Personal project / Home automation
Home/Workshop Automation System.
A home control system I'm building for the things I use every day.
RobbinsHome started as an MCP tool I built for use within Simon. It has since grown into a full custom home control system with its own user interface and an API that can be called as an MCP tool by any LLM through an MCP-compatible client.
My goal is a fully open source system for controlling lighting, devices, and most importantly, my 3D printer, with automations and scheduled workflows tying them together. I like projects where software does something physical, and this one gives me plenty to explore.
- Focus
- Reliable open source home control
- Goal
- Full 3D print automation
- Status
- In development
What I'm working on
I'm bringing lights and other connected devices into one home dashboard, where I can organize rooms and groups, control devices, and keep an eye on power use. The connections include LIFX, Tuya, and Shelly. Having a dedicated UI makes the system useful for everyday controls as well as the more involved workflows I'm building around them.
Automations let me tie those controls together into routines that run on a schedule or respond to a trigger. RobbinsHome has its own automation worker, so it can keep those routines running independently of Simon. Its API gives me another way to interact with the same system: Simon, or any other LLM connected through an MCP-compatible client, can call it as a custom MCP tool.
The printing side is where the software and hardware really meet. I'm bringing together printer batches, automated printing, and the 3D printer plate swapper, working toward a flow that handles both the print queue and the physical plate change. The end goal is to have a fully autonomous 3D printing flow that adapts to print failures and other error states, and continues without manual intervention.
I've already run a vase project through Simon and RobbinsHome from an initial prompt to a completed print. The system modeled the vases, prepared and sliced the files, then sent them to the printer, where printing completed automatically. See the vase workflow on the Simon page.
Future work
I want to keep expanding the automations and make the printing workflow more complete, especially the handoff between a finished print, a plate swap, and the next job. In its current sttate, the system can queue prints and automatically swap plates between prints. Next steps include the automation of a BCN3D robotic arm to remove parts, scrape, and clean the plate, then reload for the next print job.
The longer-term goal is to make this something other people can run and adapt: a fully open source home system with useful setup documentation and room for different devices and AI agents based around easy to obtain tools and software.