Input required: flow's with time

Emile

@Daan, good suggestion. I'll probably add something like [x] minutes before sunrise/sunset

@p0nts, that's exactly what we're going to add! :-)

p0nts

wau> Emile said:

@Daan, good suggestion. I'll probably add something like [x] minutes before sunrise/sunset

@p0nts, that's exactly what we're going to add! :-)

wow, awesome!

BasPost

p0nts said:
Would be great to be able to add a question (spoken by the homey) into the flow editor, that only can and will be answered with either yes or no (This will minimalise the amount of work it costs for Athom)

Like the example "Would you like subtitles with that?", but then available on the flow editor and just 2 answers (Yes/No). In this case it would be better accessible by people not able to script their own app to confirm certain questions that Homey asks which will give allot more possibility's to the flow editor.

Its a unique oppertunity to have even more variation in home automation, for example Im home and I have a flow that will close the blinds as soon as the sun is inside the house. But for some reason I realy dont want the blinds to close because I need the light inside the house. Homey asks if I want to close the blinds instead of just doing it, which allows me to choose whatever I want.

Sounds ok, but when you're not home? Or you don't hear Homey when you are home? No answer after 30 seconds close the blinds? Or with presets, like HomeWizard (update today with geofencing), Away, Home, Sleep, Vacation with different flows and actions, for example:

• Home = Ask, no answer after 30 secs, do it anyway (or not, whatever you want)
• Away = Don't ask, just do it
• Sleep = no flow
• Vacation = Don't ask and notify me

p0nts

BasPost said:
Sounds ok, but when you're not home? Or you don't hear Homey when you are home? No answer after 30 seconds close the blinds? Or with presets, like HomeWizard (update today with geofencing), Away, Home, Sleep, Vacation with different flows and actions, for example:

• Home = Ask, no answer after 30 secs, do it anyway (or not, whatever you want)
• Away = Don't ask, just do it
• Sleep = no flow
• Vacation = Don't ask and notify me

If not home Homey can see that because of the geofencing.

If you dont answer Homey will just close em after x seconds, its just an extra feature to be able to cancel the automation if you want. And if you are not in the room, you wouldn't care if the blinds will close anyway, so then Homey will just close it.

Emile

You could simply make Homey ask the question 'Do you want me to close the blinds?'. If you don't respond, or say no, the blinds will simply not be closed.

If you'd like it the other way around, invert the condition card (so it must not be true, for the flow's actions to fire), and ask something like "I'm about to close the blinds. Cancel?"

BasPost

But will it be possible to use presets, and so, different flow with that? I don't know if Homey uses presets.

p0nts

BasPost said:
But will it be possible to use presets, and so, different flow with that? I don't know if Homey uses presets.

I have a Homewizard as well, but I rly want to get rid of the preset switch I have in my house. Homey's focus is to automate the preset feature by using geofencing (which Homewizard implemented as well just today) instead of having to switch something on/off on the app or a switch it automates this feature. But I guess you can also just manually change the "preset" somewhere in the Homey and disable geofencing if you would want that.

From what I've read on the forums, Emile stated somewhere that It will currently supports the away/home "presets" by geofencing and some others (let me search in the meantime)

In one of the previews Emile shown it was possible to do certain things on either being Home or Away, so dont worry... It will be in

EDIT: got it..

iBeacons, GPS, Wi-Fi broadcast...

in Support of iftt.com Comment by Emile August 17

Emile

We don't really have "presets". Homey works different than it's competitors, because we think it's more natural and simply easier this way. The flow editor manages your devices, and that's it. So when you come home, you can make a flow that triggers, and sets your devices to certain states.

MarcoF

if season is "winter" and "nobody home" then HouseVentilation("Stop"); //prevent energie losses

>

if season is "summer" and indoorTemp > outsideTemp then HouseVentilation("FullPower"); //cool the house baby!

Is above possible?

Emile

Yeah. Well, I don't have a season card, but you can just use a date

Kwok

Morning announcement:
1) 6AM or 7AM notice (set when getting kids ready for school), if the weather is bad (winter storm, hurricane, etc) and local school notifications indicate school is closed, notification will be announced
2) If daily transportation route (driving, metro, bus, etc) is delayed, notification is provided and giving alternative route for travel using the same travel method (driving, metro, bus, etc)
3) When requesting for car service (i.e. Uber, Lyft, etc), announcement will be given when the car is within proximity of home
4) Announce if there are flight delays 3 hrs before designated travel

kimror

Shouldn't

If "home" and ousidetemp > x and insidetemp > y
"cool"

or something be enough? (might be a hot winter)

tommyjay

Kwok said:

3) When requesting for car service (i.e. Uber, Lyft, etc), announcement will be given when the car is within proximity of home

Damn that would be nice "Hey Homey, call me an Uber!" "Okay Tommy, Uber is on it's way. ETA 8 minutes." 7 minutes later "Tommy, your Uber is 300m from home." That would be awesome, glad Uber has an API. Too bad the taxi service I use most (Modry Andel in Prague) doesn't have an API (((

MarcoF

We have a small electric heater in the bathroom, that i turn on if light in the bathroom are on for 3 minutes.

So if the bathroom light is turned on, a timer starts and when the timer is finish i check if the light is still on and then turn the heater on.

