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May be my day job of handling servers and services at scale makes me say this… I’d like my home, appliances and equipment to be dumb and simple. A basic level

May be my day job of handling servers and services at scale makes me say this… I’d like my home, appliances and equipment to be dumb and simple. A basic level of automation by making all power switches controllable from a central private endpoint would be nice, but hooking that up to a non self-hosted service is a big No for me. I’m about to buy a home. It will be fun to find that simplicity in automation for myself.

nomel 5y ago
> making all power switches controllable from a central private endpoint would be nice This is what Zigbee and Z-Wave are for, and I would say one one of the main points of using home assistant: to keep it all local. The Nabu Casa stuff just allows you to access your required local home assistant setup (RPi, VM, whatever) without having to mess with DMZ to allow direct connections. Self hosted in the whole point of it all. If you buy smart devices that require cloud connections, then home assistant can also work with many of those, but it ends up being a much worse experience when turning your lightbulb on requires sending an http request halfway around the world and back.
crooked-v 5y ago
I'd personally recommend the Lutron Caseta line. They use a proprietary RF system so if you want full automation or phone-based control you need their hub, but even without one you can just use them as normal switches, pair switches and remotes, pair switches with motion sensors, etc just as built-in behavior. They've also covered basic usability issues that a lot of other smart switches overlook, like having a hard disconnect on every switch, so you don't need to go to the breaker box just to change a lightbulb.
- thfuran 5y ago
  Why would I need to go to the breaker to change a lightbulb?
  - tass 5y ago
    Not necessarily a smart switch thing, but dimmers don’t break the circuit when off. If you remove a bulb, it will hurt if you put your finger in the socket. There’s usually a secondary way to break the circuit - pull out a bit of plastic, snap the switch plate away from the wall… something. All mine of different brands have some way to do it.
- tlrobinson 5y ago
  Caseta is also one of the few switches that doesn’t require neutral lines.

nomel 5y ago

> making all power switches controllable from a central private endpoint would be nice This is what Zigbee and Z-Wave are for, and I would say one one of the main points of using home assistant: to keep it all local. The Nabu Casa stuff just allows you to access your required local home assistant setup (RPi, VM, whatever) without having to mess with DMZ to allow direct connections. Self hosted in the whole point of it all. If you buy smart devices that require cloud connections, then home assistant can also work with many of those, but it ends up being a much worse experience when turning your lightbulb on requires sending an http request halfway around the world and back.

crooked-v 5y ago

I'd personally recommend the Lutron Caseta line. They use a proprietary RF system so if you want full automation or phone-based control you need their hub, but even without one you can just use them as normal switches, pair switches and remotes, pair switches with motion sensors, etc just as built-in behavior. They've also covered basic usability issues that a lot of other smart switches overlook, like having a hard disconnect on every switch, so you don't need to go to the breaker box just to change a lightbulb.

thfuran 5y ago
Why would I need to go to the breaker to change a lightbulb?
- tass 5y ago
  Not necessarily a smart switch thing, but dimmers don’t break the circuit when off. If you remove a bulb, it will hurt if you put your finger in the socket. There’s usually a secondary way to break the circuit - pull out a bit of plastic, snap the switch plate away from the wall… something. All mine of different brands have some way to do it.
tlrobinson 5y ago
Caseta is also one of the few switches that doesn’t require neutral lines.