The End of Groovy Has Arrived

Announcements
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A very BIG plus one on the Notify Me When SmartApp that SmartThings provides in the Groovy world where it automatically put the device’s name in the notification no matter how many devices are chosen in the SmartApp.

And I’ll also miss their SmartThings Left It Open SmartApp as well since right now I’m trying to use a looping virtual switch in Routines which is just dumb.

And what about their SmartThings Flasher SmartApp. I was able to almost replicate it using a Routine and a virtual switch, but the timing was difficult to get right, but that’s also a dumb way to do it.

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Just a reminder:

Once a device is listed as “placeholder“ in the IDE it is using the new architecture and you can no longer get to all of its details through the IDE. And if you try to edit it to make it use a Groovy DTH from the old architecture you can break the integration altogether. so don’t try to change its details there.

If you want to put it back to using a DTH, it will have to be a custom DTH with the same fingerprint. Because an edge driver now takes precedence over a stock groovy DTH.

So…

If you have a device using an edge Driver and you want it instead to use a Groovy DTH while those are still available, you have to first add a Custom Groovy DTH with that fingerprint to your account.

(If you were using a stock groovy DTH you will probably have to copy The code for that DTH, change the name of it, and save it to your account under the new name so it becomes a custom DTH.)

Now remove the device that is using the edge driver from your account. When you re-add it, it should pick up the custom groovy DTH instead of the stock edge driver. (And, yes, this means you will have to re-create any routine/automations that were using that device.)

But all of this is changing frequently during the transition, so it’s pretty much a fingers crossed process all the way through right now. :crossed_fingers:t3:

But as of the date of this post, that’s supposed to work.

What definitely will not work is just trying to change the assignment through the IDE the way you used to do to change from one groovy DTH to another.

Remember that edge is still officially in beta until September 30, so anything you do now is subject to this kind of weirdness. :thinking:

I understand people wanting to start testing now, or getting ahead of the all in one day cutover, but you are reaching the “here be dragons“ territory on the map if you start manually using Edge drivers today rather than waiting for the system to do the transition for you at the official cutover date.:dragon_face::dragon_face::dragon_face:

Your choice, but be aware that the IDE is part of the old architecture, and it has not been updated to work with the new stuff for edge drivers.

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229

Ok… I can’t get all @JDRoberts text to appear in the quote.

Just wanted to add, when users experience issues with devices with Edge Drivers, they go to IDE and feel the reason it may not be working is the hub info is not in the Hub field and they attempt to edit that and put the hub in there. No need to edit that field… you will only receive an error message.

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Yeah, that’s a forum bug that appeared recently.

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Yep, usually I can copy all the text and remove what is not needed. Tonight, I selected all of your text and is what you saw in the quote. Strange! Also having a weird issue when using my fingers to enlarge what I see on my screen and open an image. The text in the background starts flickering.

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I know SmartThings staff hasn’t directly addressed this, but I wouldn’t consider it to be the case anymore. A SmartThings user not enrolled in any beta program can currently onboard a device and it could use an Edge driver. Specifically an Edge driver from their production channel of the Edge GitHub repo. If it looks like public, and it quacks like public, then it’s public.

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Maybe, but right now to me it looks like a public Beta phase. A lot of what should be obvious glitches still in play, including the issues with multicomponent devices, broken labels, inconsistent fingerprint mapping, variable value scales, battery life, etc.

Here are a few from today. This doesn’t look like production to me but maybe I have different standards…

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installed the Edge driver and it works more reliably but still, after a day of no use the ST click would take anywhere from 4 to 8 sec to turn on the light. It’s as if something in the hub goes to a deep sleep and needs to wake up, load, etc. to execute the command and send the HTTP request to the Tasmota web server. Once awoken, it works OK. Does anyone else see the same issue?

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234

Many of you are writing about the death of WebCore, maybe it was a useful tool but too complicated for many.

I have been using SharpTools: Dashboard and Rule Engine for SmartThings, Hubitat, and Home Assistant for several days

The fee is not high, and I can automate a lot of things based on “if”, additionally I can trigger routines via webhooks, just enter a link from webhooks to the free CRON and set it to open every minute and we have the integration working all the time.

In addition, the authors are willing to help, I needed to know the date, weather and thanks to simple API queries I was able to do it, and I am a complete like who does not know programming.

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235

Does sharptools run locally?

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Unfortunately, no, everything works after the API, but it is already adapted to the new EDGE version and you can be sure that it will work.

Better such an option than never

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I’m trying to make everything work as local as possible

