These days, we rarely make news of iPhone apps for home control systems. The bigger news would be that some company doesn’t have an app for their system!

But Lutron has a nice twist that I haven’t seen before. The company’s new app for the RadioRA 2 has an AWAY mode that simulates occupancy while the homeowners are away. Lights turn on and off automatically, and motorized shades raise and lower.

But the original twist is that Lutron is promoting its new scheduling feature “for controlling the system during holidays or other special events, like Shabbat.”

Many orthodox Jews (and religious people of other faiths, presumably) refrain from “work” on the Sabbath, such as the symbolic task of switching on and off the lights. Some custom electronics pros rig automation systems to perform the tasks for their observant clients during the Sabbath, or Shabbat, hours of sunset Friday to nightfall Saturday.

In fact, stay tuned for a feature story we plan to write on this very subject. Please share your own stories with us!

To our Jewish friends, L’shanah tovah! Happy new year.

As Adam Levy of SnapAV says, “Party like it’s 5771!”

Julie Jacobson - Editor-at-large, CE Pro

Julie Jacobson is co-founder of EH Publishing and currently spends most of her time writing for CE Pro, mostly in the areas of home automation, networked A/V and the business of home systems integration. She majored in Economics at the University of Michigan, earned an MBA from the University of Texas at Austin, and has never taken a journalism class in her life. Julie is a washed-up Ultimate Frisbee player with the scars to prove it. Follow her on Twitter @juliejacobson.