Simple automation for door/window left open repeated announcements?

SmartApps & Automations Automation Ideas
1

I used to experiment with Smartthings code a lot 2 years back when web-core integration was working fine. I didn’t follow transition to Edge much, now after 2 years I want to start fixing all the broken routines.
One of the routines I had was announce a contact sensor left open [repeated announcements if the state is maintained] through Amazon Echo Devices/speakers. I used Echo speaks and Webcore then.

Now after transition to Edge, I see scattered posts which don’t exactly accomplish this routine.
Across Sharp tools, Virtual devices etc. what will be the most simple way to execute this routine?

Many thanks!

2

You can do it with 2 routines and a virtual motion sensor from taustin. The motion sensors resetting mechanism is your timer.

The 10 min. Shed timer is my virtual motion sensor.

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My 2 routines:

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Instead of the push notification that I use you could use a Alexa switch from taustin to trigger your Alexa routine.

3 Likes
3

Thanks Paul. I came across a similar post yesterday later after i posted. The approach is indeed simple.

Albeit if i want alerts for multiple doors, the solution becomes not the most elegant. I will likely have to make peace with it :slight_smile:

4

Well at least you can use 1 virtual timer (motion sensor) for multiple doors and windows.

5

Thanks, will a shared timer not cause conflicts when multiple doors open the same time?

6

You should be able to include multiple contacts sensors in Routine one. And if any of them are open the timer would cycle.

Routine 2 would be unique for each contact.

7

Thanks will try this today.

8

As far as making voice announcements on Echo devices, there is no native integration with ST. The way I do it is by having a virtual contact sensor that opens or closes based on some set of conditions (like my gate opening) and then use that virtual contact sensor in an Alexa routine with an “Alexa Says” action.

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My recommendation would be to make the contact sensor being open as a precondition vs a trigger when simply wanting to do something based on the sensor being open for some period of time. When it is used as a trigger the condition is “when the contact goes from closed to open” vs as a precondition it is evaluating the state of the contact sensor, i.e. “if contact sensor is open”. So, the Routine would read as “When the timer gets to X mins and the contact state is open” then “do something”.

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Using it as a trigger is useful for something like the example I posted for announcing that the gate is now open.

10

Thanks ! Great suggestion

1 Like