Genie Aladdin garage door

Nevermind, spliced into the wall button and it works beautifully. Now I can open the garage door with Alexa as well, and can have it open/close when I come home/leave and automatically at night!

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Just an fyi…i was on te phone with genie & the rep said that they are working on a software update to make it comparable with smartthings & alexa. Most of yhe newer modes should upgrade with no problem. For homekit people may need to purchase a new model. Software upgrafe should be for free. Time will tell if this is true or false.

This is interesting because I emailed them like a month ago and they said they didn’t have any plans to support SmartThings or IFTTT. Maybe they changed their plans since Iris is shutting down.

I have been talking to them quite a few times last year

Let’s just keep our fingers crossed that they do it

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For those of you like me who are tired of waiting on Genie to actually create integration with SmartThings or IFTTT, I have worked out a way to access the Aladdin Connect REST API and use WebCore to open\close my garage doors. I’ll do my best to explain, but can answer any questions you might have because it is most certainly not a straightforward process.

Prerequisites:

  1. If you don’t already have Postman, you will need to download it here: https://www.getpostman.com/downloads

  2. If you aren’t using WebCore, you will need to for my instructions to work and for many other reasons; it’s a necessity for any custom automations. It takes a few steps, but you can get started here:
    https://wiki.webcore.co/webCoRE#Installing_webCoRE

Aladdin REST API integration with WebCore:

  1. Do everything in this tutorial. The most important for controls is the last step, Set Door State, but you have to go through all the steps to get there: https://documenter.getpostman.com/view/5856894/RzZAjHxV#cfb1b456-2c2d-42a5-9b73-6053d87a3feb

  2. For me, all I wanted out of this integration at the moment is to have my respective garage doors open when either my wife or I arrive at home using phone presence (if this works well I’ll get presence sensors for each vehicle). So I created a WebCore Piston which fires on our phone presence sensors and executes the open command on the respective garage door upon arrival using the following settings which will be explained in further detail:

  1. I created local variables in WebCoRE for the AladdinURL and DoubleGarageOpen using values from the SetDoorState segment of Postman. If you’re not familiar with local variables, you can create them by clicking the X^2 button at the top left of the piston editor screen in WebCore. Neither of these are required to be variables so you can actually enter them into the respective field as values instead of variables. Regardless, here is how I got them
  • The URL is: https://genie.m2.exosite.com/onep:v1/rpc/process

  • The Request body l copied from Postman after testing the open\close functionality worked. Here is the Postman screenshot, but it is VERY IMPORTANT to note that you will need to escape every { and } character in WebCore by changing them to \{ and \} otherwise WebCore can’t process the string correctly. Here is a screenshot of the Postman body used to test the open\close functionality. As noted in the Postman tutorial desired_status of 0 is closed, desired status of 1 is open :

  • The Authorization Header can be copied directly from Postman by clicking on the Code link and selecting the data from Application Header to Authorization value. Here is the formatting:

AppVersion: 2.10.1
BundleName: com.geniecompany.AladdinConnect
User-Agent: Aladdin Connect Android v2.10.21’
BuildVersion: 131
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer “YourBearerToken”

  • If you have more than one garage door, dps1 is garage door 1, dps2 is garage door 2 and dps3 is garage door 3. Only 3 are supported on any one Aladdin Connect hub. Since I have 2 garage doors I had to use a different Request body for each door. dps1 and dps2 being the only differences.
  1. Here is a screenshot of the WebCore Piston I created for reference with MyCik, MyClientId, and MyEmail address needing to be replaced by your entries from Postman:

A few things of note is that there is no need to validate the current status of the door since the Aladdin REST API already knows the current state and isn’t going to issue an open command on a currently open door. Also, if you are already using Aladdin Connect you really should be taking advantage of its timeout tools to close an open door within a certain amount of time.

Anyway, I hope this helps someone out there. I was quite excited that was able to get it to work for my needs since I have been looking for it for a long time. Also since I am not a developer by any means, I think a seasoned developer could take my rudimentary workaround and make a device handler that would provide much more functionality.

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You guys!!

It looks like official support is coming in May!!

" Compatibility with Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa, and IFTTT coming May 2019"

https://www.geniecompany.com/aladdinconnect/default.aspx

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I know they told me the same going back but where is it on thier website?

The day has finally come the Alexa skill is live :smiley:

Where? Dont see it.

Ok found the skill. Has anyone been able to.get it to appear in smartthings?

Can I ask where you found the skill? Also did you ever manage to get it to show up in smart things? :smiley:

I got the Aladdin connect going with Google Assistant. It’s not a thing perse. The setup is only through the Google Assistant app under explore. Much like setting up Harmony integration. As such, there is no device or for listed in the smart devices section of the Google home app. It works although limited. You can get door state and issue open or close commands. However, it’s wonky sometimes.

Love it, great idea to splice in. When a smart garage door is stupid!

Great write up! I only use the garage open command when i arrive, since if there garage door closes when I’m not there and the safety beam fails, it could crush a child or a bike or something ;). But seriously, thank you. Already use postman, webcore, node.js etc so quick setup!

BTW I had to use

AppVersion:2.10.1 BundleName:com.geniecompany.AladdinConnect
User-Agent:Aladdin Connect Android v2.10.1’ BuildVersion:131
Authorization:Token: asdlfjas;ldfkja;sldfj;alsdkfjasfasdfasdfasdf

instead of
Authorization: Bearera;lsdkfja;sldkfjasd;lfkj,

I’m sure it was just a typo :Bearer vs Bearer,

Anyways, thanks again. I’m using my phone as a presence sensor with a large radius to give it time to open up, since it starts with the beeping and flashing lights on the GDC.

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Reviving this old thread as I’m hoping to add my Genie opener to Smartthings for control via the app and preferably via ActionTiles.

I’ve got access to the door via Postman, is there a way to control the door manually via Smartthings? (instead of webcore pistons)

I was thinking I could add a Virtual Switch to map to garage door status (open = on) and then control the door via on / off (open/close) API calls, but i’m not sure how best to accomplish this?

thanks!

There is a new garage door opener for 49.99. I think it’s called Thailand. Fully compatible with the new smartthings app & with genie garage door. I highly recommend you look into that. I’m going to look to make that jump soon. The genie integration with alexa is horrible & it is my belief it will never fully integrate with ST.

Thanks - unfortunately I was a little rushed as the old opener had completely locked up, so I had to settle with what Home Depot had available. I don’t care about alexa integration, so i wasn’t worried about the poor reviews there, but was thinking it would be more straightforward to make API calls out of ST.

Reading a little further, it looks like I’ll be able to utilize a virtual button Device Type Handler to launch the webcore piston to open or close the door. I’m not sure if this is the best approach, but i’m hopeful i’ll be able to add this basic functionality without additional hardware.

I dont use webcore so that’s why I wasn’t looking into that solution.

Just thought I’d follow up with what I’ve got working for anyone interested who finds this thread in the future.

I’ve created a virtual switch in ST to activate the webcore piston.
When the piston fires, I use the API calls to check the current status of the door.
Parse the reply to validate door state open or closed.
Then send the proper API call to open or close the door based on the status.
I wait for 15 seconds, then turn off the virtual switch.

I’ve added the virtual button to my ActionTiles tablet so I can open/close the door. The “ON” state provides feedback that the button has been pressed and the action is in progress.

Thanks Ryan for the overview!