You can do a lot with a Fez Panda, except touch screen. In fact that’s what I’ve been doing, working out the interfacing to the sensors I want to use etc, via my Domino/Panda. The beauty of netmf is that all that code is then transportable to Cobra, maybe change a few port definitions on the way and it just works.
You have some interesting sensor decisions to make. If you’re not experienced from a hardware perspective, you might well find some challenges getting interfaces to work. Here’s some of the things that stand out to me.
Wireless. You have to be careful since “wireless” is an open ended spectrum of products. You might need to temper your thoughts here, it’s not trivial to implement things with a comprehensive wireless support, since that could mean WiFi (networking) connections, radio frequency (RF) comms on different frequencies, xbee etc.
Humidity and Temperature Sensor - relatively easy. Not so if you think it’s wireless.
Program the a/c, heating etc in the house - may be harder. How does your A/C and/or heating interface to the “world”? Serial? are you going to plug into an existing control display and manipulate that?
Motion Sensor - easy, they’re typically a relay-type arrangement with Normally Open and/or Normally Closed contacts. Motion is sensed, the contacts reverse, generate an interrupt and do something.
Camera - that’s not so easy. There are serial cameras that you could use (bing for “Bansky camera” to find a project that does this) but they’re typically not security monitoring grade devices. If you can find a security camera that has support for digital external controls you might be able to do that.
and then send alert sms/picture to my phone - not so easy. The SMS part is easy since you can buy a mobile phone card/shield and use that, which will allow you to generate SMSes. Sparkfun have several of these (search “cellular shield”). The picture though is a different matter. Think about this - a picture might be kilobytes in size, and these microcontrollers work on very small memory footprints. Buffering this data, let alone doing anything with it post-capture, will likely take time. Again, if you can find a device that allows this but is just triggered by the Fez you may be OK. I’ve never seen a project (that doesn’t mean there aren’t any) that implement MMS messaging over cellular for an image like this - but again getting the data into the Fez will be the issue.
GSM module - yep you can do this. You could also have it on the internet so it’s contollable remotely (and perhaps even use email to send pictures, again if you can get them to Fez.
Z-Wave - if you can make it work with any microcontroller, then you can likely make it work on Fez, it would be an exception where you can’t (tight control loops or other places where there are timing critical real-time requirements). again, I’ve not seen a Z-Wave project wuth a uC, not to say that it can’t be done.
wireless sensors like optical dust sensor, accelometer sure - again though why wireless, and what will that “wireless” mean? You need to delve into the specifics of each one to understand what it is and how you might interface to it.
As Gus said, if you want a touch controller then Cobra will meet your needs. I’d also think about buying a Panda / Domino in the short term to help with the development - make sure you get a LCD connected for displaying information (you could just buy the Fez LCD shield)
There are at least two of us doing work in this space (me and EriSan500) so keep posting questions and info you gather and I’m sure we’ll all be able to help out as you go.
Good luck - look forward to hearing more as you delve into the depths of your project !
(edits for spacing and bold quotes)
