mwester Posted January 24, 2016 Share Posted January 24, 2016 Awesome news! I was skeptical about the echo -- I could imagine the comments: "another toy for mwester!" -- but the family-acceptance-factor for this integration has far exceeded anything else I've installed. Hat's off to everyone for making this possible! Link to comment
stusviews Posted January 24, 2016 Share Posted January 24, 2016 What does this mean? As far as the constraint - is that removed somehow withe the "connected home" that I've read about? Sorry to veer off but I am so confused with all of this stuff - I start reading one thing then start going down another path! Echo, nodes, IR, skills, portals, mobilinc, - i wish there was a big diagram showing how all of this stuff worked together. Connected Home gives you the ability to ask Alexa to do something, such as "Alexa, turn on the living room light." Prior to Connected Home, the ISY skill required that you say, "Alexa, tell Izzy to turn on the living room light." The portal (not free) enables the ISY to "talk" the the Amazon Echo. MobiLinc is an app that allows you to use a smartphone to access ISY device, scenes, thermostats, etc. BTW, the skill is still needed to control a few devices orally such as locks and thermostats. Link to comment
jerlands Posted January 24, 2016 Share Posted January 24, 2016 What I'm confused about is what makes "Connected Home" common to UDI, Wink, SmartThings and Insteon? Are they all operating from a similar resource or are they complying to a specific set of rules? Jon... Link to comment
gduprey Posted January 24, 2016 Share Posted January 24, 2016 Connected Home is an "automation API" built into the Echo by Amazon. It provides a single, consistent interface for Echo geared toward controlling home automation devices. Vendors can then "plug in" "drivers" to the back of that which accept commands from the connected home interface and translate it to their hardware (wink, UDI/ISY, etc)So using connected home with several different technologies allows a single, consistent end-user interface. "Alexa turn on XYZ" would work for a device called XYZ whether your home automation hardware was an ISY, Wink, Insteon Hub, etc. On the other hand, the skill stuff is entirely up to the provider/vendor to create. So a skill can use any commands and words (within reason) to talk to devices, but each skill likely has it's own "syntax". Connected Home is just a way to "simplify" and harmonize the way you interface with your automation hardware through Echo.Hope that helps. Link to comment
jerlands Posted January 24, 2016 Share Posted January 24, 2016 Connected Home is an "automation API" built into the Echo by Amazon. It provides a single, consistent interface for Echo geared toward controlling home automation devices. Vendors can then "plug in" "drivers" to the back of that which accept commands from the connected home interface and translate it to their hardware (wink, UDI/ISY, etc) So using connected home with several different technologies allows a single, consistent end-user interface. "Alexa turn on XYZ" would work for a device called XYZ whether your home automation hardware was an ISY, Wink, Insteon Hub, etc. On the other hand, the skill stuff is entirely up to the provider/vendor to create. So a skill can use any commands and words (within reason) to talk to devices, but each skill likely has it's own "syntax". Connected Home is just a way to "simplify" and harmonize the way you interface with your automation hardware through Echo. Hope that helps. Hi Gerry, Thank you very much for that... The seat of the query is to understand how push notifications might be securely implemented and it seems Connected Home is possibly a means for this? Jon... Link to comment
stusviews Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 MobiLinc allows push notification from the ISY. Link to comment
barrygordon Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 Amazon Echo Skills and the Connected Home. In the context of the Amazon Echo a skill is any process that extends the Echo's ability to deal with other devices, normally devices in the realm of Home Automation or Home Control. Amazon provides a native skill to deal with lighting systems, specifically the lighting system made by Phillips and known as the HUE lighting system. Since the native skill was designed for lighting, its command structure is built around the words On, Off, and Dim. Technically the Amazon Echo "Connected Home" is a set of worker programs or devices running such worker programs that are used by the Amazon cloud process that handles speech recognition for the Echo. These worker programs can be hosted in the Amazon cloud, on a local Area Network (LAN) or any place that the Amazon cloud process can reach through the Internet. Amazon calls these worker programs "Skill Adapters". In effect they adapt the Amazon Native Skill to specific end points that have specific functionality and their own protocol for communications. The ISY is such an end point, the