Robot Vacuums and HE

Lounge
4

Buyers remorse, just a little :wink:

I was happy, but unsure about Roborock Q10 S5+ after I realized that it was one of the first Roborock vaccums not to have the ability to run local. This was one of my key reasons for purchasing Roborock. Thought originally that was what I was getting and I was glad to be free from the cloud dependency of my old Deebot...except that I wasn't as it turned out.

Motivation to keep it came from an available Homey integration which worked out pefectly becuase I had just decided to purchase a lifetime dev license for Homey SHS. Plus the Roborock was blowing my old Deebot Ozmo 970 out of the water for the exact same price I paid for that old vacuum.

I later thought to try vibe-coding a Hubitat driver as I mention in that other thread, which was based on all the code everyone was working on for this, and other roborock vacuums. That turned out really well. Still does more than the HA community developers have provided so far, and has a few more capabilies than the Homey integration has.

I haven't automated mine too much. I do have an old Lutron Connected Bulb Remote in my kitchen that wasn't in use, so I have that setup so I can press specific buttons for:

Clean Kitchen
Quitely Clean Kitchen
Clean Kitchen and living room
Stop cleaning and empty

I also created an automation for the rest of the house. There's a step up from my living room to the rest of my home, so the robot needs some help. I created an automation so when I say "Alexa, clean the house" or 3 alternate phrases, the following will happen:

  • Alexa says "OK, leave the robot in place while I empty its dustbin, then move it to the top of the steps in the foyer and say, "Alexa, I'm ready".
  • When "Alexa, I'm ready" is said, the automation selects my map for the rest of my home and starts the cleaning with my specific vacuum settings for that task.

Other than Alexa triggering some virtual switches when the commands are spoken, the robot is completely controlled from Hubitat (albeit cloud based). No Home Assistant or Homey required to automate it.