Rule Machine NOT Dimming bulbs

Intent:
When TV is turned on during evening or sleep time.

  • IF fan light on,
    Dim Fan Light to 40%
    Turn on Jason's and Jens lamp to 40%.

  • Dim Fan Light, Jason Lamp, Jens Lamp to 0 over a 2 minute time frame.

  • IF fan light is not on
    Dim Jason and Jens lamp to 40%.
    Dim down to 0 over 2 minutes.

I have tried multiple iterations of the rule and the lamps rarely dim down to 0. They will turn on but thats about it.

"Dimming" to 0 is always a bit odd. In most cases, this is equivalent to an "Off" command, though some devices do odd things or maybe just don't accept zero as a value here at either the driver or device level. One workaround is to dim to 1 (a supported value for any device), then do a separate actual turn-off action. (In your case, it seems like you'd want a 2 minute delay before that action, so adding a "Wait for event: elapsed time -> 0:02:00" between the "Lower..." and "Off" actions would be my suggestion.)

But another thing you might try: see if your device tolerates 0 as a parameter for the "Set Level" command from its device detail page. (It might; this "lower over time" action in RM might be confusing it because it calculates individual steps/changes to get you from where you are to where you need to be, schedules a series of actions over time, and either rounding errors or maybe some prohibition on 0 at the app level -- not sure about that -- give you the result you're seeing.)

If that works, the next step is to see if it tolerates a value of 600 (i.e., 10 minutes) for the optional second parameter -- the duration/transition time. (Some devices have different maximum values here or start doing different things like adding minutes or hours instead of seconds with relatively high values, which the driver may or may not compensate for, so you may need to experiment to see what, if anything, works.)

If that does work, you can do this with the regular "Set Dimmer" action in Rule Machine--just enable the "Transition time" option, and specify "600" (or whatever works).

I am testing this--- seems to work better-- time will tell.

Im guessing, as you stated, the values were not in line with the Hue bulbs.

I guess a quick work around would be the set dimmers at
0 seconds- 40%
30 seconds- 30%
60 seconds- 20%
90 seconds- 5%
120 seconds- off

Hue Accepts (0-100)

I'm not sure I'd do that when the workaround I suggested above is probably easier (fewer actions to create), but "manually" re-creating a similar set of steps yourself would also work if you need to.

But even easier would be the "Set dimmer" action I also suggested, using the "transition time" option if 120 (i.e., seconds) does what you want -- that's probably in-range of your bulb's supported values, unlike the 10 minutes I for some reason misread above. :smiley: (But it can be tested either way, more easily from the device detail page compared to a rule if you just want to see what the commands do before you make rule actions.)

AH, Im picking up what your putting down now.......

I will try transition timing over the 120 seconds.... See if that works best. I will report back.