Smart-things hub is another one as are the Insteon hub and the Philips HUE Hub. The Amazon native skill, and its skill adapters, is the one skill that does not need a name to be invoked. It is the skill that is native to the Echo and will be used by the Echo when not told to use a different named skill such as IZZY. The echo is inherently able to do other things such as playing music and answering some questions, but lets stick with skills for now. Amazon encourages developers (any one with programming skills can become an Amazon developer for the Echo and it is free cost wise to do so) to build new skills and to build skill adapters. There are two significant differences between a skill and a skill adapter. A skill adapter is limited in what can/will understand. It is basically limited to "Turn on", "Turn off" and "Dim", but I have been successful with "Shut". It also allows for noise words such as "the". A skill adapter is invoked by stating the Echo's wake up word (normally Alexa) followed by the command followed by the device name with a possible value for the Dim command. For Example "Alexa, turn off the Kitchen lights" or Alexa, dim the bedroom lights to 50 percent" A skill, as opposed to a skill adapater, has a name such is Izzy, which is the name of the UDI skill. The name must be used when the skill is invoked. The skill is not limited in its command vocabulary and has a more flexible syntactic structure as to what is spoken and can be recognized. For example "Alexa, tell Izzy to lock the front door", or "Alexa, ask Izzy what the bedroom temperature is" would all be possible with a skill (the UDI skill "Izzy" may not be able to handle this yet but in the future . . . The skills available for the connected home are listed in the "settings/connected home" section of the Alexa app. The full skills (such as Izzy) are all listed in the skills section of the Alexa app. The HUE adapter is not listed in the connected home as it is the default device that is assumed by the Amazon native skill. All other skill adapters are listed by name, and somehow you must register a desired skill adapter from the connected home with Amazon so it knows what to look for and query for device names. An Amazon Echo account can have associated with it multiple skills and/or skill adapters. The HUE Emulator which was used by many in this forum before UDI published its skill and skill adapter was a software program that emulated the Philips HUE and ran on he same LAN as the Echo using a PC, MAC or Raspberry PI as the hosting computer. It had to be running 24/7 which made the Raspberry Pi a good hosting candidate. UDI's connected home skill adapter is accessed and set up through the UDI Portal add on. This add on for the ISY costs $50 for a two year subscription. When properly set up it allows Amazon to discover the desired spoken names of those things the ISY controls that you wish to be controllable by the Echo. The Amazon data base for this is in the cloud and all Echos in the same Amazon account use this one database of device names. When the Amazon speech recognition process resolves what is spoken into text strings it checks to see what skills (native or non-native) that Echo account has associated with it. The skill adapter for the HUE is associated with every account. It then sends a synopsis of the text to the worker program that is associated with the skill adapters that you have indicated you are using, or to a skill whose skill name you have enabled is associated with the account. The Hue emulator, being local, was very fast in getting the desired action to the ISY. The ISY skill adapter is not local but rather hosted somewhere in the amazon cloud so it has to be a little slower performance wise. Amazon charges UDI for the hosting of its skill adapter and for its Skill, hence the portal charge. The ISY skill adapter does appear to be a little more forgiving, or perhaps I should say understanding with regards to what is spoken to the Echo. In all cases there is a security trust issue that is handled since a major portion of the overall process is non-local, i.e. in the cloud. You wouldn't want a stranger to be able to command your Echo/ISY to unlock the front door. The UDI skill adapter for the ISY allows the association of a name with a device, program or scene that is configured in the ISY. For a device the action of the commands are fairly obvious. For a scene the Dim command can not be used since a scene can not be dimmed. For a program the On command runs the Then section and the Off command the Else section and the Dim command is not used. The only issue I have with the ISY skill adapter is the speed factor. It takes 2-3 seconds (to me an eternity) for the actual action to occur after I finish speaking. The Hue Emulator responded almost instantaneously. I have things I would like to see Amazon do such as allow me to say "and" or "and then" to have the echo come back after the first action to hear a second command sequence with out having to begin all over with "Alexa, . . .". Perhaps the Echo would say "what" in this case thereby providing for an extended dialog to handle multiple devices without setting up a scene or group. Naturally I could also end the second command with "and then". Due to the architecture of the ISY many interesting things may be accomplished. I am completely controlling my Kitchen TV (on, off, channel selection, volume, etc) through the Echo using ISY program entries (runThen) for the most part) that run network resources that send strings to a Global Cache unit via an intermediate process that simplifies the strings for me. In a similar manner I control turning on my Home Theater. At the current time all my needs are handled by the ISY skill adapter so I am not using the Izzy skill. I am confident it will only get better!. Link to comment
jerlands Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 Barry, Thanks for further expanding on the "Connected Home vs Izzy Skill" issue. I had no idea Connected Home was constructed around Philips Hue and so its usage is likely limited to the constraints created in that initial development. Hopefully Amazon will broaden the scope of Connected Home by reconsidering the requirements of an integrated HA system. Jon... Link to comment
stusviews Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 Connected Home already includes the Insteon Hub 2. Scenes are not supported. Link to comment
MWareman Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 Connected Home already includes the Insteon Hub 2. Scenes are not supported.So in that regard, ISY wins! ISY wins again due to being able to run programs from Connected Home... Link to comment
Teken Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 Amazon Echo Skills and the Connected Home. In the context of the Amazon Echo a skill is any process that extends the Echo's ability to deal with other devices, normally devices in the realm of Home Automation or Home Control. Amazon provides a native skill to deal with lighting systems, specifically the lighting system made by Phillips and known as the HUE lighting system. Since the native skill was designed for lighting, its command structure is built around the words On, Off, and Dim. Technically the Amazon Echo "Connected Home" is a set of worker programs or devices running such worker programs that are used by the Amazon cloud process that handles speech recognition for the Echo. These worker programs can be hosted in the Amazon cloud, on a local Area Network (LAN) or any place that the Amazon cloud process can reach through the Internet. Amazon calls these worker programs "Skill Adapters". In effect they adapt the Amazon Native Skill to specific end points that have specific functionality and their own protocol for communications. The ISY is such an end point, the Smart-things hub is another one as are the Insteon hub and the Philips HUE Hub. The Amazon native skill, and its skill adapters, is the one skill that does not need a name to be invoked. It is the skill that is native to the Echo and will be used by the Echo when not told to use a different named skill such as IZZY. The echo is inherently able to do other things such as playing music and answering some questions, but lets stick with skills for now. Amazon encourages developers (any one with programming skills can become an Amazon developer for the Echo and it is free cost wise to do so) to build new skills and to build skill adapters. There are two significant differences between a skill and a skill adapter. A skill adapter is limited in what can/will understand. It is basically limited to "Turn on", "Turn off" and "Dim", but I have been successful with "Shut". It also allows for noise words such as "the". A skill adapter is invoked by stating the Echo's wake up word (normally Alexa) followed by the command followed by the device name with a possible value for the Dim command. For Example "Alexa, turn off the Kitchen lights" or Alexa, dim the bedroom lights to 50 percent" A skill, as opposed to a skill adapater, has a name such is Izzy, which is the name of the UDI skill. The name must be used when the skill is invoked. The skill is not limited in its command vocabulary and has a more flexible syntactic structure as to what is spoken and can be recognized. For example "Alexa, tell Izzy to lock the front door", or "Alexa, ask Izzy what the bedroom temperature is" would all be possible with a skill (the UDI skill "Izzy" may not be able to handle this yet but in the future . . . The skills available for the connected home are listed in the "settings/connected home" section of the Alexa app. The full skills (such as Izzy) are all listed in the skills section of the Alexa app. The HUE adapter is not listed in the connected home as it is the default device that is assumed by the Amazon native skill. All other skill adapters are listed by name, and somehow you must register a desired skill adapter from the connected home with Amazon so it knows what to look for and query for device names. An Amazon Echo account