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[on:]

Hello everybody!

I made an interesting project to control my house via the internet.

It's basically an Arduino and Ethernet Shield which is accessed by a PHP page on the internet. It can control the lights and sockets through relays, and I hacked the intercom and gate remote controller to be also controlled by the Arduino.

I made a video demonstration, using the cellphone to control the devices, it is in here:
www.youtube.com/MauricioRivello
(if you like, help me by clicking "Like" on Youtube! )

The arduino and PHP codes can be downloaded here:
Source Codes

An explanation of the system can be found here, but unfortunately there is no english version yet.
To see with google translate, you can use this link.

The project is not finished yet, so:
Any idea and suggestion is welcome and any question leave a comment!

Thank you!

[Reply #1 on:]

Great job!     The video is a excellent demonstration of what you have achieved.  I am (very slowly) working towards something like this myself.

I am impressed with the fast response speed - maybe 1-2 seconds after you issue the command.

Why do you send all 4 statuses?  (# 1100L) - this won't scale well.  Is it not better to send something like #4,1 to turn lamp 4 on?  Much shorter code when your system grows.

I guess you have some security to protect access to your PHP control page?   

Keep up the good work!

[Reply #2 on:]

I have something similar for my home.
My application is hosted on the mobile device and it uses JSONP to communicate.
I added some radio controlled switches (3pcs~15€) and several weather station radio sensor (for individual room temp control) both in 433 MHz band.
Also I bought a GPRS shield for emergency SMS, but this task is on hold.
The advantage of using radio is you need only 2 pins In and Out for tens of peripherals. The downside is you cannot tell what is the status of a remote switch (one way communication). Another thing is you might have to upgrade to Arduino Mega.
I would like to know what ethernet shield are you using and how reliable is it (especially after power failures).
Thanks,
Adi

[Reply #3 on:]

Thank you for the comments,

maidbloke,
When the PHP receives the status from the Arduino (to draw the right color to the button) is needs to get the individual information for each digital pin. I know I could make it with only one byte but I preferred simplicity since 4 bytes is almost nothing

And you're alright, there is some security methods, I did not mentioned in the videos but I talked about the need for security methods in the documentation page.

adis,
Interesting your systems, specially the GPRS part.  Once we did it but the arduino was sending SMS through a PC connected to the internet... Not that elegant.

[Reply #4 on:]

adis,
Interesting your systems, specially the GPRS part.  Once we did it but the arduino was sending SMS through a PC connected to the internet... Not that elegant.

This GPRS/SMS part is for uninvited guests that cut the wires before entering  , for long power failures during winter when the water instalation might freeze and break if there is no one home or other emergencies.

[Reply #5 on:]

adis,
Interesting your systems, specially the GPRS part.  Once we did it but the arduino was sending SMS through a PC connected to the internet... Not that elegant.

This GPRS/SMS part is for uninvited guests that cut the wires before entering  , for long power failures during winter when the water instalation might freeze and break if there is no one home or other emergencies.

That's a really nice idea!