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The 5 Most Affordable Ways To DIY Home Automation

in today's video I get to play God let there be lights and you get to watch me in bed IOT and AI are in a category right now where we in the tech industry would call disruptive technology technology that completely takes the world by storm and changes it for good in this video I'll be showing you five devices using which you can make this disruptive technology affordable technology device number one and the most expensive among the five that we'll be seeing today is Amazon echo dot this device requires no introduction but if you have been living under a rock for the past two years then here's what you need to know all the major tech companies are working on AI voice assistance that control your electrical or electronic devices Apple with Siri and Apple home Google with okay Google and Google home Microsoft is just wasting their time on Cortana and Amazon as Alexa okay if you have one of these nearby now now is a good time to put them on mute because I'll be using them quite a bit during this video the echo dot is the cheapest among Amazon's echo range of products and it costs about 50 pounds though I would be using a couple of echo dot devices to review the other four products today it's not absolutely mandatory for you to have one of these a Google home device or even your smartphone should suffice now that we've got that out of the way let the fun begin the Philips you starter kit cost one hundred and fifty pounds and their LED strips cost fifty pounds these are a couple of devices that brought home automation into mainstream today but the for devices I'd be reviewing today will cost a fraction of that and they can pretty much do almost everything that those devices can so now for device number two is the zone of Wi-Fi wall switch with touch controls it costs 10 pounds and trust me if the best 10 pounds you'll ever spend you can use it manually using the touch controls you can control it using the EB link app on your smart phone and you can also control it using Alexa of Google home by adding the EB links kill this switch will replace your regular wall switch the neutral in goes into the first port the live in goes into the second port and the light out goes into the third once installed you can connect this to your home's Wi-Fi network and control the device from anywhere in the world using the app in my case I am currently just controlling lights and an exhaust fan but you can control almost anything that is connected to the end of the switch here's a demo Alexa turn on bathroom lights and the best bit is you don't have to get out of bed to turn off the lights Alexa turn off bedroom lights ok you can also create groups and scenes to control multiple devices using a single amount Alexa but we'll discuss this in more detail in a future video device number 3 is the zone of Wi-Fi LED ceiling light I don't have a sample at hand but I have one installed on the ceiling in my room to install just remove your regular bulb socket setup from your ceiling and replace it with this LED panel connect the wires light to live and neutral to neutral and then same as before you connect the device to your home's Wi-Fi network using the EB link app on your phone you connect it to the Amazon echo dot using the Alexa app on your phone once done read the Bible Genesis chapter 1 verse 3 Alexa let there be lights and you will see that it is good device number 4 is the smart life LED are GB Wi-Fi light controller I know that's quite a mouthful you can see these LED strips almost everywhere these days they cost under five pounds for five meters and with over 20 color combinations they look pretty awesome when you buy one of these they usually come with a power adapter that plugs into a small control unit like this the control unit has a four pin connector and an infrared receiver and it also comes with an IR remote that you can use to control the color the brightness and the pattern of these LED lights now all you have to do is replace this regular control unit with the smart control unit that will cost you about five pounds you can now connect the smart controller to your Wi-Fi network and add the smart life-skills to Alexa once this is done you can not only turn your LED strips on and off you can also change the colors on them Alexa set wall lights to red Alexa set wall lights to green Alexa set wall lights to yellow Alexa set wall lights to blue device number five the last device we'll be reviewing today is the most simple and the most versatile of them all is the sewn off DIY switch it cost us four pounds you can snap this in between any pair of live and neutral wires and control the device at the end of it you take the top plates off connect the input ends coming from the wall socket and connect the output ends to the device you want to automate once connected make sure to put the top plates on and ensure that the device is properly insulated now you can connect this to your home's Wi-Fi network and control the device using the EB link app or Alexa I have connected a four-way power distributor by snapping the wire in the middle and installing this DIY switch this way I'm able to control the LED strips around the Shelf the two blue LED lamps in the first and last shelves a DVD player and the light saber on top I have also grouped it to the smart life RGB controller on the Alexa app this way I can control the devices on the shelves and also the lights around the walls all with a single command to Alexa I will show you in detail on how you can set up each of these devices in my future videos so make sure to hit the subscribe button if you have any questions leave a comment below and I'll do my best to answer them if you liked the video hit the thumbs up button if you disliked the video if the thumbs down button but do something and make yourself useful I will leave the links for all the items that I reviewed today in the description below but be sure to buy the ones specific to your country because the power supply and the construction method differ from country to country also be safe and meddling with electricity thanks for watching take

https://youtu.be/2lqJzCP8d6Y

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Home Automation with Raspberry Pi and OpenHab

