right now there is no way to tell you which smart apps are “live” and which are not. Because home automation is all about well, automation based on physical states, the user at any given time may not know what exact state or modes the house is in - especially if you have 50+ smartapps controlling various states of various “things”.
Example: arming the alarm. Nothing confirms or shows that an alarm is active. As the user you have to remember its on…or remember that it’s on until 5:30am in the current mode you are on…or remember that it’s on but off if your wife gets home but only if a light switch, controlled by another smart app is turned on. Get what I’m saying?
In addition, one could potentially have many many smart apps controlling various “things” or responding to various physical states. There is nothing to tell me if one smart app, in my current “mode” if conflicting with another.
Example: in “home” mode, I say keep the temperature at 75 degrees. Then I have a smart app that says when I leave the house, turn the temp to 80degrees. I leave the house, but I’m still n home mode OR I accidentally put myself not home mode while I’m away. Which “app” takes priority?
I guess as long as i want to automate, i have to remember I have this cocktail of if, then statements and how they interact with each other. That’s not realistic, is it? If this thing is going to integrate into the normal lives of “everyone” then there has to be better management. I mean I can’t even remember how I wired that special three way switch in the basement when I first moved in - how am I going to remember 50+ modes and 100 smart app configurations (as an example).
Am I making any sense? Someone please tell me they see this as a huge barrier to making this usable for the general market.
I 100% agree. I have only had my kit for a day but can already see it doesn’t seem like the UI is designed to handle very complicated setups.
Us android users are not even in the mix yet (still admiring the beautiful box it came in)
to be clear, you dont need to be building a complex network in your home to need good “smartapp” organization. Simply knowing if your security system is armed or not is just as important and thats just ONE smartapp.
By complicated I just meant having a lot of overlapping smartapps.
@cory yes agree