Weekly Update from Alex - 06/24/16

I noticed the same thing and I am looking into it now.

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Did some checking and it seems to be working well again, can’t find a way to get routines to fail (Directly or through an automation). I will monitor it closely though.

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20 minutes ago…

Maybe it’s time to give ‘null’ more permissions.

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@scottinpollock @slagle I am seeing the same error. Apparently it is now intermittent. In the attached screen capture, it failed to disarm “…null is not permitted…” but then armed without issue 2 minutes later. Both times I attempted to trigger the change from a physical keypad (via Button Controller SmartApp)

Occurred at 11:18am Central Time

-Tim

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@slagle Not sure if this is relevant, but I did notice a difference on executing the Hello Home action from a SmartApp vs. manually. With respect to the log entry below, the SmartApp trigger failed while the following Manual trigger worked correctly.

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Thanks all for the details. http://status.smartthings.com was updated to reflect this issue and we just deployed a fix. We are seeing good signs from the fix and are monitoring it now. Stay tuned tot he status page for updates.

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Hi Alex. @alex

Glad to see you’re making headway with the stability improvements.

Whilst I’ve been impacted with the odd outage etc, as others have, I’m confident your team will keep driving to bolster the solution.

I’m equally interested/concerned in the progress being made regarding platform features though. Like most, I’m battling full WAF (wife approval factor) as I slowly implement smart tech into our home. It would really help to know if scene controllers, wall mounted video control panels and other new device types/partner support are on the way.

That helps us address expectations as we piece this together rather than buy a turnkey solution such as control 4. They (WAF) want the polish without that pricetag and don’t care that we can’t tinker with it.

The community is awesome at building new apps or device handlers but I feel we need an uptick from the officially supported camp too.

It’s hard to defend a question about why we can’t choose a four button scene controller as it’s not supported (eg Leviton range) or why we can’t have the blinds she picked out (Lutron) as there’s no partnership.

I’m a big fan of what you’re doing and have invested a great deal or time and money thus far.

Could you kindly update us on what progress is being made to build out the platform not just making it more stable (although we like reading about that too)

Many thanks in advance.
Martin

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If you get blinds from the Lutron Serena range, they work with IFTTT, which gives you indirect integration with SmartThings that is usually sufficient for window coverings. There may be a slight lag introduced because of IFTTT, but that’s not usually a big deal for shades.

The Enerwave SC7 is a 7 button wallmount device that works with SmartThings and is quite popular, although it depends on community-created code.

And the third-party SmartTiles dashboard is an app that can run in any web browser, so it’s easy to use with a wall mount tablet. Again, it’s not officially supported, but it has been featured in the official blog. It’s fully customizable, so you can display only the individual devices that you want to. Also very popular in the community, there’s even a thread just to discuss different hardware options that people use with it.

www.smarttiles.click


The downside to the Enerwave and SmartTiles solutions is that they will not work if either the Internet or the SmartThings cloud are unavailable. So an officially-approved device that could run locally would definitely be better. :sunglasses:

So I’m not disagreeing with your point in any way, just wanted to mention that there are some alternatives that people are using now.

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Thanks @JDRoberts.

I’m sure that will work but I’m quite keen to hear when/if Lutron will be supported. They’re an industry leader in lighting and blinds so it’s only natural to think they will be supported on ST. That’s a fair question to ask.

Wink, Harmony, Echo all support natively so it’s puzzling why Smart Bridge Pro is not supported on ST.

I continue to hear from others in the forum about wanting to leave ST due to stabiliy issues. I’m personally not one of them but if the only way this platform expands is by relying on community amazing efforts then I have an issue in the long run.

Many thanks again.

Martin.

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I agree with your sentiments and this statement except it’s only a problem if the word “only” is the key.

In other words, SmartThings’s likely success will indeed be, in no small way, owed to the “Community’s amazing efforts” and SmartThings’s ability to leverage and appreciate them. SmartThings must do the building, evolving and operating of the most resilient and extensible smart home foundation / platform for developers to be infinitely creative with.

