Does anyone know how you would set a Rule to set the thermostat one degree lower than the current temperature? The rules engine allows you to set the cool temperature, or adjust the setting, but neither of these appear to be relative to the current temperature. For example, if the cool is set to 80, and it is currently 78 in the house, I want the rule to be able to set the cool temperature to 77, not 79.
I have a similar question... I was hoping to find a way to use and/or run actions with variables as the values.
Trigger: Virtual Thermostat changed
Action: Set cooling point to %value% -- but that's not allowed.
Perhaps a "track event dimmer," could be possible even if your target device isn't a dimmer? Has anyone figured out a way to do this? I just want to say "Alexa, set the thermostat to 78," and have that translate into the real thermostat as a temperature. I just can't figure out how to retrieve or set variables based on device values. They don't seem to have the same contextual awareness that the 'notification' fields do.
Just trying to decide if I want to go the node red route to create virtual Alexa thermostat to do the control
Did you ever do something like this? I just installed a new Centralite Pearl thermostat last night, and was disappointed when I came across the lack of support for thermostats in Hubitat's Alexa Skill.
I tried the virtual switch option, and I didn't like how it operated. I have been combing the community pages a little obsessively since then looking for a solution and all of the threads that I come across you seem to pop up in, usually in relation to the Hubitat - Node-RED - Alexa integration path, but I never did see this exact thing mentioned. Can you point me in the right direction to get started?
Here's what I did.
One, I used the thermostat scheduler to create basic daily setpoints schedules.
Then, I have two virtual switches "temp Up", "temp down".
Temp up runs a rule that increases the heat and cooling setpoints by 1 degree, temp down rule decreases the heat and AC by 1.
I then have Alexa routines "Alexa I'm cold" turns on "temp up", Alexa I'm hot" turns on "temp down"
Hopes this helps.
Mike
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Any clue when full Alexa integration will happen? It would be nice to say "set the thermostat to 67". I may fiddle with creating virtual switches.
As I understand it the limitation is Amazon/Alexa's support for thermostat's (in my case a zigbee).
I also created virtual switches called furnace & air conditioner. Which can be called from alexa to turn on (then auto off 2 seconds later). I have a 2 rules that monitors the switches to then set the appropriate HVAC mode and most comfortable setpoint.
In conjunction with my "i'm hot/cold" routines and thermostat scheduler I rarely touch the thermostat.
Hope this helps.
Mike
*"As I understand it the limitation is Amazon/Alexa's support for thermostat's "
Nope, my CT-101's worked by saying what temp I wanted through Alexa when they were on my lowes Iris system. With the release of the source code by Lowes I am surprised one of the code gurus here or on ST has not written an app for it yet.
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Alexa is just fine with thermostats - I used to use a virtual thermostat on ST worked just fine. Its Hubitat's Alexa integration that's probably not sending the correct device type over. Even HE temperature sensors are ignored by Alexa
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I wonder if a dimmer would work better an two switches. The other I am thinking of trying is passing the thermostat through Hombridge. Homebridge to Alexa integration is pretty complete, Will have to play to see if its worth it. Up/Down is fine, but sometimes you want to know what the heat is set to, or the current temp is. Used to be able to do that in ST.
Ok Hubitat team
I have the exact same setup
One year later where are you guys on adding this Zwave generic thermostat device type to work with Alexa?
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Sorry for the delay. I just got my thermostat and have integrated with Alexa. It took three virtual devices and 5 rules plus one alexa routine. But with that, my alexa controls are
- set cool (temperature) - sets thermostat coolSetPoint to temperature and heatSetPoint to temperature - 6. Returns notification to echo speaks of set temperatures.
- set heat (temperature). Same but for heat.
- set AC Fan (on/off). On turns on the fan. Off sets to auto. Returns notification to echo speaks of set temperatures.
- get House Temperature. Alexa routine. Caused echo speaks to send current house temperature and setpoints.
The "convolution" in the implementation is to work-around setting via thermostat scheduler. So now all work together seamlessly (not counting some echo speaks reliability issues).
If interested code and rules are at: HubitatActive/AlexaAcControl at master · DaveGut/HubitatActive · GitHub
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Hi Dave,
First, thank you for sharing your solution. I was hoping you could provide a bit more guidance in the Rules creation as I"m struggling with recreating some of those. I'm trying to use the exact naming convention of the devices/etc. that you're using to keep everything similar.
What I've done so far:
Installed your 3 custom device drivers
Created 1 instance of each of the 3 device drivers as such: [Label]:[Device type]
Cool button: Virtual AC Cool
Heat button: Virtual AC Heat
AC Fan: Virtual AC Fan
Created the following rules (Rule Machine 4.0). I still have to get add the Echo Speaks commands setup (I just installed it), but understand how that would work.
AC Fan Auto
AC Fan On
Where I'm struggling is recreating your AC Cool and AC Heat rules, specifically the first two actions you have listed in your screenshots. For example, in your AC Cool rule:
setCoolSetPoint to Cool Dimmer
setHeatSetPoint to (coolSetPoint - 10.0)
I must be missing something as I'm not sure how to recreate those actions.
The actions below those that reference the Thermostat actions, I understand and can recreate.
Also - you make mention of an Alexa routine. Can you provide a bit more information on what that looks like?
Thanks in advance for your help - I'm excited to get this working. Coming from ST, this was one thing I missed not being able to do.
Davin
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