Google Glass & HA

[IVB]

For those of you interested in Home Automation, I'm going to have to figure out how to integrate Google Glass with CQC...

Originally Posted by Vivek

#ifihadglass I'd control my home automation system by sight. When I walk away from my house, I'd look at it and say "ok glass, arm". While in the house i could integrate it with the A/V, HVAC, lighting, or other based on whatever i was looking at.

And, their response:

Originally Posted by GoogleGlass

Hi Vivek, thanks for applying! We’d like to invite you to join our #glassexplorers program. We’ll be sending you a private message with more details in the coming weeks -- keep an eye on our stream at Project Glass.

[Skybolt]

How would you use this in HA? As a controller, oppossed to a touch screen?

Not to sure I would want it for that. I like my touch screens, particularly my phone.

[IVB]

A phone or touch controller still requires overt physical action. In theory, google glass would be able to combine voice recognition and sight to perform actions. IE, look at the thermostat and say turn up heat.

[pjpjpjpj]

I admit I haven't looked at Glass a lot, but wouldn't it be using the same database that Google Goggles uses? I don't know if (m)any of you have tried the Goggles app, but it's far from where it ideally should be (and presumably wants to be). The problem seems to be that the world has "an imperfect background". In other words, if you look at something that you want it to find, you can't cut out the background and have it only see that item. If I look at a billboard from a car, I get the entire surroundings, not just the billboard.

For example, on Goggles, I took a photo of a wine bottle and it was able to get the label and pull up the website for the winery as well as prices from various stores nearby. But that was because I could lay the bottle on a table and take a photo with nothing but blank table surrounding the bottle. But most of the time when I look at something, I can't separate it from the surroundings, and thus I get a bunch of random photos taken by people, in which something matches a part of the composition of my photo. It's almost like their database got too bloated, and by photos of people in their everyday lives - with millions of photos, some random pic is going to pull a match with almost everything you photograph (or look at).

Pulling a connection to IVB's OP, if I looked at my house, it seems like it's very likely to pull up a bunch of people's house photos and maybe some real estate sites, rather than knowing it's my house. Now, of course, this could be tweaked by voice commands, but I think my broader point stands as far as "visual recognition and searching a database".

[IVB]

Originally Posted by pjpjpjpj

I admit I haven't looked at Glass a lot, but wouldn't it be using the same database that Google Goggles uses? I don't know if (m)any of you have tried the Goggles app, but it's far from where it ideally should be (and presumably wants to be). The problem seems to be that the world has "an imperfect background". In other words, if you look at something that you want it to find, you can't cut out the background and have it only see that item. If I look at a billboard from a car, I get the entire surroundings, not just the billboard.

For example, on Goggles, I took a photo of a wine bottle and it was able to get the label and pull up the website for the winery as well as prices from various stores nearby. But that was because I could lay the bottle on a table and take a photo with nothing but blank table surrounding the bottle. But most of the time when I look at something, I can't separate it from the surroundings, and thus I get a bunch of random photos taken by people, in which something matches a part of the composition of my photo. It's almost like their database got too bloated, and by photos of people in their everyday lives - with millions of photos, some random pic is going to pull a match with almost everything you photograph (or look at).

Pulling a connection to IVB's OP, if I looked at my house, it seems like it's very likely to pull up a bunch of people's house photos and maybe some real estate sites, rather than knowing it's my house. Now, of course, this could be tweaked by voice commands, but I think my broader point stands as far as "visual recognition and searching a database".

Everything you said may be totally correct. Or perhaps Glass works a different way. Or perhaps the combination of voice & sight does something. Or perhaps location triangulation via my cellphone's GPS (A la tasker).

Ask me again a month after I get the privilege of paying $1500 to be a beta tester for a monstrously successful company and get the product in hand

[Skybolt]

Originally Posted by IVB

A phone or touch controller still requires overt physical action. In theory, google glass would be able to combine voice recognition and sight to perform actions. IE, look at the thermostat and say turn up heat.

Yes, but in the case of the Thermostat, if you have to look at it, that means you have to be near it, and that means you have to be home to change the temperature. Unless this could done via remote selection of some sort or differant operating modes I guess?

I use my phone when away to do many things at the house, one of them is to adjust the temp, when returning home. It seems that Glass would have trouble with that concept? Maybe not down the road though.

[IVB]

Originally Posted by Skybolt

Yes, but in the case of the Thermostat, if you have to look at it, that means you have to be near it, and that means you have to be home to change the temperature. Unless this could done via remote selection of some sort or differant operating modes I guess?

I use my phone when away to do many things at the house, one of them is to adjust the temp, when returning home. It seems that Glass would have trouble with that concept? Maybe not down the road though.

