X10 Automation Questions

[mrburns42]

I am looking to have my Pi monitor X10 events, both powerline and RF, and then take action based on the results. I found mochad and got it working on a CM19, so I can see RF events. However, I cannot see any powerline events. I know that the CM15A can access the powerline. The problem is I do not have one and they tend to sell for pretty high on eBay. I do have both a CM11A and a SyncLinx. Both of these devices can interface with the powerline and have a serial port rather than a USB port.

My questions are:

1. Has anyone been able to modify the mochad code to support the CM11A using a USB to serial?

Another program is Heyu. It can talk to the CM11A. I don't think it has a socket interface for easy integration to other programs.

2. Does anyone have experience using Heyu from Python or Perl scripts?

3. Does Heyu support RF devices?

4. Any pointers to a system like I want with both X10 RF and X10 powerline with all codes available? (X10 has both a home control codes and security codes. Items like door switches use the RF security codes. Items like lamp switches use the home control codes.)

Thanks.

----- Steve

[scruss]

Yes, Heyu sends RF commands if you daisychain a Firecracker into the serial port with the powerline controller. The Firecracker has no way of reading RF commands, however. In theory, heyu stores the device state, but in practice, it's sometimes wrong. I call heyu from cron jobs for simple light timing; it sounds like you need more than that.

I had no joy with the CM19 if it was on the same Raspberry Pi as a serial port using a Prolific chip (= most of them). This was a while back, and USB stability has improved a lot in the Raspberry Pi firmware.

[yecam]

I would suggest that you do a search for a package called x10bot written in TCL that runs. It has been running on a very old laptop at my location under Redhat Linux for many years. It is a command line application that reads a configuration file for setups of X10 codes and macros. The CM11A is the interface device that I have been using.

As I see it, you would first have to get control of the RS232 console port and configure it for 4600 baud, the default of the CM11A along with the requisite start and stop bits etc. This would be the one thing that would have to be modified in the x10bot code (provided) and recompiled. There might be some necessary package downloads as well to get TCL and any related items into place. In any case, the source code for this package is available and I can state that the package has been rock stable for well over 10 years on my ancient laptop.