Hi everyone! I recently bought a house and am very excited to set up my SmartThings v2 hub! I love technology and messing around with “gadgets”. I’m new to home automation. I learned about SmartThings when I was looking into DIY home automation/security systems. Although I’ve had my v2 hub for about 2 weeks now, I’m FINALLY getting internet installed at my house today, so I can’t wait to get home today to set everything up!
I’m going to start out with a few switches and then hopefully expand to more sensors are such. .
I’m definitely looking forward to learning from and chatting with everyone here!
I’m just getting started. Yesterday I hooked up my Hub v2, GE dimmer switch, and a GE switch to start controlling some lights. I’m getting a Nest thermostat for Christmas that I’m thankful for the community to incorporate into the ST system.
I can certainly see that this is going to become an expensive hobby for me. My wife is scared.
I’ve spent hours reading the community boards this past week waiting for my items to be delivered. I’m hoping that all of the research will help me avoid some of headaches that you all have learned from.
I’m Kore Breach (aka “Bob”). I just started into my long-desired home automation project with the purchase of a SmartThings v2 hub, two GE lightbulbs, and an Amazon Echo. This “proof of concept” tiny setup has worked out really well. My wife is even using the Echo to turn on and off the two bulbs. I call that a success.
I wanted to know if there is a good guide for SmartThings for us newbies that someone could link to. I don’t have a problem gathering information from hundreds of forum posts and searching the internet, but I would love to have some sort of document that would jump-start my knowledge of some things. Kind of like a “SmartThings 101 Handbook”.
Already posted on another thread, but still a newbie. UK based, work in IT and have experience of various programming languages so looking to get involved.
Got the starter kit, got a couple of Wemo LED bulbs working with it (don’t like the colour temperature, so might investigate alternatives - running out of ports on my router though, so probably not Philips Hue). Also reading up on thermostat options.
It’s a shame there doesn’t seem to be a simple REST api to talk to the local hub and control devices that way though - I have a home server used for various other things, and would like to schedule tasks from that.
HI I’m A very disappointed Smartthings customer. Starting the new year out with ST failing to operate simple task and an App that constantly reports errors. New day new issues.
I’m an electrical engineer and love to tinker with electronics. Go figure! We built a new home, some of the rooms were either too hot or too cold so I thought I had an original idea about making smart vents, at the time it was 2014 and I was upset that someone already had this invention. I did a lot of research and decided that i still wanted to make my own. I started playing with the ESP8266 WIFI chip and was having fun getting it to work. (playing with Arduino and raspberry pi) I would get frustrated and then push everything aside. I would come back to it (slowly, maybe every 3 months) Well 4 years later I was doing more research and came upon the KEEN smart vents. Found that people were using the SmartThings hub and using the motion sensors as temperature sensors. That started it all! I’m addicted! I got a bunch of smart vents, motions sensors to start. Then it was smart light bulbs and switch’s, then it was the water leak sensors and an automatic water shutoff. Great stuff!! The smart vents and leak sensors were a great investment to protect my home. I am now trying to prepare for home security and buying cameras, window sensors etc. Having problems with the presence sensor. Cat keeps setting off the security. So I have challenges ahead of me but that’s what so fun about it. Its great to be part of a community also. I hope to add to the Community someday once I am done the projects I have set in motion. To anyone first starting: Step#1. Setup a budget and a plan. Step#2. Stay off amazon until to do step 1. I racked up a nice credit card bill. I’m done. See yas around.
Welcome to the community! Some of us lost interest. But it’s the best community ever. Follow @JDRoberts@tgauchat and the other ever helpful old timers.
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bamarayne
(Jason "The Enabler" as deemed so by @Smart)
55
Welcome to the Addiction!
There’s a lot of us old timers around and there are a whole lot of people just lurking… but look around, read a lot, and get plenty of ideas. There are a lot of daily posts and lots of things going on.
Welcome! There used to be a full-time moderator assigned to this community and they would encourage people to post in the welcome thread. But that person left the company a couple years ago and they now handle the mod duties differently by rotating them among a bunch of different staffers who have other jobs as well, so this thread just hasn’t been used much since then.
Meanwhile, a lot of things have changed. Since you have a technical background, I recommend starting with the technical welcome letter in the community – created wiki.
After that, go to the quick browse lists in the wiki, look down at the bottom of that page for the “project reports” section, and choose the “get started” list. You should find a lot of helpful things there.
Thanks April for starting this thread. My name is Brian and I live in Charlotte NC, USA. I am a retired Vietnam Vet if anyone is old enough to remember those days. Three years ago my home was burglarized so I decided I needed some home security. After a lot of research I purchased a professional security system with 24/7 monitoring, but the camera selections at that time were limited with this system, so after a lot of research I purchased An Arlo camera system. I still needed more sensors that my security system either did not offer, or they were too expensive. In my research I came across ST reviews and decided ST was what I was exactly what I was looking for and I was happy to find that the Arlo cameras were officially recognized.
I have about 30 devices hooked up to ST (multipurpose sensors, motion sensors, water leak sensors, Cree lights and of course, my Arlo cameras. Been in electronics, (hardware and software development), since my Army days.
My system has been quite reliable over the past three years, (except for a few hiccups and outages).
Kudos out to JDRoberts who helped me many times understand the system and get me on the right track.
We built a new home, some of the rooms were either too hot or too cold so I thought I had an original idea about making smart vents, at the time it was 2014 and I was upset that someone already had this invention. I did a lot of research and decided that i still wanted to make my own. I started playing with the ESP8266 WIFI chip and was having fun getting it to work. (playing with Arduino and raspberry pi) I would get frustrated and then push everything aside. I would come back to it (slowly, maybe every 3 months) Well 4 years later I was doing more research and came upon the KEEN smart vents. Found that people were using the SmartThings hub and using the motion sensors as temperature sensors. That started it all! I’m addicted! I got a bunch of smart vents, motions sensors to start. Then it was smart light bulbs and switch’s, then it was the water leak sensors and an automatic water shutoff. Great stuff!! The smart vents and leak sensors were a great investment to protect my home. I am now trying to prepare for home security and buying cameras, window sensors etc. Having problems with the presence sensor. Cat keeps setting off the security. So I have challenges ahead of me but that’s what so fun about it. Its great to be part of a community also. I hope to add to the Community someday once I am done the projects I have set in motion. To anyone first starting: Step#1. Setup a budget and a plan. Step#2. Stay off amazon until to do step 1. I racked up a nice credit card bill. 
I’m done. See yas around.
There used to be a full-time moderator assigned to this community and they would encourage people to post in the welcome thread. But that person left the company a couple years ago and they now handle the mod duties differently by rotating them among a bunch of different staffers who have other jobs as well, so this thread just hasn’t been used much since then.
