Just purchased a couple of Tradrfi bulbs and the small dimmer switch - I have included them to the Homey Pro and also did the separate include for the switch to the bulb - everything works great i can control the bulb through Homey and also use the switch to control the bulb - The problem is when I turn on the bulb with the remote Homey doesn’t indicate that the light is on - Have I done something wrong ? Doing it this way was trying to avoid using flows to control the bulb as not sure how the dimmer would control it with flows as I only see dim to a certain level when button is pressed
I have experienced exactly the same. I was expecting Homey to pick up on the signal from the “direct linked” remote, but it does not. Actually, it even looses the ability to change color from the remote as well - only on/off and dim up/down works.
I have tried to explain this issue to Athom, but I’m unsure if they understood the issue.
Here is the answer I got from support:
The situation you’re describing when you carry out a command directly to the light without interposition of your Homey Pro is correct. Homey doesn’t pull a signal from your Ikea bulb without given a command.
When you make multiple flow in combination with your remote buttons you can mimic its default settings like you would make use of the IKEA HUB.
When you add a remote to Homey Pro without link an action, it doesn’t do much.
To me this does not sound like they completely understand - I never expected Homey to “pull” anything from the lightbulb - I expected the remote that is included in Homeys Zigbee network to update the state (or that I at least to could set the state manually).
Thanks for the info - I thought Homey would know the status of the bulb regardless of how it’s been turned on its supposed to be smart – So if you have a power cut and then the power comes back on all the Tradfri bulbs will be on but Homey thinks they are off? - only just got a couple of Tradfri bulbs to test - I have set up flows for the switch but unfortunately you can only have a set dim level when a long press happens – I wanted to be able to have a varied dim level depending on how long I press the button - just like when the remote is paired directly to the bulb
Many other brands have a setting to set the state after powerloss (usually on, off or last known state). I don’t think the Trådfri devices have this setting. I haven’t tested but I assume they default to last state (makes sense as “dum” bulbs behave this way)
Regarding dimming: There is no way using flows to simulate that kind of behaviour reliably sadly. What you can do is relative dimming; i.e. X% up or down per longpress on the remote (I don’t know which remote you have, but my Trådfri remotes have a longpress event)
That means that for example one longpress down will dim the bulb X% down from whatever level it currently is. Then you have to let go and do another longpress - and so on…
This has nothing to do with IKEA btw. this is dimming with flows in Homey regardless of brand.
(Using z-wave devices will allow what you want, but that does not help you of course)
Like I wrote; not a good experience by any means…
Example flow from my Trådfri remote - bulb combination:
I have tried it that way as you mentioned when I first got the bulbs - turning on the bulb with the remote Homey doesn’t know the status of the bulb – shame really
The IKEA app should turn on attribute reporting then (it’s strange it doesn’t do so by default, because IKEA lamps support it and it’s not resource-intensive to do so).
I’m connecting the light bulbs directly to Homey and not through the Tradfri bridge – I didn’t want another bridge as I have a Philips Hue bridge – Only got a few bulbs to test last week as they are a lot cheaper than Philips Hue
There is no doubt (I think) that we are both using the Trådfri app created and maintained by Athom.
The issue is that when both the bulb and the remote are included in Homeys Zigbee network (and both fully working as such) and the remote is direct linked with the bulb. (Like Athom describes here: https://support.homey.app/hc/en-us/articles/360015669840-Controlling-a-Zigbee-device-with-a-Zigbee-remote-directly)
What then happens is what I and @woto (If I understand him correctly) experience:
Homey gets no information when the remote is used (dimming, on/on). Homey is clueless as to what the remote is doing to the bulb
The remote that normally can change color temp when directly linked with the bulb without Homey (or included with the Trådfri bridge for that matter) Can no longer change color temp using the side buttons.
Creating flows using all the buttons on the remote is however no problem.
I understand the problem, and I explained what the app developer has to do to get reporting working properly here.
As for the side buttons, I believe this is also an issue with other Zigbee implementations (like zigbee2mqtt) and seems to be caused by a non-standard way of how IKEA (or its gateway) deals with those buttons. But “direct dimming” should be possible.
I understood your point about attribute reporting - I was just trying to summarise a bit
If the side button problem is a known issue even with other solutions then I guess that is a dead-end for now.
That leaves us with trying to get Athom to understand the issue and update their app accordingly…
I have been in contact with their support, but very little came out of it - see my first post in this thread.
I checked this with our developers and the bulb, in this case an IKEA bulb has the responsibility to report a change in its status back to Homey. Unfortunately this doesn’t always work with every brand/bulb.
If you use a remote which is also paired to your Homey Pro, you can of course create a Flow so Homey will change the status of the bulb which results in a 100% accurate status.
I hope this answers your question to your satisfaction, which is why I’m closing your ticket. If you need additional support, please feel free to re-open your ticket by answering this email.
Brushing it off with “…doesn’t always work” seems a bit “easy” to me…
