I recently noticed that when I log into my smarthings account to manage my devices, things have changed. Almost all of my smart switches now have a Type of Placeholder, and the Device Network ID’s are gone. Sorry, but I’m new to this, and I haven’t been able to find a clear answer to why this changed.
What caused this to change?
ST is in the middle of a migration to a new architecture where the drivers no longer run in the cloud. Read more about it here. FAQ: I have no idea what Edge is. Is that a new developer tool? (2022)
Placeholder is an indication in the old IDE that your device(s) have migrated from a DTH to an Edge driver.
You can find out more about accessing ST info like device ID and types here Life after the IDE: Questions and Answers
It sounds like you are looking at the old IDE, which is part of the old architecture, and will be discontinued soon.
@h0ckeysk8er already gave you the link to the Long FAQ, which has all the details about the new architecture, but if you just want the short specific FAQ about the “placeholder“ tag, see this one:
FAQ: Why does the IDE list “placeholder” for my device? Can I change that?
Thank you! It looks like I don’t have to worry about it and it will change over automatically to the new system.
I can’t change my icons anymore? Now when I try to change an icon, the change doesn’t stay.