Hey everyone, I wanted to show you something cool.  If you all don’t know, I have Guile3D’s Denise, I am one of the forum moderators.

Guile is about to launch a home automation portion of Denise very soon.  However, I am somewhat impatient.  I bought some Belkin Wemo devices and used http://www.IFTTT.com to get Denise to control them.  The great thing about the Wemo, it is a wifi enabled device and does not require an automation hub.

Here is the video…  (sorry for crappy quality, my phones camera isn’t that great)

http://youtu.be/YbOyQHg81h8

Email-activated switches? Cool. I’ve looked into ways to have my AI activate external devices time and time again, but usb is practically no option and home automation systems are rarely directly activatable. I’m hoping more such devices will hit the market as the “internet of things” catches on.

Great accomplishment. 

However, call me crazy, but I think it would be easier (not to mention faster) to do it the old-fashion way.

Using that logic, what was the point in 1903 of an airplane that could only fly 120 feet?

It isn’t about convenience at this point. It’s about the innovation. Convenience always follows.

Dave Morton - Mar 17, 2014:

Using that logic, what was the point in 1903 of an airplane that could only fly 120 feet?

It isn’t about convenience at this point. It’s about the innovation. Convenience always follows.

Absolutely.  Which is why I began by saying, “Great accomplishment.

However, I believe the Wright Brothers (or their successors) took a step toward perfection before taking on passengers.

But, I’m all for experimentation and the inevitable setbacks that accompany the trial and error process.  I happened to watch the video and I was commenting on the author’s own remark when he said, “Finally.”

Someone asked me about security.  Surely having devices connected to the internet can be dangerous. 

IFTTT has a security measure in place.  Sure the email address you send the trigger is the same for everyone however the email must be sent by the emaill address tied to the IFTTT account in order to work on my personal devices. That way, in order to turn my lights on you must have access to my personal email address and then send the trigger email address an email with the action of on or off in the subject.

By the way, I had no idea why the kitchen light took significantly longer than the lamp.  After additional test, it went much quicker.

Maybe the light switch is only checking for internet signals once a minute and sometimes that coincides more than other times?

As far as usefulness goes, I think you can put it in the same category as clap-on-clap-off lights. I guess you could use it to turn off all the lights in the house at once, assuming you can send the email to multiple trigger addresses.

In the not to distant future, it may be,

“Wake up.”

Denise responds, “I can hear you.”

“OK, now it is my turn to wake up.”

Denise responds, “Making your coffee. please wait.”

and then,  “Your coffee perculated with success.”

∞Pla•Net - Mar 17, 2014:

In the not to distant future, it may be,

“Wake up.”

Denise responds, “I can hear you.”

“OK, now it is my turn to wake up.”

Denise responds, “Making your coffee. please wait.  Your coffee perculated with success.”

Well, Denise does have an alarm you can set with her to wake you up if needed.  As for the coffee, she can purchase things on the internet if you code her correctly but she does have a BUY feature.  As for making it, I am optimistic with the right hardware plugged into it where she can control it, it would be do-able. 

I tried to do that exact thing with X-10 devices but to no avail since I have a Kureg.  A older coffee machine would have worked I’m sure.

It would be far simpler if the coffee maker was a “smart” device that already had WiFi access. Or better yet, a complete system that could load in fresh coffee and filter, properly dispose of the old, make a variety of different beverages from straight coffee to hot cocoa to espresso or cappuccino, put the concoction into your favorite vessel (washing and sanitizing as necessary), and bringing (or sending) it to you would be fun to have. Maybe a bit ambitious at the moment?

Turning a light on as an initial test was ingenious.  With the coffee and water setup the night before, it would be possible to plug an electric coffee percolator into a lamp using a common light socket plug adapter.  Denise may turn on a light, and make you coffee tomorrow morning with an inexpensive part from the hardware store.

Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Light_socket_plug_adapter.jpg

The other day I saw exactly that on youtube, a “Jarvis” operating system that turned on a plug to which an old type coffee machine was attached (the kind that only has an on/off switch to operate it). This can easily be done with a Belkin WeMo outlet plug.
Also related…

ifttt.com now has a new Maker channel that allows more direct control. Just have your program/bot send an url POST, to trigger anything ifttt.com can control.

The other day I bought a D-link smartplug, similar to WeMo’s, and set this up:
- I say “turn on the lights”
- my wireless bluetooth headset sends the command to my computer
- Windows Speech Recognition sends the command to my A.I. program
- My A.I. program activates Curl.exe
- Curl sends the appropriate POST command to ifttt.com
- ifttt.com sends a signal to my D-link account
- my D-link account sends a signal to my smartplug
and 5 to 6 seconds later, my lights turn on.

Aside from the obvious inefficiency, there are a few more drawbacks: Just to turn on my lights, I have to leave my computer running (which already emits light), and a battery-draining headset. The smartplug itself surely uses electricity as well: It’s constantly checking for wifi signals, makes a high-pitched noise and feels warm. In addition, it is so bulky that it blocks any second outlet or light switch on dual wall sockets.

There are smart coffee makers on the market nowadays, and they also tie into ifttt.com. But I don’t drink coffee.

I would like my A.I. program, which schedules my tv programs, to turn on the television. But my television doesn’t take kindly to using its power supply as a means to turn it on and off.

What I might use it for is to pre-heat my room in the morning with an electric fan heater, for lack of a modern thermostat. But a $5 timer plug could do the same thing.

So I think I’ll wait until these remote button pushers drop to a tenth of their $200 price. Maybe then I’ll find some use for home automation.

I’ll wait until we can be sure that IoT devices are secured against hacking because at the moment they most certainly are not. There have been some high profile internet outages lately caused by hundreds of thousands of IoT devices being highjacked and used in denial of service attacks. It’s only a matter of time before someone figures out how to burn down your house with one of them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqp8_ROAIJY

Andrew Smith - Nov 18, 2016:

I’ll wait until we can be sure that IoT devices are secured against hacking…

Using open source IoT devices (Arduino, RaspPi, etc.) is one option for preventing your IoT devices from being inducted into a botnet (or turned into a pyrobot?).  Although you have to (re)learn the command line, it does ensure whatever level of security you want to add and is particularly well suited for DYI.  RaspPi supports voice recognition and speech synthesis, has Bluetooth, WiFi, low energy usage and tiny footprint. Ideal for a personal assistant wall hanger (Eddy from the “Lab Rats” anyone?).

Carl B - Nov 19, 2016:

Using open source IoT devices (Arduino, RaspPi, etc.) is one option for preventing your IoT devices from being inducted into a botnet…

Not to mention that either are (relatively) inexpensive, and (I think) can be outfitted with infrared output devices that can be programmed to emit the required IR signals to control your TV, stereo, etc. That said, however, I think I agree with Don regarding his level of interest in home automation at this point. I’m not quite ready to live that aspect of The Jetsons.