3 Alexa Homeseer Skills Available?

[WAR]

Can anyone tell me the differences? I'd like to control devices and run events.

[rmiles7721]

Can anyone tell me the differences? I'd like to control devices and run events.

The one that's just called "Homeseer" is the older one that uses the smarthome api. If you are not running one of the recent betas you can choose this one if you want direct control from Alexa, i.e. "Alexa, turn on the light"

"Homeseer Home Automation Skill" is the skill that allows you to turn on and off stuff and run events by saying "tell homeseer..." and passes anything with that straight to homeseer. The smarthome api (the third one) is easier to use with Alexa but the skill (this one) allows you to control more things and be more specific in what you want HS to do, particularly if you use something like Jon00's script, which I highly recommend.

"Homeseer Smarthome" uses Alexa's smarthome api. It's the one that allows you to just say "Alexa, turn on the lights" etc. Now that HS has updated to API v3 you can turn lights and appliances on and off, lock the doors, set colored lights, query the thermostat. You also need to be running one of the more recent Homeseer betas for this to work

I think that pretty much covers them. If I'm wrong I'm sure someone will correct lol.

It's safe to use the first and second together or the second and third but not the first and third.

[WAR]

Thanks for the thorough explanation.

I am not on a beta version of HS3. I read on the boards that it may not be long until it is released.

Long term, do you think Jon's script will be necessary to get the best use from Alexa? I'd gladly purchase it if it was easy to install and made things simpler.


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[jon00]

Long term, do you think Jon's script will be necessary to get the best use from Alexa? I'd gladly purchase it if it was easy to install and made things simpler.

I don't charge for anything but donations are appreciated.

The advantage of my script is that you can trigger on key words rather than specific sentences plus get proper dialogue back or even create pseudo conversations. Take a look at the video on the first post of my thread which gives an idea what you can do: https://forums.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=184504

[WAR]

Jon, I've been a little intimidated about trying to install your plug-in, but I'm going to give it a go tomorrow! Thanks for your response.


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[Mr_Resistor]

Jon, I've been a little intimidated about trying to install your plug-in, but I'm going to give it a go tomorrow! Thanks for your response.

Absolutely nothing to fear...and Jon and his loyal fanbase will chime in if you get stuck. Look through the forums and ask questions. Jon's helper is a great addition to the native skills. The ability to do custom responses alone is a game changer.

[rsisson]

[jon00]

You need to initiate a conversation with Alexa first.

[mulu]

I had the skills "HomeSeer" and "HomeSeer Home Automation Skill" installed. With "HomeSeer" I was able to control devices by saying "Alexa, turn on...". Since "HomeSeer SmartHome" seems to be a newer version of "HomeSeer" I decided to uninstall "HomeSeer" and install the skill "HomeSeer SmartHome". However, now I can't use "Alexa, turn on..." anymore. Alexa tells me that the skill associated with the device is not enabled. When I go to the Alexa Smart Home devices I can see that they are associated with "HomeSeer" and not "HomeSeer Smart Home". I tried to create the new association by scanning for new devices but that didn't help. How can I get this to work.

Btw, somebody said "HomeSeer SmartHome" requires a beta. I think in the meantime that's included because on https://forums.homeseer.com/forum/ho...-release-notes it says "

* Added voice command setting and checkbox in event properties to support running events from Alexa (V3 SmartHome API)"