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Philips Hue Light commands work sporadically

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Fitmiss

Philips Hue Light commands work sporadically
« on: November 29, 2016, 12:30:06 pm »
For the most part, Alexa does what I ask in terms of turning on or off lights. She doesn't dim or increase the intensity as accurately as if I was using the app on my iPhone but maybe in time she'll get more precise.

My Problem:
I have a ceiling light that has 3 connected bulbs. Sometimes I turn the light on remotely or from the Philips switch. If I turn the ceiling light group on and don't ask Alexa to turn them on, she doesn't always turn them off even though she says "OK" when I ask her.

Is this a bug or should I try removing the group and adding again?

Thanks for your input.

DParker

Re: Philips Hue Light commands work sporadically
« Reply #1 on: November 29, 2016, 01:10:57 pm »
For the most part, Alexa does what I ask in terms of turning on or off lights. She doesn't dim or increase the intensity as accurately as if I was using the app on my iPhone but maybe in time she'll get more precise.

I find this difficult to believe.  Alexa doesn't directly control your lights.  All she does is submit a request to your smart device vendor's (in this case, Philips) cloud-based API server, and the vendor's software/hardware handles the rest.  So if you say, "Alexa, set the living room lights to 40%." she'll submit a request to a Philips Hue server to set the device(s) in your "living room lights" group to 40%.  If the lights aren't actually being set to that level then that's an issue with Philips.

My Problem:
I have a ceiling light that has 3 connected bulbs. Sometimes I turn the light on remotely or from the Philips switch. If I turn the ceiling light group on and don't ask Alexa to turn them on, she doesn't always turn them off even though she says "OK" when I ask her.

Is this a bug or should I try removing the group and adding again?

Thanks for your input.

This sounds like an issue between Alexa and the aforementioned Philips Hue cloud-based API.  Specifically, it sounds like Alexa is receiving a "success" response (or at least she thinks she's receiving a success response) from the Hue server when she forwards your request to turn off the lights, even though the command is not being implemented for some reason.  If she is otherwise able to control the lights (the turn on when you tell her to turn them on) then removing and re-adding the group isn't going to help.  I would contact Amazon support and see if there's something going on with the Hue interface.

Fitmiss

Re: Philips Hue Light commands work sporadically
« Reply #2 on: November 29, 2016, 01:30:53 pm »
Thanks for explaining how it works. So it does sound like there is a communication issue between Alexa and the cloud-based API. I'll contact Amazon and maybe Philips.


This sounds like an issue between Alexa and the aforementioned Philips Hue cloud-based API.  Specifically, it sounds like Alexa is receiving a "success" response (or at least she thinks she's receiving a success response) from the Hue server when she forwards your request to turn off the lights, even though the command is not being implemented for some reason.  If she is otherwise able to control the lights (the turn on when you tell her to turn them on) then removing and re-adding the group isn't going to help.  I would contact Amazon support and see if there's something going on with the Hue interface.