Book Image

Building a Home Security System with BeagleBone

By : William Pretty
Book Image

Building a Home Security System with BeagleBone

By: William Pretty

Overview of this book

One of the best kept secrets of the security industry is just how simple the monitoring hardware actually is - BeagleBone has all the computing power you need to build yourself an extremely sophisticated access control, alarm panel, and home automation and network intrusion-detection system. Security companies make a fortune each year by charging exorbitant fees to their customers. You will learn how easy it is to make an alarm system with Beaglebone. A company-maintained-and-monitored alarm system has its place - your dear old mum is probably not going to be creating her own system any time soon. But if you are reading this book, you are probably a builder or a hobbyist with all the skills required to do it yourself. With Building a Home Security System with BeagleBone, you will learn everything you need to know to develop your own state-of-the-art security system, all for less than a year's worth of monitoring charges from your local alarm company! You will start by building and testing your hardware and open source software on an experimenter's prototype board before progressing to more complex systems. You will then learn how to test your new creations in a modular fashion and begin to utilize BeagleBone. Once your system is built and tested, you will install some of the professional-grade sensors used in modern alarm systems and learn how to use them. You will also discover how to extend your alarm system in a variety of different ways. The only limit will be your imagination.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)

The web page interface


The following screenshot shows the simple web page that is included with the code that comes with this book. The interface allows you to turn all four of the outputs on and off. You can easily change the names on the buttons and the headings by editing the provided HTML code.

The web interface

The web page is hosted by the BeagleBone/Alarm system, using the BeagleBone's built-in socket server.

What this means is that you can use your smart phone to access the alarm remotely so as to:

  • Turn low-voltage lighting on and off by driving a relay from one of the outputs

  • Turn your sprinkler system on or off using an output and the solenoid board

  • Open or close your electric blinds using the DC motor controller board

  • Open your garage door by connecting a relay across the manual open button that comes with the door

  • You can even use your smart phone as a panic button to activate the siren and strobe, if you can't reach the one you didn't think you would need!