From VERAplus to HUBITAT C7 - first expierience

I'm on the way from Vera to Hubitat. Here is my interim report with first experiences. Maybe it's helpful for someone.

My Vera system has grown up since 2015: 60 z-wave nodes (mostly multi-devices), about 30 virtual devices, 35 scenes, many GET integrations and 2000 Lines of LUA code.

My reached Level on Hubitat after the first month:

40 zwave-devices successfully moved (min. one exemplar of any device type). Mostly with more functionality than before.
Aeon DSD31, Aeontec Siren ZW164, Aeontec NanoSwitch, Aeontec SmartSwitch7 ZW175
Fibaro Smart Implant FGBS222
Nodon Soft Remote
Philio Siren PSE02, Philio Relais PAN04-1B, Philio Relais PAN06-1B, Philio 4in1 sensor (motion, door,...) PST02, Philio Plug PAN16-1
Popp/Danfoss POPE010101 TRV
Qubino Relais/sensor ZMNHAD1, Qubino Relais ZMNHND1, Qubino Relais ZMNHBD1
Remotec Button Controller ZRC90
Vision Door sensor ZD2102
Open issues:
Aeontec Multisensor ZW100 tested but removed for the moment because of excessive notifications.
Philio 4in1 sensor PAT02 (flood, humidity, temp) not completely running.

Functionality:
First tests finished (virtual devices, variables, rules, dashboards, button controllers, ..) and first rules running.
Draft finished transferring the functionality (configuration and object names concept).
I expect the standard functions of Hubitat (incl. some community driver and apps) are enough for me: Rule Machine, Maker Api, Dashboard, Groups. Button Controller, variables, virt. devices. No more coding necessary. There are much more options, I do not need and discover at the moment.

First impressions and experiences (system handling, development speed, ...).
Including devices and setting configurations is much, much faster than with Vera.
It's hard to get the first understanding of the diverse logical structures. There are many options and it's time-consuming to understand their advantages, limits, dependencies. The documentation is not very helpful for this. I needed many tests and many searches in the community forum.
The configurations in the Rule Machine are nearly self-documenting. The log and debug options are good. Unfortunately, there is no complete email functionality.

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There is built in notifications but there are some community made email notifiers as well. One of the things that you should do is install Hubitat Package Manager. This will give you access to a wide range of community made integrations and drivers.

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Thank you for sharing your experience! We are glad that you are enjoying elevating your environment with Hubitat. While we know that documentation is not fully developed, we are improving it as we go along.

If you haven't discovered our tutorials, here is a link to our YouTube channel where you can find many How-To videos and app tutorials: https://www.youtube.com/c/Hubitat/featured.

And speaking of apps. As I am sure you have noticed, we offer a wide variety, for different skill levels. A common new-user pitfall is jumping into more advanced apps like Rule Machine that require a deeper understanding of how Hubitat Elevation works.

When starting the journey with Hubitat, I always recommend new users to start with Basic Rules, which despite its name, is a powerful app that can accommodate many use cases. Learning the ins and outs of this app first, allows users to gradually familiarize and interact with Hubitat's interface, preparing them for more advanced apps like Rule Machine.

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Can I ask what would be more helpful? Just trying to get a better understanding of what gaps there may be.

In my mind, someone might go to the documentation homepage, look at Getting Started, then eventually (after getting the hub set up, etc.) the Automating Your Devices document. Each of these is linked to from the previous document, starting from the homepage. This last doc explains a few common apps, including Basic Rule (a good starting point for arbitrary automations, as BobbyD also suggests) and Motion Lighting (a self-explanatory app name, if there ever was one).

The main thing to know is that "apps" are how you configure automations on Hubitat. There are some purpose-built ones like Motion Lighting and others that let you create custom automations without truly needing to write code, like Basic Rule or Rule Machine (though there is also the ability to write code via custom apps or drivers in Groovy).

There are some plans to re-work the docs, but I'm always curious what new users would find helpful if you don't mind sharing. :smiley:

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Thank you for this guide to install.
I already found references to HPM, but other things had priority. With your guide, the installation was a quick thing.
I've already matched and updated the installed community drivers. Maybe some issues will disappear.

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You will find this is a very helpful community. No question is too small, no problem too big... Someone, usually a lot of us have already gone through what is ailing another and solutions are usually readily at hand. Also a lot of tutorials here on you tube https://www.youtube.com/c/Hubitat can help you work through the logic of RM and other apps. As suggested above, start with simpler apps like Simple Automation and Lighting apps. Once you're ready for the bigger stuff you can experiment with greater confidence.

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For quick solutions, the apps like Basic Rules, Motion Lighting, Thermotat Schduler etc. are ok (and much, much better than the functionality of Vera). I've checked them, but my "old" system logics are grown over 7 years and intensively adapted to our needs and comforts. Based on these special apps, I would have to dispense some special functionality. Or in some other cases, the realization of these specialities in the basic apps would have been more laborious than an RM app.

