Matter - smart home connectivity standard (formerly Project CHIP)

[JDRoberts]

@jkp

The Connectivity Standards Alliance Releases Green Power 1.1.2 for Zigbee-based Energy-harvesting Technology - CSA-IOT

It’s a reasonable upgrade, but I don’t see anything that will affect either smartthings or matter.

A zgp receiver is the device that can receive the tiny messages from the batteryfree ZGP devices and then pass them along. For example, on the Hue platform, the receiver can be either a Hue bulb or a hue smart plug.

As far as I can tell, this upgrade just makes it easier to get those receivers certified by allowing them to use the same testing scripts as they already use for their other Zigbee profile capabilities.

[jkp]

We’re one step closer to a global cybersecurity standard for smart home...

[jkp]

to those who use Meross Products…

Meross Smart Hub MSH4501 user trial program

Participating in Smart Hub MSH450 Trial

[JDRoberts]

Starting to see this on Matter products. They can’t say “works with SmartThings“ without going through the SmartThings certification program, but under the matter agreements as long as their device is certified for matter, at least some companies can say “compatible with smartthings. “

[mocelet]

Talking about new products, the Aqara P2 Matter over Thread is available to buy.

33.99€ in Amazon Spain, I hope they forgot the launch discount.

They announce 2 years battery life with the double CR2450 battery, that’s less than half of the Zigbee P1 motion sensor with the same batteries that sells for 23€. Still, cheaper than the Eve motion sensor, although Eve’s updates the firmware through SmartThings and uses AAA batteries instead.

[Automated_House (Jimmy)]

@JDRoberts

but under the matter agreements as long as their device is certified for matter, they can say “compatible with smartthings. “

hmmm, I don’t think they’re allowed to say that either and use that logo/badge. SmartThings used to have two cert levels: Compatible with SmartThings (CST) and Works With SmartThings (WWST). Staff on here have confirmed that CST is no more. It either WWST or nothing.

[JDRoberts]

@Automated_House

@JDRoberts

but under the matter agreements as long as their device is certified for matter, they can say “compatible with smartthings. “

hmmm, I don’t think they’re allowed to say that either and use that logo/badge. SmartThings used to have two cert levels: Compatible with SmartThings (CST) and Works With SmartThings (WWST). Staff on here have confirmed that CST is no more. It either WWST or nothing.

I know they said that at one point, but the image I posted is a brand new one from Meross that just went up yesterday, and I’m seeing it on some other new marketing from existing partners.

It may be limited to specific companies, I’m not sure. But it’s definitely happening.

[JDRoberts]

Shane Whatley does one of his usual excellent videos comparing the new aqara matter over thread motion sensor head to head with the previous Zigbee version. He specifically mentions some of the issues he had getting it to work with SmartThings.

NEW Aqara Motion & Light Sensor (with Matter & Thread)!

[mocelet]

The issue apparently is that he had more luck pairing it for first time with SmartThings instead of sharing it from Apple Home.

Interesting facts: default sensitivity is 5 meters and 30 seconds cooldown time and that can’t be changed for now.

Maybe when it gets cheaper I’ll get one, although I don’t like coin batteries.

I’m currently using Tapo Matter sensors (with their own mini H100 hub) and they’ve been incredibly reliable. No light sensor though. Also the IKEA Vallhorn, has some false positives from time to time but doesn’t matter for the price and the use case.

[jkp]

SwitchBot’s robot vacuums now work with Matter, but the platforms need to...

SwitchBot Tabletop Fan?

On April 8, 2024, SwitchBot announced that the fan does have on/off capability through their matter integration, but no other controls yet. Still waiting to hear what features are available through the official cloud cloud integration with SmartThings.

[JDRoberts]

Matter-SmartHome (available in German, French, or English) has an interesting interview with Shelly executives on what their Matter strategy will be going forward. They are particularly concerned about the lack of support for energy monitoring, which is a popular feature with their customer base.

Why Shelly relies on a Matter Bridge

also, don’t read too much into the mention of zwave with regard to a matter bridge. I think that’s just an assumption on the article writer’s part. For all the reasons we’ve discussed before, it is more complicated to build a matter bridge for zwave then for Bluetooth or Zigbee, so I doubt if we’d see that in the first pass of a Shelly Matter bridge.

