BUT, any of these same local room touch plates have ability to turn on or off any light elsewhere in the home. Any home wired with the One Button Home system will have this capability.

    So, let's use an example situation. You are in your bedroom and realize that you may have left the garage light on. Instead of going all the way down to the garage, you merely touch the touch plate four times. If you hear no beep, you have turned the garage light off.

    What happened is that you gave the code for the garage light (number 4). This signal toggles the garage light either on or off. If the garage light went off, you hear no beep from the bedroom One Button unit. If, however, you turned the light in the garage on, you will hear four beeps. The four beeps indicate that unit #4 (the garage unit) has been turned on.

    Thus, feedback from a remote switch unit is always at hand. Any time you hear a return beeping, you have turned that remote unit on.

    For control of One Button Home unit numbers beyond number nine, a system of "Dit" and "Dah" commands are used --- similar to the long-short dash system used for Morse code. Thus, unit number twenty three would be two longer "Dah" touches, followed by three brief "Dit" touches. This would turn on or off unit #23.

    Many other options are available with the One Button Home system. For example, should you wish to have your bedroom (or other room) light have a "lived-in" look while you are away, this can easily be set by another coded touch of the local room touch plate. Your bedroom light will randomly turn on or off ... or, if desired, remain on during the evening hours.

    You may even desire to have one of your One Button Home units control the furnace temperature. Thus, from any room in the home you can adjust the furnace temperature.

    Likewise, you can program the Master One Button Home unit to turn on or off a light or appliance for any system unit at a given time of day .... even on a given day of the week.

  The concept is simple. It consists of merely a master unit and a string of slaves. A single two-wire telephone type cable leads from the master unit to the slaves located throughout the home.

  The Master Unit sends out a regular pulse every second on a telephone type two-wire cable. The pulse is a drop to zero of the supply voltage. This cable doubles as both the voltage supply line for all the slaves as well as the data line. This one per second timing pulse is a 1/10,000th second drop in power on this supply/data line.

  Each slave is powered from this common two-wire line. Filtering provides a steady DC voltage for the slave's electronics. At the same time, each slave monitors the power/data line for this timing pulse -- a drop of voltage --- coming along each second from the Master Unit.

  Further, each slave is set to "listen" in on the power/data line for a second pulse which shortly follows this initial one-second timing pulse. This second data pulse is precisely timed. If the pulse occurs within the correct listening "window" of time for the slave, then the slave unit responds. A pulse arriving early in this listening "window" toggles the light relay on or off. If that pulse arrives later, the relay is forced to an off condition. Thus, each slave has it's own particular listening "window" to which it will respond. All other slaves see only the pulses directed to them by listening to their unique listening "window."

  Thus, what determines which of the slaves responds to a signal on the power/data line, is the time distance from the initial one-second pulse sent out on this power/data line by the master unit. The position of the second pulse following the one-second start pulse, determines which slave unit will be controlled, and how --- a toggle or off command.

  Since it is important to know if you've turned the circuit on or off, a method of feedback is provided. IF the light was turned on, the remote slave immediately pulses the power/data line by switching in a low ohmage resistor, signaling this as an "on" condition. This heavy draw of current on the power/data line causes the master unit to drop the power momentarily. What this does is to give yet another pulse (the third pulse) which immediately follows the second data pulse. The slave unit sending out the command, thus, can tell if that remote unit actually came on by detecting this third pulse. When such a signal is received it beeps the Sonalert signal device the correct number of times, the unit code, that was turned on. A Dit, Dah system of long, short beeps give identity for slaves beyond #9.

  IF a slave unit is not turned on, no beep is heard from the local slave unit's Sonalert.

  The one second pulse sent out from the master unit provides a convenient way to activate other functions for each slave unit. For example, a light can be turned on for given length of time. Or, one can have that slave unit give the room a "lived-in" look by cycling a light on and off randomly during evening hours. A photocell connected to the master unit can detect dusk and dawn.

  Yet another feature is added. The master unit is reset at 4:00 a.m. each day, weekdays, from an atomic clock. Thus changes in daylight savings time are automatically adjusted and precise time assured.

  One last feature is the Master Unit's ability to send a signal to any slave unit to turn on or off a light at a precise time of day and even on a given day. Up to 22 of these special on/off commands can be accomodated.

   More information and licensing may be obtained from Wayne Simister, wsimister@sisna.com, at Automated Sound.