Best Practice For Vacations

Posted on
Wed Apr 26, 2017 6:00 am
Sharek326 offline
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Posts: 377
Joined: Jul 20, 2014
Location: Lansford, PA

Best Practice For Vacations

Good Morning,

Later next month my family and I are planning a vacation for several days. This is the first time I plan to be a away since I setup Indigo and was wondering if anyone had any best practices on schedules or triggers they use to make the house look occupied? My current plan is to just setup a few schedules to fire off lights at various times. Is there a better way or a plugin I may have missed to accomplish this?

Posted on
Wed Apr 26, 2017 6:19 am
DaveL17 offline
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Joined: Aug 20, 2013
Location: Chicago, IL, USA

Re: Best Practice For Vacations

My current way is more manual than I'd like, but it does work well. I use a vacation variable as a flag (I also have flags for home/away, and holidays).

That's interpreted one of two ways:
  1. I have Python scripts that are tied to systems (like climate control). The script checks the variable and behaves accordingly. These scripts govern the whole house at once.
  2. I have different scenes (combination of Schedules and Actions) that do things differently whether vacation is true or false. To create those, I think about each light individually. For example, my bedside lamp turns on at our typical bedtime (+/- 10 minutes for a set duration) when vacation is true, but I work it manually when we're home.
I might have the whole thing more automated, but the wife likes to at least feel like she has some manner of control over our house when we're in it. :D

I came here to drink milk and kick ass....and I've just finished my milk.

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Posted on
Wed Apr 26, 2017 8:00 am
johnpolasek offline
Posts: 911
Joined: Aug 05, 2011
Location: Aggieland, Texas

Re: Best Practice For Vacations

The only thing I specifically tie to a vacation variable is the thermostat, but I have occupancy triggers that automatically make the house look occupied ANY time we are gone... The various bedroom and bathroom "morning" routines always trigger unless we set the "Let<Whoever>Sleep" variables; those are our alarm clocks... the kitchen and living room morning routines always fire period. In the evenings Indigo looks at the various bluetooth beacons we carry and have sunset+randomize triggers to turn bedroom lights on and off for whoever isn't home as well the living room and kitchen if the total family occupancy count is 0 with "cancel delayed actions" on them in the beacon detection triggers that unlock doors when we arrive home... whether we are gone for an evening or a month.

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