HA: Is there really minimal "new" in last 7 years?

[jkmonroe]

I did all that 7 years ago. Not via an rPi, but thats a non-issue as it doesn't get me anything I don't already have, and the lack of having one doesn't have an impact.  I don't understand how a "technology" focused industry can have zero effective progress in customers eyes in 7 years, and I have yet to see anyone say anything that makes me think it might materially get better in the next 3 years. Thats 10 years of effective stagnation in terms of customer stories.
 
Thats pretty sad.

 
im curious, and always enjoy a good debate - but why do you think this?
 
home automation, by its very nature is singular.  the products that we use to accomplish our goals with HA might change, but fundamentally, CQC, Crestron, Control4, HomeSeer, Wink, SmartThings, et al all try to do the same thing.  granted, there are levels of scale within that, but at the core, they integrate and automate.  if you started with a Wink Hub 7 years ago there would be a clear upgrade path, but you managed to start at the top with CQC.  so yeah, your setup is already at/near the pinnacle of what folks could hope to accomplish with HA.
 
and there hasnt been 10 years of stagnation, but when you live near the absolute cutting edge of tech releases, it can seem that way.  i mean, it's only been in the past 18/24 months that z-wave devices have been sold in big box stores like Lowes/HD/Staples/etc and youve had your install for how long?  Hue came out in 2013.  Sonos just a few years prior to that.  Think of trying to use those old Axis 205 cameras back in 2006, almost 7 YEARS before Dropcam brought home cameras to the masses.  Or screwing around with those old RFID tags that were half the size of a deck of playing cards (i still have one, actually) to attempt geolocation BEFORE THE IPHONE WAS CREATED.  
 
there isn't any exciting new technology because you've already tried it all.
 
:icon_pai:

 

[IVB]

The only HA things i've done in the last 7 years are:
1) NFC tags instead of rfID
2) a mobile tablet instead of my wallmounted touchscreen. (my touchscreen that cost $200 all-in versus a $300 tablet so moar money)
 
I've done 2 non-HA things:
1) I use Trendnet wireless cameras not integrated into my HA system as I no longer see the value in doing that. But I used to have it integrated just fine with the "wake up kitchen touchscreen and pop up the camera screen on doorbell ring", so really all I got was the ability to move my cameras around without worrying about CAT5e.
2) I have Sonos but also not integrated as its just not that hard to use a different app. 
 
I do Voice Recognition but i'd be hard pressed to call that HA as all i'm really doing is a non-HA function (VR on android), and calling a web URL.
 
I tried my hand at geolocation but didn't see how it could be predictable enough to be useful.
 
Thats it. 7 years. And when I look around, I see nothing that would make my life any easier. And in the next 3 years, hopefully voice works better, but as pete said, its not home *automation", its home *alternative manual control*.
 
But its all good, I got back to playing 4-5 games of soccer every week since HA moves so slowly. If only we wouldn't go out for pints after every game, I would have actually lost weight.
 

 

[personalt]

I find this very interesting and agree with IVB.  I did my system about 6-7 years ago as was coming back to see if I could get better tablet/ipad integeration and dont see any great new options. For hardware  I have a elk, nuvo, simple automated UBP swtiches, sage and CQC.    I have not made many changes in the past few years and was hoping to see more new stuff as I have not been following things closely for a good 3 years. 

At the time I was disappointed that i needed to build my own screens for CQC and my progress faltered.   I built some screens for ELO touchscreens for nuvo and sage controls  but eventually I just removed Sage/CQC  link and put the Sage boxes behind my tvs.   I never really got to a setup that could controll my alarm, lights and music together with a nice interface.

Is there anything new on market that would allow me to control my UPB swtiches,  Nuvo and/or my elk from my ipad and andriod phones without a very expensive upgrade? 

 

[drvnbysound]

I never really got to a setup that could controll my alarm, lights and music together with a nice interface.

Is there anything new on market that would allow me to control my UPB swtiches,  Nuvo and/or my elk from my ipad and andriod phones without a very expensive upgrade? 

 
eKeypad Pro (for Apple)?
 
EDIT: Sorry, I am pretty sure that eKeypad has the integration for Russound, but I don't think it has it for Nuvo. Here is a pretty good high-level list of what eKeypad can control: http://blog.ekeypad.net/applications/

 

[Dean Roddey]

I find this very interesting and agree with IVB.  I did my system about 6-7 years ago as was coming back to see if I could get better tablet/ipad integeration and dont see any great new options. For hardware  I have a elk, nuvo, simple automated UBP swtiches, sage and CQC.    I have not made many changes in the past few years and was hoping to see more new stuff as I have not been following things closely for a good 3 years. 