Well, i'm not saying Glass is the *only* communication channel with the HA system, only that a phone is *not* the only channel. There will certainly be instances of where a phone could be superior, such as turning a set of lights on/off. I also use my phone to do things when in a remote location.

But, I don't think we can discount the value of having a secondary channel that doesn't require pulling a phone out.

BTW, and this is something I used to throw at the MainLobby crowd when they claimed they were doing HA, using a phone or Google Glass is really just an alternate method of manual control. It is most assuredly NOT home automation. It is home "gee looky here I can use a different device to do what I want". True home automation is using automated rules to have things occur without even pulling out your phone or telling Google Glass to do something.

For example, if my phone suddenly detects that i'm (Cellphone tower, WiFi nearby, BlueTooth nearby) at my house when I wasn't, it should automatically turn off the sprinklers, turn up heat if its cold, & Turn on the appropriate set of lights if its dark out. If I'm wearing Google Glass, it could even pop up a "wife home" on them.

If I'm walking away from the house and the alarm is off, or my zWave door lock shows unlocked, or (...), send an alert to both the phone & google glass. (I constantly don't hear the SMS tone on my phone, esp if i'm mulling over some work drama).

Anyhow, i'm making all this crap up. We'll see how useful it actually is, but I think that secondary channel will drive some interesting new true automation rules.

[Skybolt]

Originally Posted by IVB

... But, I don't think we can discount the value of having a secondary channel that doesn't require pulling a phone out.

Definetly can't discount it, sorry if I came across as a doubting thomas. Definetly not the case. I just didn't/don't see the application from wearing glasses.

I use HomeSeer and have some of what you playfully through around, actually working.

I totally agree with your assement of HA and Manual control. Remote control is nice, not having to control is better.

[IVB]

yeah, i have all that working right now via Tasker integration with CQC. No idea what else I'd do with Google Glasses, but for the low low price of $1500 I guess I'll find out ;-0

[pjpjpjpj]

Originally Posted by IVB

Ask me again a month after I get the privilege of paying $1500 to be a beta tester for a monstrously successful company and get the product in hand

That's "a monstrously successful company which took away our beloved Sage" to you.

Seriously though, I read several articles yesterday (and I agree) about the enormous legal issues that Google Glass will face (or cause). Specifically, people wearing them in movie theaters or at concerts (bootleg recording), kids wearing them in school (cheating), people wearing them in locker rooms (privacy), issues with spying, pedophiles hanging around schools, or anywhere that it would be creepy and/or illegal to stand there holding a video camera, yet you can be recording or taking pictures with no one being the wiser. They also mentioned Las Vegas, and wearing of the glasses in gentlemen's clubs (no) and casinos (big no), and how their security is going to have to be trained to spot those glasses and "kindly ask that you leave" (or offer to "check" them for you).

[IVB]

Originally Posted by pjpjpjpj

Seriously though, I read several articles yesterday (and I agree) about the enormous legal issues that Google Glass will face (or cause). Specifically, people wearing them in movie theaters or at concerts (bootleg recording), kids wearing them in school (cheating), people wearing them in locker rooms (privacy), issues with spying, pedophiles hanging around schools, or anywhere that it would be creepy and/or illegal to stand there holding a video camera, yet you can be recording or taking pictures with no one being the wiser. They also mentioned Las Vegas, and wearing of the glasses in gentlemen's clubs (no) and casinos (big no), and how their security is going to have to be trained to spot those glasses and "kindly ask that you leave" (or offer to "check" them for you).

Yep, fully agree with everything you just said. Although honestly, at $1500, there is zero chance I'm wearing them in public on a regular basis. Plus I live near Berkeley, people actively SCREAM AT PEOPLE DRIVING HUMMERS and have a serious holier than thou attitude, I can't imagine the reaction if I walked around downtown Bezerkely with Google Glass.

I'll probably wear them inside the house, potentially while travelling for work, and at work to record various meetings but not before securing everyone's permission. We already audio-record many meetings so this shouldn't be a big delta.

Given that I've been too damn cheap to buy $170 polarized sunglasses, I can't imagine me pulling out $1500 glasses at the drop of a hat. And if I hadn't gotten a great severance package from my job, there's no chance I'd have even spent the $1500 on these.

[wayner]

How do you guys use your HA systems? Do you like them?

I have a Control4 system. It is quite good but it is not as DIY as I would like as there are some basic things that you need a dealer to do as they use a dealer based model, although less so than higher end systems like Crestron.

But sometimes I wonder whether the $000s of dollars that I spent on the system was worth it.

