TL;DR how do I tie Alexa to preheat my Samsung oven. What is the funniest things you have played with/done? I have two MyQ drives-- should I waste the money on the sensors? Or just use their app? what are your thoughts? In-wall seems to be me to be the cleanest/best way to deal with the lights? Lightbulbs won’t do the fan on the same circuit, with the smart switch?
Greetings! Just built a new home and I wish I wired it better-- I’m trying to get into home automation and of course ST is the best “hub” around everyone says. So I bought that, then I THOUGHT I bought a lot of devices that would work with it. I bought two echo’s (just got them today the kids are having a ball) some blink cameras. With Rboy’s app (over all it works alright wish more features directly from blink but they are working on some they say…)
I have a fancy samsung dual oven that I have tied into ST, I have alexa recongize it— so now how do I use her to DO anything with it? I’d LOVE to be able to have my wife say “alexa preheat top oven to 350 degrees” “alexa, turn on broil on range” or whatever.
I’m also getting a video door bell that I’m hoping to tie into ST that should be here soon. I’d light to do something with the lights to make the kids calm down and go to sleep… thoughts?
also has anyone ever thought of an automatic door closer PLUS locker? I don’t know if there is such a thing but when it’s a saturday morning and things are warming up if you get my drift I’d love to be able to say “alexa close and lot master bedroom door…”
Welcome! That’s a lot of different questions! (I’ve moved this to project so you can get answer specific to your own set up)
To start with last things first, door closers.
I myself use a wheelchair, so I tend to pay a lot of attention to this category.
There are a couple of door closers that you might be able to create an integration with smartthings with, but I’ll be honest – – most able-bodied people don’t like the door closers because they are very slow. About the speed of a garage door closer. That’s a safety feature to make sure that if the door bumps someone it can reverse, and that it’s not likely to catch someone to begin with.
There aren’t any that I know of that integrate simply into SmartThings. There are some where it would be possible with some hacking. So if you’re really interested in that, say so, and I’ll give some more details.
But as far as closing, and then locking, that’s easy. You could set it up so that it closes, and then once the door knows that it is closed through some kind of contact sensor, it then locks.
So the challenge for that particular use case is the door closer piece. There are some that are not too expensive, around $300, but you would need to add additional stuff to integrate it with smartthings so you might be looking at closer to $600. And again, while they’re very helpful to people who use wheelchairs, most ambulatory people end up not liking them.
As far as really cool stuff, there are two different lists in the project reports section of the quick browse lists in the community – created wiki that you would probably find interesting.
The first is the “get started” list, and it includes things like “top 10 things to do with home automation” and stuff like that.
The second is the “impress your friends” or cool stuff list, which has projects like a magic wand, a secret bookcase room, and automated welcome mat, that kind of thing. Some of it is very practical, and some of it is just for fun.
As far as the Samsung oven, it will depend on the exact model you have. Here is the support article:
However, being able to do those things with the mobile app doesn’t mean you can do them from Alexa. Alexa is limited at present to lights, switches, and thermostats.
There are some people using various workarounds, but many of the appliance manufacturers limit what you can do to keep you from burning down the house by accident. So I’m not sure just what is possible there.
The first thing I would do with that oven is disconnect it from ST. Dont get me wrong I like ST a lot but none of this is dependable enough to run an oven. Hell Samsung has trouble making a phone that doesn’t catch on fire.
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bamarayne
(Jason "The Enabler" as deemed so by @Smart)
7
Ovens are supposed to get hot… so they at least got that right
