Okay, trying to breathe here but losing myfkinghist here. Why does my iphone know exaclty where I am but there is no tool that Hubitat can accurately use to manage presence??? The geofence knows I'm in or out of the geofence but HE never sends an event. I can do it manually but why do I have to do that??????
Why do we need to install 3 or 4 different apps to manage presence. WHY IS THIS SO DIFFICULT???
Yes, I'm just ranting at this point, but SERIOUSLY, why is this so difficult? I'm ready to tape a damn $15.00 IKEA button to the dash of my $60k Lexus so I can tell Hubitat I left or came home.
What 9 apps are you guys using to manage presence? And why do we multiple apps?
Rant over. And TIA for an explanation as to why something that should just fklklkkj work doesn't work.
For whatever consolation it may be, it's definitely not just a Hubitat issue -- consistently & reliably cracking the presence nut has proven elusive on all platforms -- there are just SO many unique variables to account for.
I realize folks here will say solution XYZ works great for them (and that's great), but there'll be an equal number of users who will say XYZ totally blows, so there's that.
Unfortunately, it takes some trial-&-error to find a solution that works well for you & yours. For me & my wife (no kids), HomeKit has ended up working best, but it's still not a perfect solution. I'm just no longer motivated to chase after more refinements or some other solution.
When I stop the empathetic laughing I will try to help....
I mucked around with your problem for a while trying to get the iOS hubitat app to work reliably. Initially it seemed to work quite well, then I tinkered with the different mode management options and could never get it to work again. Any way, I found a number of suggestions that indictated people were using multiple strategies/apps together. However I found the simplest thing to do is:
Create a virtual switch that is shared with Homekit.
Set up geofencing ONLY in Homekit (disable it in the hubitat app)
Flip the virtual switch in Homekit when a Homekit geofencing event occurs
Set up hubitat rules to change your mode based on the virtual switch being flipped.
Both my watch and phone get notifications from the hubitat app when the mode changes.
Not taking credit for this solution - if I can find the threads I will link & edit this post. I also previously posted a link to a website with a summary of settings to check in iOS - will paste below when I locate!. I've found this solution to be pretty reliable and speculate it's because it keeps all the location event stuff within iOS, thus avoiding the privacy protection hoop jumping of sharing location data with an app.
Hope this helps! Happy to try and answer any questions - its a little while since I did this.
Also: Just using a spare old AppleTV for the Homekit hub / Homekit integration app. I have no experience with any other homekit compatible devices that can be used similarly etc.
Presence works fine for my iPhone and my wife iPhone using the in built geo fence to auto open garage and turn on lights and aircon. The trouble I have is the Hubitat team for some unknown reason have limited the iPhone app to have only a single geo fence boundary to setup logic against , which can be quite limiting when attempting to achieve more complex rules, at minimum there should be 2 geo fence limit (if limits are needed for one reason or another)
Take a look at the Owntracks community integration. That's what I rely on with wife's iPhone and my Android. We have a small geofence around house for presence; a larger concentric one for the HVAC; one around wife's office and 4th around wife's parents' home.
I also use Tasker on my phone for some other different locations like daycare and the local Chick-Fil-A (yes really). These start the respective app when I enter that geofence
I have resisted so far, but may give this a go since I am a new iPhone owner and am no longer a location denier. My last device in this arena was the Smart Things arrival sensor.
Questions: Do you have presence close the door? Have you ever had any erroneous door operations because of bad presence info? My car isn't 60k, but I did have the door come down once on the hatch spoiler-luckily it is robust. Then there was the crumpled farm gate caused by a departing heating oil truck incident. Both related to motion sensors and faulty logic, as I recall. The ST sensor would act up too and open the garage door in the middle of the night. It's made me cautious about automating the gate/garage door.
@markles Apple presence is definitely one of the best. Life 360 kicked everyone out.. Using a homepod and your iphone solves the issue with Hubitat and gives you additional options (like text to voice and sharing other devices, use of Homekit's dashboard with Hubitat.)
Yes it's local. (Pretty much all of home kit is) I "think" the initial use is cloud then the followup is stored locally for the phrase. @bcopeland could answer that better than I.
Language aside, which ultimately I couldn't give a... well it doesn't bother me.... Having another piece of plastic, silicon and rare earth's to take the place of the potential for a single press of a dashboard or physical button (I know.... I know...) seems a little extreme...
Personally I haven't used GeoFence of any description for a couple of years now... and I must say I haven't missed it, but am starting to consider dabbling again... It feels like, for some (many?), it can be one of those discretionary features that if it doesn't work is not the biggest deal... For others it can be a "big" deal that leads to unnecessary frustration. I feel for HE dev's trying to navigate this minefield, acknowledging the common challenges any platform can face....
Ultimately I think they (dev's) need some love in this space, rather than heat... let's try to help them achieve a better outcome. On the flipside, let's not dial down the impact an issue has on our experience, but be mindful of how this can come across for those involved.... In other words.... It's complicated...
My two cents on geofencing philosophy after HE setup and my initial attempts a couple of months ago:
I keep it sImple with low maintenance and avoid creating risk of property damage / energy waste. So limited to lights and checking for appropriate shutdown of HVAC etc. No locks and certainly no garage doors keeps the stakes low. For garage door's, if accessibility issues are not in play, it seems like most of the convenience is in not having to get out of the car. So I would stick that $15 button on the dash anyway!
As for the devs, I think they have a lot to keep up with! I appreciate their efforts evolving the platform and keeping it current. Most of my devices run on drivers written by the community - most appreciated and many thanks!
