Project on the way need some direction and clarification - New Member

[sander]

Hi everyone im a new member of this forum and this community as well.

My interest in home automation is not the only thing that brought me here but i am also working on a very basic project for home automation-home network systems for my master's degree thesis.

Ive been going through so much information over the past weeks and i have such a big information overload that i cant put things down and start working.

I basically need some direction and clarification on some things.

First things first, i am going to buit a very basic network in my flat where i will connect 2 maybe 3 devices on the sockets and have them controlled (on/off, energy reading) through a web interface like a web site on the local network. I should be able to get energy readings because i will refer to energy consumption and conservation.

The devices will have no interface for connecting to the internet for example a kettle or a toaster so they will need to be controlled through the power line.

So far ive been through various standards and transmission media and i have them all mixed up in my head. Ive been through ECHONET,UPNP, Jini, OSGi, DLNA and Powerlines, Zigbee, X-10 and some others.

- Should i go over some others? Are these sufficient to build a knowledge in order to conduct my study?

- Which would be the best to use for my requirements? And in conjuction with what standard?

- Another thing i havent figured out completely yet. Ive been through hundreds of journals and i ahvent figured out which products belong to Powerline communications like the homeplug. Is X-10 one of them? Is it anything that works on power lines? What about Zig bee?

Im also concerned with energy conservation which i am also refering to in my study. i found that ECHONET is built specificaly for energy conservation but some new products are also used for controlling energy consumption.

All in all i have everything messed up in my head and any guidance or direction or even an answer to any of my questions would be gratefully appreciated!

I would be more than willing and happy to share my results with the forum once i am finished in a couple of months!

P.S What i didnt mention is my limited amount of time which is currently 2 1/2 months.

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Hi

You've certainly done a fair bit of research but theres a load there i've never heard of (and i'm sorry but I doubt your going to find many people that have experienced all of them), I would say for the minute its worth seperating them;

X10 sends signals across the powerlines concerning switching/dimming devices and also has the ability for some devices to report the signal back to a receiver. You can also interface the CM11 to a computer and send the commands from a PC. There are no (to my knowledge) interfaces for combining X10 and power consumption reporting - it is quite a dumb protocol, and can be susceptible to interference. Theres also PLCBUS which is another similar powerline communications protocol.

ZigBee is an RF protocol so nothing is transmitted over the powerlines - its a general protocol for passing data a bit like bluetooth but has been adapted for some HA purposes.

The ones I know to combine the ability to control power and report consumption are;

http://www.edfenergy.com/ecomanager-controller/

Which seems to report power useage and the ability to control devices, but no idea if it has a PC interface sorry.

Then there is http://www.plugwise.com/idplugtype-f/home-basic but looks to only have Shucko plugs/sockets.

Over the weekend funnily enough I had a crude monitoring/control system set up...it involved a Current Cost individual appliance monitor plugged into the wall and then an X10 appliance module plugged into the top of it, then an appliance plugged in.

So I could control the device via the PC over the X10 network and read the power consumption into the PC via the current cost meter - its not a particularly polished solution though.

Hope this helps?

[toscal]

X10 would be the cheapest way to do this. and as AD said its a power line control system.
For something more advanced take a quick look at Idratek
I would also stick to the more well known HA systems. As it will be easier to find info.
Like Idratek, CBus, KNX/EIB, Z-Wave, X10, UPB. There are many more.
Both X10 and UPB are Powerline control systems i.e. they use the mains wiring to send control signals to and from modules.
A quick google will be your friend here.
If you need help with How X10 works and its protocols and command structure then let me know.

Some of the things you have mentioned aren't actually HA systems as such. Though there is no doubt that some of the standards may be used in the future.

Echonet is more a home network standard, and is based upon 2 things: 1)requires no special rewiring and so can be applied to existing homes; and 2) can easily control a wide range of devices.
So it maybe possible current automation system already do this. Powerline and Z-wave systems come to mind as a way to implement this.

UPNP This is a set of network protocols that allow the easy connection of network devices such as computers, media centers, printers and wifi access points.

Jini is just a distributed network architecture based on Java I think. Allowing network services to be used as if they where connected to your local machine.

OSGi Is another Java based system. Don't know much about it. The iPronto I think uses it.

DNLA Or the Digital Living Network Alliance is a consortium of about 200 or so companies. They have a common goal of making it easier for consumers to connect and share data. Normally media based data. Seems odd that companies want to promote file sharing when so many are trying to outlaw it.

[sander]

Hi Ad, toscal

and thank you very much for the input, i really appreciate you taking the time to clear things up.

Ad, thank you for the X 10 explanation and the links i will sure go through them but they seem to be very costy solutions and the fact that they are ready and set for installation spoils my study a bit! If you know what i mean. I need to show that ive made something even if its creating a web site or something like that!. I am not sure i fully understand how you got the enrgy readings off the appliance through the monitor. How did you connect the x 10 with the monitor ? Was it the monitor on the socket , the x 10 on top and then the appliance in the x 10? Did it actually work? Sure it doesnt sound as polish but it might work?


Toscal, thank you too for recommending the x 10. I had a quick look through idratek when i came upon the forum and it seems like a nice solution and i will go through it more thoroughly tomorrow.

I actually came upon a HA system comparison spread sheet here :
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?...dA&hl=en#gid=0 which cleared things up a bit even if it is only for lighting.

I would definitely need your experience if i am going to be using X 10. I will go through everything over the next 2-3 days and come back for sure.

