I haven’t been able to find an answer to my question (except that it wasn’t available a couple of years ago). Does Homey support 433mhz learning mode? Or does every single device have to come from a library?
I have an alarm system with different door/window sensors with different open and close signals (and every sensor has unique codes). Here I would like to simply add these sensors to homey by triggering the signals in front of homey (just like how the alarm system itself is set up).
Btw. I don’t own a homey yet - the learning mode of the signals is a must, and would find it very useless if it’s not supported.
I can not directly answer your question (though I believe Homey isn’t able to learn those codes without a Homey app).
But some other thoughts:
If you wanna invest in domitics with an alarm system then a 433MHz system might not be the best idea. This protocol doesn’t provide feedback, like i.e. Zigbee, Z-Wave and others do. So the sensor will never know if the alarm is received by the alarm hub (Homey in this case). Other protocols do.
If a light bulb is not responding to a signal, that might not be the biggest problem. But if a doorsensor doesn’t trigger an alarm, that is…
So if you invest in domotics like Homey (like we probably all recommend here), consider buying some new sensors too.
They come in all sorts, sizes and types and don’t have to be expensive.
And remember that a system like Homey can never replace a professional alarm system, although it comes a long way. Whatever sensors you use…
It’s all depending on the amount of money you want to spend I guess.
Homey in combination with i.e. Zigbee/Z-Wave sensors and the Heimdall app gives a very good value for money to my opinion!
Do anyone know why that is the case? It seems wired to me that such a seemingly open platform doesn’t support something that basic? I really don’t see why they wouldn’t just support it and perhaps hide the option away under some “advanced” functionality to not confuse basic users.
I guess that I would find it weird to pay for such an expensive hub and still have it to talk through my Son off RF to get that kind of functionality. I just found it so easy with the security system app if you could just add those keep sensors directly, but having it go through another device seems cumbersome to me.
That said - if I did set it up with my Tasmota Sonoff RF bridge, would I then get the functionality that I’m looking for?
Not any full smart home system as Homey is the only one I know of with a built in RF sender/reciever.
But my SikkertHjem Alarm System S6EVO (danish) supports adding any 433mhz signal as sensor by letting it learn the signal. This is easily set up in the app. I have added multiple cheap Chinese RF door sensors this way and it works
Also I have used OpenHab linked with Google Assistent and SikkertHjem together with my Tasmota Sonoff RF to Arm/Disarm the security system (and keep track of it’s Arm state if changed from the SikkertHjem app). The problem is that this it was very cumbersome to setup as it has to go through so many systems (and setting up every new sensor takes time).
So I really hoped that Homey would be the perfect solution with the Heimdall app to set up all this easily as it had the RF functionality built in. It might still be possible - but not as easy as I would have hoped for.
Would it be possible to make my own Homey app with that Homeyscript thing to add new sensors to the system. So does homeyscript allow me to use the RF antenna to send and receive whatever RF code. And does it allow be to create new “virtual devices” from within my custom app that can be used in all parts of Homey?
The keyword being “seemingly”. Homey isn’t an open platform, developers are bound to the functionality that Athom provides to them. To answer your next question: no, you can’t use HomeyScript or an app to receive just any RF codes (HomeyScript doesn’t support RF at all, and apps are again bound to the functionality that Athom provides through the SDK, which is that apps need to declare up front what RF signals they want to receive/send).
However, reading back your original post: if your devices all use the same protocol (signal definition) then you might be able to write an app for it. The signal definition is required to be able to decode the signals, but the data that gets conveyed by those signals (the unique code per device) doesn’t have to be known to the app and will be passed to the app in the form of an event.
“Perhaps”. It depends on whether the RF Bridge supports the protocol from your devices.
Yeah, I guess I thought that Homey was more open in it’s functionality than it perhaps is. I think I was hoping for it to be easy to use for basic functionality, but with the possibility to do much more in advanced use. But sad to hear that it’s locked in some places.
Regarding the Sonoff RF part I can currently pick up all the signals from the sensors, so I guess that part would work then.
In the event that a SonOff bridge flashed with Tasmota can’t decipher an RF transmission I think it might be possible get around this by also doing an additional flash of the RF chip that’s on the RF bridge using a firmware called Portich and just purely deal with “raw” RF codes for listening and for transmitting …
This is just a theory though…
There is a fellow in another thread on here that is currently having issues dealing with an RF device that uses a proprietary RF protocol…
I suggested to him that he try and just deal with pure RF raw codes using his SonOff… I don’t know if he has tried it yet though …
Have a read of the thread. It might give you some insight…
