New Homekit user here. Customize geofencing for two users?

[ra4oasis]

Although I love the idea of my lights turning off and on when i come and go, is there a way in the Home app to say something like, I'm leaving the house, but my wife isn't, so leave the lights on. But if we are both leaving, turn them off? I'm using an Koogeek outlet, my wife and I both have iOS 10 devices, and we have an Apple TV 4.

I'm considering getting the Phillips Hue starter kit as well, if it helps with this discussion. Thanks for any tips!

 

[steve knight]

Although I love the idea of my lights turning off and on when i come and go, is there a way in the Home app to say something like, I'm leaving the house, but my wife isn't, so leave the lights on. But if we are both leaving, turn them off? I'm using an Koogeek outlet, my wife and I both have iOS 10 devices, and we have an Apple TV 4.

I'm considering getting the Phillips Hue starter kit as well, if it helps with this discussion. Thanks for any tips!

Hue is bad about that too. I think Ihueconnect is supposed to do it. I use smartthings to manage that it won't lock the doors and turn off the lights till we both leave. So I get around hue that way.

 

[boston04and07]

I was wondering the same thing. I live with three other people and haven't figured out a way to make it so that certain actions only happen when we're all not home. Is this really not possible?

Slightly related - I set up my HomeKit setup the other day after getting a bunch of iDevices switches. They're all set up throughout the house so I set the ones in my bedroom as my favorites. I then invited my roommate to control our setup but it appears as though we can't have our own sets of Favorites - when I add something to my favorites it shows up on hers, and when I delete it from hers, it shows up as deleted on mine. Is this normal behavior?

 

[alee]

I haven't found a way to make this work without companion apps. I manage mine but I needed a bunch of stuff to make it work, which also requires 1 non-HomeKit device (a Nest):

* Nest's native home/away functionality
* Skylark (http://www.skylarkios.com) which only allows the Nest to trigger "Away" if everyone leaves the geofence, and "Home" if at least 1 person has returned
* Lutron Caseta's Nest integration to control lights based on Nest's home/away
* Standard HomeKit triggers to turn on other lights when the Caseta's lights are triggered

It works perfectly. Would be unnecessary if you could build geofence triggers for individuals. You can replace the Nest component of it with Life360 and IFTTT (https://ifttt.com/applets/157366p-turn-a-switch-off-when-everybody-leaves-home)... just need to make sure IFTTT can also control that switch.

 

[chuyn]

I haven't found a way to make this work without companion apps. I manage mine but I needed a bunch of stuff to make it work, which also requires 1 non-HomeKit device (a Nest):

* Nest's native home/away functionality
* Skylark (http://www.skylarkios.com) which only allows the Nest to trigger "Away" if everyone leaves the geofence, and "Home" if at least 1 person has returned
* Lutron Caseta's Nest integration to control lights based on Nest's home/away
* Standard HomeKit triggers to turn on other lights when the Caseta's lights are triggered

It works perfectly. Would be unnecessary if you could build geofence triggers for individuals. You can replace the Nest component of it with Life360 and IFTTT (https://ifttt.com/applets/157366p-turn-a-switch-off-when-everybody-leaves-home)... just need to make sure IFTTT can also control that switch.

Nest has this functionality built in now. It was introduced fairly recently. Each person you want to track just has their own Nest account now and are invited to the owner's "family". They'll be able to adjust the Nest normally but it'll now only go into away mode when everyone leaves (and of course, switch back to home mode when one person returns).

 

[alee]

Nest has this functionality built in now. It was introduced fairly recently. Each person you want to track just has their own Nest account now and are invited to the owner's "family". They'll be able to adjust the Nest normally but it'll now only go into away mode when everyone leaves (and of course, switch back to home mode when one person returns).

It doesn't work as well as like. Since you have to turn on auto-away it relies on both the geofence and the presence sensors. I never liked Nest's interpretation of presence. I just need a dumb geofenced auto-away, and Skylark is esp. nice since it lets you set a fence for when you leave, and a different one for when you come back, which is great for pre-cooling/pre-warming the home.

Of course, Apple's implementation of geofencing is just foolish -- like it was built by a bunch of bachelors who never had to share their apartment.

We're still a long way from automating things from 1 central location in a way that can make everyone happy. My nightlight automation had to be built with Eve and modified with Home to work right. Then I had to duplicate it because triggers with time constraints spanning past midnight don't fire correctly.

