All,
I’m pretty new to smartthings so just learning. My question is I wanted a virtual dimmer switch so I can control a group of lights with dimming functionality. Created the virtual dimmer and the smart lighting. Key Smart lighting setup items below. I can turn on and off the lights but when I try to dim the lights they don’t. Am I missing something?
What do you want to do? Turn on and Set Level.
Turn on & set lights when? Turned on.
Switch set to one of my virtual dimmers.
I don’t think Smart Lighting has any feature to mirror the Dimmer Level of one Switch to others. Set Level is a single fixed value.
Look up the add on SmartApp “Trend Setter” instead.
I use the “mirror behavior” option in Smart lighting for 3 lights in my living room. Works well.
Thanks… will look into that.
SmartLighting-Mirror, it works well eventually,
but there is lag and it can lead to short-term hunting due different ramp rates, but slave devices eventually arrive at the same level as the master. In my environment I am getting 1-5 seconds lag. I think occasionally it just misses the mirror request completely.
Better than a seperate smart-app .
That’s interesting because I never see that behavior. I see the lights turn off at slightly different times. I can see it but couldn’t measure it with a stop watch, the off delay is that small. FYIY, I’m using GE zigbee smart bulbs.
Trend Setter all day. SmartLighting has always been laggy for me…
Are we talking about virtual dimmer to physical dimmer? Or Physical to Physical?
I will double check tonight, but I think from virtual to physical dimmer is instant using smart lighting and virtual dimmer.
Also, for physical do you mean something like hue lights or GE zwave. Hue Lights return instant status, GE Zwave dimmers do not report instant status. And in contradiction to what everyone else seems to state, the new GE Zwave dimmers are also NOT instant, they are polled or something
All of my switches and most of my bulbs are dimmable. I used to use WINK and they had the ability to group lights. That grouping allowed for dimming of the group. ST does not (no issue) but I’m trying to mimic the functionality of grouping dimmable bulbs/switches. I used the Virtual Dimmer but it does not dim. Only sets to a specific level at best. The main reasons I’m looking for this grouping functionality are 1) I can use ST to group vs something like Alexa and 2) If I create flows in example (strinify) if I want multiple lights in a room to be included in the flow I have add each one vs the group.
It seems almost instant.
I have a virtual dimmer controlling one hue light, 2 plugin zwave dimmer outlets for lamps, and one in wall Ge zwave dimmer
Dragging the slider of the virtual dimmer in the SmartThings UI changes the lights up and down.
All 3 together
For voice control Echo has a simple grouping function that lets you dim lights together. I use it for my Bali blinds as well. Saying " Alexa, set the dining room shades to 47%" is amazing and very useful.
For working straight from ST or ActionTiles, I use a set of ST scenes or the ST Virtual Switch feature to program ST actions, physical buttons or AT tiles. I haven’t been able to get the Virtual Dimmer to work for me.