So let’s dive into where we got them, why we chose them, how they’re powered, the upsides & downsides, and – of course – how much they cost (please note that I cannot explain why I insist on calling them “blinds” when they’re technically roller shades). Apparently I overshot that deadline just a smidge, but better late than never. And in it I mentioned that I’d share a detailed smart blind post for you “in a few days” because they’re hands down one of my favorite smart home features that we’ve added. Once the basic building blocks of moving the blind to a position you can change the blind really easily by any method simply by changing the corresponding virtual dimmer, you can use RM rule, Dashboard, Alexa, Google, etc.So last month I wrote a post about the smart tech we added, ditched, and love most in our house. One higher level rule is that at sunrise +30min open the pool blind and fireplace left, another higher level rule is if the Master override changes then set each blind to that value, etc. I then have higher level rules that set each blind position on the blind(s) I want, this effectively creates 'groups'.I created 3 identical rules, one for each blind that will position the blind based on their respective dimmer.I created 4 virtual dimmers - Master override, pool, fireplace left and fireplace right (these are what's on the dashboard).3 blinds - pool, fireplace left, and fireplace right.For me scenes limited my flexibility so this is what I came up with. The blinds I have will overdrive and I didn't want that and they also self-calibrated slightly different so that at 50% they didn't 'look' the same so I needed a way to cap the min/max and be able to set them slightly different positions so they would look the same.
There are some real world issues that I needed to address so this was the best way for me ( uses scenes and groups and is happy with it, which is a much simpler solution if it works for you). You then use the virtual dimmer value on your dashboard, I used the vertical slider for my tile of choice but you can use a horizonal if you want. You will use RM to control each shade position based on a virtual dimmer value.
Use whatever driver you're using now to control the shades. You will not have a driver for the 'group'.
I know there are quite a few users of Bali/Graber/Zebra shades here (as well those coming from ST), so I am hopeful someone has cracked the code. Maybe I need to adjust my expectations to get both Siri and Alexa working together, but they both have their use cases in my home.
But any changes to get Alexa working, like changing them to a dimmer, kills the capability with the homebridge integration. I can group, control via Siri, and everything works great. Homebridge: With the generic z-wave shade driver and tonesto7's Homebridge integration, I actually get perfectly working shades in the Home app. I have had some better luck with setting the shades as a dimmer with Alexa and then having group control, but then I encounter issues with Homebridge. "Sorry, Living Room Shades doesn't support that." If I create a specific group called "Living Room Shades" with just the shade devices in the group, again, she doesn't allow control of the group. If I add the shades to an existing room (e.g., Living Room), asking Alexa to "set Living Room shades to 50%" just doesn't work. But any sort of grouping just doesn't work. I can live without groups within Hubitat, but then I'd need grouping in Alexa to work.Īlexa: Using the Hubitat Alexa skill, the shades appropriately show up for Alexa and individual shade control works well.
Both solutions don't seem to respond appropriately to position (it's either a fully open or fully closed situation). Grouping: Using the generic z-wave shade driver, I can't get any sort of grouping to work, be it via Groups and Scenes, or some custom apps like bravenel's Shade Control. Both seem to have their issues with my setup. With HE, my only options appear to be the generic z-wave shade driver, or using the generic dimmer. It worked great with Alexa and Homebridge, and my only complaint was the delay with the cloud aspect of ST.
With ST, I used a SmartApp called Shady paired with a custom shade device handler, which provided easy grouping and full feature control. Since migrating over to HE from ST, the only item that continues to give me grief are my Bali AutoView shades.