Sorry about my last reply. There’s been a lot of people here suggesting HomeKit and I somehow assumed your response did too.

Thanks for the suggestion. In fact this is the first thermostat that does not look like a square brick that looks like a clock from the 90’s

I’ll look into it and appreciate the suggestion

So what is the actual thermostat that you are suggesting.

There’s a lot of info there about a topic I am not 100% on. Just trying to figure out what I am looking at and for

Didn’t really find a thermostat there

Pick one tech to be your foundational system (I recommend Z-Wave or Zigbee) that can provide for >80% of your needs.

The problem with this approach is the fact that I don’t want to be pigeon holed into a single vendor for smart devices. If I go with Sony, that means that from now on - I will have to buy ONLY Sony compatible devices in the future… Not a good plan

Now pick a controller than covers your two technologies and top weirdos. You want a primarily local system so look at Homeseer, Hubitat, Homey, Zooz, Fibaro, HomeAssistant, OpenHab and ISY. Decide if you want a pre-built appliance or DIY. Be aware most appliances aren’t great at supporting more than 2 or 3 cameras as video needs a lot of bandwidth and storage. If you plan on multiple cameras you may need something PC based

To be fair I have no idea what you’re talking about. I will check the wiki though and hope it can answer things better

Heating is the first step… I just want to start automation and smart integration with the most functional and useful things and slowly work my way up…

Idea is to have a system that is modular that I can control in a central location with code

I am not buying into the apple eco-system… Thanks