Patent ID: 7769915

Claim:
A controller, comprising: a communication interface coupled to one or more control and/or monitoring devices via a communication medium, said communication interface comprising a wireless communication interface and a wired communication interface; a software defined radio coupled to the communication interface; a processor coupled to the software defined radio, the processor including logic to identify a communication protocol of the one or more control and/or monitoring devices, wherein the communication protocol of each of the one or more control and/or monitoring devices comprises one of a plurality of wireless communication protocols; logic to instruct the software defined radio to employ the identified communication protocol for communications with the one or more control and/or monitoring devices; and logic to monitor the communication interface and to determine whether a new control and/or monitoring device is detected through the communication interface, wherein when a new control and/or monitoring device is not detected and when the logic determines that data is received from a previously detected control and/or monitoring device, and when said data is not for a previously detected control and/or monitoring device, the logic processes the data and continues monitoring the communication interface, and when a new control and/or monitoring device is detected and when the received data is for a previously detected control and/or monitoring device, the logic provides the received data to the software defined radio for transmission to the previously detected control and/or monitoring device using the identified communication protocol.