Domotic and Link Systems

Unit I. Automation and Control of a Domotic System

Domotic’s / Immotic’s definition and evolution
• Domotic definition:
Set of services provided by technological systems to satisfy human
basic needs of security, communication, energy management and
comfort, and his immediate environment. Under the concept of
domotics, we are going to point to the automation and control
mechanisms (turn on / off, open / close and regulate) of domestic
systems such as lighting, air conditioning, blinds, doors and windows,
locks, irrigation, household appliances, water and gas supply, electricity
supply, etc.
Domotic’s / Immotic’s definition and evolution
• Immotic definition:
Is the use of automated technical management systems for facilities in
unique or privileged buildings, included in tertiary and industrial use
(offices, corporate, hotel, business and similar buildings), with the aim
of reducing energy consumption and increasing their comfort and
safety. We could define immotic as the domotic of large buildings.
Domotics application fields
•Selective disconnection of loads. •Fire, intrusión alarms.
•Heating and Air Condition per •Gas and wáter leak sensors.
zones. •Presence simulator.
•Lightning depending on brighness
and presence.
•Dashboards of consumption.
•Alternative energy.

Control and
energy Security
management

Facilities
Comunication
automation

•Blinds •Diagnostics.
•Awnings. •Alarms.
•Lighning •Turning on domestic appliances.
•Intercom
Elements of a domotic system
From a technical perspective, Home Automation consists of five
elements:
• Devices under control (DUC).
• Sensors, transducers and actuators.
• Pre actuators: Contactors and relays.
• Electrovalves.
• The control network
• The controller
• Remote control devices.
Devices under control (DUC).
Devices under control are all components, such as home appliances or
consumer electronics, which are connected to and controlled by the
home automation system. An increasing number of components come
with built in functionality (Web-servers, WLAN, Bluetooth-, Z-Wave-
interfaces, etc.), which allow for direct connectivity to the control
network. Other components need to be equipped with adapters in
order to integrate them with the smart home infrastructure.
Sensors, transducers and actuators.
Sensors are the eyes and ears of the home network. There are sensors
for a wide range of applications such as measuring temperature,
humidity, light, liquid, and gas and detecting movement or noise.
Actuators are the hands of the home network. They are the means of
how the smart network can actually do things in the real world.
Depending on the type of interaction required, there are mechanical
actuators such as pumps and electrical motors or electronic actuators
such as electric switches and dimmers.
Pre actuators: Contactors and relays.
Its function is to adapt the electrical signal, expanding it or simply
changing it, so the actuators receive electrical energy properly and
correctly. Any control system, domotic or not, is based on electrical
energy based on electronics, so it is evident that the signals it can
provide are not of high power. On other occasions, the actuators work
at voltages different from those that are capable of directly providing
the control systems.
Pre actuators: Contactors and relays.
Relays are devices that function similarly to contactors. The main
difference with the contactors is that the relays do not have power
contacts, but rather all the contacts are maneuvering.
Electrovalves
Valves are devices for regulating and controlling fluids. Although these
elements can be considered actuators by themselves, they usually act
as pre-actuators for other actuator elements. Its mission is to distribute
the fluid that flows through them in different ways.
Electrovalves
When the control of the valve is electrical, that is, the control of the
valve is executed by means of an electrical signal, it is called an
electrovalve. Solenoid valves are an essential element in automatic
processes, since they provide a link between the electrical control
systems (predominant in the market), and the pneumatic and hydraulic
drive systems, essential in the automation of home automation and
building automation installations.
The control network
The control network provides the connectivity between devices under control, sensors,
and actuators on the one hand and the controller along with remote control devices on the
other hand. There are three main technology options for home and building automation
control networks today:
– Power-line Communication
– Wireless Transmission
– Wireline Transmission

In general, control networks based on power line communication and wireless

transmission are dominant in residential home automation due to lower component prices
and installation cost. Wire line control networks, on the other hand, are found in the
premium residential segment and industrial building control applications.
The controller
The controller is the computer system which acts as the brain of the building automation
system. It collects information through sensors and receives commands through remote
control devices. It acts based on commands or a set of predefined rules using actuators or
means of communication such as loud speaker, email, or telephone. For residential home
automation, the controller typically is an “always-on” standalone or embedded Linux /
Windows / OS-X PC, running the control application for the house. Higher end residential
and industrial buildings use dedicated high availability, redundant controller systems with
uninterruptible power supplies (UPS).
Remote control devices
One of the main reasons for the increased acceptance of
home automation systems in the residential segment is that,
with the omnipresence of smart phones and tablets, the
need for dedicated automation control devices has vanished.
Within a few years, literally all home automation systems on
the market have introduced smartphone and tablet based
control applications. In addition, advances in voice
recognition and AI have finally brought voice based control to
smart homes as well like Alexa or Google Home.
The remote control devices act by connecting to the home
automation application on the home controller. They do this
either by connecting to the controller through the control
network itself, or through any other interface the controller
provides, such as WLAN, the Internet, or the telephone
network.
Market trends
The traditional differentiation between expensive, proprietary building
control systems and residential smart homes is blurring. Over the past
ten years these two market segments have changed drastically and are
increasingly overlapping. Expensive proprietary solutions have become
more open standards based and less expensive.
A future proof Smart home architecture
In spite of the trends towards open standards, for the realization of smart
home projects the variety of wireline and wireless standards in combination
with proprietary vendor solutions remains a challenge. Any architecture with
the objective to go beyond point solutions which control garage doors or
lights using a smartphone will need to be built upon a central, rule based
home server, capable of connecting to devices via multiple technologies. In
most homes at least part of the control infrastructure will be based on WLAN
(WiFi) and wireline technologies for the foreseeable future.
Examples are the latest generation of consumer electronic devices such as
audio equipment, TV sets and appliances (ovens, refrigerators, dish washers,
washing machines) which are all equipped with WLAN interfaces ready to be
integrated in smart home infrastructures
A future proof Smart home architecture
A future proof Smart home architecture