How can I make this work. There is a floor lamp connected with a lifx color bulb and a motion sensor. So when I walk into the room light turn on, I have set to turn off with 1 minute without motion. So far everything works. Problem is that if I’m not moving light will turn off while I’m in that room. I don’t want to set a higher number of minutes to minimize how long it will be on. Is there a better way of doing this? I was thinking even if I have to change modes perphaps… if I want to stay in that room and I see the light turning off every minute can I ask Alexa to set a specific mode where it won’t turn off?
I had that issue in my TV room. I had a lamp that came on when I entered the room, but sometimes when watching TV I would not move for several minutes and the lamp would go off. In my case I just increased the time to an amount that allow the sensor to capture me moving. The down side is if I fall asleep, the lights go off and then when I wake up and move the lights come back on and that’s a bit jarring when you just wake up even with the light dimmed.
I suppose if when in the room if you turn on another device, a TV or perhaps a computer you could create a smart app or use webcore to leave the light on if the power consumption on a plug exceeded a certain power level. If you forget to turn those off the other device then you are in the same boat. You say you have Alexa so just tell her to turn off the lights when you leave the room, that is what I did. I like to use the smart device technology as a backup only if I forget to turn things off myself.
If you dont want more advanced logic than what you’ve got you have no choice but to increase the timeout for the motion sensor. What you’re encountering is a basic problem with motion sensors. They only say yes or no to whether they detect motion.
That said, there’s a LOT of other options for advanced logic. You may want motion detection to happen one way during one portion of a day and completely different at night. Or if the TV is on - ignore the motion sensor entirely. Or…
Create a Virtual Switch called maybe “Lamp Automation”.
Rule: If “Lamp Automation” Switch is on “And” the rest of your rule arguments.
When you want to bypass the light turning off (or on), just say, “Alexa, turn off Lamp Autmoation”.
Pro Tip:
I have a Virtual Switch that acts as a bypass for all of my rooms. I also have a rule that says:
If "Room Automation Stays off for X Hours, then turn back on. This way I don’t forget to turn the automation back on.
Here’s my Turn Automation Back On Piston. A “Little” on the nerdy side but it works for me.
I have a lot of my motion automations based on level. For example, in my bedroom, lack of motion only turns the lights off if they are over 95%. That way if I’m laying down watching TV and have the lights dimmed they won’t turn off automatically. (They also don’t turn on or off in Asleep location mode but that’s beyond what you asked.) I’m performing all of this through webcore. I’ll post the piston when I’m home again.
Thank you guys so much, there is a lot of option and it seem that WebCoRE is the way to go. I’ll be looking more into it when I get home too, and do some homework on how to get it running. I have already watch a tutorial on how to install it… thanks I’ll post more as soon I can work on it
