My new Ecobee Device (disconnection issues are resolved)

Devices & Integrations Connected Things
1

To whom it may concern (i.e., My ecobee device users):

Just to let you know, there has been some issues with MyEcobeeDevice since some API changes at ecobee (and there were some weird behavior at ST too), so the code that you’re using will not work in the long term.

Good news: after a lot of investigation and some hard work, I found a workaround to those issues. However, the new code will no longer be available at github (as my code is not open source), please take note of the following statement:

http://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=My_Ecobee_Device#Notes_to_MyEcobee_Device_Users_-_Contribution_is_now_required

For more details, see below:

http://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=Category:Unpublished_SmartApps
Regards.

Thank you for your kind support !!

EDIT: A new look & Feel is coming, please refer to the following thread:

A new version is upcoming:

With my smartapps, you can do the following:

1) Setting your thermostat to Away or Home based on ST hello modes

See the ecobeeChangeMode smartapp.

2) Resuming your program/climate when you’re back home

See the ecobeeResumeProg smartapp.

3) Setting your thermostat to vacation mode

See the ecobeeManageVacation smartapp.

4) Creating/updating your ecobee climates/schedules

See the ecobeeManageClimate smartapp.

5) Setting your ecobee climate/program at a given time

See the ecobeeSetClimate smartapp.

6) Monitoring and setting your indoor humidity level based on outdoor temperature

See the MonitorAndSetEcobeeHumidity smartapp.

7) Monitoring and setting your setpoints based on any ST connected indoor temp/motion sensors (similar to ecobee3’s follow me feature) & outdoor temperature

See the MonitorAndSetEcobeeTemp smartapp.

8) Exposing your ecobee3’s remote sensors to SmartThings for HA scenarios

See the ecobee3RemoteSensorInit smartapp.

9) Controlling your smart vents based on your indoor temp/motion sensors in conjunction with your thermostat’s programs & setpoints

See the ecobeeSetZoneWithSchedule smartapp

10) Controlling your minimum fan time per hour during a climate/schedule run

See the ecobeeSetFanMinOnTime smartapp

11) Generating some ecobee HVAC stats on a daily basis and sending them to groveStreams for data analytics

See the following smartapps: ecobeeGenerateStats & groveStreams smartapps

12) Turning off your thermostat(s) when Window or Door contacts are open and restoring your thermostat mode when they are closed

See the WindowOrDoorOpen! smartapp.

13) And many more features, you may want to consult the wiki for more details

http://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=My_Ecobee_Device

http://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=Category:Unpublished_SmartApps

- MyEcobee device’s code is now fully functional and available now at my store:

- All my smartapps (which only work with MyEcobee device and represent several hundreds of hours of development work and testing) are either available for free at my github:

or

for a modest contribution at my store.

Please contact me at services@maisonsecomatiq.com for any issues/questions related to MyEcobee device.

6 Likes
2

@yvesracine as previously stated, I’d be perfectly fine with making a contribution once your app works. My concern here, obviously, is that for a long time your setup seems to have worked fine while some others, including myself, were still experiencing problems. Let’s move past the word “donation” for now. Your app now a paid app. And that’s fine. I have two questions though;

  1. How much? EDIT: Just saw the link. $15
  2. I’ve had every intention of donating to you once your app consistently worked for me for more than a week. What guarantee do I have that this will work with me paying for the app before testing it?

Thanks man. As always I appreciate all the work you put into this.

Jarett

1 Like
3

Hi @jarettp,:

  1. You’ll find all the contribution details here

http://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=My_Ecobee_Device#Notes_to_MyEcobee_Device_Users_-_Contribution_is_now_required

  1. Sorry, but I need to receive the paypal donation first. I believe that my words are your guarantee.

This is out of respect for more than 50 donators who will receive the new code very soon.

If you look at the amount of of code involved (more than 15K lines of code for the ecobee device handler and related smartapps) that I’ve developed and tested (to the best of my setup), and all the changes that have happened on the ST (which is not reputed to be stable) and ecobee sides (see below), then you may expect some issues from time to time.

Just as a reminder, there were some authentication changes at ecobee (that I could not control) on December 1st:

https://www.ecobee.com/home/developer/api/documentation/v1/change-log.shtml

If you are not willing to trust me, then you’ll hear from my beta users pretty soon…:grinning:

Regards.

4

Fair enough. Just donated. I look forward to getting the link for your new code!

