How to measure the temperature in a distant room?

[Anthony R. Gold]

Any suggestions on how to learn the temperature in a distant room? A
webcam pointing at a thermometer is the best I've managed so far. Any
solutions which can be read on Homeseer's web server would be preferred.

Thanks.

Tony

[AZ Woody]

How far away is the room? Is there a PC in that room, connected to the
local machine (a LAN, for example)?

"Anthony R. Gold" <not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> wrote in message
news:d7t1219h4d4c50og3jte0ke25500l6a3jq@4ax.com...
> Any suggestions on how to learn the temperature in a distant room? A
> webcam pointing at a thermometer is the best I've managed so far. Any
> solutions which can be read on Homeseer's web server would be preferred.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Tony
>

[Oskar Schoepf]

Anthony R. Gold (not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk) wrote:
: Any suggestions on how to learn the temperature in a distant room? A
: webcam pointing at a thermometer is the best I've managed so far. Any
: solutions which can be read on Homeseer's web server would be preferred.

Look for the Web-IO Thermometer
at http://www.wut.de

Oskar
--
Oskar Schoepf schoepf@wu-wien.ac.at EDP-Center
Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration
Augasse 2-6, A-1090 Vienna, Austria
Phone: +43 (1) 31 336 x4110 Fax: x702

[Anthony R. Gold]

On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 15:34:21 -0700, "AZ Woody" <Reply@here.not.email>
wrote:

> How far away is the room?

One is 35 miles away and another over 3,000 miles away.

> Is there a PC in that room, connected to the
> local machine (a LAN, for example)?

There are LANs in the distant rooms which are connected to the Internet.

Tony

[Anthony R. Gold]

On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 22:37:35 +0000 (UTC), schoepf@isis.wu-wien.ac.at
(Oskar Schoepf) wrote:

> Look for the Web-IO Thermometer
> at http://www.wut.de

Thanks, I will look there.

Tony

[Torsten Brasch]

This one here (http://www.lancos.com/webtherm.html) is less expensive.

"Oskar Schoepf" <schoepf@isis.wu-wien.ac.at> wrote in message
news:cvqtnf$1c3c$1@trane.wu-wien.ac.at...
> Anthony R. Gold (not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk) wrote:
> : Any suggestions on how to learn the temperature in a distant room? A
> : webcam pointing at a thermometer is the best I've managed so far. Any
> : solutions which can be read on Homeseer's web server would be preferred.
>
> Look for the Web-IO Thermometer
> at http://www.wut.de
>
> Oskar
> --
> Oskar Schoepf schoepf@wu-wien.ac.at EDP-Center
> Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration
> Augasse 2-6, A-1090 Vienna, Austria
> Phone: +43 (1) 31 336 x4110 Fax: x702

[AZ Woody]

You could do something like hooking up a 1-wire (Dallas) Serial or USB
adapter ($20) to the remote PC, and something like a DS18s20 (one or more -
$3 each) to monitor the temp(s).

Some code would need to be written to collect the temp(s) and provide it in
the manor required.


"Anthony R. Gold" <not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> wrote in message
news:io0221l71tq4umrtug9ps6puj2p1ifkgfm@4ax.com...
> On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 15:34:21 -0700, "AZ Woody" <Reply@here.not.email>
> wrote:
>
> > How far away is the room?
>
> One is 35 miles away and another over 3,000 miles away.
>
> > Is there a PC in that room, connected to the
> > local machine (a LAN, for example)?
>
> There are LANs in the distant rooms which are connected to the Internet.
>
> Tony
>
>

[Anthony R. Gold]

On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 19:42:17 -0500, "Torsten Brasch"
<nospam@nospam.nofrigginspam> wrote:

> This one here (http://www.lancos.com/webtherm.html) is less expensive.

If it was really being sold as a working appliance then a price comparison
would be meaningful. Seven months ago the author said he was planning to
make a PCB.

Tony

[Anthony R. Gold]

On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 18:09:08 -0700, "AZ Woody" <Reply@here.not.email>
wrote:

> You could do something like hooking up a 1-wire (Dallas) Serial or USB
> adapter ($20) to the remote PC, and something like a DS18s20 (one or more -
> $3 each) to monitor the temp(s).

And Torsten found something similar using DS1621, but I'm really looking
for any solution which uses off-the-shelf hardware and software.

> Some code would need to be written to collect the temp(s) and provide it in
> the manor required.

Aye, there's the rub. SMOP = small matter of programming :-)

Tony

[Alan J. Wylie]

On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 22:21:05 +0000, "Anthony R. Gold" <not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> said:

> Any suggestions on how to learn the temperature in a distant room?
> A webcam pointing at a thermometer is the best I've managed so far.
> Any solutions which can be read on Homeseer's web server would be
> preferred.

Not sure what computer hardware you are starting from, but I hope this
may be useful.

