Google Is Turning Off the Works-with-Nest API

Post by Robotbeat » Wed, May 08, 2019, 1:16 AM UTC

dreamcompiler wrote: post #28

Robotbeat wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless you roll your own. But then we’re in the bad old days of home automation just for tinkerers...

I have lost all hope that it will ever be otherwise. It's quite straightforward to build smart home devices for youself that are reliable and don't depend on the whims of some cloud or firmware vendor, but the minute you try to form a company that sells them you'll be required to generate a continuing revenue stream which means shitting on your customers in one way or the other.

Post by pugworthy » Wed, May 08, 2019, 1:19 AM UTC

mherdeg wrote: post #47

Hey, so how do I graph the temperature of my house at each temperature sensor over time? I knew how to do that with the Nest API (see e.g. https://github.com/peterot/nest-graph or https://github.com/nbrownus/nestflux ). These data provide some useful information about energy expenditure in the house, a little better than the Nest "schedule" view of daily heating/cooling activity and daily temperature settings. Will t…

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 08, 2019, 1:20 AM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #53

electrograv wrote: post #38

I see Google API/ecosystem fans often defending or dismissing Google’s pattern of behavior here, using arguments like this: “Well, sure, they shut down that API I don’t use — big deal; all things come to an end eventually! But, they’d NEVER do that to this API I rely on — that would be so horrible, Google just would not do it!” I hope we all can acknowledge that this argument is on perpetually eroding ground, at the…

Seems like a variant of the “first they came for” argument.

Post by Gibbon1 » Wed, May 08, 2019, 1:21 AM UTC

dotBen wrote: post #29

gergles wrote: post #22

> I’m a Works with Nest developer. Will I be able to access and control Nest devices moving forward? > No. The Actions on Google Smart Home platform does not provide open API access to Nest devices, so it cannot be used to access and control Nest devices. Instead, managing and controlling Google Home, Nest, and thousands of third-party smart home devices is done through the Google Home app and the Google Assistant. W…

Yup, they just did a Twitter. I lived through the Twitter ecosystem collapse and now I'm a VC I worry about investing in startups that are built on any large ecosystem where there isn't an alignment of clear economic interest. Google of all people doing this just made it tougher for everyone else to maintain confidence in large vendor platforms.

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 08, 2019, 1:22 AM UTC

pugworthy wrote: post #63

hello_asdf wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do. I have a command line nest app that I use to control my temperature.

So a personal project then, not a commercial one. My guess is they just lost a new customer with you. The root of my question though is this: Is most API use a hobby thing, or a professional thing businesses are build around? My assumption here is that the financial impact is trivial for them. They aren't Valve ending Half-Life modding for example. If that's not a clear analogy, Valve's enabling of modding for Half-L…