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Smart Home Your Devices

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youhorns

Smart Home Your Devices
« on: October 28, 2016, 12:06:06 pm »
Hi I hope somebody can help. Just trying to get to grips with Philips Hue and Amazon Echo.
My problem is when I do a scan under discover your devices, it throws up 166 devices, I have 11 hue bulbs and was just expecting to see the 11 bulbs. What it has done is include all the scenes for every light. I have not got round to setting scenes yet against each light, so it is not anything I have done. It has just picked up every standard scene that Philips hue have on the app and set it as a device. I just want to delete them. I could go through everyone and forget them, but when I get another light or device and run discovery again they will all come back.  Thanks for your help.

DParker

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #1 on: October 28, 2016, 01:08:01 pm »
I don't have my Hue system anymore, but I suspect you should be able to use the app to restrict what is visible to your Alexa account.

youhorns

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #2 on: October 28, 2016, 03:37:45 pm »
Thanks Dparker Thats exactly what I thought, yes there are scenes on my Hue app, but there is no way to delete them, which I do not really want to do, as may eventually use them. But why the amazon echo picking up all those scenes as devices is beyond me.

DParker

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #3 on: October 28, 2016, 06:06:21 pm »
Thanks Dparker Thats exactly what I thought, yes there are scenes on my Hue app, but there is no way to delete them, which I do not really want to do, as may eventually use them. But why the amazon echo picking up all those scenes as devices is beyond me.

I am a little confused about something.  You say you have 11 bulbs, but 155 scenes?  IIRC Hue comes with only a small handful of pre-configured scenes...so how in the world did you end up with 155 of them?  Do their names give you any indication of their functionality?

youhorns

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #4 on: October 29, 2016, 03:58:40 am »
Hi Thanks for the response there are 11 pre programmed scenes in hue so I have 11 lights so that's 122  scenes showing as devices. Plus 11 actual lights that are showing correctly that makes 133. I am down to 155 devices after my latest scan. The difference are other products Sonos and Nest Thermostat so that's ok. Just strange that scenes show up as devices .

urw0rst

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #5 on: November 19, 2016, 06:59:55 pm »
Hi, I feel your pain. I have exactly the same problem!
Only recently purchased my echo so have just 5 hue bulbs.
Every time I scan for devices alexa app discovers 50+ devices!
These 'devices' show up as 'scenes', 'rooms' and 'routines' for each bulb!
This then creates a nightmare scenario where when I request to say - turn hallway lamp on - alexa tells me there is more than 1 device named Hallway Lamp in my account!
She then asks to specify which device. When I do she then tells me I should rename each device with a different name to allow her to distinguish what device I mean!! WTF! It's the only device named Hallway Lamp! She has complicated it by adding all the scene setting and listing them as individual devices!
It's a disaster. What am I doing wrong?
« Last Edit: November 20, 2016, 12:42:56 pm by urw0rst »

urw0rst

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #6 on: November 20, 2016, 07:09:39 am »
UPDATE:
OK so I have now discovered I can delete scenes within the Hue app.
When on the 'Settings' screen press 'Close' top left > Select your light from the list of lights available > Select 'Scenes' at bottom of screen (its greyed out) > Click and hold on any scene and a little 'X' will appear on each available scene.
Some scenes will not delete as other lights are using them. Go through each light and return to the first light and you should be able to delete the scenes you couldn't previously delete. Eventually you will be able to delete all scenes for all lights.
NB: Some 'Routines' will also be deleted if those scenes are used by those routines.
Head over to your Alexa app and choose to 'Forget all devices' then re-run discovery.
You should then discover much less 'Devices' as before.

There still however is a problem with some devices discovered!

Some lights are discovered as:-
Hallway Lamp
Room Hallway connected via Hue
and also
Hallway Lamp
Dimmable Light

This causes Alexa to prompt - 'I found more than 1 device named Hallway Lamp, please give them unique names and run discovery again'

So what I have then done is delete the 'Room Hallway connected via Hue' entry. This seems to then work!

Its early days but hope someone can add to this and let me know is there an easier way of doing things or where Im going wrong.

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #7 on: November 20, 2016, 06:44:24 pm »
Hi, I feel your pain. I have exactly the same problem!
Only recently purchased my echo so have just 5 hue bulbs.
Every time I scan for devices alexa app discovers 50+ devices!
These 'devices' show up as 'scenes', 'rooms' and 'routines' for each bulb!
This then creates a nightmare scenario where when I request to say - turn hallway lamp on - alexa tells me there is more than 1 device named Hallway Lamp in my account!
She then asks to specify which device. When I do she then tells me I should rename each device with a different name to allow her to distinguish what device I mean!! WTF! It's the only device named Hallway Lamp! She has complicated it by adding all the scene setting and listing them as individual devices!
It's a disaster. What am I doing wrong?


just to note, if you have more than one device that uses the word lamp as part of the name, then it could say you have more than one device.  Leave off the lamp in the name and just call it hallway. 

urw0rst

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #8 on: November 20, 2016, 07:29:48 pm »
just to note, if you have more than one device that uses the word lamp as part of the name, then it could say you have more than one device.  Leave off the lamp in the name and just call it hallway.

Hi, I've renamed it numerous times without the word lamp or light - called it 'Hallway area', 'Entrance hall' but still same problems.
I know Alexa recognises 'Hallway Lamp' because she repeats it back saying 'I've detected more than 1 device named Hallway Lamp...' so I don't think the name is the problem.
Any videos I have watched have people naming devices with light or lamp in the title and they seem to have things working fine 😳

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #9 on: November 20, 2016, 08:34:05 pm »
try a one word name not two words. 

urw0rst

Re: Smart Home Your Devices
« Reply #10 on: November 21, 2016, 09:52:08 am »
try a one word name not two words.

Same applies using 1 word names. Alexa lists the device multiple times, as scenes and 'room connected to Hue'.
Also, having 1 word names defeats the purpose of a smart home! If I have 2 lamps in living room and a main light how do I name these using 1 word for each? Videos posted online show Alexa responding to multiple word requests - 'right lamp' on and 'left lamp' on and 'all lamps' on etc.