Homebridge Driver for HomeKit Support?

[zaphod]

Yes, but are we talking about Homebridge integration of the Harmony or incorporating it directly into Control4 via a driver.  I would think the latter is the way to go.

[Joshua Pressnell]

1 hour ago, zaphod said:

Yes, but are we talking about Homebridge integration of the Harmony or incorporating it directly into Control4 via a driver.  I would think the latter is the way to go.

The latter would be FAR FAR better. Apple doesn't have any AV support in HomeKit, nor does it really have the concept of "remote control"... so any support for it via homebridge would be a hack, at best.

[zaphod]

It seems like a lot of things are hacks in the integration of HA with devices "pretending" to be Hue devices.

[Joshua Pressnell]

2 hours ago, zaphod said:

It seems like a lot of things are hacks in the integration of HA with devices "pretending" to be Hue devices.

Perhaps. Doesn’t mean I should add to the craziness. I far prefer the “elegant” approach. 

Not sure how many people out there want to integrate Harmony remotes... but conceptually, the driver wouldn’t be too difficult 

[zaphod]

I agree with you about going with the elegant approach.

I would think that using Harmony devices would be attractive to many people, especially in secondary and tertiary rooms (etc) where they don't have C4 controllers and are less likely to have newer AV components that support control over IP.

[zaphod]

I have been playing around with this and I am using the Home app on both my iPhone and my iPad.  It seems like when you do some config - like set up the rooms or change the names in the Home app that it only gets reflected on that specific device - not on other devices using the Home app.  Any idea how to get the room assignments, etc from my phone to propagate over to my iPad?  I am using the same Apple ID for both devices.

[Elvis]

Everything but room background photos propagate on my iOS devices. Even with different Apple iDs. 

[Joshua Pressnell]

45 minutes ago, zaphod said:

I have been playing around with this and I am using the Home app on both my iPhone and my iPad.  It seems like when you do some config - like set up the rooms or change the names in the Home app that it only gets reflected on that specific device - not on other devices using the Home app.  Any idea how to get the room assignments, etc from my phone to propagate over to my iPad?  I am using the same Apple ID for both devices.

^--- What Elvis said.  Pretty much everything *will* propagate.. but how quickly can become a question.  Apple uses iCloud as a backing for this feature, and sometimes it takes a while for iCloud to move all the data across devices.  Siri also uses a *different* part of the iCloud database, so sometimes when you add/move devices they'll work fine in Home, but Siri won't be aware of them for a few hours or more, while the data propagates around in iCloud.  Eventually, it all catches up to itself.

[zaphod]

Is the latest room setting for a device what is used?  What if you move a device from Default Room to kitchen on your phone and then move the same device from Default Room to Living Room on your iPad.  What command sticks - the latest one executed?

[Elvis]

I deleted an empty room and it disappeared from my wife's phone as fast as I could call up the home app on her phone. 

[Elvis]

8 minutes ago, zaphod said:

latest

Yes

[Elvis]

Notifications, automations and room photos are by device. 

[zaphod]

I hid a few devices, saved the homebridge configuration but the devices that I hid were still in the Home app.  Is this something else that takes a long time to propagate?  If I reboot the Homebridge device then they disappear - but do you have to do this?

[zaphod]

Bump - when you hide devices do you need to restart the Homebridge to get it reflected or will it eventually chcange on its own.

It also seems that some devices that I moved from Default Room to another room later moved back to Default Room.  Hopefully this doesn't continue happening.

[Joshua Pressnell]

11 hours ago, zaphod said:

Bump - when you hide devices do you need to restart the Homebridge to get it reflected or will it eventually chcange on its own.

It also seems that some devices that I moved from Default Room to another room later moved back to Default Room.  Hopefully this doesn't continue happening.

When you change the homebridge configuration, you need to restart homebridge.  I did that so you can apply several changes without auto-restarting many times.  The idea is that you make all the changes you want, then choose to restart when you're done.

The devices occasionally moving back to the default room is an artifact of Apple's.  In my experience it only happens during initial setup, when you're making a LOT of changes to HomeKit.  I believe it happens because Apple is using iCloud as a backing store for HomeKit, and sometimes the iCloud changes don't save, and old data gets applied.  In my experience, you just move those devices back to their intended rooms, and then they stick there once the actual change successfully hits iCloud.

[zaphod]

Any chance of getting other devices from C4 to come through to HomeBridge/HomeKit.  I have blinds that don't appear, and a fireplace.  They could be proxied to a light switch or something similar.  The same thing with Hue lights - I have an older Hue Hub and it doesn't support HomeKit - it would be nice if the Hue devices would come into HomeKit from C4.

And does it matter in which order you do updates?  I see that there are updates for HomeBridge, the Control4 Plugin and the appliance firmware?  Do I even have the appliance firmware as I used the image file to set up my own RPi Homebridge rather than buying directly from you?

