Surprising Z-wave optimization

[Bilbrey]

What I want to know is where you, as a relatively new user of the board, would consider a good place for that type of information. (See my other posts on this thread for more of my thoughts.)

(I understand this was directed at CW!, but I have some thoughts to offer as well...)

I've been more 'lurker' on this board, but have been using HomeSeer products for the past 6 years or so...

I worked at Apple. My team created Mac Mini and Apple TV. And I heading up the Technology Advancement Group for many years before retiring.

That said, as I alluded to before, if someone were to curate an index, pointing to "current" basic information (Especially with respect to HS4), I think that reference could be very useful, and easy to create. And while some of this information exists, having a single reference to point new users to would be helpful.

And under each section, simply pointing to where the information can be found would be helpful.
Start with the basics, but expand over time to include more references...

Example:

HS3
- Getting Started
- Adding Plugins
- Adding Devices
- Creating Events
- Supporting Z-wave
- etc...

HS4
- Getting Started
- Adding Plugins
- Adding Devices
- Creating Events
- Supporting Z-wave
- etc...

It would be nice to have a 'known' place to go for answers... Or at least to check first.

The alternative to this is that users have to 'guess' what terms 'might' get them the information they are looking for, search the forum, and 'maybe' find useful information...
That is frustrating at best, and as CW! pointed out, we don't know what the 'best' answer is. And we don't know if something from 8 years ago is still relevant.

But the complexity of implementing "Home Automation" solutions is what is making "Digital Home Assistants" popular. Digital Home Assistants can't do a fraction of what a home controller can do, but ANYBODY can add an Echo and some Hue lightbulbs and then be able to say, "Alexa, turn my lights on."

The threat to companies like HomeSeer Technologies, is that as the consumer product manufacturers evolve their offerings, making their 'smart hubs' more capable, they will eventually do enough, and do it easy enough, that consumers will embrace that solution over more functionality. There are more people that want to do a lot of simple things, than the niche market of people that want to 'fully automate' their home. And because every fully automated smart home is custom, it is a harder challenge to support.

If HomeSeer Technologies is happy with their niche market, and do not aspire to increase their market penetration, that is their choice.

But to my point, I can easily speak with my Alexa device, I have been unable to get my Homeseer controller to do the same (and I've tried). One just works out of the box, the other 'requires' knowledge of how to get the feature enabled.

If I were advising HomeSeer Technologies, I'd suggest they consider enabling basic features that consumers of "Digital Home Assistants" are being trained to expect. Features like voice interaction, geofencing, etc. There are more, but I hope I've made my point.

Expecting external developers to 'support' Homeseer features, is giving control of technology essential to Homeseer to someone else. Apple/Steve had the goal of controlling their own destiny. I wonder if Homeseer has the same intentions...

[jmaddox]

"Event Clinic" sounds very interesting.
As it was created a few years ago, I would imagine it is not too applicable to HS4?

Event clinic is still very applicable. There was only one relatively minor change in the event engine from HS3 to HS4, and that's to do with one starting trigger being eliminated. Event clinic nicely explains the event engine while providing examples. It was really well done.

[jmaddox]

But to my point, I can easily speak with my Alexa device, I have been unable to get my Homeseer controller to do the same (and I've tried). One just works out of the box, the other 'requires' knowledge of how to get the feature enabled.

If I were advising HomeSeer Technologies, I'd suggest they consider enabling basic features that consumers of "Digital Home Assistants" are being trained to expect. Features like voice interaction, geofencing, etc. There are more, but I hope I've made my point.

Expecting external developers to 'support' Homeseer features, is giving control of technology essential to Homeseer to someone else. Apple/Steve had the goal of controlling their own destiny. I wonder if Homeseer has the same intentions...

I've always thought HS should market a line of array microphone/speakers similar to amazon, google and now apple. I would prefer a ceiling/wall mount POE version but would settle for a wifi tabletop unit. I've never tried using the built in voice control but I suspect it's not 'conversational', or flexible, and that would also be helpful. Finally the units should be individually addressed; such that they correspond to a specific room meaning that 'turn on the lights' does so for that room. Ahh well it's just wishful thinking.

[Bilbrey]

Event clinic is still very applicable. There was only one relatively minor change in the event engine from HS3 to HS4, and that's to do with one starting trigger being eliminated. Event clinic nicely explains the event engine while providing examples. It was really well done.

Which a novice would not know unless someone says "Event Clinic" is still applicable... 👍🏻 (Thanks!)

[ewkearns]

What better place than a professional (and printable) manual to describe what the product can do for the customer and in so doing tell them why they can't live without buying HSx?

[CW!]

I think I need to update something on the original purpose of this thread (to optimize or not to optimize). I woke up this morning and several devices had become off-line (about 24 hours after doing the above). Looking over the failures, I'm suspecting it's because I have two remote Z-wave controllers. During a normal optimization, I get the message "Done. The remote ZW interface to use was updated." Of course, without optimization, I'm not sure the remote ZW interface is being selected correctly, making half my network unresponsive. Don't know if anybody can clarify, but of course, searching the forum doesn't help much.

I'm now running an optimize (takes a while with 2 ZW controllers). Hope that improves things.

[jmaddox]

I think I need to update something on the original purpose of this thread (to optimize or not to optimize). I woke up this morning and several devices had become off-line (about 24 hours after doing the above). Looking over the failures, I'm suspecting it's because I have two remote Z-wave controllers. During a normal optimization, I get the message "Done. The remote ZW interface to use was updated." Of course, without optimization, I'm not sure the remote ZW interface is being selected correctly, making half my network unresponsive. Don't know if anybody can clarify, but of course, searching the forum doesn't help much.

I'm now running an optimize (takes a while with 2 ZW controllers). Hope that improves things.

I forget if it was in the post you initially referenced but I recall a suggestion to optimize a specific node to act as a repeater. One tool that may help you is z-seer+ I'm not sure if this advice is applicable with 2 controllers. You can also manually set routes per node, so if half your network is unreachable you may need to tell that half to use your 2nd interface.

[ewkearns]

I think I need to update something on the original purpose of this thread (to optimize or not to optimize). I woke up this morning and several devices had become off-line (about 24 hours after doing the above). Looking over the failures, I'm suspecting it's because I have two remote Z-wave controllers. During a normal optimization, I get the message "Done. The remote ZW interface to use was updated." Of course, without optimization, I'm not sure the remote ZW interface is being selected correctly, making half my network unresponsive. Don't know if anybody can clarify, but of course, searching the forum doesn't help much.

I'm now running an optimize (takes a while with 2 ZW controllers). Hope that improves things.

I don't think there should be any problem with 2 remote z-wave controllers, though it sounds like you may have something out of the ordinary going on, now. Here is another thing to consider: https://forums.homeseer.com/forum/ho...22#post1433922