Blink(1) Idea

Morning Folks,
I recently purchased a Blink 1 and has an idea, but lack the fundamental programing knowledge to make it work properly.

I would like to program the blink (i guess it would have to be through ifttt functions) to flash a certain color (yellow) for 5 seconds if a door is opened in the house, and to either turn steady burn green or steady burn red based on whether or not a certain presence censor is located in the mesh.

The idea is that my wife can be in bed upstairs, and if I arrive home she can tell if it is me arriving or perhaps someone who isn’t me. I work wonky hours and we are buying a new home, so it would be nice to help her feel safe knowing that a) the sound she heard is the door opening, b) it is only me opening the door after coming in later from work.

The other option I can think of that would make it slightly different is to use a phillips hue bridge with a bloom to make an arrival notification.

Not sure if my idea is too complex, but I have NO coding experience and it seems like a lot for me to learn. I would eventually like to learn, but it won’t happen before this project… :slight_smile: Cheers.

Dave

3 Likes

I’d like to do something similar with the SmartThings Shield LED. I just haven’t gotten around to doing it. More of a are the doors closed and locked check though.

If the color change options are available through blink’s IFTTT channel, it will be easy.

I use IFTTT with smartthings all the time, since I use it for voice control. I tell Siri to send a text to my IFTTT number, which then causes actions in the smartthings channel, using a method developed by Will Poirier’s.

Separately, I have a contact sensor on my front gate. When it is open smartthings sends a text message. This does not require IFTTT. We use this as a doorbell for the gate. It’s not perfect. Sometimes it rings right away, sometimes it rings twice,sometimes it doesn’t ring for a couple of minutes. And sometimes it doesn’t ring at all. But it’s working well enough for our purposes.

The text to IFTTT is much more consistent in performance, one reason I like it so much.

Anyway, set up an IFTTT account and play around with texts as a trigger (IF) and blink as an action (then) and you can explore the blink possibilities that way.

Then you can integrate it with a smartthings trigger. :blush:

I’ve done this with IFTTT. It works really well.

I also wrote a UDP server for the Blink(1), so other apps or computers can send messages to it. I created plugins to monitor other things in the house (i.e. internet, Synology, weather warnings, etc.).