Author: gtm12
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Automating Octopus Power-ups
One of the challenges of renewable energy is matching demand to supply. In other words, when it’s sunny and windy, more energy is generated than is required, at certain points in the day. This can be stored for later use, but this infrastructure is expensive and can take a long time to provision. An alternative…
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Energy Sankey Chart in Home Assistant
We had solar panels installed at the start of February but we’re still waiting for the accompanying battery to arrive. I put together this Home Assistant dashboard for our Kindle Fire kiosk tablet in the kitchen at home, so we could quickly spot excess solar production (and turn on the washing machine!) – but also…
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“Can we open the window yet?” : monitoring and managing home temperatures during a heat emergency
The UK experienced its hottest temperatures on record on Monday and Tuesday last week (18 and 19 July 2022), exceeding 40°C for the first time in several parts of England. This seemed far-fetched even a couple weeks ago – but here we are, and here we appear to be, until we take radical steps to…
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Reflections on Glass
Google’s Glass program is no more, at least in its current form. I’ve been using Glass on-and-off since May 2014 so I’ve been part of that journey. I had some very interesting (and in some respect, profound) experiences, so this is a good point to record them. Glass launched with an Apple-style event for the geeks…
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Working in Cambridge with clever people doing clever things with computers
We were the first generation to grow up with computers at home. Iain got one first – a BBC Micro, just as we were leaving primary school, but many of my friends got BBCs, Spectrums and Commodore 64s for Christmas 1983. Although 1984 has significance in the history of computing in other ways, it was…