Need some ideas to "alert" when dog goes upstairs

[Malarcy]

Looking for some ideas:

Problem - greedy dog is fanatical about getting to 1st floor landing where the cats are fed, what I need is something I can hook to her collar to trigger a sensor when she get halfway up 1st flight of stairs - I have found a couple of shortrange rfid setups - one looks good - but the range is 4 inches - another is a possible but it's a metre range with the right tags and antenna that will fail WAF if bolted on the stairs

So - small/discrete won't trigger when we or the cats walk by but will allow me to set of an alarm or when she tries.

Malarcy

[Rupp]

I wonder if one of these IR collar tags could be hacked to use with HS?

http://www.smarthome.com/6191dk.html

[Malarcy]

That's the kind of tool I am looking for - I wonder how much of the door i can hack away and make discrete - nice find Rupp.


Malarcy

[Rupp]

I was thinking you could use something like an Powermid and see if it would pick up the IR signal. I wonder if it constantly broadcasts IR or the door triggers it somehow.

[Bryan Nystrom]

Take a look at this if you have the ability to run a USB cable close:

Cheap USB Hardware Security Key

[dantelope]

.... invisible fence?


Dan

[Malarcy]

Bryan - The usb thing looks great - but the range in this case looks like too much - but - hey forget the dog this could be the cheap proximity thing that rupp has been looking for - given that it appears as a hid device some of the plugins (mine or stipus's) might work with it.....

Shoot.... I have the attention span of a butterfly at the best of times - now there is some cool toy to play with and...... whatever I might get one of those to play with (if newegg will ship international)...

Dantelope - do you any more details on the invisible fence - I have heard a few people mention it but I don't know if I can adapt it for indoor use.

Rupp - the powermid idea could be a winner as well

Thanks for the ideas guys, I have some thinking to do.

Malarcy

[Rupp]

Bryan - hey forget the dog this could be the cheap proximity thing that rupp has been looking for - given that it appears as a hid device some of the plugins (mine or stipus's) might work with it.....
Malarcy

Which plugins are you talking about that may work with this device? This sound like an excellent way to unlock doors and know when I'm on the couch.

[dantelope]

Invisible Fence

No adaptation required. Invisible Fence has an indoor product. Check here.

http://www.invisiblefence.com/produc...door/index.asp


Disclaimers:
I don't have a dog and I don't work for the company and I receive no kickbacks and I have no idea if this product will do what you want or if it even works. Furthermore, I may be a drooling martian from the planet Scooby hell-bent on selling you on products you can't afford in an effort to overturn the Evil Empire's financial infrastructure.

[Malarcy]

Which plugins are you talking about that may work with this device? This sound like an excellent way to unlock doors and know when I'm on the couch.

STIPUS one is more complete than mine - don't know exactly how these devices are represented to the OS but if it's a game device it may work:

http://board.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=109329

Mine is discussed here:

http://board.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=102005

Don't know - but 15bucks seems hard to resist....

Dan - thanks for the link

Malarcy