Trying to properly plan Insteon once and for all.

[kpurintun]

Hey Guys,

Moving my insteon from 'directly connected to HA', to a shiny new Polisy connected to HA.  This all used to be connected to Indigo that did most of the fancy Indigo configs..  (keypad dimming schedules, mutually exclusive keypad buttons, dimming ramp rates and default dim levels, linking, etc..)  This has since gotten goofed up in small ways, then moving to HA added extra dumb and removed some of the fanciness.   I am super excited about this move and have been eyeballing ISY for a very long time.

Anyways.  I am trying to plan this out.   I don't want to have weeks of wackiness due to me figuring out the ISY insteon stuff.  Not sure I want to put my family through this.  Its currently wacky but works 80% good. I want 100% good.

The most important question...

If I have a multiway switch group with 3 keypads as controllers for a lamplinc.  Will I just make a single scene with the Lamp as the responder and the keypad buttons as the controller  For example, the DS Lamp (far left) in the attachment.  This is connected to 3 keypads.   

If I have a single scene, Will all the buttons and the lamp stay in sync with each other if I turn on the lamp or hit any button in the scene?  ..or will I need to create all the scenes to cover each controller>responder relationship..  Lamp to keypads, keypads to lamp and other keypads..  4 scenes in total?

Then finally, what is the best way to get those to stay in sync if I change them from HA? 

Are there any other things I should consider?  

 

Thanks

[lilyoyo1]

48 minutes ago, kpurintun said:

Hey Guys,

Moving my insteon from 'directly connected to HA', to a shiny new Polisy connected to HA.  This all used to be connected to Indigo that did most of the fancy Indigo configs..  (keypad dimming schedules, mutually exclusive keypad buttons, dimming ramp rates and default dim levels, linking, etc..)  This has since gotten goofed up in small ways, then moving to HA added extra dumb and removed some of the fanciness.   I am super excited about this move and have been eyeballing ISY for a very long time.

Anyways.  I am trying to plan this out.   I don't want to have weeks of wackiness due to me figuring out the ISY insteon stuff.  Not sure I want to put my family through this.  Its currently wacky but works 80% good. I want 100% good.

The most important question...

If I have a multiway switch group with 3 keypads as controllers for a lamplinc.  Will I just make a single scene with the Lamp as the responder and the keypad buttons as the controller  For example, the DS Lamp (far left) in the attachment.  This is connected to 3 keypads.   

If I have a single scene, Will all the buttons and the lamp stay in sync with each other if I turn on the lamp or hit any button in the scene?  ..or will I need to create all the scenes to cover each controller>responder relationship..  Lamp to keypads, keypads to lamp and other keypads..  4 scenes in total?

Then finally, what is the best way to get those to stay in sync if I change them from HA? 

Are there any other things I should consider?  

 

Thanks

Multiway setups require 1 scene with both devices added to the scene and configured. You'll click on both devices and set the configuration on each. Once done, you'll click on the scene bebe and do the same there.

If control is 1 way, you'll add the controlling device as a controller and the other as a responder and then configure the controller and scene like above.

I don't use ha but i assume you'd control the scene and not the individual devices (assuming you're using the ha Node server). 

What to consider depends on your setup and how you plan on operating your home. 

I do suggest reading the Isy cookbook and ISY wiki along with the polisy forums before getting started. If you Google both, they'll show up in the search

[kpurintun]

I have a couple of button groups that i want to do..  set up some mutually exclusive stuff.. but the page where you set it up is covered in warnings..  and an alternate way..but I can’t really find any detail about doing it the better way or what the warnings really mean or if it really matters.

 

do these matter?

[MrBill]

2 minutes ago, kpurintun said:

I have a couple of button groups that i want to do..  set up some mutually exclusive stuff.. but the page where you set it up is covered in warnings..  and an alternate way..but I can’t really find any detail about doing it the better way or what the warnings really mean or if it really matters.

 

do these matter?

Create scenes.  For example, my outside lights operate using 4 scenes:  Day, Evening, Late night, Bright

Each scene contains the same devices, AND the KPL buttons for the other 3 scenes. The button to turn the scene ON is a controller, the other scene buttons are responders.  Set the KPL buttons as "non-toggle On"  When I press Bright for example the other 3 buttons will be turned off as the actual lighting devices are set for bright mode.  

("day" is known as day and not known as off, because there's an outdoor outlet that turns on in the daytime.)

Late night is a repeat of the above with the last node as the controller. 

(note: It's an admin console screenshot, just without the blue background.)

[kpurintun]

So its best to do this with scenes rather than the mutually exclusive functionality?

if you set all to ‘non-toggle on’ how do you turn it off?  
 

My first use case is our bedroom lamps..  each is a lamplinc turned on with a KPL button.. then there are two preset KPL buttons that set the two lamps to come full on or come on dimmed.   I want to be able to turn on lamps individually and off individually..  and then also do the two presets..  but when the lamps are on the presets..  turn off the individual kpl buttons and set dim or bright kpl buttons.

 

the other is my son’s lamp. But just bright and dim.

 

 

[MrBill]

1 hour ago, kpurintun said:

So its best to do this with scenes rather than the mutually exclusive functionality?

I heeded the warning on button groups screen that you provided a screen shot of and never used button groups, but i assume so.

1 hour ago, kpurintun said:

if you set all to ‘non-toggle on’ how do you turn it off?  

in the case of my front lights at least one scene is On at any given time, that may be a bad example.

You could add multiple buttons as scene controller for the same scene (just answer no to the "___ is already a controller, do you want to add it as a responder" question, then set one of the buttons as Non-toggle on, and the other as non-toggle off.

[kpurintun]

So i did a schedule with the devices..   but i should have did it with the scenes..  because then the kpl’s would be in sync right?

[MrBill]

1 hour ago, kpurintun said:

So i did a schedule with the devices..   but i should have did it with the scenes..  because then the kpl’s would be in sync right?

correct.

[kpurintun]

4 hours ago, MrBill said:

I heeded the warning on button groups screen that you provided a screen shot of and never used button groups, but i assume so.

in the case of my front lights at least one scene is On at any given time, that may be a bad example.

You could add multiple buttons as scene controller for the same scene (just answer no to the "___ is already a controller, do you want to add it as a responder" question, then set one of the buttons as Non-toggle on, and the other as non-toggle off.

well.. because it was simple lamps at the end of kpl buttons with simple dimmer changes, I just went with the mutually exclusive buttons and it works well..  i will probably never use these from an app or do anything like that for these, there is no complicated programming.  resetting them would be easy.  thanks for your help.

[lilyoyo1]

On 5/15/2022 at 6:09 PM, kpurintun said:

 .  resetting them would be easy.  thanks for your help.

Famous last words. ?

[kpurintun]

Turned out the mutually exclusive stuff was a cake walk..  everything works well.