Introduction
The following images are screen captures demonstrating how a typical residential iPad display appears, and typical features available. There are two sets of images shown – those in a low-contrast light grey theme that blends in well with a white frame and lighter walls, and those in a more vivid high-contrast black theme well suited to dark walls or more dramatic locations. Of course, the colour scheme and images used will be created uniquely for you. We try to incorporate images and tones that define your space and resonate warmly with you for a personalised result. We are guided by two principles, one following from the other – the first is to try to create something visually beautiful, and the second is to avoid cramming too much onto the one screen. How adventurous you want to be with the visuals is up to you!
The images on this page are display as groups so you can click forwards and backwards to move through them, but if that doesn’t work on your device, the images can be right-clicked to ‘Open image in new tab’.
The system is set up as a number of pages, each of which contain direct action icons, buttons, and sliders, as well as some that cause a pop-up overlay, which in turn contain more focused actions. The system can simply remain on the last page chosen, or can automatically return to the home page after a period of time.
You can have a number of displays in different locations, and they can be set to be identical (for familiarity) or unique (to directly relate to their location, with different pages and home screens).
Your home screen
This tries to capture the most frequent operations. Nobody likes to press three buttons just to turn the main lights on. To that end, often this screen controls groups of lights together, but a popup overlay allows individual light control. In the first example here, the Hall lights slider sets both the Front hall and the Back hall lights, but the popup allows control of each independently.
In addition, this screen is often used to display information, such as temperatures and air conditioner settings. Status icons are displayed in the bottom left of the display, showing for example, the garage door status (and even reminding one to clean the air conditioning filter – red icon!).
Blind and Power outlet control
In this example, the seven blinds are located in a penthouse with a panoramic city view, so a simple left to right display works well, but blinds grouped by area or function might otherwise be more appropriate. The second image shows a temperature based automation implemented for the blinds. Additionally, the blinds can be scheduled to operate at particular times, explained below.
We have written the software to directly operate TP-Link Smart Plugs (models HS100 and HS110). They are useful for floor lighting or other special uses. The HS110 model allows energy consumption measurement (see below).
Scenes
Lighting scenes are a popular aspect of automation systems. Other items such as blinds and music may be incorporated into scenes. In most building automation systems, the system installer sets up predefined scenes in accordance with what you think you want. Later, you wish you’d asked for something different, but it’s a call-out to make changes. We implement those kinds of scenes of course, but in addition, we have created fully customisable user scenes as well. You create the scene, name it, decide what is controlled, and to what setting. We’ve incorporated Philips Hue globes into the system as well, so the scene setting can get quite sophisticated.
Scenes are often thought of as creating a mood such as Romantic Dinner, Movie Time, etc, but they can perform a practical function such as turning all outside lights off.
Plans
Often it is useful to use plans to control a wider area or to simply see at a glance what is on or off. For intermediate sized plans, we can have a slider appear when that light is chosen, but for larger plans we find it better to simply have the icons toggle the lights on or off. Finer control can be gained by going to a specific page for that area.
Other areas
Usually there is more to control than the immediate area, and these are often set up on separate pages. Two examples here are the outside area and the garage. The garage page includes a timer for the garage lights and an ability to open the garage door. Given that the garage door may not be easily visible, and inadvertent operation is not desired, a password needs to be entered to operate it. A nice feature implemented here is that if the garage door is operated from the remote in the returning car, the garage lights turn on, with the 5 minute timer. The timer can be cancelled by tapping the Light delay button (also by tapping a button on a switchplate in the garage).
Mobile devices
The displays on the touchscreens are available on mobile devices too – great for accessing on the couch!
There are two displays created – one is suitable for desktop PCs and tablets, and the other is a simplified one intended for access from a smaller mobile phone screen. For example, the image on the left below is intended for PC or tablet display, while the one on the right is for mobile devices.
Air conditioner control
An air conditioner (HVAC equipment) can be controlled and schedules set. This is much easier and more intuitive than most manufacturer supplied wall mounted controllers. Many can relate to giving up in frustration trying to program schedules with such traditional controllers. Setting the current operation is as easy as tapping the icons and directly selecting the temperature, modes, and fan speed. Here we show eight presets that are just as easily set and can all be seen at a glance. Then these presets can be scheduled using the powerful scheduling function. No more reaching for the operation manual!
Temperatures and weather
Temperatures and the weather are of great interest to many people! In this example, a page has been set up to display real time temperatures in and on the property, along with the official temperature in the city. These values can be viewed as graphs on a daily, weekly, monthly, and annual basis. The same parameter (e.g. Outside temperature) can be directly compared on two separate days, and multiple parameters can be compared over the same time period.
Power consumption
We can install power consumption measuring devices that allow a real-time display of the power currently being consumed and the kWh meter reading for the different tariffs and phases feeding the property. This allows you to make energy saving decisions, particularly when used in conjunction with temperature measurement as described above. In addition to the graphical data, power consumption data can be logged to a USB drive for offline analysis, especially useful for determining the optimum tariffs and optimum solar panel layouts.
We can incorporate power monitoring at specific outlets using the TP-Link Smart Plug model HS110, and produce the same graphical results.
Scheduling
A really great feature of this automation system is the user controllable scheduling. There is an amazing degree of flexibility, with any item or scene able to be operated or turned on or off at any time of day, sunset/sunrise, any day(s) of the week/month, including/excluding holidays, etc. All set up and managed by you (or by us if you would prefer!). Examples include hall lights coming on at sunset, outside lights turning off at 1am, chargers coming on once a day for a few hours, blinds opening at 6am, and so on.
Watering (irrigation)
So much easier than struggling with a small LCD display with its “press up five times, followed by enter, two left presses, a down press, and a save”! We have created a powerful interface screen for implementing your watering requirements, operated from inside of course, rather than having to walk to the bottom of the garden. You give meaningful names to your watering zones, and these can be changed as your watering needs evolve. It offers simple Instant watering functionality, where watering zones can be instantly turned on for a predetermined duration (this duration is easy to set, and viewable right on the screen). In addition, sequences can be set up where the zones are run one after the other for predetermined durations. These sequences can be run on demand, but can be scheduled to run automatically.
We offer Smart watering, where extended watering durations are run on hot days, and/or watering is reduced on rainy days. You determine the activation levels for the Smart watering to keep your outside areas humming along nicely.
This screen may appear complex due to its power, but a simple tap brings up a help screen to explain all the possibilities.
Motion sensors
PIR motion sensors are often installed to control lights automatically. This is usually done for convenience, cost savings, and security, especially where outside lights are concerned. However simply having the lights come on and off all the time rather than being on a schedule can quickly get annoying and waste power. We can create screens to allow you to adjust the schedule that each sensor is active for, or even cancel their operation temporarily, say during a party or other event.
Security systems
We can often incorporate security systems into your touchscreen. This results in a better visualisation of your system zones, and can send a message to your phone if an alarm occurs! Where needed, security camera feeds can be viewed.
Setup screen
There are usually a number of things we want you to have control over, and we put them here, along with our logo so you (or a subsequent occupant) know who to contact for support. Here are two examples, differing in the choice of images.
Much, much more
There’s not much the system can’t do, so let us know what you’d like. We can write data to remote servers, retrieve data from websites for display, view camera feeds, interface security systems, log events, view micro-websites within a page, and on, and on, and on!
Download screen images
The screen images above are screen captures demonstrating how a typical residential iPad display appears, and are posted in half-full resolution (1024 x 768) for quicker loading. If you’d like to download a sample selection of the images in full-resolution (2048 x 1536) for viewing on an iPad to get a direct feel of the visual quality, please click HERE.
