Happy to tell. As we’ve said in a number of previous posts, we’re trying to support a dual app architecture which needs to evolve. Two main reasons it needs to change: syncing everything between two distinct architectures results in excessive failure points (talking to those of you who see a delay in some devices showing up in the new app or a new location being created) and it diverts development resources, which leads to slow fixes and feature launches.
This is why we’re asking you all to work with us and transition to the new app. I understand that’s a tough ask for our users who have invested a lot in very customized setups. But we need your help in making this happen.
A lot have asked about why we’re moving forward without being “at parity”. The answer is that we are at parity for the vast majority of our users and we have tested for that extensively. We’re trying to provide the best experience possible to the largest number of users, but given how much customization our platform allows, that means there are going to be edge cases. Here’s an interesting example: can anybody guess how many unique SmartApps are only installed in a single (1) location? 92% of them. What percent of total locations with installed Smartapps do those locations represent? 0.2%. And of total users? Roughly 0.05%. The point being, while we really want to support every single use case (because many of them are really cool and add a lot of value to you all), we can’t do that.
So the overall message I want to get across is that we didn’t bury our heads in the sand on this process and we understand what everyone is going through right now - we’re all users as well. But the faster we can sunset Classic, the faster we can resolve a number of issues and give everyone an even better experience with SmartThings. It’s going to be a different experience for sure, but it will definitely be better.