Abstract: A method for controlling a heating/cooling system located at a home of a user. For a population of users, occurrences of occupancy-related events occurring in the users' homes are detected. Then, occurrences of such occupancy-related events in different timeslots are counted separately for each user of the population. The counts of the various users are then merged and a topic model is applied thereto, to provide probabilities that latent habits give raise to certain sequences of occupancy-related events and proportions of each habit in the home occupancy routine of each user of the population. Thereby, a reliable forecast of the home occupancy routine of each user of the population may be provided. That allows setting the heating/cooling system of each user of the population to fit such reliable forecast, minimizing energy waste and/or maximizing user's comfort.

Abstract: A method for controlling a heating/cooling system located at a home of a user. For a population of users, occurrences of occupancy-related events occurring in the users' homes are detected. Then, occurrences of such occupancy-related events in different timeslots are counted separately for each user of the population. The counts of the various users are then merged and a topic model is applied thereto, to provide probabilities that latent habits give raise to certain sequences of occupancy-related events and proportions of each habit in the home occupancy routine of each user of the population. Thereby, a reliable forecast of the home occupancy routine of each user of the population may be provided. That allows setting the heating/cooling system of each user of the population to fit such reliable forecast, minimizing energy waste and/or maximizing user's comfort.