can have associated with it multiple skills and/or skill adapters. The HUE Emulator which was used by many in this forum before UDI published its skill and skill adapter was a software program that emulated the Philips HUE and ran on he same LAN as the Echo using a PC, MAC or Raspberry PI as the hosting computer. It had to be running 24/7 which made the Raspberry Pi a good hosting candidate. UDI's connected home skill adapter is accessed and set up through the UDI Portal add on. This add on for the ISY costs $50 for a two year subscription. When properly set up it allows Amazon to discover the desired spoken names of those things the ISY controls that you wish to be controllable by the Echo. The Amazon data base for this is in the cloud and all Echos in the same Amazon account use this one database of device names. When the Amazon speech recognition process resolves what is spoken into text strings it checks to see what skills (native or non-native) that Echo account has associated with it. The skill adapter for the HUE is associated with every account. It then sends a synopsis of the text to the worker program that is associated with the skill adapters that you have indicated you are using, or to a skill whose skill name you have enabled is associated with the account. The Hue emulator, being local, was very fast in getting the desired action to the ISY. The ISY skill adapter is not local but rather hosted somewhere in the amazon cloud so it has to be a little slower performance wise. Amazon charges UDI for the hosting of its skill adapter and for its Skill, hence the portal charge. The ISY skill adapter does appear to be a little more forgiving, or perhaps I should say understanding with regards to what is spoken to the Echo. In all cases there is a security trust issue that is handled since a major portion of the overall process is non-local, i.e. in the cloud. You wouldn't want a stranger to be able to command your Echo/ISY to unlock the front door. The UDI skill adapter for the ISY allows the association of a name with a device, program or scene that is configured in the ISY. For a device the action of the commands are fairly obvious. For a scene the Dim command can not be used since a scene can not be dimmed. For a program the On command runs the Then section and the Off command the Else section and the Dim command is not used. The only issue I have with the ISY skill adapter is the speed factor. It takes 2-3 seconds (to me an eternity) for the actual action to occur after I finish speaking. The Hue Emulator responded almost instantaneously. I have things I would like to see Amazon do such as allow me to say "and" or "and then" to have the echo come back after the first action to hear a second command sequence with out having to begin all over with "Alexa, . . .". Perhaps the Echo would say "what" in this case thereby providing for an extended dialog to handle multiple devices without setting up a scene or group. Naturally I could also end the second command with "and then". Due to the architecture of the ISY many interesting things may be accomplished. I am completely controlling my Kitchen TV (on, off, channel selection, volume, etc) through the Echo using ISY program entries (runThen) for the most part) that run network resources that send strings to a Global Cache unit via an intermediate process that simplifies the strings for me. In a similar manner I control turning on my Home Theater. At the current time all my needs are handled by the ISY skill adapter so I am not using the Izzy skill. I am confident it will only get better!. Barry, From the bottom of my achy breaky heart. Thank you for taking the time to explain in detail the two service offerings. I don't know about anyone else. But his reply should be appended in a FAQ or pinned somewhere for all to see and read. In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. Link to comment
Jamison_IO Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 Is it feasible or at all likely that the currently hosted portion of the feature (that impacts speed), would be allowed to be hosted locally? Link to comment
barrygordon Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 ISY always wins on all fronts when compared to most of the current offerings of a similar nature. Link to comment
barrygordon Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 Jameson, I do not think it is an "Allowed" issue, but I am not sure. I know that Amazon does invite and support developers to build connected home skill adapters and I do not believe they specify that the code must run in their cloud. I believe it is up to the developer to determine how best to implement the adapter to meet their needs. I could be wrong though. Link to comment
