New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone else?

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Questions about hardware that can be controlled by Indigo (but not through the interfaces and plugins listed). If Indigo doesn't support some bit of hardware you're interested in, and you don't find a 3rd Party Plugin for it, add it to this forum. Be sure to include links to as much information as you can find about it.

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Posted on
Wed Jan 14, 2015 8:25 pm
chobo offline
Posts: 126
Joined: Dec 08, 2013
Location: USA

New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone else?

All,

We're in the middle of another cold winter down south and the frustration of dealing with a Trane z-wave thermostat that only "knows" the temperature of one room has finally driven me to search for something better. I did some homework and decided to give the ecobee3 a try. So far, my experience has been mostly positive with only a few minor frustrations along the way. And that brings me to a few questions:

Is anyone else using the ecobee3 (or another ecobee thermostat) alongside Indigo?
If so, have you had any luck with the ecobee api and Indigo? (I definitely lack the skills to build a full-fledged plugin, but I'm working on some cURL commands to communicate with the t-stat via their API)
After a quick search, I noticed there has been some discussion about an ecobee plugin (http://forums.indigodomo.com/viewtopic.php?f=63&t=10930&p=86205&hilit=ecobee#p86205, but it seems the status of this project is unknown.

And finally, curious to know if anyone has built their own temp-averaging smart thermostat via scripting?

Looking forward to hearing any and all experiences!

Best,
chobo997
Last edited by chobo on Wed Jan 14, 2015 10:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Posted on
Wed Jan 14, 2015 8:40 pm
jay (support) offline
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Joined: Mar 19, 2008
Location: Austin, Texas

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

I've not heard of anyone actively working on a plugin, though one would be nice. We don't have the bandwidth to tackle it at present.

Jay (Indigo Support)
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Posted on
Thu Jan 15, 2015 7:37 am
pvrfan offline
Posts: 53
Joined: Apr 19, 2011
Location: Near Toronto, Canada

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

Lots of Ecobee discussion at:

http://www.smarthomehub.net/forums/

Craig

Posted on
Wed Jan 21, 2015 7:19 pm
moscomedve offline
Posts: 34
Joined: Apr 02, 2012

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

Would it be possible to modify the Nest plugin to talk to the Ecobee web service? I believe it was written in Python. Even just the most basic functionality would be useful.

Posted on
Tue Aug 04, 2015 8:02 am
rapamatic offline
Posts: 276
Joined: Aug 03, 2015
Location: Glencoe, IL

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

Let me just throw my name in as someone else interested in getting an ecobee plugin working. Happy to help this process in any way.

Posted on
Fri Aug 07, 2015 4:32 pm
koensayr offline
Posts: 90
Joined: Jul 10, 2013

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

I would be interested as well. The Naitive Smarthome one is just plain terrible.

Posted on
Wed Sep 09, 2015 4:25 am
bbruck offline
Posts: 343
Joined: Oct 05, 2008

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

I just purchased an Ecobee3. For me the compelling reason was remote thermometers. We have a sunroom that we stay in late afternoon - evening that's 5-8 degrees hotter than the hallway where the thermostat is, and during the week on the days when my wife works (out of the home) I'm downstairs in my home office which is 8 degrees cooler than the hallway. The idea of having a thermostat that adjusts the temp based on the rooms that are occupied simply made 1000% more sense than any other approach.

I would like to see a plugin for the Ecobee3 for sure.

That said, I would probably continue to use their own app, as I often take a look at the temperatures in the various rooms and utilization graphs.

Increasingly, I'm finding that I like to use other apps for smart devices - in fact, I devote page 2 of my iPhone to automation apps. As a for-instance, while I can control my Hue devices somewhat awkwardly from Indigo, I like having a couple of the Hue apps. Similarly for Netatmo - I like being able to see what the rainfall was during the past day, and just get a little more reporting than is possible through the API.

Posted on
Mon Oct 05, 2015 1:07 am
koensayr offline
Posts: 90
Joined: Jul 10, 2013

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

Might as well +1 a request for an Ecobee3 Plugin. So much so, I'd offer to Spondsor the author by purchasing them an Ecobee3 unit myself!

Posted on
Thu Oct 22, 2015 11:29 pm
Jann offline
Posts: 120
Joined: Mar 12, 2006
Location: Auburndale, FL

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

I just got the ecobee3... Got tired of the number of times Nest has gone down with my thermostat.

Count me in with the request for control of Ecobee3!

There *is* a public API at https://www.ecobee.com/home/developer/a ... otes.shtml

Wondering how hard it would be to do a plugin a la "Yet Another Nest Thermostat Plugin"

Jann

Posted on
Thu Oct 22, 2015 11:36 pm
kw123 offline
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Posts: 8333
Joined: May 12, 2013
Location: Dallas, TX

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

As I understand it to change anything on the ecobee system you need to connect to the cloud. What is the difference to the NEST?

I have a simple TRANE + a regular temp sensor (any one works, e.g. Scientific Oregon + RFXCOM or insteon or z- wave ..)

Then a simple trigger or schedule to check the temps and set the thermostat accordingly .

What am I missing?

Karl

Posted on
Sun Jan 24, 2016 7:32 am
bbruck offline
Posts: 343
Joined: Oct 05, 2008

Re: New ecobee3 and a handful of remote sensors... Anyone el

I've had the Ecobee3 for a couple months now and LOVE it. We have a 1960 two-story house, with the living area (primarily the Sun Room) upstairs and my Office/ManCave/RecRoom downstairs. The old thermostat was in the hall. A great Carrier ultimate thermo, but why bother? The temperature in the hall would be 70, while downstairs it might be 66, the sun room 66, the bedrooms 68 and 72, etc.

I put sensors in each bedroom, the downstairs office, and the sun room. Now the following happens:
- At night the temperature is the average of the two bedrooms.
- During the day, the temperature is the average of (only) the occupied rooms.
- All the other typical bells and whistles of a smart set-back thermostat.

YMMV, but IF your thermostat is in a room other than the room you occupy, and/or IF there are wide temperature variations in often-occupied rooms in your house, the Ecobee3 is the way to go. Remote thermostats are a godsend.

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