[RELEASE] Ring Alarm Range Extender Gen2 driver

[Terk]

No hub less than a C-7 can pair with S2 from what I understand. I paired by holding the button on the front for 3 seconds to put it in classic pairing mode which is the only way it would pair with a C-3.

[dennypage]

I can't speak to the C-3. However I tested the Gen2 Ring Range Extender on the C-7, both with S2 and without security. It worked fine either way. There was a rumor at one point that S2 was required to have the power notification work, but in my testing and use this was not needed. I generally ran my production Ring Range Extenders without security.

Fair disclosure: I no longer use the Gen2 Ring Range Extenders in my network. I bought an AirSpy and started measuring the transmit power of various devices in the network and I found that the standard transmit power level of the Ring units was several dB lower than the other extenders that I was using. There were also bugs with the power settings on the range test. I really like having the battery, but in my case range (power) was more important.

The power issues may have been fixed in a newer firmware release. If anyone has a firmware update for these units, I would appreciate knowing about it.

[steve.maddigan]

Just curious, what range extenders do you prefer?

[dennypage]

Took me a minute to find, but this post sums it up.

Z Wave Routing Defies All Reason

When I originally tested many months ago, this was true for both the Aeotec and the Ring. Several weeks ago I did a huge amount of testing with both the Aeotec RE7 and the Ring RE2 to look at radio signal signal strength. During this testing, I repeated my prior experiments for both. I am no longer able to reproduce the failure to respond issue with the Aeotec RE7, or the failure to report battery/mains transitions with the Ring RE2. I have been running both without security for a few weeks wi…

If you're interested, the driver for the Aeotec can be found here:

[RELEASE] Aeotec Range Extender 7

Hello, If anyone is interested, I have released a driver for the Aeotec Range Extender 7. Code can be found here: GitHub - dennypage/hubitat: Hubitat drivers and applications Please note the issues in the readme regarding limitations in the current firmware. Denny

[steve.maddigan]

Thanks. I have two of the Aeotec 6’s but when I switched to the C7 and Brian was recommending the Ring S2’s i originally picked up three of them and then two more. To tell you the truth I am not impressed with any of the ones I have but I am no scholar. I will read through the other thread for info. I know I have at least read part of it because I recognize the subject line.

[dennypage]

I've just pushed a minor update to the driver (1.3.0) to cover the situation of the power source (mains/battery) and battery state changing while the hub is down. This addresses the issue described here:

@672southmain

when a power fail occurs and the hub shuts down, and then later reboots when power returns, the Ring Extender switches from battery to mains before the hub has rebooted, causing the “switch to mains” event to be missed (discarded), so the Ring Extender’s power source state in the driver still indicates that power source is “battery”.

[kahn-hubitat]

added this line a couple of place in the battery report and the power report. as even when periodically doing a refresh no events appeared in the logs so hard to know if device is still working and i had one drop off my mesh

map.isStateChange = true

it appears the heardbeats are not working as i dont ever see them any ideas.

[dennypage]

@kahn-hubitat

added this line a couple of place in the battery report and the power report. as even when periodically doing a refresh no events appeared in the logs so hard to know if device is still working and i had one drop off my mesh

map.isStateChange = true

I don't see how setting isStateChange to true will change anything for a device that has dropped off the network. Setting isStateChange to true forces an event to be considered as a state change even if the value itself has not changed. But if there are no packets actually received from the device there will be no calls to sendEvent().

If you want to know if a device has disappeared from the network, the best thing is to monitor the last activity time for the device. FWIW, I have an app specifically for that purpose, Simple Idle Alerts, which is part of the Simple Series of applications.

[kahn-hubitat]

Activity monitor didn't tell.me fir some reason..so.i looked at events. There is no.way to tell.in events if even in normal operation there are no events. So.this way i can look at events or write a specific rule.

[dennypage]

Last Activity is different that Last Event. Last Activity is last Z-Wave activity, which includes the heartbeats (Last Event does not). I can't speak to Activity monitor, but the app I pointed you, Simple Idle Alerts, should be able to address your issue. It's what I use.

[tray_e]

Just got an update in HPM for this driver to version 1.3.0. However, I cannot find any release notes. Any idea what was addressed in the update?

[dennypage]

5 posts above...

