2015-03-23T13:47:57Z

Mortice: Created page with "Occasionally new software may become available for the MortiSafe Pro core unit. You'll get an email when this happens, which will contain a link to a file. To do this: # You'll…"

Build your own from parts

2015-03-23T13:36:47Z

Mortice: /* More information */

Checking the MortiSafe Pro core unit

2015-03-22T19:05:26Z

Mortice:

You should check over the set of 'magic' parts you've got:

* The core circuit board (a Raspberry Pi) with relay unit on top and cable screwed into the relay unit. On the underside of the Raspberry Pi there's a micro-USB card held in a holder
* A wifi unit which has a cover over one end (this can be discarded) to reveal a USB plug
* An aerial which should be screwed into the end of the wifi unit
* A USB power cable with clips half way along it
* A micro SD adapter in a plastic cover. You shouldn't need this unless you have to do an upgrade in future.

[[File:MSP_BoardCloseup.JPG|700px]]

Some things you should do and check when unpacking:

# Screw the aerial into the wifi unit and plug that into the core unit (any socket)
# Make sure the relay board is seated on the connector on the main board. If it's come loose in shipping, the relay board plugs into the line of pins on the main board. As seen on the picture, it goes on the right hand side of those pins so there's 7 pairs of pins left of it that are left exposed. The relay unit sits at an angle - the top end (as seen on pic) is kept off the main board by a nylon peg to stop short-circuiting
# The relay unit has 2 little red 'jumper connectors', they should be on the board in the position indicated on the picture above
# The white cable should be screwed into the screws marked 'A1' and 'COM1' on the relay board (doesn't matter which color goes into which screw) so ensure these are still in tight, and tighten if necessary
# Make sure the micro-SD card (on the underside of the core unit) is correctly seated in its holder. If you push it in a little it will pop out, but you should push it in again

Some things of note:

# Later on you'll plug the power cable into the unit, you can see on this picture where it goes
# You'll also need to plug in an HDMI monitor cable later on, it fits into the socket next to the power socket at the top of the picture (you can only just see it on the picture)
# There's a bunch of cable ties on the right of the core unit - these are there to guard the SD card and stop it getting bumped out when the parts are inside the safe

You can now proceed to [[Wiring the digital safe to the MortiSafe Pro core unit wiring]].

So you want to be a MortiSafe Pro Agent?

2015-03-17T00:08:58Z

Mortice: /* Potential problems */

==Introduction==

I make parts which can be fitted into a digital safe to make it a MortiSafe Pro. You could make a business from becoming an Agent, buying the digital safe and other bits (from ebay etc) and buying the other parts from me, fitting them together, and selling them as fully fitted and working MortiSafe Pro's.
To find out what a MortiSafe Pro is, see the rest of the site.

==What's the business?==

The production of the MortiSafe Pro parts is currently a 'hobby' business - I'm making in small volume and not aggressively marketing it, so if you're hoping to make millions from it, this may not be the ideal business opportunity. Perhaps it will take off and turn into a high volume business, and if so then you'll benefit from being in at the beginning, but I have no specific plans for that at the moment.

And currently the project is in 'early adopter' phase, I've only sold a few and expecting feedback from them may cause tweaks to it.

I will handle all questions from customers about the technical workings of the MortiSafe Pro, you only need manage buying in safes and fitting MortiSafe Pro parts to it (which would take 5 minutes to fit and test when you get used to it) and shipping the finished product to the customer.

==How would it work?==

It works like this:

* A customer contacts me about buying from an agent and I refer them on to you
* They contact you and pay for a completed MortiSafe Pro
* You acquire the digital safe (and other 'Muggle Parts') from ebay or wherever's convenient
* You buy the MortiSafe Pro 'Magic Parts' from me
* You fit them together and send them on to the customer, keeping whatever profit you've allowed for in the price.

As you can see, there's no initial outlay required by any Agent until they get an order (no stock needed) although if you were to hold stock then it would speed up initial delivery (that's up to you).

==Agent listing==

There is a page here listing all the MortiSafe Pro Agents, including information such as:

* Where in the world they are
* Where would they ship to
* How much do they charge for the assembly and shipping
* Is the Agent associated with a known online business
* It would be worth having some words of description from the Agent to express how they can be trusted with someone's money - if they've been a recognized figure online, they manage social groups or online groups, etc
* We need a guideline indication of the time between placing an order and delivering the MortiSafe Pro to the customer, although that depends on many things so may not be calculable yet.

