Speaking just for myself, I’d be fine with a footnote explanation that “manufacturer” relates to the integration/edge driver, not the physical device.
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I was working with a user in another community that was having an issue. I’ve tried to replicate that with my devices but am not seeing that. They both reflect SmartThingsCommunity.
I have added a couple of caveats to the existing community FAQ on changing from one edge driver to another. One that routines may be affected and another that parameter values may be affected. Feel free to add an additional post to that thread if there are other warnings that you think people need.
FAQ: How to change to a different edge driver
There has also always been a security section in the community edge driver FAQ that points out that under the new architecture you can’t review custom code before you install it. (Point 9 in the faq) It also links to a more technical discussion of the security issues. Again, feel free to add to either of those threads if you think there’s more that needs to be said.
FAQ: I have no idea what Edge is. Is that a new developer tool? (2022)
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Hi @nayelyz
I don’t know if this has been reported yet.
The Device Name field shows the name of the profile that was assigned to device the first time or subsequent times that the device is paired.
It has nothing to do with the name of the device and does not help at all.
Shouldn’t I at least assign the device label of the pairing profile, not the profile name?
In this screenshot, the Device Name field has a profile name when device was created in Dec 2021, that doesn’t even exist in any driver anymore.
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It has certainly been noticed before but I don’t think that at the time we had any idea whether the name was just there for back compatibility with the legacy platform or whether it would live on. We still don’t really know.
Now it is visible in the Advanced Web App it has also become more obvious how confusing it is, especially as it is read-only and so you are stuck with it. For Zigbee or Z-Wave I’d perhaps expect to see the fingerprint id, though even that doesn’t reflect driver changes.
There is a related problem with virtual devices created via the CLI. There you might assume that when you are being invited to name the device you are being asked for something friendly like ‘Bedroom Fan’ to go in the label. Instead it goes into the name and you are stuck with it even if you start using the device for something unrelated. You’d probably expect the name to reflect the type of virtual device, if anything.
Indeed where there is both a name and a label for an API object there is often confusion, especially as the name is usually read-only. For example, Location Modes are created with the same name and label but only the label can be changed.
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It has been mentioned before, here’s the feedback from the team:
- The Device Name field is something that is assigned to the device at its join time
- While this can often be dictated by the profile name, that won’t necessarily remain true as the profile changes over time
a. This means that a device will only change its name if it’s rejoined and the name of the profile assigned is different than before - The device “name” field is basically a fallback name if there is no label assigned to a device.
I can add a feature request to put a tooltip on this field
I don’t know if it’s worth it or if it has any use for the user.
As I said, perhaps if when the device is paired, instead of assigning the profile name, it is assigned the device label that it has in fingerprints.yml, then it would serve to know the original name assigned to the device and the one that the user has changed in the device label
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Since it requires a change in how this is handled internally, I’ll create a feature request with your suggestion and it will depend on the engineering team’s review.
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Where can I find my automatic routines? The default(manually run routines) show up as scenes in the advanced page.
They aren’t on the UI yet, but you can see them using the API Browser +
I could have sworn they were on the non-advanced web UI but the Automations page there only shows Scenes. But it calls them Routines.
AFAIR the Automatic routines (AKA Routines) were never on the UI, only Scenes (now Manually run routines). As mentioned you can use the API Browser + or the app.
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i’m so confused about the terminology:
automations
scenes
routines
That is quite understandable as it has varied over time and still varies depending on where you look.
It is probably best to think of automation in a generic sense where it means a routine / scene / script / app / piston / programme being used to automate operations in SmartThings. The mobile apps seem to have largely stopped using it in any other way.
Routines are simple ‘if conditions then actions’ automations that are managed within the mobile apps. They actually use SmartThings native rules engine called the ‘Rules API’ but they hide all of that. Indeed you can’t access them from the public API.
Scenes are a bit of an oddity. They are, in essence, the actions part of Routines. In the latest app updates any pretence that they are anything other than that has been abandoned and they are now being called ‘manually run routines’.
The reason I say they are a bit of an oddity is that Scenes have been around longer than Routines and they used to use different technology from each other. While the Routines are private to the client apps, the Scenes are in the public API. Ideally the Scenes would just disappear as they really don’t need to be independent things. The mobile app has got that much right, it is just that calling them ‘manually run’ is awfully misleading.
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Unfortunately they all have new names:
Scenes are now called “Manually run routines”
Routines are now called “Automatic routines”
Collectively they were all called Automations but are now all called “Routines”.
Not sure why it all had to change but it is what it is and I agree it is confusing.
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Is this new?
In the Advanced web site, on the page for a device, you now are shown Scenes in the In Use By list.
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Rules are now there.
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More confusion with names - they are routines.
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Apparently just changing the names isn’t confusing enough. I listed the new names they are using in the iOS SmartThings app. The Advanced website is different yet…
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