jerlands Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 Is it feasible or at all likely that the currently hosted portion of the feature (that impacts speed), would be allowed to be hosted locally? Reliability diminishes the further devices are removed from local control. Amazon Echo is really the first "commercial" voice activated HA controller (at least that I'm aware of) but to predict the future I suspect some enterprising company will make use of voice recognition and implement it on a more local (home server) system. Jon... Link to comment
stusviews Posted January 25, 2016 Share Posted January 25, 2016 Siri's HA apps been around for a while. Link to comment
Teken Posted January 26, 2016 Share Posted January 26, 2016 What causes the portal to not see the ISY? After repeated soft / hard reboots the portal continues to show a gray status LED and the system indicates the controller is off line? Logging into the controller locally / remotely show its on line and obviously accessible . . . Link to comment
Scottmichaelj Posted January 26, 2016 Share Posted January 26, 2016 What causes the portal to not see the ISY? After repeated soft / hard reboots the portal continues to show a gray status LED and the system indicates the controller is off line? Logging into the controller locally / remotely show its on line and obviously accessible . . . Ruh roh kinda sounds like my issue. Change the IP and see if that fixes it. If so you can change back. That fixed my portal issue. Also check your settings to make sure you have HTTPS client settings set to TLS 1.2 and Strength of All. Also make sure you don't have any port forwarding rules to ISY and specifically port 8001. http://wiki.universal-devices.com/index.php?title=Main_Page#Network_Security Link to comment
Teken Posted January 26, 2016 Share Posted January 26, 2016 Ruh roh kinda sounds like my issue. Change the IP and see if that fixes it. If so you can change back. That fixed my portal issue. Yeah, I have been tracking that very issue you and others have seen. In my case it has nothing to do with my network as the controller was already set to DHCP with a reserved IP via the router. The problem seems to me which has been a long time issue is that the controller does not react the same way when soft booted vs a hard boot of removal of power. Next, I went the extra step to remove the controller from the portal and the expected step was to go to the portal tab locally in the controller and enable the portals addition of the ISY. I was greeted with a pop up message that said something like *bad response* or what ever. After putzing around for another ten minutes I tried another soft reboot and the registration took hold. Lastly, if it wasn't for Xathros's comment about deleting all links and associations from the portal / app. I would have never been able to see these mythical device lists! That literally took an hour to get working because the App would tell you it disabled the skill when in fact it didn't! EDIT: Are people also seeing the *More Info* tab in the controller does absolutely nothing besides launching another web browser which has a blank page WTF? Link to comment
Scottmichaelj Posted January 26, 2016 Share Posted January 26, 2016 Yeah, I have been tracking that very issue you and others have seen. In my case it has nothing to do with my network as the controller was already set to DHCP with a reserved IP via the router. The problem seems to me which has been a long time issue is that the controller does not react the same way when soft booted vs a hard boot of removal of power. Next, I went the extra step to remove the controller from the portal and the expected step was to go to the portal tab locally in the controller and enable the portals addition of the ISY. I was greeted with a pop up message that said something like *bad response* or what ever. After putzing around for another ten minutes I tried another soft reboot and the registration took hold. Lastly, if it wasn't for Xathros's comment about deleting all links and associations from the portal / app. I would have never been able to see these mythical device lists! That literally took an hour to get working because the App would tell you it disabled the skill when in fact it didn't! I dono it was strange that mine wouldnt connect until I switched the IP then it found the ISY. I changed it back to the original IP and it was fine. Did you look in the error log and see if anything shows up? My issue now is my connected home is not showing up even though I signed up before the beta. So I guess I have to wait until Amazon puts it back in the app. Link to comment
