Ubuntu on my NUC, Armbian on my SBCs.
You guys need to get out more 
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Nowhere to go. Stuck at home and getting stranger by the day 
Soon I'll be talking to my 
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Wilson!!!
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We could add it to our Hue bridges along with those Sylvania bulbs 
Just a joke btw. Sorry, I couldn't help myself.
In all seriousness, I think people may equate Zigbee 3.0 with better behaved, more reliable devices. More likely that the tech has just matured, not due to the 3.0 spec.
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The only thing I can think of is it is more compatible with a wider range of "legacy" devices since it essentially can handle all the various zigbee standards? No need for additional bridge type hubs etc.
This to me at least seems useful but whether or not its worth it in a business sense relative to the increase in design/production costs I'm guessing probably not.
So they just came up with an entire new spec for no reason?
New hub, going to charge for some cloud service instead of allowing seamless local backup of zwave and no interest or timeline at all to keep up with latest Zigbee tech. My enthusiasm is dropping rapidly.
Ok, well we're sorry that we can't please everyone.
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Is this question rhetorical or do you know the answer?
Being a non-expert at most of this stuff, I would love to know if possible.
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My question was serious but it’s just that a question. I don’t know the answer but I’m very skeptical that an entirely new generation of Zigbee protocol is without serious improvements. I’ve read the documents but they are over my head.
I was just miffed that it’s dismissed so quickly out of hand. I’m concerned about getting boxed in going forward. I appreciate being able to express my thoughts but nobody should take them as expert opinion as I most certainly am not.
Fair enough, and I don’t mean to imply there’s nothing worthwhile about zigbee 3.0 vs. ZHA 1.2, which is what the hub and most Zigbee devices that pair with it support.
But I don’t see @mike.maxwell’s responses as dismissive, more of an indication that the hubitat team has made a reasoned decision there isn’t any compelling reason to focus efforts on updating the hub itself to a zigbee 3.0 device.
Any zigbee 3.0 devices can still connect with the hub, at least.
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A big part of it is security-related with a unique encryption key per device. It comes with some drawbackd like additional memory requirements on the Zigbee chip, but it is definitely more secure for those devices that support it.
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But is the current level of secure communication inadequate in some meaningful way?
Sometimes security can come at the expense of other, more practical considerations.
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In addition to what @markus notes, zigbee green power is the other big thing in zigbee 3.0.
There aren’t that many ZGP devices out there yet (at least in North America).
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No, not really from a practical perspective, cryptographers of course always want more!
The current Zigbee encryption/security is roughly equivalent to Z-Wave S0.
Unlike Z-Wave S0, Zigbee 1.2 security is enabled by default and doesn't carry the overhead of S0.
So all Zigbee communication is encrypted by default, unlike Z-Wave where encryption is optional.
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It is very easy to get the key from a non-zigbee 3.0 mesh when in pairing mode, not the case with zigbee 3.0, and if you do get it, it is just for that one device. It makes things more complex, so if it's a good idea for home use I wouldn't care to even begin to discuss. IKEA does think so though it seems.
This is a concern with ZB3.0, it can become complex.
Yes, it's a cool tech, but as you say, where are all the devices?
There are some other fun things in ZB3.0 as well as ZB3.0 devices that are supposedly fully compliant which doesn't even pair with HE. In general this should not be the case, but it can happen. It is more likely a non-certified ZB3.0 device would not work if implemented incorrectly. Certified should, according to specs, be backwards compatible, this is usually the case, but not always.
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So then is ZigBee 3.0 security like S2 ? So in that respect there is a plus there? Obviously it better that it has some security by default unlike z-wave but the improvements are still there for a reason.
100% this. There are lots of manufacturer's producing "zigbee 3.0 end devices" that don't show up in the certification database and also don't fall back to zha 1.2 (or zll).
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The Aurora stuff that @mike.maxwell has in a box has some kinetic switches which would work once on 3.0, but other than switches not sure what else COULD be green energy. Surely that's the only thing, as it has to be capable of creating power?
Yup.
Again, that is one of the worst parts of zigbee vs zwave.
All sorts of half assed devices are marked as "zigbee 3.0" or "zigbee HA 1.2" that don't interoperate worth a **** or use 100% manufacturer specific clusters.
Zigbee has a LOT of other very good qualities - but consistency and interoperability is NOT one of them.
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