as to why home automation hasn’t seen the explosive growth that’s been predicted for several years.  CABA’s version is optimistic while the New York Times’ spin on the Technology page was more dour.  But both agree that there’s a need for something known as the “killer app.”

Despite it’s rather ominous sounding name, a killer app is “A killer application (commonly shortened to killer apps), in the jargon of computer programmers and video gamers, has been used to refer to any computer program that is so necessary or desirable that it provides the core value of some larger technology.” - Wikipedia.  Some examples of killer apps are email which drew people to using desktop computers in the home as well as the web.  The Mosaic full screen browser was the killer app to bring the masses to using the Internet and ultimately, e-commerce.  The Kindle from Amazon may be the killer app for electronic books - although there are plenty of nay-sayers who still doubt the Kindle.  I see Kindle as the killer app for that elusive consumer electronics niche - women.  Men pan the Kindle, women buy it, love it and endorse it.

This editorial from Hidden Wires magazine, the home automation magazine of Europe, posed the killer app question to experts in integration from all over Europe.  Not surprisingly, their ideas for the killer app for home automation were all over the place.  Security and surveillance, power use monitoring and instant feedback, excellent touchscreen interfaces, and remote access and control of the system using a smartphone were all mentioned.  But the response of Ly Chiu, Managing Director of Cytech Technology really caught my attention.  His position is that the killer app for home automation will be relible voice recognition.  He sees potential not only for control of the system without hunting for the universal remote or your phone or going to the nearest touchscreen, but control that is transformative and liberating.  Imagine what voice control of automation can do for disabled and elderly populations?

This reminded me of something my sister, Andrea, asked in the early days of Hestia Network:  “Can you make it help me find my purse?”  It wasn’t the distributed audio, the HD and 7.1 surround a/v system, the touchscreen, the universal remote, remote access, or energy usage control that excited her.  She saw value in a home automation system that could do something really practical that is an ongoing need.  Some Canadian students have launched Project LadyBag.  It’s a purse that uses RFID technology to determine if a set list of items deemed necessary to have in the purse are in it before you leave the house.  If you forget your cellphone and that’s programmed into your LadyBag, an LED display will show you that your cellphone is missing.  Practical, useful and the purses are nice-looking as well.  Market opportunity?  Market researcher Kelley Styring estimates that 88.5 million women use over 212 million purses at any given time.

Our industry needs to figure out how to market home automation to women.  A Coach bag and voice recognition technology could be the beginning of a beautiful relationship.  And be the killer app…

This year with our expanded home automation system we tried using an outlet switch for our outdoor Christmas lights rather than the old school rotating timers.  We used the Control4 outlet switch in the garage - right now Control4 isn’t making a wireless outlet switch that can stand up to use outdoors.  But we usually have a cord going into the garage anyways so it was easy to add.  The outlet in question is on the ceiling and also powers the garage door opener and the Card Access sensor attached to it.  We stabilized it by using the screwmount at the top of the switch which is fine for holding it in place.

What does the switch do that an ordinary outdoor timer can’t?  Well, we’ve got it calibrated according to sunset - the lighting scene activates 15 minutes before sunset and self-adjusts according to our exact location and time zone every day.  Another advantage has to do with a power outage we had briefly on Christmas Eve due to heavy snows - 4 hours.  We left the house for a time during the outage and I wondered if the switch would adjust to correct time when the power came back on.  I’m happy to report that it passed this major test.  No reloading of the scene or programming was required.  The only clocks we had to reset were on the range and microwave. I have another string around the deck that is on a traditional outdoor timer and had to reset the time after my oldest daughter complained about the lights being on after midnight and illuminating her room so as to prevent sleep.

Next year, I foresee using outlet switches for all of my Christmas lighting needs, including the tree and mantle.  We don’t have huge amounts of lights - but I can see the value of outlet switches for displays with several hundred lights and programming lighting animation rather than a static “all on or all off” scene that outdoor timers allow.  December power outages are a way of life in the Pacific Northwest - I’m impressed with the performance of our system and the switch after undergoing this major test.

