My take on making sure the garage door is closed at night

[Matt M]

I know that there have been other programs posted regarding automatically closing garage doors at night. I have also run across the many warnings to heed before proceeding. This is my attempt at programming the task myself. The rules are as follows:

1. Only close the door between 9pm and 6am.
2. Only close the door if it has been open for 10 minutes just in case we come in at between those two times.

3. Flash the garage lights as a warning, and then close the garage door.

Do my programs look correct to accomplish this task?

[paulbates]

I did something similar at my last house as it was a detached garage where the door could not be seen, and at the time with kids in and out, or even me, it did get left open. 

2 comments

1. I believe you can do it all with one program.  Put the "then"s all in the first program.The only edge condition would be if the door were to be opened at 6:50am or later.. then it would not complete. My guess is if that happened, it was an unusual case, it was on purpose like you're leaving early for some reason
    
2. To follow the comment under 1 above, what happens if a family member goes out to warm up a car early to leave in the winter (Doctors appointment, drop somebody up at the airport etc),, is 10 minutes enough? Wouldn't be for me, but something to think about.

I finally changed the approach. The garage door was opened with a keypad button that would light up when the door was up... that helped a lot. After a certain point in the evening, the keypad would beep every 20 minutes if the door was up

 

Edited May 12 by paulbates

[Goose66]

Mine is on a “good night” routine. I tell Alexa “I’m going to bed” and it does all the stuff. That gives me a chance to consciously think about context before doors moving, alarm arming, thermostat changing, etc., although it’s not really “automated.”

[ldb]

I send myself a text if the door is up over an hour without detecting motion during the day and over 15 minutes if after dark.  It repeats if the door status does not change.  I've never been comfortable with automating the close.

[oberkc]

Your program looks to me as if it will meet your stated requirements.  The only thing I notice that may cause an issue is in the last repeat (repeat 1 time) of the last program.  (I assume that your garage door is configured to alway trigger from an ON command, which may not be true.)  First, I am not sure but assume that those last few lines will be executed twice (literally repeated 1 time).  Second, if so, you might be closing your door, then opening the door 30 seconds later.  

[dbwarner5]

Your programs look good. I do something similar but it's a combination of the above comments. 

-a keypad turns on steady if there is a door open ( I have three)

-if winter time, (heated garage), the door will shut after 20 minutes with a voice warning from elk and a chime warning in the garage and lights blinking -- total delay ~20 seconds. 

-in non winter time, it will stay open until bedtime routine.

-I also check to see if the door actually shut. I attempt it 2 times. And if it doesn't shut successfully, the keypad button will blink quickly and a voice announcement declares an error. 

-Keypad button will also blink slowly if the service door is open, which requires manually intervention. 

-All three doors can be shut or opened individually via Alexa  or opened or shut simultaneously via Alexa. For added convenience, I have an echo dot in the garage so can open / close any door as I am walking around the garage. 

Lastly, I also use geofencing and driveway sensors to open the appropriate door for myself or my wife when we come home.  As added information, I get a pushover anytime a door is opened or shut and have an optional elk voice announcement of the same inside the house that I can toggle on or off (usually have it on in the winter time due to heat to ensure things shut etc). 

[Matt M]

First I would like to thank everyone for their replies. I apologize for taking so long to get back to this, but I was having issues with programs that I was trying to work out.

On 5/12/2024 at 8:31 AM, paulbates said:

I did something similar at my last house as it was a detached garage where the door could not be seen, and at the time with kids in and out, or even me, it did get left open. 

2 comments

1. I believe you can do it all with one program.  Put the "then"s all in the first program.The only edge condition would be if the door were to be opened at 6:50am or later.. then it would not complete. My guess is if that happened, it was an unusual case, it was on purpose like you're leaving early for some reason
    
2. To follow the comment under 1 above, what happens if a family member goes out to warm up a car early to leave in the winter (Doctors appointment, drop somebody up at the airport etc),, is 10 minutes enough? Wouldn't be for me, but something to think about.

I finally changed the approach. The garage door was opened with a keypad button that would light up when the door was up... that helped a lot. After a certain point in the evening, the keypad would beep every 20 minutes if the door was up

 

I see that I could combine two of the programs, but I believe that the "Night Close" program needs to be separate because of the If statement to see if the door is still up 10 minutes later.

 

On 5/13/2024 at 6:35 AM, oberkc said:

Your program looks to me as if it will meet your stated requirements.  The only thing I notice that may cause an issue is in the last repeat (repeat 1 time) of the last program.  (I assume that your garage door is configured to alway trigger from an ON command, which may not be true.)  First, I am not sure but assume that those last few lines will be executed twice (literally repeated 1 time).  Second, if so, you might be closing your door, then opening the door 30 seconds later.  

From the ISY cookbook:
"• To break a Repeat sequence, add a "Repeat 1 times". Actions after this Repeat will
only run once (that is to say, they won't repeat at all).
This is useful when you want some Actions repeated, but then want to continue on with
more Actions that should not be repeated."

