I updated the webpage that displays our home automation status. It shows the last 3 things that have happened, but now the time and temp as well.

I switched out the new P4 system and put up a couple of old PII's to run firefox in fullscreen.
I also switched from windows XP to a small linux distro called DSL - I remastered the ISO so that it would all boot from a CD, so there's no need for a hard drive.

A few things I used:
DSL Linux

R-Kiosk Extension for FF 2.0 to start the browser in fullscreen mode
Ratpoison window manager, via MyDSL - Allows you to position the mouse pointer in the lower right-hand corner of the screen, so you don't see it! - just put 'addhook switchwin banish' in the ~/.ratpoisonrc file
Edited .xinitrc to to turn off the screensaver (xset s off &) and start firefox with the URL to my Home auto server web app
Edited .destop to use ratpoison instead of jwm

It work quite well on the old PII systems - When the power goes out, it won't ruin anything, and it'll start right back up later!

Here's a how-to on remastering the DSL cd:

I have my front yard light connected to a outletbox controlled via a LPT port. And it's hooked up the the rest of the home automation system.

I was just having cron turn on and off the light a specified times. But a little script and a bit of help from a government website, the light turns off at sunrise and back on at sunset.

Here's the idea - Have a dedicated computer/kiosk that displays the latest home automation notifications.
It's pretty simple - Use a full screen webbrowser for display - write a .cgi script that updates each time it's run.

I've been using Bonjour chat for Home automation updates - When someone calls, a chat box will appear with the caller id info.
But Bonjour chat isn't working in Ubuntu 9.04 - It crashes Pidgin.

So why not use the slick new notification system?

Awhile back I wrote a tutorial for setting up a LAN instant messaging system.
It works quite well for in-home stuff, like sending links and small files to other people in the household.

I've wanted to send IMs via the command line - My servers could update me with stats and the like.
And here's how to do it in Ubuntu 8.04 (May work in others, haven't tested)

We'll need a few programs - mzclient to broadcast our presence to other IM clients, and telnet to send IMs (telnet _should_ already be installed!)

When things finally click in the brain and work on the machine, happy things happen!

I keep adding to my home automation server. This time I got an old ISA modem. Found it in the piles of cards in my chicken coop (which I use for computer storage now). And I got caller ID working on it.

Setting Up the Modem

If your modem already works, skip this!
Had to get the modem detected and IRQs all set right. Yup, it's that old! Found a free IRQ by running

I've tried _ALL_ of the command line webcam apps that Ubuntu has.... To no avail!!!!
Messages like "No supported palette found," etc, were common.
The webcam works great in Cheese and other GUI apps, but I want to use the camera on my server.

But then I stumbled upon 'streamer' - It didn't show up when I apt-cache searched for webcam - I'm not sure why :(

Anyhow - I can now grab images (or video) from the command line now-

Yay!

Just got unlimited texting on my cellphone....

Items needed:

1. A dedicated email address for the relaying (POP3, SMTP, no ssl)