My Alexa Routines using Smartthings devices as the triggers are no longer triggering after switching to the new Alexa app. Any fixes?
1 Like
In the Alexa app, I have a group named Upstairs Lights. in that group I have three GE dimmer switches imported via smartthings skill and 4 hue bulbs. Everything worked well until about a week ago, but I just got time to look into it.
I noticed all of my smartthings items were missing in my Alexa routines. I disabled and enabled the smartthings skill. This forced me to the new smartthings skill and migrate to the new smartthings app. When trying to remove scenes using the Alexa pc portal, I accidentally deleted all my Alexa groups as well (ouch)
When I rebuilt the Upstairs Lights group it wouldn’t dim all the lights.
If I only have the ge dimmer switches in the group, the switches all dim as expected. If I add the hue bulbs, only the hue bulbs dim when given a dimming command. All lights will power on and off with “turn off upstairs lights” “turn on upstairs lights”, so it can send a signal to the entire group.
I have no idea what changed, but it seems that however the group sends the commands to the respective API, that the call to the ge switches is not happening or it’s formatted incorrectly due to the hue light being added. i have noticed the dimmer switches say “power level” instead of “brightness”.
this was working before. the only change is the smartthings skill. i called alexa support and they blamed smarrthings. LOL.
for now i have built a “set upstairs lights to 5%”, “set … to 10%”, etc and hardcoded each light in the routine to the corresponding percentage. This is a pretty awful workaround.
any help is greatly appreciated.
Did you try changing the dimmer switch to a light on the Alexa side? If it treats the switch as a Light I would think that might fix it.
This problem (Not dimming as part of an Alexa group) has also been reported for Homeseer switches.
It appears in that case that instead of exposing “dim level“ to Alexa, the Homeseer switches are exposing “power level,” hence their being ignored when grouped with bulbs which do have dim level.
I don’t know any more than that, though, or why it’s now changed or who should fix it. 
@mwav3 ‘s suggestion of changing the type in the Alexa routine to light is interesting and easy to try—let us know if it makes a difference.
1 Like
I think it would have to be something in the Homeseer DTH to cause this. Considering like Inovelli, you need the custom DTH to use the advanced features of the Homeseer switch, like central scene and color notifications, not using their DTH is likely not a good long term solution, but you can verify if we’re on the right track by temporarily changing the DTH to the default ‘Dimmer Switch’ and then running discovery in Alexa to see if the behavior changes. @fredd0, if @mwav3’s suggestion doesn’t help you can give this a try - if it fixes it, you’ll need to talk to the author of the Homeseer DTH
Sorry for any confusion. @fredd0 is reporting a problem with GE dimmer switches. I was just saying that the same symptom has also been reported by another community member who has Homeseer switches, and in that case it was determined because the switch was reporting “Power level“ instead of “dim level.“
I don’t know if it’s the same issue, but since it also happened in the changeover I just wanted to mention it.
1 Like
Forgot include I did that. It didn’t help.
They have the exact same behavior on light or switch they only seems to change what they are categorized as. Maybe that translator is messed up in Alexa’s end…
After looking at the old app again, the dimmer levels are labeled as brightness, the new one is just labeled dimmer. My guess is it’s a power level as that is what Alexa shows. This seems to be part of the cause
As a software engineer, i can picture a method that converts the instructions of a light that was a switch, but if the conditional is written incorrectly and if one of the items isn’t needing conversion, it just won’t convert any of them.
1 Like
@nathancu could be right about a problem with the DTH itself. I have a bunch of ge dimmers and in Alexa they all show brightness and not power level. I updated a bunch of the DTHs for the GE dimmers to work in the new app, do you want to try my custom DTH? It’s here https://github.com/mwav3/smartthingscode/blob/master/devicetypes/mwav3/ge-jasco-zwave-plus-dimmer-switch.src/ge-jasco-zwave-plus-dimmer-switch.groovy
Edit - I should add there are a bunch of different GE dimmers. There’s 3 versions, the DTH in the link is the most common but if you confirm the model number I can double check it’s the right one
3 Likes
I’m using the ge enbrighten 14294.
I’ll load the handler in a little bit, thanks!
You may have the updated version they both went by 14294, the GE’s use multiple different model numbers, the newer one is a 14294 but also goes by 46203. If that first link doesn’t do it try this one . Also, you May have to delete the device from Alexa and run a new rediscovery to update it
2 Likes
Thanks - still testing. The first one worked but it still showed power level. The grouped switches and hue skill acted the same. I’m going to remove them from Alexa online and from smartthings. The first time I just deleted the device from Alexa and changed the handler in groovy. Then rediscovered in Alexa.