So what you are saying about ECHONET is that it might already been implemented?

About Jini and OSGi, i went through some interesting journals where some people used jini and OSGi with Zig bee and UPNP to create systems for home automation like a P2P technology middleware architecture to enable user-centric services deployment on low-cost embedded networked devices but they seem to be lengthy and too advanced for the moment.

I have a complete thesis from another student that is very similar to what i have to do. You dont have to go through it if you dont want to but i will post it anyway since there is some nice information in the study. Dont worry im not breaching any law the study is already available in the web to download!!

http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/university/itniversityofsalford/MSc-Project-Report-Data-Telecom-and-Networks-by-Hewa-Balisane-2007.zip

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...
Ad, thank you for the X 10 explanation and the links i will sure go through them but they seem to be very costy solutions and the fact that they are ready and set for installation spoils my study a bit! If you know what i mean. I need to show that ive made something even if its creating a web site or something like that!. I am not sure i fully understand how you got the enrgy readings off the appliance through the monitor. How did you connect the x 10 with the monitor ? Was it the monitor on the socket , the x 10 on top and then the appliance in the x 10? Did it actually work? Sure it doesnt sound as polish but it might work?...

Yes basically, plugged a Current Cost IAM into the wall, then plugged an X10 module into it, then the appliance into that - so essentially you control the device with X10 and get the power use from the current cost module, it works but is'nt really a finished solution.

The Current Cost Envi (base) receiver has a serial output, you could then read this into a PC and write your own application...then if you had an X10 CM11 you could interface this into your application to control the devices based on useage.

I do something similar with HomeSeer and have the ability to turn off the non essential stuff based on the total power used.

[sander]

Is this the kind of a cost meter you are refering to?http://www.pocket-lint.com/quick-rev...28-envi-review
The solution you are proposing is interesting enough but i am not sure i have the full knowledge to implement it. I will research into it though and see what comes out.

What are you using from homeseer? An appliance module?Perhaps even a z-wave one? Because i am also interested in wireless controll as well. Actually i kind of have to controll the appliance wirelessly even if that meens the devices is plugged on the wall and i am controlling it from a pc through the home network.

But if the whole thing is ip based then i could controll it from remote locations from a web page or such.

I dont know maybe im still too confused and need to research some more. Thank you again for your suggestions and help.

By the way, does anyone have any experience with zig bee? If yes, how could i use zig bee for my study? I know it uses RF so its similar to z-wave? Which one is cheaper? better? easier to install and control?
Ive been through some retailers of zig bee products but im still confused as to what would work for me.

[sander]

This is an interesting way of controlling appliances using X 10 :

http://www.uk-automation.co.uk/article_info.php?articles_id=14

Using an iphone with an iphone app built for controlling x 10 modules.

Basically my understanding of that is that the CM11 has a serial output as well which you can connect to the pc and program or create some macros it think? Then the macros are saved in the x 10's eeprom. This is with the pc.

However it is also possible to control the x 10 with a remote as the site states.

[chris_j_hunter]

Zigbee - have a look at AlertMe ...

http://www.alertme.com/

their website is quite informative (under how-it-works, the science, etc) and they have a forum which might help ...

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HomeSeer may be slight overkill for what you are after, although it can be very powerful and can support an iPhone interface (which I use)...in short HomeSeer supports the control of X10 (& Z-Wave but I don't use it) via its own plugin, then it also supports the interfacing of the Current Cost meter via another plugin (there are all sorts of other plugins for it), then inside HomeSeer you can set up events that If the wattage from the Current Cost IAM was greater than 200W then turn the appliance off.

As I say probably overkill for you i'd say unless you wish to expand on it, it does have a web interface but requires a PC on 24x7 which may take up power..it does have a web page (and you can create your own) that you can control it over the web.

The macros that it can store are quite basic but it has been some time (years) since i've used them, I think its limited to basically timers and not alot more.
EDIT: just to clarify the above is the macros that the CM11/CM12 can store

[toscal]

if you want to do something in Java with X10 then have a look here http://www.agaveblue.org/projects/x10/ and

http://www.amug.org/~glguerin/sw/gadget/index.html

Also I know there are some small web server type devices (no bigger than a large box of matches) that you can also program in Java so they might be interesting for you.
Or you can have a look at this project. I might be able to supply some of the bits as I was going to build one but never got round to it. So still have the bits somewhere.

http://www.edcheung.com/automa/webx10.htm

The TW523 is the same as the XM10 interface.

Some other web interfaces

http://www.x10.crevier.org/webinterface/

[sander]

Wow, thank you all for the continous support! The only one i had the time to go through is the TW523 project which looks interesting and promising for my requirements. What im wondering is, could i fit a current cost meter in there? Ill figure it out and yes oscal, i might need some of the bits you have! I could buy them off you when im ready to go through if this is what i am doing or similar.

At the moment im still getting information which i have to process so i will come back later when i clear some things up.

Really though, thanks for the ongoing support. I appreciate it!

[sander]

Chris thank you very much for the link. I actually decided to take two different technologies, for the moment im thinking x-10 and zig bee, and compare the two in various aspects. Im thinking plugwise or alert me and an x-10 module with a remote control.

Not a sure thing yet but i will need those bits from toscal as i am also going to try that project out as well. Ill drop you a pm, toscal, to figure this out later.

Which would be the best to buy that uses zig bee? Plugwise uk or alert me? And why? Im going through them as we speak so just figured id ask if anyone knows better.

Thanks again.