Headworx

Whenever I come across a discussion that involves wireless communications over the Thread protocol (such as this one ), there is almost 100% chance people don't understand the underlying physics and traffic patterns. This is the result of Thread marketing since 2014, highlighting the IPv6 protocol as its key strength. And typically it goes like that: "Thread is based on IPv6 and there are more IPv6 addresses that grains of sand in the Universe". And people read this "because Thread is based on IPv6, it is a highly scalable wireless protocol". Treating the potential number of static addresses equally to the dynamic situation when these devices actually send data. If we consider the networked lighting control domain, the most prevalent pattern today is to have a motion sensor in every luminaire. The motion sensor usually has multiple functions: it is a motion sensor of course. But it also is a light level sensor enabling daylight harvesting (or dimming lights down...

Once considered the greatest thing since sliced bread, notifications have spun of of control. Meant to be the (most) important stuff, have been sliding into complete irrelevance. And have become totally distracting and annoying. The operating systems (including the flagship Android and iOS), even with their recent Artificial Intelligence (AI) features have failed to cope with the notifications' torrents. Out of box, every app wants to send notifications about everything - this is of course the fight for potential revenue through engagement and conversion. Yes this can be managed. But only theoretically, as users really drown in the ocean of options they do not understand. On top of the notifications' options there is the hierarchy - you have favorite contacts (meant to always go through), you have time - or activity - based profiles (iOS calls them focuses). Barely anyone understands the combinations. Then there are the super annoying users of (increasingly more popular) instan...

I really liked the Lex Fridman's recent interview with David Heinemeier Hansson (aka DHH) - the 37signals / Ruby on Rails guy. Many topics, but the small teams theme has really resonated with me. I was a solo programmer for about 20 years, starting with Sinclair ZX Spectrum in 1983 and going through several jobs including the company I cocreated in 1992, which grew up to around 300 people ten years later. This solo experience has spoiled me. I was the product manager, the ux designer, the architect and the coder. And that was extremely efficient. Of course the solo approach has limits to the scalability, as there are only 2 hands and 24 hours in a day, no matter how much money you throw in. So at some point I had to give up and cede the tasks to the team. And that was so immensely frustrating. Despite the team being many developers (I still tried to keep the architect role), things started going super slow. I was spending countless hours teaching, explaining, then explaining again ...

Utilities move slowly. But ultimately they do. Half a year ago I installed the Home Assistant multi-channel energy meter which has  clearly shown the energy usage patterns. I had known before my addiction to hot bath every day cost me dearly. And it was really the lowest hanging fruit. Water boiler is the most efficient and available energy storage . After seeing the usage patterns, I was planning to switch to variable energy pricing plan. But filling the related paperwork was tedious enough to procrastinate. Until the utility offered the helping hand: switch to energy pricing with just a single "yes" click on their web site. No paperwork, no nothing.  A couple of days later the confirmation of the switch arrived. Plus I have online access to the formal energy meter readings. No Home Assistant integration yet, but the patterns and values match with what I have, which is reassuring. I need to get used to this a bit (although the main patterns have already been preprogrammed)....

This one is quite interesting and I am yet to collect the hard evidence on what really happens. Long story short: Home Assistant can, behind the scenes, drain battery in a smart watch. It all leads back many months ago when I started seeing my Garmin fēnix  watch dead every morning. I mean ALMOST every morning. Normally it can run for 1-2 weeks on a charge and suddenly every morning it was dead, despite being fully charged on the day before. I tried different things - software/firmware update of course, changing some parameters (but it had been working fine before) - no lasting improvement. Until this June (after having extensive travel period - US West Coast, twice to China and then Europe), when I realized that it did not lose the battery when I was away from home. I started thinking on what was so special at home that the watch, left for the night on my bedside table, was losing the charge completely. There was one idea that came to mind: Home Assistant. And to be precise: ...

It has been almost 6 full months since (after long procrastination) I finally completed the home energy monitoring project . In short: Home Assistant + Circuit Setup energy meter based on ESPHome. Long story short: all has been working flawlessly. There have been multiple routine firmware updates (they are released ~monthly). To be honest I have not paid (almost) any attention to them. Luckily nothing got broken, but equally Home Assistant could be releasing one update per year. This is a side observation, but generally people are fed up with software updates. Even if they go flawlessly, there is always the risk of something getting broken. I've been hearing the same from our customers: you release too frequently (we used to every 6 months, but now there is the pressure to release at most once a year). Ove the 6 months I have learned quite a lot about my usage patterns. Daily hot bath is an energy hog, but I can easily run the boiler when the energy is least expensive (=middle of ...

High speed trains in China are phenomenal. I could sit by the window for hours watching the passing landscape. They do not run on ground. They either soar high on concrete bridges and piers or pierce through tunnels. It is thousands of kilometers of piers and tunnels. And the landscape mostly flips from agricultural fields to endless seas of industrial buildings - factories. It is totally unlike anywhere else. When the train enters an industrial zone, there are thousands and thousands factories. It probably takes such a train ride to understand the hypothetical effort of moving manufacturing to the West. The factories form a unique and super efficient industrial supply chain. It is not about the iPhone. While a flagship symbol of Western dominance, we could do without iPhones. But probably we could not do without lights, linen, pots, just about every daily used item is made in China. And then there are basic components to make them: wires, bolts, glue, paint. And then the raw materials...