We recently completed a lighting and security installation at Peaks Frozen Custard in Seattle, WA.  Peaks had their grand opening the Friday after Thanksgiving and has been doing brisk business in spite of the recent cold and stormy weather we’ve been experiencing.  Peaks Frozen Custard was founded by our neighbor Tim Wolfe and friend Theresa Blaser who are Wisconsin transplants and UW-Madison classmates.  Tim approached us when they’re were remodeling their storefront last summer about automated lighting solutions.  Peaks strives to be as green as possible in their use of resources and energy from the containers and utensils used for their frozen custard, espresso and baked goods to construction materials to lighting solutions.  Peaks is taking advantage of the Smart Business Program with Seattle City Light to keep their lighting electrical costs below a set wattage each day to earn rebates from the utility.  Hestia Network was able to help with a simple installation that was focused on lighting control.

Peaks offers free wi-fi for their customers so a wireless system was a natural choice for their automation installation.  We installed keypads, dimmers and outlet switches that are programmed for three different scenes:  Pre-opening, open and close.  Additionally, we integrated an ambient light sensor from Card Access.  When a certain  level of natural lighting coming through the south-facing windows is detected by the sensor, the lights dim or turn off.  Motion sensors are integrated into the restrooms to reduce unnecessary lighting in unoccupied bathrooms.  Wireless webcams are part of the security system.  Tim can use his Blackberry or a computer for remote access and management of his lighting and security systems through a web-based interface.

The reviews for Peaks’ frozen custard have so far been wildly enthusiastic - especially for the chocolate frozen custard.  Located on NE 65th between 12th Ave NE and Roosevelt Way (right next to Teddy’s), Peaks has a fabulous product and delightful space.  Stop in for fresh coffee and espresso drinks, baked goods by Theresa, and the finest frozen treat in Seattle.

Many home automation control systems tend to introduce more equipment into the home rather than decreasing or eliminating devices.  In addition to existing audio/visual equipment, most installations include the addition of a control center that’s the size of an average tuner/amplifier that is usually included in a racking system near the a/v equipment.  Throw in a power management device (like the Panamax M5100-PM) and you’re adding two more shelves or upgrading your racking system all together to make room for your new devices.  In addition to swapping out thermostats and switches, touchscreen interfaces are typically added in central locations - we’re averaging three control interfaces in fixed locations in our typical installations.

There is a signifcant and growing sector of our customers that wants to decrease or de-emphasize the amount of devices installed in their homes.  Simply put, they want something that’s clean, simple and classy - not a flashy or huge interface that screams, “I have a home automation system!”  Not surprisingly, these are customers doing a major remodel or retrofit into one of the thousands of homes in Seattle built between the 1920 and 1960.  It’s important to these customers to retain the architectural style and feel of their home while updating integrating their security, climate, lighting and entertainment into a single control system.  The Lagotek HIP100 has been an excellent solution for our customers who are looking for a solution that reduces or eliminates wall clutter and want modern control and efficiency without compromising the character of their homes.

The HIP100 can take the place of the following devices that have typically been installed as separate devices in a home automation solution:  the control device itself, irrigation control keypad, thermostat, intercom, security keypad and alarm, audio/visual components.  All of these functions can be launched, programmed and controlled from a single device that measures the size of your average programmable thermostat - about 3 x 4 inches.  The HIP100 operates off a Z-Wave wireless mesh network - with a some modification of an existing space for a two or three switch gangbox, the HIP100 easily integrates into older construction.

The December 2008 issue of Telephony magazine is dedicated to the connected home.  Of special note in this issue, is an article by Carol Wilson - “Connected Homes, The Next Network Frontier.” The refrain for connected devices and control systems in today’s home continues to be KISS - Keep Is Simple (fill in your favorite perjorative beginning with S here).

The wow factors in home automation continue to be fun but the ability of a home automation system to be practical, useful and solve problems is what will propel connected homes forward in the coming years.  Thermostats and energy management that allow local and remote access via computer or cellphone are mentioned specifically.