==Potential problems==

There are a few challenges with all this, including:
* I'm happy to handle replacement faulty parts for the bits I sell. I imagine if you ship a safe and there's a problem with it then you'd need to handle that (of course, since you'd modified the safe, that would invalidate your guarantee with the supplier). The problem comes if the customer has an unknown problem so we don't know whose responsibility it is. We need to come up with a 'statement of responsibility' or something.
* When I sell the parts to a customer, I get them to agree to these [[Conditions of sale]] which includes limiting my liability to replacement parts or refund. I admit, I don't know if this is legally binding, and international sales complicates that some more. You should get your customer to agree to something similar, but that's up to you.
* I'm aware that commercial products have to go through formal certification, such as CE marking in Europe. The parts of the MortiSafe Pro are (apart from wire cutting) only plugging together existing parts and and are all low voltage (no danger of death) and are currently being sold as one-off items (not commercial volume) so I hope they're exempt from formal certification. It will be up to you as seller of the completed safe to understand if there's any such regulation in your area which applies to what you're selling.

==What's next?==

* Take a look at the list of 'Muggle parts' which you would need to get in addition to the 'Magic parts' you get from me to make a full MortiSafe Pro.
* There's some suggested sources, but you may find you can buy them locally to you which might save on postage and time.
* Take a look at the build instructions to check you're okay with doing that but the only tricky bit is cleaning insulation off the end of a wire so I don't think anyone would have a problem doing it, and should take 5 minutes once you've done it the first time.
* You may need to make some consideration to reshipping the safe once it has parts inside it. Not sure what's best for that, perhaps taping the parts inside the safe or filling it with packaging material.
* Work out what it would cost you to make a MortiSafe Pro including shipping to customer.
* If you want to go ahead with it, send me that info and any details from the 'Agent listing' section above.
* I'll list whatever details you give on this site.
* A customer will get in contact with me, I send them on and you do business!

==Other information==

* My current plan is for the cost to end customer or to an Agent for the magic parts to be £70 (UK sterling currency) (around US$110) which includes shipping worldwide and paypal charges etc. That's dependent on many things including volume, so is a ballpark figure at the moment (likely that will be the initial price but may change later). You can work out your cost calculations based on that figure.
* FYI I think you can get the other parts for around £30 / $40 so you could use that as a benchmark to add profit and shipping and come up with a target customer price. For instance, shipping is around £13 / $15 (cheapest option) so with £17 / $25 profit you could sell for £130 / $190, but up to you to check those figures and pick a price.
* As long as you're happy with all the above, you shouldn't need to purchase anything up front. When you get a first customer, you could use that experience to get the parts, see what its all about, then sell it on.
* If you're interested in this project other than as a business and would like to build a MortiSafe Pro for yourself and to understand how it works, I will sell you the magic parts at cost price of £55. Get in touch if you're interested.
* There's a simple process you can use to confirm that a safe is correctly wired, but that will involve you configuring the safe to use your home wifi system then doing a test lockup (if you configure the safe to unlock in the past, it will lock then unlock which is a handy test). You'll need to clear out that configuration before sending it to the customer so they don't get your wifi password.
* My production of the magic parts is dependent on getting hold of all the parts required so my lead time is quite unpredictable. I have some stock at the moment but don't know how much more to buy until I understand what the level of interest is for the product. At times we could be talking about a customer waiting a week or two between initial interest/payment and receiving goods.
* It's up to you what price you quote for selling a fully built MortiSafe Pro, and I can list that price on the 'Agents' page on the website for you. If I get several Agents all in the same area making the same offering but at different prices, it probably makes sense for you to get together and agree on a fee, otherwise the one with the lowest fee will always get the custom.
* I'm not initially planning on aggressive marketing of this product, so don't expect hundreds of customers within the first week. It will initially be posted to sites like FetLife to generate some low volume sales. I don't currently have any plan for commercial advertising (don't have the infrastructure at the moment for large volume).
* There's lots of enhancements I have planned for the software which I'm considering, but want to get through the first batch of sales before redesigning anything. Any changes won't make a significant change to the build, security or cost of the system.
* You're free to do any other promotion of MortiSafe Pro if you like, as long as it accurately represents the capability of the device. I would not plan on doing that just yet as you don't want to generate lots of excited customers and not have the volume of product to meet it. But opportunities for that may come later.

[mailto:info@mortisafe.com?subject=Agent Mail me] if you'd like to become an Agent!

So you want to be a MortiSafe Pro Agent?

2015-03-17T00:08:03Z

Mortice: /* Potential problems */

==Introduction==

I make parts which can be fitted into a digital safe to make it a MortiSafe Pro. You could make a business from becoming an Agent, buying the digital safe and other bits (from ebay etc) and buying the other parts from me, fitting them together, and selling them as fully fitted and working MortiSafe Pro's.
To find out what a MortiSafe Pro is, see the rest of the site.