[RELEASE] Ring Alarm Range Extender Gen2 driver

I've just pushed a minor update to the driver (1.3.0) to cover the situation of the power source (mains/battery) and battery state changing while the hub is down. This addresses the issue described here:

[tray_e]

Okay.

Wow!, HPM was a little slow on this one if you did the update in April. I saw that the last activity in the forum was from June and did not scroll farther up because I just got notified about the update today.

[dennypage]

@tray_e

HPM was a little slow on this one if you did the update in April.

My fault. I misunderstood the intent of the HPM creator/maintainer regarding versions in the schema. There are multiple places that version info can appear, and the place I had it appears to have caused HPM to ignore updates, possibly since the first version.

It Here are all the changes that have been happened in the driver:

// Version 1.0.0    Initial release.
// Version 1.1.0    Clean up log messages. Handle button push.
// Version 1.1.1    Mark seconds as a required input for power test.
// Version 1.2.0    Normalize logging.
// Version 1.2.1    Minor capitalization fix.
// Version 1.3.0    Add Initialize capability to cover PowerSource changes while hub not running.

[tray_e]

@dennypage

HPM to ignore updates, possibly since the first version.

Well, I never had cause to revisit the forum on this driver since I installed it initially. So, everything was working well enough on 1.0.0 LOL Just checking on this version so I would know what to look out for.

[Aussie]

Hey all. Well I just ploughed thru about 100 posts on Ring Alarm Range Extender Gen 2 Driver and I would appreciate some advice.

Does the dennypage driver still offer benefits (e.g., Range test function, Power test function, Configurable battery report interval, Refresh covers power source (mains vs battery), Additional status/error reporting) over the standard driver ... or has the standard driver been updated to include these features?

I have my Ring Alarm Extender operational on a C7 hub, using the standard driver. What is the process to change over to the dennypage driver ... something like this, or please advise:

1. Use HPM to install dennypage driver
2. In Hubitat Devices select the dennypage driver

What RM functions do I use to get access to:

1. Range test function
2. Power test function
3. Configurable battery report interval
4. Refresh covers power source (mains vs battery) ... RM Power source of Ring Alarm
5. Additional status/error reporting

Thanks in advance for any help.

[672southmain]

@Aussie

Does the dennypage driver still offer benefits (e.g., Range test function, Power test function, Configurable battery report interval, Refresh covers power source (mains vs battery), Additional status/error reporting) over the standard driver

Yes

@Aussie

or has the standard driver been updated to include these features?

No

@Aussie

I have my Ring Alarm Extender operational on a C7 hub, using the standard driver. What is the process to change over to the dennypage driver ... something like this, or please advise:

1. Use HPM to install dennypage driver
2. In Hubitat Devices select the dennypage driver

There is a step 1.5, install the user driver. HPM only loads the code.

@Aussie

What RM functions do I use to get access to:

Run Actuator on the device. I have 6 of the Ring Extender V2 on my hub, using @dennypage’s driver. Very happy, works perfectly.

I believe most people use the device page to do the various special things. I don’t believe I’ve ever heard of people writing a rule to do them regularly, but it should work. If not, put a line:

Capability: Actuator

Before the commands in the driver.

[Aussie]

Wow! Thanks for the clear and concise answer Based on your response, and dennypage's excellent driver reviews, I decided to install the upgraded driver this morning.

I still need the installation process clarified as I get confused about the User Driver Install Sequence. In particular, "There is a step 1.5, install the user driver. HPM only loads the code." Hence the purpose of my initial post installation question.

Here is what I am seeing after my "installation" ...

After running HPM package installation, in the HE Drivers Code section, I already see a "// [Ring Alarm Range Extender gen2] ... Denny Page ..." as shown here

On the devices page I can select the driver and save, as shown here.

I see the new capabilities (I think) on the devices page.

What exactly (web link to instructions will probably work) do I need to do to accomplish "1.5 install the user driver." Because, after the HPM package installation, it appears to me that the driver is installed, and if not, I don't know where to find the driver (as opposed to if I downloaded the driver myself and saved it).

[672southmain]

You are all set because the driver shows up.

[Aussie]

OK ... thanks for confirming that I am good to go.

From my "black box" point of view, I just want to make sure that I have it installed correctly. It is working well.