I am bumping up this thread, as the use of IFTTT has literally exploded in recent weeks since SmartThings channel has been ROCK SOLID for a month now. Great work SmartThings team. @slagle , please share with your team. The recent efforts are paying off. Please keep up the good work!
So, I am making use of IFTTT to integrate the following non ST devices.
Automatic for various driving related activities
Abode for arming/disarming and 433mhz sensors
Nest Cam for motion and sound detection
Arlo cam for motion detection
Life 360 for various locations within my circle
Rachio for some sprinklers control
Alexa for texting shopping lists
Wemo Coffee for brewing my morning coffee
Just got an Automatic for my wifeâs car this week and love it. My Sonos will tell me when she made it to work & tell me when sheâs leaving work with the help of IFTTT. (That helps me to figure out when to start the grill for dinner.)
I was hoping to have the ability to ask Alexa how much gas was in her car, but her cars computer doesnât have that capability.
Yeah, my Alexa integration lacks substance. We both have the same make and model, so is pointless to ask Alexa anything, because I donât know which car sheâs talking about. Luckily, I can ask Alexa via âmy homeâ skill and sheâll tell me which car is in the garage.
I donât know about that recipe, but routines work fine as long as you have associated them to a virtual switch.
There is a smart app in the marketplace which is specifically for that purpose. Itâs very popular and has been around for a long time so that it uses the older terminology âhome phraseâ instead of âroutineâ but itâs the same thing.
To use it, first create a virtual switch.
Authorize its use in IFTTT.
Then do the following:
One) open the mobile app and go to the marketplace section.
choose smart apps, then lights and switches, and scroll down until you see the following.
install that smart APP and just follow its directions.
Once you have the virtual switch associated to a routine, you can then use it in an IFTTT recipe.
mdawson
(Different Computers. So happy with Indigo.)
42
My new uses are all about getting ST sensors to report to my much, much better but not Zigbee compatible Indigo home automation system. Plus controlling a few non-Hue compatible lights: a Sengeld, a Sylvania IQlight, two OSRAM Gardenlights.
So Indigo can natively send a URL request to the Maker Channel of IFTTT, which then tells ST to do something. That last part works most of the timeâIFTTT says it did its stuff, but sometimes my hub ignores it. Typical!
Gotta use the Maker channel because IFTTT has never responded to Indigodomoâs request for info on how to develop an Indigo channel.
Also, I use IFTTTâs ST channel to Gmail to Indigoâs Better Email Plugin to receive state changes from the Iris contact sensors I already owned from when I used ST but that arenât compatible with Indigo. Surprisingly fast response there, but thatâs because the Better Email Plugin supports IDLE SMTP connections.
It has been a week or less, and it is working pretty well, to the point Iâll start really incorporating both sides of it into more automation routines now.
Coming up I expect to start using Automatic to tell Indigo Iâm home, and iOS Location too.
We are absolutely thrilled to bring the SmartThings community the first video doorbell connected to SmartThings! You now have the ability to receive triggers from SkyBell HDâs button and motion sensor AND send commands to SkyBell HD!
SkyBell HD was named âBest Video Doorbellâ by CNET and WireCutter - and is the same version partnered with Honeywell, Alarm.com and Nest. Weâve helped customers prevent break-ins while the burglar was on their doorstep - even when theyâre not home.
Weâre thrilled to join the SmartThings platform and continue to help make safer homes and neighborhoods.
Only the SkyBell HD is compatible with SmartThings.
I use it for 4 things. Lock and unlock deadbolts as you canât through just Alexia like bulbs and switches. And I have one to trigger all sirens and turn off all. I just say trigger panic and it sounds. Or trigger back door lock or trigger back door unlock. It tells me its sending that to IF and few seconds later it does what I ask!!!
Since this post was split, and some were moved to another unrelated topic - I will post this again here, just for documentation in the case that it could give someone else an ideaâŠ
âSo, my use of IFTTT is pretty simple. We use a fan for white noise when we sleep, which is connected to a Z-Wave outlet. We also have an Aria scale (Fitbit has an IFTTT channel). So, since my wife is usually the last one our of bed in the morning, when she steps on the scale to weigh herself (every morning), the fan turns off when a new weight is logged.â
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bamarayne
(Jason "The Enabler" as deemed so by @Smart)
47
What kind of delays do you experience with ifttt? Iâve always had huge ones that just made it unacceptable for use.
