Home Automation and Security Systems

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Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

My latest smart automated thing that is dumb to purchase in such a small apartment is a smart plug. This one makes a little more sense. Since I started having breathing problems I started to sometimes have anxiety when going to sleep that is mitigated with a fan blowing up to the ceiling.

The problem is that the fan is disruptive to my actual sleep, and wakes me up or leaves me with a scratchy throat in the morning. So I decided to get a smart plug that would turn this off at a set time, landing on the ihome finally. Unfortunately the app itself doesn't allow you to set an off time without a start time. Which is annoying because I don't want to use the fan every night. I then discovered HomeKit will turn it off at a certain time. Which is cool, except, if it is not on, the off trigger sometimes it turns it on (seems to be a general bug with the app as it does this with my lights sometimes as well). So this isn't really working.

I think I might just use this plug for a space heater later in the year. I thought about getting another brand compatible with IFTTT, but if I'm honest, a fifty year old five dollar light timer is probably still better tech for my fan purpose. Not as cool, though.

# ¿ Oct 9, 2016 11:13

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# ¿ Apr 18, 2024 01:53

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

I wish IFTTT had the option of one more "if."

I like the hue triggers I have but some would be more useful if you could also have them not run if it is like 4:00 am.

# ¿ Dec 16, 2016 15:40

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

RevKrule posted:

So I started looking at Hue Tap (thanks to recent posts) as I'm in an apartment so rewiring light switches is a no go. I'm concerned with the notation that it has "50,000 lifetime clicks" and reading reviews that the number is much less (like basically a years worth a clicks). Does anyone have experience with them to sway me one way or the other? Does anyone have a better, less disposable solution? I have voice control but scenes elude me.

I got the tap on kind of a whim despite not having a lot of faith in how useful it would be last year. Basically to stick near my door for the rare occasion that it's cloudy or I have my curtains drawn and I'm stepping into a dark apartment in the middle of the day (I have my geofence stuff set up to only turn the lights on automatically post sunset only, because normally that's the only time I need them) and want to turn a light or two on without having to dig through my pockets for my phone.

It's worked perfectly for that, and been useful beyond that. Even though my apartment is set up so that I have a device capable of controlling my lights just about anywhere in the room, it's still frequently convenient having something that works quickly and reliably that I can press to change a scene or turn the lights off.

I could've arguably done all this with voice controls, but I'm still having trouble justifying purchasing an Echo to myself (even with the incredibly low bar I have for justifying purchases) and Siri works most of the time but is less reliable and I don't want to be sitting there yelling at my phone when I can just hit a button.

I've had it for a year and it's still going strong but I only average a tap or two a day so maybe I just haven't hit the thousand tap lifetimeor so that I've seen some people complain about.

# ¿ Jan 4, 2017 01:06

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Pants Donkey posted:

For months now my hue just up and stopped following the routine to turn off the lights when I leave home and turn them back on when I get home. I thought it was because I switched phones, but reinstalling the app and logging into the Hue account has done nothing for me. It seems to follow other timed routines just fine, but obviously I really like not having to muck about in the dark when I get home and I'm bringing in groceries or something.

One thing that happened to me in this situation is that I deleted the theme I was using before (I use the original Hue app instead of the new one, though, which I hear has problems with geofencing in general). When I selected a new theme it worked. Also, in another instance, I changed the names of one of the lights. When I reselected the theme, it worked again.

RevKrule posted:

Hmm, my situation sounds similar. Thanks, this is useful.

No problem, glad it was useful.

# ¿ Jan 5, 2017 23:23

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

You're absolutely right, just about all the smart home stuff is priced to fleece enthusiasts and early adopters. It might just be that is the only real market for the stuff now, though.

# ¿ Feb 3, 2017 02:01

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Happy Noodle Boy posted:

I bought a couple more Hue stuff today including a light strip. I was debating where I wanted to use it and ended up doing a portion of my bed platform. Looks really drat nice but now I need to buy some extensions to the rest. It's going to be loving awesome once I finish it up.

I need an additional pair of flood lights for the hallway, 2 bulbs for my office and that should cover what I can use Hue on. The rest would require me changing the fixtures for something more Hue friendly or would need to go another route (light switches, probably elgato or lutron). Or go for a poo poo ton more light strips but gently caress me those are expensive.

