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The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

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Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#81

Post by KennyBlanken »

vnxli wrote: post #6

This is entirely on the author. Sure these vendors make awful products and poorly maintain them - but nobody is forcing anyone to buy them or integrate them into their house. I have yet to hear, or especially see, these devices make anybody’s life easier than doing the task manually. I never think about light in my home, I flip the switch if I need it - lights seem like such a chore to my friends who have to issue co…

We are talking about someone who spent a thousand dollars on glowing hexagonal tiles that have a shitty wood pattern silkscreened on them.

If she'd done a 5 minute google search like I just did, she would have seen several reviews describing them as being very buggy.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#82

Post by tpush »

martythemaniak wrote: post #68
yholio wrote: post #23

I think any software engineer with some industry experience will absolutely NOT install a device in his home that receives automatic updates over the internet and is critical for performing some task or using some basic functionality of the house; especially one that has a well known, highly stable and ergonomic traditional mode of interaction - controlling the lights and water, opening the windows and shades etc. We…

> I think any software engineer with some industry experience will absolutely NOT install a device ... I'm curious what goes on in one's mind when you write something like that. Surely you're aware that people other than yourself exist? People with their own thoughts and lives that are actually different from yours? Or you genuinely believe that there are no people out there who are smarter, more experienced and wise…

Stating something that's painfully, obviously not the case with the confidence of someone who thinks his opinions define reality is somewhat of a staple of HN.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#83

Post by lotsofpulp »

ninkendo wrote: post #9

I did my whole house in Lutron’s smart switches (close to 50 of them), and I think it’s good? It’s been about 2 years now and I really haven’t had any issues. The switches aren’t Wi-Fi connected, because Wi-Fi would be an awful choice for 50 devices that you only communicate with a few times a day. They use their own wireless frequency and communicate in a really simple/reliable way to the bridge, which is wired to m…

I installed Homekit compatible Hunter ceiling fans almost a year ago and they have worked without issue since. All I had to do was scan a QR code to add it to my network. I feel like as long as you read reviews, you can stick to the quality stuff that works.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#84

Post by tga »

arcticbull wrote: post #10
ninkendo wrote: post #9

I did my whole house in Lutron’s smart switches (close to 50 of them), and I think it’s good? It’s been about 2 years now and I really haven’t had any issues. The switches aren’t Wi-Fi connected, because Wi-Fi would be an awful choice for 50 devices that you only communicate with a few times a day. They use their own wireless frequency and communicate in a really simple/reliable way to the bridge, which is wired to m…

I was about to say the same thing. I set up all my non-standard lighting fixtures with Lutron Caseta switches, and replaced all the standard bulbs with Philips Hue bulbs. They've both been working flawlessly, together, with my 3 HomePod Minis for about a year and a half now. It really is a brand thing. Most are bad. [edit] > My favorite aspect is that the pico switches can be programmed to switch whole rooms of light…

Philips Hue lights are sadly not on the same seriousness level as the Lutron hardware.

After a time away, I tried to turn on lights with my phone -- only to be greeted by a message like "There is a mandatory update available for your bridge. You can use your system again after 10 minutes". I found not being able to turn on the lights for 10 minutes because they were installing unprompted updates completely unacceptable, so that was my last day as a Hue user. I now use a mix of Zigbee bulbs controlled with a (stable, offline) zigbee2mqtt gateway.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#85

Post by beardedwizard »

moffkalast wrote: post #58
xyzzy_plugh wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a counter point, I've lived in places with frequent power disruptions and smart timers that use the internet and NTP and figure out the time work _so much better_ than the mechanical timers.

I hate to be the tiktok pokerface simple solution meme guy, but that's a solvable issue by just adding a RTC module, no complex internet garbage required.

Ah yes, the trivial to build, ultra simple crystal oscillator real time clock. Every hobbyist can just fab them right up, or just dig around in the garden to find a few.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#86

Post by markbnj »

Yeah over the last few weeks Alexa has grown annoyingly chatty. Pretty much every ask, like "Alexa, what's the outside temperature?" is followed by the answer and then "Did you know..." which is itself followed by me saying "Alexa stop" in an irritated voice.

"Computer, lay in a course to intercept the Romulan cruiser." "Intercept course calculated. Did you know, I can automatically reorder toilet paper for the bridge head?"

If any one from Amazon is hanging nearby, please pass along how annoying a chatty home assistant is.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#87

Post by hokumguru »

arcticbull wrote: post #10
ninkendo wrote: post #9

I did my whole house in Lutron’s smart switches (close to 50 of them), and I think it’s good? It’s been about 2 years now and I really haven’t had any issues. The switches aren’t Wi-Fi connected, because Wi-Fi would be an awful choice for 50 devices that you only communicate with a few times a day. They use their own wireless frequency and communicate in a really simple/reliable way to the bridge, which is wired to m…

I was about to say the same thing. I set up all my non-standard lighting fixtures with Lutron Caseta switches, and replaced all the standard bulbs with Philips Hue bulbs. They've both been working flawlessly, together, with my 3 HomePod Minis for about a year and a half now. It really is a brand thing. Most are bad. [edit] > My favorite aspect is that the pico switches can be programmed to switch whole rooms of light…

Lutron sells a pro bridge for the caseta that exposes the Pico over IP. Allows for easy setup with HomeBridge running on a raspberry pi.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#88

Post by gangstead »

ninkendo wrote: post #9

I did my whole house in Lutron’s smart switches (close to 50 of them), and I think it’s good? It’s been about 2 years now and I really haven’t had any issues. The switches aren’t Wi-Fi connected, because Wi-Fi would be an awful choice for 50 devices that you only communicate with a few times a day. They use their own wireless frequency and communicate in a really simple/reliable way to the bridge, which is wired to m…

I worked at Lutron my first two years after getting my EE. I wasn't on the wireless products but we did do crazy amounts of fussing over fall back behaviors and corner cases. We very much developed the software with the attitude of hardware: we knew what we shipped had to work for years and field updates were unacceptable.

I've been gone from Coopersburg for 15 years but I still practice the engineering culture I learned there.

Fun fact: I don't know what they do today but when I was there it was a long standing tradition that engineers put in some time on the customer support phones. That way you get direct (and sometimes very unfiltered) feedback from users and their expectations on your product and understanding of the instructions you wrote. So if you call the 800 number it's not going to India and you might get to talk to one of the (lower level) engineers that made the product!

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#89

Post by dralley »

beardedwizard wrote: post #85
moffkalast wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to be the tiktok pokerface simple solution meme guy, but that's a solvable issue by just adding a RTC module, no complex internet garbage required.

Ah yes, the trivial to build, ultra simple crystal oscillator real time clock. Every hobbyist can just fab them right up, or just dig around in the garden to find a few.

Or buy them online for $15

https://www.sparkfun.com/products/12708

Following hobbyist-directed instructions that are, also, readily available online

https://create.arduino.cc/projecthub/embeddedlab786/real-tim...

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#90

Post by quickthrowman »

ninkendo wrote: post #9

I did my whole house in Lutron’s smart switches (close to 50 of them), and I think it’s good? It’s been about 2 years now and I really haven’t had any issues. The switches aren’t Wi-Fi connected, because Wi-Fi would be an awful choice for 50 devices that you only communicate with a few times a day. They use their own wireless frequency and communicate in a really simple/reliable way to the bridge, which is wired to m…

The Lutron Pico line is really nice, probably because it’s a commercial grade lighting controls line.
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