I have been using Domoticz for a number of years to control some wireless socket and log wireless sensor data. I designed and built a USB Rfm69 wireless adapter. The adapter exposes the functions of the Rfm69 radio module as a command line interface, which is simple to use from a python plugin or directly from a serial console application for testing and debug purposes.
The adapter has a 50 Ohm SMA connector to connect an antenna. The adapter has pretty good sensitivity and transmission range.
Suitable antenna
Some of the cheaper chinese stub antennas are not the best they are not 50 Ohms or well tuned to the center frequency.
I use an RfmUsb adapter to control a number of these
sockets around the house. I also have a plugin that is compatible with some of the other energenie sensor devices.
There is some additional documentation available
here.