KNX Scientific Conference Environment control platform based on KNX and NFC technologies to support independent daily life Pamplona 4 th 5 th November 2010 1
Table of Contents Introduction Who are we? Objectives Why? Platform architecture What? Development tools How? Use cases When? Evaluation Closure Conclusion Ending
> Who are we? Introduction
> Why? Objectives Problem Life expectancy and ageing population Direct relationship between ageing population and some disabilities New interaction mechanisms with home automation standards are necessary Scientific basis Ambient Intelligence (AmI) Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) Goal Design a platform to allow elderly people and persons with certain disabilities enjoy a new experience when interacting with ordinary devices and home appliances Basic requirements Easy to use: learning cost must be inexistent or very low Accessible: devices should be usable by the target users Useful: services must provide an improvement in the quality of life of the users Attractive: users should find only benefits in the use of the tools Technologically feasible and scalable: the result system must be ready to be installed avoiding deep changes
> What? Platform architecture Near Field Communication (NFC) Short-range wireless connectivity technology Based on RFID 13.56 MHz @ 424 kbps Distance from 0 to 20 cm Helps people receiving and sharing information Bluetooth Wireless technology 2.4 GHz @ 3 Mbps Distance from 10 to 100 meters The Bluetooth signal is able to penetrate solid objects Doesn t require line of sight between devices KNX Worldwide standard Home and building automation Several transmission mediums: twisted pair, radio frequency, power line and ethernet Guarantees interoperability and interworking between different devices Independent from any hardware and software technology
> How? Development tools Software tools Eclipse IDE for Java developers Java TM 2 platform Standard Edition development kit (J2SE) Java TM platform Micro Edition (J2ME) Java TM APIs 1.1 for Bluetooth ProSyst mbs Smart Home ETS-3 Nokia Connectivity Framework 1.2 Hardware tools MIFARE 1k and MIFARE 4k (NFC smart tags) Mobile phone Nokia 6131 Bluetooth dongle with JSR 82 stack Smart card reader ACR122 Tira 2.1 (bidirectional USB/IR adapter) KNX home automation network (sensors and actuators)
> When? Use cases Aim Success Scenario 1: IR appliances control Solve the inaccessibility and the absence of real switches at some home locations Installing NFC smart tags we can reduce risk, hazards or uncomfortable situations
> When? Use cases Aim Success Scenario 2: Scene management (1/5) Eliminate repetitive tasks on user s daily life Objects in the real world could be associated with actions in home automation networks ( the homeautomation of things )
> When? Use cases Aim Success Scenario 2: Scene management (2/5) Eliminate repetitive tasks on user s daily life Objects in the real world could be associated with actions in home automation networks ( the homeautomation of things )
> When? Use cases Aim Success Scenario 2: Scene management (3/5) Eliminate repetitive tasks on user s daily life Objects in the real world could be associated with actions in home automation networks ( the homeautomation of things )
> When? Use cases Aim Success Scenario 2: Scene management (4/5) Eliminate repetitive tasks on user s daily life Objects in the real world could be associated with actions in home automation networks ( the homeautomation of things )
> When? Use cases Aim Success Scenario 2: Scene management (5/5) Eliminate repetitive tasks on user s daily life Objects in the real world could be associated with actions in home automation networks ( the homeautomation of things ) Scene name At home Traditional scene trigger A presence or movement sensor detects the user/the user presses a button Advanced scene trigger The keys are placed into the key basket Ready to read The user presses a button The user picks up a book from the bookcase Goodbye The user presses a button A smart tag is touched by a mobile phone Go to sleep The user presses a button A mobile phone is placed into the night table
> When? Use cases Aim Success Scenario 3: Contextual lighting Users with severe disabilities couldn t access easily to home automation systems Universal switches (on/off/dim) could be developed combining SpheraOne TM indoor location system and NFC tags
> Closure Evaluation Users review Nursing home in Alicante (Spain) @ May 2009 14 people between 60 at 74 years old Interaction paradigm with NFC technology Questionnaire based on Likert scale (efficiency, easiness of use, easiness to learn, benefits and emotional response) Users were really impressed: able to use and understand it without any learning process Technical review Done by qualified persons in the CIAmI Living Lab Adaptable and accessible infrastructure Intelligent space for testing technological prototypes with real users All proposed scenarios are permanently available
