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Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

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Re: Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

#41

Post by georgehotelling »

mankyd wrote: post #16
deprave wrote: post #11

I cannot understand why anyone would buy hardware from Google. Chromecast for $35 a pop is as much as I'd be willing to pay from something that they could arbitrarily shut down.

Im curious how you think they'll shut your router off? Certainly, they could turn cloud based features such as this off, but the router itself?

My understanding is that OnHub routers are managed through a mobile app via Google's cloud. If Google end-of-lifed that service, owners would have no way to manage their routers.

Re: Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

#42

Post by mrbill »

rdegges wrote: post #3

OnHub is one of the best routers I've ever owned. I've been buying custom router hardware for years -- I even went as far as building my own OpenBSD / PFsense router way back when, but nothing I've ever built (or bought!) has given me the same reliability / stability / speed as the OnHub. I'm seriously impressed with it. Also: the OnHub management app for mobile is AMAZING. It is so cool. Awesome product. Really grea…

Same here.. Long string of custom built routers, pfsense with wifi, OpenWRT, etc... even at one point a very expensive Cisco industrial-class 2.4/5 AP.

Now I have an Ubiquiti Edgerouter Lite as my "core" router, and the OnHub acting as just-an-AP in bridge mode. It Just Works, and works better than any piece of wireless gear I've had before.

My only "complaint" would be that I'm forced to use a mobile app for configuration - although in the OnHub subreddit, it was said a while back that a basic web UI was in development.

Re: Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

#43

Post by matt_wulfeck »

dan_quixote wrote: post #30
rdegges wrote: post #3

OnHub is one of the best routers I've ever owned. I've been buying custom router hardware for years -- I even went as far as building my own OpenBSD / PFsense router way back when, but nothing I've ever built (or bought!) has given me the same reliability / stability / speed as the OnHub. I'm seriously impressed with it. Also: the OnHub management app for mobile is AMAZING. It is so cool. Awesome product. Really grea…

Single data point on custom router build reliability: I've been using IPFire/pfSense on a little passively cooled Celeron box for a couple years. It reliably hits the theoretical gigabit limit ~800Mb/s and has never once failed even while running intrusion detection. Coupled with a ~$150 wireless router-turned-access point, I have never had a single reliability issue.

Have you ever measured combined power usage of your two devices?

Re: Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

#45

Post by kefka »

zyxley wrote: post #5

I just wish more of these companies would add support for a locally runnable IFTTT equivalent, or at least something like MQTT support so you can bake your own.

Absolutely true. MQTT exists, as does CoAP and AMQP. There's also simple JSON blobs that can be emitted under an API. None of these things are hard...

... But they do free you from the company. And these days, ball-and-chaining you to their servers is the big "In" thing to do.

Now for me, I'm a big fan of Node-Red. It's best described as a IFTTT for your machine/network. Runs locally, and just works. I also use PageNodes, a client-only modification of Node-Red. You can use it here:

http://ipfs.io/ipfs/QmSCrZUPkqH4gsncsD7tGXPiFpymsbwmywsHXLDh...

(It's an IPFS link, and is on the permanent web. That link will always work as long as machines are hosting it.)

EDIT: Really? Multiple -1's for a valid criticism of "companies want you locked in to their network"? We just got done with Google killing off a whole platform because of extensive tie-in to 'cloud servers'. I'm just giving a converse answer how to approach the problem.

Re: Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

#46

Post by westernmostcoy »

umsm wrote: post #32
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The app also gives you insights into what's happening with your OnHub -- per device traffic sums, speed tests, alerts, etc. And we're constantly improving it. IMHO that's the real win with the OnHub; the router itself is constantly upgraded with up to date firmware with security updates and new features. And the mobile app that administrates it is constantly getting new features. Maybe I should transfer to marketing.

I completely agree with untog. Apple's Airport device is so seamless that it's a pleasure to use. What kind of firmware / security updates do you get with OnHub? Aren't firmware updates dangerous if everything is working perfectly (the possibility to introduce issues)?

I feel like asking "what kind of updates" is too vague a question to reasonably answer.

