A Virtual Window for a Windowless Basement

 

Creating a Virtual Window

When the pandemic hit, like many others, I found myself working from home fulltime.  While I have dedicated office in my home, I quickly realized that this office space was not conducive to working 8+ hours a day, mixing Zoom meetings with email and other work.  Therefore, about a month into the process, I opted to create a better all-day workspace in our finished basement.  While this was a much better and larger space for working all day, the one drawback is that our basement has no windows.  I'd spend the entire day in this space with no idea if it was sunny, raining, windy or calm.  I knew that some of the cruise lines had begun placing "virtual windows" within their interior cabins with a live camera feed to make those spaces feel less claustrophobic.  So. I wondered if a creating and installing a virtual window next to my workspace would do the same for me, trapped all day in a windowless basement.

3D Printed Clock, Scoreboard and more with Home Assistant Integration

 

Clock, Countdown Timer, Temperature and Scoreboard

Yet another 7-segment LED Clock

You can find a multitude of variations on a 7-segment LED clock on YouTube and other web sites.  In fact, this one is an enhancement and variation of the original design by YouTuber Leon van den Beukel, but adds features like local push button control, a host of additional default settings and optional Home Assistant (or other  system) integration via MQTT. View a short highlight of the features on my YouTube video

Building your own LED light strip controller (for cheap!)

 

Did you know that you can build your own LED light strip controller for a fraction of the cost of buying one?  And that this DIY controller has over a hundred light patterns and effects, can sync multiple light strips together, has a mobile app and is designed to integrate with most home automation platforms?  Yep.. and you can do it with no soldering, programming or other special skills and about $8.

Smart Home Devices: Build vs. Buy

 

Do you like to tinker?  Do you like to learn new skills?  Can you follow basic instructions or follow along with a video?  Do you like to save substantial money?  If you answered 'yes' to any of these, you may want to consider building your own smart home devices.  This is actually easier than you think and doesn't require advanced tools, programming skills or a degree in electrical engineering.  In fact, some devices can be build without soldering at all and without writing a single line of code.

My Five Golden Rules for Adding New Smart Devices

 

Maybe you're still in the planning and research stage for your own smart home.  Or maybe you've already established a platform.  But at some stage, you are probably going to add new devices, actions and automations.  If you are sharing your household with others or routinely have visitors or guests, you'll want to assure that your smart home is following the goals you initially established.

Selecting a Home Automation Platform

Upping the Game

So you've decided that you'd like to move from a mishmash of individual smart devices to a true integrated and automated smart home.  The first step you must take is to decide on a platform or system that will serve as the "brains" of your automated home.  This is not a trivial step.  You will be spending substantial time (and possibly a decent chunk of change over time) getting your home to the desired state.  The last thing you want is to find that you've painted yourself into a corner and can't do some of the things you'd really like to do.  So, before beginning, you need to do some planning and research.

Issues and Goals for my Smart Home

 

As I started to acquire more and more "smart" devices and bring them into the home, a number of problems, issues and concerns arose.

 

Home Automation with Home Assistant

Welcome to the first post of my new blog.  This blog will focus primarily on the details of my smart home journey and delve into some of the automations and devices that I've integrated into our everyday lives.  It will be Home Assistant-centric, but many of the processes, devices and automations should work on other platforms as well.