I use IFTTT all the time since thatâs how I do voice control of my home entertainment devices. At my house itâs a pretty consistent eight second delay, sometimes a little less. But I know it varies a lot from house to house.
Also, channels which rely on certain kinds of polling have much longer delays. I have found that anything that relies on the SmartThings channel reporting a switch going on/off as the âifâ definitely can have a longer delay than if SmartThings is the âthat.â
Also a text as the âifâ processes much faster than an email as the âif.â
So I use SmartThings as the âthatâ in IFTTT recipes. But if I use it as the âifâ I expect a much longer delay.
So, my use of IFTTT is pretty simple. We use a fan for white noise when we sleep, which is connected to a Z-Wave outlet. We also have an Aria scale (Fitbit has an IFTTT channel). So, since my wife is usually the last one our of bed in the morning, when she steps on the scale to weigh herself (every morning), the fan turns off when a new weight is logged.
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bamarayne
(Jason "The Enabler" as deemed so by @Smart)
51
Have you thought about setting up a speaker and when a new weight is registered it starts screaming? ? Iâve got to do that!
I am not sure exactly how high the WAF would be on that integration⊠although I have used my Sonos Connect Amp (with outside speakers) to tell our dog âNOâ when I saw him rolling around in plants (watching from our outside cameras). I just push a buttonâŠ
He was really confused to hear his name and a command in a very loud, very nice female voice
My wife threatened to get one of those hotel honor bar weight sensors to put in my beer fridge. Thank God sheâs technology illiterate! If she could figure it out, every time I got a beer, my sonos would announce. Murray got a beer!
This came up in another thread, but I just wanted to mention that in my experience using SmartThings as the âthatâ in an IFTTT recipe works much more quickly than using ST as the âif.â
Lag varies for different people, but at my house ST as a âthatâ is a pretty typical 8 seconds, but ST as an âifâ might be 10 minutes.
The maker channel is just one of many channel/services on IFTTT. Its purpose is to let you contact IFTTT via the Internet. The maker channel can be accessed by either a get or a put.
In this sense, it serves the same purpose as the phone channel or the text channel â â itâs a way to let you âcall-inâ to IFTTT as a trigger for another event. Only youâre doing it from the Internet.
This is most useful when there is a device that is capable of making or receiving these kinds of web requests that does not have its own IFTTT service/channel. Or when youâre building your own device but you donât want to pay for a special IFTTT channel for it.
SmartThings as the That (Having an outside service contact SmartThings via the IFTTT maker channel)
If you have something that already does these kinds of web requests, such as an IBeacon app, then you just set that up to send the code to the IFTTT maker channel as the âifâ and use the regular SmartThings IFTTT channel as the âthat.â For example, thatâs how I use Ibeacons to trigger SmartThings events.
The BeaconSandwich website explains how to do this with their app:
This is how you use IFTTT to connect a device that doesnât have its own IFTTT channel/service with SmartThings.
BeaconSandwich doesnât have its own IFTTT channel/service, but it doesnât need one, because it can communicate via the maker channel.
SmartThings as the IF ( having an outside service receive a put via the IFTTT maker channel )
If you want to have a SmartThings event like a virtual switch coming on then trigger a put to an outside service you can use the SmartThings IFTTT channel as the IF and the maker channel as the that.
SmartThings sending to the IFTTT make a channel as the If
Itâs possible by setting up a service manager smartapp to send an outgoing message to the IFTTT maker channel which would become an if in an IFTTT recipe/applet , but presumably thatâs obvious if you already know how to write a service manager. And thereâs not really much point, because you could accomplish exactly the same thing by flipping a virtual switch in the smartthings channel instead, unless youâre trying to also send some additional parameters, in which case most of the time you wouldnât be using IFTTT.
The first two methods above would be more likely to be used by non-coders. Theyâre just using IFTTT as the glue between two disparate systems, for example between the beaconplus app and SmartThings.
In almost all cases if the maker channel is going to be useful for non-coders, the device manufacturer will have included instructions, as in the beacon sandwich example above, for how to use it. Itâs not something you typically just use on your own unless youâre building your own devices.
Most often you see it referenced with something like
Q. Does your device have an IFTTT service/channel?
A. No, but you can use the IFTTT Maker Channel to achieve integration. { and then instructions for how to do that.}
If youâre not a programmer and youâre not trying to use a device which is telling you to use the maker channel, youâre not likely to need it.