A question to smart people of the smartthings community. Is there any documentation on Arlo Pro integration with smarththings and sharptools integration. I am trying to initiate video/clip recording using tasker and sharptool but can’t make it work. I can use smartthings app and smart home monitor to trigger video recording by the motion of another motion sensor but the delay is unacceptable? There are a couple of methods available like capture, startStream, stopStream but I haven’t managed to initiate video/clip recording on my Arlo Pro 2 camera. Thank you. Zoran
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@Scott2ya , as per Brian’s suggestion from netgear forum, I am forwarding my question hoping you might be able to shade some light on the topic.
Thank you
Zoran
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For what it’s worth, here are the commands that the Arlo Pro is reporting as available:
{
"name": "on",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "off",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "refresh",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "ping",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "on",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "off",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "mute",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "unmute",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "flip",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "capture",
"arguments": [{
"enumType": "physicalgraph.device.DataType",
"name": "DATE"
}, {
"enumType": "physicalgraph.device.DataType",
"name": "DATE"
}, {
"enumType": "physicalgraph.device.DataType",
"name": "DATE"
}]
}, {
"name": "startStream",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "stopStream",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "setProfile",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "setProfile1",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "setProfile2",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "setProfile3",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "setProfile4",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "setProfile5",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "startStream",
"arguments": []
}, {
"name": "stopStream",
"arguments": []
}
The question is what the three parameters for the capture() method are supposed to be as it seems like that is what you would need to trigger a recording.
I would also note that if you can use a motion sensor as a trigger for your Arlo camera to tell it to record, you could try creating a virtual motion sensor and then using SharpTools (or WebCoRE, etc) to trigger that virtual motion sensor as active.
@joshua_lyon
Thanks for your reply. That adds another way to solve his problem. I think he is trying to find a way to reduce the inherent delay when using St with Arlo. Yes, I have already recommended using a different trigger to start the recordings earlier and I believe he has tried that. (I have corresponded with Joshua on the Arlo Community Forum). I recommended that he contact Scott2ya as Scott2ya says he is using the Arlo Modes to arm/disarm his system to avoid the dalays. (I use the external trigger method), I am wondering if Scott2ya has to leave his cameras powered up all the time to accomplish this.
Brian
Since Arlo pilot, I now leave my cameras on all the time, but disable recording on my back 3 cameras when I let the dog out. The only way to not record and let the motion detection still work was too leave either push notification on our email. I elected email, and send those to my junk mailbox. The reason I do it like that is at night I still want my motion to trigger my back flood lights. Before arlopilot, I used to disable my back 3 cameras using smartthings smart lighting app a virtual switch to toggle the three cameras, Google voice and iftt.
So I’d suggest using Arlo custom modes, while still integrating Arlo into ST.
Thank you all for your participation and your ideas. If ST and/or SHM could trigger Arlo camera video recording and sharptools is integrated with the ST/SHM there’s gotta be a way for shartptools to independently or via ST initiate video recording on Arlo cameras. I’m looking for that missing part (which might not have been implemented yet). Thank you. Zoran
I’m not sure I quite understand what it is you are trying to accomplish. You have other non Arlo motion sensors that you want to use as additional triggers to make your cameras record, but the delay it’s unacceptable. Does that sound about right?
@vzoran
Here is a simplified version of how I think the systems work. First, without using ST as the controller -
Arlo’s base station serves two functions. It connects to the internet and to their Cloud servers. The second thing the base staton does is to communicate back and forth with the cameras using their own frequency and code. The camera detects motion. It sends the information to the base station. The base station then sends all the information it needs to their servers over the internet. Their servers send back a signal for the camera to start recording. Depending on the weather, how much traffic is on the internet at that time, etc. this should normally take less than a second to accomplish with your cameras.
Now throw in Smartthings and you have communication back and forth between both Smartthings servers and Smartthings hub and Arlo’s servers and then back and forth with the cameras. This is what causes the delay when using Smartthings to control your system. They are closed loops and there is nothing at this time that will make the cameras start recording any earlier except for two things.
- Have extra trigger sources such as other motion detectors (which, by the way Arlo by itself does not accept), to tell Smartthings to start communicating earlier before the camera’s own motion detectors see the motion.
- do as Scott2ya does and leave the Arlo system to use its own modes and rules to start the recording process. Theis leaves Smartthings out of the lop, thus minimal delay.
Since I use method number 1 I am not sure what Scott2ya is using the Smartthings/Arlo integration for or how he accomplished that. I will let him explain that.
Brian
I simply let Arlo handle recording. I have it set to schedule in Arlo and it works. I use Arlo motion sensors to turn on lights using ST. I try to keep it simple.
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@Scott2ya I am trying to figure out how to initiate video recording (record 2min video clip) on Arlo Pro/Q camera using sharptools.
Unless someone familiar with the device methods I listed above (as reported by the Arlo DTH) can comment on using one of the methods to start recording, your next best option is going to be to control a virtual device which triggers the recording using one of the other methods you mentioned works natively in SmartThings.
@joshua_lyon
That is a cool list you posted. I wonder if SteveWhite’s Arlopilot could use the on/off coding to do what the routines do now - that is to set the cameras to active/inactive states when a mode changes?
Brian
I don’t personally have an Arlo, so I can’t speak to what each of the methods on the DTH do (eg. if on()/off() are even implemented!). I’m the developer of SharpTools and worked with @vzoran to get an export of the capabilities of the device so we could see if the community has any experience with using the methods that the DTH exposes.
Is there a reason it has to be sharptools? Arlo doesn’t partner with sharptools, so you are basically going through SmartThings. I use Stringify to initiate a 300 second video clip on my Arlo’s. I use Google voice, IFTTT, and Stringify. OK googgle did you hear that, will record all my camera’s 300 seconds, and turn on my flood lights for 5 minutes.
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I just try to stick to one application (tasker/sharptools) that would do all the work for me. Tasker provides a lot of flexibility and I wanted to use it to initiate video recording on Arlo cameras. I was not able to figure it out on my own hance my posts to various communities in hope of finding the answer. Through this post I learned about other methods I was not aware of before but those still introduce a delay that is not acceptable for my implementation. Anyway, I gave up on triggering video recording using a motion sensor of another arlo camera. Instead, I use sound to trigger recording of the camera inside my car (whoever bump or scratch or try to get in will make a sound or open the door, break the window and I’ll have it documented). Thank you all.
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