Dwelling automation techniques are all nicely and good, as long as the one who constructed all of it is round to drive it. Let’s face it, they’re very often a posh internet of interconnected techniques, all tied to the specifics of 1’s residence — and somebody much less aware of all of it might get slightly irritated if, on a cold day, the interface to the boiler is through a Python script, and one thing gained’t work. Simply saying. Home Buttons by [Matej Planinšek] over on Hackaday.IO is a properly polished venture, which goals to take a few of the hackiness out of such automation by offering a smooth entrance finish to these automation routines, enabling anybody to rock on over and set one in motion with out trouble.
The PCB design was offered in Altium format, which you’ll find on the project GitHub page. This reveals a simple design, with just a few good little particulars right here and there. The internally mounted 18650 cell is reportedly good for at the least a yr of operation, however when time, it may be charged through USB. A Xysemi XB8608AF (PDF) safety chip offers applicable limiting for the 18650 cell, shielding it from the perils of overcharging, discharging, and whatnot. Not that that’s doubtless on this present setup. A Sensiron SHTC3 humidity and temperature sensor can also be in there, hanging off the I2C bus, which is smart for this utility.
Dwelling Automation hacks are a lot on these pages, like this scroll-wheel interface, as an example. If all these things is wanting fairly overbearingly difficult to get into, how about beginning with a Pico W?