Hubitat Security System Integration or Replacement

Has anyone replaced or integrated their traditional home security system with Hubitat? I have a traditional system with wired door, and wireless motion and glass break sensors, that I'm willing to replace unless I can fully integrate it. My primary goals are to leverage the security motion sensors for lighting automation, and to self-monitor the security system when away. I've spent hours combing through the forums and am struggling to figure out whether posts are valid due to their age. Some posts talk about solutions that seem to be no longer valid or supported. I have a DSC security system and have added an Envisalink interface.

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Have you looked at @brianwilson’s Evisalink integration.

Another possible option would be https://konnected.io

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Not directly integrated or guaranteed to continue to work, but Ring retrofit kit with the unofficial Ring integration is another possible solution.

Thank you for the reply. Unfortunately, you didn't tell me anything I didn't already know. I am reluctant to use the Envisalink app since the developer is gone. Brian Wilson and I have been in contact but I was hoping to avoid adding a Pi to the mix. I have a Pi I can dedicate to this purpose but I was hoping for a solution that is less "enthusiast". I don't put myself in that category so I will need to be hand-held through the whole process. My ego can handle that, but I'd rather implement something that is more commodity and less fiddly. Not being derogatory to Brian in any way. He was very helpful thus far. I'm just concerned for long-term support. It seems my goals are far less common than I initially thought. I assumed there would be plenty of users wanting to leverage their investment in an existing home security system by integrating it to HE.

Have you considered @ogiewon's other suggestion:

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Not sure that your goals are different, but unfortunately the reality of the situation is that most home alarm systems were/are built as a closed propriatary solution. Some in recent years have allowed Zigbee devices (may also be some ZWave but I haven’t seen them) to be added to their control panel/hub, so it is possible that those devices may be able to be repurposed, but they are few and far between.

Yes, I have previously. I have a couple of problems with going with Konnected. My 6 motion and 2 glass break sensors are wireless so I'll need to replace those with something that directly connects (Zigbee/Zwave/WiFi) to HE. That approach will give me the motion sensor integration I want for lighting automation and motion security, but I'll then be fully reliant on HE as my security system. I'd rather rely on a traditional security system, and I'd rather not throw away the investment in those sensors. Thanks for your input though.

I understand. I actually replaced my GE Concord system a couple years ago with a DSC system and Envisalink just to get some integration between the two worlds. Thanks for your input.

Thank you @ogiewon, @SmartHomePrimer, @aaiyar, @thebearmay. I appreciate your time. You've helped me confirm what I thought my options were. That is valuable.

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yes i have 3 connected boards and have integrated it fine.. i have an issue with one flakey motion detector but the rest ie windows and doors work flawlessly.

I'm interested in this subject too, but I haven't looked at my Envisalink for years. I know that it's still working because every once in a while I'll get an email, or text, (I forget), when I have a (thankfully, false) alarm.

The SmartThings-nodeproxy integration works extremely well. Yes, you’re making part of your home automation dependent on another piece of hardware, but there are so many other opportunities for failure (HE locking up, power issues, etc), it’s not unrealistic to have some LAN dependencies.

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To piggyback on this. Just getting started with Hubitat. I have an Ademco Vista 20p integrated with my Vera via ADB2USB. Works OK. Missing some functions that I would like such as detailed status showing which zone is faulted ect. Couple of wired motion sensors and door sensors. A few wireless window an door sensors.

So I'm wondering what the best way to integrate a security system into Hubitat?

Something simple, with no Raspberry Pi or through a computer.

Lets me use my sensors in automation would be nice.

I don't mind getting an in between such as Envisalink if it integrates nice. Or grabbing a whole Ring Alarm system instead.

Any help would be appreciated!

Thanks to all. Konnection is for wired sensors only.