That said, the one thing I really, really, really want to see is HomeKit for MacOS. The fact I can't use my iMac to act as my hub or manage / set up automation is loving ridiculous. (also I'm bitter they got rid of automation for the 3rd gen apple tv)

I really wanted the hue light strip, but what ultimately has made it kind of useless for me is the giant plug made it hard for me to get it where I wanted it, and I don't want to just mount it somewhere else just to mount it. I figure if I'm ever an actual home owner I can probably install it more discretely somewhere.

As of now, I just have it loosely coiled on the bottom empty shelf of my entertainment stand. I've been thinking about maybe putting some translucent fabric over the shelf to make into a sort of cheap lightbox but haven't gotten around to it yet.

# ¿ Feb 5, 2017 06:17

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Happy Noodle Boy posted:

(Hue) So do I need a separate app to do color / music synching for the color lights?

Yeah. I have used Hue Disco and it worked but I just basically did it to see if it worked and haven't tried it since.

I do use the camera to match tv/color fairly regularly and while the app for that needs a ton of work as far as meeting basic quality standards for a 2017 app, it does do the job of syncing the lights with your television.

Rick fucked around with this message at 23:21 on Feb 8, 2017

# ¿ Feb 8, 2017 23:18

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

I wouldn't say we're 100% to that yet. You inspired me to read this: http://www.techlicious.com/guide/5-futuristic-smart-locks-for-your-home/

Basically there are a lot of ways you can unlock door via touching something, or, the lock, or even asking siri to do it (uhh...that doesn't sound so great).

You could probably come closer to touchless entry with older tech. At my last place of work we had proxmity locks and I just needed to wave my wallet in front of it to unlock (although, it was more reliable to touch it). I wonder if the sensor would have been a bit lower or if I was quite a bit taller or more athletic if it wouldn't have worked by just leaning against it while in my pants.

# ¿ Feb 17, 2017 06:04

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

With the number of times my last place of employment had police just shrug at footage, I'm really not sure if they actually give you a fighting chance wen it comes to prosecuting property crime. They create a lot of false expectation of being able to solve every crime that happens (despite the camera system not having solved any crimes except for the mystery of "which employee ate the cake . . . oh it's someone we really like, let's just pretend this didn't happen" over five years ) by staff and members, and the general paranoia that you're always watching.

I do think they act as a deterrent to people who choose to be honest when there's a possibility of getting caught, which I guess is what the real purpose for a lot of security systems is. It's also cool for seeing who's at the door, or watching animals. So they aren't totally useless.

A lot of it is really a lighting and storage issue. Consumer night vision cameras suck, and it's expensive to maintain the lighting a camera needs in a lot of instances, and then it starts to get expensive to store high quality footage for longer than a few days if you do get it (which is better than "longer than a few hours" like it was five years ago).

If you're investing tens of thousands instead of simply thousands maybe it's a different story.

Three Olives posted:

Honestly it depends on what kind of system you put in. I've been amazed at how many even brand new expensive apartment buildings put in absolute poo poo cameras, borderline useless and then brag about their camera security. Then something happens and the footage is absolutely useless. We have over six figures invested in dozens of HD IP cameras, storage and processing.

If you put cameras in do it right and don't put in a useless wide angle SD coax poo poo with a cheapass DVR that seems to be all the rage because it is cheap as poo poo now and you can claim you have camera security.

I do agree with your sentiment.

I quoted my last place 7 grand (after yet another unsolved crime right before we were purchasing cameras) for actually covering the building the way it needed to be covered, they spent 1500 and got another useless system, to bring it to three useless systems at three different locations. I'm told it helps their insurance rates, though.

Rick fucked around with this message at 00:55 on Feb 20, 2017

# ¿ Feb 20, 2017 00:52

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

That's really good, thank you, I'm totally saving a link to that post in case anyone ever asks me to buy cameras again.

# ¿ Feb 20, 2017 03:03

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

I still primarily use the Hue app to control my lights but, that is partly because I had them before HomeKit and also I just am more used to the original (Hue App Classic I think they call it) app. I like HomeKit for automation and making stuff from different manufacturers work together but I think they need some work still on fine tuning lighting.

# ¿ Mar 4, 2017 21:25

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

It's the time of year in Arizona where it's getting warm but the AC won't be on in my apartment until like mid April, so I start looking at ways to turn my portable AC unit on automatically (it has a temp sensor and will go into fan mode after a certain temp, but it needs to be on for that to work and that just seems like a lot of power to use all day).