[Joshua Pressnell]

21 hours ago, zaphod said:

Any chance of getting other devices from C4 to come through to HomeBridge/HomeKit.  I have blinds that don't appear, and a fireplace.  They could be proxied to a light switch or something similar.  The same thing with Hue lights - I have an older Hue Hub and it doesn't support HomeKit - it would be nice if the Hue devices would come into HomeKit from C4.

And does it matter in which order you do updates?  I see that there are updates for HomeBridge, the Control4 Plugin and the appliance firmware?  Do I even have the appliance firmware as I used the image file to set up my own RPi Homebridge rather than buying directly from you?

Yes, I'll be adding more device support as I can.

1) Blinds - Apple doesn't have "good" native blind support.  They assume that blinds *must* be able to indicate actual relative position (0%-100%) and support "move to position" calls.  Most blinds in C4 don't do this.  They support "up" "down" and "stop" commands.  You can support those already by using virtual switch drivers and linking those in programming to proper blind commands.

2) Fireplace - This is coming.

3) Hue - There's a homebridge Hue plugin already.  You should be able to use that to enable HomeKit for Hue without going through C4.

Updates: It should matter what order you do them, as long as you reboot the director first, and then the appliance after updates are done, and as long as you update all of *my* software to the latest version (to make sure it's all compatible, although I do try to remain backwards compatible where possible).

Firmware: Yes.. if you installed my OS image, then you're running my firmware.

[zaphod]

Thanks for the info regarding additional devices Joshua. 

My Hue hub is the original round 1 but I guess I do have a newer squared one that I am not using.  I guess I should bite the bullet and replace it and then the Hue can actually be directly supported in HomeKit without needing Homebridge - unless there is a benefit to using Homebridge.

I think you made a typo in the section where you discuss Updates as I think you meant to say "It shouldn't matter..."

[Joshua Pressnell]

You're right... "It shouldn't matter"

[zaphod]

I finally have pretty much all of my hardware set up in the correct rooms.  Will I ever have to redo this config in the HomeKit app or will this be remembered permanently, even if I do upgrades, etc?  That was a painful exercise - at least I now know to give better names than "Main" to my lights, although in C4 it can be a bit redundant to have Kitchen - Kitchen Main as a light name.

You have to be careful with Siri as well as if you don't specify a room when saying "Turn the lights off" it will turn off all of the lights in the house".  But Siri is better than Alexa in the sense that your syntax doesn't have to be exact.

[Elvis]

1 hour ago, zaphod said:

Will I ever have to redo this config in the HomeKit app

The Homebridge is the key. As long as it is not deleted, everything sticks permanently. Deleting it is just like starting over from scratch.

1 hour ago, zaphod said:

at least I now know to give better names

I don't know if this applies, but Homekit will not repeat the room name if the device name starts with the room name. For example, I have a room that is called Outside. In that room I have Outside Fan, Outside Floods, Outside Lights. Instead of these showing up as Outside - Outside Fan, they just show up as Outside Fan, etc. So Kitchen - Kitchen Main shows up as just Kitchen Main. Master Bedroom as a room with Master Bedroom Cans will not show up as Master Bedroom - Master Bedroom Cans, but just Master Bedroom Cans.

I just noticed iOS 11 now has Zones. Haven't explored it yet, but looks interesting.

[zaphod]

The Home app doesn't seem to work over VPN - is that what others see as well?  I am at work and am using OpenVPN on my iPad to connect to my home LAN.  But when I go into the Home app it says

"This accessory is unavailable.  To control it when you're away from home, set up an Apple TV (4th generation)."

Why wouldn't it work over VPN?  Just Apple being Apple?

[Joshua Pressnell]

Just now, zaphod said:

The Home app doesn't seem to work over VPN - is that what others see as well?  I am at work and am using OpenVPN on my iPad to connect to my home LAN.  But when I go into the Home app it says

"This accessory is unavailable.  To control it when you're away from home, set up an Apple TV (4th generation)."

Why wouldn't it work over VPN?  Just Apple being Apple?

Probably.  HomeKit requires Bonjour, which is a local network thing.  I'm not sure your VPN would be configured to allow Bonjour across?  HomeKit is also based in iCloud, so if you have a "HomeHub" (iPad or ATV4+) then they will act as the HomeKit proxy, and you won't even need the VPN to get through to the home.

[zaphod]

I don't have any ATVs but I do have iPads.  Do I have to keep the iPad at home to act as the hub?

[VINCELdUB]

I don't have any ATVs but I do have iPads.  Do I have to keep the iPad at home to act as the hub?

Yes, if you want outside access the iPad will have to be home. But only during the time you need the access. The iPad acts as a hardware vpn basically is my understanding.




Happy Automating!!