> Ending Conclusion Advantages System based on mature and robustness technologies Final solution could be used by non technical persons with a low learning curve Objects in the real world could be associated with actions in home automation networks The development tools (hardware and software) are available in the market at low cost Users were really impressed: able to use it and understand it without any learning process Disadvantages NFC is not a widely adopted technology in the market A computer with a logical algorithm is required Elderly people don t like carry on electronic devices A technical person is needed for burning the instructions commands into each one NFC tag
> Ending Conclusion At the present, the interaction way with home automation systems is poor, non natural and is an important handicap to many people (elderly users and persons with several disabilities)
> Thank you! Juan-Pablo Lázaro-Ramos Miguel-Ángel Llorente-Carmona Ángel Martínez-Cavero Chief Scientific Officer R&D Department jplazaro@tsbtecnologia s.es Researcher R&D Department mllorente@tsbtecnologi as.es Researcher R&D Department amartinez@tsbtecnolo gias.es Tecnologías para la Salud y el Bienestar Instituto ITACA Universidad Politécnica de Valencia Edificio 8G Camino de Vera s/n (Valencia, Spain) Telephone number: +34 96 387 76 06 Fax number: +34 96 387 72 79 http://www.tsb.upv.es Soluciones Tecnológicas para la Salud y el Bienestar S.A Ronda Auguste & Louis Lumiere 23, Nave 13 Parque Tecnológico de Valencia Paterna Valencia Spain Telephone number: +34 96 182 71 77 Fax number: +34 96 182 94 15 http://www.tsbtecnologias.com
Environment control platform based on KNX and NFC technologies to support independent daily life Miguel-Ángel Llorente-Carmona 1, Ángel Martínez-Cavero 1, Juan-Pablo Lázaro-Ramos 1 (1) TSB Tecnologías para la Salud y el Bienestar S.A. Ronda Auguste y Louis Lumiere 23, Nave 13. +34 96 182 71 77. Parque Tecnológico de Valencia. 46980, Paterna. Valencia (Spain) {mllorente, amartinez, jplazaro}@tsbtecnologias.es Keywords Ambient Assisted Living, Human Computer interface, Independent living, Ambient Intelligence Abstract The use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in the social services as in Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) applications is a new step in the improvement of the quality of life and the independent living of elderly people. A rich application is presented to support the environment control in smart homes using an easy human-computer interface based on Near Field Communication (NFC) technology combined with the KNX worldwide standard for home automation. The easy interaction mechanisms that NFC technology provides combined with a reliable communication infrastructure distributed at home, creates a new bunch of innovative applications that will help to facilitate daily life to elderly people as well as facilitate the use of technology to achieve their objectives. 1. Introduction This paper describes a platform that is designed to allow that elderly people and people with certain disabilities enjoy of a new experience when interacting with ordinary devices and appliances at home. First, it is presented the list of basic requirements that have guided the work. In the next chapter it is described the architecture of the platform and how the workflows between the different technologies are coordinated to improve users experiences. After that, three scenarios have been implemented in order to demonstrate the capacity of the platform thanks to the combination of NFC, KNX and Bluetooth. Finally, the different scenarios have been tested and evaluated with real elderly users who have been participating in different evaluation activities providing feedback and opportunities for improvement according to their requirements and critical point of view. 2. Objectives The main purpose of this work is the creation of a platform in order to build different services oriented to support activities of daily living (ADL) of elderly people or impaired users at home by making more accessible the conventional KNX home automation systems. The list of basic requirements of the platform is:
Easy-to-use: the learning costs must be very low or inexistent to enable all kind of users the use of the KNX system at home. Accessible: devices should be usable by the target users (icons or messages must be readable, feedback sounds must be played loudly enough, etc). Useful: services must provide an improvement in the quality of life of the users extending the range of ADL they are able to do and decreasing the dependence with other people. Attractive: users should find only benefits in the use of the tools. Any inconvenient or difficulty could decrease the interest of them in its use. Technologically feasible and scalable: the new systems must be also ready to be installed in the houses with a previous KNX network avoiding deep changes on it. 3. Platform architecture The platform architecture defines the required technological hardware components and the internal information flow exchange that will allow the successful implementation of the overall AAL proposed platforms and applications or services. The right-hand side figure shows that there are several standard technologies that work together with KNX systems in order to ensure the right performance of the system: systems or energy management, for instance. The KNX standard recognizes twisted pair, radio frequency, power line or Ethernet like transmission medium to communicate with all installed devices. One of the most important things about this system is that the human-computer interface is greatly simplified. A number of smart tags are distributed over the user s home and each one is assigned with a certain desired functionality. For instance, one tag can be used to switch on/off or dimming lamps; another one to up and down blinds or another one to run full scenes that involve different devices from several KNX lines. The system could be formed by a lot of tags but it is necessary that each one has its own functionality (it isn t possible to use the same tag for more than one functionality). When users want to interact with the system they just have to touch a tag with a NFC-enabled mobile phone. Then a J2ME application running in background mode in the terminal pops up and reads automatically the command or commands previously burned in the tag. At this point it is important to note that the application runs automatically without users intervention (they don t need to start anything by accessing through the complex mobile phone menu). After this, data are sent to a computer (located anywhere at users home) via the Bluetooth channel. Finally, the required action is transmitted to the KNX network from the computer using any USB/KNX interface available nowadays in the market. Near Field Communication (NFC) [1] is a short range wireless connectivity technology based on RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) that operates at 13.56 MHz and it is able to transfer data at up 424 kbits/s over a distance from 0 to 20 centimeters. NFC simplifies the way consumer devices interact with one other and helps people receiving and sharing information. Bluetooth [2] is a wireless technology that operates at 2.4 GHz over a distance of 10 or 100 meters with a peak data rate nearly 3 Mbps depending on the device class employed. The Bluetooth signal is able to penetrate solid objects and doesn t require line of sight positioning between the transmitter and receiver devices. KNX [3] is a worldwide standard for home and building automation able to offer comfort and versatility in the management of air-conditioning, lighting, access control, monitoring and security Figure 1 Real system architecture
4.2. Hardware tools 4. Development tools Develop and install any ICT system in general and AAL system in particular requires a series of complex tools and our proposal is not an exception. For this reason, we describe all the tools (software and hardware) employed by us to make possible the service described in the paper. 4.1. Software tools The software tools required to develop the full application are listed below: Eclipse IDE for Java developers [4] is an open source integrated development environment comprised of frameworks and tools for building, deploying and managing software. Java TM 2 platform Standard Edition development kit (J2SE 1.5.0) [5] to develop the Java application running in the computer side (between the mobile phone and the KNX network). Java TM platform Micro Edition (J2ME) [5] provides a robust and flexible environment for applications running on embedded devices like mobile phones. Java APIs 1.1 for Bluetooth [5] (optional library of the above package) involves the Bluetooth and OBEX (Object Exchange Protocol) code required by JSR 82. ProSyst s mbs Smart Home [6] provides a full catalogue of Java TM APIs to interact with the most important home automation standards currently available (Zigbee, KNX or X10, for instance). ETS [3] is the software to design, configure and maintain smart homes and building control installations made with the KNX system. The ETS 3 Professional version was employed by us to identify the physical and group addresses of all sensors and actuators available in the KNX network. Nokia Connectivity Framework 1.2 [7] is a tool to visualize, construct and test environments that utilize Nokia SDK emulators. This tool is used to test and emulate in a computer platform the application that runs inside the mobile phone. The hardware tools required to develop the full application are listed below: MIFARE 1k and MIFARE 4k [8] are the two kinds of NFC smart tags used in our AAL development provided by MIFARE Company. Nokia 6131 