Goose66

Woohoo!

It appears that Alexa keys this functionality off the displayCategory reported for the device from the v3 ISY Smart Home Skill. This suggests that it will be limited to the category values for that field defined by the API, which are currently: ACTIVITY_TRIGGER CAMERA DOOR LIGHT OTHER SCENE_TRIGGER SMARTLOCK SMARTPLUG SPEAKERS SWITCH TEMPERATURE_SENSOR THERMOSTAT TV So maybe "Alexa, turn off the TV" or "Alexa, what is the temperature" may work if you have a TV device or a thermostat device in the Group, but I don't have the capability to test that and I haven't seen anything online other than "turn the lights off." For the "many devices share..." error, is it possible that you still had a device or scene defined in the portal named just "light" or "lights?" If there is one or more devices named "light" or "lights," Alexa seems to favor this over the implicit targeting feature.

Here is the key functionality you need from the iOS app (notice the Alexa device inside the Group):

It definitely appears that the alexa.amazon.com website lacks this functionality for U.S. computers as well. I can see my groups, but it doesn't show any icons for the devices and it doesn't list the Alexa device as a member of the group. However, it does still have the "Forget" button which is now gone in at least the iOS app. So, Amazon may update the web app to add the new Smart Home Group functionality, but if that also takes away the "Forget" button for devices and scenes, it creates a whole new batch of problems. Honestly I didn't even know the web app existed until I was trying to find the "Forget" functionality to make the transition from the v2 to v3 skill. I have always used the iOS app for Alexa, so it didn't occur to me to make a distinction.

Yes, and "Fan On," "Fireplace On," etc. It would have been much better I think if the implicit targeting looked at the name of the devices to infer which to turn on or off instead of the displayCategory attribute which is limited to those categories defined by the API. Maybe a future version of the Alexa service will enable this.

Agreed. I have no intention of ever using the Amazon Alexa app to control my devices, and don't care one iota about the distinctions of device types, scenes, groups, etc. in the Alexa app. I don't see myself using this functionality for anything other than the implicit targeting function. I would have preferred a solution that would have put the room functionality over on the skill side (UDI's code), maybe using the Room labels from the portal, but the Alexa Smart Home Skill API just doesn't support such.

The Smart Home Groups are created in the Amazon Alexa app. If it is not giving you the option to add an Alexa Device to a group and/or you don't see some devices (not scenes) with the light bulb icon, then I think you must be running an old version of the app. I set mine up using the latest Alexa app on an iPhone. Also, if you have the latest Alexa app but all of your devices are showing as OTHER, you may have not performed the migration to ISY Smart Home Skill v3 correctly: 1. Forget all devices - can only be done on the web app (http://alexa.amazon.com), not a mobile device or tablet 2. Disable v2 skill 3. Enable v3 skill 4. Discover devices and scenes.

But you don't have to put all of them in the group. Just put the lights that you want to control by the shortcut (the "implicit targeting" functionality) in the group, and leave the rest to be controlled by their spoken name. If this implicit targeting works for thermostats as well, you may want to throw your thermostat for the room in the group as well, but I haven't tested that (don't have Insteon thermostats in new house yet).

No. The name of the Smart Home Group has no bearing on the functionality. It is the presence of the particular Alexa device AND the particular light devices in the Smart Home Group that establish the relationship and enable the functionality.

If you have enabled the v3 skill, forgot all your devices, and then performed rediscovery, this is how you do it: 1. Create a Smart Home Group for room 1 and add the Alexa device in room 1 and one or more devices that are categorized as LIGHTS (with the light icon). 2. Create a Smart Home Group for room 2 and add the Alexa device in room 2 and one or more other devices that are lights. 3. When in room 1, say "Alexa, turn on the lights" and the devices added to the Smart Home Group for room 1 will turn on. 4. When in room 2, say "Alexa, lights on" and the devices added to the Smart Home Group for room 2 will turn on. This is how I initially tested it back at post 19 - one Smart Home Group named "Master Bedroom" and one named "Office," both with Echo Dots. It's worth noting that if any of the spoken names for devices or scenes setup in your ISY Portal is just "Light" or "Lights," this will probably keep the "turn on the lights" shortcut from working properly.

That's incorrect. It can be accomplished with a single account using v.3 with individual devices now, and with scenes on the next iteration of the v.3 Skill.

But Alexa Smart Home Skill first!

Great to hear!

Can you explain how to get different Alexa devices tied to a single Amazon account to turn on or off different groups of ISY devices or scenes when you say "Alexa, lights off" while using the v2 ISY Skill? I can't figure it out without using the Smart Home Groups and the "implicit targeting" feature that is only enabled by the v3 ISY Smart Home Skill. Then we agree - it would be beneficial to allow users in the ISY Portal to select the classification for their devices and scenes in order to get the most functionality out of the Alexa Smart Home service. The question still stands for Benoit: Can this be added to the Portal and ISY Smart Home Skill v3?

