Home Automation in the UK

[Patrick Lidstone <patrick-lidstone@xxxxxxx>]

>
>
>Hi Patrick
>
>Thats why I suggested pooling resources.

I think this is a great idea. I'm not sure what the best way to go about it
is, though, since there seem to be a diverse range of projects bubbling
away on this list - so there isn't necessarily the focus that would be
provided by a single "master" project.

Cutting / publishing / adopting open interface standards has got to be a
good starting point.

>My background is in hardware with a little BBC Basic for controlling
things
>although my main job now is Intranet developement involving Web based
front
>ends for databases etc.

I currently work as a software engineer for Psion / Symbian - specialising
in communications software. I've got a reasonably solid digital electronics
background - but I don't use it professionally.

>Were is the best place to learn about Linux?

www.linux.org will give you a lead. Distributions can be downloaded by ftp,
or you can buy a cd from the likes of John Winters at www.polo.demon.co.uk
for a couple of quid. I'm a long standing user of the Slackware
distribution, myself. People also have good things to say about RedHat.

>I have seen several references to it on c.h.a but other than that I
know
nothing
>about it. I am keen to have an Intranet based HA system running at home
where any
>PC on the LAN could control and program everything, and with a Browser
running on
>a PC fitted with a Video card with TV output any TV in the house could
see
what was
>happening. A small bit of hardware to interface IR recievers to the PC
and
some
>software to make the IR commands control the browser and you have a
VERY
>flexible system for little cost.

This is more or less the direction I'm heading in. I have one reservation
about using a browser - it's not particularly easy to push information out
to the browser. The scenario I'm thinking of is something like notification
of an incoming phone call - caller ID looks up the name, and you want to
display the callers details instantly. With my limited knowledge of HTML, I
can't see how I'd do this - unless I refresh the page continuously, which
isn't very satisfactory. Perhaps you can give us some insights as an
intranet guru ;-)

One of the major advantages of using a browser is that you can suck useful
information off the net each day and cache it locally of course - I grab
the weather forecast, TV listings and news headlines automatically first
thing each morning, for example, from the net and cache them on my server
for later reference during the day.

>By low spec 486 do you mean that a SX33 is OK?

That would be fine. I've had Linux running on 386DX33 with 8MB/100MB just
fine. It doesn't scream along, but it's quite adequate with a text based
interface. X-Windows (graphical user interface) is a different matter
entirely. I'd recommend a Pentium class machine, or a fastish 486 with a
16MB plus of RAM.

Patrick

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