A feature request: Auto Re-evaluation as part of the rule.
If you have a rule, in which one of the conditions is a time range, say 10:00 --> 14:00, a binary selector could appear to say Auto Re-evaluate? Yes/no - with a setting of every x (set by the user) minutes during this period.
Reason being that the action only occurs at the moment that the conditions are met, when the rule truth = true… but it stays true, hence why you introduced the ability to reevaluate using triggers or other rule actions - however it may be useful to re-evaluate at a set frequency (I can think of a few examples) during the period.
I see where AdamV is going. If the rule misses an event trigger for some reason it would circle back around and catch it again if it looks to say see if a light was on that was supposed to trigger an event and for whatever reason the event didnt trigger such as the current issue with SmartThings not processing correctly,
That is not the reason why I wanted this feature - the reason was that you have a wide time range, and you may want something to be happening continuously during this time. However the action is only fired off at the point the that the conditions are met, so in most cases at the start of the time range.
If you wanted something to be happening continuously during the time range you would have to make in some cases hundreds of extra triggers that re evaluate the rule during the period - and that will take time and clog up Rule Machine - and then if you wanted to change the timing you’d have to start from scratch pretty much!
I can think of quite a few use cases that I would use this for… however Bruce rejected it categorically without questioning it - so I’ll leave it there…
Throw out your most needed use case. Sometimes there is a way and sometimes Bruce can be convinced. He rightly rejects features that are Band-Aids for ST gaping wounds because that does not help.
Just a quick note. I have just created a device type for the ZWave.Me Key Fob. this device has the ability to differentiate a double click from just pushed as well as held, so you can allocate three actions per button. the value i used for the button double click state is “doubleclick” unsurprisingly.
I expanded the Button Controller smartapp to cater for this state value. but it would be good for devices like these that they could be catered for in Rule Machine also if we can agree the value of doubleclick is the way to go.
Description / Free Form Text Field.
Maybe required to be an input field, but if possible make it completely irrelevant to the actual rule of course.
The purpose is documenting in more detail what the rule does, was created for and perhaps documenting why you configured certain things that may not be completely obvious when looking at the rule - such as limited it to certain modes or had a certain virtual switch disable it where that Virtual Switch’s description may not be meaningful int the context of that rule, etc.
Trigger: virtual button on
Conditions: your conditions
Action for true: your actions, delayed on virtual switch in x minutes
Action for false: your actions
The virtual button would be a “Momentary button tile”, which you create in the IDE. This will loop every x minutes until the conditions become false. This is the basic form, variations are possible.
Sorry if these have already been addressed. I did search, but didn’t find anything about cloning or backup or exporting. so…
*1. Cloning
Could you add the ability to clone an existing rule so we can use good, working rules as templates so that we don’t have to repeat the entire rule creation process everytime when we’re creating a series of rules that are all the same in functionality but which are aimed at different places in the house which have completely different sets of hardware, etc?
*2. Backup
Would it be possible to do something to let us backup our rules so that we can get them back in if there is ever data corruption or anything?
*3a. Exporting
Would it be possible to allow us to export one or more rules from Rule Machine?
In order to use them as completely separate SmartApps?
In order to share them with each other
*3b. Importing
In order for us to be able to import a rule that somebody else exported from their Rule Machine.
It would be cool if, in the Rules Examples thread, we could post the code for a rule, and/or grab the code for somebody else’s rule and import it into our own.
@bravenel now TTS is working well I have taken a look again at sonos notifications. What I want to do is get the current volume and play status and then play text at the volume I choose then restore the queue, volume level and start playing if it was playing before.
No idea how to achieve this. I see the getvolume function in advanced actions, How do you store collected values to be used in later actions in the rule? Or am I missing something obvious?
@Fuzzyligic the next RM release should support TTS natively, without the need to go the custom command route. The implemented command is playTextAndRestoe, which includes a volume setting in the action selection.
Guys excellent work on the TTS integration. I have another feature request, would it be possible to bring in the momentary button press into the action pane. I am sure i am not the only Philips hue user that uses the like of hue Re-Connect to be able to use Philips Hue scenes, I know this can be done by expert features, but it is long winded to maintain this for the number of scenes i have.
if i use these scenes as switches/toggles then when i action once they stay in the on state. I also know that i can have them reset in the rules engine, but this is also incredibly long winded also and clutters with the expanded rule set.
