HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

Posted on
Tue Feb 02, 2021 3:34 pm
DaveL17 offline
User avatar
Posts: 6741
Joined: Aug 20, 2013
Location: Chicago, IL, USA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

I don't know what's causing the variation. I'm on 7.5 and Catalina and my HKB install is working properly (I probably don't use all the features to the extent that some users do). The upgrade did involve some work and repair, but since I did that it's been fine.

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

[My Plugins] - [My Forums]

Posted on
Tue Feb 02, 2021 4:02 pm
jay (support) offline
Site Admin
User avatar
Posts: 18199
Joined: Mar 19, 2008
Location: Austin, Texas

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

GaryL wrote:
So are we at a dead end then?


This user was able to get back up and running under Bug Sur - maybe those steps will help you as well?

I honestly believe that HomeKit can get into a bad state pretty easily, and doing a sorta reset seems to be the solution. I personally don't use HomeKit and HomeKit Bridge so I can't speak to direct experience, only what others have said. My intuition is that even if you do revert everything back the chances are not favorable that it will just start working.

Jay (Indigo Support)
Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn

Posted on
Tue Feb 02, 2021 4:43 pm
GaryL offline
Posts: 8
Joined: Jan 31, 2019

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

You're probably right. I should report a bug to Apple, but in this case they would say I am running a non-authorized configuration and it's not their problem

So maybe my time is better spent leaving Indigo an HKB as is (everything LOOKs to be running) since its working for DaveL and delete my Home and rebuild that. All in All its probably no more work then the down grading experience.

I am not using anything fancy in Homekit at all. I just use the bridge so that my mostly Zwave and some Insteon can be controlled via Siri (and the home app to a lesser extent). I'll check back in when I do all that and let people know if I have any luck.

Posted on
Tue Feb 02, 2021 5:15 pm
Londonmark offline
Posts: 509
Joined: Feb 29, 2012

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

I found a while back that I occasionally had to delete my home in the Home App and start again. It was at that end rather than HKB where the problems arose. It’s a hassle but not crazy to do that. Typically took me about fifteen minutes - and there are other home automation problems that take days to sort. Haven’t had to do it in ages though. All been very stable.

Posted on
Fri Feb 19, 2021 4:39 pm
GaryL offline
Posts: 8
Joined: Jan 31, 2019

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

Sadly, after trying everything ELSE. I ended up deleting my HOME, waiting about 20 mins (just to make sure it synced through iCloud everywhere) and then created a new HOME and added the HomeKit bridge back. Everything showed up.

I then had to read all my other stuff (cameras, thermostats, AppleTV's, Vizio TV's, Homepods, etc). All in all it took me about 2 hours to go through everything, rename stuff, etc. So not something I want to do on a whim.

Really sad if this is an Apple thing, but I can't open a case with them because they don't recognize software bridges as valid, so thats the way it goes.

But I am back in business for now and I won't update my OS or Indigo SW just because any more. I will look at what if anything I get for the trouble.

Posted on
Sat Feb 20, 2021 10:48 am
dstrickler offline
User avatar
Posts: 340
Joined: Oct 08, 2010
Location: Boston, MA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

Please keep us posted if it holds up well. I'd be willing to do the same, but not if there's a good chance it will fail again.

Dave

Posted on
Sat Feb 20, 2021 11:38 am
GaryL offline
Posts: 8
Joined: Jan 31, 2019

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

Been working fine for almost 2 weeks. So I think it's going to stick. The only issue I have had since rebuilding is my Arlo cameras (which connect to HomeKit outside of home bridge). They worked for about a week then stopped. I had to delete just them and re-add and they have been OK so far.

Posted on
Sat Feb 20, 2021 12:12 pm
cuhouse offline
Posts: 144
Joined: Feb 21, 2007
Location: Virginia, USA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

I mainly use Apple’s app to view my HK devices but also use some others just to review. I noticed today that Home+ has a backup option included. It is in Beta but I ran one just to have the option to try it. Hopefully I won’t need it. Here is a link to the developers site where they describe it. https://hochgatterer.me/home+/docs/features/backup/

Indigo 2022.1.2, Big Sur v11.7.1, Dedicated late 2014 Mac Mini, PowerLinc 2413U.

Posted on
Mon Sep 27, 2021 3:20 pm
rbdubz3 offline
User avatar
Posts: 224
Joined: Sep 18, 2016
Location: San Diego, CA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

Anyone have the magic sequence to get the HomeKit bridge working in the Home app? I had been running just fine for a couple of years - then recently was troubleshooting some mismatch in Home app on iOS vs MacOSX, and ended up deleting the 'Home' on the iOS Home.app.. Now iOS Home.app doesn't appear to see the Bridge at all in the 'Add Accessory' flow on my iPhone 11.. Maybe Apple is clamping down on these?

