© Copyright 2020 Darren Rigg - Hosted on AWS.

I love home automation

On this page I have noted some of the things I have learned and am still learning whilst building an automated home.

Hubitat

A new way to create resume for you

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed vulputate est leo, vitae auctor metus eleifend eu. Quisque fermentum nisi sed convallis ornare.

  • Aliquam lorem ante, dapibus in, viverra quis, feugiat
  • Phasellus viverra nulla ut metus varius laoreet. Quisque rutrum. Aenean
  • Etiam ultricies nisi vel augue. Curabitur ullamcorper ultricies nisi nam
  • Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Aenean
  • Maecenas tempus, tellus eget
  • Nam quam nunc, blandit vel, luctus pulvinar, hendrerit id, lorem. neque
  • Nam quam nunc, blandit vel, luctus pulvinar, hendrerit id, lorem maece
  • Venenatis faucibus. Nullam quis ante. Etiam sit amet orci eget eros lorem
  • Nullam quis ante. Etiam sit amet eget eros faucibus tinci
  • Luctus pulvinar hendrerit
  • Sapien ut libero
  • Adipiscing elit

Fire Tablets

How to use cheap fire tablets as home control units.

Fire tablets can make great (cheap) smart wall panels but some Issues need to be overcome first. There are a number of problems to overcome - Mounting, removing the adverts, applications. Below is how I have done it.

Wall Mounting - I found the best mounts were 3D printed by this company in the US. There was no problem shipping to the UK.
I used my tablets with Hubitat to display a dedicated webpage using full kiosk browser. There is no reason the tablets cant show any dashboard that will display on the browser. Setup instructions are below for 7" Gen 9 tablets.

  • Select the Language you want as normal.
  • The Device automatically connected to my WiFi and offered to connect to my account. Select switch accounts this de-registers the device
  • Select New to Amazon, a country, then back and cancel (Do this twice) then select not now at the bottom of the screen and skip registration.
  • Perform a factory reset, Settins, device, factory reset
  • Select Language again
  • Select any wifi and just tap any key in the password box until continue appears, then press cancel and skip setup
  •  
  • Connect to WiFi if needed by swiping down and long pressing the WiFi.
  • Open the Silk Browser and head to https://www.apkmirror.com
  • Find Google Services Framework 7.1.2 Download the APK, Accept the security warnings and install it.
  • Find Google Account Manager 7.1.2 Download and install it.
  • Download Google Play Services 20.30.19 Varient 203019015 and install it.
  • Download Google Play Store 20.9.20 Varient 82092000 and install it
  • You should now be able to get to play store. You will need to sign in, I use a seperate google account for my wall monuted tablets so I'm not compromising my normal google account.
  • Backup to Google Drive if you wish
  • You should now be in play store and can configure your tablet as you wish. I used full Kiosk browser (from play store) and Launcher Hijacker from https://github.com/BaronKiko/LauncherHijack/releases) to configure my tablets.
  • This process is based on the excellent page by Andrew Connell here -> https://www.andrewconnell.com/blog/using-a-kindle-fire-as-a-home-kiosk-for-smartthings-smart-home-monitor/