What is a smart home?

Certainly, our residences have evolved significantly over time, and now, an average home is equipped with numerous electrical devices, lights, blinds, ovens, air conditioners, computers, and more. This creates a substantial demand for an intelligent central system capable of managing all these units automatically, conveniently, and reliably, while maintaining a high degree of safety. Presently, the market offers various tiers of smart home solutions, ranging from the most basic, typically wireless solutions, to more complex wired systems, which provide the most reliable and comprehensive solutions.

If that’s the case, what do they mean by a ‘smart home’ and what should one expect from a smart home?

Lighting Control

In contrast to older homes, contemporary residences are equipped with a plethora of lighting fixtures and numerous electrical appliances. To illustrate, in a recent project involving a standard three-bedroom house, the architect incorporated over 80 light fixtures, the majority of which were intended for ambiance and decorative purposes. Naturally, this raises the issue of how to accommodate such a vast array of light switches and the challenge of remembering the function of each one. The optimal solution is a building management system that enables the activation of lighting fixtures via an application or automated timers.

Blinds Control

The blinds can be managed using specially designed panels, standard blind switches, or even through a dedicated app. The app displays the status of the blinds, indicating how open they are or if they are closed, via a shutter icon. It’s possible to configure a scenario to close all blinds when you exit the house. The app also allows for setting an unlimited number of timers for each blind, giving you the flexibility to decide when a specific blind should open or close during the day.

Climate Control

The app allows you to manage your air conditioners. You can adjust the temperature and wind intensity directly from the app. It also enables you to set timers (for instance, during weekends hours) for the individual activation of each air conditioner. Additionally, the app provides the feature to automatically switch off all air conditioners when you leave the house, or you can do so manually with the press of a button.

Manage the doors by securing them with an electric latch

Use the app to unlock the door or gate. The house is designed to lock itself automatically each time we depart and to unlock upon our return. A switch can be pressed to secure the house every night before we sleep and it will unlock when we rise in the morning. If the house door remains open while we are away, we will be notified.

To learn more about Automata's smart doors, click here <<

Smart panels

Smart panels are a distinctive feature of a smart home setup. Upon entering such a home, it becomes apparent that the switches are not your typical ones. They are part of a molded panel, typically consisting of 8 backlit touch switches. Each of these switches has an LED indicator that lights up when a light is turned on or a scenario is activated. Hence, if a light is on, its corresponding LED on the panel is also lit. These panels come in a variety of designs, and certain systems, like the Automata system, offer customers the option to customize the panel design to match the wall color or even imprint it with a kid-friendly design. A top-notch smart panel is capable of adjusting the brightness of its LEDs to ensure it doesn’t interfere with our sleep. In public areas, where we don’t want just anyone to have control over the lights, it gives us the option to disable it. Smart panels, such as those by Automata, can also enter a sleep mode at night and become active again in the morning.

For more information on Automata's smart panels, click here <<

Alarm system Control

The intelligent home system can be programmed to manage the security system as well. This feature enables us to secure the house and activate the alarm using a mobile application or through a home locking scheme that can be triggered from any standard circuit breaker. Consequently, this eliminates the necessity for a dedicated alarm system coder, which is often incompatible with the overall design and can also be costly.

Unplugging hazardous power sockets

The option to unplug high-energy devices like ovens or electric stoves can alleviate concerns, as leaving electrical appliances plugged in unsupervised can pose a risk and potentially lead to fires.

Scenarios and building automation

A scenario refers to a sequence of operations executed by the smart home in succession. Sophisticated smart home systems like the Automata system enable the integration of diverse conditions in an electrical equipment activation scenario. An example of this is a ‘good night’ switch that turns off the lights and secures the doors when it’s bedtime. The scenario can also send messages to the user, activate counters, and more.

These scenarios provide us with the ability to automate the infrastructure, decide the timing of each scenario, and essentially dictate the daily behavior of the infrastructure.

Smart home app

The ability to manage the house via an app provides us with a sense of security. We can always access the app to monitor our home, see who’s there, check if the door is open, if the garden has been watered, and more. It’s essential that the app we use is compatible with both Android and iPhone devices, as well as personal computers, allowing us to conveniently control our home even from work. The children should have a version of the app specifically tailored for them. We should be able to issue voice commands to the system.

Automata offers an app that’s compatible with any Android phone or iPhone, as well as desktop applications, without restrictions on the number of users. Each user can get an interface specially adapted for him. Full control from anywhere and at any time and without monthly payment.

For more information on the Automata app, click here <<

Prevent water damage

Imagine a scenario where a pipe bursts while we’re vacationing overseas, leading to a distressing situation upon our return. However, if our smart home system is configured to automatically shut off the main water supply every time we leave, and promptly turn it back on upon our return without our intervention, we can sidestep such mishaps. An added bonus is that we might even qualify for a discount on our insurance!

For more on flood prevention  Click here <<

Smart Irrigation

If our home is already equipped with a smart system, it makes sense for it to manage garden irrigation as well. The watering schedule should be adjusted based on the seasons and soil conditions. On especially hot days, we can manually water the garden through the app, even if we’re overseas. We’ve got one of the smartest irrigation systems, and at no additional cost!   

Did we exaggerate? Definitely not!

This is merely the dawn of possibilities with a genuine smart home. As with any fresh technology, once we acclimate to it, it becomes indispensable, leaving us wondering how we ever managed without it!

Read more, click here <<