The majority of lights in our house are X10 controlled either through a wall mount receiver, hard-wired module or plug in modules. There are a few lights that need to still be included which are not controllable from the web page or from the various hand-held remotes but they are in the future plan. Since lights have a very high activity rate, I decided not to try to track each and every change in light status. Instead, I included some code in the TC+ that looks for a LIGHTREFRESH command from the PC and then sends the current light data back to the PC for viewing in a web page. This requires a REFRESH button on the lights status page but keeps traffic low. The refresh button fires off the LIGHTREFRESH command, waits for the execution of it, and then goes back to the lights status page which reads the light status text file and builds the display page.

Additionally, lights can be controlled from the web page in similar fashion. There are some limitations at this time in what can be controlled since keyboard access to all 256 X10 modules is difficult using the keyboard in the EventManage program. Instead, I have selected the key lights to control, added a form for them on the lights page and then provided code in the TC+ to look for those commands and control the light. Some functions are easy to establish such as ALL LIGHTS ON or ALL LIGHTS OFF, others are more difficult to setup controls since code must be written for each activity in the TC+. Hopefully future versions or the EventManager software or a replacement for it will be available that will allow DDE or some other automation interaction with the TC+ and local programs on the PC.

I have several appliances tied into the HA system one way or another and in this area have simply provided some status views and controls for them. Appliances that currently do not have direct HA controls such as the washing machine and dryer provide status information only. Since these items cannot be ‘refreshed’ for status information, a status file is written each time the unit toggles on or off. The latest information is provided on the web page with logs available for seeing the history of each unit.

For example, we can see if the Washing and Dryer are on or off from the Appliances page and the last time the activity was logged. When logged in, there are some additional features that allow viewing graphs of the log files providing run time information and estimated electrical usage based on the runtime. Other appliances such the humidifier are treated similarly except they can be turned on or off from the web page. Next I’d like to track the water heater but being a natural gas fired unit, I’m going to have to see how to get status information back from it. Additionally, the dish washer is on the list since it will rather easy to control via X10 and can then be schedule off hours or during the day if we are not here to hear it run it’s cycle. I am current working on feedback sensors for the refrigerators allowing run time data for them.

An interesting item as to why the entertainment system would be accessible from the web is the entertainment system. Consisting of the video/audio receiver/amplifier, TV/Monitor, VCR, and Cable box, the system can track status information by using the switched power outlet on the main units. The output of these are hooked up to a 110v AC relay which drives an X10 burglar alarm interface to send an X10 signal when on and when off. This helps the TC+ to make sure the units are off when everything is supposed to be shutdown and on when asked to be on.

Control is provided by the Infrared controller on the TC+. The unit points towards a X10 Powermid that relays the info into the primary living area where the Entertainment system is located. This unit also drives an infrared amplifier block that provided for illumination in the garage which is explained in the security section. The entertainment system is actually one of the easiest areas to control since all the IR commands can be completed through keyboard sequences in the EventManager software. It is slightly tricky since there are a lot of down arrow or down/right arrow keyboard movements to select the right controls but anything that the IR unit can do can be setup.

There are some potential problems in that one does not know the status of the MUTE command for example and unless it is tracked, you can easily be in inverted situation. Future audio feed by using a Real Audio or other server realt time audio encoder at the house would resolve this and provide "listen in" features. I have worked some with this on a Linux machine but have not been happy with the results yet. I have also tried this using Microsoft’s Netmeeting package but really want to keep all interaction web browser based.

The Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning has proved to be the more difficult area to integrate with our existing setback thermostat system. Currently, it is pretty much limited to tracking the current temperature and humidity values, and current status of AC, Heater and blower. With a planned replacement of the existing thermostat with an RCS X10 unit, integration should be much easier. Status for the HVAC unit is currently provided by in-line relays for the thermostat and digital inputs on the TC+.

Currently the temperature control form doesn’t actually control temperatures but all the code is setup both on the web server and the TC+ to handle it.

The primary reason for the Lawn and Garden section is the control and tracking of the sprinkler systems. I also duplicate the temperature section here and the future weather information will most likely be centered around this area. Additionally the front and rear moisture sensors are displayed here. These sensors are manually adjusted on/off sensors and do not provide an analog value at this point.

The security system, a hard-wired burglar and fire unit, is firmly integrated since this was the original reason I wanted web control. I wanted to be able to check the house and make sure the alarm was armed since we frequently forget to set the away mode when leaving the house. Once I get to work, I can view the house and make sure all things are in order if no one is home. I have enabled arming, disarming, and viewing activity logs for those who are authorized for such information. I can view when the alarm last sounded, check to see if all the loops are good and what activity each had, and view and graph historical data for any of the information.

This are also tracks the video log information and will contain the camera captures as soon as they are online. I currently have most of the needed equipment but haven’t setup a machine to do the captures yet. This will be done on the cheap using a Snappy capture device, an old 486 box, and one of the capture packages that are available. I have played with a Connectix cam for this feature too and it works fine, but I haven’t dedicated a camera for this purpose yet.

Obviously this much control must be limited to those who have access to it and this is where the web security comes into play. Although web servers do open your machine up to the world, scripting allows a much deeper level of control than static web sites can. One feature particular to my connection is the use of an Ascend Pipeline 75 router. This router acts as a Network Address Translation, or NAT point and a firewall allowing a better protected internal network. This could be accomplishing using a product such as IPRoute and an old DOS PC for an analog dialup connection which I had before. Additionally, a move to Microsoft NT would increase this security to some degree.

Phone integration with the web server is centered around status information including incoming and outgoing call tracking. On the incoming side, I have a CID tracking program that reads incoming calls, announces them via the Text To Speech (TTS) system and logs the call date, time, name and number to a file that is available to the web server. Outgoing calls can be viewed since all calls DTMF values are stored into a file along with date and time information. As a secondary set of data, the X10 phone controller generates an X10 signal when the phone rings which is tracked to count the number of rings for each incoming call.

Under development, is a PC based voice mail system that will then allow listening to voice mail through the web browser. The key is having the voice mail system log the recorded data into a format that can be read by a web browser or at least a format that can be converted by a command line program that ASPExec can call.

The mode control interface is rather straight forward since I am simply viewing /setting the various modes the system supports. The primary modes of Home/Away, Entertainment, Vacation and Defcon are used to determine how the automation system reacts to activity inside and outside the house. These modes are displayed for authorized users and can be turned on or off from the web interface.

The voice system is one of the more fun areas of the site providing the ability to make the system speak from anywhere in the world. If authorized, the system can be turned on and off through a simple flag file that is created or deleted by the on/off form. From there, one can input any text to say and the Text To Speech (TTS) system will speak it through the audio distribution system.

Currently under development is the speech output section that will use the Microsoft Agent technology to report information in a talking character for the complete system. I have built a couple sample pages using the agents and it is reasonably simple to do. It does limit activity on those pages to Microsoft IE browsers but since most system I will be using are already running IE I personally don’t have any issues with that.

Although there are no standards on web interfacing of home automation systems to date, there are definitely easy ways of putting this feature in place. What I have done is take existing technologies and add a bit of custom programming to interface the different parts. Although ASP programming can be somewhat confusing, anyone that has programmed a TC+ or Stargate can learn how this works with some time and effort. I manager several web sites that use ASP as the core to create custom, database driven web pages and House.ProtoWrxs.com is not too different.