Decoupling switch/dimmer buttons from actual light/relay

[benjamin]

I'm a software engineer just dipping my toe into setting up a smart home. I'm brand new to Hubitat and Z-wave and smart switches/dimmers, so I'm trying to learn the lingo (scenes, button controllers, etc.) but I'm very familiar with things like IFTTT and programming in general. I'm eager to dive-in, but I'm trying to get an idea of the capabilities before I waste money on unnecessary hardware.

I started off with the Hubitat Hub plus two Inovelli Dimmer Red Series (LZW31-SN). The two dimmers are installed in the same wall-box and control two sets of lights in the same room. 90% (maybe even 100%) of the time I want both sets of lights on together (or off together) at the same brightness... in fact I almost just connected both sets to the same dimmer (instead of using two dimmers). However, for the sake of learning, let's pretend I want to keep the two sets lights independently controllable for now (that may change as I expand my smart home).

Here's my question: Is it possible to effectively de-couple the physical buttons on the switch from the actual lights and control them both independently? For example, I have two physical dimmer switches controlling two sets of lights. Without rewiring anything, could I configure one set of physical buttons to control both sets of lights, and then use the other set of physical buttons to control something else entirely (some future smart relay/light I install in the future)? This would allow me to use the physical buttons for the majority of the cases that I want both sets of lights to respond the same, but I could still program something more complicated (such as a voice command to turn on or the other set of lights) for the special cases.

When I installed each Inovelli Dimmer, they each showed up as two devices: a parent device for the dimmer and a child device for the LED. However, in my head, I think of the each of the Inovelli Dimmer as really four devices (I think these are the right terms, let me know if I'm misusing them): two buttons (input devices), one LED (output device), and a dimmable relay (output device). By default two buttons are configured to control the dimmable relay and the LED reflects whether the lights are on or off. I'm surprised that Hubitat is showing me two devices and not those four devices, but maybe I'm just looking in the wrong place.

Similarly, I started playing with Basic Rules. My goal was to create a rule to the effect of "when top left button is pressed, turn east and west lights on" and "when bottom button is pressed, turn east and west lights off". However, the closest I could find was "When east lights turn on, turn on the west lights".

As I said, I'm new to this, so I'm really just curious about the terminology to use and what is possible, both in the Z-wave community in general and in the Hubitat environment specifically. I appreciate any pointers, tips, suggestions, etc.

Thanks,

• Ben

[benjamin]

Replying to my own post, I found a comment on this thread by csteele:

@csteele

There are a few Smart Dimmers that are smarter than average.. Inovelli's Red series can segregate the dim action from the physical 'paddle'. The 'paddle' then functions as more of a Button, telling the Hub that a button is being held and when it is released. The hub can then be instructed to use those events to mimic a dimmer. Multiple dimmers can be told to follow along.

The screenshot shows the option to segregate. You enable that and the dim electronics built into the dimmer only operate via commands from the hub. Cool, huh? It becomes a button controller sitting right on top of a buttonless dimmer. The button controller tells the Hub about the presses going on and the hub uses those to raise/lower or on/off the dimmer function. AND the hub can tell any number of dimmers to follow along.

This is NOT a tutorial on how-to do this... it's just an attempt to highlight what-is-possible.

(I picked Inovelli because I have one and can screen capture the option.)

This is exactly what I was talking about ("It becomes a button controller sitting right on top of a buttonless dimmer"), and it has some of the terminology to describe what I'm trying to do, so now I know it is possible. I noticed the option for "Disable local load Control", but it hadn't occurred to me to use that option to achieve my goal. There is another option for the Inovelli called "Association Behavior" with the description "When should the switch send commands to associated devices?" that looked promising.

I'll keep poking around to get a better understanding of what those two options do (and maybe find an actual tutorial).

[bertabcd1234]

@benjamin

I noticed the option for "Disable local load Control", but it hadn't occurred to me to use that option to achieve my goal. There is another option for the Inovelli called "Association Behavior" with the description "When should the switch send commands to associated devices?" that looked promising.

Disabling local control is probably what you want to do. You can add association on top of that if you want to; it's a way for two Z-Wave devices to directly control each other (often something like a motion sensor to a switch or, here, a switch/dimmer to a bulb) without putting the hub in the middle. This makes it potentially faster and more reliable, though less flexible since you can't add as much customization to the automation as you could with the hub. Hubitat also hasn't historically had much in the way of easy support for configuring associations, though some third-party drivers (like Inovelli's) have, and this is slowly changing with the built-in capabilities as well.

You'll probably find more as you continue reading...but hopefully that's enough to point you in the right direction.

Oh, also, all recent Zooz switches and dimmers can disable local control, too. HomeSeer is a notable player that can't (I honestly don't think they understand the use case...they didn't a few years ago when I saw someone ask on their forums, and they just released a new 700-series switch/dimmer that can't do this, either, so I doubt anything has changed). I don't think GE/Jasco do, either, though I haven't used any of their products in a few years. The Inovelli Red Series are great, though (and a community favorite if the recent poll is any indication).

[benjamin]

@bertabcd1234

Disabling local control is probably what you want to do. You can add association on top of that if you want to; it's a way for two Z-Wave devices to directly control each other (often something like a motion sensor to a switch or, here, a switch/dimmer to a bulb) without putting the hub in the middle. This makes it potentially faster and more reliable, though less flexible since you can't add as much customization to the automation as you could with the hub. Hubitat also hasn't historically had much in the way of easy support for configuring associations, though some third-party drivers (like Inovelli's) have, and this is slowly changing with the built-in capabilities as well.

Thanks! This is a huge help. I hadn't appreciated that you could get two Z-Wave devices to talk directly to one another, and that definitely helps me better understand both that setting and some of the parameter descriptions from the Inovelli manual.

@bertabcd1234

Oh, also, all recent Zooz switches and dimmers can disable local control, too. HomeSeer is a notable player that can't (I honestly don't think they understand the use case...they didn't a few years ago when I saw someone ask on their forums, and they just released a new 700-series switch/dimmer that can't do this, either, so I doubt anything has changed). I don't think GE/Jasco do, either, though I haven't used any of their products in a few years. The Inovelli Red Series are great, though (and a community favorite if the recent poll is any indication).

This is also a big help! I saw the Zooz stuff when I was researching. I'm usually the type to spend way too long researching before buying, but the Inovelli Red Series were a bit of an impulse buy at the recommendation of a co-worker. It sounds like I got good advice.