And why not?  Thermostats are already in homes - as stated in Telephony, they’re a necessity, not a luxury.  Customers are very receptive to a replacement of an existing device that is affordable, has an interface they are already familiar with and know how to operate, yet will improve efficiency and performance.  A home control thermostat fits the bill perfectly.

We’ve had a programmable thermostat since remodeling our home in 2000 but recently swapped out the old Honeywell model for a Control4 thermostat.  In addition to the thermostat itself, we manipulate our climate settings at our 4″ and 7″ touchscreens, the smart remote and through the on-screen interface on our flat-screen.  Our former thermostat, while programmable, was limited.  Two climate scenes - just leave and return - and on holidays, snow days or other weekdays when we were at home, we’d remember to turn on “Hold Temp” only after the temperature had dipped to 63 degrees and we were looking for wool socks and sweaters.

We’re doing much finer calibration and setting programming with the Control4 Thermostat.  Currently, we’re planning to program a scene that will kick in at the activation of Power Down setting that will put the thermostat at a lower setting when we actually leave the house, whether it’s for the entire day on a weekday or for a few hours on the weekend.  Two advantages:  we’re not bound by an arbitrary time setting that may not be in effect every single day.  The system will activate the thermostat to heat at a lower temperature when we actually leave the house.  The second advantage is on weekends with children who are growing older and busier, we’re finding we spend significant time away from our home, yet the climate is still in Weekend mode and heating the space as if we’re there.

We’re investigating if we can program recurring events such as holidays or school breaks into our climate control as well….

Interesting blog post from Bits, a technology blog in the New York Times by Saul Hansell.   This post resonates with our previous post What I’d Ask a Builder if Buying New Construction…regarding intentional wiring for what we think is the future for video - streaming or downloading from the Internet, rather than renting from a brick and mortar store or mail service.  In South Korea, consumers can download or stream a newly released movie before it comes out in DVD now and Internet rentals have eclipsed the traditional movie rental market in sales.

One thing I learned from this post that helps digital distribution immensely in South Korea is 19/20 homeowners are broadband subscribers and the download speed is 6x faster than the average speed of broadband dowload in the U.S. - 43mbps compared to 8.8mbps here.  Let’s hope the promises of improving the national broadband infrastructure come to fruition.

You can read Saul Hansell’s post here.

There are a lot of great deals in new construction to be had right now.  Buyers who have the down payment and financing pre-approval right now are finding that properties that were out of reach a few months ago are now within price range.  Amenities in these deals include  green features such as sustainably harvested hardwoods in flooring and trim, low-voc paint, recycled materials in finishes such as countertops and tiling.

We’ve been visiting some new properties that have been on the market for several months in Seattle to see what builders are including in new construction to address technology needs and wants of homebuyers today and in the coming months when the market will stabilize.  We’re surprised to find that these new properties are technologically and electronically very similar to the new homes built in the previous decade.  If I were shopping new construction for my next home, these are five questions I’d be asking builders:

1.  “What kind of outlet is installed in rooms where I’m most likely to mount my flat-screen and is it installed so I can mount my flatscreen on the wall?”

In a new home we looked at last week for field research, we were encouraged to see an outlet over the mantle above the fireplace in the living room.  But this was a bright light-filled room that blended into the dining room and kitchen for the “great room” effect and not an ideal location for a dedicated home theater.  Downstairs provided a more ideal space for home theater set-up, but was there an outlet installed for a wall-mounted flatscreen?  No, outlets in the downstairs space were all located 12″ from the floor.

We also paid attention to the kind of outlet that was installed.  For our flatscreen LCD downstairs, we retrofitted a power conditioning outlet from Panamax with a built in surge protector.  There are normal everyday current spikes in your electrical system from turning on things such as hair dryers, vacuum cleaners, air circulation from the furnace - typically anything that requires a motor.  Spikes up to 300 volts can enter your system and outlets.  Surge protectors are designed to protect against significant spikes like one sees in a lightening strike or restoration of power after a total outage, not these little day to day spikes.  But today’s flatscreen televisions have circuit boards that are highly susceptible to damage from these smaller fluctuations in volts.  A power conditioning outlet regulates voltage protects your investment and should be standard in the locations where a display will be plugged in.