The fact that Alexa has a toggle to switch from switch to light makes me think their transformer is broken when used in a group.
Hopefully that works, it’s definitely a head scratcher. I have two ge dimmers and a smart life smart bulb on a group and I just tested it and when I say “Alexa, set bottom floor to 25%” they all change together. I’ve been using the new skill for a few months too and it’s been working. I do remember having to change the switches to lights because they at first didn’t show in Guard lighting control. Maybe that needs to be done before adding the light to the group? The group lighting control in the Alexa app has changed a lot recently too so not sure if that impacted any new setups. The other difference between mine is the phillips hue. Never used those but if all this doesn’t work maybe it’s in the hue side that’s causing issues?
2 Likes
I would ship you a hue bulb to test it 
@Lars (tagged you because i saw you are engineer - me too… this is a huge fix, i think)
TLDR: for some strange reason the word “light” or “lights” included in the name of the switch name in smarrthings made it work… excuse me while i hunt down a developer and beat them silly.
I also found that chandelier and bulb also work.
@ronczap reported that the word lamp works too.
@woodsby reports “Sconce” works as well
After the subsequent reported trigger words, at this point, there obviously is a library of “light indicators” in the smartthings skill that exports a different format to Alexa.
the “feel my pain” version below
--------------------i was in the middle of reporting back------------
nope… same thing with that handler. i reverted to an older version and the device now show a difference in the way the levels are displayed. when it’s a switch, it’s “power level” and when it’s a light it displays “brightness”
this tells me someone is messing around in the groups portion of the app (like you said)
nothing shows in the logs - i was hoping a bad request or something might log.
i’m going to mess around with other versions
-------------------HARD STOP HOLD TF UP----------------------
you are NOT going to believe this @#L$HJK@# situation…
while troubleshooting, and installing older versions, i remembered i also had a dimmer switch in my bedroom. so i tried it, fully expecting it to fail.
well… IT DIDN’T. NOW REALLY WTF??? something must be different in the switches, right? no i dug in to look.
in groovy i looked for any differencse. noticed the room wasn’t assigned. maybe? so i switched that. NOPE. REALLY?!@?! COME ON MAN!!!
the switches were named Theater Front, Theater Rear, and Theater side. my bedroom switch is called “master fan lights”… it can’t be the word “lights” in the name, can it? i am a software engineer. “run it, see what it does” is literally my job. sooooo… i change the name to “theater front lights”
too stupid to work, right? WRONG
The effin’ things WORK!!!
i soooooooo want to look in the code to see what the hell is going on in there.
this has to be an amazon issue, but who knows. i’m going to call back on my support ticket with them. someone HAS to look into this. this is too weird to leave alone. these names are what they always were, so it worked without the word lights before, but something changed somewhere…
thank you for reading… my hyperfocused self can finally rest. whew…
well i couldn’t rest. so i tested some more. i found that when not containing the word “light” or “lights” in the name of the switch in smartthings, the device is registered differently in the alexa app.
when named “Theater front” in smarrthings, notice there are 4 options in the settings when imported to alexa
When the word “lights” is in the title in smartthings (“light” works too) it gets imported differently. notice the "color capabilities option. i tried changing the name in the alexa app and it didn’t work…
then this is what shows on the main device screen when imported with the word “lights” and you switch it to a “light” in the alexa device settings - the word “brightness” is back, not “power level”.
@ronczap also reported the word lamp works too.
THANK YOU!!! fredd0 OUT!!! (mic drop)
4 Likes
do your switches contain the word “light” or “lights” in them in smartthings?
Yes mine all do have"lights" or"light" in the name. Can’t believe that was causing the issue, I never would have guessed that.
3 Likes
I have several Leviton plugin and wall dimmers named Den, Living Room, Bedroom, etc.
They all show power level EXCEPT two -
Floor Lamp and Spotlight.
I guess “lamp” works also…
3 Likes
That’s very helpful. For multiple reasons, I would prefer to add “lamp” to most names instead of “light. “ choice is good. 
Seems rather idiotic to base attributes/functionality on the device name 
3 Likes
Super interested on the “how” on the operation of this. Is it Alexa not flipping a switch to a light unless the device name includes light or lamp? Was that supposed to point at device type instead of device name?
I love chasing bugs…
1 Like