is the mobile phone chosen by us with NFC and Bluetooth capabilities. This terminal uses the JSR 257 (set of APIs for proximity and contactless based communication). A Bluetooth dongle to receive and send information between the mobile phone and the KNX network if our computer hasn t Bluetooth features. There are a lot of available alternatives on the market at low cost nowadays (the only requirement is that this additional dongle must implement the JSR 82 stack). A full network of KNX sensors and actuators installed at the users home (the higher number of devices available the better the services work). ACR122 [9] is a standard NFC smart card reader that supports the most important NFC tags available in the market. This device has been used to build rich scenarios that involve daily objects to launch the scenes. Tira 2.1 [10] is a bidirectional USB/IR adapter that can send and receive signals to/from remote controls. This device could control a lot of home appliances sending IR signals. 5. Use cases In this section we will analyze different use cases that make sense to the AAL services proposed in this technical paper. As we can see, the same service will be exploited in several scenarios for users with different degrees of needs. 5.1. Scenario 1: IR appliances control This first scenario is intended to solve the inaccessibility and the absence of real switches or push-buttons at some home locations. With a low number of smart tags installed near the user location, we can reduce risk, hazards or uncomfortable situations. The figure below shows how adding a NFC smart tag into the sofa s arm a conventional television can be controlled. If the user wants to turn on the television,
touches the corresponding tag with his/her mobile phone. Then, a loop appears at the phone s display asking what action he/she wants to do: on or off. When the display shows the user desired action, he/she distances the terminal from the tag and a phone s buzzing means that an IR signal will be send to the television. wants to leave home touches this tag with his/her mobile phone and all lights and non critical home appliances (the television or the radio if applicable, for instance) will be turned off and a SMS will be sent to a familiar caregiver to inform that the elderly user is now away home. Go to sleep scene. A smart tag with a size easily visible for elderly people is stuck into the bedside table. When the user goes to the bed, he/she puts his/her mobile phone on top of the NFC tag and automatically all lights and the television will be turned off. Figure 2 - Turning OF/OFF a TV with NFC tags 5.2. Scenario 2: Scene management A scene in the home automation world is defined as an iterative function sequence that helps the user to eliminate routine and repetitive tasks on his/her daily life pressing a simple button. Using NFC tags in real environments adds more capabilities to enrich the traditional scenes available nowadays in the market and opens a new range of possibilities for interacting with the system thanks to enhanced interaction devices. The most important thing about these interaction devices is that is not necessary to employ an expensive touch panel or a new generation of KNX switches to launch the scene, the user only has to concentrate on what he/she really wants to do in a natural way: I m at home scene. The elderly user arrives at home and put his keys into a key basket located in the hall. Thanks to a NFC reader hidden under the key basket when the user places his/her keys on it the scene is automatically launched: the hall lights will be turned on, on the radio will sound a welcome nice song and a SMS will be sent to a familiar caregiver to inform that the elderly user is now at home. Ready to read scene. A smart tag is stuck on the back cover of a book. When the user wants to read a book, picks up one of them from his/her bookcase and sits on his/her sofa. After this, the living room lights dim its brightness until a favorable value appropriate for reading the book. Goodbye scene. A NFC tag is located near the door at a suitable height. When the elderly user Scene name At home Ready to read Goodbye Go to sleep Traditional scene trigger A presence or movement sensor detects the user/the user presses a button The user presses a button The user presses a button The user presses a button Advanced scene trigger The keys are placed into the key basket The user picks up a book from the bookcase A smart tag is touched by a mobile phone A mobile phone is placed into the night table Table 1 - Traditional scene trigger vs advanced scene trigger 5.3. Scenario 3: Contextual lightning At the present, there is an innovative technology with a huge potential at home environments based on indoor location systems that will design and develop a new group of emerging applications. This new kind of services will improve the existing home automation installations because