IFTTT - Custom Applets

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Paul1977

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#274485 25-Aug-2020 11:09

We have an AirTouch 4 controller for our new ducted heat pump. To make a long story short, it is not nearly as programmable as I require.

It supports IFTTT, but only has a very limited selection of published applets (none of which do what I require).

Can you create you own applets for another companys products? If so, how do you even get started?

Thanks

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davidcole

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#2549329 25-Aug-2020 11:44

Wouldn't you be better to try and figure out if there's a local lan control option for your heatpump rather than a honking great big round trip on the internet to control something 1m away from you?

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Paul1977

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#2549509 25-Aug-2020 14:58

davidcole:

Wouldn't you be better to try and figure out if there's a local lan control option for your heatpump rather than a honking great big round trip on the internet to control something 1m away from you?

For most functions yes, but I was looking at keeping it simple initially and just scheduling mode changes (e.g. heating to fan only) a couple of times a day. For something like that over the Internet is fine. I'd like to get fancier, but thought that was a good place to start.

I actually managed to get hold of one of their software engineers today, and they wrote and published an IFTTT applet for me already, and said they'd look at incorporating the functionality into a future firmware for local scheduling. They also sent through some TCP protocol info for trying to set stuff up locally myself, but I think it will probably be beyond my skill set.

davidcole

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#2549514 25-Aug-2020 15:10

These guys looks like they might have started getting some success: https://forums.homeseer.com/forum/homeseer-products-services/general-discussion-area/1318292-expert-opinion-please-a-c-integration-document-direct-api-control

neb

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#2549518 25-Aug-2020 15:13

Paul1977:
It supports IFTTT, but only has a very limited selection of published applets (none of which do what I require).

I've found IFTTT to often be more of a pain than it's worth, you tend to require an excessive amount of plumbing to get anything that isn't trivial out-of-the-box done, and debugging problems is next to impossible. For my most recent job I just did all the work on an ODroid, which was far easier than fighting IFTTT. I still use IFTTT to ping me via email if there's a problem, but probably wouldn't have needed that either.

davidcole

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#2549519 25-Aug-2020 15:13

And if apple based this might be a plugin for home bridge: https://github.com/mihailescu2m/homebridge-airtouch4-platform

Paul1977

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#2549539 25-Aug-2020 15:26

davidcole:

And if apple based this might be a plugin for home bridge: https://github.com/mihailescu2m/homebridge-airtouch4-platform

Thanks. Is this a plugin for HomeBridge in HomeAssistant? We have iPhones and are using HomeAssistant for the lights, haven't setup HomeBridge on HomeAssistant yet.

I haven't seen a HomeAssistant Integration for AirTouch, I thought that would be required?

Paul1977

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#2549543 25-Aug-2020 15:29

neb:
Paul1977:

It supports IFTTT, but only has a very limited selection of published applets (none of which do what I require).

I've found IFTTT to often be more of a pain than it's worth, you tend to require an excessive amount of plumbing to get anything that isn't trivial out-of-the-box done, and debugging problems is next to impossible. For my most recent job I just did all the work on an ODroid, which was far easier than fighting IFTTT. I still use IFTTT to ping me via email if there's a problem, but probably wouldn't have needed that either.

I'd like to do something similar, but I think it's probably beyond my skill level.

EDIT: Could be a good learning exercise I suppose.

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davidcole

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#2549550 25-Aug-2020 15:36

Paul1977:

davidcole:

And if apple based this might be a plugin for home bridge: https://github.com/mihailescu2m/homebridge-airtouch4-platform

Thanks. Is this a plugin for HomeBridge in HomeAssistant? We have iPhones and are using HomeAssistant for the lights, haven't setup HomeBridge on HomeAssistant yet.

I haven't seen a HomeAssistant Integration for AirTouch, I thought that would be required?

No it didn't look if there was a home assistant integration. Homebridge is external to home assistant, it can be a standalone entity for exposiing things to homekit.

neb

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#2549553 25-Aug-2020 15:41

Paul1977:
I'd like to do something similar, but I think it's probably beyond my skill level.

What made me suggest it is that if there's no pre-made IFTTT app then you're down to poke-and-hope programming and debugging to try and get anything working, while if you're running off a local device the development process will be much less painful.

Paul1977

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#2549582 25-Aug-2020 16:22

neb:
Paul1977:

I'd like to do something similar, but I think it's probably beyond my skill level.

What made me suggest it is that if there's no pre-made IFTTT app then you're down to poke-and-hope programming and debugging to try and get anything working, while if you're running off a local device the development process will be much less painful.

That makes sense. Incidentally, the IFTTT applet they published for me today works - but unfortunately you can only set up one schedule.

Paul1977

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#2549594 25-Aug-2020 16:30

davidcole:

No it didn't look if there was a home assistant integration. Homebridge is external to home assistant, it can be a standalone entity for exposiing things to homekit.

I just found this comment on a forum referencing that same plugin:

I’m running hoobs in a docker with an Airtouch 4 plugin. This effectively turns the Airtouch into a HomeKit product that can be added to HA via the homekit intergration

So that sounds promising. Sounds like I have some experimenting to do.