HomePod Homepod (Mini) or what?

[MRrainer]

Hi,

I am looking for a device that can play Apple Music directly (without the need for an iPhone) and that can ideally be controlled via those "Bluetooth-buttons".

My mother suffered a stroke and I am not sure how well her motor functions in the hands will return and if it's enough to operate a phone.
Pressing a large button will be easier.

Siri is obviously also not an option for the same reason.

Can this be done with a HomePod or HomePod Mini?

 

[erihp]

Hi,

I am looking for a device that can play Apple Music directly (without the need for an iPhone) and that can ideally be controlled via those "Bluetooth-buttons".

My mother suffered a stroke and I am not sure how well her motor functions in the hands will return and if it's enough to operate a phone.
Pressing a large button will be easier.

Siri is obviously also not an option for the same reason.

Can this be done with a HomePod or HomePod Mini?

supporting bluetooth buttons, ehh, not really, no.

that said, siri does actually work quite well for this very simple use case.

with an apple music subscription and voice controls, its quite reliable for asking siri to play a particular song/artist/genre, with no phone required.

'hey siri, play 50's classics' will start playing music from the 1950s. 'hey siri, next track' or 'hey siri, stop the music' works just fine, no need for buttons.

 

[MRrainer]

First of all, my mother's speech is still impaired by the stroke. Then, she only speaks German. And not high-german.

So, Siri is out.

 

[erihp]

First of all, my mother's speech is still impaired by the stroke. Then, she only speaks German. And not high-german.

So, Siri is out.

then the homepod is not the right choice.

 

[JulianL]

Hi,

I am looking for a device that can play Apple Music directly (without the need for an iPhone) and that can ideally be controlled via those "Bluetooth-buttons".

My mother suffered a stroke and I am not sure how well her motor functions in the hands will return and if it's enough to operate a phone.
Pressing a large button will be easier.

Siri is obviously also not an option for the same reason.

Can this be done with a HomePod or HomePod Mini?

Sorry to hear about your mother. I hope she makes a good recovery.

Disclaimer: I don't actually have HomePods, I'm planning to get my first ones when Apple releases its updated version of the HomePod Mini rumoured to be fairly soon. I also haven't used Apple Home yet because I don't plan to start playing with that until I get my first HomePod. Having said that I had a feeling that what you want should be possible with Apple Home and Shortcuts so I did a bit of Googling and from what I found I suspect that I'm right.

I think the trick might be to set up some Apple shortcuts to execute the actions that you want the buttons to perform and then trigger those shortcuts from buttons.

If you go into the Shortcuts app on an iOS or MacOS device you can see the options for what Media and Apple Music actions you can initiate from within a shortcut and they are quite extensive including selecting the output device for media playback (e.g. a HomePod), play, pause, volume up/down, select particular playlists/artists etc.

Obviously if your mother is only controlling via buttons she won't (I assume) have the ability to specify exactly what she wants played unless your going to recreate an entire keyboard using big buttons so I'm guessing the music selection itself would either be a limited number of favourite artists/albums and/or pre-created playlists. From having a quick look at the media shortcut actions myself I am pretty sure that shortcuts could do all of that.

Once you've got your shortcuts set up you can I believe then use Apple Home to have a button trigger a shortcut which I think would complete the picture to give you what you want.

One issue might be cost (although with a mother who needs help I suspect that isn't a huge issue) because I think you'd need something more than just a HomePod to setup and run the shortcuts and I'm not sure what Apple devices might already be in your mother's house. Then again, that might also be an opportunity.

If you have or end up buying an iPad maybe instead of using Bluetooth buttons you could design a custom Apple Home dashboard with just big buttons on it for the media functions instead of using physical Bluetooth buttons. I'm pretty sure you could then lock the dashboard onto the screen probably using kiosk mode to make things simple for your mother and I'm guessing you'd probably want to permanently connect the iPad to power and maybe set the screen to never go off to make it look like a physical button panel.

