Like @ogiewon, I can get Alexa routines with both motion active/inactive to work. These are the same routines I created a couple days ago.
Edit:
Can you confirm that motion sensor updates from Hubitat are being accurately reflected in your Alexa app?
If I had to guess here, and I do since we have no insight into Alexa's AWS, I would guess that there's one specific AWS Alexa deployment region that's having an intermittent issue, and all the other regions are working as expected...
Certainly seems feasible.
When I examine the details of the Alexa skill application. I can see
locale us-east-1
I've also see some referencing in my browser cache where the hubitat login referenced us-east-2. So in some ways dealing with the us-east regions one way or the other..
In terms of errors seen. The only error I've ever got within the Alexa skilk shown in hubitat was this:
app:1392021-06-17 08:00:04.765 pm errorError making Call to Alexa message gateway: {"header":{"namespace":"System","name":"Exception","messageId":"6cb95b6b-9f9f-4415-ad39-b56811a842a1"},"payload":{"code":"THROTTLING_EXCEPTION","description":"Request could not be processed due to throttling."}}
It doesn't correlate to when the sensors start misbehaving. There's no error or indication anywhere that I know that of that points to the issue exactly. But the error message above does show resource strain in some sense because throttling was occuring within the skill (tho not exactly related to when my issue is occurring).
The fact this is sporadic does seem like it could be related to resource strain. I wish there was more visibility into what's going on here.
It's working now and I'm very happy but I'm not feeling too confident it won't happen again. Sounds like they need beefier or more AWS instances to work the load maybe
From the beginning hubitat application has always accurately reflected the motion activity either way.
The Alexa app, if you go to your routines and locate one where "motion not detected" then click the 3 dots in the upper right hand corner to view activity.
All of my "motion not detected" triggered routines show no activity what so ever. Says "routine activity not available" so perhaps it's just not made available to the Alexa app?....for me
It doesn't seem the activity notifications is consequential to the success of the routines running or not as right now my "motion not detected" routines are working just never shows any activity related to no motion detected.
Does yours show activity detail?
Also what region are you in (from your Alexa skill app setting in hubitat)
What app is "app 139"? Those throttling errors are typically a result of community-based Amazon Echo integrations, like Echo Speaks or Alexa TTS Manager.
Right, I don't believe the seen errors are relevant to my problem. When the issue occurs there's no indication in the logs of an issue.
To be honest, I still don't understand the exact nature of your problem. So I've broken it down into three parts:
Part 1: Motion sensor working in Hubitat
I interpret what you have stated to indicate that the motion sensor accurately displays its status (active/inactive) in the Hubitat app. If this is correct, that's great.
Part 2: Motion sensor status in the Alexa app
Leaving routines aside, does the motion sensor accurately indicate detected vs not detected in the Alexa app. If it does not, then there is a problem with your Hubitat Alexa skill. If it does, then the Hubitat Alexa skill is working as expected and that is great. Proceed to Part 3 only if motion sensor status is displayed accurately in the Alexa app.
Part 3: Routines using the motion sensor in the Alexa app
If the motion sensor status is displayed accurately in the Alexa app (part 2 above), but does not trigger Alexa routines, then this failure is purely on the Amazon side. Executing those routines should not have anything to do with Hubitat's Alexa skill.
@ogiewon @mike.maxwell @bcopeland - could you correct any inaccuracies I've written - especially about Part 3.
Correct.. If the status is displayed correctly, then the issue is with how Alexa routines work.. If it is not, let me know..
It's part:4
Everything works in hubitat (indications for activity and inactivity for each sensor). Check.
Alexa routines triggered by "motion not detected" do NOT show trigger activity in the Alexa app on your phone. Outside of routines there's no indication of activity or inactivity. Just not how the motion sensors work with Alexa (not an error) just a limitation in features I guess. I mentioned in my previous post how to check the trigger activity via routines, this is where it's supposed to show when there's activity or the lack thereof. However for me It never show activity for the routines triggered by "motion not detected" ... Please check your setup and see if it shows anything on your end.
Regardless if the hubitat alexa skill is working or not it doesn't show "motion not detected" activity.
