I hope this discussion helps someone new to smart home world out there or just struggling. This may have been mentioned before but I didn't see any clear post about it.
The story-
Hubitat was recommended to me by a family member- all the same reasons you may have went or moved to it. Local, fast etc
For the last six months I have had a serious struggle getting Hubitat to work fast, consistent etc.. Trying to set up smart home with kids and a wife, well you know how it can be. So I created a dashboard in the beginning and let everyone have at it while I tinkered with setting this up. Time went on, system just didn't seem right and I was underwhelmed. I kept thinking that I've got to be missing something here. I chased down logs, exclude, re-include, repeaters, spent many hours trying to fix it.. but patiently I stuck to it. Hell, I even excluded ALL 40-50 zwave devices three times! Resetting everything.
Reading online and using all resources I was confident I had this set up right with a good mesh network and good quality devices. I remember watching a video possibly from hubitat live stating -Hubitat dashboard isn't developed focusing on dashboard something to that degree
I deleted all four boards and waited a day because I'm will to give it a try at this point….. Everything just suddenly worked even better than I was told it could!!
Along the way I'm sure there were other variables like the 4 in 1 zooz and of course not properly excluding moved or deleted devices. The only thing that truly made a difference to the point the family realized- “this is actually cool” - was the dashboard delete/uninstall.
Again, I may have missed this important memo. Kinda like how I overlooked zooz sensors not compatible with c7.
I would realy like to hear an official response from Hubitat team on this.
I am aware of the idea some people have saying real automation does not involve dashboards (for me this is not a option for now) but I never thought dashboards will effect Z-wave performance. Do they?
I am not making all devices available for each dashboard (only the relevant ones).
Is it realy a recomandation "do not use Hubitat dashboards" and your Z-wave performance wil improve?
I agree with @aaiyar . Never include all devices to a single dashboard. Honestly i've never had a problem with the dashboard, though i minimally use a dashboard because i use mostly automation not remote control...
Have you read the Dashboard documentation? While it does need to be updated, under the section "Create a New Dashboard" is the sentence, "Limiting the number of authorized devices will help speed up the loading of Dashboards".
Device attributes for all selected/authorized devices get updated. When one has a large number of devices, or a large number of devices with frequent updates (eg. power monitoring), my understanding is that keeping up with the updates slows things down even if authorized devices are not actually used on Dashboard tiles.
So it is best practice to only authorize those devices that will actually be used in Dashboard tiles.
I don’t think anyone that works for Hubitat actually discourages users from using dashboards. They were added to the platform early on so that users can use them.
Some community members here happen to feel very strongly about automation vs. other ways of interacting with one’s smart home. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but some people do tend to evangelize. My opinion is that everyone should do what they think works for them in their own home.
@aaiyar’s advice is nonetheless sound, and consistent with what is recommended in the official documentation: if you’re not going to use a device on a dashboard, don’t authorize it for use on that dashboard. It forces the hub to do more work in the background for no reason.
I fully agree and unserdtand that including many devices on the dashboard can effect DASHBOARD performance but I was and still am under the impression that what michaelmcvay88 was reffering to was z-wave performance. He wrote - "I chased down logs, exclude, re-include, repeaters, spent many hours trying to fix it.. but patiently I stuck to it. Hell, I even excluded ALL 40-50 zwave devices three times! Resetting everything".
I’m not sure any of us can either totally confirm or refute OP’s experience re: dashboards and overall system stability.
However I’ll just reiterate that a general recommendation like this has never come from a Hubitat staff member. And it is not one I agree with. Many people use the built-in dashboard app without issues. Myself included.
An inappropriately configured Dashboard can slow the entire platform down - not just Dashboards. That is why it is essential to configure Dashboards as suggested in the Documentation.
As @marktheknife indicated, thousands of users use Dashboards without any issue. And Hubitat staff have never (to my knowledge) discouraged the use of Dashboards. However, they have on numerous occasions encouraged the proper configuration of the Dashboards app, including limiting the devices authorized for any given Dashboard to only those devices that will be used in tiles.