Teken Posted January 26, 2016 Share Posted January 26, 2016 Ruh roh kinda sounds like my issue. Change the IP and see if that fixes it. If so you can change back. That fixed my portal issue. Also check your settings to make sure you have HTTPS client settings set to TLS 1.2 and Strength of All. Also make sure you don't have any port forwarding rules to ISY and specifically port 8001. http://wiki.universal-devices.com/index.php?title=Main_Page#Network_Security Its interesting that some people have to go through so many hoops while others do absolutely nothing and it works? I still have the same network attributes as I had before and all port forwarding is present. I can connect with out issue at this point. I dono it was strange that mine wouldnt connect until I switched the IP then it found the ISY. I changed it back to the original IP and it was fine. Did you look in the error log and see if anything shows up? My issue now is my connected home is not showing up even though I signed up before the beta. So I guess I have to wait until Amazon puts it back in the app. The connected home really had me going for about an hour and just about gave up. As I stated if it wasn't for my partner in crime Xathros's comment about deleting amazon portal from the UDI Portal and disabling the iOS Alexa App. The *Connected Home* would have never found the ISY . . . Also, here is another nugget that for what ever reason must be done. In Michel's steps there is a link which for what ever reason seems to be the only thing that makes the stupid thing reference the ISY to Echo. Using the App will literally give you a false positive and you will think its all working when in fact it doesn't. With out someone actually showing a person what to look for. In this case the ISY should be listed as an option like you see for the Insteon HUB, SmartThings, etc. This option never appears unless you use the link Michel has in his instructions. Give it a whirl and I assure you it will be like X-MAS when it shows up! Link to comment
Scottmichaelj Posted January 26, 2016 Share Posted January 26, 2016 The connected home really had me going for about an hour and just about gave up. As I stated if it wasn't for my partner in crime Xathros's comment about deleting amazon portal from the UDI Portal and disabling the iOS Alexa App. The *Connected Home* would have never found the ISY . . . Also, here is another nugget that for what ever reason must be done. In Michel's steps there is a link which for what ever reason seems to be the only thing that makes the stupid thing reference the ISY to Echo. Using the App will literally give you a false positive and you will think its all working when in fact it doesn't. With out someone actually showing a person what to look for. In this case the ISY should be listed as an option like you see for the Insteon HUB, SmartThings, etc. This option never appears unless you use the link Michel has in his instructions. Give it a whirl and I assure you it will be like X-MAS when it shows up! Yeah I am about to give up. I unlinked my account from Amazon via the portal, I made sure the skill was disabled in the app, then back in the portal it shows connected to my ISY and green. When I go back in and link my account it shows its linked to Amazon, but then when I go into the Amazon app I still don't see the connected home available. When selecting "Amazon Echo" in the portal I get an error "The ISY skill is not linked to your portal user profile. Please go to your echo app, enable the ISY skill, and link the skill with this user profile." however if I hit ok I can see my scenes and devices in the drop down lists. I added one device but nada. Tried unlinking and linking again, nada. Link to comment
Teken Posted January 26, 2016 Share Posted January 26, 2016 The connected home is under settings unless you mean something else? Also you really need to do this in order. After two hours of screwing around it just made sense to delete it all and start from the beginning. Now I have to figure out which key words operate fine because the system doesn't seem to do anything using the connected home vs the skill? In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. Link to comment
Scottmichaelj Posted January 26, 2016 Share Posted January 26, 2016 The connected home is under settings unless you mean something else? Also you really need to do this in order. After two hours of screwing around it just made sense to delete it all and start from the beginning. Now I have to figure out which key words operate fine because the system doesn't seem to do anything using the connected home vs the skill? In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. Argh The HUE emulator seemed less work than this "easier" way. I deleted everything and still only Insteon, Wink and SmartThings are shown in the connected home amazon app. You have anything under the "Requested Services" on the ISY Admin Portal page? Link to comment
MWareman Posted January 26, 2016 Share Posted January 26, 2016 ... still only Insteon, Wink and SmartThings are shown in the connected home amazon app. ISY also shows up in the 'Connected Home' page of the Amazon app - but only if you clicked the activation link Michel posted in the instructions while previously being logged into your Amazon account. If its not showing, you haven't clicked the correct link yet to activate it (and Amazon haven't taken the 'beta' lock off yet) I'm sure this will be going away at some point - it (is/was) the way Amazon control access to beta resources. If you're looking in the 'Skill' area - your in the wrong part of the app. Link to comment
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