This is all you see in Alexa in terms of the sensors outside of routines.
That’s an Alexa display issue. If your motion sensors have motion and temperature capabilities, then Hubitat reports both to the Alexa Skill. Amazon has chosen to display temperature, but both types of events are used by Alexa routines.
My motion sensors use a driver without temperature.
This is what mine look like in the Alexa app:
@bcopeland - is there any way for the Hubitat Alexa Skill to specific which Capability is the primary one Alexa should use for display? I see lots of reports that people only see Temperature in Alexa, for Motion and Contact sensors that also report Temperature. I know all of my Iris v2 Zigbee motion and contact sensors show up as Temperature sensors in Alexa. I would really prefer to see the status of the Motion or Contact sensor instead. Hopefully there is an option to tell Alexa which one to use?
I haven't seen in the Alexa Smarthome Skill API documentation.. Not to say it isn't possible, but I haven't seen a way yet..
Welp, it's that time of the day. It's not working again...
Feel free to test yours to see if it's also not working now. I'm bouncing against us-east servers
It is working. I am also using the us-east servers.
I give up, I may have to switch back to ST in the interim as I can't continue like this. I submitted some tickets with support but they circled me back here.
Still working fine here as well.
Try disabling your Echo Speaks (or Alexa TTS) integration for a while and see if it affect the Alexa Skill functioning. I'm wondering if cookie renewal by some other integration momentarily affects the Hubitat Alexa Skill.
Edit: FWIW, I am not using either of those integrations now, although I used Alexa TTS for over a year without experiencing any issues with the Hubitat Alexa Skill.
Decided to move one sensor back over to ST and try. Everything works perfectly, even the sensors show up as a motion in Alexa (not temperature). Very fast an responsive when testing.
Just glad I'm able to use a work around. I hope eventually hubitat support is able to resolve.
The issue wasn't with Amazon Alexa servers. I tried consistently switching sensors back and forward between Hubitat and Smarthings. Both hubs shows the motion/ inactivity fine so the issue doesn't appear to be with the hubs.
Smarthings skill + sensors works perfectly fine against the same AWS amazon servers
I switched those same sensors to my hubitat hub (still using the exact same AWS amazon servers) and the "motion not detected" routines in alexa do not fire.
I've contacted support several times on this issue, they pointed me right back here to the community. I was expecting at some point someone from Hubitat would say "We'll we will check with our developers and look into the possibility of a bug existing within our skill", or we will try to help troubleshoot why the hubitat motion sensors are no longer working consistently with Alexa routines. We have multiple people's routines all stop working on the 16th and the sporadic behavior of the sensors working/not working with routines (it's not just me), but I get it, it's easy to say it's amazons fault and wash your hands but the problem is still here. I was forced back to smart things because of it.
Please look into your hubitat Alexa skill for changes and modifications made on or around the 16th of June. Please provide assistance in figuring out why your skill no longer works consistently with Alexa routines (where smarthings does).
Thank you
@joeswann.biz - I have some additional data that I find interesting. I recently purchased an Amazon Echo v4 during Prime Day, as it contains a Zigbee hub and I plan on helping my parents move off of SmartThings (v1 hub that is now a paperweight) and over to a simple Zigbee system based on Alexa. So, as a test, I paired an Iris v2 motion/temperature sensor to the new Echo. That worked fine. I also have my Lutron Caseta lighting system integrated directly to Alexa via the Lutron Skill (I.e. no Hubitat involved whatsoever.). I then created 2 Alexa Routines, one to turn on a light when motion is detected, and another to turn off a light when motion is not detected for 2 minutes.
At first, everything worked fine. But after a while, the routine that is supposed to be triggered when there is no motion, stopped working. The other routine, for when there is motion, always works.
This reminded me of your exact issue that you’ve reported.
I also added a Hubitat connected light (via Philips Hue Hubitat Integration) to the Alexa Routines just to see if it was a Lutron issue. Testing shows the problem to be on the Alexa side of things. If I run the Alexa Routine manually, it properly turns off both lights.
Just thought this might be another piece of data that might help.
Download the Hubitat app
