You don't have to be a geek to appreciate automation through wires and sensors and computers. As time goes on man finds easier ways to take care of our pets to reduce cost, time, or increase stability and life span.  Some of the technology is simple things like plugging in a timer.  Other things involve installing web cam servers, servers to monitor data, scheduled processes, automation scripts, web interfaces and more.  For everyone there is usually some level of automation to make tank maintenance easy.