5

Will this code work for Ecobee Smart si as well? Mine keeps getting disconnected and ST support says they are working on fixing it.

6

I’m in too… Donation sent as well. Working around the changes must have been mind numbing!

7

Sorry, I’m not paying to bata test. Let me know when the released version is stable. I already spent a lot of time beta testing the previous versions.

2 Likes
8

Hi,

My custom ecobee device is compatible with all ecobee models (ecobee3, smart-SI, smart, EMS).

I can tell you that my device is more responsive than the ST stock device. However, like stated before, my code will not run properly if there are ST or ecobee (servers or APIs) outages…

I’m actually beta testing with some users and I can tell you that the ST platform is far from being deterministic…So, even if I put some all the defensive mechanisms you can imagine, availability is not guaranteed.

Regards.

9

Well Bob,

If you own anything from Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, or Google, then you already pay to beta test!! lol 8)

10

Donated. Thanks for your hard work

11

Just donated.

How do you plan to distribute the code? Is it just going to be a link to google drive folder or something? Why not just make a private Github repo so that contributors can still report issues or submit pull requests?

12

Hi,

I’m actually testing the code with some beta users.

It needs some fine tuning before I release it to the general public.

If you contribute as specified in the ST community wiki, then your email address will be put
on the upgrade list.

I will then send you a temporary google drive link (to folder) as soon as the code is complete. It should not take
more than a couple of days (if everything runs smoothly).

P.S. I might create a private github later (when I have some time)…

Regards.

13

Cool. Looking forward to it.

As a software software engineer, I definitely like the idea of a private repo when you get a chance. It would make things much simpler if I ever want to tinker with what you have done.

Thanks again for the great work!

14

I have your current version and having some issues, I assume this new code will fix those issues especially with the remote sensor on the ecobee3. It sees it and I can get a temperature but the motion does not seem to work properly. If this new code fixes this I will gladly donate for the code.

15

Hi,

Please take note of the following limitations regarding motion sensors:

http://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=Ecobee3RemoteSensorInit#Known_issues

Also, you may want to check if your thermostat firmware is at least v3.6.

Regards.

16

@Yvesracine, This is a bit of a head-scratcher as far as a business decision. You choose to become a paid app now, right after weeks of instability in your free app? I understand that many of the problems, like other 3rd party apps, are a result of issues with either ecobee or ST. That was all fine and good when this was just a free app. If I am going to pay, even $15, I expect stability, and despite your disclaimers, other customers will as well. Get ready for many requests for refunds, threats, and all sorts of customer service nightmares that you cannot even begin to anticipate.

Anybody trying to make money off the ST platform right now, with the exception of ST themselves, is crazy. Too many ST platform problems that will become your problems.

I look forward to the feedback from the beta testers before I decide to contribute. Also, I highly recommend you change the wording from donation to paid app. If you made the fee optional, then it’s a donation, and I would personally consider donating, probably more than $15 if the thing worked regularly. However, now you took something that was free, and made it paid, and that does not make me happy since this was not something you built in expectations for. If you said, hey, this is free now, but understand we are going to charge for it later, then so be it. Anyway, I understand your desire to make money given your hard work, but as someone with a lot of years in the software business, I think you will quickly find the amount of money you are going to make from this is negligible compared to the amount of headaches you are about to experience. Good luck.

6 Likes
17

Complaining to yvesracine about paying for the app isn’t going to change anything. We should really be complaining to SmartThings and get them to pay yvesracine for his code, especially considering they tout EcoBee3 compatibility so blatantly (and I suspect this may be one of the motives behind yvesracine’s shift to pay-for-play) .

Why doesn’t SmartThings just write him a check for X thousand dollars and take over the code maintenance for themselves? Then everyone can get a feature-rich working app for free again.

1 Like
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And, FYI, I’m not the only developer who wants to be paid for his/her apps:

SmartThings should build an app store for its own sake…Otherwise, developers will soon lose interests.

Regards.

19

Have you tried getting in contact with higher ups at SmartThings and proposing some kind of deal?

20

Hi @gtozzi, no, my contacts are limited to the ST inviduals at developers call.

However, I think that if a lot of ST users ask for my app to become the official ecobee app then they may contact me…

Otherwise, based on the discussions during the developers call, I don’t see it happening soon. They don’t seem to have a clear vision of what they want to achieve with community developers (unless there is something that I’m not aware of)…

Regards.