Cree to offer Zigbee LED smart bulb

Eric,

I’m using the Joshua Gray code that was fixed for dimming and I don’t see those in my device events.

I main problem I have with the code is that the on/off state doesn’t seem to update e.g. if I manually change the bulb state by toggling the physical switch, it gets out of sync with what ST thinks the state is.

I am having the same problem. The bulb will work with the app control but it does not update properly when I turn the light on or off at the switch

@lkreeger and @jma9 this is a general issue with smart bulbs. Once turned off at the switch, it can’t communicate its status with the hub. In the last device type I posted based on the GE Link, we attempt to capture the message when a bulb is first turned back on at the switch, but it’s inconsistent in practice and we also lean on Polling to update the bulb status every minute. It still can’t tell us if the bulb is physically switched off because there is no communication.

You could write code to check for status and assume it’s off if you don’t receive a reply within a certain timeframe; but it’s complex to code and it could lead to false “off” messages if the bulb/hub communication isn’t great.

I think knowing the bulb is on after it is manually turned on by a physical power toggle is the most important thing for me at the moment. With that working, then the switch SmartApp feature to turn off a bulb after a period of time should start working when manually turning it on (I hope). I haven’t tried out your code yet, but I will. Has anyone else tried it yet?

OK, I just tried out Scott’s code based on the GE Link. It works to turn the lights on/off and dim. The only improvement I see with regard to updating the status after manually turning the bulb on is that when I hit the refresh button, the status actually refreshes properly. Unfortunately, the status doesn’t seem to update on its own, but maybe I just haven’t waited long enough for a poll to happen?

Factory reset my bulb 3 times last evening and attempted to join them and using the latest posted code. With the code for the device type in first when i search for the bulb it picks it up right but the controls still do not function for on/off or dimming. Reset the bulb again - added it to my hue hub and it works fine with on/off and dimming from the hue app and using the bulb via smarthings through the hue hub. Definitely odd.

I have the exact same issue, Josh, ST finds the bulb just fine, but can’t control it.

What I DID notice was that, in using the code posted by Scott, ST seems to be receiving information from the lamp, just not transmitting. As in, I will turn the lamp off from the app then refresh, and ST then will report that the lamp is on.

I’ve tried the same thing with the IDE simulator to no avail.

This is not how ZLL end devices are supposed to work, but Connectedly say Cree bulbs have a “connection code” printed on the base of each bulb and you have to enter that as the serial number for a manual device add to get the Hue bridge to recognize a Cree bulb. Just in case that helps anyone with any other type of connection with an “unknown device” detection error, here are their instructions:

If you’re polling every bulb every minute aren’t you adding a huge amount of traffic to the mesh? Why can’t you just poll immediately after an event request for a brief period of time? Or is that what you meant?

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Is it too soon to say if there is any advantage with these over the GE Link bulbs? GigaOM says that they are loud when dimmed?

I started with Joshua’s code. It worked without dimming.
Now, this code works with dimming. Seems like it’s ready for more testing.
I just picked up one of these bulbs this evening. It took (only) an hour to find the code for a custom device type in this community, and implement an on/off and dimming Cree bulb.

I am not a programmer, but I can surely copy and paste.
Nice work guys/ gals

Frequent polling is not a great solution by any means. As you said it adds traffic to the zigbee mesh, and it also adds traffic to the ST cloud. I have decided not to use polling for those reasons. Unfortunately the primary use of polling - to update when physical power is switched - has no “event request” to trigger it; so our only option is frequent polling if we want that functionality. At the end of the day, they’re all mediocre solutions, and the true fix all is to never power cycle these bulbs manually. They seem to work much better if they’re always powered on.

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Used this code. Works well. Thanks. Look forward to the Smartthings approved code.

Yup. Yup.
This process works fine.
I seem to have found 1 bulb that doesn’t connect.
1 connected fine.
2nd one wouldn’t.
Used the on off 2, on off 2, on off 2, on blink, off, start connection waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting.
Tried another bulb and it worked 1st time with above sequence.
Make sure to create device type from code first with STicks18 code.

An alternative to interval polling is some variation of a smart switch, like the Hue Tap, as we’ve been discussing in the Hue topic:

Seeing how similar these bulbs are in price and function to the GE Link bulbs, I wouldn’t be surprised if the same manufacturer made the logic boards for both. Perhaps GE and Cree simply attach their LEDs to them.

I initially had the same thoughts, as the reset procedure is the same for both. But they both have different endpoints. Maybe that’s because one is LightLink and the other is not?

Make sure you have the most recent zigbee firmware. I had the same problem. Once I updated the zigbee firmware to 1.5.4 it started to work. Email ST support and they will take care of it, of needed.

Thanks so much, @jma9, that did the trick! Emailed support and they had my hub updated in under an hour. Now I’m running just fine on the code posted by Scott.

Thanks @jma9 and @Blake . The updated firmware did it for me too.