A DIY project of creating a smart home hub may sound intimidating to you. Surely, you think of a basement filled with servers and connected to the Internet using dozens of wires. But it is not as complicated as it may sound. Moreover, you do not have to be an engineer to create one.

Your trump card in this situation is the open source software Home Assistant. This program allows the devices in your house to communicate with each other. In other words, it becomes a universal translator for the light bulbs and locks available to you. The software will be installed in the mini-computer called Raspberry Pi. Its size is no greater than the size of a regular deck of cards.

So, the first thing you will need is the hardware. The optimal choice is Raspberry Pi 4 because it has the best ratio of the cost and performance. Other pieces of hardware needed are the power adapter and MicroSD card of at least 32GB.

Then you will have to install the software, and this step may scare many people. What you should do is to download the Raspberry Pi Imager to your computer and create a system on the MicroSD card. Then you insert the card into Raspberry Pi and plug the device into electricity. It takes about twenty minutes for the first boot.

When the installation is finished, you will be able to access the device through the browser of your computer. You will see a wonderful control panel on the screen. As you can see, the configuring of devices will become possible literally right after the startup. It supports tens of thousands of manufacturers, so most likely it will be able to handle your devices.

The ability to automate the devices will make your hub really useful. You will be able to teach the system to turn the light bulbs on when the sun goes down. You will get a notification if you forget to close the garage door. So, you will be able to teach your house to behave properly. That means that it will become a tireless butler who never asks for a raise.

In terms of security, your hub will be secure because all the data will be stored in this small box. Nothing goes to some company’s cloud services. This means that your data belongs only to you. This is a rare feature now.

Surely, there will be some difficulties in the process. You will not be able to set everything properly and will sometimes have to start over. This is a normal stage of any project. But once you get familiar with it, you will feel like a wizard.