[OBSOLETE] Vacation Light Director

Without logs it is hard to know. Your issues could have been platform issues, or a problem in the smartapp. I have not had the problem you described, even this past week.

Doesn’t seem to be working for me at all either. @slagle you might want to remove the app from the marketplace until / if an again functioning version is released.

Works OK for me so can I respectfully ask that you do not remove it.
Thanks

Doesn’t work at all anymore it seems. Only seems to be sending off signals to all my lights.

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This “kinda” worked for me when I tested it one evening last(?) week, I tried to keep track while I was working.

Settings: 45 minute cycle, 2 active at a time, sunset to 11:05, only during vacation mode

Note: I had one other switch selected that I didn’t record, so the 2 active at a time setting may be working correctly regardless of my results.

21:42 started vacation mode, K on, L on, B on
21:47 K blink off then on, L off, B off 
22:00 K blink off then on, L off, B on 
22:45 K off, L on, B off 
23:00 K off, L off, B on 
23:10 went to bed, B still on

My feedback

-timing is incorrect per 45 minute setting, but will suffice for switching some lights when I am away
-would be nice to have lights all turn off at the end, like we went to bed

I saw in another thread reporting that it only works for one night, but I didn’t test that.

For some reason when I install the app I receive the message “Page Setup Failed” I doubt the app is running as a result.

Anyone have issues on the actual install?

@tslagle13 - is there a way to make sure that the lights all turn off at the end of the timeframe? It seems like it is in the code but my test, it didn’t work correctly. Thanks!

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Back from vacation and finding that this “VLD” SmartApp didn’t work and worse, it seems I can’t control the light switches which were selected in VLD setup via the SmartThings app. They do work when physically switching them on the wall. In the IDE log, nothing shows when I turn these off/on via ST app. Another light switch in basement which as not selected in VLD works and shows on/off messages in log. Some details in other thread I posted here.

It’s happening for the 3 lights I selected in VLD (2 are Enerwave and one GE). Any ideas what could cause this? I have tried repairing zwave.

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After some testing it appears that this only seems to work if the trigger mode is triggered within the time period you specify, and additionally the lights only run once. That is, only on the day that the mode was changed. If the mode remains set for subsequent days then the lights don’t activate. I have to switch out of the trigger mode and back into it to activate the lights. Which basically means this app only seems suitable for 1 day long vacations!

I am going to try using SmartRules to set the trigger mode every day at a certain time when I am away but I don’t know if I will also have to switch out of the trigger mode first or whether just re-setting the trigger mode will do it. We shall see.

Perhaps I’m just using this wrong or misunderstanding the expected behaviour.

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As I described in my last post this is the exact behaviour I am seeing

Mine does not have this problem.

strange. this has happened 2 nights in a row now. i wonder what i am doing wrong.
i have set up “Away - Day” and “Away - Night” modes that flip flop at sunrise and sunset respectively and where the vacation light director triggers on “Away - Night”. We’ll see if this makes any differences tomorrow night!

mine doesn’t work either. not just you

Mine also did not run during the 3 weeks I was gone. Its broken overall I think.

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That’s the thing, you’re probably doing nothing wrong. Maybe open live logging, change modes and set the times to be short, and see if there are any errors. Mine works flawlessly. I use it in away mode and vacation mode. I have a morning and an evening setup.

Failing for me as well in strange ways. I updated the to latest in GitHub last Saturday before going camping for three days. While I was gone, Vacation Director only triggered two of the eight lights I had configured and after the first run, it would trigger them strangely.

Lights configured in smartapp: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H
Only when Away
Change lights every 48 minutes
Two lights at a time

Expected: change two lights from off to on every 48 minutes

Actual
Goodbye routine triggers Away mode
2 minutes later, vacation director turns on lights A, B
48 minutes later, vacation director turns off lights A, B, then turns them back on instantly
at next :00 top of the hour vacation director turns lights A, B off
next :48 after the hour, vacation director turns lights A, B on
:00 top of next hour (12 minutes later) vacation director tuns lights A, B off
:48 minutes past hour, vacation director turns lights A, B on
continue loop, lights A, B only stay on for 12 minutes
Manual trigger of I’m Back and then Goodbye routines doesn’t fix behavior, same pattern repeats.

Changing light on duration to 67 minutes in Lighting Director smartapp, then re-triggering I’m Back, then Goodbye results in lighting director turning on Lights A and B and they stay on.

I had similar problems over the past month with the official version of Lighting Director. I noticed the problem around end of June. It previously worked fine for me. Various uninstall and reinstall and code update attempts have failed to resolve the problem for me.

Perhaps my schedules are resetting at the top of every hour since I run tons of smartapps and devices. Everything else except longer Power Allowance smartapps appear to be operating just fine.

The latest VLD version was changed to use cron for its scheduling. It’s using interval scheduling, so it resets to the top of the hour to turn lights on/off, then turns on/off the lights at 48 mins. past the hour (in your case), then resets again at the top of the hour to repeat the cycle. :unamused: It’s not as “random” as the previous versions, but if you use a smaller interval time (I use 17 mins. — so at 0, 17, 34, 51 mins) it can seem random 
 still, not as random as I’d like.

After having set up an away - day/away - night cycle things seem to have been working the last two nights. slightly concerned at others mentioning how VLD resets and turns lights on/off at the top of the hour. i haven’t looked into what cron is and whether it’s the right thing to use but it really doesn’t seem like it should be this complicated!

Maybe i should learn Groovy and have a crack myself before complaining too much about other people’s (free) software! Or try @E_Sch’s vacation-light-directorERS

I do use VLD. But honestly I went the groovy route. I found that while most people wrote great apps, they didn’t do exactly what I wanted. Virtually all fell short for one reason or another. I think this is the power and frustration of ST for many people. My ST does everything that I want.

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Updated to support intervals up to 180 minutes