Announcement | SmartThings Edge for Devices and Automations

[jody.albritton (Jody)]

@eric182

What is going to happen to virtual switches that we created in the groovy IDE?

For non-developers we are working to reduce the need to use virtual switches. In most cases virtual switches are being used as a workaround in a rule or with a voice integration. Work is being done to improve those experiences.

For developers who want to work with creating virtual devices today we have released a tutorial for creating simulated edge drivers as a tutorial. -Note- This is not a replacement for virtual switches but is meant to highlight that simulated devices can be used with Edge on the Hub. We have more plans for virtual/simulated devices that we will be sharing at a later date as well.

Tutorial | Writing an RPC Client Edge Device Driver

This is an in-depth guide that will walk you through writing a SmartThings Edge Driver integrating a LAN device that exposes a basic RPC (Remote Procedure Call) server API. This tutorial requires no specific hardware, and instead uses a software network device simulator that you can run on your computer called thingsim. When finished, the driver we create will discover the thingsim devices/servers on the network and then act as a client to the devices’ servers. We won’t be covering most the basics like package structure and CLI use here, except for a few specific commands you’ll be told to run. with developing Edge Drivers or don’t have the tools setup, you may want to start by reading the basic getting started guide for Hub-Connected Edge Device Drivers in the official docs. Backgroun…