I use my system for lighting, HVAC, automation of gas fireplace and blinds. The system can also be used for controlling my Home Theater but I haven't really used it for that as it requires a controller at each TV which starts to get expensive. And I am happy using the same Hamrony remotes at each TV with Sage extenders. It sounds like lots of the installs for stuff like Control4 uses video matrix switches and distributes the video from a central locations which seems like a waste to me compared to distributing via ethernet to Sage extenders.

[IVB]

Well, obviously I like mine as I'm spending $1500 to control it with Google Glass :-)

What I like about the DIY systems is that you don't have to predefine 'requirements' or go with the dealer template, you can tweak them yourself to add automation rules as you want. And as you decide those rules don't quite fit, you can modify them to suit.

What I've seen from most pros is "quilt-making". That is, they don't really integrate the various subsystems (lighting, a/v, HVAC, security) but rather present it all in a unified GUI. *Maybe* they offer some fancy cross-system stuff but not a lot.

You can also integrate many more things. C4 is pretty closed in what it can control. CQC, and I believe HomeSeer, can monitor SageTV extenders and perform actions on Sage based on external stuff (pause show if doorbell rings). Or perform external actions based on Sage stuff (turn down lights if the extender goes into Play mode).

Sure, you could pay a pro to do that, but it would be big $$ and negative ROI. But, when the Investment is near zero, the return doesn't have to be monstrous to make for an enjoyable house.

I know several professional installers, 3 of them say that my house has more functionality than 99% of the AMX or Crestron installs that they do.

[wayner]

I wish I knew more about the closed nature of C4 before I got into it. I really wish that they had an open API like Sage that would allow users to build functionality as you could do great things as you have mentioned.

A lot of this stuff is cool to do but I wonder how practical it is. Sure I could have a really cool wake-up routine where the lights come on gradually and the radio ramps up, but that doesn't really fit my lifestyle as it would piss off my wife or wake up the kid that has jumped into our bed in the middle of the night.

Sure that "pause the TV when the doorbell rings" idea is cool, but it doesn't benefit me much since it is usually the kids watching TV and they aren't going to be answering the door.

And I think that is true for many people.

I have lots of flexibility on controlling the t-stat but I keep it set at a constant temp since we pretty much always have someone in the house and my wife doesn't want me to turn the heat down at night in case the kids get uncovered.

The main benefit for me is the ability to control landscape lighting and the flexibility in using a wall keypad to control whatever lights you want.

[IVB]

oh sure, that example is a silly one, but it was more of a proof-of-concept. But, what i've found about true automation is that its the 1000 small things that you do that makes it cool, there's not really any single killer feature. And its a lot easier to do 1000 things (which is really 5000 things as its the spaghetti-on-the-wall cliche) when you DIY.

My big thing is shutting down the house when we arm the security system. Turn off all lights, TVs, equipment, turn down HVAC.

When I come home, I hold my phone up to an NFC chip, it has CQC disarm the security system, turn up HVAC. If its at a certain hour, it turns on specific lighting. I don't even have to press any buttons or open up any apps.

With Google Glass, I am curious as to whether I can just look at the doorbell and say "Ok Google, I'm home". Of course, I usually have my phone in my hand as I'm walking home from the train, but thats besides the point :-)

[wayner]

What about taking things a step farther and using proximity sensors, or even the action of your bluetooth phone joining the home LAN as the initiation of the "IVB is home" routine.

For me this stuff is less useful since normally the wife, kids, nanny or housekeeper are always home .

[IVB]

Unpredictable. I have Tasker kick off things when I enter the home area (WiFi near), but it's not always a given that I'm going inside. I live in a very Archie Bunker type neighborhood , houses 15' apart, 10' back from street. We walk most places.

[Skybolt]

Originally Posted by wayner

I wish I knew more about the closed nature of C4 before I got into it. I really wish that they had an open API like Sage that would allow users to build functionality as you could do great things as you have mentioned. ...

You should take a look at HomeSeer, it is AWESOME, not only is there a plugin interface, they they also provide an SDK and fully documented API.

As far as what I use it for, everything it's tied into everything and nothing.
Meaning, If I turn it off, everything can still operate just fine. With it on I can do things like, pull into the driveway with my phone in pocket, and have the house disarm, unlock the front door, turn the music on - bar lights on etc.

[pjpjpjpj]

IVB, you're GONNA GO BLIND!!!
(j/k)

http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/te...id=msnhp&pos=5

[IVB]

Ack, thanks for posting, I actually *have* had PRK (Lasik equivalent).

And, as I just posted here...

Rethinking whether I should plunk down the $1500 for Google Glass, esp after a post by +Robert Hirsch about people just using them to take silly pictures. Am I about to buy a product that tons of people will abuse and get blowback from everyone?