Garage Door Opener and Alexa

[taylormia]

I have a zwave garage door device that has "Open" and "Close" as actions. But with the Echo API I can only say "Alexa, Turn on Garage Door" or "Turn off Garage Door" to get the open and close actions. Saying "Alexa, Open Garage Door" gets an "I'm not sure how to handle that..." response.

Any ideas on how to get the API to respond to "open" and "close" instead of "on" and "off"?

Thanks.

[rmasonjr]

Right now, the Smart Home API only extends to Lighting and Thermostats. I hope Amazon keeps extending this to other devices.

[Surfrider00724]

Garage Door

I have the same problem as open and close used to work with the Alexa. The work around I use is to create virtual open and close garage door devices and also two open and close garage door events that are manually triggered. I then use IFTTT and create two recipes. I now have to say "Alexa trigger open garage door" (or close) and it works. It's a bit of a pain but I hate having to to say on and off to open and close.

[kingfetty]

I have the same problem as open and close used to work with the Alexa. The work around I use is to create virtual open and close garage door devices and also two open and close garage door events that are manually triggered. I then use IFTTT and create two recipes. I now have to say "Alexa trigger open garage door" (or close) and it works. It's a bit of a pain but I hate having to to say on and off to open and close.

A couple of options I can think of:

1: Setup homseer events that trigger on voice commands "Open Garage Door" and have the event do so. Then tell Alexa "Tell homeseer Open Garage Door". It will then run the event.

or

2: In the device for your garage door set the Value Status Pair - Control Use drop down to On or Off. Name the device "Garage Door" then tell Alexa "Turn on the garage door".

[DigitalMatrix]

It would be nice if Alexa could control Link I/O devices but I can see why Amazon isn't allowing it at the moment.

I added the HomeSeer Skill to Alexa and now she can control my Insteon Link I/O devices.

I have to say "Alexa tell HomeSeer to turn on the fireplace"

but it works so I'm happy...

[langenet]

Oh... so you don't need to tell homeseer to run event then? The event name is assumed? In other words, I don't need to "Tell homeseer 'to run event' Open Garage Door" but rather can just "Tell homeseer Open Garage Door"? Or... is the trigger a "Trigger on a phrase"?

Robert

[kingfetty]

Oh... so you don't need to tell homeseer to run event then? The event name is assumed? In other words, I don't need to "Tell homeseer 'to run event' Open Garage Door" but rather can just "Tell homeseer Open Garage Door"? Or... is the trigger a "Trigger on a phrase"?

Robert

When you "tell homeseer to" it simply sends the voice commands over to homeseer. So if you create an event that's triggered from a specific phrase, you can just say that phrase.

Example:

Event-1: Trigger = phrase "yellow berries"

You: "Alexa, Tell Homeseer Yellow Berries"
Alexa: "Ok I will run the event Event-1 for you"

[langenet]

Ah... also just discovered Jon's script http://board.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=184504 which makes stuff like that real easy.

Robert

[AZweimiller]

I'm 90% sure that Alexa has stealthily extended their Smart Home API to included Garage Doors as a device type. Nexx replaced their Custom Skill with a Smart Home skill on November 25, 2019. Here is the announcement.

The Genie Aladdin controller has also recently released a Smart Home skill. Here is a press release.

If this is true, can HomeSeer update their skill to take advantage?

Thanks!

[dbrunt]

I just use a FortrezZ switch in momentary mode and have two Alexa routines: "Open Garage Door" and "Close Garage Door". The Fortrezz switch is wired in parallel with the garage door switch and that device "Garage Door" is Voice Enabled. When I say either "Alexa, open garage door" or "Alexa, close garage door" the action is the same "turn on Garage Door". I also have a tilt sensor on it so I know if it's open or closed.

[Pete]

Here using / testing MCS Michael's all in one $5 USD "el cheapo" wireless modded Sonoff Basic with Tasmota firmware device which:

1 - has a local wired to open and close reed switches (2 sensors)
2 - button command to close and open Garage door (directly managed by Alexa) - modded digital button to Sonoff Basic.
3 - DS18B20 temperature sensor

Most difficult pieces of installation was climbing on a ladder and working above the garage door opener.

Using Alexa TTS for status of the above and Alexa VR for opening and closing door. All info is reflected in Homeseer but using Alexa direct commands.

Still in place for many years are wired sensors / button to OmniPro 2 alarm panel (and use of Omni Plugin).

[taylormia]

Here's how I have integrated my LiftMaster garage door opener with HS3 and Alexa using a Sonoff 4CH and MQTT for local control: https://forums.homeseer.com/forum/li...rs#post1302355

[AZweimiller]

The consistent theme seems to be that people are using Alexa routines to make her accept the open/close commands. I guess I can do that as a work around. It would just be nice and cleaner if HomeSeer would report these devices to Alexa as Garage Doors so that they worked natively. So far a routine has closed the gap. Thanks.

[jgreenberg01]

The easiest way to control a GDO is create an HS3 event & let Alexa discover Scenes (event).

Then create a Routine in the Alexa app that runs the scene - you can use any phrase you want. As an example, mine responds to "Close landing bay doors".

Alexa will run the routine which first triggers the event to close the garage door, then says "Lowering shields to keep the zombies out".

Yes, I know I'm mixing genres - I did that to annoy my son. Kind of like answering "Live long and prosper" with "may the force be with you".

[mr.Magoo]

Just keep in mind that from a safety standpoint you probably DON'T want Alexa to respond to someone shouting through the window "Alexa, open the garage door"
Personally I named my Garage Door " hzxgdflaskdjh" and created a routine for closing it, that way there's no (easy) way for someone to open it from the outside.