New Forums are just setup so there's not a lot there yet
This is a new service offering. Yes there is a charge. No it's not free. The backend system is a commercial Telematics system used by hundreds of companies, governments and other entities around the world. This costs me money to operate but I wanted to bring it to Home Automation so I've done what I can to drop the pricing to bare minimum for those with interest or need.
The system is geared towards the DIY/IOT crowd. You bring your own device and data plan or you can purchase one through us. Be aware the cheap devices on E-Bay and Amazon are well cheap devices and some of them are locked to their seller's service at a hardware level not SIM and for some it requires special hardware to perform a firmware reset. Contact us for information on re-configuring devices. Mobile apps are available and we work with other 3rd party mobile apps as well. Note that mobile apps no matter the upstream provider all suffer from the same problems with Android/IOS limitations and battery consumption for fast/accurate reporting. We recommend and prefer hardware devices.
This system integrates through the use of the Maker API. Create a Virtual Switch or Virtual Presence Device and use the Maker API Cloud End Point to switch it on/off. This is done through the system using the standard Notification system which among a lot of things can send a Request via HTTP using POST or GET.
Hubitat:
Enter
Method: GET
URL: https://cloud.hubitat.com/api/<YOUR_HUB>/apps/254/devices/338/on?access_token=<YOUR_TOKEN>&locate
Body:
Exit
Method: GET
URL: https://cloud.hubitat.com/api/<YOUR_HUB>/apps/254/devices/338/off?access_token=<YOUR_TOKEN>&locate
Body:
I have reached out to @bravenel asking if there's interest in an official Hubitat App for presence along with Life360. No feedback yet. May never be I don't know.
There are over 1500+ devices that are supported natively. I can't really list them all. However if you want to look up a specific device look here:
As stated before. This is a commercial offering this is not a homegrown system that we have built. We purchase and run this system and have decided to bring it to the Home Automation markets. The developer of the system is Gurtam the backend system is called Wialon.
This is a IOT/DIY platform where you bring your own device and data. We have plans to offer devices for sale if there's enough interest. The devices we currently can provide are from Calamp, Sinocastel and Xirgo. Since device sales is not our primary focus this aspect is not fleshed out with online sales but more on requests.
There are two "tag" apps provided. Those being WiaTag and GPS Tag, both are from Gurtam. WiaTag is newer with more features and GPS Tag is a more "basic" Tag app. Both work very well. Some people prefer to the simpler GPS Tag over WiaTag.
The Traccar Client is also supported. However it was reported of issues of the latest version having "Send Failed" issues. This is a not a Wialon issue as the same error occurs going directly against a Traccar server.
The BTraced client is in process of being added to the support list (upon a user request). It will be a couple more weeks before that is on the official list of mobile apps.
For OBDII devices I listed that we can provide Calamp, Sinocastel and Xirgo. The Calamp LMU-3030BT is a very advanced device with BlueTooth capabilities including the possibility to use your Phone Mobile Data plan instead of a separate data plan. The Sinocastel IDD-213LA is a new LTE device I use these myself along with the Calamp. The IDD-213LA also has a Wifi Hotspot feature if your data plan can support that type of use. The Xirgo is the same unit used by insurance companies and other fleet tracking companies that you can find selling device+service online.
For a "personal" tracker a option is a phone specific for this purpose. A cheap pre-paid phone that is not used for other tasks so the battery drain is not a huge issue. Otherwise for hardware trackers the Queclink GL300 is VERY common and durable and there's a new device on the market the Concox QBit which is a very sleek and small portable device.
There's not "suggestions" per se as every use case and scenario is different.
In the rare occasion that a device is not directly supported such as the Particle IO boards there's the option of using Flespi which accepts any HTTP or MQTT connection with native ability to stream the data directly to Wialon.
On the topic of the "mobile apps". There is the Wialon Mobile app which is the monitor and viewer for mobile devices. This is the mobile app used to see your units on a map and track them via a mobile device.