On 5/13/2024 at 9:38 AM, dbwarner5 said:

Your programs look good. I do something similar but it's a combination of the above comments. 

-a keypad turns on steady if there is a door open ( I have three)

I have two garage doors, and also have two keypad buttons that light up to indicate that the respective door is open/closed. They can also be used to open/close each door. This leads to why it took me so long to reply to this topic.

I have the garage lights come on when either door is opened, and turn off two minutes after both doors are closed IF the garage lights weren't turned on previously. I was having consistency issues when using the standard method of monitoring the switch and sensor. I came up with the following programs that monitor the two keypad buttons that open/close the garage doors instead, and this has been reliable for me.

Now that I have confidence in being able to read the status of the garage doors consistently, I am comfortable in moving forward with the auto-closing of the doors.

[oberkc]

10 hours ago, Matt M said:

From the ISY cookbook:
"• To break a Repeat sequence, add a "Repeat 1 times". Actions after this Repeat will
only run once (that is to say, they won't repeat at all).

Thanks for the refresher.  I thought it might be something like this, but did not recall.  I also did not recall whether there was another command such as "end repeat" to break a repeat sequence.  

[Jim P]

Since we are talking about garage door open detection...

Last week at 8:03 PM  for 4 or 5 nights I received an email stating my garage door was open. 

My garage door app said it was closed.

GarageOpenAtNight - [ID 004F][Parent 0016]

If
        Time is  8:00:00PM
    And 'Garage Closed Status' Status is Off
 
Then
        Run Program 'Garage Open Alert' (Then Path)
 
Else
   - No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action')
 
This program sounds alarm if Garage Door is open at 08:00 PM

 

I changed to checking the variable for the device status and this works..

GarageOpenAtNight - [ID 004F][Parent 0016]

If
        Time is  8:00:00PM
    And $iGarage.Closed.Status is 0
 
Then
        Run Program 'Garage Open Alert' (Then Path)
 
Else
   - No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action')
 
This program sounds alarm if Garage Door is open at 08:00 PM

I don't think I have changed this program for a very long time,  so I was wondering if anyone else has seen something like this?

Device is a  2450 IOLinc v41 .

Didn't mean to hop this thread but is was kind of in the ball park and I am not too worried about this as I usually set an integer variable when a control changes a status...  I was more curious about why after at least 3 years I would start seeing something with this. Maybe the IOLinc is getting querky about it's status?

[Techman]

Being that the IOLinc is a powerline only device it could be that you're having communications issues, maybe due to powerline noise, etc. 

Take a look at your log to see if there is any activity prior to the garage door status changing. 

You might also want to create a program that emails you in real time when the garage door is opened and closed. That will help you narrow down the problem by giving you an exact time frame.

Another possibility is that the IOLinc relay is sticking, I've had this happen on occasion. 

[Brian H]

Another point.

The I/OLinc besides being power line only. Also has a small switching power supply in it and the old Smarthome did the different sized capacitors trick. The early revision 1.0 has what I would call too low a sized capacitor in it and when the relay is on. The power supply voltage sages. That may or may not effect  your setup. If the unit is older and has aged.

[Jim P]

The actual status changes are detected. The program that generates the email originally checked the status of the iolinc which must have reported wrong as other programs that report the actual status changes are recorded fine. ..

[Techman]

@Jim P

The IOLinc has 2 nodes, is it possible that the program you're having issues with is monitoring the wrong node?

Also take a look at the IOLinc options. Is the relay following the sensor?

Edited May 27 by Techman

[Matt M]

On 5/26/2024 at 5:54 PM, Jim P said:

Since we are talking about garage door open detection...

Last week at 8:03 PM  for 4 or 5 nights I received an email stating my garage door was open. 

My garage door app said it was closed.

GarageOpenAtNight - [ID 004F][Parent 0016]

If
        Time is  8:00:00PM
    And 'Garage Closed Status' Status is Off
 
Then
        Run Program 'Garage Open Alert' (Then Path)
 
Else
   - No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action')
 
This program sounds alarm if Garage Door is open at 08:00 PM

 

I changed to checking the variable for the device status and this works..

GarageOpenAtNight - [ID 004F][Parent 0016]

If
        Time is  8:00:00PM
    And $iGarage.Closed.Status is 0
 
Then
        Run Program 'Garage Open Alert' (Then Path)
 
Else
   - No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action')
 
This program sounds alarm if Garage Door is open at 08:00 PM

I don't think I have changed this program for a very long time,  so I was wondering if anyone else has seen something like this?

Device is a  2450 IOLinc v41 .

Didn't mean to hop this thread but is was kind of in the ball park and I am not too worried about this as I usually set an integer variable when a control changes a status...  I was more curious about why after at least 3 years I would start seeing something with this. Maybe the IOLinc is getting querky about it's status?

For what it's worth, mine are both 2450 IOLinc v41. I have an Isy994I/IR Pro running v.4.9.0.