Cloud development

The Shelly app is created by a community developer.

I know, but “owned” by Alterco that is a verified developer.

It’s still supplied by, what you call, hobbyists, though.

Marking apps with the name of the brand is a marketing thing, it makes Athom look good to the outside world. But lots of those brand apps are not developed by the brand at all, it’s either a rebranded community app or Athom itself has written it.

First of all, I did not mean any disrespect by using the word “hobbyist”, I apologize if any developer felt trampled on.

I realize that it’s often community initiatives behind the apps, but I maintain that the companies that put their own name on the app shows a commitment to being on this platform and indicate an interest in keeping the app maintained. I think we can also assume that developers of apps where the brand is involved likely has better access to the documentation needed to support the products and hopefully also advance information about upcoming products.
The reason I pointed to Shelly is that it’s one of rather few suppliers I see that has taken this step, but as I said, I got the impression this is the thing Athom is hoping for.

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There is one advantage of a manufacture having to develop the Homey driver, they will soon realise the shortfalls and impact of imposed limitations of their API.

I think a lot of them add an API due to mass demand but never actually try to implement the other end to see if it works. Most custom device API’s are aimed at third party apps blindly controlling devices and normally severely lack feedback to keep the third party app’s state in sync. They normally rely on polling but with limited rates. If they provide something like a door contact or motion sensor then getting a status update every 15 minutes is not much use.

As a hobbyist I have to work with or around those limitations and I’m generally ignored by the manufactures when I try to point out the problems. Therefore, I have to admit that some of my apps are sub-optimal and don’t work as well as I would like, but there is nothing I can do about that.

So part of me would love for manufactures to take responsibility for their apps, but at the same time I fear that support will often be slow.

I try to fix issues within 24 hours and add support for new devices within a few days, provided I can get the required information. I feel that manufactures will most likely take weeks or even months to do the same.

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