My main practical University project was to build a home security and control system. Ever since then I have wanted to build one that not only controlled lights and monitored sensors but provided a level of intelligence that would improve the quality and efficiency of the living environment.
To that end I have designed a microprocessor based controller for use as a control node in a distributed control system. This will act as the eyes and ears as well as the arms and legs of the system.
The hardware is only one half of the system. The other half is in the control software. Both on the embedded controller and on the supervisory PC based system. For that I use the new Microsoft Robotics Studio and custom driver software I have written in C on the embedded controller platform.