Node-red-contrib-homekit-bridged: [BUG] HomeKit automations stability / reliability

[radokristof]

Hello Everyone!

I have changed the way how my home automation system (openHAB 2) detects if someone came home. This should be a real game changer, because earlier the current location was just polled from iCloud every 5-10 min and then calculated if that phone is home or not.
I have set-up some "proxy" switches which is turned ON/OFF by HomeKit automation for every phone. It works really great, almost instant if a phone comes home, if it works...
It seems that sometimes it misses to update that switch. I don't own a HomePod or ATV so I'm using my iPad as a hub which is at home 99% of the time.

This is not a real bug report because I assume that HomeKit implementation works like this, I just wanted to confirm that this works the same for others as well.
Maybe @crxporter I think you use these automations. Do you have the same problem? Do you use an ATV or HomePod as a hub?
I think that iPad maybe goes into some sleep mode after some time, that's why it misses these some times....

[NorthernMan54]

I doing the same with a HomeKit automation turning on and off a Vacant switch, which was created with the node. I’m using an appleTV, and haven’t noticed it being buggy at all. But as people say, YMMV.

On Sep 6, 2019, at 11:11 AM, Kristof Rado [e-mail] wrote:

Hello Everyone!

I have changed the way how my home automation system (openHAB 2) detects if someone came home. This should be a real game changer, because earlier the current location was just polled from iCloud every 5-10 min and then calculated if that phone is home or not.
I have set-up some "proxy" switches which is turned ON/OFF by HomeKit automation for every phone. It works really great, almost instant if a phone comes home, if it works...
It seems that sometimes it misses to update that switch. I don't own a HomePod or ATV so I'm using my iPad as a hub which is at home 99% of the time.

This is not a real bug report because I assume that HomeKit implementation works like this, I just wanted to confirm that this works the same for others as well.
Maybe @crxporter https://github.com/crxporter I think you use these automations. Do you have the same problem? Do you use an ATV or HomePod as a hub?
I think that iPad maybe goes into some sleep mode after some time, that's why it misses these some times....

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[crxporter]

I ran my presence detection like this for a while, it worked really well. I did have Apple TVs and homepods though - never tried with the iPad hub.

I do notice that the hubs occasionally forget about their rules. To fix it I will turn off my phone WiFi (so I’m going through apple servers, not local) then disable/enable my automation. Generally is helpful if I have a broken rule... something else to try.

[radokristof]

Thanks for your feedbacks!

@crxporter I don't think that the rules are got forgotten by the hub. (Or what do you exactly mean about this?). Basically it just doesn't trigger it sometimes. I have 3 different phones (6 rules in HomeKit for on and off for each device) and it is randomly one or two are not getting updated as I (or others) leave/arrive.

Ps.: I need to investigate this more. Now it looked like that only somehow the state change are not "going through" Node-RED to openhab and HomeKit has the states correctly, but before I can totally recall that the HomeKit and openHAB items were in sync (and had wrong state).

[djiwondee]

I have 3 different phones (6 rules in HomeKit for on and off for each device) and it is randomly one or two are not getting updated as I (or others) leave/arrive.

I must confess to have a similar experience right now a couple of weeks. I assume Apple is working under the hood on HomeKit services, e. g. in conjunction with iCloud sync across devices because of the upcoming iOS, macOS, iPadOS, Apple TV OS releases. In my setup an Apple TV 4 is working as my HomeKit central. I'm using various iPhones, am iPad and two Macs right now. One Mac and on iPhone running Public Beta macOS Catalina / iOS 13.1 respectively. It happens to me as well:

• Some automations of HomeKit not running reliable
• property settings of Accessories (room assignement, status, notification) got lost or are at least switched back to a state where the bridge was included in the setup initially
• Siri sometimes doesn't understood which accessory (e. g. "switch outlet bla bla bla to on") has to be triggered, regardless of an NRCHKB device or an Apple certified one.
  Just my thoughts on that...

[radokristof]

Thank you @djiwondee !
One thing that I really forgot about: I use iOS 13 beta on my iPad and never used these automations before on a stable iOS version so this could be another problem. I'm waiting now until the stable version is out and see how it works then...

[djiwondee]

@radokristof even it may not be relevant

before on a stable iOS version so this could be another problem

since I've switch off HomeKit on the iCloud settings on my iOS13 and Catalina Beta, the problems mentioned here went away. Lets see how it works if we see all major release on the street in October.

[radokristof]

Ok, so now 13.1.2 is installed on all of my devices, but this problem seems to be there... If it works it is really great (before I had to poll location which was never "instant"), but sometimes it doesn't work. Also it seems that leaving home works always, but arriving don't.

[Shaquu]

I can see that 13.1.2 doesn't change anything regarding HomeKit.
We have to wait for 13.2 and there will be some changes and fixes.

[radokristof]

I can assume 2 things:

• iPad works a little bit different from other HomeKit Hubs because it is not always powered, thus missing some push notifications (I assume that the device sends a push message to the hub to change state...).
• Something is wrong on the server side...

I don't really know. I will try to delete and re-add the automations.

[Shaquu]

Actually a fact is that every Home.app works differently. For example you cannot add new bridges on macOS or watchOs.

[radokristof]

I have tried deleting the automations and re-adding it, but none of them worked. I have found some Apple Support Articles to check Home Location Access and other things like that, but everything was enabled as I thought (usually works as it should and the switch is turned on/off instantly at arrival/leaving).

[djiwondee]

I have tried deleting the automations and re-adding it, but none of them worked

Same on my setup. An Apple TV 4 is used as the hub. Some Automation ignores presence of persons. Sometimes family setup seems to be ignored as well. Overall the combination of tvOS 13, MacOS 10.15 Catalina and iOS 13.1.2 seems still buggy at least what homekit means. Don't think NRCHKB is an issue here.

@radokristof

[radokristof]

@djiwondee
Yes I think the same, it is clearly an Apple side bug. I just sharing my thoughts and experiences here, maybe can help someone with same issues or at least we can discuss if there is some sort of solution. For me it is great to know that you also have this issue :)
I just didn't know how it worked before (on iOS 12 or earlier) because I just started using these automations now...

[djiwondee]

@radokristof think it's worth to share a longer story and how to guidance I had with Apple support a Month ago discussing those issues mentioned above. They gave me the generic advice:

1. Disable iCloud sync for homekit on _all_ connected devices (Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple TV)
2. log of from iCloud on _all_ connected devices as well
3. Deleting the home app on _all_ connected iOS devices to ensure local files with the setup are also dropped
4. Download the home app on iOS devices
5. Login to iCloud, enable iCloud sync and create a new home in the home app on _one_ device
6. Setting up accessories from scratch :-(
7. Choosing iPad or Apple TV as the new central
8. Adding stepwise additional devices by first enabling iCloud sync in the settings and launching then the home app

You can imagine it was a hard and steep learning curve. After that Apple support was also not sure what the reason are. So I got the feeling a key issue is/could be the iCloud sync of the homekit setup, especially if you have multiple Apple devices (Mac, iPhone, iPad) connected to your home kit setup. If you ever follow this it may be a good idea to have a backup of your homekit setup e. g. created with that app. So you can save at least the time re-creating your accessories in the home app.

[radokristof]

@djiwondee thanks for this. However it seems that a few iterations of deleting the automations and re-adding it solved the issue. Now it seems that all events are picked up correctly. I will close this and reopen if I have problems with this in the future or the near-future doesn't prove this, because it only works right since 2-3 days ago.