It appears that the devices are roughly in the same place as last year, which is to say no human being confirming any smart thermometer/sensor is able to trigger a smart plug to do anything via either IFTTT or homekit (and in fact the reviews usually specifically saying that despite whatever the website says, the device doesn't work for anything other than monitoring).

I think probably in truth the better, most energy efficent way to solve this really is to just get a regular smart plug or maybe just like, a regular old outlet timer and set the portable AC to turn on like an hour before work is over, but I figured I'd post in case someone has any experience with the temp sensors.

# ¿ Mar 11, 2017 13:46

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

I honestly don't know, it just seems standard for aparments I have lived in with "central air" to switch from heat to cold and vice versa at certain times of the year. I'm not even really worried about cost per se, since utilities are included, I just don't want to be a jerk and cool my empty apartment all day (the real only reason for this is the portable AC takes significantly longer to cool than the main AC does when it's on, so I can't just set it to 90 when I'm gone and drop it to 75 when I'm home and expect that transition to happen in a short time).

I would love to put a Nest or some sort of smart thermostat in but it's a fairly old place with the thermostat embedded into the wall in a way I won't be able to replace it without damaging the wall, so I'm stuck with work-arounds.

# ¿ Mar 11, 2017 19:39

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

AlexF posted:

So ESC 2017 is coming up and I would like to spice up the party by having the Hue lights change to the flag colours of the country that's currently on stage. There's a github link but I have no idea how that stuff works. Does anyone know of an app or something else to make this happen?

If I understand what you're asking correctly, this is easy if you can get your hands on the original Hue app (I think you can still download it from itunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/philips-hue-gen-1/id557206189?mt=8).

Just add the image of the flags into scenes and you should be ready to go.

You can probably still do it with the new app but it was kind of a pain in the rear end last time I tried so I just keep using the old one.

# ¿ May 23, 2017 06:06

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Keystoned posted:

Im looking for some type of electronic cat door that I can close or lock automatically. Ideally it would be something that I could trigger using my phone and ideally Alexa. It would also be nice if I could build in some type of automation to tell it if the garage door is open the lock the cat door, otherwise leave it unlocked.

This may be a bit specific so not sure if ill find anything. Basically we keep the litter box in the garage and have a cat door already, but the cat is in the habit of bolting out the door the second we open the garage and running down the sewer so Im trying to figure out how to stop him.

Well, I am not sure there is an easy way to do it.

They make electronic pet doors but I think they are generally battery powered (honestly probably for good reason). If they were powered via outlet, you could probably use whatever automation solution you use two control two different smart plugs. Like for instance in Apple Home you could create a scene that runs when within your home geofence that deactivates the power to the cat door while activating power to the garage door (although you actually probably would just need to depower the pet door when you were in range of home).

This is also something you could probably solve with an audrino or two if you have the knack for that sort of thing. Combining maybe an audrino garage door opener (which I almost feel like I could handle if I could solder) and a battery powered audrino controlling an electromagnet (a bit beyond me but people do it) that held the car door in place once the garage door was triggered seems like a way to me to maybe do this but I don't really know.

# ¿ Jun 5, 2017 13:21

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

FCKGW posted:

Amazon has a 3-pack of Philips Hue bulbs on sale for $36
https://www.amazon.com/Philips-468058-White-3-Pack-Amazon/dp/B01M1S6I1Y

I thought about getting this because that would basically mean every light in my apartment was smart. But honestly the lights that currently aren't don't need to be so that's probably a bad idea.

# ¿ Jun 14, 2017 11:10

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Happy Noodle Boy posted:

I've been putting my older Hue bulbs on the few spots I have no need for them so now so now I can turn on my closet which is really dumb in practice but I have it set to turn on around the time I get ready for work so it mostly works?

Plus all the lights are now geofenced to turn off when I leave so there's that?

That was my thought. I forget to turn my closet light off sometimes, so it turning itself off would probably be good.

Keystoned posted:

Theyre normally 15 each but the 3 pack has been a little cheaper. So really youre getting $5 off on the three pack already plus another $5 off for the sale. I ordered one because I have a few misc lamps and stuff to fill.

Anyone know of any bedroom / tower fans that would be compatible with alexa? I can find some ceiling fans but im just looking for a standalone fan I can turn on/ off with voice.

Off topic but also any recommendations for a good garage/gym fan? I got some gym equipment for my garage earlier in the year and its starting to get hot as gently caress in there. Id prefer to stay around $50 if possible.

