The email feature is awesome

[ewelin]

A couple months ago, my company purchased a web application which has automated monthly billing. Unfortunately they do not send out receipts for the transactions and only do so upon request. I spent several weeks looking for an automated way to send an email once a month to request the receipt, when it finally dawned on me to use HCA! A created a simple program with just the email element in it and it simply sends an email to the billing department and the return address is my company's address. :D It's scheduled to run 1 day after they're schedule the automated billing for. It's worked great and now I'm curious how long before the lady on their billing department realizes she's getting the exact same email from me every month. LMAO.

Never did I think I would use HCA to automate emailing sending, but it works and it's extremely easy!

[ghostt]

A couple months ago, my company purchased a web application which has automated monthly billing. Unfortunately they do not send out receipts for the transactions and only do so upon request. I spent several weeks looking for an automated way to send an email once a month to request the receipt, when it finally dawned on me to use HCA! A created a simple program with just the email element in it and it simply sends an email to the billing department and the return address is my company's address. :D It's scheduled to run 1 day after they're schedule the automated billing for. It's worked great and now I'm curious how long before the lady on their billing department realizes she's getting the exact same email from me every month. LMAO.

Never did I think I would use HCA to automate emailing sending, but it works and it's extremely easy!


I couldn't agree more. I use the e-mail feature for quite a few things, but most notably, a home-grown security system. I am a system administrator by profession, as such I carry around a blackberry with me at all times. Its quite nice to be able to have my house drop me a line whenever something is happening out of the ordinary.

I use the mail feature to have the house tell me when the doorbell is pressed (such as when I'm at work, and expecting a package, I can call the neighbor and have them put it inside my garage for instance), HCA e-mails me when the garage door is opened if I'm not home, if a door is opened if I'm not home (using DS10A sensors), when motion is detected in the house when I'm not home, the list goes on and on. Definitely love it. :)

[ewelin]

I keep adding more and more email alerts, but for different reasons. I work from home, so the home-brew security features are not really need, but HCA is installed on my WHS box in my basement and I live on the 2nd floor, so I use it more for alerts or notifications. I have programs which run to alert me of power failures or recoveries, if the set HCA schedule isn't correct, and I even have a program which emails me when the HCA Status changes to Yellow or Red. I stole part of that program from the HCA sample, but when I have some time I'll have to export it and share it. It's pretty handy if you don't check the computer that HCA is running on very frequently.

[MrMagic]

The feature I'm finding most useful in this area is the text messaging feature. I've been using this quite a bit in my own home installation. The one I like best is the one I have set in a program that is triggered when someone steps up on my front porch during the day when I'm gone. The program is triggered by by a motion sensor and when it does trigger, the program sends me text message that it did in fact trigger and records the date and time. This same program kicks on a video cam at the front door and a VCR to capture the video.
The text message not only lets me know that somebody was there for some reason, but also helps find the time of day on the VCR when the alert triggered.

HCA V9 is so full of new features like this that it's hard to say which one is the best, but as a whole, V9 is pretty much a quantum leap.

Steve