"Non member" is left in the house

Hi,

I’m not really sure if there already is a topic about this, frankly I’m unsure which keywords would apply.

Really happy with Homey Pro (came from Google Home + Ikea) so already had tons of devices. Result: within a month I already have dozens of advanced flows and it all works great.

Yesterday I encountered the first “issue” whereby the automations completely went against what you want them to do and it became a real issue.

We have a lot of flows in the house that are triggered by all members leaving or entering. Such as a flow that triggers the alarm and turns of all lights when all members leave.

However, we encountered the first time a guest that was babysitting our son (that wasn’t set as one of the memebers logically because it was a one time occurance). So when we left the babysitter and my son were left in the dark and subsequently triggered the alarm :'-).

This seems like a really basic thing more people would have encountered. Is there a basic high level state in HOmey pro stating that all flows are suspended (something like a pause mode or something) for instances like these? I fixed it for now by driving back and janking the homey out of the power socket. But that feels like a really dumb way of doing things.

Interested to learn what the suggested way of fixing this is.

Thanks!

Why driving back?

Why not setting yourself at home?

I have my home/away detection in one flow.

I could disable this flow before leaving the house so for Homey thinks that someone is still at home.

2 Likes

Create a ‘Guest’ user that you can (only) manually set to ‘At home’ ?

Or create some flow to do it for you.

Or create a user for your son and set him to ‘At home’ since he obviously is a member you forgot to add :wink:

Hi Guys,

Thanks for the tips. Setting myself as at home is no option because I imagine my phone will just overwrite that when I drive away again.

I think making my son a member is the way to go. Ill just set him as away unless we are away and he is at home. Thanks :+1:

Now that I’m setting up my son as a member I’m encountering all kinds of issues I really don’t want. My son is 7 and doesn’t have a phone. Setting him home/gone or asleep/awake manually every time makes no sense.

However, A lot of advanced flows are set up so that “if last member of the house leaves do X” or when every member is asleep do Y.

I can re-setup everything but even then I need to manually change the state of my son for a lot of flows to work which is not an option untill he gets his own phone.

Is there maybe some higher level state where you can say follow member logic or fall back to guest logic or something like that?

At his age there are probably certain bedtimes. So marking him asleep/awake shouldn’t be a problem.

Away/at home could be solved if you create a YES/NO variable ‘son stays at home with sitter’

WHEN
somebody leaves home
AND
dad is away
Mum is away
‘Son stays at home with sitter’ is NO
THEN
Mark son away

Your son might have the solution: ’ just gimmie a phone…’ :laughing:

2 Likes

Hi,
I solved this by creating a virtual “Guest Mode” button, that I activate, when we have guests. With that button I can in my flows exactly define what should / should not happen, when guests are in the house.

Hey all. Thanks. I think this general mode would fix best. Updating statuses for member “son” is too much of a hassle. This would fix it.

I think that this is a typical problem that arises when you setup your smart home to be a replacement of a regular home, rather than an extension of it.
When you install an alarm system, normally you would set it up with a possibility to disable it manually by entering a code. In the days before smart homes, you would give your babysitter a key and a temporary alarm code with instructions on how to disable it.

When you design your smart home, it is nice that you can program it to automatically disable and enable the alarm based on the presence of family members, but you should NEVER override the ability to set and and unset it manually. You should also NEVER assume that your smart home will always work without issues. If you have an alarm system, all you members and guests should be able to disable it manually.

A smart home is an addition to your house, not a replacement of basic functionality.

2 Likes

I use also a physical smart button and a virtual switch for activating a “Guest Mode”, as @4x4_Pete already mentioned. The physical button turns the virtual switch on or off via Flow.
If you and your wife leave the house and your son stays at home with a babysitter, you press the physical button, which is ideally located near the front door, and thereby activates “Babysitter Mode”. Integrating a virtual switch into the Flows (and is turned on) is not a lot of work.
When you return home, you can automatically deactivate “Babysitter Mode” using Flow. However, if you leave again, you will have to press the physical button again when you leave.

Personally, I would do this with the IcalCalendar app. I Guess you plan in advance when the babysitter will be at home. Enter the appointment in the calendar linked to Homey via the IcalCalendar app. Even if the babysitter cancels at short notice, no manual intervention is necessary because you do not leave the house and the flows work as normal.
In my opinion, the IcalCalendar app is one of the best tool apps and is often underestimated. Through imported ICS calendars, e.g. for school holidays, public holidays, garbage collection, etc. and specially created appointments, e.g. when we are on vacation, in conjunction with Homeys build-in Home/Away function, the corresponding flows run automatically.

Well me and my girlfriend are plugged in with the APP, this scenario almost never happends, so having the option to activate from time to time in the app the “Guest mode” would suffice. Offcourse we could use an ikea remote or whatever to trigger this state.

Alarm is a bit much, I have that heimdall app installed on Homey Pro, but it flashes lights and make noise and then sends me a message so I can take action. But the “alarm” quits after 80 seconds.

So, I really think in this case the Gues mode would suffice.

My question would be what the advised way is to set such a mode. I don’t have modes yet. Do you create a 1 or 0 kind of variable or something like that? Or is there a better way? also visibility in the APP is important for this one I think.

Update: never mind, chat GPT helped :-). Used an app called virtual devices. That does the trick when you want to create a certain mood and show this in the app as well.

That actually was my first suggestion before ‘create an account for your son’…

1 Like

Agreed, alway have a ‘fallback if in error’ scenario.

I run some flows for heating, if it fails it goes back to the program of the thermostat…

Yeah all things considered this was the best fit :slight_smile:

For a simple switch, no additional app is needed.
Homey provides it’s own virtual devices like a virtual button, a virtual socket, which can be used for this use case and a virtual IP-Camera.
To be able to use them, you have to activate them first:
– Smartphone App: More → Settings → Experiments → Virtual Devices
– WebApp: :gear: → Experiments → Virtual Devices

1 Like

True, but they don’t show if the status is On or Off. For instance a AVD can…

Since there is no other physical notification of a ‘gueststatus’ you probably want to see this in the app (or on a dashboard)…

Of course shows the virtual socket the status, if its on or off:

:man_shrugging:t3:

Ok, I tried the same but did not get a status afaik… Just a pushbutton…

Then you’re doing something wrong:


(WebApp Screenshot)