I use a smart plug for this. I am using homekit and not Echo but I am sure it's the same there, if you set the device as a a fan in the smart plug's app, it should be identified to the voice controls as simply "fan." So "hey siri, turn the fan off" works, I don't have to say "siri please turn off the lasko fan" or whatever.

I use this fan: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004IS6JBY/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It's a monster. If you want quiet, it's not this fan, but it blows air around like a motherfucker even on the lowest setting.

Rick fucked around with this message at 08:51 on Jun 16, 2017

# ¿ Jun 16, 2017 08:42

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

stevewm posted:

Stupidly this is standard on a LOT of smart bulbs and often cannot be changed. I can only assume this is so they will act like a normal bulb if you have them on a physical switch.

The ZWave bulbs I have in my living room lamps are also like this. And for some stupid reason will also on occasion turn on to full brightness after a Zwave network heal event. (part of maintenance that a zwave controller does from time to time)

Believe it or not "works with a light switch" was an important feature when the current smart bulbs came to market because the "smart" lights of an earlier generation behaved erratically if light switches were flipped, and, also lots of people were for some reason afraid of lights that didn't come on when you flipped the switch.

I wonder if a few gens into this now, though maybe "works with a light switch" can be a setting, not an unchangeable thing.

# ¿ Jul 12, 2017 22:08

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Burt Sexual posted:

What's the opinion on ADT pulse? I mean it's kinda expensive at 57$ a month but that's ok to me if they have Good reliable systems and service. 36 month contract.

I used the business version so it might have had features that were unavailable in consumer, but it was overall decent. Lots of features could be controlled in my browser. I usually got called if the alarm went off, never had problem getting service in Tucson when we needed it.

Getting service in Yuma was a loving pain in the rear end but this is the case for practically any service thing (printers and furniture was the only exception), but the local owned/ran security solutions were flakes, so we still went with ADT because slow service was better than guys we thought might rob us if they were bored, after waiting weeks for a return phone call.

# ¿ Aug 7, 2017 22:15

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Burt Sexual posted:

Odd since everything I read says they have the best service, at least phone based. After it's setup I think I could be talked through anything. For instance someone recommended vivint, and they suck I guess and don't install.

I never had a problem with their service in Tucson. In Yuma they were driving someone in from San Diego whenever service was needed.

But we still found this better than the local guy who owned all the companies there.

# ¿ Aug 7, 2017 22:34

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

SpaceCadetBob posted:

When I got into Hue a year back I got one full color bulb, and honestly it feels like the biggest waste of money I spent out of all the somewhat overpriced smart home components I've gotten. I have a bunch of hue whites, and now any bulb I get is the hue ambiance. The ambiance one covers all the color temps and dimming needs you could have without the premium cost for wimpy and dull random colors that we honestly never use once the coolness factor wore off after an hour or two.

I would be pretty hesitant to get a bulb at only 600 lumens as opposed to 800, but that is because most of my house lighting is in single bulb table lamps. As it is sometimes 800 feels just a hair not bright enough on my hue white bulbs, but color temp control on the ambiance does alleviate that a bit if is really jack up the blue tone.

I'm a little more positive on 600 lumen colored Hues (like I still enjoy them), but I have a couple 800s and they just look way better.

Rick fucked around with this message at 06:15 on Sep 24, 2017

# ¿ Sep 24, 2017 06:10

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Kalman posted:

A RaspberryPi with a Zwave USB stick running eDomoticz to control Zwave stuff, and a HomeKit bridge (homebridge) along with some plugins to provide HomeKit control of my Zwave switches, Harmony remote, and Nest. (The various Harmony scenes are surfaced to Homekit/Siri as light switches, so I can use Siri to do things like "Siri, turn on Apple TV in the living room.")

I'm really impressed. I knew it was possible but didn't know anyone who's done it.

# ¿ Sep 24, 2017 06:19

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Boris Galerkin posted:

Can you guys tell me if it's possible to do the following things with my new Hue and iPhone:

1. I put two bulbs in my living room and one in my bedroom. I would like the living room to turn on automagically when I'm in the living room, and my bedroom to turn on when I'm in my bedroom. I'm guessing this isn't going to be possible without multiple gateways but I'm hoping I'm wrong.

2. I have a light alarm set to start fading in at 6am and fully on at 6:30am, and then turn off at 7:30am when I leave. Is it possible to make it start changing colors, say at 7am start fading to a red color so I know to get ready to leave? I guess I could just set two alarms to do this one after another but maybe there's a better way.

