I'm confused.....wouldn't having to constantly open an app be a "part time job", just to get devices daily functioning the way you wish, rather than actually automating them as they were designed to be?
It appears that for better or worse every reviewer will be looking for an app for Hubitat. It should be slick looking and easy to use. Even though it will have only the limited functionality that Patrick mentioned earlier, until HE has such a product, it will be at a competitive disadvantage.
In my own humble opinion, I feel that a native app for simple control, notification, and presence will be of great value.
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Yeah that was my point exactly. I also agree that the app doing simple control/notification/presence is totally adequate at this stage. I'm still confused why some people are fighting SO hard against an app. It's just totally bizarre to me. If they don't want to use the app, by all means don't use it. But for many people, it's expected and a requirement for better or worse.
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I don't know if I'd say people are fighting against an app per se. I'd say pretty much everyone is keen on the app as Patrick describes it, even those that are happy with the alternatives currently. I think some have a genuine worry though for a devolution of the local control, privacy, speed point of difference as more convenience orientated (let's say) consumers join the community.
That said, I also agree with folks that rightly point out that the lack of any app is holding adoption back. Patrick and crew would agree though with the need to have something there, given that they've been developing one for probably the last year. So in a sense, we actually all agree with each other on the basics, but have disagreement over the necessities and focus I think. 
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No we have Amazon devices in every room for when we are at home, I should have made things a little clearer. We have the phillips hue system (big mistake on my part but I digress) we are originally from Baltimore MD we now live in Buford Ga the power company down here is just plain horrific (Georgia Power) she can be at work it can be a totally sunny day nothing weather wise happening and the power goes out this happens like 15 times per month if you have the phillips system you know once the power restores all the damn lights turn back on so we were dealing with the lights being turned on all day I outfitted every light in the house with bulbs your talking 28 lights here being on for multiple hours so she needs an app to turn off when it does happen.
My opinion - it's a check the box item. So is WiFi. Having worked in the government, you don't know how many times I have seen crap products selected because they checked the most boxes. Many of the so-called capabilities will never be used but the product "wins" because it checks the most boxes.
So glad to be retired from that . . .
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Hue introduced a power restore last state option in settings a few months ago. This can be turned on to make sure this no longer happens.
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Works good. Just tested it the other day as a transformer blew in the neighborhood. Even the 1st gen hue bulbs are supported although there is a brief flash on them before they power back off.
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Thanks Patrick didn't know this, I have another question if you can answer I'm not sure but I thought I read in another topic that the hue bulbs could be connected to HE without needing their hub is this the case?
This is possible. I don't personally recommend it. I like to segment my Hue and non hue light bulbs on the Hue Bridge and use our integration. My Zigbee (non bulbs) stay on my Hubitat hub, and things have been far more stable. Bulbs make horrible repeaters and were designed really to only repeat for other bulbs.
I know it probably wouldn't be too good, but I'm at my wit's end with hue and then demanding that you upgrade the hub.
Me and my wife often travel because our jobs and it's not in heard of for both of us to be fine from the house at the same time for up to 2 weeks, and hue have our is into bad situations with not being able to access something features from the app remotely before we upgrade the hub and man I don't know how many times it had just kicked out my remote access saying I need to press the button on the hub.
If they were directly attached to HE at least I would still have access.
I mean I'm in to that damn system like $1300 and I can't get access when I need it. I guess it's my fault for jumping head in on the hue band wagon I'm just trying to figure my options I either stuck with them or sell my system and try to find another bulb solution.
You can access your hue bulbs via Hubitat dashboards using the cloud dashboard link using the hue integration to the hue bridge.
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Why not switch to dimmers/switches instead of a ton of bulbs?
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One possibility is that development resources are limited, so that takes time away from fixing other issues or adding other features.
I’m not necessarily saying I agree with that viewpoint (I’m somewhere in the middle when it comes to home control vs. home automation).
But it’s not like those who feel strongly about not wanting an app are doing it just to spite the people that do want one.
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Only reason I went the bulb route was the ease of installation and the fact that we would need an installer for dimmer switches and where we live they just milk the hell out of you to do anything service wise no matter what it is
Is there a tutorial or easy reference showing how to make that shortcut to your dashboards?
You can open the dashboard cloud link in your phone browser and in the menu of the browser it has for creating a shortcut in your home page.
I've been hesitant to weigh in on this debate because I truly am riding the middle ground on my opinion...
For those against the creation of an app, I completely see the point. With many of you coming from SmartThings, I completely agree. The ST apps are crap (classic) and crappier (new). Those who were with ST during the Kickstarter days may remember a lot of what SmartThings took away when they released the current classic app.
I was using IrisV2 until March 2016 when I left for SmartThing due to Iris V2 being a steaming pile of you-know-what at the time. I despise Iris to this day, and have not shed a tear for its' demise.. But, the one thing that I will credit Lowe's for getting right is their app..
For those who never used the Iris app, there are (were) things that you can do in their app that you simply cannot replace with a Hubitat dashboard. The Iris UI was built with the concept of "cards".... It had, for example, a Doors & Windows card that displayed at a glance, on the main page, how many open doors and how many windows were open. How do you replicate that, out of the box in Hubitat?? You can't. In fact, I think you would probably need either complex RM rules, or custom code to achieve.
The same goes for Locks, Smoke devices, garage doors, etc...
How does one view active HSM alarms, triggered devices, and alarm history in the dashboard when .. I don't think you can.. At least I have not figured out how do to that.
Again I am neutral on this because it's been 3 years since I've had a truly usable mobile app.. My intent was to show there are other purposes and use cases for a mobile app that extend beyond what dashboards can currently do.
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The concept of cards is similar to how I have setup my dashboards. This works better for me than the rooms construct that I have in Google Home/Assistant. Lights and fans I might want to turn on or off but windows and doors I mostly want to see what is open and what is closed. Water and smoke alarms I really only want to know about when there is a problem.
