It's Not That Smart – The Wife Does Not Allow It!
Here is a thing nobody tells you when you install smart bulbs: the moment someone flips the physical wall switch off, your entire carefully-configured Adaptive Lighting setup quietly falls apart. Not loudly. Not with an error. It just stops adapting. Silently. And you won’t notice until you walk into the lounge the following morning and … Read more
IKEA has long been celebrated for making smart home technology accessible and affordable. So when they released the BILRESA remote control – a sleek, scroll-wheel Matter device – I was genuinely excited. After spending time with it, however, I’ve come to a frustrating conclusion: this is one of the most poorly thought-out smart home remotes … Read more
For those who followed the earlier pages on this site, I came to Home Assistant out of necessity. I needed a customised Sky Q remote control for a family member with advancing dementia. That came with two immediate challenges: they had never used a smartphone, tablet or computer before, and I was living well over … Read more
The SkyQ Project has one simple aim: to set up a one-touch channel changer for someone living with dementia. Their speed and dexterity have declined to the point where even typing a three-digit Sky channel number quickly enough has become a real challenge, and we needed a practical way to help. If you have already … Read more
Around three weeks after doing anything, I have usually forgotten it ever happened. I have no idea why the last five years have turned me into such a forgetful wreck, but I am going to blame an abundance of free time during the COVID lockdowns and the rather impressive quantities of mind-numbing alcohol that accompanied … Read more