I have two string lights outdoors, one connected to a Zooz Zen14 Z-Wave double plug and the other to an EVA Logik ZW97 Z-Wave double plug.
I have a Simple Rule to turn both of the string lights on at sunset -20. The log for the app shows the Turn On signal firing but the lights do not turn on. I can manually turn them on. At 2200 hours the devices turn off via the app firing the anti-Turn On command.
Here are the app parameters:
Go to the device detail page for the device, go to the "Events" tab, and see if you find something with "command" under the "Type" column at the time the app logs say it's sending the command. It should match, but the device is the real way to see for sure. (To be clear, you are looking only for a command, not necessarily events.)
If so, the app worked as expected and your device just didn't respond for some reason. Either way, this will help you know where to start troubleshooting.
what kind of lights but outdoor lights are usually on the end of your wifi for zwave , zigbee mesh and are more prone to miss commands due to this.. i had to shore up my zigbee mesh without repeaters or switches outside in a water proof box and another just inside the wall from them.. also my outdoor lights that are on wifi occasionally miss something as well.. but lately have been good.
I'd go to the device Command pages first and select "on and off". If that turns the device on and off then the z-wave communications to the device works. The issue will reside with the app. I'd also turn on logging for the devices if not already enabled. Might be interesting to see if it behaves differently in Rule Machine.
One additional thought, what hub software version? Seems to me there were some recent problems with sunrise sunset. To check try setting your sunset to a time instead and see if that runs. If that is a fix then update to the current version.
Thanks for the help, everyone.
Hubitat C-8 Pro software ver 2.4.4.130.
Simple Rule ver 1.2
Patio Plug East log reports it is off on all commands. The Christmas Lights device is plugged into the Patio Plug East device.
Christmas Lights logs show turned off and turned on. Turn On was from manual command. Turn Off automatic. No log note for the Sunset -20 command from app.
The app fires but the devices are not getting the Turn On at Sunset -20 command. The Anti-Turn On command is time-based and works correctly.
Everything is working correctly manually from Dashboard and via Device page.
I deleted all app references to the Christmas Lights device and re-built from scratch using Simple Rule 1.2.
I have tested time-based Turn On and those fire correctly.
I will update to hub ver 2.4.4.132 and will report back.
I am also having a very similar problem but with Rule Machine only with rules that I have created with Z-wave outlet type of devices, switches seem to be working fine, I am already on hub version 2.4.4.132. Any pointers would be appreciated.
As a test could you create a virtual switch called "sunset lights". Make a rule to just turn that on at sunset -20 then change your other rule (main rule) to trigger on the vswitch. Then in your main rule switch off the sunset lights vswitch on the anti event (22:00).
I know its messy but at least starts to decouple the sunset from the first rule to see if that is the problem or just the turn on in general is messed up.
probably a mesh issue. but easy enough to check . look at device events if if shows the off command but doesn't show the device then reporting off you most likely have a device or weak mesh issue
I have two Innovelli Z-Wave switches on the other side of the wall 15 feet away. The mesh network doesn't have to hop more than 20 feet to get to another wired Z-Wave repeater, all the way to Hubitat. Full line-of-sight for hops, too.
@CuriousB,
I'll play along. I created a virtual switch "Sunset Lights" and an app to turn it on at sunset -20 and off at 2200. My Christmas Lights rule is set to trigger at Sunset Lights turning on and off when Sunset Lights turns off.
Now I'm "Curious"!
Sunset Lights at sunset -20 app
- 17:57:00.389 act: Turn On
- 22:00:00.442 act: anti-Turn On
Sunset Lights virtual switch
- 17:57:00.400 turned on
- 22:00:00.488 turned off
Christmas Lights app
- 17:57:00.485 act: Turn On
- 22:00:00.857 act: anti-Turn On
Christmas Lights device
- 20:00:03.600 turned on (manually by me)
- 22:00:06.102 turned off
The device did not register the turn on command.
It appears that sunset -20 is firing correctly.
Next test: I turned on the Double Plug parent device On. Maybe if it's turned off it is now blocking the first command to the child device. This does not make sense to me because with parent device a manual Turn On command executes on the child device.
I had a rule to control the Zooz switches two of my cameras are powered by. The rule was relatively simple:
They both turn on in away mode. One of them turns on when the mode is night.
For off, I had when any modes other than night or away, to turn them both off. I did this in one action. One of the switches either got sleepy, or whatever ( I do not recall what the original issue was, but it would occaisionally happen - might have just been a firmware updated needed). In any case, whenever that happened, the off action failed for BOTH (even the one that was not having issues). I would power cycle the switch (or sometimes, it would just wake up by turning it off/on in the device page), and the rule would work again. It took me a bit to work out that it appeared to be an issue where I had BOTH devices listed in the same off action and one of them was sleepy/not responding. Before I had resolved the root issue, I wound up just splitting the action into two separate ones. That at least allowed the one that did still work to turn off.
Wondering if you might be running into something similar where one of them is not working 100% and causing the overall action to fail?
Does the light turn on/off reliably when you toggle it in the device command tab? i.e. manually, nothing to do with rule logic?
If you create a separate (test) rule to toggle that light every 15 seconds will it switch on and off? or does it only turn the light off as you see in your other rule?
@CuriousB ,
Thanks for the instruction. I haven't worked in RM much. Now I'm not sure why.
I set up the test environment and toggled at 2 seconds. The Christmas lights turn on/off along with my office light which I included as a control.
The rule ran per schedule until I manually stopped it.
The hardware is testing solid. Test apps running correctly. The data is pointing at the Patio Christmas Lights rule.
I changed it to Turn On at 1800 from sunset -20. Now we wait.
Again, thanks for helping me.
Greg
