Most smart homes have different 'modes' of operation, that change they way they behave. Our research has led us to these three basic modes:
In the contextual smart home these three modes allow every aspect of the smart home to adapt and behave differently based on the one currently selected. These modes do not have to represent the actual physical reality at any one time. The smart home may predict when you will arrive home and may change its mode to 'In' some time before you actually arrive home. We also use a 'Test' mode but this is purely to assist with further development.
The modes are independent of the alarm build into our contextual smart home, as this can be enabled regarless of if we are at home, out, or away on holiday.
To avoid the need to have to tell our smart home when we are in, out or away on holiday we also added an automatic mode. Our research has proved that the contextual smart home has enough information and context to accurately decide which mode to use automatically and this is the default mode we have been using reliably in our @smartest_home for many years. This is a good example of a zero-touch user experience.
The mode is just one input into the contextual smart home. There are many other factors that define how it behaves such as occupancy and presence.
To avoid confusing its users our Home Control System actually uses two modes. The only one that is exposed to users is the 'requested mode' which is one of: In, Out, Away or Auto (and Test for developers).
The Home Control System then maps this to an 'operational status', which is one of In, Out, or Away. Changes of status can be sent to relevant people as notifications if required and this is a very useful tool when testing and improving our smart home.
Based on our identity models, we are using trust relationships and roles to restrict who is allowed to change the smart home mode. It's not something anyone can do!
