Sustainable Smart Homes and Community Happiness in the Malaysian Context

Smart House

With the innovations and development in ICT, now the focus has shifted towards such houses that are not only sustainable but at the same time are smart or intelligent. Smart homes include the control and connectivity of appliances used within the house and also act in a certain way depending on the situation (Karkar and Gandhi, 2018). Various definitions exist emphasizing what makes a house to be smart or intelligent. One of the popular definitions of smart house is “A dwelling incorporating a communication network that connects the key electrical appliances and services, and allows them to be remotely controlled, monitored or accessed” (King, 2003).

Based on this definition, it can be inferred that a smart house consists of those devices which are able to do networking, controlling other devices and automation (Chernbumroong, Atkins & Hongnian Yu, 2010; Jiang, Liu & Yang, 2004). Networking devices help different devices to communicate with each other. Furthermore, controlling devices basically manage the entire system and automation devices help in monitoring the physical environment (Sripan, Petchlorlean & Ketcham, 2012). Another definition of smart home was proposed by Intertek, (2003) which describes a smart house consisting of a communication network which connects electrical appliances and allows controlling, monitoring or accessing those devices.