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Comment by marcosdumay | Hacker News Reader

Why does a thermostat integrate with cameras and microphones anyway? Do they have any internal one?

Anyway, I do really want a smart home lock. Just changing the shape of the keys so that they would stop puncturing my pockets when I walk would be enough of a gain. I also want a programmable bedroom light that can slowly dim on at morning.

I don't have those because the costs are much higher than the benefits. I'm sure a smart lock will lock me out of home at some point, with no way in. A smart light will also fail at the worst possible way, and I don't want to deal with it.

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> also want a programmable bedroom light that can slowly dim on at morning

Oh you absolutely do, this has been by far the best (arguably only) benefit I've seen from home automation. Sunrise is now whenever is convenient. The lights slowly come on over 30 minutes and it feels like I'll wake up at some convenient time for my body during that period, rather than having my sleep interrupted by an infuriating alarm.

> A smart light will also fail at the worst possible way, and I don't want to deal with it.

I haven't had any problems with mine (v1 hues), they default to working like normal bulbs so the worst case scenario is you toggle the switch off and on and you get an illuminated lightbulb every time. Also (true of any LED light) they will continue to work even after you've shattered the glass by accident.

> changing the shape of the keys so that they would stop puncturing my pockets when I walk

Have you considered alternate solutions such as less-tight pants? ;P

> I also want a programmable bedroom light that can slowly dim on at morning.

FWIW, a lot of cheap CFL bulbs do this on their own. It's one of the reasons I hate CFLs for most uses, but I've come to appreciate that the light in my kids' room starts at about half (perceived) brightness and takes a minute or two to warm up.

I think the key part is that the bulbs come on automatically, not necessarily the ramping up of brightness.

I don't really care about brightness ramping, I just have my bedroom Hue bulbs come on at max brightness at 6500K at 5:00 every morning, switch to 2700K at noon, and 2000K (and dimmer) at 20:00.

Shameless plug: we - at Crownstone - have an open source plug or built-in switch with with wake-up functionality. I don't know if it's too smart, but if it is, I'm fine with you flashing adjusted firmware to make it dumber. :-)

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