Building a Home Security System with BeagleBone: Save money and pursue your computing passion with this guide to building a sophisticated home security system using BeagleBone. From a basic alarm system to fingerprint scanners, all you need to turn your home into a fortress.

William Pretty

$9.99 ~~$19.99~~

4.1 (7 Ratings)

eBook Dec 2013 120 pages 1st Edition

William Pretty

$9.99 ~~$19.99~~

4.1 (7 Ratings)

eBook Dec 2013 120 pages 1st Edition

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Key benefits

Build your own state-of-the-art security system
Monitor your system from anywhere you can receive e-mail
Add control of other systems such as sprinklers and gates
Save thousands on monitoring and rental fees

Description

One of the best kept secrets of the security industry is just how simple the monitoring hardware actually is - BeagleBone has all the computing power you need to build yourself an extremely sophisticated access control, alarm panel, and home automation and network intrusion-detection system. Security companies make a fortune each year by charging exorbitant fees to their customers. You will learn how easy it is to make an alarm system with Beaglebone. A company-maintained-and-monitored alarm system has its place - your dear old mum is probably not going to be creating her own system any time soon. But if you are reading this book, you are probably a builder or a hobbyist with all the skills required to do it yourself. With Building a Home Security System with BeagleBone, you will learn everything you need to know to develop your own state-of-the-art security system, all for less than a year's worth of monitoring charges from your local alarm company! You will start by building and testing your hardware and open source software on an experimenter's prototype board before progressing to more complex systems. You will then learn how to test your new creations in a modular fashion and begin to utilize BeagleBone. Once your system is built and tested, you will install some of the professional-grade sensors used in modern alarm systems and learn how to use them. You will also discover how to extend your alarm system in a variety of different ways. The only limit will be your imagination.

Who is this book for?

This book is for anyone who is interested in alarm systems and how they work; for hobbyists and basement tinkerers who love to build things. If you want to build the hardware described in this book, you will need some basic soldering skills, but all the parts are of the thru-hole variety and are very easy to put together. When it comes to software, you can just run it as-is, but if you want to modify the code, you will need knowledge of Java and IDEs.

What you will learn

Understand the components of an alarm system
Build a basic zone 1 alarm system
Modify your alarm system to perform complex tasks
Build the actual hardware onto BeagleBone
Integrate home automation into your security system
Protect your network from intruders
Keep an eye on your system from anywhere in the world
Install and use a range of sensor equipment

Product Details

Publication date, Length, Edition, Language, ISBN-13

Publication date : Dec 17, 2013

Length: 120 pages

Edition : 1st

Language : English

ISBN-13 : 9781783559619

Vendor :

BeagleBoard.org

Category :

IoT & Hardware

Languages :

C++

Concepts :

Single Board Computers

Tools :

BeagleBone

What do you get with eBook?

Instant access to your Digital eBook purchase

Download this book in EPUB and PDF formats

Access this title in our online reader with advanced features

DRM FREE - Read whenever, wherever and however you want

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Sarah Barney Jul 06, 2016

Look at the cover. If you can solder components onto a silkscreened base to build a board like this, this book is for you.It covers just about everything else: sensors, actuators, code, and light carpentry.

Amazon Verified review

Charlie Brown Jan 30, 2016

Got my security system up and running in a short while.

Doug Duncan Feb 28, 2014

Disclaimer: I was given a reviewer's copy of 'Building a Home Security System with BeagleBone'. The fact that I was given a copy of this book has in no way influenced my review.Building a Home Security System with BeagleBone by Bill Pretty was a fun book to read.Bill starts out by giving a quick overview of alarm system sensors: passive infrared, glass break and temperature and then walks you through building a simple alarm.Chapters 3 and 4 walk you through planning how to layout your system, build the hardware and writing some software to control it.Chapters 5 and 6 take you through testing and automating the system.In chapters 7 and 8, Bill gives a solution that will allow you to use the built system to also go through an protect your home's computer network.The book concludes with a chapter that gives ideas on devices that could be added on such as a fingerprint scanner or RFID reads.Even though I might never actually build my own home security system, it was interesting to see how the BeagleBone can be used to run this type of system.

CNC guy Feb 03, 2014

First ImpressionsDisclaimer: I recognized the author as a frequent participant on the BeagleBoard mailing list. Packt Publishing provided me with a copy of this book in order to do this review.This is a very short book. The nine chapters comprise a mere 88 pages. It seemed odd that such a short book had five technical reviewers.What this book is aboutThe first two chapters in the book cover the basics of alarm systems and a very simple single zone alarm system. The third chapter discusses planning for an alarm system installation.Chapters 4 and 5 are about building and testing hardware. Several printed circuit boards (PCB) are presented in these chapters.Chapter 6 covers automation. Chapters 7 and 8 provide ideas on using the BeagleBone to monitor your home networks as the alarm system functionality doesn't even come close to tapping out the capacity of the BeagleBone. The final chapter mentions some additions that could be made to your alaram system such as RFID readers, fingerprint scanners, etc.Who is this book for?If you are and experienced electronics hobbyist with some knowledge of Javascript contemplating building a security system this could be a good book for you. A lot of electronics is assumed in this book. None of the circuit components are explained with the exception of comparators which are briefly discussed and related to op-amps which are not covered at all. Transistors, etc. just appear in circuits.The book also seems to assume the reader is familiar with PCB manufacturing. The appropriate files are provided to etch your own PCBs, but unless I missed it there are no pre-made boards available. Wiring harnesses are shown and other than a tip to use needlenose pliers instead of an expensive crimping tool no direction is given on how to build these.If you understood what I said in the two paragraphs above, you will probably be fine with this book. Having never build a security system myself, I definitely learned a few things reading this book.Who the book is NOT forIf you have never built any electronics before or are just getting started in electronics this is probably not the book for you. I suspect you will be frustrated by a lack of fundamental electronics knowledge. I would be much less concerned if Javascript is new to you, but you have some background in electronics.If you are also interested in home automation, you might be OK if you read the BeagleBone Home Automation book by Juha Lumme (also reviewed here on my blog[...]) first to get some background before reading this book. Alternatively, some of the Make electronics books or similar might be helpful.Book Link at Packt[...]

Ken Berck Oct 14, 2014

Good book, a great way to get started into the home automation addition!

Building a Home Security System with BeagleBone: Save money and pursue your computing passion with this guide to building a sophisticated home security system using BeagleBone. From a basic alarm system to fingerprint scanners, all you need to turn your home into a fortress.

What do you get with eBook?