I'm an extremely novice user who is in the process of switching over from Smartthings.
I purchased a C8 hub and am running it wired into my router.
I updated it upon startup. Version 2.4.0.145
I added most of my devices (zwave smart plugs and several zwave light switches)
I had some issues pairing my Schlage connect locks and like an idiot turned off the power then turned it back on. I all of my devices however there were ghost devices in the Zwave settings.
Following instructions on here I attempted to discover them which failed in all cases I then removed them. I then factory reset them and readded them.
I have 2 remaining issues:
a. 1 zwave item on the device page that I am unsure what it is and does not respond
b. 2 listings in the zwave settings that are not tied to devices that I can not seem to do anything with (discover/remove)
FYSA
a. All adding of dsevices has been through the z wave inclusion method
b. I have 2 more Zwave light switches in the garage that need to be paired(1 successfully paired before power shut down and one failed); I have 1 zwave honeywell thermostat that has never been added to the system that needs to be added.
c. light switches are all jasco/GE
SO my question is should I keep going with this or should I exclude everything I can and do a factory reset on my hub and start from scratch?
Just at first glance, you have two ghost nodes that I would remove before going any further. Read in this forum how to do that. There are a few easy methods that SOMETIMES work. And then there are more complicated methods that seem to ALWAYS work.
I don't think things are so bad that you have to start over but just to answer that question, you can. Not advised.. yet.
The advice you've received is good... remove those two. One is easy, it says Pending and next to that is a Remove button... click remove and it should just go away.
The other will need you to click Refresh and wait for the Remove button to appear. If it doesn't, click Refresh again BUT wait at least a minute between.
I suggest you follow a different pattern for joining new devices to Hubitat. I call it "exclude before include". Both of the devices that need removing are of a type "SPECIFIC_TYPE_POWER_SWITCH_BINARY" and you have 3 in a row. The implication is that you took 3 attempts to get one switch added. Two fails and one success. The fails left behind debris and now you have to clean that up.
The better way is to start by Excluding the new device first. A successful exclude tells you that the connectivity between the hub and device is functional. Plus it has the benefit of setting the device back into a state where it's ready to Include.
Also double check the zwave info after both a sucessful and failed add. Ghosts are much easier to remove at that point . For a failed add before retrying a simple device exclude works.
Also to remove the stuborn ghost you need to make sure it is not powered on.
"Z-Wave Network responded with Busy" is the signal that the CPU out on the ZWave module isn't responding in a timely way. After a shutdown, remove power. The loss of power is the only action that reboots the SOC on the Z-Wave and Zigbee radios. Shutdown alone doesn't do it.
The hub does try to recover from Busy, but we humans are rarely patient enough
I usually just factory reset the device first, and no exclude is needed. I've had ghosts from removing devices that would not exclude, for whatever reason, and I had to use the manual method to remove them from Zwave after.
The keyword is "needed" -- it's true, not needed BUT you're focusing on the device and not the communications, I think.
If you are looking at Ghosts and why they occur, it's most typically due to communications between the hub and the device that fails in one direction or the other. Starting with an Exclude overcomes a big percentage by confirming round trip communications non-destructively. Discovering that the device is having a hard time Excluding does not cause a ghost. Prevention is worth a lot I have found.
What @csteele said. In the context of creating/maintaining a stable z-wave mesh, the purpose of exclusion using Hubitat is not to (factory) reset the device being excluded.
Rather, if the z-wave radio can successfully exclude a device at a particular location w.r.t the hub, then it is extremely likely that it can include the device at the same location. Thus, greatly reducing the likelihood of creating a ghost or stranded device due to incomplete or failed inclusion.
