Connect LaMetric (lametric.com) with Smart Things and use it as home display

@chrisb,

Yes, you can trigger pre-set widgets via API. So connection with UBI should be easy.

Specific info, that consists of icon/text/sound, you can show by simply sending a message(in specific format) to device’s email.
The combination of LaMetric + IFTTT + Smart Things allows you to show what happens at you home, including when wife’s car comes home (Example). Review IFTTT tab of the simulator, we’ve generated some ideas what’s possible. If you have some other ideas/use cases, would be great if you create them in simulator.

Unfortunately, device does not allow to connect analog phone cord.

Friends,

We’ve just launched LaMetric on Kickstarter - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/smartatoms/lametric-customizable-smart-ticker-for-life-and-bu

I like the idea of message ticker for notifications. In some cases it’s more practical than sms/push messages or voice announcements. It’s not cheap - $129 for “plug-in” and $149 for rechargeable version for KS backers, but affordable.

My concern however is latency. Looks like the only way to send messages is via IFTTT channel, i.e. ST -> IFTTT -> Email -> LaMetric. That can take many seconds if not a couple of minutes. I’d prefer a direct access to the ticker board from the hub.

Also, it would be nice to have standard “display” device capability to allow SmartApps sending messages to display(s) in hardware-independent manner.

@geko,

Besides IFTTT/Email integration, LaMetric will have local API on the device which you can call to output anything you like without any latency.

Just a heads up that LaMetric will be shipping soon. See their Kickstarter update from today:

Also, using coupon code “getlametricsoon” will get you a $30 discount.

Full disclosure: I backed LaMetric on Kickstarter, but otherwise have no affiliation with Smart Atoms. I’m just interested in getting SmartThings and LaMetric working together now that I’m also a new (2 days) SmartThings user.

I really want one of these. But I just can not justify the price.

Just got my “LaMetric Time” yesterday. I’ll try and get some picks soon…

The good news:
Really impressive looking hardware. I was quite surprised at how sharp it looked out of the box. The front, when off, looks just like solid black plastic… when on the LEDs show up nice and bright through the “false front” of the unit. Colors are sharp looking, over all just impressive look and feel.

The built in functions like time, weather, timer, stopwatch, etc. look to work well, and there is some level of developer access right out of the box.

The Android mobile app at least appears to be stable and functional. There’s some grammar issues, but I have a hard time faulting them there as I’m not always very accurate with spelling and grammar myself and I don’t have the excuse of English not being my native language!

The bad news:
There isn’t a “non-developer” way to send custom info to the device yet. The original plan was to be able to email and/or text the device and have it display info based on the content of the email or text. This does not exist yet. I emailed support and they said that instead of going that route, they decided to go with IFTTT integration instead (or at least initially… maybe direct email/text comes later). While I approve of that decision, IFTTT isn’t ready yet either, so still no “non-developer” way to get custom info to the display.

I’m not wild about placement of the power cord. I do applaud their return to the ubiquitous micro-usb power option, but placing in the back mean wall mounting is out. I’d hoped that they would do some sort of channel so the cord could be directed out back, bottom, or side a the users choice, but this didn’t happen.

The ugly… or rather just the unknown cause honestly there is no ugly.
It’s still in it’s infancy so there’s to much unknown to say thumbs up or down quite yet. For me personally it’ll hinge on how fast we can get IFTTT support going and how quickly IFTTT events will trigger. I figure I’ll use switches or sensors as triggers in IFTTT and have the actions being displaying something on LaMetric. How quickly will that loop happen? 1 second? 10 seconds? More? That’s a biggie for me.

I received mine yesterday. The build quality seems verry good. I’m especially impressed with how they got the color LEDs on the left match the white ones while scrolling text across both.

Yeah, hardware-wise… top notch!

Anyone come up with a way to use this in combination with SmartThings yet?

I’ve dappled a bit with trying to create an apps, but honestly, my coding ability is “intermediate” at best and I have no clue what I’m doing.

It seems the easiest way would be to do a push app were I’m supposed to send data to a specific URL. I suspect there’s a way to do that in groovy, but I’m not sure what the right commands are.

I’m also clueless about how to format the data to sent to LaMetric.

They have some forums on LaMetric, but the people there aren’t overtly helpful so far… well, some are, but nobody who seems to have the knowledge that I need. :frowning:

Hey @smartatoms , I like your lametric product and have had fun working with it. But latency on IFTTT is a big issue which for me makes it difficult to use with ST If you could find a way to pick up ST notification directly or had a device type we could feed. from a ST hub or API it would have a big impact. Basically from my side if it could notify me instantly a sensor has detected an event it would make this a core part of a HA system. I’m not a developer so coding is a challenge for me. Is there any chance of you making this happen even if it’s unofficial.

It’s glad to hear you love LaMetric!

This week we are planning to release firmware version which allows developers push data in the local network. It will be very useful for ST x LaMetric direct integration.

Additionally, we have added native support of SmartThings into our backlog. Please publish all your ideas on our community forum and stay tuned for the news.

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ive just bought one, cant wait to get stuck in with programming some integration

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I’d be very interested to see were you get to. There look to be several way that integration could work. IFTTT works but is dogged by it’s slow response time and old messages stay online until overwritten. Good luck

ah well just recieved it today so am just looking through the API documentation, all-though i am a bit disappointed with the simplistic API, wanting to see if they have the ability to properly code for the device

Is there a local API to this thing or it’s also all cloud-based crap?

its cloud based at the moment but I did reach out to them about their API and they stated they were a month or so away from having a new API which includes a local connection method.
So they are essentially looking at changing their API model to make it easier to integrate with HA which from the looks of it they see as a growth area

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Hey, guys! We would like to share some news with you! Our team spent some time developing SmartThings integration with LaMetric and we did it! But… SmartThings currently does not accept new smart apps into their store because of, how they said, improving underlying infrastructure. That is why we decided to publish the source code of LaMetric smart apps to our public GitHub repository.

If you are familiar with developing smart apps for SmartThings you can try LaMetric integration today! All you have to do is to create one device handler and two smart apps (LaMetric (Connect) and LaMetric Notifier). Source code is available here. LaMetric device API reference is available here.

Please note, that device handler and smart apps work with LaMetric firmware v1.6.0. You feedback is greatly appreciated.

UPD: For OAuth2 to work you have to create Notification App. This will give you client_id and client_secret.

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Thanks guys I know a few of us who were using it were frustrated with having to use it via IFTTT. I’ve downloaded it and I’ll be testing it as soon as I get home.

Great product guys its one of the thing visitors comment on when they come to my home.

Just saw your update will try that

thks

UPD that worked thanks you may want to point people to a step by step on creating a Lametric notifier app. I’ve done it before but it will be new to others