Advice on my home automation future

[wannaspeed]

My current smart systems are fragmented, many of them don't work together, although until recently most of them were all at least operated from my Android. I really like Voxcommando, it's very powerful software and is a lot of fun to play with. It's not as plug and play as other systems like the Alexa or Google Home, but it is so capable. I'm just having a hard time figuring out how to integrate everything in a seamless, cost effective manor while doing what I want, or decided which products to potentially abandon.

So these are the systems I have in play:

• Two wemo switches, one for outside carport lights and one for an outside amplifier.
  
  
• Firetv with built in Alexa and Kodi installed in the livingroom. I use either amazon fire remote or Yatsi to control it. Although I might try to get it working with Vox, I've played with it a little and see it does work. Although I don't think I can launch it from voice.

• HTPC in the bedroom with voxcommando and k400 keyboard and kinect.

• I have 9 tp-link smart plugs on their way. I bought 9 because they were $6 each and i couldn't pass on a $26 per plug savings. Both wemo and tplink are compatible with Alexa, I "think" only Wemo is compatible with VC. And google home is supposed to have compatibly with both soon.
  
  
• I also bought some smart ëco plugs a couple years ago, was a 2 pack for $7, I don't think they will be part of the system, but goes to show the extent of the fragmentation.

• 3 ceiling fans with dimmers and are controlled by RF remotes. I've had a heck of a time trying to figure out how to control them via smart without losing fan speed control, and dimmer. I'm hoping the beam sphere will be my answer there. Maybe??

• For audio I was using a Logitech squeezbox, with 3 linux pogoplug squeezeboxes. This was a cost effective alternative to Sonos and worked well for multiroom audio but it reached the end of its lifespan. I have since purchased 4 Chromecast audios which work well, but I have no way to Voice integrate them unless I use google home. Google home is rather limited at the moment. Having multiple assistants seems kinda redundant, but each one by themselves doesn't do exactly what I want.

• I'm also part of Nest beta and they send me different products to beta test, but the beta program isn't compatible with Works with nest", google now or anything like that. You get an app similar to the default app to control everything from there, or login to a web address.

I've considered wall mounting androids for intercoms, lighting and music control, but then I have been messing with vox and really like it so I considered doing windows tablets instead, although that might not be as useful since it really only needs a microphone to control systems and that's available on android. Ideally I would like control both from phone as well as voice, and either a nice panel integration using tablets, or my current wall switches to run as a system for the wife. Obviously this is all very personal in which way to go, but if anyone has suggestions i'm open. It also helps for me to type it out to kind of map through my own ideas.[/list]

[PegLegTV]

if your looking for some type of tablet interface and already have some android tablets then I would recommend checking out Tasker, it is a powerful app and you can make your own apps with it (Check out my home control app I made with tasker and VC http://voxcommando.com/forum/index.php?topic=2353.0)

if you are looking for cheap solid tablets and you are willing to root them I would check out the Amazon Fire 7 tablets only $50, I have 5 of them all rooted running the Nexus Rom, 3 of them are used as normal, 1 replaced my tablet I used in the video on the other forum post, and the other is used to play music and my morning wake up calls with a Bluetooth speaker.

if you want to use the android mic while staying in your home control app then you will want to add AutoVoice

and if you want to have your home control app to have communication both ways (VC to Android) then you will need to add Autoremote as well

for all 3 apps (Tasker, AutoVoice, and Autoremote) your looking at less then $10

this is what I use currently, but I know some on here use IRule and I've seen chatter of Open Remote(not sure if anyone is using it though) so there are other options out there but they will all require a decent amount of leg work to get your want.

I hope this was helpful 
 

[nime5ter]

If you want to really use VC and voice commands in a more integrated way, then it might be helpful to set up something like Home Assistant or Domoticz:

Either of these, on the same network as VC, can be set up to pass info in both directions using voice commands and/or events. They can help expand on VC's built-in ability to communicate with a broad range of devices and services via existing plugins, command line, http requests, UDP, & TCP.

http://voxcommando.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=Home_Automation

https://home-assistant.io/components/
https://domoticz.com/

[wannaspeed]

Thanks for the replies. PegLegTV - I have played with tracker and auto voice before to make use of "ok google" and triggers. Although in the case I was using it for I didn't really like how it opened a web search in google now. I do like how your app is seamless across the different home automation systems and works along side VC. I'll have to check out your video on how you went about making it.

nime5ster - I've seen mention of Home Assistant on the VC forum, but I thought it was referring to the new Google Home Assistant air freshener looking thing. That looks like it might be a good option for a web interface program to work along with VC. I have two Windows 10 tablets that don't really get any use. It also looks like it's compatible with Wemo, TP link, and Alexa.

I'm really considering going with a Smart Things hub and some Z wave fan switches and light dimmers. Almost every room in the house has ceiling fans with a dimmer, so control of that is going to be a big part of the whole house automation. I noticed Home Assistant is compatible with Zwave via some kind of usb stick, or smartthings via MQTT bridge, as well as the Wemo, TPlink, Alexa, Chromecast and Kodi (though I don't know the extend of its capability with Kodi and Chromecast.

Will Vox commander work with smartthings? Either on its own or via HomeAssistant? Do most people use VC and HA sidebyside or do they directly communicate with eachother? There is so many ways to go with all this.

[PegLegTV]

using Tasker would be your interface and then you would still want to use something like nime5ter recommended to control every thing

Tasker can communicate directly with some home automation stuff, but I find it a lot easier to have VC handle the communication between smart devices and have Tasker just be an extension of VC (so much faster to build elaborate commands in VC)

I use Autovoice continuous option so it doesn't have to open a pop up box when issuing a voice command, I used to leave the Autovoice continuous on all the time and use a prefix, but with the Fire 7 Tablet it doesn't work that well, so I just created a button in my app to start it, and then when the command is recognized it then turns the Autovoice continuous off

[nime5ter]

Will Vox commander work with smartthings? Either on its own or via HomeAssistant? Do most people use VC and HA sidebyside or do they directly communicate with eachother? There is so many ways to go with all this.

VoxCommando generally can work directly or via an intermediary with a huge variety of hardware and software. How one integrates things with VC is usually a question of one's existing ecosystem, budget, and technical knowledge or interest in reading documentation.

The most common home automation pairing for VC is the Vera because VC has a Vera plugin that greatly simplifies 2-way interaction.

However, it sounds like you have some things that won't necessarily play well with Vera.

Quite commonly VC users pair the program with EventGhost -- the program that was actually one of the main inspirations for VC.

I only know of one person who has explicitly mentioned using Home Assistant, but we have a lot of silent users so who knows. Several people use Domoticz, at least one person has posted about how he's using SmartThings.

In each of these scenarios there's probably more than one way to integrate the home automation controller with VC. In some cases it's possible the additional intermediary software or hardware would be redundant if the user had a better understanding of how http requests work or TCP or Python scripting or whatnot.