DIY Project: Crown moulding with timed lighting
This is the first in a series of posts describing some of the automated tasks that run in my house.
The Problem/Idea:
I have a 2-year-old that goes to bed every day around the same time. He likes the night light to be on at night. Need to make the lights to turn ON and OFF on a schedule (preferably with an ability to override/cancel the entire schedule or a single event remotely).
The Solution:
I thought that having a regular night light is too boring for an automated home and came up with a following idea… Why not install a crown moulding with some lights inside that could be dimmed at night or run at full brightness for an ambient lighting effect. Additionally, this approach has a huge “wow” factor and also increases resale value of the house. And then there was one other thing… I really wanted to test my Christmass present – a cordless nail gun! And I thought this would be a great application for it. |-)
In search of a ‘killer app’
It’s been over 30 years since X10 came around, and still home automation has a very hard time catching up with the rest of the technologies that invaded our homes in these past decades. According to Google Trends the popularity of “home automation” search is even dropping. Why? What’s stopping wide adoption of home automation by Joe “The Plumber” and the likes?
Some experts believe that home automation needs a “killer app” and some government encouragement. So what could be that “killer app”?