 

[chuyn]

It doesn't work as well as like. Since you have to turn on auto-away it relies on both the geofence and the presence sensors. I never liked Nest's interpretation of presence. I just need a dumb geofenced auto-away, and Skylark is esp. nice since it lets you set a fence for when you leave, and a different one for when you come back, which is great for pre-cooling/pre-warming the home.

Of course, Apple's implementation of geofencing is just foolish -- like it was built by a bunch of bachelors who never had to share their apartment.

We're still a long way from automating things from 1 central location in a way that can make everyone happy. My nightlight automation had to be built with Eve and modified with Home to work right. Then I had to duplicate it because triggers with time constraints spanning past midnight don't fire correctly.

I agree. Most systems seem designed around single people. It's a bit annoying. Honeywell's Lyric and the Nest are the only systems I've seen that have built-in support for more than one user.

The thing about Nest though, I agree the presence sensing kind of sucks, it takes a couple hours to kick in, and that bugged me too. But it only relies on both if you have them set that way. I have the thermostat and protects turned off under the "what decides if you're home" menu. Only the geofencing is on, and it goes into away mode as soon as we leave the geofence. I mean, I'm not saying it's better than what you've already got working with the different fence sizes, but it at least can function using only a geofence.

 

[steve knight]

This is why I will still use smartthings time home gets much better. Home kit will have to deal with Android as not everyone will have iPhone.

 

[KingBowser64]

Currently with HomeKit I have a house made up of 6 people (including myself) and I am the person that 'made the Home.' I have: Philips Hue Lights, an Elgato Eve, an August Doorbell (HomeKit update soon), an August Lock, an iDevices Switch, and First Alert OneLink Smoke/CO detectors (apparently they are receiving their 2.0 firmware update this Sunday, January 8, 2017 that allows support for Apple Home, according to a customer service representative that I am currently in contact with).

I have a Geofencing Automation setup within Home so that whenever someone leaves the house, the "Inside Garage" lights turn off, and whenever someone comes home, the "Inside Garage" lights turn on.

Whenever I leave or come home, my Automation executes properly. I asked my family to pay attention to see if their phones also activate the Automation. My Mom told me today that when she came home the lights were not on. I also checked to see when she left the house about an hour ago if the lights turned off, and they did not.

Is HomeKit Automation meant to work across all devices? I have every person setup to "Allow Remote Access" and "Allow Editing." We have an Apple TV 4 and iPad Mini 4 as Home Hubs (plus a 'disabled' Apple TV 3). I checked her location services on her iPhone and everything is on. I am confused as to what is going on because under her "Automation" tab on Home, it shows my 4 Automations there. Any thoughts or ideas?

I love HomeKit, especially when it works, but when it does not work, trying to fix it is truly problematic.

 

[boston04and07]

@KingBowser64, just out of curiosity, how do you like the OneLink? It was the first HomeKit enabled smoke detector in the market, right, or am I thinking of something else? I just ask because I was interested in a HomeKit smoke detector too but the reviews for that one didn't seem great. So, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.

Thanks!!

 

[KingBowser64]

@KingBowser64, just out of curiosity, how do you like the OneLink? It was the first HomeKit enabled smoke detector in the market, right, or am I thinking of something else? I just ask because I was interested in a HomeKit smoke detector too but the reviews for that one didn't seem great. So, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.

Thanks!!

@boston04and07, I am kind of indifferent about the OneLink. I want to like it because of it being HomeKit-capable (once it receives the update to work with Apple Home to work properly), but right now, the OneLink app needs some work. I currently have 3 First Alert OneLink alarms in my house (I did not upgrade every alarm in my room, just the main rooms, but everything works as a normal alarm in sync together). I have trouble checking for firmware updates sometimes. So I ended up contacting First Alert a few days ago and found out that 1 of my 3 models is incapable of receiving the 2.0 firmware update that will allow Apple Home functionality. I ordered all 3 models at the same time, but 1 of them is different and has a date marked on it that is from 2015, while the others are from 2016. The representative informed me that they will send me a replacement free of charge for this. We have the wired alarms, so they offer the LED light, which is nice because it can be dimmed with Siri and the First Alert app. The alarms themselves are extremely loud, and it is great because from the tests that I have ran, they all announce what the problem is and what room the problem has been found in. With iOS 10.2 this allows for push notifications from triggers/alerts, which would be a nice feature if smoke/CO were detected and you were at/away from home because you would be notified almost instantly. Every time that my August front door is unlocked/locked, all 6 of us receive a push notification from Home of the activity, which is great. I hope that with this 2.0 firmware update, the devices will truly work properly in the Apple Home app because this will then offer the functionality that I have been hoping for. What I want to do is set a trigger so that if smoke/CO is detected, every single Philips Hue light in my house will turn on as Red at 100% brightness. This feature alone would be critical for the prompt evacuation of a home because it would wake everyone up and alert neighbors of a possible problem in my house. I do believe that the First Alert OneLink was the first HomeKit-capable smoke/CO detector, with another being announced at CES 2017.