==What's the business?==

The production of the MortiSafe Pro parts is currently a 'hobby' business - I'm making in small volume and not aggressively marketing it, so if you're hoping to make millions from it, this may not be the ideal business opportunity. Perhaps it will take off and turn into a high volume business, and if so then you'll benefit from being in at the beginning, but I have no specific plans for that at the moment.

And currently the project is in 'early adopter' phase, I've only sold a few and expecting feedback from them may cause tweaks to it.

I will handle all questions from customers about the technical workings of the MortiSafe Pro, you only need manage buying in safes and fitting MortiSafe Pro parts to it (which would take 5 minutes to fit and test when you get used to it) and shipping the finished product to the customer.

==How would it work?==

It works like this:

* A customer contacts me about buying from an agent and I refer them on to you
* They contact you and pay for a completed MortiSafe Pro
* You acquire the digital safe (and other 'Muggle Parts') from ebay or wherever's convenient
* You buy the MortiSafe Pro 'Magic Parts' from me
* You fit them together and send them on to the customer, keeping whatever profit you've allowed for in the price.

As you can see, there's no initial outlay required by any Agent until they get an order (no stock needed) although if you were to hold stock then it would speed up initial delivery (that's up to you).

==Agent listing==

There is a page here listing all the MortiSafe Pro Agents, including information such as:

* Where in the world they are
* Where would they ship to
* How much do they charge for the assembly and shipping
* Is the Agent associated with a known online business
* It would be worth having some words of description from the Agent to express how they can be trusted with someone's money - if they've been a recognized figure online, they manage social groups or online groups, etc
* We need a guideline indication of the time between placing an order and delivering the MortiSafe Pro to the customer, although that depends on many things so may not be calculable yet.

==Potential problems==

There are a few challenges with all this, including:
* I'm happy to handle replacement faulty parts for the bits I sell. I imagine if you ship a safe and there's a problem with it then you'd need to handle that (of course, since you'd modified the safe, that would invalidate your guarantee with the supplier). The problem comes if the customer has an unknown problem so we don't know whose responsibility it is. We need to come up with a 'statement of responsibility' or something.
* When I sell the parts to a customer, I get them to agree to these [[Conditions of Sale]] which includes limiting my liability to replacement parts or refund. I admit, I don't know if this is legally binding, and international sales complicates that some more. You should get your customer to agree to something similar, but that's up to you.
* I'm aware that commercial products have to go through formal certification, such as CE marking in Europe. The parts of the MortiSafe Pro are (apart from wire cutting) only plugging together existing parts and and are all low voltage (no danger of death) and are currently being sold as one-off items (not commercial volume) so I hope they're exempt from formal certification. It will be up to you as seller of the completed safe to understand if there's any such regulation in your area which applies to what you're selling.

==What's next?==

* Take a look at the list of 'Muggle parts' which you would need to get in addition to the 'Magic parts' you get from me to make a full MortiSafe Pro.
* There's some suggested sources, but you may find you can buy them locally to you which might save on postage and time.
* Take a look at the build instructions to check you're okay with doing that but the only tricky bit is cleaning insulation off the end of a wire so I don't think anyone would have a problem doing it, and should take 5 minutes once you've done it the first time.
* You may need to make some consideration to reshipping the safe once it has parts inside it. Not sure what's best for that, perhaps taping the parts inside the safe or filling it with packaging material.
* Work out what it would cost you to make a MortiSafe Pro including shipping to customer.
* If you want to go ahead with it, send me that info and any details from the 'Agent listing' section above.
* I'll list whatever details you give on this site.
* A customer will get in contact with me, I send them on and you do business!