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I think it’s also an issue with manufacturers wanting customers to use their own systems. In lutrons case they require you to use their hub and app for most things unless you control it through iftttt, which even then is severely limited. I know a few other manufacturers who are also following the same mantra, because at the end of it they want you to be invested in their system and not someone else’s.

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Maybe they want to be able to guarantee good user experience and don’t want to deal with supporting users of some third party platform that may or may not be having sporadic issues.
If they concentrate on their system, they can test it, debug it and ensure it works consistently. Allowing integration with another system exposes them to problems that are out of their control. That could be an option in the future once their own system is stable enough and they could/want to spare the resources to work on something else.

True, but at the same time they could have a basic api which allows for the same control. If an integration is provided through an api it reduces the work needed to maintain an integration and most of the work would actually be on the side of whoever is planning the integration. As of now they provide very limited access to their api.

If you want to discuss the details of specific integrations, we should start a new thread, but if you’re referring to Lutron, they do have an open API, many installers use it to include lutron lighting into a home theater set up. But it requires LAN communication which the SmartThings hub does not support.

http://www.lutron.com/TechnicalDocumentLibrary/040249.pdf

If you look at the bridge project that one community member did for his own Lutron devices, the issue wasn’t on the Lutron side.

Thanks JD and all comments.

The point of my initial post was to thank @alex and the ST team for continuing to improve stability but also to request more feedback on feature improvements too.

The ST journey is great, rocky in places, but is ultimately the platform I’m backing as it suits the DIY approach. I would just like to hear we’ve backed the progressive open solution that builds partnerships with all leading vendors. There’s a few obvious commissions in that department as of now (Lutron, Nest, Ring to name a few).

Again, the community is amazing - not only the developers but the regular commenters too - that’s what makes this platform compelling to me. But we need more capabilities from the underlying fabric ands that’s for ST to deliver.

If ST are not going to build out new partnerships or add device types any time soon then let’s enable the great community to do it…eg, If adding proper support for Lutron Smart Bridge Pro was possible, someone would have done it by now. Wink, Hamony, Echo have all done it natively (not via IFTTT) - as @JDRoberts stated, it requires feature capabilities from ST before the community can go to work.

Thanks again for all the feedback
Martin

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You may be disappointed. While “open” is a good thing, and I love the ability to get my fingers between the fan blades of SmartThings, some may see this as risk.

It would appear that both Nest and Chamberlain are unwilling to hand the keys to the kingdom over to SmartThings. And SmartThings is either incapable of or unwilling to implement some of the restraints these prospective partners would like to see.

It’s a bit of a double edged sword, that what I like most about SmartThings, appears to be a barrier for some partnerships and official integrations. And Samsung needs to be very careful here. Yes, Samsung is gonna produce for us, umpteen hours of VR coverage of the Olympics, but only accessible via Samsung devices. This “our way or the highway” has been deeply embedded in their company culture, and I guarantee I am not the only one who realizes this. If they’re not careful (and I’m pretty sure that’s not their long suit), a “works with Samsung” moniker might be something some prospective partners may shy away from.

In any event, community devs have pretty much saved SmartThings bacon as out of the box it is woefully inadequate, yet SmartThings has been paralyzed in cultivating this resource with anything more than token gestures and the proverbial “soon” ETA.

With continued platform issues, and the uncanny ability to drop the ball on practically everything they announce, I don’t have the expectation we’ll see a lot of positives in the short term.

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Woops, didn’t realize Lutron opened their api. Well more manufacturers need to do that. There are so many excellent devices out there, but limited ways to use it.

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Speaking of device handler improvements, the Enerwave ZWN-BPC ceiling mounted z-wave motion sensor still does not pair correctly without workarounds despite being listed in the “add thing” menu. I have several of these devices (and would like to get more, they are great once you manage to get them paired) but they are a real pain to add to my hub right now.

Can we get somebody to look at this device and fix the pairing process?

See thread here: Enerwave ZWN-BPC Z-wave Ceiling Mounted, Battery Powered PIR Sensor

Tagging @Tyler

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