USe of Unique device names in Indigo

Hi,

I just was playing arround with homebridge. Thanks for the detailed Howto to set it up. That was great and it ran instantly.

Unfortunately Indigo insists on unique device names. I have about 30 Lamps in my house. Lets say about 6 ceiling lamps, 5 Table Lamps etc.
How do you address them? Am I missing something.
I know that Siri is able to distinguish between rooms, but still in Indigo every device hast to have an unique name.
How are you getting arround this, guys?

I suppose you are not saying "switch on ceiling lamp 1 in the bedroom?"
Any help greatly appreciated.

Wilhelm

I have a mix of names.

Some are based on the device type so I can keep them straight, since they use different interfaces: Great Room Link and Great Room Lux. But also Corner Hue, Bedroom Hue, Dresser, Stone Lamp, Bar Lamp. Do you just have a bunch of things named "Lamp" or "Bulb"?

Also those names are easily changed and all references in Indigo to them are preserved, since Indigo "really" uses the device ID. At least as far as I can tell.

Also those names are easily changed and all references in Indigo to them are preserved, since Indigo "really" uses the device ID. At least as far as I can tell.

Not quite.

Internally Indigo uses the ID, but if you've written any scripts and used the name instead of the ID, you'll need to change the name in the script - or ideally change it to ID whilst you're at it.

Ah!

But just in scripts, right? If I have triggers, or action groups, stuff built in the UI, and change a device name, things don't break, right?

Ah!

But just in scripts, right? If I have triggers, or action groups, stuff built in the UI, and change a device name, things don't break, right?

Correct.

So, let me summarize:
You are living with it.

I find it at least a bit odd, that there are sceenes, rooms etc which you can associate with the devices but still you have to have a unique name for each device all over the house.

Honestly I find this is a real dealbreaker to use siri with it.
Just my 2ct.

"You are living with it."

Um, what? It isn't anything I find any kind of a limit! If and when I install Home Bridge, I'll consider it a feature that if I say "turn on the light" it doesn't turn on ALL the lights. And it doesn't seem too much to say "turn on the counter lights."

I still don't understand what it is you're upset about. You still haven't answered my question:

Do you just have a bunch of things named "Lamp" or "Bulb"?

Sorry, I'm not upset (maybe you misunderstood, English is not my native language so maybe something came out wrong? )
I just want to understand what the designer of homekit (Apple) was thinking.
Let me make an example:

I have 3 ceiling lamps, one in the bedroom, one in the living room an one in my office.
Natuarally I would tend to say "turn on the ceiling lamp in the office" or " turn on the ceiling lamp in the living room".
Unfortunately Indigo as well as Homekit insist on a unique name for each device all over the house.

This seems to be quite odd, it would be the same when "Finder" would insist on a unique name for a file over all directories, meaning you can't have the same filename in more than one directory?

Maybe I understand something completely wrong or homekit is just made for installations with a few devices.

Cheers
Wilhelm

No problem.

Maybe it's a grammar or syntax difference between the languages.

Is it awkward to say "turn off the office ceiling lamp" instead of "turn off the ceiling lamp in the office"?

See, Office Ceiling Lamp could be the Indigo name of the device. Büro-Deckenleuchte

For that matter, you could name it "The Ceiling Lamp in the Office"! Die Deckenleuchte I'm Büro

(Sorry if you're Dutch or Scandinavian, I can't tell from the name.)

I think what @Umtauscher is saying is that Homekit recognizes rooms, therefore, you can have a device called "Ceiling Light" in the office and a device called "Ceiling Light" in the bedroom. Then with Siri, you can say "Turn on ceiling light in the bedroom." and that's the only one that would turn on. You could have many devices called "ceiling light" as long as they were in different rooms. With Indigo, even though you may have folders for rooms, the software doesn't distinguish folders as separate* and requires unique names. So given the above example, you would have to name the devices "Office Ceiling Light" and "Bedroom Ceiling Light". Then you could say "Turn on office ceiling light."

Yes, Indigo requires distinct device names. A primary reason is because you can refer to devices by name in scripts and if two devices were named the same thing, then the command would go to both of them.

Dave

* (for the purposes of device naming.)

Thanks, thats exactly what I meant.
Such things happen, when you have two unique names for one object.
Some reference them by their id and some by their name.
This simply isn't ' proper design and it seems Apple went the same way with Homekit.
I tried to rename the alias of a device in the homekit app and it didn't work either because the api refuse because there is a 'similar name' already existing which seems to state that they are also treating the device name as unique.

So I think, I have to let go of trying to address every single device with Siri. I find it useless if everybody has to learn every unique name of more than 40 devices. I understand that it's more simple in English than in German, because the room names tend to get longer and I simply refuse to prefix every device with the room name , which is pretty redundant. Before I tried homekit, I simply put the devicenumber in front of the name but this is silly when you have to use it for voice commands.
So I would rather rely on actions or scenes then.

Thanks for your help.
Cheers
Wilhelm