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The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

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Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#251

Post by jiveturkey »

dkarl wrote: post #238

I have a Homepod (short story, I needed a new speaker for the kitchen, and I was shopping for security camera at the same time) and it has been much more annoying than the simple bluetooth speaker that it replaced. The other day I was hearing strange sounds from it, rustling and crackling and murmuring, and I couldn't transfer the podcast on my phone to the Homepod like I normally do. I was convinced that either some…

do you mean homepod or homepod mini?

yes it is infuriating how it has a mind of its own. if you just want to use it like a bluetooth then disconnect it from your icloud account. it will still work as an airplay target.

what you (and i initially) failed to understand about it is that it is a streamer device (limited to apple music). not simply a wireless speaker.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#252

Post by kragen »

People should not have computers in their homes running software that they do not have control over. They should have the full legal and practical freedoms to study, copy, modify, and redistribute the software they are running, and to delegate those abilities to the people of their choice, since not everyone wants to be a programmer.

The current situation, where Google, Samsung, and Amazon have unaccountable devices running unauditable secret code, which they can update whenever they want, with access to the most private aspects of many people's lives (including microphones and sometimes cameras in their bedrooms), is extremely risky; no government and no company can be trusted with that kind of power.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#254

Post by setpatchaddress »

markbnj wrote: post #86

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 bridg…

If Apple ever does this with HomePods, I’m throwing mine out (after smashing them with a mallet to ensure that they won’t plague anyone else).

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#255

Post by bryanrasmussen »

pkulak wrote: post #200
h2odragon wrote: post #2

In that same time period, my "plant light" timer, a $15 mechanical item of a design unmodified since the 1970s, has worked flawlessly, requiring attention only when the clocks change or my schedule does. It has not informed Google, Amazon, or anyone else about its job or anything else in my home. It has generated no royalties nor invoked any support or ongoing maintenance costs. It has never needed a software upgrade…

I love my smart home stuff. My lights turn on in the morning, change color temperature at sunset, and turn off at night. Thermostats set to the right temperature/mode at night and in the morning depending on the forecast for the day. My garden is watered, but not if it's going to rain. When I turn on my TV, the lights turn off and the blinds close. Everything shuts down and locks when the family leaves, resumes when…

>But what's important is that it's all rock solid and 100% reliable,

There will come soft rains.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#256

Post by Tyr42 »

asxd wrote: post #46
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…

Honestly. I may have just not heard the right sales pitch, but at the moment a smart home is a clear case of "if it's not broken don't fix it." I'd like my software issues to be minimal after 5pm! Like you allude to, I'm sure there will come a time where the effort is appropriately rewarded for a grump like me, and I'm grateful there are folks out there working and struggling to improve this.

Blinds which close themselves after sundown is nice. Motion controlled lights for the stairs are also nice, especially if you don't always have your hands free.

But I'm enjoying messing with Home Assistant anyways, so maybe that's not enough to convince you (and that's okay!). I did need to two two different zigbee integrations, but now it's working and I can buy the ikea stuff and I know it will work.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#257

Post by mrandish »

est31 wrote: post #240
Spivak wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think your solution is good but paranoid in the wrong areas. You’re probably gonna get bit by 25 years from now is the dependency on current gen Wi-Fi. The thing you have to own is the transport layer and all the devices that directly interface with it. Then all you will ever need to replace is the bridge to your “control plane” — apps, HomeAssistant. The golden solution (for me) is RF. 100 years from now you will…

I put wi-fi, at least the earlier generations, up there are the list of consumer technology that will always be supported somehow, simply due to its extreme popularity. I can still buy floppy drives even though they became outdated decades ago, just as I can buy serial ports. USB-A will be up there as well, as will wi-fi and bluetooth, as long as governments don't ban wi-fi/bluetooth devices. Wi-Fi runs in unregulate…

> I put wi-fi, at least the earlier generations, up there are the list of consumer technology that will always be supported somehow

I agree with you about wifi. In fact, as you were posting, I was writing my reply (here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29335111) saying much the same. I've been observing the evolution of tech professionally now for over 40 years and as a serial entrepreneur making risky bets on uncertain outcomes with the harsh (yet instructive) feedback of putting my own money and livelihood on the line each time. There are a few tech standards that become so ubiquitous and accepted that they reach the longevity and influence of Roman chariot wheel widths (which many anthropologists believe influenced the gauge of modern railroads). Various forms of early wifi (ie 802.11b) and various flavors and bitrates of RS-232-type serial signaling are two examples. I still have a couple of 802.11b wifi devices running on a sub-net that are ~20 years old and I still network with devices over 20 years old through Cat5 signaling with / RJ45 connectors.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#258

Post by dntrkv »

driverdan wrote: post #78
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 in his home that receives automatic updates Have you ever talked to another SE? The majority I know don't even care about privacy and have all kinds of invasive auto update devices in their homes (Alexa, Nest, Ring, etc).

Classic HN bubble thinking from OP. I only hear these IoT complaints on HN and Twitter. I'm in the same boat as you, most devs I know have smart home devices and don't give two shits about any privacy issues.

There is a huge disconnect between what you read about online and the real world. Even my conspiracy friends that talk endlessly about Big Tech and their harvesting of data use all the Big Tech things without putting in even the minimal amount of effort to protect their data.

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#259

Post by jodrellblank »

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…

Beginning with "I think" is a strong indication that they understand alternatives such as "other people think" and therefore "other people exist". Someone unaware of such a thing would leave that part out, because why specify "I do X" if there is nobody else? (Indeed, why write a comment at all if one believes nobody else exists?)

Re: The unbearable fussiness of the smart home

#260

Post by twobitshifter »

I am remodeling my house and opted to go without any smart outlets, lights, or even USB A or C outlets. The premium that is charged for these devices are not worth the very limited benefit and I imagine they will very quickly reach obsolescence unlike the simple outlet and light switch. I had some plug in smart outlets and switches which were a necessity at my last apartment - there were no lights in some rooms so you needed a way to turn things on and off. It worked fine but I realized that speaking to your lights has no meaningful advantage and one color is good enough.

That said I am interested in doing things with home assistant with a raspberry pi - but building it permanently into my home is not in the cards. I doubt a future home owner is going to love my cobbled together security system, but they also would not love a house that comes with a service contract or sends videos of their family to the cloud.

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