How do Dashboards work?

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1

Contemplating the move from SmartThings to Hubitat and have a question about Dashboards…

I've watched a number of YouTube vids on creating them, and "assume" that clicking on various elements call a URL (either via the cloud or directly to the hub). So my question is "can you call these URLs from anywhere?" (from a Shell script or AppleScript for instance).

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Might help if you gave a specific example. You can do pretty much anything you want but how you go about it depends on what you're trying to do.

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Just something simple like…

#!/bin/sh

curl <URL>
4

I think I remember hearing the dashboard uses a web socket to keep its elements updated.

If you want to interact with a device there is the maker api that exposes a url and a http get can be used as a trigger in rule machine.

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5

It's a good thing your taking your time. By the time you decide HE is the one for you, they might be back in stock :rofl:

There are all kinds of dashboard solution for HE and if your looking to make something unique they have made it easy to do that as well via maker like @potts.mike mentioned.

Have you checked out the Show Off thread? Long post, but lots of samples of different ways people interact with HE.

6

Are you wanting to display a dashboard that is launched from a script? Or are you trying to mine/manipulate the data from a dashboard page?

If the former, the Hubitat Dashboard is just a web app running on the Hub, which can be accessed by any compatible web browser either using a LAN URL or a CLOUD URL. The cloud URL will work even if you’re on your home LAN. If you’re script is launching a browser with the Dashboard URL, I would think that should work.

If the latter, I would recommend you take a look at the Hubitat Maker API, which implements a RESTful API, transferring JSON back and forth. It works very well and can be called via the iOS Shortcuts App’s scripts to get data about a device, or issue commands to a device.

Developers have even implemented full integrations using the MakerAPI app for things like HomeBridge and The Home Remote.

Hope this helps. If you explain What you’d like to accomplish, I am sure the community will be happy to assist.

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7

Thanks… I have built a web server that executes scripts (shell, AppleScript, Python, Automator workflows, or any combination of the above). In SmartThings, I could control devices in such scripts by building URL tokens for them, ala…

do shell script "curl https://graph.api.smartthings.com/api/smartapps/installations/xxx-xxx-xxx/devices/mySwitches/xxx-xxx-xxx/off?access_token=xxx-xxx-xxx"

It is kind of a pain creating the tokens, but they work (and I only need to do it once). Just looking to do a similar thing with devices that are paired with the HE hub (ideally locally).

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I think the Hubitat Maker API will be your best, simplest method of integrating custom apps running on other hardware with Hubitat. It works very well. You can also supply a URL to have Maker API call with unsolicited device status updates, to keep your custom application up to date without any need for polling the hub.

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9

Thanks, I appreciate all of your comments!

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