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Thread is a WiFi replacement, the devices talk IP over thread. And it has an encrypted pairing process to your vendor controlled hub. Said vendor can allow or

Thread is a WiFi replacement, the devices talk IP over thread. And it has an encrypted pairing process to your vendor controlled hub. Said vendor can allow or disallow it which other vendors may speak with said hub. Here is the landscape we have: HomeKit: fully closed, requires certification from Apple. Very expensive and limited functionality. Zigbee: fully open, anyone can make Zigbee devices and sell them without any restriction. Operates on the same frequency all over the world. Devices are super cheap. You can expand the protocol however you like as a vendor. Z-wave: fully closed, several incompatible frequencies, requires certification to sell devices. Thread and matter: semi closed, same ieee standard as Zigbee for data transfer. Vendors can allow it to talk to devices of other vendors. Requires certification. Same price tag as HomeKit, aka 3-4 more expensive than Zigbee. All of them require hubs. And only with Zigbee you are guaranteed to have interop between all vendors and all devices sold across the globe. Thanks to Home Assistant. With thread the vendor can simply disallow you to use your devices with HomeAssistant, which is unacceptable by me.

Asmod4n 1y ago
Oh and, Zigbee has automatic range extension as part of its standard. Every device with a plug expands your network.
hardwaresofton 1y ago
Thanks for all this context/explanation -- also the follow up. Automatic range extension (i.e. actually being a mesh and forwarding along messages) is an excellent feature. > All of them require hubs. And only with Zigbee you are guaranteed to have interop between all vendors and all devices sold across the globe. Thanks to Home Assistant. With thread the vendor can simply disallow you to use your devices with HomeAssistant, which is unacceptable by me. This is the one I want to push back on -- Thread over Wifi doesn't require a special Hub right? Taken with other info from this thread clearly in the real world it's not so simple to find the right hardware... but it's possible to just buy a thread device and use it over regular old wifi. Sounds like Zigbee is closer to ideal than Thread or Thread/Wifi. Maybe this is the startup someone needs to do -- some reasonably powered device to attack to a router/connect close to a router which supports Thread and Zigbee, has completely local management and call it a day. Is this just over-complicating a smart hub? Don't know.
- Asmod4n 1y ago
  Thread is using the same protocol as Zigbee, which requires specialized hardware to talk to it. You can’t get around a centralized hub when wanting to use them on your WiFi network. Thread just adds an IP layer above Zigbee. Zigbee is on the same protocol layer as Ethernet or WiFi.
  - hardwaresofton 1y ago
    > Thread is using the same protocol as Zigbee, which requires specialized hardware to talk to it. You can’t get around a centralized hub when wanting to use them on your WiFi network. > > Thread just adds an IP layer above Zigbee. Zigbee is on the same protocol layer as Ethernet or WiFi. AH, I've just realized that I've been using the wrong terminology. I've been meaning to say Matter over Thread vs Matter over Wifi! Matter seems like a decent way forward, and it can work only over wifi which is what drew me in to focusing on Matter. IIRC Matter/Zigbee isn't a thing (though it technically should be possible, Zigbee is just a transport as far as Matter is concerned right?). [EDIT] works -> can work, Thread/Zigbee -> Matter/Zigbee
    - Asmod4n 1y ago
      Thread and Zigbee implement the same IEEE standard. Matter would be correctly the application layer protocol of thread and could be spoken over any transport. Like HTTP
    - Asmod4n 1y ago
      But here comes the tricky bit, when you buy either Zigbee or matter devices each vendor will add its own extensions. In the Zigbee ecosystem vendors out right refuse to communicate with devices from other vendors even though Zigbee is an interoperable standard. That lead to the birth of zigbee2mqtt, literally hundreds of years of development time went into it to have full feature support for every Zigbee device that exists. For thread and matter devices each vendor would have to do the same. And that won’t happen, leading to a fragmented ecosystem.
      - 1y ago

Asmod4n 1y ago

Oh and, Zigbee has automatic range extension as part of its standard. Every device with a plug expands your network.

hardwaresofton 1y ago

Thanks for all this context/explanation -- also the follow up. Automatic range extension (i.e. actually being a mesh and forwarding along messages) is an excellent feature. > All of them require hubs. And only with Zigbee you are guaranteed to have interop between all vendors and all devices sold across the globe. Thanks to Home Assistant. With thread the vendor can simply disallow you to use your devices with HomeAssistant, which is unacceptable by me. This is the one I want to push back on -- Thread over Wifi doesn't require a special Hub right? Taken with other info from this thread clearly in the real world it's not so simple to find the right hardware... but it's possible to just buy a thread device and use it over regular old wifi. Sounds like Zigbee is closer to ideal than Thread or Thread/Wifi. Maybe this is the startup someone needs to do -- some reasonably powered device to attack to a router/connect close to a router which supports Thread and Zigbee, has completely local management and call it a day. Is this just over-complicating a smart hub? Don't know.

Asmod4n 1y ago
Thread is using the same protocol as Zigbee, which requires specialized hardware to talk to it. You can’t get around a centralized hub when wanting to use them on your WiFi network. Thread just adds an IP layer above Zigbee. Zigbee is on the same protocol layer as Ethernet or WiFi.
- hardwaresofton 1y ago
  > Thread is using the same protocol as Zigbee, which requires specialized hardware to talk to it. You can’t get around a centralized hub when wanting to use them on your WiFi network. > > Thread just adds an IP layer above Zigbee. Zigbee is on the same protocol layer as Ethernet or WiFi. AH, I've just realized that I've been using the wrong terminology. I've been meaning to say Matter over Thread vs Matter over Wifi! Matter seems like a decent way forward, and it can work only over wifi which is what drew me in to focusing on Matter. IIRC Matter/Zigbee isn't a thing (though it technically should be possible, Zigbee is just a transport as far as Matter is concerned right?). [EDIT] works -> can work, Thread/Zigbee -> Matter/Zigbee
  - Asmod4n 1y ago
    Thread and Zigbee implement the same IEEE standard. Matter would be correctly the application layer protocol of thread and could be spoken over any transport. Like HTTP
  - Asmod4n 1y ago
    But here comes the tricky bit, when you buy either Zigbee or matter devices each vendor will add its own extensions. In the Zigbee ecosystem vendors out right refuse to communicate with devices from other vendors even though Zigbee is an interoperable standard. That lead to the birth of zigbee2mqtt, literally hundreds of years of development time went into it to have full feature support for every Zigbee device that exists. For thread and matter devices each vendor would have to do the same. And that won’t happen, leading to a fragmented ecosystem.
    - 1y ago