KNX is an open-standard 2-wire low voltage bus system that has been used in commercial, industrial and residential buildings in Europe for decades. It has recently been ratified as the Australian and New Zealand "smart home" building standard.
KNX integrates over IP, and provides read and write access to all the building's electrical services - mostly DIN Rail lighting, heating, aircon, window treatments, access control, security, energy management, audio/visual, irrigation, weather stations, presence and motion sensing... you get the picture. Every large European electrical manufacture supports KNX, meaning there is an extensive range of products at many price points, all with exceptional reliability and controllability.
There's a link to more developer's info at the bottom of the KNX org website.
It would be nice to offer Hubitat as a cost-effective "Do-It-For-Me" solution for our customers.
Not sure what your asking here? KNX is a completely different ball game to hubitat DIY home automation, the control and configurations I can do with KNX far surpasses what ZigBee and z-wave is capable currently. There are some massive pit falls in KNX that the likes of hubitat easily surpasses but there is a reason why KNX is so expensive, it's super fast, reliable and can do crazy things if you have a good imagination.
KNX is a professional solution, which we sell and programme. Our mid and high-end installations use Savant and KNX-based inwall touchscreens & phone apps, but there is a gap in the market for a budget-priced app interface and logic processor. We have many clients who already stretch their budgets to get the music and movie systems they want integrated into their new homes, but adding an app interface to change their RGB LEDs from a KNX manufacturer is around NZ$1000. Open-source projects like Openhab and Home Assistant have support for KNX, but for an integrator like us there are advantages to an off-the-shelf hardware product such as Hubitat.
There is also the issue of the last-meter. In retro-fits and the occasional tricky architectural vision, it's not always possible to get a wire to a location, so Z-Wave has a place in our design toolkit. The normal KNX to Z-Wave gateways are the aforementioned $$$$ bits of kit, which is a really expensive way to not run a cable 1 meter. (Yea, I've totally been there. Beautiful home tho)
A system like Hubitat would also enable our tech-savvy clients program behaviour of their own home, without risk of damaging the underlying building functionality.
KNX is about 20% more expensive than the old-fashioned equivalent, which is a cost-effective way to futureproof a building that will last 50+ years. There's going to be a lot of new homes built in NZ with KNX specified by architects and electricians, even if the owners never know anything about smarthomes.
The KNX big-boys will catch on and offer cheap hardware solutions eventually, but in the mean time there's a need for quality mobile user interface that won't break the bank.
So I'd like to have an IP KNX driver for Hubitat, but I'm probably not the right guy to write it.
This is what i'm saying, it's not a simple as writing software for KNX ( I work for a manufacturer who makes KNX products and I have to support it) the reason the costs are high and always will be is due to what KNX charge to test it. Your not allowed to just wright some software and say it works with KNX, its like DALI or z-wave on steroids, they are so stringent with what goes on there system and the tests involved. Which is great in one way because if you buy something that works with KNX it WILL work with any other product from any other brand on there system. But that costs a lot of money to test, each time we make any change to our product they charge something like 6000 euros to test it even if the change has nothing to do with the connection or how it will work on there system. I'm sure our bill is around 15000 for one range!
so i'm assuming the aforementioned gateway is also literally that, a gateway, for z-wave to KNX and the z-wave products populate on their KNX software?
we are the big boys i can tell you unless they charge us less, the price will not come down.
the amount habitat who have to invest in KNX would be crazy. Also hubitat is its own system with its own rules engine, so then wouldn't be work with the 1000 Euro a pop software that they support.
Your statement only applies if officially supported by HE. As with HomSeer and OpenHAB it is the community who built the integration. Not the product owner. My belief is he is looking for a community developer to assist him in achieving KNX-HE connectivity.
I agree but if you spent tens of thousands of hard earned cash on a KNX system would you chance putting something on that could jeopardize or invalidate it so that they wouldn't support it? In my mind if you wanted a tinker/ cheaper solution you would just buy hubitat in the 1st place?
I tend to agree, but that decision is really up to the end user. So if there are others that would use the integration - that is their decision, right? People do things all the time I think are ill advised.
Anyway, I also see this as something a community member would have to step forward on and decide if they want to work with someone to get this fleshed out.
I would be interested in the KNX-HE connectivity if it was available. I have a ventilation system in my house which has a KNX gateway, but all my other automation is Zigbee, Z-wave and WiFi/Ethernet.
Any news on this? I think the KNX support over IP of current Hubitat is really interesting and make full sense. I currently own a Z-Wave + Zigbee installation in my current home, but I'll move to a new one soon, and this one has preinstalled KNX devices.
For me it makes sense that Hubitat be the common point to coordinate sensors and actuators rules from any of the three networks, instead of forcing me to build my own solution with open source, or needing to spend some more money on a ZipaBox I also own.
(Yea, I've totally been there. Beautiful home tho)
