
Show HN: Control IKEA Lights Using Google Home and IFTTT - pretty_bubbles
https://github.com/valenting/node_tradfri_ifttt
======
gregmac
I don't mean to diminish the work done here, but I can't bring myself to use
any home automation that relies on internet and 3rd party services. The whole
"I can't turn off my lights/adjust my thermostat/close my garage door because
the internet is down" is a cliche these days, but also reality when you use
services like these.

There's a difference between core and nice to have services (eg, ability to
tell you the weather), but I consider light, door, and temperature control to
be "core": having a dozen separate points of failure is just bad design. You
could consider voice control nice-to-have, but if it works well, I have a
feeling it would move to being core. If it doesn't work well enough to be used
all the time (and thus irritatingly missed when it's broken), why bother?

I'm aware of Mycroft; anyone have experience with it or alternatives?

~~~
melling
I guess if it doesn’t work for you, you should skip the thread so as not to
drown out the effort.

Someday someone might come along and build the thing you want. Perhaps they
will build on this project.

~~~
dpark
His criticism is reasonable. There is a line between valuable criticism and
pointless negativity. The latter deserves the “if you don’t like it, go away”
response. The former does not. The line is fuzzy, so err on the side of
leniency.

Now, if there is a flaw in the criticism, address that, not the mere fact that
it is criticism.

~~~
melling
It’s like people who jump in an a discussion about electric vehicles then
filling the comments with “I won’t buy one until the range increases“. Their
criticism is also legitimate.

People should simply realize the product isn’t for them.

~~~
dpark
That’s also a reasonable response and if I had a conversation about EVs with a
large group of friends, I would expect one of them to make that comment. I
would not expect the person with that sentiment to simply walk away rather
than engage.

~~~
melling
But everyone already knows they have limited range. You aren’t adding to the
online conversation. You aren’t going to change anything.

Often in long conversations, people chime in without reading the conversation
and several people make the same “observation”.

In this conversation, we know there are downsides to cloud-based voice
recognition. Telling someone who built it that it’s not for you, doesn’t add
any value.

~~~
dpark
> _But everyone already knows they have limited range. You aren’t adding to
> the online conversation. You aren’t going to change anything._

Realistically everything in this hypothetical conversation will be things that
“everyone” knows. Unless you’re discussing confidential info about EVs,
everything is by definition public knowledge and probably even common
knowledge. Most conversations are about opinions rather than facts.

Is the guy who comments about EVs having all their torque available from a
standstill also adding nothing to the conversation? What about the guy who
mentions the environmental friendliness? Or the one who mentions the
environmental costs of lithium mining? Who is really adding to the
conversation here?

> _In this conversation, we know there are downsides to cloud-based voice
> recognition. Telling someone who built it that it’s not for you, doesn’t add
> any value._

And yet it’s the top comment and the top reply provides info about a platform
that doesn’t have the same drawback. I think this is pretty clearly value
added.

~~~
melling
When you read the comment about short range and the environmental impact of
the batteries, they’re often highly upvoted by people that dislike electric
vehicles too.

So, my point about someone drowning out someone’s project is proven by the
top-rated comment about how it doesn’t work for them.

~~~
dpark
So you’re just going to pretend that the top comment doesn’t have a useful and
relevant reply?

~~~
melling
Snips? It has been submitted 5 times this week. E.g.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16537734](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16537734)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16544893](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16544893)

~~~
dpark
Yes. I don’t know if Snips is any good but it seems extremely relevant and the
“I won’t use remote automation” comment led clearly to the posting of Snips in
this conversation.

Putting aside Snips for a moment, my point with my last comment was to note
that you took the “upvotes aren’t a meaningful indicator” tangent and ignored
the rest of the reply. You ignored the fact that the criticism led to a
meaningful reply and did in fact contribute to the conversation. You also
ignored my questions about what constitutes actual contributions to a
conversation. Is it just positivity? Because most of the positive stuff people
post is still not new and it seems unreasonable to me to claim that criticism
is at heart not contributing to the conversation while fanboyism is.

~~~
melling
Hey, good for the Snips developer to get another chance to promote his project
again.

Hopefully, both projects get a few more people involved.

~~~
dpark
Hope so

------
kuschku
One of the most amazing things about TRÅDFRI is that it’s actually well-
designed. The software is minimalistic, and designed for security by default,
it’s fault-tolerant, and it’s local by default.

A massive contrast to the silicon-valley node.js on each lightbulb products,
reliant on cloud servers, with analytics everywhere; or the cheap chinese
unsecured lightbulbs that are just days after purchase infected with Mirai.

A welcome change, indeed.

~~~
pretty_bubbles
I agree. I also really appreciate the build quality in the remote.

I am a bit disappointed by their slowness in supporting Google Home by default
- hence my project. It would be a lot better if they actually open-sourced the
code for the gateway.

------
brianjking
Nice. I use Home Assistant for my Home Automation setup. [https://home-
assistant.io/](https://home-assistant.io/)

[Over 1,000 components]([https://home-assistant.io/components/](https://home-
assistant.io/components/)) are available with more added daily, including
[IKEA Tradfri lights]([https://home-
assistant.io/components/tradfri/](https://home-
assistant.io/components/tradfri/)).

My Home Assistant config files can be found at
[https://github.com/brianjking/homeassistant-
config](https://github.com/brianjking/homeassistant-config) if you're
interested.

Cheers!

~~~
oulipo
If you are using Home Assistant and you want a free, open-source and 100% on-
device solution to build a Voice AI you can take a look at what we build at
Snips [https://snips.ai](https://snips.ai)

You can build your Voice AI in English, French, German, and soon Japanese and
Korean, with more European languages coming

It runs on a Raspberry Pi 3 and will be 100% free for makers

~~~
gingerlime
Perhaps I didn't search well enough, but is there a way to buy a ready-made
snips device? Like I would buy an Amazon Echo?

I'd be keen to use something like Snips instead of Alexa, but I'm not too sure
I have the time and energy to solder things, or even just attach wires to some
connector... Or even just figure out which part to order from where... And I
already have a pi3 running Home Assistant.

To me this is the biggest barrier of entry.

The 2nd one (which is the same pretty much), is convincing my wife to replace
this thing[0] with this thing[1], and also preventing my 4 year old from
messing with the wires...

[0] [http://d2ydh70d4b5xgv.cloudfront.net/images/e/1/new-echo-
dot...](http://d2ydh70d4b5xgv.cloudfront.net/images/e/1/new-echo-dot-2nd-
generation-white-alexa-voice-amazon-ready-original-tv-w-
media-5aef1950bef6e89144b47aa2337f7c4e.jpg)

[1]
[https://i.vimeocdn.com/video/660238369_640.jpg](https://i.vimeocdn.com/video/660238369_640.jpg)

(please don't take it the wrong way, I really want Snips to win over
proprietary cloud-based solutions)

~~~
oulipo
We are working on this! You can buy any Raspberry Pi 3 and we have tutorials
to show common hardware to use, but soon there will be a maker kit you can get
from us too!

We recommend a Raspberry Pi 3 and a ReSpeaker2 microphone there is a list of
materials you can find on this blog post, and please subscribe to our
newsletter to learn about the kit

[https://medium.com/snips-ai/building-a-voice-controlled-
home...](https://medium.com/snips-ai/building-a-voice-controlled-home-sound-
system-using-snips-and-sonos-2aaf16523ce9)

------
owenwil
This is super cool! To be honest, I think the easier way to do this is using
the Hue Hub, which can connect to Tradfi AND integrates directly with Google
Home

------
alvarlagerlof
Or just use a Hue hub

