4 ms·

(I've been running home automation stuff for ~10 years now but) I am little surprised the author thought wifi/bluetooth would be better than technology made spe

(I've been running home automation stuff for ~10 years now but) I am little surprised the author thought wifi/bluetooth would be better than technology made specifically for (home?) automation. To me meshing is a natural fit for interconnecting devices all around the house vs the hub and spoke model that wifi has. Furthermore, I (read) and kind of disagree that thread/matter is a mess, but I'm coming from the point of view of an engineer who is keenly interested in home automation tech; for the typical consumer that's probably a fair take.

agloe_dreams 3y ago
Thread and matter are a mess from both technical and consumer angles. Yes, they are both good technologies...but the players in the hub space have made an utter mess of it if you have multiple hubs or, like most Americans, use an iPhone but have Nest or Echo devices. Then you have the lack of adoption of thread in general. And finally, Matter support being always 6 months away for everything or just straight up not working. It is mind blowing to me that it was easier for me to set up my Wiz bulbs to work in Homekit via HA than to get them to actually frickin work over Matter...seeing as the Matter logo was on the box when I bought them. Honestly, I'm kinda shocked that no hub company has shipped a Cheap Zwave/Zigbee integrated HA hub. Sure you have HA Green and Yellow and all that, but you could get that price way down with a simple partnership and purpose built hardware that is elegant.
- Xelynega 3y ago
  I think an integrated hub would be a bit extra tbh. Amazon sells a coordinator usb for $20, so pair that with anything that can rub home assistant(raspi, ha green/yellow, old laptop, etc.) and you have a ZigBee hub that's plug and play for ZHA and Z2M.
- edude03 3y ago
  Yeah, not having a way to share keys between thread networks I think is the biggest technical challenge for the user/user experience. Home Assistant for example is able to import keys from an iOS device using its app and join a HomeKit thread network, but I don't know if that approach is scalable. > Cheap Zwave/Zigbee integrated HA hub The ikea Dirigera and smartthings hub have great HA support from what I understand, I'm not sure what'd it take to get the HA logo slapped on the box and have them officially supported though
- rlpb 3y ago
  > Honestly, I'm kinda shocked that no hub company has shipped a Cheap Zwave/Zigbee integrated HA hub. Samsung SmartThings does both, doesn't it? Source: https://support.smartthings.com/hc/en-us/articles/360052390151-SmartThings-Enabled-Hubs https://support.smartthings.com/hc/en-us/articles/3600523901...
Xelynega 3y ago
I haven't looked too much into thread/matter, but my understanding of them has been basically this: https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/ I shudder at the idea of ipv6 addresses for my lightbulbs.
- edude03 3y ago
  From what I understand the benefit of ip addressing for IoT things is that apps on your phone (for example) can communicate with them directly, ignoring the underlying transport (and therefore, no need to have a thread radio in your phone for the manufacturer specific app to work) I've always found that the most reliable combination is the Manufacturers app + hub + IoT devices (for example all Aqara or all Nest or all Hue) and interop hasn't worked great because there are special features that only work with the app made for the device (which again, only works with that manufacturers hub) so thread should fix that by making the hub just a dumb Zigbee to IPv6 adapter.
  - tremon 3y ago
    the most reliable combination is the Manufacturers app + hub + IoT devices This means that the standard has failed to be an actual Standard, and thread/matter really is a big mess.

agloe_dreams 3y ago

Thread and matter are a mess from both technical and consumer angles. Yes, they are both good technologies...but the players in the hub space have made an utter mess of it if you have multiple hubs or, like most Americans, use an iPhone but have Nest or Echo devices. Then you have the lack of adoption of thread in general. And finally, Matter support being always 6 months away for everything or just straight up not working. It is mind blowing to me that it was easier for me to set up my Wiz bulbs to work in Homekit via HA than to get them to actually frickin work over Matter...seeing as the Matter logo was on the box when I bought them. Honestly, I'm kinda shocked that no hub company has shipped a Cheap Zwave/Zigbee integrated HA hub. Sure you have HA Green and Yellow and all that, but you could get that price way down with a simple partnership and purpose built hardware that is elegant.

Xelynega 3y ago
I think an integrated hub would be a bit extra tbh. Amazon sells a coordinator usb for $20, so pair that with anything that can rub home assistant(raspi, ha green/yellow, old laptop, etc.) and you have a ZigBee hub that's plug and play for ZHA and Z2M.
edude03 3y ago
Yeah, not having a way to share keys between thread networks I think is the biggest technical challenge for the user/user experience. Home Assistant for example is able to import keys from an iOS device using its app and join a HomeKit thread network, but I don't know if that approach is scalable. > Cheap Zwave/Zigbee integrated HA hub The ikea Dirigera and smartthings hub have great HA support from what I understand, I'm not sure what'd it take to get the HA logo slapped on the box and have them officially supported though
rlpb 3y ago
> Honestly, I'm kinda shocked that no hub company has shipped a Cheap Zwave/Zigbee integrated HA hub. Samsung SmartThings does both, doesn't it? Source: https://support.smartthings.com/hc/en-us/articles/360052390151-SmartThings-Enabled-Hubs https://support.smartthings.com/hc/en-us/articles/3600523901...

Xelynega 3y ago

I haven't looked too much into thread/matter, but my understanding of them has been basically this: https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/ I shudder at the idea of ipv6 addresses for my lightbulbs.

edude03 3y ago
From what I understand the benefit of ip addressing for IoT things is that apps on your phone (for example) can communicate with them directly, ignoring the underlying transport (and therefore, no need to have a thread radio in your phone for the manufacturer specific app to work) I've always found that the most reliable combination is the Manufacturers app + hub + IoT devices (for example all Aqara or all Nest or all Hue) and interop hasn't worked great because there are special features that only work with the app made for the device (which again, only works with that manufacturers hub) so thread should fix that by making the hub just a dumb Zigbee to IPv6 adapter.
- tremon 3y ago
  the most reliable combination is the Manufacturers app + hub + IoT devices This means that the standard has failed to be an actual Standard, and thread/matter really is a big mess.