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Essay: Exploring Home Automation and Smart Home Systems: A Guide

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  • Subject area(s): Sample essays
  • Reading time: 5 minutes
  • Price: Free download
  • Published: 1 April 2019*
  • Last Modified: 23 July 2024
  • File format: Text
  • Words: 1,174 (approx)
  • Number of pages: 5 (approx)

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This page of the essay has 1,174 words.



Table of Contents

Table of Tables 2

Table of Figures 2

1. Introduction 3

2. Research Survey 4

2.1. Smart Home Systems 4

2.1.1. Apple HomeKit 4

2.1.2. Amazon Echo & Alexa 5

2.2. Smart Home Device 6

2.2.1. Philips Hue 6

2.2.2. Tado Smart Thermostat 6

3. Block Diagram 8

4. Components and Descriptions 9

4.1. Global System for Mobile communication (GSM Modem) 9

4.2. Light Dependent Resistor (LDR) 10

4.3. Light-Emitting Diode (LED) 10

4.4. Temperature Sensor 11

4.5. Smoke Sensor 11

5. Logic Gates 12

5.1. AND Gate 12

5.2. OR Gate 12

5.3. XOR Gate 12

5.4. NOT Gate 13

6. Simple Electronic Design Circuit 13

7. Circuit Design Description 15

7.1. CEDAR Logic for Fire Sprinkler System and Fan & AC 16

7.2. CEDAR Logic for Curtain & Lighting 18

8. Final Flowchart 21

9. Final Truth Table 22

10. Unresolved Problems 22

11. Assumptions 22

12. Final Circuit 23

13. References 24

Table of Tables

Table 1: Truth Table for AND Gate 12

Table 2: Truth Table for OR Gate 12

Table 3: Truth Table for XOR Gate 12

Table 4: Truth Table for OR Gate 13

Table 5: Final Truth Table for final circuit 22

Table of Figures

Figure 1:Block Diagram 8

Figure 2: Pinout SIM900 9

Figure 3: SIM900 GSM Quadband Module for Raspberry Pi 9

Figure 4: Light Dependent Resistor (LDR) 10

Figure 5: Light-Emitting Diodes (LED) 10

Figure 6: Temperature Sensor LM35 11

Figure 7: Smoke Sensor (MQ-2) 11

Figure 8: IoT Based Temperature Monitoring 13

Figure 9: Circuit of the smart bulb holder 14

Figure 10: Design Outline 15

Figure 11: Final Flow Chart 21

Figure 13: Final Circuit 23

1. Introduction

The world we live in today has been gradually replaced by automations where many of the systems are getting automated and no longer require human to make it happen manually. This includes home, industrial, production, business automation and many more.

Home automation systems, also more commonly known as ‘smart house’, are advancement of mechanization processes of human effort where access is provided to control and operate devices located in house remotely. This involves IoT appliances such as lightings, electronic devices like microwaves or kettle where users may switch it on ahead of time before reaching home to reduce the total amount of waiting time and spent it wisely. From a home security perspective, users are able to monitor and assured that their house is perfectly safe from any type of harm with the convenience of monitoring and accessing its system anytime while being away from home, which includes alarms, buzzers, gates, surveillance camera.

Our home automation systems are aimed at lightening up the load of modern-day people with utmost convenience as their pace are getting busier and busier day by day. The systems connected to microcontroller & WIFI for centralized remote control and implemented with threshold that will set off limit, which automatically provides more comfort for people with least amount of effort, example, when the temperature exceeded the threshold limit, the smart house air conditioner will be switched on instead to keep the temperature inside the house cooler.

2. Research Survey

2.1. Smart Home Systems

2.1.1. Apple HomeKit

Apple HomeKit is a system that allows access all your smart home devices in centralized space in Apple OS instead of one application per devices which causes inconvenience and time-consumed just to variation settings. Adjustments such as lights, thermostats and locks can be made with a tap on mobile phones via Apple Home application. Apple HomeKit’s connecting capability is limited to certain brand. (Chang 2017)

 How does it work?

o Connect device to either Bluetooth or WIFI

o Open the Home app, add compatible device

o Tap to turn on or off the device

o Can create custom scenes: settings of multiple device for certain mood

o May command Siri to control the devices

2.1.2. Amazon Echo & Alexa

Amazon Echo & Alexa makes the best pair of voice assistant system under your control. It can go from playing your favourite music, search web for news, shopping and smart home controls for compatible devices with voice commands. (Stables 2018)

 How does it work?

o Download mobile app – Alexa, available on iOS & Android

o Navigate to menu -> Settings -> Set up new device (Choose Amazon Echo type)

o Pair Alexa & Echo

o Add smart home devices

o Command Echo to do desired task

 Create groups and scenes

 Tap to turn on or off the device

 May use voice command for smart home system control (Alexa, lights on)

2.2. Smart Home Device

2.2.1. Philips Hue

Philips Hue lighting is a smart LED lighting that connects to smart home system that offers an enormous range of colour settings to the extent of mixing colour plates for custom colour) and effects for various mood, settings and occasion in the house remotely. (Prospero, Chin 2018) Phillips Hue bulbs comes in different sizes and shapes and still looking very similarly to normal light bulbs.

 How does it work?

o Connect Philips Light and Philips Bridge

o Powered up Philips Light and Hue Bridge to make sure they are discoverable

o Download Hue application (available on iOS and Android)

o Assign lightbulbs to room (for easier control)

o Set the lights to desired lights, brightness or colour through the control from the apps

2.2.2. Tado Smart Thermostat

Tado Smart Thermostat is a smart thermostat that connects a home’s heating and air conditioning with home automation system. The Tado Smart Thermostat is connected to a bridge which wireless communicates with the thermostat wired into the back of router. The attractive LED display of ambient temperature and connection status with a press on button located on the thermostat. (Ludlow 2017)

 How does it work?

o Set up Thermostat connecting to bridge

o May use app for manual controlling

o Set desired temperature, fixed setting for day and night available

3. Block Diagram

Block diagram explain the structure of the system. First, the sensors will work as input components which collects the data input and passover to micro-controller to process the home automation system to function properly. Execution of the system will take place and the system will be checking in accordance to the limit threshold. The data will be forwarded to GSM modem and web server vise versa for accessing and controlling remotely.

4. Components and Descriptions

4.1. Global System for Mobile communication (GSM Modem)

SIM900 is a GSM compatible quad-band SMT Module which communicates in frequency range of 850/900/1800/1900MHz, establishes communication between Internet, SMS or oral communication. Through connecting this module with Raspberry Pi, user will be able to access the web server and communicates with the devices using internet.

4.2. Light Dependent Resistor (LDR)

Light Dependant Resistor is a light sensing circuit, which basically means it will react depending on the light intensity that falls on it. This component in our final circuit in a way that if there’s enough light in the room, the curtain will not be closed.

4.3. Light-Emitting Diode (LED)

Light-Emitting Diodes is a semiconductor device where when an electric current pass through it, it will emit visible light, signifying electric current occurrence successful.

4.4. Temperature Sensor

The LM35 temperature sensor is a high precision temperature sensor which calibrates directly in °Celsius. Although it may require more power voltage to power compared to TMP36, LM35 has proven to provide the best accuracy indoor within the widest temperature range (-55 °c …. + 150 °c).

4.5. Smoke Sensor

The smoke sensor MQ-2 is used to detect the presence of gas, smoke, hydrogen and so on. It requires only 5V to power it, and measurement can be taken as soon as possible due to its short reaction time. Its sensitivity can be adjusted by using potentiometer.

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