Journal

Notes on living with a connected home

What we have learned installing, integrating and supporting these systems — written plainly, without the vendor gloss.

June 26, 2026

Choosing Smart Devices That Won't Be Abandoned in Two Years

Smart device graveyards are real; here's how to spot the gear that will still work in five years versus the future paperweights.

June 26, 2026

Unplugging chargers won't help; here's how energy monitoring finds the few large loads that actually drive your bill.

June 26, 2026

One shared login means no record and no clean way to remove anyone; here's how to scope household access by role and revoke it cleanly.

June 26, 2026

Six cameras and fifty false alerts isn't security; here's the layered, mostly automatic approach that actually protects a home.

June 26, 2026

Most expensive home repairs are the end of a long ignored countdown; here's the maintenance schedule that catches them early.

June 26, 2026

Houses fail on a calendar: first freeze, spring thaw, leaf drop. A season-by-season checklist for HVAC, gutters, and detectors.

June 26, 2026

Water causes more claims than fire; here's the cheap sensor, shutoff, and freeze-protection setup that prevents five-figure damage.

June 26, 2026

A smart home helpless offline was built wrong; here's how to diagnose an outage, keep essentials working, and recover cleanly.

June 26, 2026

Five apps for one house isn't your fault; here's why smart devices don't cooperate and how Matter, Thread, and a hub fix it.