I am a noob to home automation but I have a few Kasa light switches that I like. The Kasa switches connect via wifi and Google is able to interact with them. I am also interested in some smartblinds (maybe Smartwings) and I notice they REQUIRE a hub. I understand they are Zigbee over wifi. Why do some devices require a hub and others don’t?

  • fahim-sabir@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    You have to be careful not to confuse Matter and Thread.

    Matter is a protocol which works over multiple mediums including WiFi and Thread, but theoretically over any protocol (Matter over two cans and string is a possibility I guess 🤣).

    Thread is meant to be the spiritual successor to Zigbee. Time will tell as to whether it comes good on its promise.

      • fahim-sabir@alien.topBEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        Actually Matter works really well. Specifically if you have a HomeKit-centric set up.

        I’ve not had a chance to play with Thread yet.

        • lastingd@alien.topBEnglish
          1·
          10 months ago

          I’m old school.

          Keep your high-faluting-sparkly-new-age-hippy-protocols away from my old-school-cool smarthome. :-)

          • fahim-sabir@alien.topBEnglish
            1·
            10 months ago

            🤣🤣🤣

            Completely understand. I’m the “I’m installing the beta update on day 1” then I will moan about how my system has been gimped.

            In all honesty, though. The Matter stuff is working beautifully well with HomeKit. It’s opened up a universe of devices that needed a hack like HomeBridge before.

            It’s an utter train wreck with Alexa though so have to use traditional skills with that.

            I guess someone has to go get the experience so they can improve stuff before people like you start using it. 🤣🤣🤣🤣

            • lastingd@alien.topBEnglish
              1·
              10 months ago

              I wouldn’t use a system built around someone elses idea of what I can and can’t do, not for Home Automation at least. For many, the amazon, google, apple ecosystems are perfectly fine and I certainly dabbled in them during my journey, but I soon outgrew their offerings and grew frustrated by not being able to do things.

              I’ve been automating and adding telemetry to things in my house for over 12 years now, I’m upwards of 900+ entities in my home controlled by Home Assistant and I can’t imgaine having to manage all that through a dinky app, utterly dependant on clouds, the honourable intentions of shareholders, a following wind and working internet. (Chamberlain MyQ comes to mind for some of this, but companies have gone bust, withdrawn features and made them payable and worse.)

              I use Home Assistant so I don’t have issues getting devices to talk to each other :-) The home assistant community are rapidly approaching full voice integration (Hot words, spacial microphone arrays etc.) and the range of supporting kit and services is dazzling.