Month: October 2012

Setting up and testing my heating schedule

3 Replies Christopher Roberts

This is the 150th article I have posted on Technology Bloggers!

This is the fourth in a series of articles in which I am exploring Remote Heating Control – a technology of the future. Learn more about this series by reading the introductory article, called stepping into the future of smarter living.

In the last few weeks it has been getting colder, and around a week ago, I decided that it was time to put my heating on. I would usually try to hold off until October, however this year, as I now have Remote Heating Control installed, I didn’t think about it in the same way. Why set a date before which you will not turn on your heating? If it is cold in September but warm in October, why not have your heating on in September and off in October?

With Remote Heating Control I can tell my heating to come on only when the temperature in my house drops below a certain level. I know it may sound odd, but I can have my heating scheduled to come on in July if the temperature drops below say 15°C. Is that likely? Probably not, however if it were to happen, I would be able to justify putting my heating on, as it isn’t the time of year that should govern my heating habits, I believe it should be the temperature.

Setting Up A Heating Scheduled

I was now ready to become one of the first people in the country to programme a heating scheduled via the internet!

To set a schedule is really simple. I login to myHome, and on the homepage click the heating box – remember from last time, there are two boxes on the home screen, temperature and heating. This takes you to the schedule screen where you can set your heating schedule.

The schedule is split into four sections, Sleep, Wake, Away and Home. Sleep covers late at night until early morning, Wake covers early morning, Away covers the day, and Home is the evening. These times are obviously just guidelines, and you can use them for whatever you want, but I imagine most people will use Sleep for when they are in bed, Wake for when they get up in the morning, Away for when they go out, be it for leisure, work, school or whatever, and Home for when they return.

That schedule plan worked for me, so I set mine. For the moment, as it isn’t that cold, I decided that at the time of day I want my house the hottest I would have it at 18°C – I don’t mind wearing a jumper, but I don’t want to freeze! That is in the evening and morning, when I wake up and return home. During the day I am out, so I don’t mind the house getting colder so I have set this to 8°C – no point heating empty rooms! Then at night, I want to be comfortable if I get up, however I should be in bed for most of it, so I have set the temperature to 15°C. It will keep the house from going cold but wont waste unnecessary gas.

The image below shows my heating schedule.

Remote Heating Control Simple Schedule - Simple View

My heating schedule

The image above shows the temperatures at which my heating will be triggered. You may notice that there is one schedule for weekdays, and another for the weekend. This is because of a weekend, you are likely to do different things than on a weekday, so you may want your heating different. If your days are all pretty much the same, then setting your heating via the Simple schedule is probably the easiest way. For me however I use the Advanced schedule option (see the blue tab at the top right of the image).

Below is my heating schedule as viewed from the advanced view.

Remote Heating Control Schedule - Advanced

My heating schedule – advanced view

As you can see, throughout the week my heating has slight daily variations. I can only make these changes on the Advanced heating schedule tab. Some noticeable variations are that on Monday morning, my heating comes on a little earlier than the rest of the week. This is because I have to get up slightly earlier. On a Friday and Saturday, my Home period lasts slightly longer, keeping my house warm later into the night, this is because I will usually stay up later on these days. Also on a weekend I am usually in the house all day on Sunday, so during the day my heating is at 18°C.

The brilliant thing about setting a schedule is that I can still change the temperature whenever I like. Say it is Monday and I come home at midday, my heating will only be set to come on if the house temperature drops below 8°C. When I arrive home I want the temperature to be 18°C though. The change is really easy to make, I just get out my phone and text HEAT ON 18 to a number British Gas have given me, and for the duration of that heating cycle (which would be Away) my heating schedule will be overridden and my house will stay at 18°C. When the next cycle (Home) starts, the heating schedule will automatically turn back onto the default temperature for that time.

I could also change the schedule via an app. Both Android and iDevice apps are available, so you can change your heating temperature via any iDevice or Android powered phone with an internet connection.

The heating temperature can also be altered from within my house on the smart linked thermostat, but it is often much more convenient to do it remotely – it means coming home to a warm house!

Hopefully you now understand how the schedule part of British Gas’s Remote Heating Control technology works. I have been using it for around a week now, and it has been really great. I have been getting up and it has been warm, and when I come home of an evening the house is already warm.

I am sure in the weeks to come when it gets colder, I will change the schedule, to make it hotter than 18°C, however at the moment, with the weather like it is seem to be just the right temperature to be comfortable whilst not wasting too much gas.

An interesting and useful tool that the myHome system has is that is tells you the temperature your smart linked thermostat has read in the recent past month. This means you can work out when your heating will have been triggered, and when it wont have because the temperature will have been above the ‘kick in’ level.

