I have a C8 pro controller and I've run into an issue with some new matter bulbs that I've put in that I would like some opinions on.
I have found that the odd time when I alternately control my bulb from my HomePod and then from habitat, the hubitat will sometimes "lose the state of the bulb ". The bulb will stop responding from hubitat until I toggle the bulb from HomeKit or vice versa.
My first thought to resolve this problem, was to first pair of the bulb with habitat, and then export the bulb from hubitat to the HomePod so that hubitat would be the prime controller for the bulb, but it seems that I am not able to do this on a C8 as the app is not supported.
Has anybody with a C8 pro actually tried doing this pairing a bulb with habitat and then exporting the bulb to HomeKit with the HomeKit bridge and has any one else run into issues like I'm seeing?
What platform version are you running and which brand of bulb? More specifically, to your question, Matter devices paired with Hubitat cannot be exported back to Apple Home via HomeKit Bridge. You can try pairing with Hubitat first via Matter and then generating a pairing code to join Apple Home. I'm not sure if that will work any better.
What I'm doing is I'm first pairing it with an Apple HomePod, and then pairing it with hubitat with a pairing code. Im using linkind bulbs
Apparently, this is a very well-known problem when using certain matter devices when running in a multi controller set up, which when you forced to use using a hubitat C7 or C8, Apparently many matter devices do not run well in a multi controller set up.
Now, as far as being unable to export a matter paired bulb from hubitat back again to to Apple home, I was actually able to do that. Here's what I did. I first paired my bulb with the HomePod then did use the pairing code to get that device back into hubitat. I then rename that device in hubitat to something unique and then exported it via the hubitat bridge back into Apple home, it worked flawlessly. I was I saw both the original device in Apple home and the new one that I paired back from hubitat. The reason I did this test was I was actually concerned that hubitat wouldn't allow me to bridge back a matter device, but it seemed to work.
Unless this is a limitation that the C8-pro has when you're pairing matter devices to it directly as the master commissioning controller, there seems to be no issue exporting. (if someone who has matter devices only paired with hubitat c8-pro could try this, I would be greatly appreciative). From what I've been researching this is actually one of the recommended solutions to get around this problem, only commissioned the bulb to one controller and then export it out via a bridge back to HomeKit.
I can reproduce this issue 100% of the time using my bulbs. Take a bulb and pair it with the HomePod then pair it with hubitat. Turn the bulb on and off and verify that it works from both controllers. Then physically remove power from the bulb for a brief time and then try to control the bulb from hubitat. I can pretty much guarantee that you will lose control of the bulb. The only thing that seems to bring it back is to start toggling the bulb off and on from the controller that has control of the bulb, The homepod.
Per their docs (HomeKit Bridge | Hubitat Documentation), āDevices added to Hubitat via Matter are not supported; such devices should be added to Apple Home first and then additionally added to Hubitat,ā. The advice given is to prevent a looping possibility that can get a device stuck.
My third reality Matter nightlights do not exhibit this behavior. It sounds more like a Linkind bulb issue than necessarily a Hubitat issue. With that said, what platform version are you on? There used to be some weirdness with Matter and subscriptions, but a lot of that has been smoothed over with 2.4.4
The latest beta of 2.4.4. Well documentation aside I really home hubitat doesn't remove this ability because, quite frankly these bulbs are dogsh*t and this will probably be the only way to make them work properly. They should either be fixed or removed from the compatibility list.
When I originally added some Matter devices probably a year ago Homekit bridge would not allow it to be added there. At some point one of the updates enabled this. I have done it successfully several times with no issues. So all I can say is it works.
I have Linkind bulbs, Linkind light strips, and Gover light strips all connected via matter to Home Assistant and Hubitat. They all work perfectly fine. I don't know your bulb model that may make a difference but devices can be connected to multiple controllers with zero issue.
I bought mine off the shelf at Walmart. I looked for the model number that is shown in Amazon but I can't find it in the Walmart info and I don't have the boxes anymore. The pictures look the same but there could be something different.
Well, the bug still exists, but thanks to J715 I think I have found a work around to the problem.
As I mentioned earlier, I had been first adding the device to HomeKit and then to the c8 as a secondary controller because the C8 would not let me load the app to do pairing on the hub itself. I did not know that you could add matter devices to the hub directly using the mobile application as I normally don't use that application.
So as a test, I completely unpaired one of my bulbs and then paired it only to the C8 using the mobile application. After that, I then exported the bulb to HomeKit using the home bridge app, as I normally do for all my other devices. Since the bulb is now only paired to the C8 it no longer gets confused and seems to work much better.
The only thing that I have noticed is that after a power failure, this bulb does take a few minutes to reconnect to the C8, but that's just a minor inconvenience.
I will re-pair all my bulbs using this method, and see how this works long term.
I don't use Homekit so it could as you said been a bug in the communication system involving HE and Homekit through the matter portion. I have experienced matter bridge issues with HE in the past. Matter just isn't as mature as it will be in the future which that is a given.
I am glad you found a work around. From my own experience I have found myself doing this several times for one thing or another.
Have you connected them to the AiDot app in case there are any firmware updates for the bulbs themselves? This sounds like a light bulb issue rather than a Matter controller one especially after glancing at some of the Amazon reviews.
well, this was the reply from linkind support when asked about issues.
" Because our Matter lights only support the standard Matter protocol, which connects to Apple Home/Google Home/Alexa/SmartThings.
We also rarely test whether they support Hubitat. "
I'll let you decide whether they are a reliable vendor or whether they should remain on the compatibility list or not...
