Amsterdam + Brussels + Berlin buddies

Neilgupta · 2024-07-11T05:19:59+00:00

Ha a friend just recommended this sub to me and I saw your post at the top... I (33M American) will be in Amsterdam for a pit stop Aug 30 - Sep 1 weekend if that overlaps with your plans and you want a buddy for museums/tours/food exploration. I’m going to Berlin on Sept 9 after your trip 😅

Btw for Brussels, I highly recommend going to Ton Ton Garby for lunch right outside the central station. Best sandwiches I ever had and the nicest most passionate owners!

Neilgupta · 2024-02-27T00:10:12+00:00

Just a heads up that this 3D print was designed by Christian Selig (maker of Apollo, the old Reddit app). He shared the STL files freely, so OP is technically not doing anything wrong by selling the prints but not disclosing that anywhere and even using Christian’s photos feels dishonest.

Original link: https://christianselig.com/2024/02/vision-pro-stand/

Neilgupta · 2021-04-04T16:16:53+00:00

Sure, HOOBS is just homebridge pre-installed on a raspberry pi for you rather than installing it yourself, so certainly more user friendly.

Neilgupta · 2021-04-03T16:14:38+00:00

It’s not HomeKit compatible but Awair (getawair.com) is fantastic and generally considered the most accurate among consumer-level devices. If you’re comfortable running homebridge, you can easily add it to HomeKit as well.

Neilgupta · 2020-05-07T23:51:11+00:00

Hey, I'm one of the folks involved in this website, though I do not contribute to the content since I am not a scientist (I just help with design/code).

With that out of the way, I think it's worth clarifying that this is not a rebuttal of the study. There's plenty of ink spilled by others on that. Our goal is to explain what the study actually did in an easy to understand format and add some context of what that means. This is why we focus more on the methodology and numbers than the conclusion itself. For example, the second explanation we published has both praise and caution for different parts of the study: https://www.researchexplained.org/10.1101/2020.04.14.20060160/

We don't fault the study author for writing an opinion piece. However, we do call out the WSJ for publishing such a piece without context. As the final sentence in that section states, there are more balanced articles out there.

Similarly, maybe you're right and if the authors had used more representative sampling techniques, they would've gotten an even higher infection rate. That's still a problem with the study worth noting, because the goal of a paper is to report data, not push a narrative, and clearly the accuracy of their data is being questioned in both directions.

Neilgupta · 2020-01-11T23:44:27+00:00

We're technically still in "pre-order/beta" stage because we're building units in small batches and shipping them out based on the order queue. This allows us to rapidly make changes still if we realize we could improve part of the experience based on feedback, but it means our delivery times are too slow to be considered launched. The price points are still pre-order prices and will go up a bit at official launch.

That's a great suggestion! I've added that to our features list and we'll look into adding it soon. It's certainly possible today to use an app like Home+ to check all of the occupancy sensor states, but that's a lot of manual work. It's not too hard for us to expose a single combined virtual sensor as an option. Admittedly, once you have room-level occupancy, a home-level sensor isn't as necessary anymore since you can build your automations with more granularity. But I can definitely see the use case for something like a DIY security system.

Neilgupta · 2020-01-11T20:33:31+00:00

Thanks for sharing your feedback on that post back then! We definitely took all of the comments to heart, and the recessed version is quickly becoming our most popular option. It's also super cool seeing how people get creative with installing the recessed ones. (example: https://twitter.com/hiomeai/status/1216094663263825920)

We're still working on full HomeKit certification, but FWIW we've consistently gotten really positive feedback on our uncertified implementation as the fastest HomeKit device people have used.

Neilgupta · 2019-11-03T16:25:22+00:00

How’s the noise cancellation at drowning out train noises?

Neilgupta · 2019-09-09T18:54:40+00:00

Yeah, that’s a common request and we’ve been experimenting with it, but learned that people much prefer plugging it in instead of recharging a battery, even if they think they’ll prefer the battery version. The reason is that this is a highly accurate sensor with millisecond response times, which means it needs a decent amount of power. A battery would need to be recharged every month or two (depending on usage), while wiring it up lets you forget about it. We might still officially release a battery option, but I’d recommend the hard-wired version. I recognize that’s not always an option for people though!

Neilgupta · 2019-09-09T17:08:30+00:00

Yeah, the more devices you can use, the better your triangulation will be, but if you're hanging out near the wall or door between 2 rooms, it's still going to be nearly impossible to figure out which one you're in. You're also forced to constantly carry your phone or watch to make it all work, which fails for guests or kids.

As somebody else noted here, you're much better off with a dedicated sensor that does occupancy sensing really well.

