People tweeting stuff. We allow tweets from anyone.
RULES:
My rule for smarthome stuff is that it's self-hosted, and it has to have a low-tech way to use it. A light switch can be on Zigbee attached to my Home Assistant server, but it needs to function as just a light switch when the network is down.
Have some old stuff that doesn't follow these rules, but I'm slowly replacing them.
All fun and games until you get a power outage and one of your nodes doesn't boot properly which means no quorum to start HAOS which means no lights
But that's what flashlights are for :p
All fun and games when a grey hat hacker "hacks" his way into your living room through your window and starts turning on your lights without your permission.
And someone could throw a brick through my window and take all my stuff. There are some threats that we take care of by having a society where people don't break other peoples things just because they can.
It's overcomplicated because it's not immediately easy to keep the smart functionality totally local to your own network.
Almost every company that sells an IoT product wants you to make online accounts, download their special app, sign up for subscriptions, download useless firmware updates, and have all the hardware connect externally with their mothership cloud servers in order to function, all because they want to run a data harvesting racket disguised as an "ecosystem".
I'd use mechanical switches in the house, but at the same time, yelling at Siri to turn on my lights for the third time is the closest thing we currently have to sexbot servants. I only have so many years left on this planet, and I wish to embrace the future now.
Home Assistant + ZigBee devices.
If only ZigBee was reliable. I had to send back a wall switch because I deactivated the default on/off in favor of hassio handled response. When it lost ZigBee connectivity I couldn't put it in pairing mode because the on/off was deactivated and holding both wasn't recognized.
ZigBee is reliable, your specific device might not be.
Mr. Bean demonstrating the principle of "it's not stupid if it works".
I build my own smart lights to avoid this kind of bs. Thanks to ESPhome i didn't even need to program them myself. Everything is in an offline VLan and connected to Homeassistant.
Everything is in an offline VLan
This is the way.
I don't need ANYONE to control my house when not in my house, and if that means I don't get to either, then oh well.
I find it funny how people who are not working with any kind of electronics are the ones who have smart homes, smart bulbs, smart keys, smart tv's. People who work in it have nothing connected to the internet, except their own server with a hammer next to it.
Oh I can control my stuff remotely. After connecting to my VPN that is.
Why don't just use simple lightswitches?
Because then the lights wouldn't change brightness or color temperature with the angle of the sun, my motion sensors wouldn't work, and the light wouldn't turn on together with my morning alarm.
I see you're a person of culture. I too get flashbanged every morning by all my lights.
That technology would be okay if it was 100% open source, and came with a hard-copy manual alongside purchase so I could write a Python script to control it from my PC. Then and only then would I consider deploying such a technology in my home.
You just described home assistant. The only part not open sourced is the firmware in the device you want to control.
Zigbee device + zigbee usb bridge and you can talk to the device directly or via an MQTT abstraction layer provided by another open source service. The MQTT way makes it even easier to do.
I've had my Phillips hue bulbs for over 10 years now. I own like 20 bulbs and have only had a single failure. Never had any issues with the bulbs. Google Assistant however has let itself go.
I will never use smart technology. I prefer analogue technology. Imagine using a subscription in your home for lights and TV and AC and heat and appliances and then boom, they decide to terminate your subscription and now your home is inaccessible for habitat.
There are ways you can set up a smart home without subscriptions, for instance using Home Assistant. But most people somehow chose to be stuck in these cloud apps with subscriptions. Ring, with a subscription for a doorbell, is wild to me.
Yes. Yes we have. This is why the internet isn't fun anymore. I use YouTube like 20th century folk used TV. But at least I have control over my shit in that case.
Most people use YouTube without an addblocker. In which case, your content comes with about ten times the amount of advertisements than if you'd have used a TV back then.
While we're at it: I remember when opting into adds was a choice for creators on YouTube. Quite a few refused, even popular channels. Can't imagine growing up with this shit now and thinking it's normal.
I like smart tech, as long as I can make it work for me and not just another data vacuum for some faceless corporation. I've got Home Assistant handling a lot of my stuff now, and I'm moving things over to it and replacing corporate-app-only things with things that can work locally.
This is what the Unabomber was trying to warn us about!
The only "smart" light fixture I have has its own separate remote for switching between modes and adjusting light. I will never buy a device that either needs Bluetooth of Wi-Fi.
I have shitass intelligent bulbs. In case of lost connection, they work like standard bulbs via , you know, switching lights on or off via switch. Wtf. Also app allows me to connect via bluetooth and just requires me to be on the same wifi.
Cheap intelligent lightbulbs apparently are better xD
If it has to be smart, instead of every single bulb, wouldn't you better have the light switch in smart?
The post the other day about charging their something with their couch and 10 yr old them...
Back around 2011, I remember reading a headline along the lines of "Samsung Galaxy 2 receives Google Android Ice Cream Sandwich on Sprint" and understood it completely while also thinking that just 5 years earlier that I'd call 911 if someone said that because they were clearly having a stroke.
The kind I have, worst that happens is I can't change the color or warmth of the light until I am reconnected. They still work with the switch going on or off, and they are set to return to default color/warmth settings when the fixture they are in is physically turned off so I also won't be stuck with rave party disco lights.
Yes, we did.
