■ CONTENTS ix Voice 157 The Software for Voice Recognition 158 Remote Voice Control 160 Speech Synthesis 161 Piecemeal Samples 164 Web Access 165 Building a Web Server 166 SMS 174 Processing with a Phone 175 Custom Numbers and APIs 178 Conclusion 184 ■Chapter 6: Data Sources 185 Why Data Is Important 185 Legalities 185 Distribution 190 Public Data 190 TV Guides 190 Train Times 191 Road Traffic 193 Weather 193 Radio 197 CD Data 199 News 201 ■ CONTENTS x Private Data 204 Calendar 204 Webmail 206 Twitter 208 Facebook 210 Automation 210 Timed Events 211 Error Handling 213 Conclusion 214 ■Chapter 7: Control Hubs 215 Integration of Technologies 215 The Teakettle: An Example 216 Minerva 218 Overview 219 Linux Users Are Not HA Users 220 Device Abstractions 222 Conduits 226 Messaging Conduits 229 Message Relays 234 Time-Based Messaging 234 Location-Based Messaging 236 Cosmic 237 Web Applets 239 Manifest 256 Marple 257 Utility Scripts 261 ■ CONTENTS xi Topology Ideas 262 Networking 262 Wiring Looms 264 Conclusion 267 Index 269 xii About the Author ■Steven Goodwin (London, England) has been involved in science and technology from an early age, building his first synthesizer while still in his teens. Since then, his projects have been wide and varied. He has built robots, musical instruments, and chess sets, and he has a house that can be controlled from the Internet where he is able to e- mail his video and control his light switches from work. The growth of this desire for home automation led to the creation of the Minerva project, an open source suite of tools and protocols that make it possible to combine many different technologies and have them interact in new and interesting ways. It is a project for which he is still the lead architecture and developer. He is also an active member of the Linux, free software, and open source communities and has spoken at many conferences, including UKUUG, FOSDEM, NotCon, and the BBC Backstage OpenTech event. His articles have appeared in more than 50 magazines, covering topics from programming to management (even including magic and beer!), and he is the author of two industry-standard textbooks for the game industry. Currently, Steven is funding his passion for technology through the development of the SGX 3D engine and his work on games for Facebook. xiii About the Technical Reviewers ■Steve Potts graduated from Manchester University, England, with a bachelor’s degree in applied computing and continued to study a master’s degree in computing for commerce and industry at the Open University, United Kingdom. His career has a foundation in the defense industry, squeezing an immense amount of failure- resistant software into a remarkably small footprint, which migrated into developing for handheld devices, the mobile Internet, and the e-commerce Web. Given his meticulous disposition (his friends have other words to describe this), he is an accomplished technical editor having worked on Java, XHTML, PHP, wireless, and social media publications including Building Online Communities from Apress. Steve is the founder of the technical consultancy outfit Free Balloon, and he has the rewarding position of CTO at Hawdale Associates, an invigorating usability and design customer experience company operating out of Manchester, England. He is continuously refitting his house with home automation technology. ■Michael Still is the author of The Definitive Guide to ImageMagick and Practical MythTV. He hacks on a variety of open source projects and likes playing with embedded systems. He also spends too much time reading science-fiction novels. He lives in Australia with his wife and two kids. . Minerva 218 Overview 219 Linux Users Are Not HA Users 220 Device Abstractions 222 Conduits 226 Messaging Conduits 229 Message Relays 234 Time-Based Messaging 234 Location-Based Messaging 236. controlled from the Internet where he is able to e- mail his video and control his light switches from work. The growth of this desire for home automation led to the creation of the Minerva project,. experience company operating out of Manchester, England. He is continuously refitting his house with home automation technology. ■Michael Still is the author of The Definitive Guide to ImageMagick