@jbates57 I am in the same place. My Hubitat just arrived, is up and running and I envisioned it talking with my Qolsys 2.0 running over Alarm.com (ADC.) Looks like I was wrong per @jmpierce:

"For my setup, I have almost all my home automation controlled via HE. With the ADC app, I can arm/disarm my panel via the HE/automation routines. The alarm.com panel itself has only basic devices linked. Like a few door sensors and a motion senor. Those devices are not linked to my HE.

tl;dr version: It's not currently possible, and I doubt it ever will be given how alarm.com does not offer access to a modern web service platform. I recommend doing as much as you can with your HE."
Alarm.com Integration Help - Developers - Hubitat

Two concerns with self-monitoring are travel and home insurance discounts. Thinking this through, I can get a tolerant family member to receive the notifications when I travel again.

As to the discount for home insurance, that would most likely be offset by no alarm permits to my city and the monthly bill reduction to my current (AAA) alarm company. Maybe self-monitoring still counts...

So...it appears that there are three options:

  1. Do a lot of work with coding and soldering
  2. Split the duties
    3.. Going away from main stream alarm systems.

Corrections to my conclusions requested.

I think I've read that @lewis.heidrick knows about integrating Envisalink with DSC. I'd be interested myself, but I don't have a new Envisalink...it's an IP170D.

Dsc and Honeywell Vista panels both integrate nicely. There is a native option to the hub but it's chatty. Would work fine on a dedicated hub or one without much load. The raspberry pi option works great even on a loaded hub.

For the dedicated hub you could use hub mesh or hubconnect to link the two hubs. Envisalink supports both wired and wireless zones. The alarm panels are easy to swap out if you have a different wired alarm panel system.

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@lewis.heidrick Thank you for this; time for me to learn more. If it isn't too much trouble, I could use some help understanding.

You introduce vocabulary that I am not familiar with. I was able to find the DSC panel here DSC Alarm Systems (alarmsystemstore.com) and the Honeywell at the same website. Envisalink connects the hardware to the panel; correct?

"There is a native option to the hub but it's chatty." The hub must be the Hubitat, but native? Chatty? I don't understand and my internet search comes up blank.

While I know what a Rasberry Pi is, this seems to be heading into developer territory, meaning that it fits into the "soldering and coding" category, which isn't scalable to non-tech people. While I consider myself a power user, programming is in my future.

Thanks again for your time.

Yes, there are 4 wires that go from the Envisalink to the alarm panel.

This is the Envisalink board
image

And this is where they screw into the alarm panel. (Black, Red, Green, Yellow)

The "Native option" is where the Envisalink connects directly to the Hubitat hub via a telnet connection using a driver that you add to the hub and the app. The process is best described in feed on @brianwilson Github link here: GitHub - bdwilson/hubitat_envisalink: Integration for Hubitat to Envisalink 3 or 4

The Envisalink sends a bunch of commands back and forth every second hence why I call it chatty and prefer to offload it to a raspberry pi to cut down on the amount of load on my production hub.

The Raspberry pi doesn't require any soldering, there are just a few screws to screw in when you put it in the case and plug in a memory card. I used my computer monitor and keyboard from another system to set everything up. There's a docker container that has most of the command line stuff done for you already if you want to use it but it was easier for me to just install the nodeproxy directly.

There are two main components you need to setup, Nodeproxy being the main one, and the Envisalink communication part being the second. There's a video and a guide that walks you through the process so I wouldn't classify this as easy but definitely doable by non-tech people if they just follow along. I had my 11-year-old daughter, 10 at the time, setup the Raspberry PI as a learning moment for her. I wanted to give her some exposure to the techy side. She has almost no computer experience at all and was able to get it up and running in about an hour or so. Most power users around here could easily fiddle their way through getting it set up and running well.

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I have two pi's running at my house. One is production and one is a development pi so I can test things before I try them on my production hub. I'd recommend getting the Argon One case for the Raspberry Pi. It's cheap but works very well. Also puts all the ports on one side so it's nice and clean looking. Also has a magnetic top if you ever want to access the io ports in the future.

https://www.amazon.com/Argon-Raspberry-Aluminum-Heatsink-Supports/dp/B07WP8WC3V

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I know even the mention of Linux can be intimidating but it's not that bad. The desktop looks a lot like windows. The terminal window is basically like a command prompt in windows. The commands differ a bit but if you go by what's shown in the videos you should be fine.

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