2.  Did you wire for the new digital sound standard - 5.1 surround?

Amidst all the hoopla about the new digital video standard that goes into effect in February 2009, we’re not hearing so much about the new digital audio standard that goes into effect as well.  All audio broadcast over the air as of February 2009 will be in digital 5.1 surround.  5.1 means front left, center and right and real left and right with the “1″ being low frequency or sub-woofer.   Any room that might have a television should have speaker wire behind walls or in ceilings as well as wall plates for a clean speaker installation, connection and configuration.

3.  Did you run CAT5 or CAT6, where are there drops and did you run two cables?

More and more devices are going to run off power over ethernet (our 7″ touchscreen mentioned above for example) or benefit from a wired network connection (our Control4 Speaker Points for distributed audio).  We think video distribution via broadband is the next big development.  Netflix understands this with streaming video to PC service and their partnerships with Xbox, Roku and TiVo for bridging digital video between a wired network and the television.  Vudu is another well-regarded company with a product that is gaining significant traction in the digital streaming market.

4.  Is there a network drop next to the outlet for the television?

See #3.

5.  Where should I put my wireless router in this house?

In addition to desktop and laptops, more and more devices run off a mesh wireless network than ever before.  In our house we’re running multiple laptops, the home automation system and peripherals all on a wireless network.  If you’ve ever tried to use a wireless network that was retrofitted into a building built primarily of concrete (think your typical building at a college), you’ve probably experienced the poor performance due to building materials.  Anything reflective such as glass, sheet metals in ducting systems, steel framing and mirrors will impair a signal’s ability to travel.  Anything impervious such as granite, marble or concrete will also interfere with a wireless network.  A home with infrastructure and finishes that I’ve just described might need more than one wireless router for a reliable signal.  Router placement could be included in architectural plans as easily as receptacle, switch and phone jack placements.  Router placements should be considered in advance of constructin and included in architectural plans.

We recently added the Control4 7″ touchscreen to our home automation system. It’s installed right between the kitchen and dining rooms, the hub of activity morning and evening. A feature that we added to our programming configuration is WeatherBug.

I admit to being a weather junkie.  My addiction is way beyond watching the Weather Channel - that’s for amateurs.  Before WeatherBug, one of my sources for weather info was (and continues to be) the National Weather Service site for the Western region of the U.S.  I check and read from time to time the discussions posted by meteorologists at the Seattle NOAA office, on the upcoming forecast.  It feels like having an access to insider information.  The meteorologists try to reconcile different modeling solutions generated out of Canada, Europe and Asia with the information they get from their local models.  The almanac has been an excellent source for historical information in my instructional work.  The NOAA site though isn’t for everyone - lots of jargon and abbreviations that have taken me time to decode and understand such as “AFD” - Area Forecaster Discussion, “IR” - Infrared, “POPS” - having to do with chance of precipitation.  Some jargon I still don’t understand - dirty ridging for example.  Sounds kind of…sexy.  But I have no idea what that means.

Along comes WeatherBug.  Control4 recently announced in conjunction with the release of their 7″ touchscreen that they’d formed a partnership with Weatherbug.  Weatherbug is affiliated with our local NBC affiliate here in Seattle.  WeatherBug gathers local data through partnerships with local schools, churches and community organizations.  My local weather data comes from a little weather station installed at a private school 20 blocks from my house.  The WeatherBug application is programmed to show me my local data, although changing to another location is easy to do in settings.  Additionally, a 24 hour weather camera gives me a visual option.  What really sets WeatherBug apart from my favorite NOAA website is it’s ability to notify me immediately if there is an alert has been issued related to weather or civil emergency.

