RE: moving away from the remote-control paradigm

["Mark Harrison" <Mark.Harrison@xxxxxxx>]

Paul,

I don't want to abandon this just because it's complex. Quite the
opposite - I've got some time, and I've got some money, and I'm
interested in taking my HA further than "wow - I can dim the lights
when
I press 'DVD' on my Pronto."

On the specifics, I'm more interested in being able to anwer "is this
room occupied" rather than "who's in it". I'm guessing that
I could
answer the question "how many in this room" with 98% accuracy,
though.

Fortunately, the layout of my house makes this relatively
straightforward in the main rooms, since none have connecting doors to
each other.

I was imagining a combination of PIRs and IR beams (set too high for the
cats to trigger), but it sounds like occupancy sensors is where I want
to go.

BTW, as for...

> (simultaneously passing each other in the doorway!)

... you've met me. NO WAY could I pass anyone in a doorway ;-)

Mark Harrison
Head of Systems, eKingfisher


-----Original Message-----
From: Paul Gordon [mailto:paul_gordon@xxxxxxx]
Sent: 8 August 2001 17:11
To: ukha_d@xxxxxxx
Subject: RE: [ukha_d] moving away from the remote-control paradigm


Mark,

We discussed this very scenario at some great length about a year (or
so)
ago...

When we got into the nitty-gritty of it, it really is not as simple as
it
sounds like it ought to be!

With only one person in a house, its actually quite simple. with every
additional person, the complexity squares! - you can't use any SINGLE
detection technology to achieve it IMHO... - just imagine scenarios
like:
you are in a room, SWMBO is in an adjacent room, and there is a
connecting
door between them.. either or both of you may be moving about, or may be

totally still, (so PIR's are immediately not ideal)..
Either or both of you may be moving about immediately next to the
connecting
door, (so pressure mats could be tricky), either of you may move between

rooms, and heaven forbid - you may actually swap places (simultaneously
passing each other in the doorway!) - all of which needs to be coded
for...

Then go a step further, and imagine that there is another route between
these two rooms - lets say you  could go through another door into the
kitchen, then from the kitchen into the other room... you've then got to

account for every possible combination of occupancy state change via
that
route as well...

Then add a 3rd person! - getting a feel for just how nightmarish this
really
could become yet? - Don't even think about pets, and whether you do or
do
not want to account for occupancy by wandering animals...

If you want to do nothing more complex than just "is this room
occupied"

then with enough consideration of all the possibilities, and utilisation
of
appropriate existing technologies, that shouldn't be as you say
"beyond
the
wit of man". But, if you want to advance that to "How many people
are in

this room", or "who is in this room" - AAAARRRRGGGHHH MY
BRAINS
EXPLODING!!

Paul G.

(I'm going home now to cry...)


>
>Thanks.
>
>Is there some way of sensing not just that I've been through a doorway
>(broken a beam), but to tell which DIRECTION I was going in.
>
>Given that there are only 2 of us in the house, it wouldn't be beyond
>the wit of man to be able to say that "person enters room",
ROOM IS NOW
>OCCUPIED, "person enters room", "person leaves",
"person leaves", ROOM
>IS NOW EMPTY ... type of thing, but this is contingent on being able to
>detect the diffence between "enters" and "leaves".
>
>Regards,
>
>Mark Harrison
>Head of Systems, eKingfisher


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