Note : I originally posted this on Reddit, where not everyone is familiar with HS and its capabilities. The feedback was very positive, and I wanted to share it with the HS community.
Problem :
For Thanksgiving, I'm having 56 family members at my home. I only have two available bathrooms for their use. Last year, a long queue formed for the bathrooms, and one tended to be under utilized due to it being on a different floor.
My Home Automation Components :
- HSM-200 Z-Wave Motion Detectors w/ status lights
- Insteon Switchlinc Dimmers for Bathroom Lights
- Insteon Hidden Door Sensors
- HomeSeer w/HSTouch (wall mounted tablets throughout house).
Home Automation Solution (took 4-5 hours to make):
- Using the bathroom motion sensors, light status, and door sensors, HomeSeer knows the occupancy of each bathroom.
- When guests arrived, they got notified by SMS that the home has a bathroom reservation system. By replying "P", they get added to a queue. A reply is sent back telling them how many people are in front of them.
- In HomeSeer, whenever a bathroom becomes unoccupied, an event gets triggered to check the queue and to text them (via the SMS plugin) notifying which bathroom is available for them to use. Alternatively, you can use IFTTT with the Android SMS channel for similar results
- For younger kids without phones, they can use any of the wall-mounted Android tablets. In HSTouch, I created a special "bathroom" screen showing all of the kids pictures (remember, it's all extended family). Younger kids immediately jump to the front of the queue. A notification will show up telling them which one to go to, and wait outside... HomeSeer will direct them to which bathroom has been occupied the longest. (which may not always be the best one, but without knowing what people are doing inside there...) :-)
Result :
The new system ended up being a smashing success. Getting discretely notified when it's your turn to go to the restroom allowed people to mingle longer and not break conversation. Younger kids got directed to a bathroom quickly, and potential minimized any dramas of accidents. However, the older grandparents, who are technology averse, thought it was all a bit too much :-)
Future expansion ideas :
- Release a puff of fragrance every time somebody does a #2 (probably can make this based on the duration of how long they were in there)
- For the young kids, give better directions on how to get to the assigned bathroom
- Figure out which bathroom will be available next, and text the next person ahead of time so that they get to the assigned restroom as it is being unoccupied (to minimize bathroom downtime)
Problem :
For Thanksgiving, I'm having 56 family members at my home. I only have two available bathrooms for their use. Last year, a long queue formed for the bathrooms, and one tended to be under utilized due to it being on a different floor.
My Home Automation Components :
- HSM-200 Z-Wave Motion Detectors w/ status lights
- Insteon Switchlinc Dimmers for Bathroom Lights
- Insteon Hidden Door Sensors
- HomeSeer w/HSTouch (wall mounted tablets throughout house).
Home Automation Solution (took 4-5 hours to make):
- Using the bathroom motion sensors, light status, and door sensors, HomeSeer knows the occupancy of each bathroom.
- When guests arrived, they got notified by SMS that the home has a bathroom reservation system. By replying "P", they get added to a queue. A reply is sent back telling them how many people are in front of them.
- In HomeSeer, whenever a bathroom becomes unoccupied, an event gets triggered to check the queue and to text them (via the SMS plugin) notifying which bathroom is available for them to use. Alternatively, you can use IFTTT with the Android SMS channel for similar results
- For younger kids without phones, they can use any of the wall-mounted Android tablets. In HSTouch, I created a special "bathroom" screen showing all of the kids pictures (remember, it's all extended family). Younger kids immediately jump to the front of the queue. A notification will show up telling them which one to go to, and wait outside... HomeSeer will direct them to which bathroom has been occupied the longest. (which may not always be the best one, but without knowing what people are doing inside there...) :-)
Result :
The new system ended up being a smashing success. Getting discretely notified when it's your turn to go to the restroom allowed people to mingle longer and not break conversation. Younger kids got directed to a bathroom quickly, and potential minimized any dramas of accidents. However, the older grandparents, who are technology averse, thought it was all a bit too much :-)
Future expansion ideas :
- Release a puff of fragrance every time somebody does a #2 (probably can make this based on the duration of how long they were in there)
- For the young kids, give better directions on how to get to the assigned bathroom
- Figure out which bathroom will be available next, and text the next person ahead of time so that they get to the assigned restroom as it is being unoccupied (to minimize bathroom downtime)
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