This can't be said enough. I have zero dashboards and no voice control in the house yet everything 'just works' and my wife is happy. We rarely look at the HA app to control anything. It's gotten to the point that occasionally my wife leaves the bathroom light on and later goes "oh right, that one's not automatic"
Agreed, my wife has no interest in dashboards etc, but theres loads of things that do make our lives easier, motion activated lights in high traffic areas, we're getting more sensors etc, for things like our drying cupboard humidity.
Which means you have no control over anything in your house, like lighting. I guess that's fine if you always use the same lights every time, but there are very few places in my house where that applies, I guess it would work in the bathroom, sometimes.
Which means you have no control over anything in your house, like lighting.
Hah, that's dead wrong, I have complete control over everything. The switches work like regular switches so guests can use them without even knowing they're smart. Not all lights turn on/off automatically, some are only turned on (ussually through the app, almost never physically unless it's a guest) when extra lighting is needed. Some lights turn on always (closet lights when closet doors open) and some turn on sometimes (kitchen under-cabinet lights at night or when cloudy/etc during the day). Some even turn on with specific variables like the kitchen ceiling lights when the stove turns on as an example.
EDIT: just a note on the bathroom, never automate those. Nothing aggravates everyone more than the lights turning off while pooping or showering.
EDIT: just a note on the bathroom, never automate those. Nothing aggravates everyone more than the lights turning off while pooping or showering.
True dat, although if my kids can't be arsed to turn lights off after them then they will deal with the consequences. We have 3 bathrooms, and the "kids bathroom" is the only one I automate the lights on because they were just ALWAYS on. Now the lights turn off 10 minutes after they're turned on like the ones at work unless the button is long-pressed.
The ones at work were motion-triggered so I used to keep a bouncy ball in my pocket. When they went off I would lob that ball under the door of the cubicle to flip the lights and get another 10 minutes of Reddit, then just washed the ball while I washed my hands.
Gotta meet in the middle me thinks. We have motion sensors in the bathroom/landing/front doorway/kitchen. The former 3 work great, the latter required a bit of tinkering, (had to increase the on period the more it detects as you could be eating and it wouldn't detect motion), but I am probably going to try a bit of machine learning there to really get a good automation.
However, I just can't automate our other rooms (ml might be able to but eh oh), it would be really difficult without extra sensors as well which just aren't worth the effort.
Just about what works for you and not strangers in the internet tbh.
Like I said, it's about what works for you as an individual. There's loads of automation products out there but tbh there all fairly simple, like motion activated lights etc. Any more than that and you need either an incredible amount of granular detail about a customer, or for them to be willing to spend a lot of time configuring it.
I think the latter is probably more common in this sub, and that's probably because it's also a hobby.
The simple automations I've got at home are Phillips hue motion lights... Those were such little effort I think my wife set them up, we've had them for a couple years and have been so good. The more complicated ones are me doing it for fun, I don't expect an ROI per se, but it's cool to have something working. I mention ML as I'm interested in it anyway, might as well give it a go, it might make a far superior model than I have for occupation detection in rooms like my kitchen that have multiple use.
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u/jackd90 Oct 05 '20
This can't be said enough. I have zero dashboards and no voice control in the house yet everything 'just works' and my wife is happy. We rarely look at the HA app to control anything. It's gotten to the point that occasionally my wife leaves the bathroom light on and later goes "oh right, that one's not automatic"