I'm trying to get the light to gradually increase in brightness over the course of an hour. like a sunrise, I suppose. Rule Machine is not only over my head, it's just not working. i get an error message and that message doesn't go away until I delete the app and reload it. I'm not motivated to look into that right now, I'd rather find a work around if I can. If I can't, I'll just wait and figure it out another time.
So it looks like my other option is in Simple Automation Rules. At any rate, there's Dimmer Level and Fade Rate there. But, when I make a rule in that app, I'm just turning it on. I think it's asking me at what brightness I want the light to turn on? I don't see how to tell it to turn on at, say, a 2 and increase until it's at 50. And "fade rate" is a term I'm not sure about. i'm looking for it to brighten, not fade, so is the fade rate negative? is it measured in seconds? I'm playing around with it, but also this app doesn't have a "run the program" button so each time I change something I have to change the time it's triggered and then wait for a minute to watch my change still not make sense to me.
Am I asking this app to do something it cannot do? Is there another option to get around my non-working Rule Machine?
Thanks! That conversation is a little over my head right now but I think i will be able to figure out what is going on there when I can sit down and really focus on it.
I almost didn't get a hubitat because I am NOT techy, but I will never learn to be if I don't give myself a project to do, so everything is just taking me a little longer to figure out. Which is fine, I'm having so much fun! But it just takes me longer.
The "fade" option works in some situations and doesn't in others; you'll really just have to try it. But what RM can always do is brighten in stages -- send a slightly higher level every few seconds until it reaches the target value. For some lights, the difference between each light level is a noticeable jump; for others, you can set the device itself to transition over a few seconds.
For my current lights, I find that changing level 1-2% at a time with the device executing each change over the course of a second is barely perceptible and works very nicely. My previous setup, using dumb bulbs and dimmers, even very small brightness adjustments caused a noticeable sudden jump or drop in light levels. It really is a matter of experimenting with what produces a smooth non-jarring fade in your devices, for better or worse.
As an example, here's my wake-up light routine which incorporates a couple different fades:
(The cut from RGB to CT always makes the lights blink off for a fraction of a second despite the fade value; I don't think the bulbs I have are actually capable of a clean transition between the two modes.)
