Quickly viewing door access from cell phone like August or Nest

[Guest]

Hi everyone,

What do people use to view the status of ZWave deadbolts from their cell phone, like if you wanted to see a quick log of when someone has opened the door or not? I just bought a new home so was going to buy new locks but the one issue I always had at my old home was that I didn't really see any easy way to do this. I'm basically looking for something similar to the attached image from the August lock. I'm debating on if I should just use August or the Nest Yale lock since they do this very easily, but then it doesn't seem like HomeSeer integration is the best, or even possible like with the Nest one. I don't really need full integration with HomeSeer but there might be a case where it would be handy to disable the alarm or set the temperature when the house cleaner's door code is used and what not. I like with these systems how you can quickly open the app and see who was coming and going all day and get notifications easily etc. Just wondering what most people do, if anything, to accomplish this with HS3 with ZWave locks. Ignore the google link, I originally linked to a photo below but the link changed it to just some homepage and now won't let me save the post without a link added.

https://dz2563isv5m4b4oy42huiqwm-wpe...bile-app-1.jpg

[Eman]

Hi everyone,

What do people use to view the status of ZWave deadbolts from their cell phone, like if you wanted to see a quick log of when someone has opened the door or not? I just bought a new home so was going to buy new locks but the one issue I always had at my old home was that I didn't really see any easy way to do this. I'm basically looking for something similar to the attached image from the August lock. I'm debating on if I should just use August or the Nest Yale lock since they do this very easily, but then it doesn't seem like HomeSeer integration is the best, or even possible like with the Nest one. I don't really need full integration with HomeSeer but there might be a case where it would be handy to disable the alarm or set the temperature when the house cleaner's door code is used and what not. I like with these systems how you can quickly open the app and see who was coming and going all day and get notifications easily etc. Just wondering what most people do, if anything, to accomplish this with HS3 with ZWave locks. Ignore the google ink, I originally linked to a photo below but the link changed it to just some homepage and now won't let me save the post without a link added.
https://dz2563isv5m4b4oy42huiqwm-wpe...bile-app-1.jpg

Hmm,
What would be so wrong or low tech to do the project using door sensors and NEST network cameras at the doors in question? With that you can have a visual proof on record and already supported in HomeSeer!



Eman.

[jvm]

Well, you won't find as nice a graphical interface built-in to HomeSeer, but you can search the HomeSeer log using a keyword like "lock" and you'll get every instance of a lock opening, closing, etc. Additionally, the locks generally have an associated "notification" device and you can use that to determine whether it was manually locked/unlocked or done via a code. I don't think the log will give you a history of the codes. To get that, you may need a plugin. I think the (free) BLLock does it for you, but I haven't tested it myself.

[Guest]

Thanks everyone, definitely good ideas and for sure an option. I'll have a Nest doorbell camera plus a Nest cam aiming at the door so I guess that's just as easy to determine who is coming or going. I guess I was thinking more with adding codes, like I like how with August etc you can just open the app and quickly add a user to it, where HomeSeer is kinda clunky on mobile since it's a desktop interface of course. But the August lock and the Nest Yale one are so expensive compared to ZWave ones so just looking at various options.

I guess another option is using IFFT or something as there might even be a way to have HS post lock events to a Google Sheet or something but not really a huge deal. Just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing something. I'll check the BLLock to see, thanks!

[sparkman]

You could also try the lock event script located here: https://forums.homeseer.com/forum/de...pt?postcount=1. It logs to a database and a virtual device and could in theory be modified to log to other places like Google Sheets as well.

[drparker151]

You could also try the lock event script located here: https://forums.homeseer.com/forum/de...pt?postcount=1. It logs to a database and a virtual device and could in theory be modified to log to other places like Google Sheets as well.

I just installed this scripted a few days ago. Working great, I have it send me pushover notices. so I know exactly when my kids come home.

[jvm]

I use a very low-tech method.

On my Schlage locks, when a user code is entered, the associated "Access Control Notification" device's value changes to indicate which code was entered. The values begin at 6001 and continue sequentially. By default, the "Access Control Notification" device uses a range 6000 - 6040 to capture this and report that a user code was entered (Note, user code #1 actually generates the value 6001, I believe 6000 is for one of the "built-in" codes). I break this group of values out into individual status lines and edit the status text to indicate who unlocked the door. Of course, you also have to change the original range value 6000-6040 to give back the lines for the individual codes (thus, I changed it to 6007-6040). From my testing it seems that the first value 6000 isn't actually reported when a user code is entered - I assume it may be for one of the locks built-in codes. I reserve 6001 (the first user code) to indicate that a user entering this has some kind of "emergency"). See image, below.

Then I have a simple event which looks for a unlock and when that occurs, I send a text to my phone (to send a text, I use the "normal" email action -- an email to my phone number at AT&T gets changed into a text. So, using US numbers, I send to 2125551212@mms.att.net as the email destination). In the body of the email, I use the replacement value $$DSR:ref: to insert the status text (replacing ref with the device reference # of the Access Control Notification device). This results in the status phrase (e.g., "Unlocked By AAAA") being inserted into the text which I receive at my phone.

I have my event to run off of the door unlock but you could also have it set to run off of the change in the Access Control Notification so that Different events are run depending on the code that is entered.

It would be nice if there was a replacement value allowing me to get the user name directly from the lock management page so I didn't have to manually edit the status lines each time I change the code, but I haven't been able to find that.