Yes and I think also don't leave dashboards open and running unless needed. My understanding is that inactive browser tabs with dashboards in them do not carry any hub overhead. But active tabs will keep refreshing according to the settings (which for a local dash could be every 2 seconds across all the devices you have loaded in the dash) and that could be a heck of a load. So, use with care for sure. And nowadays the Rooms/Devices option in the app can also be a good substitute for quick control of devices without having to create a dashboard.
I have 10 dashboards and 2 of them are active 24/7 on 2 wall mount displays.
This is on a C5 hub. Zero issue. The biggest problem most of us having already mentioned by @aaiyar and @marktheknife but also you need to remove the device from the dashboard before deleting/excluding it from your hub.
It’s on a Hubitat YouTube live video, the most recent one. Want me to find it? I apologize if I’m spreading false information. This didn’t come purely from that video I checked with two other experienced hubitat users and they were surprised i used it. I’m told network connection and speed becomes a veritable but also the server.
I'm trying to locate the video as I sit here reading the comments.
Allow me to rephrase- it wasn't that he out right said "don't use dashboard". Someone said "we didn't develop hubitat to perform with dashboard ....it was developed for speed ....and reliability.....automations"
I've watched all the Hubitat live episodes and don't remember them saying anything quite like that. I suppose it's possible I missed something, but that exact meaning seems unlikely. I would say is true, whether they admit it or not (I suspect they would), that Hubitat is primarily focused on automation. Further, it's objectively true that Dashboard was not in the first few hub firmware versions, so it was likely not an initial focus (and guy who appeared to be the primary developer behind it left the company and there have been only minor changes since), though it's been around for years now. In any case, they have said the past is that you should limit the number of devices you authorize for each Dashboard (in Apps > Hubitat Dashboard, then the child app for your particular dashboard) to only the ones that you're using on that particular Dashboard--first just because it helped prevent slow loading of any particular Dashboard and now likely because your entire hub may perform better if so. There used to be an "authorize all devices" checkbox that they removed, likely because they discovered performance issues if you used it (and had a lot of events/devices)--consistent with these other observations.
So, I'd recommend heeding that advice--though that's really true for most apps (only subscribe to the devices and events you need). Just perhaps more noticeable with Dashboard (and presumably most third-party dashboards, too) since they probably subscribe to all events for that device, or at least more than most apps would that generally just target one. I wouldn't take it as a blanket recommendation against Hubitat Dashboard. I would also probably avoid keeping cloud Dashboards open longer than you need to given that they will periodically refresh over HTTPS; local should matter less given that it will prefer a websocket connection over HTTP(S) unless the former gets broken, which incurs less of a load on the hub. Recent firmware versions let you check runtime stats (new menu entry on the left-side bar), so if you suspect Dashboard--or anything--is a problem for you, that's one way you can help narrow things down. Good luck, whatever solution you choose!
(FWIW, I have a couple dashboards set up but rarely use them; I automate anything I can and occasionally use voice to check things like temperatures in rooms I'm curious about--something one of my Dashboards does except I never really have it handy to get to. But different solutions for different people!)
Its close lol! It's just strange all along I felt I was missing something important and that's why I was struggling. I heard this somewhere and I am confident it came from hubitat live.
I think what I said is consistent with what @aaiyar and @marktheknife said above, but perhaps more long-winded.
Up to you on the post--Dashboard can be a problem if you authorize too many devices (and the devices generate "too many" events), hence the advice to authorize only those you use. What we're saying is just that we haven't seen any blanket recommendations against its use entirely.
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I would say is true, whether they admit it or not (I suspect they would), that Hubitat is primarily focused on automation. Further, it's objectively true that Dashboard was not in the first few hub firmware versions, so it was likely not an initial focus (and guy who appeared to be the primary developer behind it left the company and there have been only minor changes since), though it's been around for years now. In any case, they have said the past is that you should limit the number of devices you authorize for each Dashboard (in Apps > Hubitat Dashboard, then the child app for your particular dashboard) to only the ones that you're using on that particular Dashboard--first just because it helped prevent slow loading of any particular Dashboard and now likely because your entire hub may perform better if so. There used to be an "authorize all devices" checkbox that they removed, likely because they discovered performance issues if you used it (and had a lot of events/devices)--consistent with these other observations.