 

[boston04and07]

@KingBowser64, thanks for that detailed description and your thoughts on this. I hope the 2.0 update fixes that for you, and I'd love to hear your thoughts after that update goes through. I too really would love the HomeKit integration for the reasons you've listed - automatically turning on lights and the like when smoke is detected would be awesome. It was nice of them to send you a replacement unit too. I was just wary about this model at first because literally almost all the reviews I've found (from Apple, Amazon, etc) seem to indicate that there was something seriously wrong with these devices universally, so I wasn't sure if there might even be a recall or something. Hope all these issues get ironed out soon.

 

[The JTizzle]

iConnect Hue supports multi user Geofencing. its an additional 1.99 purchase but it works perfectly. You install the app on all the users phones and when everyone leaves it shuts all your lights off. When the first person comes home the lights turn on. When one person leaves the lights remain untouched and won't shut off. Its perfect and solves the main issue we had with Hue when we set out house up up and the wife would be taking a nap, have the lights off and I would come home and the house would turn on in all it's glory. Best Hue app out there. Well worth the money.

 

[toxlab1]

Currently with HomeKit I have a house made up of 6 people (including myself) and I am the person that 'made the Home.' I have: Philips Hue Lights, an Elgato Eve, an August Doorbell (HomeKit update soon), an August Lock, an iDevices Switch, and First Alert OneLink Smoke/CO detectors (apparently they are receiving their 2.0 firmware update this Sunday, January 8, 2017 that allows support for Apple Home, according to a customer service representative that I am currently in contact with).

I have a Geofencing Automation setup within Home so that whenever someone leaves the house, the "Inside Garage" lights turn off, and whenever someone comes home, the "Inside Garage" lights turn on.

Whenever I leave or come home, my Automation executes properly. I asked my family to pay attention to see if their phones also activate the Automation. My Mom told me today that when she came home the lights were not on. I also checked to see when she left the house about an hour ago if the lights turned off, and they did not.

Is HomeKit Automation meant to work across all devices? I have every person setup to "Allow Remote Access" and "Allow Editing." We have an Apple TV 4 and iPad Mini 4 as Home Hubs (plus a 'disabled' Apple TV 3). I checked her location services on her iPhone and everything is on. I am confused as to what is going on because under her "Automation" tab on Home, it shows my 4 Automations there. Any thoughts or ideas?

I love HomeKit, especially when it works, but when it does not work, trying to fix it is truly problematic.

If you have not already solved the problem I had the same problem and it was solved by switching of the allow Home switching in "add home section" and only allow the shared or invited home you invited them to them to share. If not it won't work for anyone but you since their phones will switch to their default home when leaving, which will be the same as yours, but will not have your automations present.

 

[cjbryce]

Although I love the idea of my lights turning off and on when i come and go, is there a way in the Home app to say something like, I'm leaving the house, but my wife isn't, so leave the lights on. But if we are both leaving, turn them off? I'm using an Koogeek outlet, my wife and I both have iOS 10 devices, and we have an Apple TV 4.

I'm considering getting the Phillips Hue starter kit as well, if it helps with this discussion. Thanks for any tips!

Yes, share your home with your wife, then Home automations can work easily to achieve what you're after if all your smart devices are HomeKit enabled. In fact Home has two default automations "When first person arrives home" and "When last person leaves home". I have numerous scenes/accessories, including multiple Hues, tied to these automations and others.

The only smart device I have that isn't included in this is a Tado thermostat, which has its own geofencing and switches the heating on much earlier (geographically) than Home does (otherwise it'd only just come on as I get to about 100m from my house.) I've also can also shared Tado with my partner via the Tado app.

 

[TrueBlou]

As @cjbryce said, if you share your Home with whom ever you want included, for instance I share with my wife, then you can create Automations for tasks such as Arriving Home, Leaving Home, Time, Sensors Activation......

Within that you can choose whom to include and exclude from the rule and have it based on any of the included people arriving/leaving, or the first of the included people arriving/leaving.

I think the Eve app allows a bit more flexibility than Home does and you don’t need any Eve products to use the app.
Beyond that you can also use IFTTT to give you much more flexibility in what you want to happen. Although I think at the moment you may need to setup Homebridge to integrate IFTTT.