ESP8266 Community Forum

I want to create a simple home automation system where I can turn off/on lights, check the temperature of the room and turn on the ac from my android device. whether this is from 4g or a different wifi network, I cant find any tutorials that dont connect via local network. ie 10.0.0.15 I tried to use ifttt with a email system but I cant find a way for the esp8266 to check email via imap. I am working with the arduino ide, the esp8266 is running the arduino code itself.
any idea would be greatly apreicted.

I'll just make sure you have seen the wiki on this page (scroll up) in the grey menu band . Bottom of first page has some email examples.

Yahoo and gmail use https connections and won't let you in directly so you have to use a go between like smtpcorp.com smtp2go.

Two things you might try:

Blynk (http://www.blynk.cc) does exactly what you want. Free IOS and Android apps, Blynk code library on your ESP, and you can read/write any pin on your ESP directly, or change variables with "virtual pins," over the Internet. Free and easy - I had a temp sensor and LED demo running in 20 minutes.

IFTTT has a new "Maker" channel (https://ifttt.com/maker) that lets you control your processor from their interface. I haven't tried it yet, but it seems to do what you're looking for.

Good luck!