Smart home
The term 'smart' is typically applied to an 'intelligent' web-connected electronic device or system which may operate stand-alone or in a network with other devices. It usually involves some form of user interaction.
New technology is enabling the creation of smart homes, integrating devices to make the home a better place to be in terms of safety, comfort, productivity and well-being. Smart thermostats note, for example, each time the dial is turned up or down, to build a detailed schedule based on the user’s preferences.
BSRIA (Building Services Research and Information Association) defines smart homes as those operating, ‘…a building control system, which provides integrated, centralised control of two or more individual systems’. Effectively this is the residential extension of commercial type controls.
Individual systems can be any of the following:
- Environmental control system (heating ventilation and air conditioning - HVAC).
- Household appliances (clothes dryers, washing machines, refrigerators, freezers, dishwashers, ovens, coffee-makers, microwaves, etc.)
- Consumer electronics (TV, radio, audio-video equipment, game consoles, etc.)
- Building components (blinds, curtains, windows, doors, etc.).
Devices may be connected through a wired or wireless network to allow control via a personal computer, and may allow remote access via the internet using a PC, smartphone or tablet.
These smart products typically incorporate user-friendly operation, for example, displaying green symbols when energy is being saved and red when excessive amounts are being consumed.
If the smart home system is accessible remotely via the internet, BSRIA refers to it as a 'connected home'.
[edit] Related articles on Designing Buildings
- Active system.
- A smart home can be a healthy home too.
- Building management systems.
- Consumer electronics.
- Engineering Smart Cities.
- European connected and smart home market.
- Information and communications technology.
- Internet of things.
- Making a house a home.
- PAS 180:2014 Smart cities – Vocabulary.
- PAS 181:2014 Smart city Framework. Guide to establishing strategies for smart.
- PAS 182 Smart city data concept model.
- Post-pandemic home design.
- Smart buildings.
- Smart cities design timeframe.
- Smart cities.
- Smart city.
- Smart home and light commercial market in 2017.
- Smart technology.
- The global smart homes market.
- The smart buildings market.
Featured articles and news
How orchards can influence planning and development.
A practical guide to the use of flint in design and architecture.
Designing for neurodiversity: driving change for the better
Accessible inclusive design translated into reality.
RIBA detailed response to Grenfell Inquiry Phase 2 report
Briefing notes following its initial 4 September response.
Approved Document B: Fire Safety from March
Current and future changes with historical documentation.
A New Year, a new look for BSRIA
As phase 1 of the BSRIA Living Laboratory is completed.
A must-attend event for the architecture industry.
Caroline Gumble to step down as CIOB CEO in 2025
After transformative tenure take on a leadership role within the engineering sector.
RIDDOR and the provisional statistics for 2023 / 2024
Work related deaths; over 50 percent from construction and 50 percent recorded as fall from height.
Solar PV company fined for health and safety failure
Work at height not properly planned and failure to take suitable steps to prevent a fall.
The term value when assessing the viability of developments
Consultation on the compulsory purchase process, compensation reforms and potential removal of hope value.
Trees are part of the history of how places have developed.