Here’s what I did. I purchased a USB iBeacon and plugged into an outlet in my home office. Then I purchased an iOS app called Beecon (note the spelling). This app discovers your beacon and allows you to set actions when your iPhone enters and exits a zone. It also allows you to specify the range. One of the actions it offers is “Call URL”. Then I wrote a simple little PHP script that uses ISY’s REST api to authenticate and turn on my INSTEON light switch. And then duplicated the script and modified it to turn off the switch. Then uploaded the scripts to my web server. Now I have two distinct URL’s that I can call when I enter and exit the zone (my home office). Finally, back to the Beecon app on my iPhone to set the URL actions for entering and exiting the zone. I had to play with the distance setting a bit to get the desired actions but that was fairly straight forward. Now, whenever I enter the room the light automatically comes on and goes off when I leave the room. Works quite well. Pretty simple I know but it was more a proof of concept than anything. The possibilities are endless.
