So here’s the situation:
For the last week or two I have been having slow or no response problems with smartThing events. I’ve also been experiencing a slow UI. One of the most annoying was with my Hue Bulbs. After many back and forth emails, support had me
remove all of my hue bulbs and hue hub from ST
power cycle my hue hub and ST hub
Pair the hue hub with ST hub
Add the bulbs back into ST
configure all automation again
This process really sucked, but tonight all of my modes have changed as expected, all of my lights are responding as expected, and the UI is back to normal. For the past 2 weeks I have tried to power cycle my ST hub and tried to rebuild the automation but I still had these problems. Can the hue hub have negative impact on the ST hub if it is having problems?
At this point, I am just happy to have things working again. Before I breath a sigh of relief, I will need to monitor my automation again for a few night.
I also want to add that it never occurred to me that most of my problems started after sunset and my mode changes started at sunset. The mode changes also triggered my hue bulb changes. All of this could be purely coincidental, but things are really snappy tonight.
Yeah, I have that problem, too, as do many others. ST isn’t polling the Hue Bridge, and if it thinks a bulb is already on it won’t issue another On command. This is particularly a problem if you use parallel control options like Echo or IFTTT.
It will work again briefly, then fails again. Sometimes it’s ok for a few days, sometimes only a few hours, support is aware of the issue but doesn’t have a fix yet.
Yeah, but it is worth doing to get it to start working again. I just don’t understand why ST won’t give us a hook to jumpstart dead schedules. I mean, how hard would it be to scan running SmartApps and look for ones that should have schedules running and restart them?
This issue is really complex, I realize that, and the fix isn’t easy, but fixing the problem is taking way longer then implementing any suggested work arounds until the problem is fixed.
If I knew doing it once a day would fix it for 24 hours, I might consider it. But given that it can fail again at any time, it’s hard for me to justify the physical effort it takes to do the reset. (The ST app is not very accessible.) So we do bulb control through nonST methods for now.
Others may not see it as a big deal to do kickstart when a bulb fails, mine is an edge case, obviously.
Yeah, well, plenty of automatable solutions as well. For example, exposing an OAUTH endpoint you can hit from a website to jumpstart the schedule and even poll to see if schedule is running and restart already exist.
I think the fundamental issue is ST is too focused on fixing the bigger issue, which is really hard.
However, some percent of support and engineering resources should be put on finding acceptable workarounds and patching the issue until the fix can be implemented.
The standard should be this:
-Identify the problem
-Reproduce the problem
-Indentify any and all workarounds for the problem
-Identify any and all fixes for the problem
-Implement workarounds until fix is implemented
-Develop fix
-Test fix
-Deploy fix
-Confirm fix works
-Remove any and all workarounds
Rinse and repeat.
This is a customer first strategy used by major corporations in making sure the end user is up and running fully while waiting for proper fixes to be implemented.
I am getting sick of seeing all these “open” issues with “fixes” in the works and we know its broken BS. Find and implement workarounds. Yeah, sometimes the workaround becomes the fix, but if it aint broke, don’t fix it.
The hue integration with ST simply does not work. They should simply drop it from the Labs and admit that they cannot make it to work. This is approximately the seventh or eighth month since I started using it and it is like horrible forever. Doesn’t even reliably turn on 3-4 bulbs. Forget about a larger batch. Today it has lost all control.
It was this so called integration that had drawn me to ST and this will be probably the reason I am going to bid farewell to ST.
If I leave it will be the end of HA HA adventure for me. i will make myself happy with native apps. The irony is I love ST, the support team as individuals, what they are trying to do and seriously wish them well but it’s becoming too much of a pain for me to just keep fidgeting with things on a daily basis.
I will hate myself if I quit so will probably stick with the parts which work well and use independent apps till something comes along. It’s kind of difficult getting over your first love.
I’ve removed the hue connect app all together and I am using HAM Bridge to to send the commands to the Hue Bridge. It’s been working the last few hours pretty well.
I am going out of country for a few weeks and of course will remove the hues, sirens etc. from the platform. Will set up some third party app to turn on/off lights at random periods. I don’t have any family or friends nearby who can help here. Wifi where I am going is rare!
Is this going to work? I keep a speakerphone next to Alexa. Call my home phone from outside the country, it will get to the voice mail and meanwhile echo will turn the lights on. never know. It might work.
i will make myself happy with native apps. The irony is I love ST, the support team as individuals, what they are trying to do and seriously wish them well but it’s becoming too much of a pain for me to just keep fidgeting with things on a daily basis.