So far, I love WeatherBug. I installed it on two laptops prior to adding it to our Control4 system to get familiar with the interface and the alerting capability.  We added WeatherBug to our Control4 system and enabled the 7″ touchscreen to show WeatherBug info by pressing the first button on the left at the bottom of the touchscreen.  The initial press reveals any weather or civil emergency alerts - subsequent presses show us current conditions (including the outside temp) and a five day forecast, complete with little weather graphics.  Not long after the initial installation of WeatherBug, I was startled on a windy Saturday afternoon in early October by what sounded like a cricket.  My first though was my 13-year-old had managed to procure a cellphone without my knowledge and I actually rifled through her backpack looking for the source of the mysterious noise that sounded like a ringtone.

We realized it was WeatherBug sounding the alert tone.  A check at the touchscreen showed us that NOAA had just published a wind advisory alert, including areas affected and expected time when the alert would expire.  One of the great things about living in the Northwest is the weather isn’t about extremes.  Sure, we get the odd snowstorm and a truly destructive windstorm or rain event every few years.  But we don’t have a tornado or hurricane season to contend with as other parts of the nation must.  WeatherBug is a must-have for any Control4 installation from the Great Plains states to the Eastern Seaboard, especially in Tornado Alley.  While the weather alerting feature in WeatherBug is more of a curiosity satisfier for me, it also includes alerts having to do with geological phenomena which make it a must-have for a Western States installation.  Volcanic eruptions, lahars, tsunamis and earthquake aftermath are all part of life on the Pacific Rim.  WeatherBug is tied into the agencies that will disseminate information in the event of a tectonic occurrence.

I get a kick out of having weather information at my fingertips as does the rest of my household.  But WeatherBug is more than a “fun” feature in a Control 4 system.  I consider it as essential to a home automation installation as security.  We’re still experimenting with more configuration options such as a screen within a screen display if a weather alert is issued while we’re watching a DVD and sending a text from the Control4 system if an alert is issued.  You can get text messages from WeatherBug directly - for $3.99 per month.   We think a Control4 system should be able to give access to the WeatherBug application through 4Sight.

In my CABA briefs today, a digest for an article published in the Arizona Republic by Rosie Romero on lighting control as an introduction to home automation caught my eye. A great, succinct and straightforward explanation of lighting control through home automation and why this is an ideal launching pad for introducing home automation to new adopters. Some of the programming add-ons mentioned are ones we have in our own house. If our garage door is left open in the evening past 9:00, we get a text message that says “Close the garage door!”

Amidst all the vendors, dealers and entrepreneurs at CEDIA 2008, here are some products and companies that stood out to us here at Hestia Network that have true transformational power…

SE2 Labs ITC One - We’re continually searching for the excellent product that integrate simplicty and intuition in design.  The ITC One was  unlike any other device at CEDIA that we saw.  A single appliance that contains a X-Box 360, Blue-Ray Drive, High Def DVR, Bryston surround sound processor, Netlinx control system for automation, Icepower amp, Apple TV and iPod dock, smart remote and power conditioner unit.  Imagining a huge racking system?  The ITC One contains it all in dimensions no larger than a small subwoofer.   XLR ports for speakers, ability to add Wii, an excellent cooling system and the most straightforward connection panel I’ve seen yet.  The interface is a 4″ touchscreen that is intuitive - it’s literally plug and play and delivers excellent high end performance.  An excellent solution for a customer looking for a total home entertainment solution that combines quality and performance with user friendliness and aesthetics.  An amazing and exciting product…

Zee Vee ZvBox - Using the television as a computer display is not new - but streaming digital content from the Internet through a desktop to an HDTV is new.  We thought this was nifty when we saw this demonstrated in Denver - the upconverting is real and impressive.  We got a marketing e-mail from Amazon touting it’s new video on demand service this week and immediately thought of the ZvBox.  We’re convinced video and audio content on is going to move exclusively to streaming and on-demand, making cable, the DVD rental business and satellite a thing of the past.   The device is an excellent bridge for this emerging technology as well as a great platform for viewing the digital content generated by home users.  Home video and slideshows will be taken to a whole new level.