Sometimes the automatic join doesn’t work because a particular model needs a custom edge driver. Or the device manufacturer may tell you that using a custom edge driver will give you more features.
All custom edge drivers for zwave and zigbee devices are installed in the same way.
- follow the invitation link to the channel page
- select the edge driver that you want to download
- subscribe. It will be automatically downloaded to your hub. This can take several hours but usually it happens almost right away.
- open the Smartthings app on your mobile device, go to the device that you want to have use the new driver, and click on the little gear icon to open its details page
- choose the “driver“ option if it is there. (If it is not there, the “fingerprint” for your device might not be included in that driver. In that case, you have to talk to the author to get your fingerprint included.)
- now you should see a list of the available edge drivers that are already on your hub that match this device’s fingerprint. Choose the one you want to use. And that’s all there is to it.
Caution: in some cases, changing from one driver to another might cause your existing routines that use that device to be paused or even deleted. So you have to be prepared to rebuild them, although usually you don’t have to. Also, some of the edge Drivers will reset the parameter variables. That can add some additional unpredictability. You should always be able to rebuild what you had, but every once in a while it turns out to be harder than expected. It’s a good idea to read the author’s thread in this forum before changing to a new driver to see if any of these quirks apply.
You will find these instructions in more detail plus pretty much everything you could ever want to know about edge Drivers in the community FAQ:
FAQ: I have no idea what Edge is. Is that a new developer tool? (2022)
this method will not work for LAN devices. See the FAQ for more details on those.