Yes, updating any software adds some risk of something breaking. This is not unique to OnHub. This is still a pretty nice feature for most people.

Re: Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

#47

Post by dudus »

skrebbel wrote: post #35
kyrra wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The opinions stated here are my own, not necessarily those of Google. If you are referring to Revolv, Nest/Revolv stopped selling the device the day Nest acquired them (Oct 2014), and they are also issuing refunds to anyone that contacts them[0]. The other major hardware cancel I know about was the Nexus Q which Google also provided a full refund for anyone that contacts them. Sure, Google could cancel it, but they s…

I think the problem is more that many people feel that Google doesn't care about their customers, for a variety of reasons that I'm sure you can imagine. That's an image thing, and I'm sure you can come up with all kinds of historical facts on why that image is not right, or not right anymore, but that hardly helps fix the image. I think that if Google really wanted to fix that image, they could do revolutionary stuf…

I think doing things right is the way to change the image. Surely it's easier to trash your image than fix it, but with time I don't see why it can't happen.

The examples of refunds provided for Neus Q and Revolv are a good example of the company trying to do what's right, and I'm sure that helps the image a little bit.

Plus at least for the onHub they do provide email and phone support. https://support.google.com/onhub/answer/6270180

Re: Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

#48

Post by kefka »

venomsnake wrote: post #9

> To create Recipes for things you would like to happen automatically, just register and login at IFTTT.com (it’s free) and connect to the OnHub channel. Then start cooking up the Recipes that serve you best. Because OnHub on IFTTT works with so many products and services, there are lots of options for Recipes you can create. And why this needs to be cloud service? Instead of locally running demon on a raspberry pi?

I have my instances of Node-Red running on :

     1. Home IoT controller
     2. Public-facing webserver
     3. At friend's house where my 3d printers are
And they are all connected together via Tor for networking. Hidden Services are awesome, as they can semantically be treated as a huge ethernet hub (topologically speaking). And Node-Red can command and control other Node-Reds via other plugins.

Edit: There's 474 different Nodes that Node-Red can use. And one node is node-red-contrib-npm, which exposes any npm module as a node to Node-Red. Which sums that up to about 250,000 nodes. http://flows.nodered.org/

Re: Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

#49

Post by westernmostcoy »

skrebbel wrote: post #35
kyrra wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The opinions stated here are my own, not necessarily those of Google. If you are referring to Revolv, Nest/Revolv stopped selling the device the day Nest acquired them (Oct 2014), and they are also issuing refunds to anyone that contacts them[0]. The other major hardware cancel I know about was the Nexus Q which Google also provided a full refund for anyone that contacts them. Sure, Google could cancel it, but they s…

I think the problem is more that many people feel that Google doesn't care about their customers, for a variety of reasons that I'm sure you can imagine. That's an image thing, and I'm sure you can come up with all kinds of historical facts on why that image is not right, or not right anymore, but that hardly helps fix the image. I think that if Google really wanted to fix that image, they could do revolutionary stuf…

This line of conversation is an easy way to get points on HN, but if you actually looked for a phone number for OnHub support you'd find one quite easily. Here it is in two locations:

Bottom right: https://on.google.com/hub/support/#ready "Contact Us" on: https://support.google.com/onhub#topic=6243113

Re: Google rolls out “If This Then That” support for its $200 OnHub router

#50

Post by jhoechtl »

thrownaway2424 wrote: post #7
rdegges wrote: post #3

OnHub is one of the best routers I've ever owned. I've been buying custom router hardware for years -- I even went as far as building my own OpenBSD / PFsense router way back when, but nothing I've ever built (or bought!) has given me the same reliability / stability / speed as the OnHub. I'm seriously impressed with it. Also: the OnHub management app for mobile is AMAZING. It is so cool. Awesome product. Really grea…

I haven't seen my OnHub since I turned it on last year. This puts it well ahead of all other wifi access points I have owned.

I haven't seen my Asus ac68 ever since. Reading these comments all the way down leaves the impression as the hefty overpriced OnHub is the only reliable wifi router on earth.
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