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Automation Can Be More Then Clapper

(This is a paper I wrote for my Advanced Composition class. The assignment was a "Definition Paper", I received a "A".)

July 1996

When you put together the words “home'' and “automation,'' it often doesn't mean anything to people.

However, having a light switch can technically be a form of automation, since it allows one to turn on a light without having to get into the electrical connections or having to screw in a light bulb every time the light needs to come on. Therefore, home automation means reducing the number of tasks to perform some action in your home.

An automated home can be very simple. Some forms of simple automation include the light switch, garage door opener, dishwasher, and microwave oven. A dishwasher saves the user from having to wash dishes by hand. A wireless remote control in use with a motorized garage door opener saves the user from having to get out of the car to manually open the garage. A microwave is as common as a conventional oven, and in some cases replaces it. Even the Clapper, a device that lets you turn something on by clapping your hands, is a form of home automation. Today we consider these necessities of living and may even take them for granted. Who washes their clothes or even their dishes by hand today? A 100 years ago dishwashers were people you hired, there was no need for a garage door openers since people didn't have cars (or garages).

When people speak of home automation they are most likely talking about capabilities beyond what is standard in a home today. To the enthusiast, home automation means reducing tasks to performing some action in the home far more that what is common. It often goes beyond reducing beyond reducing tasks to anticipating what tasks will need to be performed in the future.

To do this, one needs more than just a light switch: one needs a computer with the proper software and the ability to interface the computer with the light switch. Not just one light switch but al1 the light switches, the stereo, the ceiling fans, the appliances, etc. The computer will need to know if it's dark out, if it's raining, what the internal temperature of the house is, etc. The more data the house can collect, the better.

Let’s say it is very early in the morning or late at night and dark. You need to get up to go to the bathroom or get ready for work. In doing so you have to fumble around in the dark to find the light switch. When you turn on the light it wakes your spouse. Having the light come on instantly at full brightness isn't the most pleasant experience after being asleep for several hours. An advanced automated home solves this problem. First, motion detectors or proximity detectors detect that someone is getting up to go somewhere in the house. Since the computer knows it's dark out and all the lights are off, it can turn on some very low boor lighting. As the detectors follow you through the house they can turn on lighting as you walk and turn off lighting behind you. A very smart system could predict where you're going and turn on lighting ahead of you. When you arrive in the bathroom there's no need to look for the light switch; the computer will turn it on for you based on motion detector data. But it will not turn the lights a1l the way on, it will calculate the time between sunset and sunrise and determine what percentage to turn the light on (30% for example). Once you have left the bathroom and gone back to bed the computer would know this and turn off the lighting behind you.

Another use of advanced home automation is controlling other systems in the house and eliminating the human element a1l together (so the human element can go do more interesting things). By gathering weather information, temperature, rainfall data, and forecasts, the computer could manage the watering of the grass and plants. lf it knows what the watering requirements of the plants are and how much water they have received historically, it can calculate how much water they will need in the future. lf it knows the weather forecast-' can give the plants water or back because rain is expected. A very advanced system could have cameras that look at the color of the grass and determine that it needs fertilizer. It also has the advantage of “saving the environment” by giving the landscape only the amount of water it needs and not over watering.

Much of the systems described are very advanced and not in widespread use today. The hobbyists and home automation industry developing these systems are much like the same people who experimented with electric light over one hundred years ago. What we consider standard today would be considered magic to some back A century from now home automation will probably still not be a common term, yet many of the systems that are considered advanced today will be common place or even considered a necessity.

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