So i "need" one of the following;

• Check if condition after timer is still true

• stop timer/flow when lights turned off.

hope this is, in the future, possible

TheoDeKoning

Here a same sort of situation.
A KaKu light sensor 'off' command start a timer say for 2 minutes .
If the same sensor gives a 'on' command the timer has to canceled so the light stays on.

This I have done it by hand with javascript: clearInterval ( sensorIntervalId ).
How I have to do this with Homey I don't no yet.
It seems that Homey can do a lot, but how to let Homey do this is not clear to me yet.

Emile

Hm, interesting... maybe I could add a delay options for conditions as well..

Fire69

If it's possible, why not? As you can see, anything you add will always be useful to somebody :-)

tommyjay

Yeah, I'm sure that a 'universal delay' function would be useful. Especially in geofencing (thinking bits starts cleaning 10 minutes after I leave - to prevent errors or some mishaps), or with the already previously discussed sunset/sunrise function....

Emile

Fire69 said:
If it's possible, why not? As you can see, anything you add will always be useful to somebody :-)

And possibly confusing for the other 99% :-) Good design is all about tradeoffs, and finding the common denominator.

tommyjay said:
Yeah, I'm sure that a 'universal delay' function would be useful. Especially in geofencing (thinking bits starts cleaning 10 minutes after I leave - to prevent errors or some mishaps), or with the already previously discussed sunset/sunrise function....

Delaying actions is already possible! :-)

MarcoF

@Emile:
If a flow with an timer is started, the world could be totally different when the timer is finished.

Our sunblind is "z-waved" and based on the sun-position, time, month, wind, rain, "people at home status" and lux the blind goes open for XXX%.
For the lux value i use a average calculation and if the average lux >= 4000 for X minutes, then the screen will open.
To prevent continuously and/or irritating opening/closing, i use a timer. If the lux value <4000 a timer is started and if the timer is finished and the Lux value is still <4000 the sunblind will close.

It would be great if its possible to check on

if (value is still XXXXX) then

do ......

Maybe you guys can add an option like:

Does the condition need to be true when timer is finished?

TheoDeKoning

For the KaKu light sensor I need this because the hysteresis on/off is very small. By cloudy weather my lights go some times 5x on/off in 1 minute.

Emile

It's maybe better to add a flow trigger "When the value is between x,y for z seconds"

honey

Marco, maybe I am wrong but the flow editor is not really useful for many of us that is a way too simple thing. Practically it is an If This&This Than That. It might be a cool thing for an "average customer" but a proper home automation is a much more complex thing and your sun shade is a good example for that. Lighting is a similarly complex thing, not to mention the heating.
Many of us have hoped that it will be a bit more advanced I mean it would be a real flow editor, meaning that there are loops, forks, etc. Unfortunately, we need to write the apps for ourself. If we don`t know how we need to learn it.

TheoDeKoning

The KaKu light sensor gives only a on/off signal not a value.

MarcoF

@honey
I also think the FlowEditor will not be that powerfull, but i hope it will be in the future.
But the other side is, that this flow editor looks more advanced then my current "crapy-"flow"-wizard" in my Vera3. In my Vera3 almost everything is hardcoded, but i hope that a lot of simple things can be done with Homey's floweditor.

For example;

• Sundown: Frontyard lights on
• Last person left geofence area; roomba start cleaning
• First person back inside geofence area; roomba stop cleaning and dock
• To dark outside (sunrise and thundercloud); livingroom lights on
• No people at home and sundown; several lights on
• Last person left home and sundown; turn lights on
• My beer crates are in the backyard so; if Sundown and backdoor opened; garden lights on for 5min.
• Outside temp below 18°c; let Homey remind us if this window is, after 1 hour, still open.
• Outside temp below 13°c and last person left geofence area; stop mechanical ventilation after 20 min. (energy saving)
• if household powerusage >6500W; turn HUE light(s) on to the color red and send email with devices that are using more then 1000W.

A lot of the above cases i have in some way implemented in my Vera3. But almost all code is hardcoded and thats a really "pain in the ass".... So i hope that a lot of cases can be moved to the floweditor and i don't need to migrate them from LUA to JS....

honey

I wonder if we can set a overrule hierarchy in the flow editor to avoid that two contradicting command to make an infinite loop. Anyway I hope we can make our own flow editor. There is one opensource quite advanced editor called: Scratch. It has been developed by the MIT university. We should implement this somehow. Zipato also uses Scratch:

RobinVanKekem

Emile said:

Fire69 said:
If it's possible, why not? As you can see, anything you add will always be useful to somebody :-)

And possibly confusing for the other 99% :-) Good design is all about tradeoffs, and finding the common denominator.

>
Agreed. But maybe, I time, an advanced option in the flow editor to keep it at start simple but with more advanced options for those seeking it?

MarcelKuijper

How about "when alarm( or some random switch is on) is armed between 23:00 and 6:00 then, voice commands are not accepted"

Emile

MarcelKuijper said:
How about "when alarm( or some random switch is on) is armed between 23:00 and 6:00 then, voice commands are not accepted"

Possible! At 23:00, disable voice recognition, and at 06:00 enable it again :-)

pim555

@Emile, one more suggestion migrating from a home grown automation solution (Homegenie) to Homey as of now...

I have my shutters open at 7h15 in the morning for the kids to wake up. However, when we have a public holiday, I would like to make an exception to that time. So ideally would like to be able to have a card that allows me to select national holidays as days such that I can logically AND that with time. Would require some localisation to be able to deal with different national holiday schemas in different countries...

Best
Pim