Honeycomb: An open-source distributed system for smart buildings

Protocol for a distributed smart building solution using semi-physical simulation

“…The simulator contains the zone models, device models, and environmental parameters corresponding to the practical system and applies the same control algorithms as Honeycomb. 1 Use the simulation tool to test environmental response, assist control design, and simulate the experimental environment in the next section’s demo. Refer to the key resources table for a detailed introduction to the architecture and models of SPBS.…”

“… 10 Consequently, some researchers have attempted to develop distributed smart building systems using wireless sensor networks (WSN) 11 and multi-agent systems (MAS), 12 although accurately reflecting the physical processes in buildings remains a challenge for these self-organizing networks. 13 Learning from the activity patterns of natural bee swarms, we developed Honeycomb, 1 an open-source smart building solution with a fully distributed architecture. Honeycomb offers easily added/removed smart nodes, evolving distributed applications, and plug-and-play capabilities, resulting in significant energy efficiency improvements in building systems.…”

“…For more detailed information, please refer to the EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURES section in Honeycomb. 1

Figure 1 Building automation system and smart node deployments 1 (A) Basic BAS of the office. (B) Topology and network connections of the system.

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“… (B) Topology and network connections of the system.

Figure 2 System networking 1 Physical signals from thermal sensors are converted to standard current signals and transmitted to the local smart node through an RS485-RTU bus. Other devices connect to their respective smart nodes via the same bus, except for the camera, which transmits video signals to the Jetson Nano device for processing occupancy information.

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“…In the previous work, 1 we suggested an occupancy measurement system with features of considerable interest. This part will provide detailed installation instruction step by step.…”