Living With Vera - Tip Of The Day

[ballroller]

"Also don't be too alarmed if Vera randomly tries to show off her many talents and you wake at 4 am to find the house a blaze with lights turned on (she's just practicing lol) In those situations its best to just shut off the lights and go to bed and let Vera sort it out"

You must not be married! My closet light- which shines into our bedroom decided to go- and off. And on. And off. Etc. All night long the next morning was not a pleasant time around my home. I removed the light from the system- I couldn't afford any more grief from it (Franky, I don't blame her).

[mystic860]

POWER CYCLING IS YOUR FRIEND!

How is this accomplished?

[Mugwug]

Use luup code to schedule a routine reboot.

In my case I also plugged my vera into one of those Wemo modules to give me the option of a remote power cycle (nothing more frustrating than being off site and having the thing bog down or otherwise grind to a halt). Doesn't come up often, but is damned handy when it does (and I had three of those Wemo modules sitting around doing nothing).

[otakup0pe]

HA I'm also about to wire my Vera3 through a WeMo and setup it's raspberry pi buddy to act as a heartbeat. I really don't like having the Vera get stuck to the point where I can't even SSH into it

[callahan]

4) Don't get hung up with the Vera web UI, there are many others you can use for your PC, Mac and smart devices. Think of it more as the background admin console, look at the Remote Control section on this forum for ideas.

Although I am fine with UI5, I am curious. Do the different UIs surface more functionality? If it makes it possible to do more with a different interface, I'm willing to give it a try.

[Chrisfraser05]

My tip of the day is to use the rooms facility to create both rooms and systems for ease of navigation.

For example I've got each room, plus "system AV", "System Alarm",  "System Utilities" etc.

Things like room temps, lux levels and actual devices like lamps I've got in the rooms.

The actual motion sensor I've put in "System Alarm" along with my PLEG device.

"System Utilities" homes plugin devices and the like, vera alerts, day/night switch etc.

Obviously everyone has their own ways and means, and what works for one doesn't for another but the better you organise your structure the easier it becomes to find things, make changes and come up with new ideas of how to control things

[ZwaveOutlet]

For everyone trying to do auto reboots take a look at the Wattbox. It's very good at just that. Ping sensor ( internal and external) Text alerts and remote power cycles that are tide to the cloud and reboot schedules! Perfect if you aren't on site to reboot vera, modem, and router 

[homeuser]

+1 thats a genius idea! Nothing like having my wife call me at work with the siren going off in the background with a toddler crying because of the noise and not being able to connect to vera to turn it off.

Use luup code to schedule a routine reboot.

In my case I also plugged my vera into one of those Wemo modules to give me the option of a remote power cycle (nothing more frustrating than being off site and having the thing bog down or otherwise grind to a halt). Doesn't come up often, but is damned handy when it does (and I had three of those Wemo modules sitting around doing nothing).

[RichardTSchaefer]

Sounds like you need the Vera - Emergency Kit
   - 1 Pair of Earplugs
   - 1 Pair of Extra Small Earplugs

You may need some eye shades to ... in case the lights are blinking.

[MrAutomate]

@Richard, too funny!! 

So , to live with Vera, this week, I stripped her  of 99% of apps and devices and moved over to Indigo where it just works. 

Vera is much happier, taking care of the wink devices, a few scenes (for Wink)  I trigger from Indigo for the wink devices, and the ZWave door locks...  When vera gets a firmware bug, it will barely impact my day

[MrAutomate]

Funny,  the more often I speak of Vera's short comings, I seem to get smited.

[Jamr]

Today we turned a 13$ outdoor motion sensor flood light into a Z-Wave outdoor motion sensor flood light.
Now I can trigger all of my scenes, other lights inside and out, sirens, even other flood lights making it appear that someone is home all from this one Z-Wave motion light.
I can even get notifications on my phone when this happens instantly.
The best part is that the motion sensor is easy to install, use and is made for outdoor use.

Take a look and tell us what you think.
http://www.007systems.com/blog/z-wave-outdoor-motion-flood-light
 

[Scoutmedic]

Today we turned a 13$ outdoor motion sensor flood light into a Z-Wave outdoor motion sensor flood light.
Now I can trigger all of my scenes, other lights inside and out, sirens, even other flood lights making it appear that someone is home all from this one Z-Wave motion light.
I can even get notifications on my phone when this happens instantly.
The best part is that the motion sensor is easy to install, use and is made for outdoor use.

Take a look and tell us what you think.
http://www.007systems.com/blog/z-wave-outdoor-motion-flood-light

I'd like to see this done for solar powered flood lights.

[Mike Yeager]

I'd like to see how the wired the relay module....

[otakup0pe]

These days it's all about coping mechanisms. Whiskey, actually having to use a lightswitch, coming home to my partner sitting in a darkened home, that kind of thing.