At the time I was disappointed that i needed to build my own screens for CQC and my progress faltered.   I built some screens for ELO touchscreens for nuvo and sage controls  but eventually I just removed Sage/CQC  link and put the Sage boxes behind my tvs.   I never really got to a setup that could controll my alarm, lights and music together with a nice interface.

Is there anything new on market that would allow me to control my UPB swtiches,  Nuvo and/or my elk from my ipad and andriod phones without a very expensive upgrade? 

 
In the most recent versions of CQC we have a new auto-generation system. It works with our new V2 drivers. The Elk and Nuvo both have V2 drivers. There's not yet a V2 UPB driver, but if the UPB is connected through the Elk, you'd get that as well. Here's a quick demonstrate of how it works.
 
http://www.charmedquark.com/Web2/Downloads/Video%20Tutorials/Version4_6/Tutorials/AutoGen_1.wmv

 

[pete_c]

I built some screens for ELO touchscreens for nuvo and sage controls  but eventually I just removed Sage/CQC  link and put the Sage boxes behind my tvs.

 
Here went to using XBMC (Kodi) Ubuntu 64bit Aopen digital engines for behind my televisions.  These boxes stream live or recorded HD media just fine.  Using MythTV to record content from HDHomerun devices / old satellite card and it does fine.  I do not watch TV though and most of the recording and watching is done by wife using DTV recorders.
 
Relating to touchscreens here using a hodgepodge (since the early 2000's).  Most current testing stuff is a dual touch very thin 17" 3M capacitance screen using an Atom Baytrail quad core CPU (low powered) running W81 with the addition of using a Kinect for input (plus touch).  This is where I plan to test Chris's application. 
 

 
Older ones today (4:3) utilize core duo digital engines.  Newer tabletops (>20) are 8" capacitance screens (Gb - POE) Atom based modded hardware using XPe.  (IE: master bedroom has one Omnitouch screen and 3 tabletops which work fine).  The tabletops stream live TV / HD multimedia just fine.
 
I utilize older Russound zoned amps (12 zones) here with serial server splitting going to Russound keypads, Omnitouch screens and my own touchscreens. 
 
I have IR blasting here but my software / hardware automation doesn't manage my music / media / television watching stuff.  Personally never really liked using IR blasting integration to my home automation (that is me though).
 
UPB is primarily utilized for in wall light switches (have migrated many over now to dual load multitoggle switches).  Primary / secondary control is via my Leviton OPII panel and secondarily via my automation software. 
 
I have the option of utilizing my cell phones / tablets for console control automation but do not. 
 
IE: played with Geotracking with Microsoft mobile in the early 2000's (before the IPhone) and it worked just fine for me (even driving home automation events with Homeseer at the time).
 
That is me.
 
Here starting using Homeseer in 1998 in Wintel. 
 
Always liked Linux and have gone to a hodgepodge mix hub and spoke like now for my tinkering automation.  IE: my irrigation software (which is not a software timer) is running on an Arm based tiny box inside of my old Rainbird controller box.  It is connected serially to two 8 zone controllers, weather station, analog sensors, water meters, et al and primarily uses ET to water these days.
 
My software (Homeseer) old is running on Wintel Server.  New Homeseer 3 now runs in Wintel, Linux or MAC.  I am mixing the OS's a bit right now running Homeseer on Ubuntu 14.04 64bit, some stuff in Wine and some in a Wintel server VM.  Homeseer touchscreen designer runs in Wintel and it'll let you design screens for Wintel, Android or iOS. 
 
Personally big data / cloud based automation for the masses is in the future for automation (well and a bunch of other stuff).  I'll am currently tinkering with it but not using it for my automation (well and I never will; but that is me).  (I've skipped the detriments of the ketchup (not); well because it was already known to me before it started).

 

[personalt]

In the most recent versions of CQC we have a new auto-generation system. It works with our new V2 drivers. The Elk and Nuvo both have V2 drivers. There's not yet a V2 UPB driver, but if the UPB is connected through the Elk, you'd get that as well. Here's a quick demonstrate of how it works.
 
http://www.charmedquark.com/Web2/Downloads/Video%20Tutorials/Version4_6/Tutorials/AutoGen_1.wmv

 
Dean - this is very intersting.  Is this autogen make screens for ipad/android devices or just for PCs running CQC?

 

[Dean Roddey]

They are just regular CQC UI templates so they can run on iOS/Android devices via third party RIVA clients. For 5.0 we are also working on a browser based client for these types of devices as well. For a RIVA client, probably the iOS client is a better choice.