As to your first point, as you have pointed out ad nauseum, you are using multiple accounts, one for each Alexa device. Not everyone wants to do that for a variety of reasons. The new "implicit targeting" feature removes that need by allowing the Alexa device to use a generic term like "lights" to refer to all light devices in the Smart Home Group that contains that Alexa device. In this way, you can say "Alexa, lights off" to any Alexa device and it can turn off all lights in that room without having to have each Alexa device configured for a separate account and losing the other functionality that comes from having a single account (e.g., drop in, multi-room music, single source for lists, calendars, flash briefings, etc.). As to your second question, I am speaking in the context of how the ISY Smart Home Skill operates. In response to a spoken request or user interaction with the Alexa app, the Alexa service requests discovery of devices from the ISY Skill. The ISY Skill returns a "discovery payload" message that enumerates the devices and scenes (referred to in the API as "endpoints") supported by the ISY along with capabilities and other attributes for each. The devices and scenes returned are the ones setup in the Portal for Alexa connectivity. In fact, if you specify two or more spoken names for a device or scene, the portal ISY Skill will return two or more endpoints for that device or scene, each with a separate spoken name. In the v3 API, one of the attributes in the discovery payload for each endpoint is a displayCategory attribute. This has a value of "LIGHT," "SCENE,_TRIGGER," "THERMOSTAT," "DOOR," "SWITCH," "CAMERA," etc. This is how the Alexa app decides what iconography to display in the Alexa app for the endpoint and on what tab it will appear. It seems that the "implicit targeting" feature also relies on this attribute to decide which devices in a Smart Home Group to turn off when you say "Alexa, lights off." Only the endpoints categorized as "LIGHT" will be turned off. However, as I pointed out before, for us Insteon users, most of our light endpoints are controlled by Insteon Scenes in order to keep multi-switch circuits and/or KPL buttons synced with the status of the light. So, for Insteon users, the "implicit targeting" feature is pretty useless, unless we can get the new ISY Smart Home Skill v3 (implemented by UDI) to categorize these scenes as LIGHTS in the discovery payload. I realize not every scene is for lights. That is why I mentioned a few posts up that the ideal solution would be to provide a dropdown box in the portal that would allow the user to tell the ISY Smart Home Skill what category each device or scene they add represents so that they could get the best Alexa Smart Home functionality possible.

Can the Zwave radio device to add to an ISY 994 Pro still be purchased?

Benoit, I don’t think you are understanding the problem. I know how to add scenes to the portal and how to control those scenes using Alexa spoken commands. The problem is the fact that the “implict targeting,” i.e., “Alexa, lights off” only works with those end points categorized as “Lights,” but most of my end points that I have (and I believe most Insteon users) are scenes. The reason for using scenes is to keep multiple switches and KPL buttons in sync. If we control devices directly all those multi-switch circuits and KPL buttons get out of sync. In order to use the implicit targeting feature, we need the Portal to show the scenes as Lights in the discovery payload to the Alexa Smart Home API instead of Scenes.

Ok, having only enabled the v3 skill last night, I quickly added a couple of devices to my bedroom and tested it to make sure it worked before posting. However, now I am looking at how I would actually use this feature, and since scenes don't work with it, it's utterly useless. The Alexa Smart Home documentation describes a "scene" as a collection of devices to turn on or off together in no specific order. And I have SOME scenes that may fall into that category. But being and Insteon user, 80+% of my scenes are to support multi-switch circuits and KPL buttons that control a single light (or set of lights). I have dozens of multi-switch circuits in the house and at least 5 KPLs. If I add devices to a Smart Home Group so that I can use the "Alexa, lights off" commands, that throws synchronization amongst my multi-switch circuits and KPL buttons (realized by Insteon Scenes) out the window. The way to fix this is to have the portal report Insteon Scenes as displayCategory of "LIGHTS" instead of "SCENES." Or better yet, add a dropdown in the portal so that I can select the displayCategory for my devices I add to the Alexa Skill. Benoit, cela peut-il être fait?

Only if you are naming your devices "Light." If you name your devices something else and put them in a Smart Home Group with the Alexa device, when you say "Alexa, turn on the lights" it will turn on every device in the group that is identified as a lighting device by the portal to the ISY Smart Home Skill.

Also, what is address 11.02.01 point to? I think the link table in the switch (2B.BF.11) may be bad. You may want to try restoring that device from the ISY.

This is reminiscent of my old house where the SwitchLincs controlling fluorescents or CFLs were constantly causing me trouble. Dumped them all in favor of LED (and legacy incandescents).

What types of motion sensors? If they are the older 2842-222 then "On Only" is a jumper setting (pin 4). It will send On on motion and continue to send On every second until motion stops. The light will be in a scene as a responder with the motion detector as a controller. When the motion detector sends an On, the light should turn on immediately without the 1 or 2 second delay introduced by the ISY's program cycle. But the motion detector never sends and Off. Your program is setup to respond to the motion detector being "switched On" and will run a timer for the desired duration after last motion and then switch the light off in the "Then" branch. Each subsequent On for the motion detector will re-run the program (and thus reset the timer). The program can also update the status of KPL keys and other switches that control the light to keep everything in sync.

Are we doing this again?

If they only lasted a year, I could go through 13 years of them before paying for one Jandy WaterColors LED pool light. Of course, those things are more like 300W equivalent as opposed to the 75W equivalent I will get from a Hue color LED light.

If I could get my stinking pool controller to handle colored lights, I could just have the ISY program color the spa blue when it's cold, yellow when it's getting close, and red when it's ready. Maybe I can just put some Hue can lights in the pool light fixtures.