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238

Not sure if I should start a new thread along the lines of “Where to from here”.
I have not been giving the latest developments much attention since my two smart homes have been running stable for the past few years. I have as a result also not been frequenting this forum as often as I used to. Reading about the end of Groovy on Friday night just as I was about to go to bed, gave me a massive wake-up call and to say it messed up my weekend, is putting it mildly. (For context, according to the Smartthings IDE, I have a total of 415 actual and virtual devices between the two hubs. These devices are primarily controlled with about 140 webCore pistons. I’m using about 35 custom DTH’s)
After having been frantically reading this and other forums since Friday evening, my understanding is the following:
(a) I will no longer be able to control my 4 Harmony Hubs; Arduino custom devices (which I use to check the water level of my water reservoir and which garage is empty (to open the door of the empty garage when I arrive home)); the LaMetric displays which notify us which outside doors are opened; my Denon Heos wifi speakers and many other devices. I have also not been able to figure out how to migrate my 41 Hue lights.)
(b) Only devices showing the “device type” as “Placeholder” in the IDE, have been updated to the edge drivers (in my case, it is only about 15 devices, mainly due to switching to Tod Austin’s (@TAustin) Edge driver for the Envisalink interface; adding a new Samsung TV and a new cell phone. The rest of my devices are all still using the old drivers.) I have many Fibaro and Aeon switches, contact sensors etc., using the native Z-wave drivers. None of these has migrated automatically to date.
(c) The only way to manually / force an update to the Edge driver is to exclude and re-include devices. (I.e. climbing into the attic; getting on ladders to get to switches; moving furniture around, opening walls etc.) And if the device requires a custom driver, one has to find a new custom Edge driver before being able to re-include the device.
(d) I prefer creating my automations on a computer, and with that in mind, the Sharptools Rules engine is probably the best alternative to webCore. I have tried re-creating a few webCore pistons, it is not nearly as powerful as webCore.
(e) Re-creating my pistons in Sharptools now is going to be a waste of time because if devices do not migrate automatically to edge drivers, I will have to remove and include them. Doing that will result in having to re-add the devices one by one to the newly created Sharptools rules.
(f) The way Samsung is implementing the change, is ridiculous. One would have expected them to tell us when they will finish with the driver migration and once the driver migration has finished, give us a month or two before shutting down Groovy support. That way, we’ll know for which of our devices we must find new drivers.
(g) The IDE will eventually also disappear and the only way one will be able to manage device/device settings, will be via the Apple or Android apps.
If my understanding is correct, I would like guidance regarding the following:
(i) Are we really in a position where we must wait until the last moment to see if Samsung will migrate devices to the new drivers? If we wait too long, we’ll end up with lots of devices and automations not working.
ii) Will we be able to access webCore pistons to use them as guidelines to create new automations in whatever new system we use? I fear that once Groovy is gone, webCore will not be accessible at all?
(iii) Am I being unnecessarily pessimistic, or is this a major mess? How will other members in my position be approaching the migration?
(iv) Since I’ll have to recreate all my automation from scratch, is there any reason why one would not move to Hubitat now? At least my understanding is that one will be able to migrate current webCore pistons to Hubitat, saving the hassle of re-creating all 140 automation. And it seems that the custom handlers I need, are available in the Hubitat environment. I would prefer to stay with Smartthings, but it seems that they are dumbing down their system to the level of the other major systems and for more advanced automations, we must look elsewhere. I suppose part of my conclusion is my perception that developers of custom handlers are moving away from Smartthings.
(v) Once a device is using an Edge driver, will it be necessary to remove and add the device to change the native Edge driver for the device, to a custom edge drive should one become available? (If I’m correct that the IDE will no longer be used to manage device drivers)

Sorry for the long post, but I’m sure many other members will be waking up to the same surprise soon. Because I’ve been married to the Smartthings system for so long and I know so little of where this is going, it is impossible to make an informed decision of where to go from here. I’ll therefore appreciate your input very much.

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239

Will there be a way to see z-wave /ZigBee routes after these changes?

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240

Wow SmartThings, create an announcement post line this and then ignore it without responses to customers questions. Bedsides the previous unanswered questions here’s one more.

Since SmartThings is making this migration mandatory by the end of next month, then why am I not seeing the SmartThings ‘production’ drivers available on the list of available device drivers for an Edge device that I’ve connected using a SmartThings Beta or another developer’s Edge driver? Will the SmartThings default ‘production’ drivers ever appear on the list of available drivers for an Edge device?

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Instead of requiring us to go through various fingerprint files to find compatible devices, why not create a web-based database that allows us to easily look up what’s been put in to production? I’m spending hours checking these damn devices against code, getting confused with what’s commented and what’s not. Help us make the transition.

And… oh… how about an app that isn’t slow as balls which more easily allows us to transition?

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Move to hubitat, your be able to port all your WebCore pistons, seeing this post on Friday has made me complete the hubitat move (Hadn’t moved z-wave devices across) over this weekend I started over a year ago but Hubconnect (allows ST <-> hubitat communication which will die when groovy dies) made me lazy.

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(g) The IDE will eventually also disappear and the only way one will be able to manage device/device settings, will be via the Apple or Android apps.

I think most of your a) to f) is correct: hopefully others will chime in if not.

On g), there is a programmer’s tool, the CLI (command line interface) which you have to download onto a pc and then you can write queries to get some device information, like network ID. I haven’t used it myself because I only have a tablet, no laptop, and because it’s obviously going to be awful to use with a voice reader. (I’m quadriparetic.) But there are community members using it now who can answer more questions.

@Mariano_Colmenarejo has written a detailed post on how to setup the CLI.

Edge Driver or Device Handeler for a TUYA (Zemismart) Zigbee plug with energy mesurment capabilities - #18 by Mariano_Colmenarejo

Otherwise the only documentation I know of is in the developer preview GitHub, but maybe there’s more elsewhere, I haven’t looked. :thinking: Like many people, I’m hoping ST will eventually release a web interface with IDE-like information for the new architecture. But no promises.

Tagging @orangebucket @nayelyz in case there’s a documentation link for the CLI that I’ve missed.

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have also not been able to figure out how to migrate my 41 Hue lights.

If they are connected via a hue bridge you don’t have to do anything. The cloud to cloud integration is already using the new architecture and the LAN integration is being automatically updated.

If you are using a custom DTH to connect them directly to a ST hub, it’s like any other custom DTH. Try asking in the author thread for that DTH. :thinking:

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That works on the old groovy architecture, though, right? Is there an updated version for the new architecture?

I noticed the other day that Hubitat has built in support for MQTT, so you could set up communication that way using @taustin ‘s Edge based MQTT project, but that’s pretty clunky. ST <->MQTT<->Hubitat.

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Just a note to users reading this part. Do not use HubConnect at this point. When ST starts migrating directly connected devices over to Edge Drivers then HubConnect will not work as it depends on Device Handlers. There are alternative options but I leave that to you to discover. :slight_smile:

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