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The Rise of Smart Buildings

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the hive-mind-homes dept.

Roland Piquepaille writes "In a very well-documented article, Computerworld describes the current status of building automation systems (BAS) that control heat, air conditioning or lighting and how these systems are merging with traditional IT infrastructures. Computerworld writes that they're not enough standards in this industry and asks a fundamental question: who will administer these building networks, IT or facilities managers? Take for example Yale University which wants to connect 210 campus buildings, but also wishes "to integrate the BAS with the university's accounting system for billing and chargeback." Imagine the security risks involved with such an approach. This shorter summary contains selected excerpts of this must-read article."

3 of 171 comments (clear)

  1. Security? by The+Tarquin · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Bruce Schneier scratched the surface of this in his book Secrets and Lies. He specifically adressed internet or network-accessable appliances. Basically his take is: sure they might seem convenient, but how can you be sure that someone properly went over the code on your refrigerator to make sure it was secure? Last thing I want is someone hacking my fridge and shutting it down so my beer and mountain dew get warm.

  2. Bad (or exagerated) journalism . . . by StateOfTheUnion · · Score: 4, Insightful
    This shorter summary contains selected excerpts of this must-read article." Come on . . .grow up . . . a "must-read article" That sounds like a troll if I ever heard one.


    Does this guy actually think that this article is of improtance and relevance to every single slashdot reader? Sounds like old TV commercials . . . "Tonight a very special episode of Blossom . . . the one you can't afford to miss . . . ." This is just poor sensationalized journalism. Does Roland Piquepaille think that /. readers are that gullible or does he think that we're just that stupid?

  3. Re:IT will do it. by bleckywelcky · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Actually, it's funny you spin it this way. Because in the current state of affairs, highly trained technicians handle these things because it's not "simplified for less qualified" IT personnel or otherwise to handle. These technicians are higher paid than the IT staff. Now this mainly has to do with these systems developing entirely separately from IT (ie the HVAC industry really had no incentives to make their systems IT friendly, nor did they really know otherwise - so they just developed the systems themselves).

    But, despite what you may think about having an IT person jump right on the job because the system 'seems similar' to what they work on, the type of specialized training involved in dealing with building systems is much different than typical IT work. I would think at least a year-long training program would be required before anyone could become an apprentice. And then another year or two of on-the-job training before you are fully qualified to work on your own. If your project hiccups, fine... you might lose some sales, computers might go down temporarily, services might be unavailable. If your building systems hiccup, you might burn a building down, hinder hundreds of people from doing their jobs, or damage millions of dollars of equipment, samples, resarch, etc. Need me to prove my point? Give most IT staffers a wiring diagram, and they'll scratch their head and ask you what the hell it is ...