his week we've got something special for you this is the first video in a series that we're putting together show you how to build your own home automation system using the open source software open tab we'll be building a Raspberry Pi touchscreen command center they can interface with over a hundred and fifty different smart home products and provides an interface for control and task scheduling instead of using an existing product though we'll build our own wirelessly controlled RGB LED strip that interfaces with openhab that allows you to control it from any smartphone or computer on your network openhab is great because it interfaces with so many products it's free it's open source and it's incredibly versatile it also runs on Windows OSX and Linux so you don't necessarily have to use a Raspberry Pi for this project if you have an old laptop or desktop kicking around you can just as easily run the same set up we also want to thank Aero for sponsoring this build they've given us access to their vast inventory of electronic components in order to make this project series possible we're really excited to share what we've come up with main parts for this build are a Raspberry Pi and touchscreen as well as the components used to control the neopixel strip you can purchase the component from Aero or other online electronics vendors you also need a few tools for soldering and programming microcontroller begin by assembling the Raspberry Pi touchscreen and mounting it to the PI then download the latest build of raspbian from the Raspberry Pi website and flash it onto an SD card plug in a keyboard and Wi-Fi adapter then insert the card into the pi and boot it up go through the configuration process for your setup in order to get the touchscreen to work you'll likely need to run a few commands in the command line to update raspbian after the update restarting the PI will flip the screen upside down if that's a bother to you you can flip it back by adding the line LCD underscore rotate equals 2 to the config dot text file in the boot folder now it's time to install our home automation control software openhab and the associated openhab add-ons we'll be using this gets a little command-line heavy so for a full list of commands click on the link to the project instructions in the description below since the communication between our openhab server and our lights will occur over a messaging protocol called MQTT we'll need to install mosquito and MQTT broker finally download our pre-made openhab configuration files in stall them in the Associated openhab folders with openhab setup on a Raspberry Pi it's time to switch to building our neopixel strip controller the cheap Wi-Fi enabled at Adafruit esp8266 huzzah board is perfect for this but because it uses 3.3 volt logic level instead of the neopixel strips five volts will need to solder a logic level converter between them before we start that though solder the provided header pins to the board so we can program it using an FTDI adapter now on the low-level side of the converter pin to from the ESP will connect to a 1 pin 3 2 LV and ground to ground on the high side of converter pen b1 is soldered to the neopixel data pin wire that's the striped wire on the neopixel connector and ground will go to ground solder a red wire to the HV pin on the converter and another red wire to the B+ on the ESP male end of the neopixel strip will also provide power for the ESB so solder the red wire from the strip to the red wires coming from the V Plus and HV pins and the black wire goes to the ground on the ESP after that plug the neopixel strip into the wall with a provided cord and make sure that the ESP is getting power by hitting the reset button to see if the on-board LED flashes with everything wired up it's time to flash the ESP using the arduino ide take a moment to install the boards and libraries by following the links in the description and then open the provided arduino sketch then edit the sketch to include your Wi-Fi network settings and the PI's IP address you can check your PI's IP address by typing IP space addr space show into the command line connect your computer to the ESP with an FTDI cable and set your board and port in the arduino ide put the ESP into programming mode by holding the GPIO 0 button down and pressing the reset button then upload your code after it's flashed open a serial monitor and make sure that the board connects to your Wi-Fi network successfully with openhab configured in our neopixel strip on the network it's time to test it out download the openhab app to your phone or tablet it's available for both Android and iOS then open it and select settings in the upper right corner change the open have URL field to your PI's IP address followed by a colon and 8080 exit the menu and your phone should connect to openhab bringing up your led controller alternatively you can also control the LEDs from any computer on the same network including the pi by entering the PI's IP address followed by slash openhab app question mark sitemap equals home I know a lot of you probably thinking that there are a lot easier ways to control RGB LED strips wirelessly but there's a reason we decided to do it this way openhab is extremely versatile and we've only just scratched the surface of the things you can do with it you can control things with voice commands monitor sensor networks even set up rules for automating devices from email or if t8 events in future videos we'll show you how to build other cool devices that connect to openhab make your house even smarter that's it for this time we'll see you in the next weekend project if you liked this video subscribe to our channel or send us a comment on Facebook or Twitter be sure to check out our other project videos or visit us on make zine calm

https://youtu.be/G65aCy_SsYI

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Alert 360

At Alert 360, we deliver experience, best-in-class technology, reliable and dependable service, innovative partnerships … complete security + automation. We connect people to their lives and homes, helping protect the things they care most about. We help automate their every day, delivering convenience and comfort in a busy world. And, we provide this through you – our valued dealer partners – and our simple, straightforward and extremely rewarding dealer program.

Source: LinkedIn Public Company Page

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Loxone UK

Founded in 2009, there are currently 50,000 Loxone Smart Homes worldwide, automated using high-quality products designed and manufactured at our headquarters in Kollerschlag, Austria. The Loxone Smart Home looks after all the aspects that you would expect from a true modern smart home; such as lighting, heating, multiroom audio, security and more. All of these functions are centrally controlled by the Loxone Miniserver, which communicates between switches, lights, speakers, relays and the like to automate everyday tasks. Loxone can also take care of the more complex aspects of a smart home, for example energy management including Solar PV optimisation and the control of heating and cooling systems. Again, these are all centrally controlled by the Miniserver to give the end user a seamless experience.

Source: LinkedIn Public Company Page

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Netatmo

Netatmo is a leading smart home company creating simple, beautiful smart solutions for a safer and more comfortable home. The company’s ambition is to bring useful technology, to the most intimate place you own. In order to pursue this goal, Netatmo follows four commitments that embody the company’s DNA: • Durable design: no planned obsolescence. • Privacy at its core: from the conception phase, we ensure that we can guarantee data protection. • Useful & reliable: our products make your life easier. • Thoughtful notifications: we notify you only when it is important. Since 2012, Netatmo has launched thirteen devices and accessories to meet the main demands of the smart home industry. The company offers different solutions to automate the home and make life easier, from its first product in 2012 to today. In addition to its main product range, Netatmo collaborates with key industrial leaders with its “with Netatmo” program to expand its reach and continue to grow strategically with smart integrated solutions that fit in your home’s infrastructure. Thanks to this strategy, Netatmo can bring simpler, easier and better home experiences. Netatmo, same home, just smarter.

Source: LinkedIn Public Company Page