I am able to use the temperature history graph (reached by clicking on the temperature box on the homepage) to see what sort of temperature my house has been at recently, and judge against how I have been feeling (e.g. too hot, comfortable, nippy, cold etc.) the temperature it has been, to ensure that I only have my heating come on when I really want it to.

To conclude this article (4/6 in this series) I am really glad to have been asked to be a pioneer in testing the technology, as it is proving very useful at saving my money – we will have to wait for a bill to come through to try to see just how much.

Next Time

The next article in the series will go live on Friday the 19th of October, when we will be well into mid-Autumn, and looking at a 14 day forecast the temperature outside will be around 9°C where I live, so I will surely be using the heating every day, most of the time.

In the next article I will be talking some more about the other resources that are available behind the buttons on the myHome console. I will also be updating you as always on my experience of the system.

Radar and Speed Camera Apps

21 Replies Jonny Hankins

20 years ago I worked above a garage in Manchester. The owner was a young man who liked fast cars, but in Britain the roads are monitored with cameras and speed traps making it easy to lose your license through the points deduction system.

My boy racer friend had a solution however, on the rear view mirror he had a radar detection system. These systems were illegal to use, but not to own, so although visible to a passing police officer there was little they could do about it.

20 years on the technology has improved. Now for 6 euros you can download Radardroid, it sits in your smartphone and informs you when you are getting close to a speed camera or radar. This App sends a visual and sonic signal to warn you, so you can slow down and avoid fines and potentially losing your license.

To think it used to be like this!

Modern technology means less places to hide

There are many systems available. Some like Radardroid are openly helping you to avoid abiding by the law, but others market themselves as driver help tools. They let you know when there is a traffic jam ahead, bad weather or a radar by describing them all as ‘risk zones’. These systems have even been endorsed by some European governments and car manufacturing companies are starting to put the technology directly into their cars.

One problem remains however, in some countries the use of this technology is prohibited. Germany and Switzerland enforce bans on such technology, something that was easy with older systems that could be spotted from outside the car. But what about if it sits within your phone. How can a sovereign state stop people driving on their territory with an App in their phone? Will they stop cars that are factory fitted with the technology from crossing their borders?

I doubt that enforcement will be possible, and this highlights just one of the problems of the management of a single market across different sovereign countries. Technology transcends geographic boundaries, as the internet buying of banned products has proved.

And this leads me to my final question, does this mean that people only abide by the law because they think that they might get into trouble if they don’t? What are the ethical implications of the marketing and endorsing of such products? If this process continues many laws will become obsolete as technology finds ways to avoid being caught.

In Italy you have to pay to use the motorways, so you get a ticket when you enter, that you present when you leave and pay. On some motorways they have introduced what they call a tutor. It is old school technology, the ticket has the time you enter stamped on it. When you leave the time is registered again. If you cover more distance than is possible while remaining within the speed limit you get a fine. A simple A to B calculation that has dramatically cut deaths on my local motorway.

If you are interested in reading more about ethics in technological innovation take a look at my work blog.

SEO: certainly not DIY

10 Replies MattRawlings

While many of us fancy ourselves as DIY experts; sawing, hammering and nailing bits together to create a new set of shelves, or putting a picture on the wall, SEO is not something you can ‘blag’ your way through. There are just too many complicated and frequently changing factors involved that require expertise as opposed to an instruction book.

A lot of people in the IT industry, or working “in IT” for large businesses feel as though their limited knowledge of SEO is enough that the firm doesn’t have to bring in experts in the field, and that they can do it themselves. However, history and case studies show us that this is the start of a slippery slope. A lot of businesses who opt to do their own SEO soon find that they’re being penalized by Google for over-optimisation of their site, essentially ‘spamming’ the site with the terms that they want to be seen ranking highly for, and Google subsequently prevents them from doing so, knocking them down the rankings or not including them at all.

One of the main reasons that firms opt against bringing in so-called SEO experts is that they believe all of the best firms are based in the United States and that they charge overwhelming amounts. However, there are plenty of British and Irish SEO agencies who are gaining reputations for being among the very best in the industry, and, what’s more, they don’t charge the substantial American fees and – for those based in the UK and Ireland – they’re working at the same times as you, there’s no time zone changes, meaning that if you have any issues or need to contact them for an update, they should be on-hand whenever you need them.

An upwards arrowFor those still not convinced on the advantages of bringing in an SEO firm, you have to question how you want to get to the “next level” in your industry. You might be doing very well, but you always want to be doing better – ambition is only natural with any business. But sometimes, no matter how good your existing in-house IT team may be, they don’t have the expertise in SEO to find the strategies to take you from the top 20 search results for your key term to the first page, top 5, number one, wherever it is you want to be.

With so many strategies in an ever-evolving industry, there’s no way this is a DIY job. Reaching the next level is serious stuff and therefore needs the best in the business, not the amateurs.