==Other information==

* My current plan is for the cost to end customer or to an Agent for the magic parts to be £70 (UK sterling currency) (around US$110) which includes shipping worldwide and paypal charges etc. That's dependent on many things including volume, so is a ballpark figure at the moment (likely that will be the initial price but may change later). You can work out your cost calculations based on that figure.
* FYI I think you can get the other parts for around £30 / $40 so you could use that as a benchmark to add profit and shipping and come up with a target customer price. For instance, shipping is around £13 / $15 (cheapest option) so with £17 / $25 profit you could sell for £130 / $190, but up to you to check those figures and pick a price.
* As long as you're happy with all the above, you shouldn't need to purchase anything up front. When you get a first customer, you could use that experience to get the parts, see what its all about, then sell it on.
* If you're interested in this project other than as a business and would like to build a MortiSafe Pro for yourself and to understand how it works, I will sell you the magic parts at cost price of £55. Get in touch if you're interested.
* There's a simple process you can use to confirm that a safe is correctly wired, but that will involve you configuring the safe to use your home wifi system then doing a test lockup (if you configure the safe to unlock in the past, it will lock then unlock which is a handy test). You'll need to clear out that configuration before sending it to the customer so they don't get your wifi password.
* My production of the magic parts is dependent on getting hold of all the parts required so my lead time is quite unpredictable. I have some stock at the moment but don't know how much more to buy until I understand what the level of interest is for the product. At times we could be talking about a customer waiting a week or two between initial interest/payment and receiving goods.
* It's up to you what price you quote for selling a fully built MortiSafe Pro, and I can list that price on the 'Agents' page on the website for you. If I get several Agents all in the same area making the same offering but at different prices, it probably makes sense for you to get together and agree on a fee, otherwise the one with the lowest fee will always get the custom.
* I'm not initially planning on aggressive marketing of this product, so don't expect hundreds of customers within the first week. It will initially be posted to sites like FetLife to generate some low volume sales. I don't currently have any plan for commercial advertising (don't have the infrastructure at the moment for large volume).
* There's lots of enhancements I have planned for the software which I'm considering, but want to get through the first batch of sales before redesigning anything. Any changes won't make a significant change to the build, security or cost of the system.
* You're free to do any other promotion of MortiSafe Pro if you like, as long as it accurately represents the capability of the device. I would not plan on doing that just yet as you don't want to generate lots of excited customers and not have the volume of product to meet it. But opportunities for that may come later.

[mailto:info@mortisafe.com?subject=Agent Mail me] if you'd like to become an Agent!

Frequently asked questions

2015-03-16T23:08:29Z

Mortice:

These are not currently organised. When I write up more of them, I'll group and order them. Please mail me if you have further questions you'l like to see listed here.

===What's the difference between MortiSafe and MortiSafe Pro===
They have very similar functionality but do it in a different way. 'Pro' is web based so easier to use (no specialist software to run) and easier to implement new features. It has a public website so people without a MortiSafe Pro can still check out what's happening.

===What happens if the power fails?===
If the power to the safe goes off and on again, then within a few minutes the safe will restore operation and continue as before. If the safe is locked with a configured time to open, the safe will open at that time.

===What happens if my internet connection fails?===
The safe will connect to the internet regularly to check for orders and other data, but that's not required for the operation of the safe. As long as you can connect through a web browser to the safe, it will still operate as normal. If your safe is locked due to an order from a controller and the controller has set a password on the order, then even if the internet connection fails you can still connect to the safe through a web browser and give it the password to open the safe if necessary.

Note that this is about a failure of your internet connection, but typically this means the appliances on wifi in your house can still talk to each other, just not out to the rest of the world. If you have a failure which means your wifi no longer works, see the next section about electronics failure.

===What happens if the electronics in the safe fail?===
Electronics are never 100% reliable and you always need a fallback. All digital safes come with a physical key which can be used to open the safe in the case of failure.

Failure in this case means failure of the electronics inside the safe or the ability for it to talk to your computer via wifi.

===What happens if the public website goes down?===
Once a safe is locked, it will open when the time expires or when a password is supplied. Both of those things will still happen if the public website goes down. The only thing the public website is used for is controllers to issue lock and unlock orders, so it's useful but not vital to the running of the system.

The only likely glitch if the public site is down is that if your safe is locked or unlocked while the site is down, it may not show up-to-date information about your locked state. That can usually be fixed by using the 'configure' option on the safe's website, which has a side-effect of updating the public website with the safe's state.

===Do I need to know how to configure my internet connection?===
You need to know your wifi password and the protocol it's using (such as WPA).The process of adding MortiSafe Pro to your wifi network is very similar to adding a mobile phone or any other application.

You do NOT need to make any advanced configuration changes such as port mapping or dynamic DNS configuration. The system is designed to be as simple as possible to set up.

===Aren't there other ways of doing time control or internet control of keys?===
Yes, plenty of other methods. MortiSafe is not necessarily better than any of them, you should choose whatever system meets all your needs. But I do think that MortiSafe is the most sophisticated system of its kind for the price.

===What's the Playpen?===
The Playpen is a set of websites that run exactly the same software as the websites that MortiSafe Pro uses inside the safe and for public interaction, so you can simulate how you would use a MortiSafe Pro. You can for instance configure one of the simulated MortiSafe Pro's with a sub name and controller password, then go to the playpen public website and issue an order using those details, then go back to the MortiSafe Pro site and accept the order.

The only differences between the Playpen and the real product is that the Playpen doesn't have a real physical safe (when it says 'locked' it's just a simulated locking) and there's options to 'reset' the system (in case the last person using the Playpen locked one of the safes for a year).

Check out the [[Playpen]].

===I can't connect to my MortiSafe Pro website, what do I do?===
Check out [[What to do if your MortiSafe Pro IP address changes]]