-
One work-around if you want to have more than one system is to use a 3rd party home automation system. Homeseer is one I've used. There's a Caseta plug-in for it that'll allow communicating with up to four Caseta Smartbridge Pro units (for up to 196 Caseta devices). You'd need to set up four different Caseta systems and then use those credentials in the plug-in's configuration.
https://forums.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=183039
Homeseer also has an Amazon Alexa interface, and that would present all of your devices together.
-
Originally Posted by
Eric H.
Exciting news - Alexa just got even smarter! Starting today, Caséta Wireless scenes now work with Amazon Alexa, too! Before today, you could control your Caséta lights using Alexa, and now you can also control any manual scenes created in the Caséta app. What this means is that you can now control lights, shades, and even audio (if you're using Sonos) from a simple voice command (e.g. “Alexa, turn on Entertain” or "Alexa, turn on Dining").
Alexa scene support went live earlier today, so the next time you open your Alexa app you should also see all of your manual scenes in the list with your other Caseta Wireless devices. Note that shades still cannot be directly controlled by Alexa, however, you can add shades into a scene in order to have Alexa open/close your shades.
Here are a few other things to consider when using scenes with Alexa:
1. Avoid using the word “scene” when talking to Alexa (e.g. say “Alexa, turn on Dining” NOT “Alexa, turn on Dining scene”.)
2. Avoid using words like ‘on’ or ‘off’ or ‘music’ in the scene names within the Lutron app (e.g. name a scene ‘Goodnight’ instead of ‘All Off’.)
3. Just like in the Lutron app, scenes can only be turned on, not off, with Alexa. (e.g. say “Alexa, turn on Goodnight”, NOT “Alexa, turn off Goodnight”).
4. Manual scenes can be controlled by Alexa, but not scheduled scenes. If you have scheduled scenes that you’d like to integrate with Alexa you need to recreate them as manual scenes.
We will be updating the Alexa FAQs on casetawireless.com/support shortly. Enjoy!
I just moved over from x10 and I love Caseta. But saying 'Alexa, turn on Goodnight' makes no sense. Can you say 'Alexa, set Goodnight' ??
-
Originally Posted by
whsbuss
I just moved over from x10 and I love Caseta. But saying 'Alexa, turn on Goodnight' makes no sense. Can you say 'Alexa, set Goodnight' ??
"Set" is a dimmer trigger command, not a scene trigger command.
"Alexa set Goodnight" doesn't work.
-
Originally Posted by
Brian W.
"Set" is a dimmer trigger command, not a scene trigger command.
"Alexa set Goodnight" doesn't work.
I know that now. So why isn't there enough intelligence for scenes - why is it always 'turn on' ?
-
Originally Posted by
whsbuss
I know that now. So why isn't there enough intelligence for scenes - why is it always 'turn on' ?
The Caseta system doesn't have that kind of intelligence for it. It only has the ability to turn on scenes. It can't turn off scenes. That is why you have to create a second scene in the Caseta app to turn off the loads of another scene, which you had programmed to turned on the lights.
-
This is all about the Amazon smart home command structure. There's only "so many" ways it can accept commands.
That and most other lighting systems have never had the same kind of 'scene' features you can easily get with Lutron devices. As in, most are little more than just groups of lighting commands, often being sent one-after-the-other. Leading to lights coming on looking like popcorn popping. Scenes only work because the lights are joined to a scene and know to respond when a scene is requested, it's not just direct communication with each light in a scene.
Bear in mind that scenes do not necessarily behave as toggles. I've got some scenes that bring up certain lights while dimming/extinguishing others. With Ra2 if you wanted a toggling kind of scene you'd be using a keypad button with 'room monitoring'.
But I'm making no excuses here, I'd also like a better kind of syntax for controlling scenes.
-
Post Thanks / Like - 0 Thanks, 1 Likes
-
I've encountered a situation where one set of lights ("living room", Caseta dimmer and Pico remote installed) won't work on the first command. I have Caseta dimmers on 5 sets of lights in my home. All of the others, including another set that are in the "sitting room" but actually just another part of my living room, work on the first command but I need to say everything twice to get it to work on the living room lights. I tried removing the skill and reenabling it but that didn't work. I've also restarted the hub. Any thoughts??
-
Have you tried to rename "living room" to something else and see if works ? Perhaps there are multiple instances of living room leftover in your groups or device list on the Alexa app ?
-
Need to ask Echo twice to turn on living room lights
Originally Posted by
Blurum
Have you tried to rename "living room" to something else and see if works ? Perhaps there are multiple instances of living room leftover in your groups or device list on the Alexa app ?
Thanks for the response. I tried changing everything from living room (including the switch) and it still takes 2 tries to get it to react. It's strange. It's always exactly 2 requests ("Alexa, turn on the living room lights" - or whatever I've named them). Doesn't matter which of my Dots I use.