But is a Matter controller also possible? The esphome component seems to connect to compatible Matter controllers, but I can’t find anywhere if the ESP32 can also be the Matter controller.
I think it is definitely possible, but that would mean Athom has to run the Matter server (or rather a customized version that’s more efficient with multiple Bridges/users on Homey Cloud, since the existing Matter implementations seem to be designed to run only 1 network) and then use the Bridge as a proxy for BLE, LAN and Thread (if it gets a Thread-compatible module)
This has strayed somewhat from the point i tried to make, although a completely valid and interesting thread… So it would seem to be that the Bridge could act as a Thread mesh node, like it does as a Zigbee router node, within the mesh network to relay data from sleepy end devices… if only its radio supported it and wasn’t a really old chip design.
The Thread boarder router and Matter bridge are a whole other topic… but the main reason I haven’t explored the SHS router is because it doesn’t support it, without the use of an external TBR and Matter bridge. Again, that seems nuts to me, that the more power-user centric SHS doesn’t support something that the other solutions does.
Yes, it’s primarily because of the resources needed to run a Matter network with the existing implementations.
For Matter, that would mean another instance of the Matter controller needs to be running for each individual network, which will cost many resources on the cloud. Since the existing Matter controller implementations are not designed to run thousands of networks at once while using minimal resources, this would mean that they have a few options:
They can build their own implementation, which is very advanced since Matter uses multiple different protocols (BLE for commisioning, and then either LAN or Thread for communication).
or charge an extra fee for Matter for the many resources that 1 instance of the Matter controller costs, and just use the existing implementations
or increase the price for Homey Premium and cover it with that subscription
What about running the Matter controller on SHS, and having either a Bridge that supports Thread (TBR) or allowing SHS to use devices like the SMLight Zigbee/Thread PoE LAN Adapter (which as far as I know isn’t currently supported).
I think it would be unrealistic to expect Homey Cloud to support a Matter controller, and therefore a TBR on the Bridge when used with Cloud. But surely the Bridge could be setup to differentiate between Cloud radio usage, and SHS usage… that wouldn’t be too much to ask would it?
I’m sure they could do that, turning on Thread only for SHS, but you’ll need newer hardware, so higher costs. Since Homey Cloud is meant to be the cheap/free version of Homey, the Bridge also needs to stay cheap. The Bridge was never intended for SHS users. It was always just an antenna for Homey Cloud, and SHS was added later.
Tiny issue with link display from routers to devices. The website says 0 transmissions whereas the stats say „rx“: int 11626. Controler to routers the stats are there. Stats from routers to end devices only the ones with values above 10k have a not dotted line. The stats under „link quality“ display values from 1007 tx onwards but seem to consider 13123 tx as to little traffic.
And of course devices with a question mark don’t float in the air, esp. when stats say there are tx
Would it be possible to also have the map and link quality stats on a widget you could add to a Dashboard please?
And would it be possible to create a device card you could add, with a setting of Update Interval in minutes, and stats/insights for Weak, Fair, Good, Too Little Traffic, and N° of Stale Routes? That way you could use the Insights graphs to spot trends, like at a certain time of day interference might be causing a problem with your Zigbee mesh in a certain area of your home. Would be very useful for fault tracking.
I would like to say, this app is awesome! Wanted this for ages now, thank you
I’ve sent in a Pull Request to your original repository to add a traffic overview. I also made the panes collapsable to get a bigger area for the actual network overview.
Thank you. I’m quite new to this lark I don’t have many ZigBee devices yet but had been discussing with @Drako74 elsewhere why my Homey Bridge wasn’t connecting to anything.
The Bridge is in the same room as 3 (2 Aqara switches & an Innr GU10) of the 4 devices.
The 4th is a Shelly 1PM in a temporary location for some power logging & is mostly powered off but that connects to one of the switches through the 0.5m wall from an upstairs room directly above my Homey Pro. I don’t know if it would connect directly if left long enough.
The GU10 is powered on & off directly by its switch. When I first tried it soft connected it wasn’t responding reliably but I now think that is due to general connectivity. Running a flow from a switch press seems to only work 1st time around 50% of the time, unless I’ve used the switch recently.
The Bridge just sits on its lonesome doing nothing useful, just connected to the house WiFi. It is in line of sight to the Homey Pro through the, usually open, doorway & has good line of sight with the nearest switch.
Just to double check: Do you mean that the switch cuts power to the INNR GU10 spot? If so, that is no good: the GU10 is a Zigbee router device and should be permanently powered. Otherwise it may break your Zigbee network. Also Homey is not able to switch on/off the GU10 if the physical switch has cut power to the light.
Zigbee devices can stick to their route, even if you add another router like Homey Bridge.
If you think one/some zigbee devices need to use it as hop, re-pair the devices (without removing these from Homey in advance), or power off all router devices & Homey Pro + Bridge for 15 minutes, then power on Pro and zigbee router devices.
This should cause the zigbee mesh to build itself up from scratch.
I might swap the bulb for dumb one & use the Innr one elsewhere eventually. It was the 1st smart light I’d connected to the switches. The other 2 lights connected to the switches arent smart so rely on power on & off. Once I had problems with reliability I turned the physical switching back on to the lamp with the Innr one. Then,as I did more, I found the switches still weren’t running flows reliably first time, & sometimes not 2nd or 3rd time. They always respond if I run the flow from the Homey app though.
Once switched on the Innr bulb, pretty much without any delay, responds to controls from its device settings if I want to change any settings. It seems to remember the settings through power cycles too.
When I first switched to Homey for my smart home control, I thought I had done sufficient research on Zigbee bulbs, and went all out on INNR bulbs and RC250 wireless switches.
When I first started having Zigbee reliability issues, I thought it was just because I had 80+ devices. But after much testing and a f*** tone more trawling the internet and late nights… I have found out that the INNR bulbs, and specifically the GU10 bulbs, use an older subset of the Zigbee protocol… one that doesn’t play well with Homey.
And another forum member who is developing an INNR Bridge app, informed me that INNR doesn’t actually produce their Bridge or the GU10 bulbs or the RC250 buttons, they are just rebranded Leedarson Lighting devices.
I’m still kinda trying to recover from this realisation that I may have seriously boobed with my Zigbee lighting, having spent a small fortune on INNR bulbs, that from my tests have fairly conclusively proven to be the problem with my Zigbee network.
I have since been testing some Aqara GU10 spots, and E27 bulbs… which you can select one of two firmwares to run, Zigbee or Thread… and so far they have proven to be ten times more stable, in both Zigbee and Matter over Thread configurations.
The INNR bulbs seem to work fine with the simpler INNR Bridge, but that means they are not part of the Homey network, so don’t add to its mesh router nodes.
In summary… you may be trying to flog a dead horse with the INNR GU10 bulbs
I would just like to give a shout out to these little guys… that seem to do far more in the way of supporting my Zigbee mesh than any of the bulbs or smart plugs I have… they’re absolute champs, and seem to be the most reliable and consistent Zigbee router nodes on my network. Yay for the little guy
For what it’s worth: not sure which specific INNR GU10 bulbs you have, but I have 4 of INNR’s basic warm white bulbs connected to my Homey (so w/o hue and w/o color temperature) and they have not caused issues in my Zigbee network (with approx 75 devices).
respect!
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