What are some other "out of the box" things I can do with a Hue ad iPhone, because I can't really think of anything else but I'm not a very creative person.

Also what's the purpose of HomeKit? It's a bit annoying syncing between the Hue app and HomeKit and I'm honestly not sure what HomeKit can do for me that the Hue app can not.

1. is possible with hue motion sensor (allegedly, I haven't tried it, but it seems easy). If you don't want to go that route I'm pretty sure people have accomplished similar with audrino or raspberry pi. Although it might cost you a lot more to do that.

2. There was something similar to what you were requesting on Hue Labs for a while, but I don't think it is still there. You would probably have to do separate alarms without that.

If you don't care about Siri, or controlling your lights via control center, then homekit integration is not that important to you, if the lights are the only smart object you have. Integrating different smart stuff made by different and getting it to work together rather seamlessly is where it shines to me (and I'm sure Alexa and Google home do that well too).

Kalman posted:

It honestly isn't that bad to setup - mostly pretty well documented. The Nest integration is the most annoying part (you need to register for Nest API info, though detailed instructions exist).

Probably took an hour or two of screwing around in a terminal?

That doesn't sound so bad! I don't live in a place where I can use a smart thermostat but I figure eventually it'll happen.

# ¿ Sep 27, 2017 07:14

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Happy Noodle Boy posted:

Also this is my monthly reminder that MacOS having no HomeKit support at all to either control or manage is a loving joke.

Yeah I still don't get this. At the very least it seems like it would've been an advertiserable bullet point feature in an OS upgrade this year, and probably should've been in a year before that. When they only had them on Apple TVs I could at least understand that maybe they were using hubs to sell them but now that it's on ipads it really doesn't make sense.

(I mean, I guess you can control your Hue lights from the website but it is slow).

# ¿ Oct 4, 2017 05:14

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

This might not be the exact thread, but I'm looking for a space heater to pair with a smart plug. My favorite "anything that moves air around" brand is Lasko but as far as I can tell, all their models of heaters do not power back on once power is restored after being off (probably a safety feature, but the smart plug I use does not power on after power outtages so I'm not too worried about this coming on in the middle of the day for some reason and burning the apartment down). I have some small units that work the desired way but are small.

I would like temperature settings but really just anything that works is fine. I've not had good experiences with Honeywell heaters so maybe not them unless that's the only option.

Rick fucked around with this message at 11:26 on Nov 18, 2017

# ¿ Nov 18, 2017 11:19

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

I feel like I read someone online claiming they were running ~200. They were really mad when you had to buy a new bridge to support Homekit (not because of the cost but because how much of a pain in the rear end it was going to be to set them up again).

# ¿ Nov 28, 2017 07:26

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

I definitely had that happen once and I don't know what went wrong or why it fixed, I guess it's just good that it got better.

# ¿ Dec 2, 2017 20:09

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Pants Donkey posted:

I got a motion sensor for Hue to use in the bathroom, and according to HomeKit this thing is reading room temperature? Is that HomeKit weirdness, or could I possibly use this with an Ecobee in lieu of their own room temp sensors?

The temp sensor is definitely in the motion sensor, although I haven't heard of anyone doing anything interesting with it quite yet. My place is too small to justify a motion sensor (or any smart lights, really, but that hasn't stopped me there).

# ¿ Dec 28, 2017 01:25

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Boris Galerkin posted:

I want one of my Hue lightbulbs to turn a specified color in the morning, every morning at 7am, but only when it�s raining right now.

I feel like IFTTT should be made for this kind of stuff but I�ve never used it before and can�t seem to figure out a way to use �and� statements. If not IFTTT how can I do this? I have an iPhone if it matters.

As others have said getting all of this may not be somethign IFTTT can do. But if you're cool with your lights turning a color every time it's raining you can adapt this: https://ifttt.com/applets/19451314d-if-it-begins-to-rain-then-change-the-light-colors-to-blue

# ¿ Jan 2, 2018 21:49

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

I use the classic Hue App, Lightbow (basically makes light shows. Usually has to be massaged into working but cool when it does) , Hue Party (used to suck but is pretty good now) which changes your lights to music, and Hue Camera (another app that has to be massaged into working every time but good at what it does) which tries to match your lights with what is on a display screen.

