I have the below setup to turn off logitech harmony activities using Alexa and Smartthings. Is there a better way to accomplish this? I want to say “Alexa turn off Harmony” to turn off whatever activity is currently running.
I created a simulated switch and named it “Harmony” and turned the switch on.
I created the below CoRE piston which turns off Harmony activities and sets the state of Harmony switch to on again.
I created another simulated switch to refresh harmony activities instantly using the below core piston. I included the simulated switch from ST called Harmony-Refresh into all Logitech harmony activities.
Instead of using a virtual switch just set your piston to turn off all of the individual activity switches. Doesn’t matter if they are already off, sending another off command won’t hurt.
@ronatalley, I like your suggestion, but there seems to be a long process to be able to accurately sync all the harmony activities in real time. Only then will this approach work - correct?
Why not just use Alexa’s built in Harmony integration, create a group with just one harmony activity called Harmony, then you tell it to turn off harmony, and it will do so, no ST/CoRE needed. I tested that a while ago, and can say Alexa Turn off TV, even if the activity is Fire TV, PS3, etc.
I think this doesn’t work in the UK. I have to say “Alexa tell harmony to turn off…”. I think in US there is an additional skill which can be used without the “tell harmony”.
I have seen this before, but didn’t want to go through the hassle of adding all the harmony activities into harmony again through smartthings. But I will consider this if thats the only solution.
Wouldn’t that issue multiple off commands to each activity? I have a manually added IR command in my harmony activities to turn off my subwoofer. When I issue the off command twice, it turns on the subwoofer.
Thats what I thought and works like this when I press the off button on the remote. But when I issue off commands multiple times from smartthings, my subwoofer keeps toggling. All other devices are fine.
That sounds like more of an issue in your harmony activity programming most likely.
Not sure why, but Amazon hasn’t opened up the smart skill (UK) for Alexa to allow you to skip the “tell harmony to” but you have some choices:
A) Direct Alexa → Harmony route utilizing “tell harmony” is probably most reliable as you skip the ST middleman. You also get the added bonus of pause, stop, play, change to a channel, mute, volume up/down. Also, during skill setup, I believe you can setup friendly names for activities & channels. Only issue is i’m not sure what will happen if you group the activities in Alexa for a master Off. ST keeps switch status, Alexa doesn’t so it’s going to send the multiple off commands. Again, unsure how harmony would respond.
B) Alexa → ST → Harmony , assuming you have all the harmony activities setup in ST via the harmony connect app. Grant those switched access to Alexa & you can control individually. If you want a universal turn off command, just setup a routine called harmony(or whatever you want) & have it turn off all harmony ST switches. As long as you follow the below instructions (previously mentioned) , you will have realtime status in ST. That way when the routine tries to shutoff the switches, it will only send the command to harmony for the current ON switch.
I think I will do this, this weekend. Thanks for the detailed response.
Regarding the subwoofer turning on, I don’t think it is a harmony activity programming error. Below is my setup.
I have a AV receiver on, off commands seperately in Harmony. I Have a subwoofer which has just 1 button to turn on and off. So I added the 1 button to the on and off sequence of the AV receiver. When I turn off using the harmony remote, the off command is not issued again if all devices are off. But through smartthings, it seems to work differently. Harmony seems to receive and process an off command. Because all my devices have seperate on and off commands, its fine with them. But the subwoofer having same button, turns on.
My Vizio TV was like this, It would toggle the power. I fixed it by changing the power setting in Harmony. When I originally set it up I followed the guide and selected single power button because that’s what my remote had.
I later, just yesterday, played with this and went into the TV power setup and changed it to an on & off button choice vice the toggle choice. Then selected on for on command and off for off command. Saved it and tested it.
Now Alexa works right in that if the TV is off and I say turn off the TV it stays off, On then turns on the TV and a second on command does not turn off the TV. Even if the TV was previously operated by the regular remote.
Just thought I would share, maybe you can make something like that work for your Subwoofer
Thanks Don. I have done this for all other devices I have, but the subwoofer power commands are something I had to manually teach harmony. It only had 1 button. No way for me to change the setting. Other devices, eventhough they had only 1 button on the remote, harmony already had on and off commands in the database.
Unless his harmony programming has the subwoofer state wrong.
Not a problem with dedicated off/on buttons, but a toggle power would show weird actions.
@sapstar What brand/model subwoofer are you using? Sometimes same mfg could have another code for a dedicated off button from a similar model?
Also, how many times do you see it toggling? Is it just once, or a defined #? Do you see the hub activity light flashing while it is toggling? Just trying to help you cover all bases.
Personally I have only one power toggle item out of my 6 devices, windows media player extender, and I have an occasional sync issue, typically when one of my kids decides to move stuff around & my IR extender doesn’t get a good beam to the unit or a power outage that flips it on or someone flips through its activity & out quickly, as it doesn’t respond to toggle during its startup boot.
In the integration with Alexa, I would bypass ST altogether.
Harmony offers two nice skills – one using native commands for turning on/of devices and the system, and another that allows you to do things like pause/play and turn up/down the volume.
Within the “blue” Harmony app, you can set a device alias for your entire system. That alias could be “Harmony,” if you want to just say “Turn off Harmony.”
If you have the Harmony smart app enables in ST, the cloud will keep your device statuses in sync between ST and Alexa.