One note here - I had a wild idea to try this out on a old iPhone6, thinking maybe I'd get lucky with the older software. It actually worked once partially - as I have so many devices/virtuals mapped via HKB, my Indigo setup uses 2 different Bridges. Using the old iPhone 6 I was only able to load the device mappings for one of the bridge. So I went back and deleted the Home again from iOS Home.app, hoping to see if I could map both Bridges.. After this, I can't get anything working via the older iPhone6 .. Arrgghh - I guess I shoulda left well enuf alone :(

I automate because I am lazy :D - My Plugins: https://forums.indigodomo.com/viewforum.php?f=309

Posted on
Mon Sep 27, 2021 4:48 pm
DaveL17 offline
User avatar
Posts: 6741
Joined: Aug 20, 2013
Location: Chicago, IL, USA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

I recently lost my ability to get Actions to work, although Devices will still work. I reset everything, including deleting HKB and all preferences and caches and reinstalled. Nothing I could find would bring the Actions back.

I decided to move everything to the Home Remote app and get Siri control through the Shortcuts app. IMO, besides Siri control, there's nothing compelling about Apple's Home app anyway.

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

[My Plugins] - [My Forums]

Posted on
Tue Sep 28, 2021 12:33 pm
rbdubz3 offline
User avatar
Posts: 224
Joined: Sep 18, 2016
Location: San Diego, CA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

@DaveL17 - so far with HomeKit and HKB, all I've ever used is device mappings - not any Actions per-se.. Can you describe your setup in a bit more detail? I'm familiar with the iOS 'Remote' app, but not for mapping to Indigo devices.

BTW - are you able to re-initialize a Home to pull device from Indigo and HKB? My guess is that Apple is now blocking these integrations. But if others can still get this HKB back maybe all isn't lost and I'll keep trying ;)

I automate because I am lazy :D - My Plugins: https://forums.indigodomo.com/viewforum.php?f=309

Posted on
Tue Sep 28, 2021 2:01 pm
DaveL17 offline
User avatar
Posts: 6741
Joined: Aug 20, 2013
Location: Chicago, IL, USA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

@rbdubz3

Thing one: The Home Remote app that I'm using has a fair bit of Indigo integration built in. The UI is a bit unusual, but once you get the hang of it, it works really well. After you establish a Device or Action within the app, it's one click to add the device to iOS Shortcuts (with included Siri integration). It has GeoFencing, a widget, and Apple Watch, and Apple TV integrations. It also does:

  • HTTP GET,
  • Milight,
  • LIFX,
  • WeMo,
  • TCP/UDP, and
  • Multi Action.

If you have any questions or want more details, just holler.

Thing Two: I reset everything just the other day and was able to pull in the HKB hub and Indigo devices. The devices appeared to work 100%. I was able to pull in Actions, but those didn't work at all. Could be I got "lucky". There were a few Python errors when I did a clean install of HKB, but they didn't appear to be fatal. I didn't look under the hood to see if I could repair them. I don't think the errors had anything to do with the Actions not working, but that's just a guess. I was using HKB mostly to use Siri to fire Actions, so I was dead in the water at that point.

IMG_7E3E4C1640D0-1 copy.jpeg
IMG_7E3E4C1640D0-1 copy.jpeg (132.94 KiB) Viewed 2473 times

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

[My Plugins] - [My Forums]

Posted on
Tue Sep 28, 2021 3:57 pm
rbdubz3 offline
User avatar
Posts: 224
Joined: Sep 18, 2016
Location: San Diego, CA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

@DaveL17 - thanks for the info on the 'Home Remote' - I'll check this out. In regards to Apple Home app and HKB - when you mention 'Reset Everything' - does this mean you removed the 'Home' in iOS Home app? Or maybe you removed all items from the HKB Bridge device panel in Indigo ? Or maybe even just deleted the HKB Bridge devices entirely and re-created them?

BTW - so far all I have tried is deleting the 'Home' in the iOS app.. Nothing on the Indigo side other than removing some outdated/unneeded devices from my 2 Bridges. And yeah maybe I went a little overboard mapping devices/virtual devices (over 100 total) so I can use them in the iOS Home app. But at this point I'm dead in the water - and willing to wipe all the HKB in Indigo and redo fresh if it helps

I automate because I am lazy :D - My Plugins: https://forums.indigodomo.com/viewforum.php?f=309

Posted on
Tue Sep 28, 2021 5:15 pm
DaveL17 offline
User avatar
Posts: 6741
Joined: Aug 20, 2013
Location: Chicago, IL, USA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

I deleted and recreated *everything*.

Disabled the HKB plugin.
Deleted the HKB hub device in Indigo.
Deleted the HKB plugin and preferences file.
Deleted the hub in iOS Home.app
Restarted the Indigo server.
Restarted the Home.app
Downloaded and installed a new copy of the HKB plugin.
Created a new HKB hub device.
Linked the hub in Home.app.

I re-did the whole shooting match.

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

[My Plugins] - [My Forums]

Posted on
Tue Sep 28, 2021 5:40 pm
rbdubz3 offline
User avatar
Posts: 224
Joined: Sep 18, 2016
Location: San Diego, CA

Re: HomeKit Bridge is no longer seen by Home app

@daveL13 - thanks for the tip - wiped out my 2 HKB devices in Indigo, disabled/re-enabled the HKB plugin, added a single new virtual device to a new HKB. Started clean on the iOS Home app as well.. Worked first time and I could find the new HKB ! Thanks again!

I automate because I am lazy :D - My Plugins: https://forums.indigodomo.com/viewforum.php?f=309

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests

cron