Getting Status of Alexa-connected 3rd-Party HA Devices Over to SmartThings?

SmartApps & Automations Automation Ideas
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[NOTE: In lieu of a better grasp of established terminology,
in this thread…
‘1st-Party’ = my SmartThings system.
‘2nd-Party’ = my Amazon Alexa system.
‘3rd-Party’ = other home automation gear that doesn’t work directly with SmartThings, but which I have configured in Alexa, and get to it from SmartThings that way.
e.g. Monster Smart Color LED Light Strips, Merkury Light Bulbs, etc]

Like many of you, I am using my Amazon Alexa system as a bridge to enable my SmartThings system to interact with certain brands/models of home automation gadgets that don’t have their own native SmartThings integration but do work with Alexa (I know I could probably do some of this with my Google Home system acting as the ‘bridge’ as well, but I just haven’t done much with that system yet).

I have many such automations configured in webCoRE, etc.

First, here are some of the things I CAN do (then I’ll tell you what I can’t do)…

  1. I can have basically almost anything in SmartThings trigger almost anything in Alexa when the automation begins on the SmartThings side. This is great!

  2. I can touch almost anything in SmartThings from Alexa when the automation starts on the Alexa side AND when that automation only begins with Alexa directly doing something with a ‘thing’ in SmartThings.

Here is what I CAN’T do…

Alexa does NOT offer the ability to begin an automation (Routine) on the Alexa side by monitoring for and reacting to something happening to/with an item in one of the ‘3rd-Party’ systems (e.g. Monster Smart).

When I create an automation in Alexa, since I can’t start it by using a monitored activity from one of my ‘3rd-Party’ gadgets (e.g. Let’s say, “When THIS MONSTER LIGHT STRIP TURNS OFF”) as the impetus for starting the automation, there appears to be no way of getting the status of any of the gadgets in these ‘3rd-Party’ systems sent over to SmartThings.

Here’s where/when this matters…
If I happen to interact directly with a device in one of my Alexa-connected ‘3rd-Party’ systems (e.g. via that 3rd-Party system’s Android app on my phone or whatever), it does what I want within that system, but it doesn’t tell SmartThings about it, and Alexa can’t be triggered by it. So, I can’t have Alexa send that status over to SmartThings either.

Of course, it’s not a big deal, and I know that the recommended behavior is ‘Don’t do that’. lol :slight_smile: Still…

TL;DR:
Have any of you found a way of getting the status of devices in your Alexa-connected ‘3rd-Party’ systems over to SmartThings?

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It’s not that the recommended behavior is “don’t do that” it’s that unless the third-party system provides the status information to Echo, which many of them do not, there’s no way for smartthings to get to it either. :disappointed_relieved:

This is reportedly precisely why echo routines (not smartthings routines) cannot be triggered by a switch but only by a sensor. Most of the switches don’t tell echo when they change state.

So the first thing you would need to do is contact the manufacturer of the third-party device and ask them if they are reporting the change in state to echo or to Ifttt. Or if they have an open API.

Absent that, the only thing you can do is look for a physical event that you can capture. For example, if it’s a light coming on, can a lux sensor capture that? If it’s an appliance coming on, can a vibration sensor capture it? And so on.

But unless the third-party device provides the information in the first place, there’s no protocol integration we can create on the SmartThings side. :sunglasses:

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Thanks again, JD. :slight_smile:
I figured this was the case, but I just wanted to check; just in case anybody knew of any technomagic I was unaware of. lol

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For some devices, if you just want to know if they are on or off, you could just use the SmartThings wifi plug (~$16) that has power meter capability. You could e.g., use Webcore to monitor power usage and trigger actions based on that.
I use this method to know when the TV (that also connects to Echo) is turned on and trigger actions based on that.

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For devices that proactively report or have retrievable status, it is theoretically possible to setup a program to poll alexa for the current state, though it would require using undocumented apis (and running on something external like rpi that can relay the data to smartthings). I have not heard of anyone that has done this yet.

(in the Alexa app, you can view device details and hold the “connected via” to get advanced info that includes details on the registered alexa capabilities of the device)

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Although it may not look like it at first, that’s the same idea as using a lux sensor or vibration sensor.

Turning on the third-party device causes a measurable physical change in the environment, in this case the power draw. So you take another device which is able to recognize that physical change and that is capable of reporting the event to smartthings. Thus bridging the two systems, not through protocol, but through the detection of physical events. :sunglasses: :racing_car:

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