As I think is obvious from my disclaimer up top, I have no idea how much flexibility there is to design custom dashboards in Apple Home or how big you can make each button (tap target). I'm guessing that since your mother has compromised fine motor skills at the moment so you'd want them big and I'm not sure if the biggest sizes that the standard Apple Home app can make them would be big enough. If the core Apple Home app won't give you what you want then there are third party apps for creating dashboards that might be more suitable for getting big button on screen (or might not, I've no idea; sorry).

Here's just one random old (2022) article about different dashboard software that might be a start but I'm sure there are better articles and resources out there if you want to go that route - https://appleinsider.com/articles/22/06/02/how-to-reuse-an-ipad-as-a-homekit-dashboard . Viz Designer (https://www.viz-designer.com/) looks very flexible but also one heck of a lot of work.

Again I emphasise that I don't in any practical sense know what I'm talking about but I'm hoping that this post might prompt people who do have hands-on experience with Apple Home and shortcuts to chime in and either dismiss or give more authoritative detail for my suggestions.

 

[waw74]

if she has a bit of mobility, you can setup shortcuts that are triggered by RFID tags. You'll need a phone to trigger them though. doesn't need cellular activated.

You could make a grid of tags, and the she just has to hold the phone up against the one she wants, probably be easiest with a few playlists/stations, and some more for pause, and volume controls (probably vol + and - and a volume 25% or whatever her normal volume might be) Spacing on the grid determined by her abilities.
Just leave the phone plugged in, and next to the board.

If she's able to pick things up. could mount tags on things. that she could hold against the phone.


Depending on your tech abilities, you could also do the same with a Sonos speaker, the Sonos http api running on a raspberry pi, and some sort of scanner (barcode or RFID would work)

https://www.reddit.com/r/sonos/comments/wnp6su/controlling_my_sonos_with_a_diy_nfc_jukebox

 

[MRrainer]

Well, there's an iPhone XR and an iPad (and a 2018 i5 Mini) I got her a couple of years ago.

She is in rehab and recovering, but I'm not sure if she will be able to use these again.

Before the stroke, she had already lost pretty much all of her short-term memory (I had to reset the iPhone because she had forgotten the PIN - the iPad PIN was written down somewhere, as was the password to the Mac, so I could reset the iCloud password....).

The stroke hasn't helped in that regard, obviously.


Thanks everyone for the ideas.

I usually listen to music via my headphones when I need to shut out office noise or during driving - I never saw the need for the HomePods for myself - even more so because I actually have a stereo.

 

[erihp]

I guess everyone missed the ‘without the need for an iPhone’ requirement?

Anyway hope you find something that can bring your mom the joy of listening to music.

 

[JulianL]

I guess everyone missed the ‘without the need for an iPhone’ requirement?

Anyway hope you find something that can bring your mom the joy of listening to music.

I took the "without the need for an iPhone" to mean that she couldn't use an an iPhone as a control device due to the small screen (hence small tap targets) making it impossible due to her compromised fine motor skills, not that it was unacceptable for the OP to use an iPhone (or other device) for the setup and maybe left running as a hub (to execute shortcuts) that his/her mother never needed to touch or even know was permanently plugged in in a cupboard somewhere.

 

[erihp]

I took the "without the need for an iPhone" to mean that she couldn't use an an iPhone as a control device due to the small screen (hence small tap targets) making it impossible due to her compromised fine motor skills, not that it was unacceptable for the OP to use an iPhone (or other device) for the setup and maybe left running as a hub (to execute shortcuts) that his/her mother never needed to touch or even know was permanently plugged in in a cupboard somewhere.

Dunno, I hear ya, but seems like what you described still requires an iPhone.