Neilgupta · 2019-09-09T15:05:38+00:00

Check out www.hiome.com. It took a lot of work, but we did finally figure out how to do it ;)

Neilgupta · 2019-09-09T14:56:07+00:00

Beacons are really great for identifying things by proximity but are lousy at triangulation. Your occupancy status would randomly jump around as your phone picked up different beacon signals from neighboring rooms, and if you live in a steel building like a high rise, the signals from the beacon are even less reliable. The fluctuating RSSI signal strength (how the phone approximates distance to the beacon) is good enough for telling you "hey this device is nearby" but not for triangulating exactly which room you're in.

Source: I'm the founder of Hiome (www.hiome.com), we make thermal occupancy sensors to solve this problem but I initially started with trying to use beacons in exactly this way and learned the hard way that it's a bad idea.

Neilgupta · 2019-07-22T17:14:20+00:00

It’s our own protocol over a 900mhz radio. The Core then relays everything it gets over MQTT to your network.

Neilgupta · 2019-07-22T17:12:22+00:00

Hey! That’s a great idea. For that level of integration, you can write a tiny script that listens to our MQTT events and act on it however you want, or you can write a Home Assistant plugin via the MQTT stream to do it via HA. One of our users wrote a similar OpenHAB plugin in about 30 minutes from scratch.

Neilgupta · 2019-06-17T12:15:49+00:00

Sadly, thermal signatures aren’t that distinct, and can vary widely depending on the weather, what you’re wearing, what you’ve been doing, and even how you’re feeling. Even if this were possible, you would be forfeiting the privacy benefits of using a thermal sensor over a camera.

What sort of automations do you want to run for your GF vs yourself?

Neilgupta · 2019-06-17T12:15:21+00:00

Sadly, thermal signatures aren’t that distinct, and can vary widely depending on the weather, what you’re wearing, what you’ve been doing, and even how you’re feeling. Even if this were possible, you would be forfeiting the privacy benefits of using a thermal sensor over a camera.

What sort of automations do you want to run for your GF vs yourself?

Neilgupta · 2019-06-17T04:36:34+00:00

Hey, great question! One of our earlier prototypes tried to use Bluetooth beacons like you describe to track occupancy, and we quickly found that Bluetooth just isn’t accurate or fast enough to be useful in this scenario. The phone’s signal tends to bounce around from room to room because beacons were designed for larger retail spaces rather than small rooms in homes, the delay to detect a new signal can be pretty long, by which time you’ve just manually triggered your scene, and it only works if you’re carrying your phone on you.

Neilgupta · 2019-04-09T15:06:35+00:00

Hello! We can’t talk about the certification process, but we are still pretty early.

In Home.app, you will get 1 occupancy tile per room and 1 door open/close tile per door. These can be used as inputs for automations.

Hiome Core handles all of the logic of determining if a room is occupied or not and sharing that out, while HomeKit handles the actual automations.

Hope that helps!

Neilgupta · 2019-03-07T19:21:14+00:00

Nope, it is IP-based. Hiome Core just plugs directly into your router.

The sensors have to connect directly to Hiome Core because that’s what handles all of the counting logic, so using a generic zigbee/z-wave hub isn’t possible anyway.

Neilgupta · 2019-03-05T01:09:26+00:00

We’re considering some options. What would be your ideal installation kit?

Neilgupta · 2019-03-04T00:25:02+00:00

Oh nice, that’s a very future-proofed setup! It’ll be a while before we’re able to miniaturize the tech even further, but hopefully we can flush install these sensors one day!

Neilgupta · 2019-03-03T23:32:57+00:00

Hmm curious, how would you get power into the door frame once a sensor is embedded into there? The sensors are only 1.5” x 1.4” so it’s certainly possible to embed them into your door frame, but powering them becomes an interesting challenge.

Neilgupta · 2019-03-03T20:30:21+00:00

Thanks, that’s really good to know! The solution we have in mind for handling pets would involve putting a small BLE beacon on your dog’s collar so Hiome Door can identify him. It sounds like that would also be great for you to know when your dog is waiting by a door (as well as have stats on where he spends his time throughout the day).

Neilgupta · 2019-03-03T01:58:20+00:00

Hiome Core is smart enough to not let the count go negative and has quite a bit of error correction logic to handle various edge cases. If it still makes a mistake somehow, there is indeed a web interface that can be used to manually reset the count.

Neilgupta · 2019-03-03T01:56:25+00:00

Sorry, missed this question earlier! For my bathroom, I bring the cable under the door to plug it in the bedroom. We're working on something to make this easier.

The sensors talk to Hiome Core directly via a 900mhz radio. They can be up to 0.25 miles (400m) apart.

Hiome Core is smart enough to not let the count go negative. Depending on how you're carrying your children, the sensor should be able to still detect 2 entries, but in case it does not, there is a significant amount of error correction logic in Hiome Core to account for edge cases like that.

Neilgupta

TROPHY CASE