Is there a devise that I just aren’t seeing where I can control my blinds with Open/Close instead of On/Off? I have them going through an Echo currently, and it seems to depend on the day if Open/Close works, or if I have to On/Off. Today it’s a mix of both. I can tell Alexa to Open the blinds, but I have to turn them Off to close them. Any thoughts? When I added them into ST, I just told it to look for devices, and it grabbed a switch device. I have full control of % which is nice, but knowing I can say Open/Close would be nicer.
Open/Close with Somfy blinds
Mine work with the Open Blinds command. I am not sure if this is the reason, but I added a Amazon Echo group called Blinds and it works for me.
Just tried the groups, still didn’t work. It’ll open, but I have to turn off to close.
Echo does not support “Close” and barely supports “Open”, which maps to “Turn On”. I believe the Open command is not officially supported, and that is why it is hit or miss.
We started to just say “Turn On/Off” since it seems to have better success.
1 Like
Same behavior of hit and miss. Usually open works, close never works. I just go with on/off for now.
Amazon Echo has been extremely unreliable with unsupported integrations (i.e: blinds, Harmony, garage doors, etc). For this reason, your best bet is to use IFTTT and use “Trigger Open Blinds” along with virtual switches. What works today, might not work tomorrow with native Echo commands for unsupported device. You can continue to use On/Off as that seems to be reliable.
https://community.smartthings.com/t/echo-naming-quirks/21080
1 Like
I am opposite. I have to say turn on shades to open them, but I can say to close the shades and that works
Bet there are tests going on and that is why there are different behaviors. Close used to work well for me.
I actually haven’t had any issues with my Harmony. Well, except getting them set up. I have 3 remotes at home, and when the activities get imported, it’s hard to tell which one is for which remote. But I can turn all activities on and off, and change channel with no issues. SOMETIMES it’ll say it won’t work, but it still does. The blinds worked great for months, then one day Alexa caught an attitude and gave me issues with lights and the blinds, and the blinds haven’t worked right since. Not sure what I did to make her mad. My MyQ is goofy too. I can’t “Open” the door, but telling her to close it toggles it lol.
That is my favorite error; “That device does not support that command” as it opens the blinds.
I do think they are dialing in the logic. I have periods of maybe a week of not working for the blinds, but for the most part its been pretty good.
Well, if you’re feeling froggy you can install the askAlexa smart app.
You can then not only tell her to open and close, but you can ask her if they are open or closed and she tells you. You’ll also get the percentage that they are open as well.
1 Like
Correct me if I am wrong, but that query status would only work if you didn’t open/close the blinds with the physical remote control, correct?
Yep, the ZRTSII won’t report changes to the blind or shade when using a normal RF remote.
My favorite is, when it says the device doesn’t exist when clearly 30 seconds ago it opened the shade.
I have Aks Alexa installed, and use it for a few routines. Isn’t it still restricted to on/off commands?
@ZebraBlinds: I have a bunch of things named “ROOM Blinds” and when I say “Open Blinds” she asks “Which one?” and I have to say “Blinds” again, then she opens them. I have to do that about 50% of the time.
No, the Alexa skills do not have the sane restrictions as the native integration. We can puritan the skills to do pretty much anything we want…
It is awesome!
Mine is set up to be conversational and to give smart ass contents in return. I call it teenager mode.
Me: Alexa, ask home for the last time the litter box was cleaned.
Alexa: the last time the litter box was cleaned was yesterday at 10:23 pm. Will there be anything else?
Me: yes
Alexa: give tell me what to do and I will do as you command, if I feel like it.
Me: open the garage door
Alexa: the garage door is opening. Well Will there be anything else?
Me: no
Alexa: fine, I didn’t want to do anything else anyway.
1 Like
This is why I hide the remote from my wife and kids 
1 Like
Is that AskAlexa or AskHome?
Looking at AskHome and it seems super powerful.
Alexa home is for the programmer. You are building it almost from the ground up.
AskAlexa is a programmed app that does a whole hell of a lot. It’s for the non programmer.
I took askAlexa and combined it with what I did on Alexa home to firm a hybrid monster!
1 Like
I just realized I never set up the Lambda stuff for AskAlexa. 
I am looking at Ask Home now because I want to call my house a custom name.