OP stated: “I am looking for a device that can play Apple Music directly (without the need for an iPhone)”

 

[MBAir2010]

Mom should be happy with simple things as the BT option is the best bet
as the Homepods mini work off iCloud and wifi perhaps BT as well.
to set up one needs an iPhone as the iPad won't set up that easier.
control these is through the HOME app on MacBooks, iPad and iPhones.
Iphones do react better via HOME to adjusting than the other 2  products.

the sound is quite very good.
but the overall experience is tricky compared to a BT speaker like Klispch, JBL etc.
sometimes hovering over the face of the HomePod will trigger random playing of a song on "music" iCloud.
and louder as the initial startle of music is not expected, thus annoying.
there is a way to turn that off but involved.
sometime a website will turn off music vein played unless the auto play is turned off in safari, etc.

these HomePod speakers are convent, nice sound but very hardy to use.

 

[MRrainer]

Thanks everybody for the input.

I honestly thought there would be an easy "trick" to wire a couple of BT "buttons" to some Apple Music playlists like "60s", "70s", "80s" and "Classical".

My mother can't be the only one impaired enough to make the classical touch or voice interface of iOS unbearable?

 

[erihp]

Thanks everybody for the input.

I honestly thought there would be an easy "trick" to wire a couple of BT "buttons" to some Apple Music playlists like "60s", "70s", "80s" and "Classical".

My mother can't be the only one impaired enough to make the classical touch or voice interface of iOS unbearable?

Hmmm this gave me an idea…. Maybe you could build/buy a ‘soundboard’ of sorts. When a button is pressed, instead of Bluetooth commands, a small speaker would play a recorded voice saying ‘hey siri - %command%’.

Then you could have a small array of arcade push buttons with the common functions and the recorded voice would trigger the HomePod to play.

This board looks perfect!

https://www.adafruit.com/product/2210

https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-audio-fx-sound-board?view=all

In the same vein, with no DIY required (albeit ‘for dogs’), this could work!

RIBOSY Dog Buttons for Communication, 7 in 1 Dog Talking Button Set, Recordable Training Buzzers for Dogs with 50 Scene Stickers (Battery Included)

RIBOSY Dog Buttons for Communication, 7 in 1 Dog Talking Button Set, Recordable Training Buzzers for Dogs with 50 Scene Stickers (Battery Included)

www.amazon.com

 

[MRrainer]

If only voice commands were reliable....

 

[erihp]

If only voice commands were reliable....

for basic music control operations ive found them to be very reliable. $20 is a pretty cheap proof of concept

 

[waw74]

actually... sorry, went too deep on the solution.

homekit buttons.

you can setup homekit scenes on those buttons. You would need multiple (one for each genre), and one for stop. Adjusting the volume from song to song if needed could be an issue, but when making a scene you setup which music to play (must be Apple Music), and you can set a volume for the scene. a scene can also be configured to stop the music, Or to set the volume to a certain level, while not changing what's playing. Homekit buttons support short, long, and double presses. So if she has the motor control , you may be able to cut down the number of buttons.

Found this one, it's matter over thread, which the HomePod (full or mini) will support. and looks to be fairly easy to press, https://a.co/d/52bLBnd

There are several options out there, so take a look. Any "matter over thread" or homekit button will work. Thread will be more reliable.


added bonus, you could get a smart plug/s, and add another button to toggle the lights on and off. Easy to setup with shortcuts, so that if the lights are on, a single press turns them off, and if they're off it will turn them on. or do short on, long off.

You can also set timers, so a certain light might go to 20% at night, and off in the morning. or have a certain playlist start playing automatically in the morning. or stop the music at a certain time.
With homekit, you can access all of this remotely as long as you have an apple product (iPhone, iPad, Mac, watch) . Initial setup and adding devices must be done with an iPhone while you're there, Configuring scenes, button actions, and timers can be done remotely, as can activating scenes. When remote you can only see if the HP is playing or paused, You have to be local to see what it's actually playing.

also you could add a motion or presence sensor so you can see if someone is moving around.

Or a door sensor. You can set up alerts on your phone anytime one opens. There's also a log in the home app of when the door was opened or closed (door sensors and alarms are the only thing that log like that)

and with homepods, you can do intercom, allowing you to speak into the house from anywhere. T