Some functionality anyway needs the Rule Machine (in- and outgoing GET-communication with other systems and web services or complex warning and alarming logics or sub-rule structures to make the logic simpler and clearer, ...).
So I decided to do everything with Rule Machine. I expect, this will facilitate the clarity and documentation of the whole system on the long term.

To understand the basic principles of RM wasn't the problem. But to understand the interaction between the different variable types and connection devices with RM, Maker Api, Dashboard etc. was hard. I couldn't find an entry in the docu. So I had to test and search in the forum.

Also time-consuming for me was name concept for the devices (and partly the apps): Device label, device name, sub-device label, room, variable name, conection device name/label,..
Hubitat offers many possibilities (much more than Vera). But what type of info in which name part? How to beware clarity in a hundred objects? What are the results in the listings, selection boxes, dashboard, ...? I also couldn't find an entry point in the documentation. So I had to test and test.

But on the other side: After some time and effort, I started to understand the relatively clear and powerful structure of the system.

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Yeah, the UI has always been a weak point in a lot of people's eyes despite RM being incredibly powerful. Some people prefer offloading rules to an RPI using Node Red as that works better in their head than RM does (I mean the format structure not the actual performance)

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I learned to appreciate the possibility to modify the names of devices etc. without breaking the rules. This is a great advantage of the RM. It takes a bit more time to create the rules, but they work, and they stay working.

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I actually moved everything to NR based on a demonstrable improvement in performance. I understand that EVERYTHING about this setup allegedly improving performance screams "does-not-compute." That said, it was perceptibly faster as well as backed up by data.

It was over a year ago and I probably won't re-enable RM to test again. Things may have improved. The ease of replacing devices in the flows is enough benefit for me.

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I agree @harold.min.. Although not completely sure it's faster for my setup, rather it's fast enough not to make a noticeable difference. Being less taxing on the hub(s) resource-wise is a plus. Also am definitely one of those people who finds the NR's "flow based" ui to be extremely intuitive.

For folks new to home automation and/or others coming from a different platform, starting out with the base apps on HE is probably the way to go and will likely be the easiest/most rewarding route to a workable system.

If you are into things tech and want to integrate and control a bunch of different systems using a powerful, flexible, opensource controller maintainable all the way down to the hardware then Node-RED is definitely something to consider.

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I am in the same situation as the OP – moving from VeraPlus to something, in this case HE. My installation is nowhere as sophisticated as the OP’s, but it works for me. I have yet to move any physical (Z-wave) devices to HE, but have installed and configured a few apps, written some code, and integrated other devices such as Arduinos. Everything I have done works per my expectations and the HE is mostly a portal to other devices on my network. I could (and somewhat did) accomplish the same with my VeraPlus, which has not failed me. It has annoyed me, but not failed me.

HE documentation is lacking, and while this forum somewhat mitigates that, it’s still lacking.

Most importantly I have made two support requests this year for my HE seemingly randomly locking-up, and from what I can determine, no action was taken. Because I don’t rely on my HE at this point and mostly work on in-house technology during the winter months, I’ll deal with it in the future. The situation is, however, concerning.

And as a side note, I recently had an issue with geofencing on my VeraPlus. Because of its extensive logging capabilities, I was able to resolve the issue quickly.

Thanks for your feedback. Would you care to elaborate on what specific logging details were you able to gather that helped you troubleshoot the issue quickly?

As for your hub randomly locking-up, be sure to leverage our active community, as both staff and other members are quickly to jump in to help, faster and more thoroughly than any lone agent would, via email.

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I already did post: HE device logs

What the hell does "and more thoroughly than any lone agent would, via email." mean?

There are no logs in that post.

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It means that not just an agent will help, it means the whole community usually jumps in because one or all of us have seen whatever issue before.

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That said we need some more details. Can you post a copy of your z-wave details page to start?

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It means that the tremendous hands on experience of our community's most active members cannot be matched by one single agent assigned to a case.

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@bobbyD

Rather than highjack this thread, which was not my intention, I posted more info on my original thread. HE device logs

@kunpet Nicely done and comprehensive - thanks for your contribution and welcome aboard! I've been absent from here for a couple of months, but I am also a VeraPlus transplant. My experiences back in March, in terms of getting my bearings and figuring out how to 'translate' from Vera to HE, were similar. Likewise w.r.t the documentation and the "many searches" in the forum, though both are improving and they've come a long way since the new HE was released 3 years ago. My interactions here have been helpful, the developers are very responsive, and the HE staff takes all feedback seriously (like how Vera was early on).

I wonder how many of us have come here from Vera? IDK but I wish I had documented my experience in detail, including some practical things like how to translate a scene to RM, etc. That would likely have made it easier for you. and any others migrating from Vera. Have you made a dashboard yet? I haven't had time (trying to finish my CS PhD by December), but that's a topic I think would be helpful because it has potential display/manage the system in a more familar way - more like the Vera app. Food for thought...