Dealing with devices that don't return their state

Hi Glenn,

I have a LightwaveRF devices that I connect with the RFXCom plug-in. They don't report back their states which means that if someone turns one on manually, HomeKit thinks it's still off and a voice command (or shortcuts command) to turn them off will fail. Is there a way to force an on or off command regardless of what HomeKit thinks the state is?

Mark

Hi Glenn,

I have a LightwaveRF devices that I connect with the RFXCom plug-in. They don't report back their states which means that if someone turns one on manually, HomeKit thinks it's still off and a voice command (or shortcuts command) to turn them off will fail. Is there a way to force an on or off command regardless of what HomeKit thinks the state is?

Mark

Hi

That would likely be an issue.

There is no easy way to send off when device is already off from within homekit. Well there probably is, but will be a bit of code change and UI to select probably difficult. Wouldn’t be that keen to implement… although will have a think. What Homekit device? - switch only? (Might be able to add a new selector when back just for this)

Alternatively - could create a Virtual Device and add that to HomeKit. With Action Group that always sends off/on regardless of state. That would likely achieve the same outcome.


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Thanks for quick response.

Same issue arose with the C4W plug-in and webdeck suggested a small change to the plugin code that addressed it. See this thread - viewtopic.php?f=191&t=21311&p=167247#p167247

Appreciate your plug-in is very different so probably not that helpful!

This is not a very major problem at all and I have a very small number of devices for which it matters - just wall sockets , so yes - switches. I'd be very happy to implement the workaround you suggest but not quite sure I understand how what it would work. Probably being dense...

Hi

I’ll have a look and see what options there are.

Whilst the plugin could always send commands regardless of state of device (currently it doesn’t - and that is the library preference it would seem) I’m not sure that homekit/Siri would (always) do the same.

There is a lot of ‘processing’ that homekit app seems to do - which changes with OS’s. Eg. On for homekit, is different to on using Siri. Sometimes Siri sends commands that don’t exist and homekit is supposed to figure it out. So it is possible that if homekit/Siri knows device is off, and you tell it to be off - that command may not make it to the plugin to action (either now, or in the future)

Glenn


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Thanks Glenn. That's very kind.

I also have this issue with multiple half-smart devices, mostly ones whose IQ got raised by a Bond Bridge. Solar lights, ceiling fans, stuff like that. Four different devices in total.

Hi

Just noticed the above reply - as was to busy adding support for resending on/off regardless of current device state reported!

Try 0.3.9

Should achieve what you wish I would hope? Give it a try.

On testing, & reviewing logic/code found it would actually get very little use as can't send off to device already off within App.
(only if state isn't reported correctly). Also currently do the same for locks..

Alternatively:
You could just use an Action Group - Action Groups within Homekit are "activate only". They don't have a device, or state to report to HomeKit.
Meaning that within homekit they act as a "momentary switch" - press on, runs action group and then immediately turns off.


Glenn

Thank you! Was just going to post something to request this feature, but it is working in 0.3.9. Just installed this but had what I thought was the latest, 0.3.3. Seems to work so far with my X10 setup. I can now turn off X10 Lights with Siri which were manually turned on by the switch (and Indigo didn't know they were on). This was an issue with HomeKit Bridge also, but the author posted a manual code work-around to prevent it from looking at the current state of the switch / light before issuing the command.

o

Sorry Glenn - probably being dense. Where is the link to 0.3.9?

Found it and it works. Thank you!