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Review: Aeon Labs Minimote
As some can probably tell from my writings, I'm very into home automation and have my whole house setup so that it basically runs itself (OK, not really). I have lots of "scenes" programmed to respond to various triggers such as wall switches, motion detectors and time of day. The way our house is setup, we have a very large sliding glass door leading to the backyard which makes it hard to mount any switch near it. At night we let the dog out and turn the light on for him; if the door was closed, opening the door at night causes the light to turn on. If the door was open like it has been all summer, the light only comes on when the dog passes the outside motion sensor.
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Cable confusion helps in cutting the cord
A few months ago, my parents moved to a different part of town and one of the services they had to switch was cable. Due to franchise agreements in San Diego, they had to switch providers. My dad called me and asked for advice on what cable TV package to get and I had no idea because I don't have cable TV and have a different provider. However, we went through the shows that my parents recorded on their TiVo and with a few exceptions, the shows were all on broadcast TV. I suggested that my dad give an antenna a try as that would be a lot cheaper and he wouldn't have to pick a package. He agree and I told him to order an Antennas Direct ClearStream Antenna
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Conserve like every day is hot
San Diego has been experiencing a major heat wave and our local utility, SDG&E, has asked people to conserve electricity so that the grid isn't taxed too much. If people sign up for "Reduce Your Use" rewards, SDG&E will pay people if they use a certain amount less than normal at peak times. This annoys me to no end as I conserve everyday and can't conserve any more. We use ceiling fans all the time, turn off lights in rooms we're not using, run appliances at non-peak times, installed high efficiency appliances and lights, etc.
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SSL Certificates on Private Networks with the EdgeRouter
These days it seems like every device on my home network has its own web server. Some of the devices have SSL enabled on them and force you to use them (http requests are redirected to https); this isn't bad, but since the sites are accessed with an IP address or a local name (using Bonjour), browsers always give a warning about a domain name mismatch. For those that don't know, when you connect to a secure site, the browser checks the domain name you entered with that of the certificate; if they don't match, it could indicate that someone is trying to spoof the site. You can either ignore the warning or you can choose the option to always trust the certificate. The latter method is what I usually do, but it just doesn't feel right and there could be security issues with this method.