the users will be identified and located by the intelligence of the system all the time. Although this feature will be a non ethical policy (direct attack on his/her privacy) for some users for others like elderly people o persons with several or moderate disabilities could be the only way to access to these smart systems. The brand product available nowadays in the market chosen by us to develop this scenario is the SpheraOne TM system owned by TSB Tecnologías para la Salud y el Bienestar S.A [11]. SpheraOne TM is a technology that enables creating localization, identification and tracking applications that can be used to monitor people at indoors spaces in a safety, precise and efficient way. The SpheraOne TM system works automatically through the installation of location system beacons in any given area. Meanwhile, each person to be monitored wears a
bracelet which serves to identify, locate and trace them at all times. Combining this indoor location system with a smart tag carried on a wheelchair we could develop universal on, off or dim switches in an easy way. The system knows the user location and touching the NFC tag (stuck in the arm s wheelchair, for instance) he/she could interact with the right lamp. the realization of the activities, identifying the most important users impressions in order to look for potential improvements of the service. Most users were really impressed about the unexpected good performance of the technology so that they are able to use it, understand it and benefit for it, without any learning process with the exception of some words to explain them the basic principles of work. Figure 4 - NFC user s evaluation Figure 3 - Indoor location system with NFC tags 5. Evaluation To demonstrate the real effectiveness and efficiency of all AAL scenarios previously defined by us is needed to do an evaluation from two complementary points of view: users and a technical review. In the first of them the full system is built, installed in an environment similar to its final location and tested with target users. At the end, an important feedback is obtained by developers to improve the final design. Although all the AAL scenarios suggested in this paper couldn t been tested by real users the interaction paradigm with NFC technology has been validated by real elderly users in a Spanish nursing home. During the last week of May 2009 the usability of a NFC technology was tested by a group of users in Old People s Care Centre of San Vicente del Raspeig municipality (Alicante, Spain). Up to 14 people between 60 at 74 years old participated in this experiment. The test consisted in the realization of a number of tasks using one test application provided running in the NFC mobile phone. In order to classify the results of the experiment, a questionnaire was defined based on Likert scale. It consists on a 5 points assessment scale where 5 means totally in agreement and 1 means totally in disagreement. Each question is connected to one of the main classifiers that define the user experience: efficiency, easiness of use, easiness to learn, benefits and emotional response. Calculating the average of the obtained answers, it is possible to obtain the rate that the service has got in each of the basic usability aspects. Apart from the objective results, several interviews took place during On the other hand, the technical review has been done by qualified persons in the CIAmI Living Lab. The CIAmI Living Lab [12] is an adaptable and accessible infrastructure that combines on one hand the simulation of a living space where anyone could live in total comfort and safety and on the other hand, integrated technologies hidden into the physical environment. Its purpose is to provide an intelligent space for testing technological prototypes with their potential users in real conditions. All proposed scenarios are permanently available in this living laboratory. 6. Conclusion In this technical paper we have reviewed a new way to interact with the KNX home and building automation installations specially oriented to elderly people and persons with some disabilities. Despite of there are a lot of devices (sensors, actuators and gateways between different technologies) available to home automation installers in the manufacturers catalogs the list of them related with the interaction part are limited, unattractive and inaccessible for those users who really could be benefit for the use of smart systems at home. Little displays with low resolution, technologically obsolete and fixed wall touch panels and small portable computers with high capabilities but too expensive are all the possibilities we can find in the market nowadays. For this reason, is very important for all population guarantees that the next generations of home automation devices ensure an easy interaction between all equipment present in an installation in a natural and intuitive way.