Some motherboards (e.g. Soltek SL-75DRV2) come with a temperature
sensor on a cable, designed for measuring the temperature of hard disk
drives, etc. If you place this away from heat generating components,
close to an air intake, you will be able to measure ambient.

With windows, use Motherboard Monitor[1], and some of the plugins/extensions
such as MBM-Network Host Monitor and MBMTemp, and away you go, with no extra
hardware to purchase/install.

With Linux, use lm_sensors, and a quick bit of shell scripting, possibly
using "sensord -g".

[1] http://mbm.livewiredev.com/

--
Alan J. Wylie http://www.wylie.me.uk/
"Perfection [in design] is achieved not when there is nothing left to add,
but rather when there is nothing left to take away."
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

[Anthony Fremont]

"Anthony R. Gold" wrote
>"Torsten Brasch" wrote:
>
> > This one here (http://www.lancos.com/webtherm.html) is less
expensive.
>
> If it was really being sold as a working appliance then a price
comparison
> would be meaningful. Seven months ago the author said he was planning
to
> make a PCB.

Looks like it's been longer than that. July 2003 seems to be the last
update.

This project looks ok, but the 1-wire devices would have allowed for far
more than 8 sensors on the bus. Of course implementing 1-wire protocol
to search the bus is a "bit" more complicated than addressing a few I2C
devices. Also, the I2C bus wasn't designed to be dozens of meters long
or arranged in a star pattern which would be desirable for this
application. Perhaps that is why he didn't proceed with the project.

[Oskar Schoepf]

Oskar Schoepf (schoepf@isis.wu-wien.ac.at) wrote:
: Anthony R. Gold (not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk) wrote:
: : Any suggestions on how to learn the temperature in a distant room? A
: : webcam pointing at a thermometer is the best I've managed so far. Any
: : solutions which can be read on Homeseer's web server would be preferred.

: Look for the Web-IO Thermometer
: at http://www.wut.de


Another solution we use is a UPS from APC with a Network Management Card
with Environmental Monitoring.

Both products (wut and apc) work out of the box.

Oskar


--
Oskar Schoepf schoepf@wu-wien.ac.at EDP-Center
Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration
Augasse 2-6, A-1090 Vienna, Austria
Phone: +43 (1) 31 336 x4110 Fax: x702

[Anthony R. Gold]

On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 22:21:05 +0000, "Anthony R. Gold"
<not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> wrote:

> Any suggestions on how to learn the temperature in a distant room? A
> webcam pointing at a thermometer is the best I've managed so far. Any
> solutions which can be read on Homeseer's web server would be preferred.

I just came upon the Harmony HTSK1 which looks promising:

http://www.simplyautomate.co.uk/productDisplay.asp?prodId=4870

Does anyone here know anything good or bad about it?

Tony

[SQLit]

"Anthony R. Gold" <not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> wrote in message
news:v1272159snmju998cghjda2led1evd0lvh@4ax.com...
> On Sat, 26 Feb 2005 22:21:05 +0000, "Anthony R. Gold"
> <not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > Any suggestions on how to learn the temperature in a distant room? A
> > webcam pointing at a thermometer is the best I've managed so far. Any
> > solutions which can be read on Homeseer's web server would be preferred.
>
> I just came upon the Harmony HTSK1 which looks promising:
>
> http://www.simplyautomate.co.uk/productDisplay.asp?prodId=4870
>
> Does anyone here know anything good or bad about it?
>
> Tony

appears to be a Lennox product

http://www.lennox.com/pdfs/brochures/Lennox%20Harmony%20II%20Zoning%20System.pdf

I was interested because of my Harmony remote.

[Anthony R. Gold]

On Mon, 28 Feb 2005 15:31:34 -0700, "SQLit" <SQLitnospam@cox.net> wrote:

> appears to be a Lennox product
>
> http://www.lennox.com/pdfs/brochures/Lennox%20Harmony%20II%20Zoning%20System.pdf
>
> I was interested because of my Harmony remote.

I venture that's merely a coincidence of brand names but with no product
relationship.

Tony

[Gary S.]

G'day there,

Might be a little simple for your needs, you could try this -

http://www.allthingsspiny.co.uk/index.html

Thre is a link for a PC Thermometer that plugs into your joystick port,
and can upload the data to an FTP/Web server. I build the first version
and it worked fine, and cost only a couple of dollars to build - and
comparing it to another commercial made digital thermometer I had it was
reasonably accurate after calibration.

Hope it is of use.

[Anthony R. Gold]

On Wed, 2 Mar 2005 12:24:26 +1100, Gary S. <istafaan@ihug.com.au> wrote:

> G'day there,

Good onya Cobber!

> Might be a little simple for your needs, you could try this -
>
> http://www.allthingsspiny.co.uk/index.html

Thanks - that looks frugal enough but I don't have the time or the
patience to do the assembly and calibration.

BTW, here is the status-quo which I'm trying to improve on:

http://camera4.ahjg.co.uk (Username:user Password:pass for next 24 hrs.)

which is not such a tough hurdle to beat :-)

Tony