[jkp]

More Meross news on upcoming Matter Presence Sensor…

Brand New Meross Matter-Compatible Sensor Product, Recruiting Beta Testers at the end of this month.

Get ready for the arrival of our new Matter-compatible sensor, the Presence Sensor! This exciting addition will be announced at the end of the month, so stay tuned for more details on how to participate as Beta Testers.

[JDRoberts]

This is interesting.

Amazon has been gradually increasing the number of specific device models that could be used as triggers in their routines.

Originally, it was only some sensors, and then they added locks and some doorbells.

Very noticeably, they did not include switches or plugs, With some speculation that this might’ve been because many of the devices that they sell do not report a manual change in state to Alexa so they may just not have wanted the consumer support headaches of trying to explain why one light switch worked in a routine and another didn’t.

Anyway, Last December, they added pretty much anything connected to a Hue bridge to the available triggers for an Alexa routine, including the hue plug and friends of Hue light switches. And most of the buttons and remotes that could be connected to the Hue Bridge.

Amazon basic plugs also turned up sometime in the last year or so.

And now there are a bunch of new potential trigger candidates. Lots of ring devices, including the path lighting.

And… at least some matter Smart plugs, including the Tapo matter over wifi P125M models.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BXMNJDW3/

At our house, this enabled us to create some additional proxy options for bringing non-matter devices into the Apple home app or SmartThings. For example, we have an automatic door opener which is controlled by BroadLink and appears as a light switch in Alexa. It does not support matter at this time.

To bring it into Apple Home, we are now using a Tapo Matter smart plug as a proxy.

The plug can be turned on or off in Apple home. And we can now use an Alexa routine as an intermediary, so when that plug turns on, an Alexa routine opens the door. This also lets me open the door with my Apple Watch.

The same method could be used to bring the door opener into SmartThings.

My guess is that matter devices update state, so Amazon now feels comfortable using them as triggers.

I don’t have any matter light switches: if someone does and also uses Alexa routines, could you check and see if that switch is now available as an Alexa routine trigger?

This would be another example of a useful feature from a matter integration.

[jkp]

Yale’s inexpensive new retrofit lock will work with Matter-over-Thread

[h0ckeysk8er (Bruce Pinsky)]

@JDRoberts

I don’t have any matter light switches: if someone does and also uses Alexa routines, could you check and see if that switch is now available as an Alexa routine trigger?

My Eve Energy and Tapo Matter outlets do not show up as events/triggers for Alexa routines.

My Leviton Matter switches and dimmers do show up as events/triggers for Alexa routines.

[JDRoberts]

@h0ckeysk8er

My Eve Energy and Tapo Matter outlets do not show up as events/triggers for Alexa routines.

Interesting.

I don’t have an Eve energy, but my Tapo 125M models definitely show up as Alexa routine trigger candidates: we’re using them on a daily basis.

[h0ckeysk8er (Bruce Pinsky)]

@JDRoberts

Interesting.

I don’t have an Eve energy, but my Tapo 125M models definitely show up as Alexa routine trigger candidates: we’re using them on a daily basis.

Yeah, that is strange. The Tapo shows up to control, but doesn’t show up as a trigger.

Control

Trigger

[Zmarc (Marc)]

Interesting article on Verge about 2.4GHz; Thread, Zigbee are mentioned, of course.

Nothing new, but the comments section is fun to read.

How do you solve a problem like 2.4GHz Wi-Fi?

[JDRoberts]

Unfortunately, One of the best informed “industry watcher“ blogs on matter, matter-SmartHome.de, has been told by the CSA that their name is a trademark violation.

matter-smarthome.de says goodbye
.
An exciting and successful project is coming to an end. I have been following the development of the Matter smart home standard in this space since May 2021. News, interviews and background reports have appeared on matter-smarthome.de. They answered questions and highlighted the advantages of the standard, but also showed where there was room for improvement. The independent reporting made the website a popular source of information. At peak times, more than 105,000 visitors per month came by to find out more or search for available products in the device overview.
.
After three years, in April 2024, the CSA (link) as the lead organization of the Matter standard surprisingly decided to no longer tolerate the use of the term Matter in the domain name and title of my website. As I do not have the time or financial resources to make this voluntary project a success again under a new name, I am taking it offline. Considering the many high-reach sites that now report on Matter, my effort required for a relaunch would be too great.

[Automated_House (Jimmy)]

Well that’s annoying…