The Internet Power Line Adapter - University of Queensland

Home Automation, Power Lines and the Internet Quenten Alick
recent move being towards home automation networks. It will be interesting to
see how this standard fares in the next few years.
2.4 CEBus (Consumer Electronics Bus) Standard
The CEBus standard is designed as a general standard for home automation.
Like the LONWorks standard, CEBus does not specify any one communications
medium, rather it lays out specifications for using any of the mediums, either in
isolation or in combination, that can provide home automations services. The
mediums supported by the CEBus standard include power line wiring, infrared,
radio frequency, twisted pair cables and coaxial cables.
2.4.1 CEBus Network Layout
CEBus has two possible methods of organization and control. Either all nodes in
the network are independent and can communicate and control each other, or a
“cluster control” node can control several other nodes. These two methods can
also be combined in the one network. In this way, CEBus does not require a
central control point; neither does it exclude the possibility.
Each device on a CEBus network has two addresses. The first is the house code
which is shared by all devices in an area such an apartment or home. The second
is a device address that is unique to each device. There is provision for about
64k (2 16 ) unique devices for each house code, which also has 64k values.
Several of these are reserved, such as the broadcast address.
Every network also has a control channel and an optional number of data
channels. The control channel is used to send command messages in a specified
format and is required by all CEBus compliant nodes. The data channels are
used to send other information, which can be in any format desired. The only
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