Apparently the use of “instances” has a connotation here that I did not intend. I did not mean that I install new SmartApp code for every light I have, I mean I use the SmartThings provided “Smart Light” SmartApp to attach to a light. But as of yesterday its broken. See this thread: Smart light - an unexpected error occured
OH! I missed that. I have multiple instances of Smartlights running. I wonder what is most optimal…?
Yeah, this should be considered an emergency priority IMO. This is such an integral part of having a smart home, I consider the system “broken” until this feature is available.
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performance wise, probably no difference, but clutter wise, huge difference…
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I think that is what they are saying, but I just tried it, and with both motion stops and power exceeded selected , I don’t get the " after this many minutes" option.
I just put one of my extra PIRs in the front hall, because before moving to ST I always had the front hall lights set to turn on with door unlock, lights off 2 minutes after door locked. To give time to actually get in the house and take you coat off etc. Or as is more often the case this time of year the door is open all day, so you go to close it at night and as soon as you lock it, you are standing in a dark hallway.
It seems the lights off when door is locked supersedes the lights off with no motion. Lights came on when I walked into the hall to close the door, but still left me standing in the dark as soon as the door was locked.
See my previous post, even if you select multi, only one is saved…
I was more/less confirming that and also adding that even if you have more than 1 SL "rule " ( ie light on/off with door unlock/lock and light on/off with motion/no motion) , the off with lock superseded the on with motion. Still leaves you standing in a dark hallway.
Hmmm, interesting. I have two Smart Lights rules for my garage: Turn lights on with contact sensor open and turn lights on when motion is detected; turn off after 15 minutes of no motion, and so far, so good. What I haven’t tried is seeing if it stops detecting motion, then detects motion again and resets timer (sounds like it doesn’t reset the timer).
Just out of curiosity, is there any reason NOT to install multiple instances of Smart Lighting?
Now that power allowance appears to be back, I’m going to be adding a LOT more automations to the app. I was considering, purely from an organizational effort, putting like automation instances together in one install and other automations in another install.
For example… I’ll probably end up with 10+ automations just for my daughter’s room and possible another 10+ automations for my son’s room. This is on top of the dozen or so automations I currently have installed.
I’d like to Install Smart Lighting three times… putting all my kids automations into a different install for each child, and then a third for all the rest.
Again… this is purely for an organization standpoint. If I need to edit later I can drill down to the right Smart Lighting app first, then only need to look through a dozen or so entries rather than 30-40 entries.
On purely side note… time to add ‘automations’ to Chrome’s spell check dictionary I think! 
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I’m pretty sure that the last platform update specifically disallows a user from doing this.
If you manually prefix the suggested name with a room or zone identifier the automations will at lease sort by your prefix in the app.
Mike is correct, only one install is allowed. You’ve mentioned 30 - 40 instances. I am at near 30 now. Wondering if there is a limit…
unlikely, as each automation is a separate smartApp…
So I wonder, who do we tag for some official response on this with regards to performance for the client and performance on their back end systems:
- One Smart Lighting app with lots of automations
- OR -
- Lots of Smart Lighting apps with one automation (or more) each.
I’m still learning and I spotted this when I accidentally installed another Smart Lighting app and that’s what got me wondering.
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Agree, because the multiple same named “Smart Lighting” rules drive me a bit batty. I have to look in each one to find the one I want to edit. @slagle what is best practice?
Give them names… You should only have the app installed once and then inside of it you have various routines with custom names. Example:
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I believe you are correct. That looks a lot better than what I have. Still, we long time users have trouble putting all our eggs in one basket (all our lighting in one smartapp). UNLESS! The automatons (hee spell check) are separate apps behind the scenes, and then all is well. Still would like the official line on this.
Trust me, the automations are separate apps behind the scene. Have a troll through the IDE and you’ll see what I mean.
It’s a parent/child app.
The parent app (smart lighting) is nothing but a display and configuration container for the automations, each of which is a separate smart App.
Yes, these are definitely each separate smartapps. Smart Lighting is using the new child smartapps feature.
I should have looked, and that’s the answer. I’ll be combining. Thanks!