As we can see in the figure labeled as Real system architecture (figure 1) we propose an innovative system to solve this problem providing a reasonable alternative. The more important advantages of this proposal architecture are: Elderly people don t like carry on electronic devices like mobile phones at home. A simple solution could be replacing this interaction device by a smart bracelet or something similar with NFC and KNX capabilities. The system is based on three mature and robustness technologies with low cost. The final solution could be used by non technical persons with a low learning curve. Using high technological devices for interaction and computing allows to define more complex scenarios with full standards compatibility (additional sensors, communications networks and gadgets could be integrated). The full architecture has a high degree of innovation because we could associate objects in the real world with actions in the home automation network ( the home-automation of things ). The software and hardware tools required to build this kind of AAL scenarios are available in the market at low cost. A person with a technical profile is needed for burning the instructions command into each one NFC tag and doing the computer s maintenance. For all these reasons we can conclude that this is a service platform really useful for elderly people and persons with several disabilities. At the present, there are home automation installations with a huge quantity of sensors to measure an enormous variety of parameters and actuators to control any home equipment but the interaction way with these systems is poor, non natural and is an important handicap to many people. However, the creation of a short-term brand product would be very difficult because there are a lot of different technologies involved in the AAL services and the real needs of each user are completely different of the rest of other users. 7. References For launching scenes it is not necessary additional tasks by the user (he/she only needs to do that he/she wants to do: nothing else). There are many technologies and electronic gadgets appropriate to work in home environments that can allow the development of rich scenarios (the only limit is our imagination). On the other hand, the more important disadvantages are: NFC is not a widely adopted technology in the market. This is the most important problem because this implies that there are few mobile phones (or other devices with similar features ready to interact with the system) with the NFC profile enabled. Although this is a huge disadvantage we must consider the Nokia s announce [13] that said all its mobile phones will be NFC compatibles in the next year (2011). [1] NFC Forum (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.nfc-forum.org [2] Official Bluetooth info site (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.bluetooth.com [3] KNX Association (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.knx.org [4] Eclipse (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.eclipse.org/ [5] Oracle (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.oracle.com [6] Prosyst (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.prosyst.com [7] Forum Nokia (accessed in October, 2010) http://wiki.forum.nokia.com A computer with a logical algorithm is required to interact with the home automation network (sends/receive KNX frames thanks to an USB/KNX adapter). This component could work without a display and doesn t requires a high performance. [8] Mifare (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.mifare.net/ [9] ACR card reader (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.nfc-reader.com/
[10] HOME electronics (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.home-electro.com/ [11] TSB Tecnologías para la Salud y el Bienestar S.A (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.tsbtecnologias.com [12] CIAmI Living Lab (accessed in October, 2010) http://www.ciami.es [13] Nokia s announce (accessed in October, 2010) http://thenokiablog.com/2010/06/17/nokia-nfc/ Acknowledgement The AAL service presented here has been tested in the CIAmI Living Lab which has been developed under the Plan Avanza framework (2007) of the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Commerce (Spain). The authors wish to acknowledge the Spanish Ministry for their support.
LIGHTING MANAGEMENT SYSTEM USING KNX IN THE REMOTE LABORATORY OF AUTOMATIC CONTROL AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LEÓN Manuel Domínguez, Juan José Fuertes, Perfecto Reguera, Serafín Alonso, Antonio Morán. Instituto de Automática y Fabricación. Aŕea de Automática y Control (AAC-IAF). Universidad de León. KNX Conference, 05 September 2010 A.Morán (AAC-IAF) Lighting management in LRA-ULE KNX Conference 2010 1 / 17
Outline 1 Introduction 2 LRA-ULE 3 Lighting System 4 Operation Modes 5 Study of Energy Saving 6 Conclusions A.Morán (AAC-IAF) Lighting management in LRA-ULE KNX Conference 2010 2 / 17
Introduction Energy efficiency is a priority in modern societies where available resources are limited and demanded comfort increases exponentially A.Morán (AAC-IAF) Lighting management in LRA-ULE KNX Conference 2010 3 / 17
Introduction Energy efficiency is a priority in modern societies where available resources are limited and demanded comfort increases exponentially One of the main factors for better energy efficiency in a building, is the effective management of lighting system. A.Morán (AAC-IAF) Lighting management in LRA-ULE KNX Conference 2010 3 / 17
Introduction Energy efficiency is a priority in modern societies where available resources are limited and demanded comfort increases exponentially One of the main factors for better energy efficiency in a building, is the effective management of lighting system. To reduce the energy consumption in the laboratory an autonomous lighting system has been implemented. A.Morán (AAC-IAF) Lighting management in LRA-ULE KNX Conference 2010 3 / 17