# ¿ Jan 4, 2018 22:29

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

I am surprised how much I use the tap, and am probably getting another one for the bathroom of all places. I usually have a device within arm's reach ofme wherever I'm sitting that can control my lights but if I'm in the living room I still often get up and hit the button.

# ¿ Feb 12, 2018 19:26

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Endless Mike posted:

Is there a way to check what Hue lights are doing? Something is making mine turn on at 10 PM every night, and I can't find any automations I set up in anything that might cause it. The app doesn't seem to have anything for diagnostics, and I'm pretty close to just resetting the whole thing and starting over, which seems like a pain in the rear end.

Lightbow basically summarizes everything that's happening on the hub, although it isn't necessarily easy to interpret the information from the app into something useful.

I think there's a way to purge all alarms although it might be something you have to do from meethue.com.

# ¿ Mar 12, 2018 18:51

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Endless Mike posted:

Oh I found it now. I had an IFTTT trigger that sets my lights to a softer white, which turns them all to that color.

Oh yeah that'll do it. IFTTT is both the best and worst thing for Hue.

# ¿ Mar 14, 2018 20:32

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Kalman posted:

This still requires some config (and exposing your instance to the cloud), though they're working on getting Google approval for a Home 'skill' or whatever that would work the same as the Alexa skill (easier config, no need to expose a port to the internet.)

They're also finishing up HomeKit integration so that you can use Siri to control things, if you are on the Apple side of things. (There's an existing addon, Homebridge, that does this as well.) Basically everything will be supported within a release or two - right now it's a subset (lights, covers, climate, some sensors, maybe some other stuff.)

But yeah basically HASS is good, and if you're semi-competent with computers you can make it do lots of fun tricks.

Well, this is pleasing news. If I ever buy a home, it would be nice to have Nests as an out-of-box option.

# ¿ Apr 10, 2018 20:52

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

This actually seems like a good use case for one of Amazon's creepy cams.

# ¿ May 10, 2018 07:08

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

enraged_camel posted:

Are the Philips Hue bulbs compatible with built-in ceiling lights?

They make a bunch of different ones for different fixtures, included recessed ceiling lights, although some of these are pretty hard to find except on the Hue website.

# ¿ May 21, 2018 19:32

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

At one of our office they have an analog camera system with a DVR with a bad HD, and the boss doesn't want to replace the HD, he wants to replace the whole DVR. It is true that it's about 10 years old. But if we keep the cameras, is there any realistic improvement that can be expected from a newer DVR?

I'm half thinking that we can almost just get a new digital system at the cost of an analog DVR but we also need way more cameras too within the next year so doing that while rendering the ones we have obsolete is a tough sell.

# ¿ May 27, 2018 02:39

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

Thomamelas posted:

Short answer is no. The longer answer depends on just how old and poo poo the old DVR is. You might find some improvements in retention time with larger hard drive options. And you may find you have a large pool of framerate to play with. If it's really old and poo poo, you might see some improvements from the interlacing via hardware or the software onboard. But these tend to be really marginal improvements.

For future proofing you have two options. The first is to use an encoder for the existing analog cameras and use that to bring them into a NVR or VMS. The second option is to find one of the tribid DVR options. Those should support analog along with the two competing HD standards for CCTV. That gives some flexibility to add cameras that will be better in the future.

If you stick with Hikvision or Dahua for this, you'll find that most VMSes can treat their DVRs as encoders so you can backdoor into an IP system that way.

Thanks! This gives me a place to go. It's a little more than he thinks we should spend, but I think when I compare how the digital look at our main office and how the analog look at the site, it should be logical to see this is the way to go moving forward and if we can do it without tossing the old cameras, even better.

# ¿ May 27, 2018 09:34

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

enraged_camel posted:

So should I invest in individual Philips Hue bulbs, or get one smart switch to control a bunch of regular LED bulbs?

I've had Hue for a few years now and the novelty of color lights still have not worn off for me.

# ¿ Jun 9, 2018 11:37

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# ¿ Apr 18, 2024 01:53

Rick: Feb 23, 2004; When I was 17, my father was so stupid, I didn't want to be seen with him in public. When I was 24, I was amazed at how much the old man had learned in just 7 years.

I have a couple Hue taps (I really only need one, but I found having one in the bathroom was nice in the morning or before bed). I can't imagine people having trouble working them, but if they did they have ones that just look like dimmer switches.

Like obviously not the cheapest solution to smart lights but if you're buying Hue you left that road a long time ago anyway.

# ¿ Jun 12, 2018 23:08

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