How To: Get a Notification When There's Someone at Your Door | SmartThings

How To: Get a Notification When There's Someone at Your Door | SmartThings

For specific holiday color codes and notifications, please see our chart here: Inovelli Notification Color Recommendation Chart (middle of the page)

Overview

In this example we'll combine a couple knowledge-base articles into one specific, "how-to" and show you how to create a scene where if motion is detected at your front door, your Inovelli LED Notifications will turn on and once motion is no longer detected, the notifications will turn off and the LED bar will go back to the default color. This is useful for holiday's when you have people over, Halloween to know when Trick-or-Treaters are coming to your house, or for birthday parties to know when people are arriving.

In this example, we're going to have your outdoor motion sensor detect when there is motion (ie: trick-or-treaters) which will turn on your LED bar notifications to let you know there are people approaching (and then revert back to default once people leave). As per the note at the top of the page, you can use these same steps for any type of event and substitute colors for the specific event (ie: Cyan for Easter, Red for Thanksgiving, Green for Christmas, etc).

What You'll Need

To accomplish the above example, you'll need the following from a hardware perspective:
  1. SmartThings Compatible Outdoor Motion Sensor: Zooz, Ring, etc*
  2. RGBW Bulb(s) and/or Lightstrips: Inovelli Bulb, Inovelli Lightstrip, etc*
  3. Inovelli Red Series Switches: On/Off, Dimmer, Fan/Light
From a software perspective, you'll need to install some device handlers and setup SmartThings built-in SmartApp (Smart Lighting).

Device Handlers

  1. Motion Sensor: Please check with the manufacturer for device handler instructions for the outdoor motion sensor
  2. Inovelli Products: Bulb, Lightstrip, Red Series On/Off, Red Series Dimmer, Red Series Fan/Light

SmartApps

For this exercise, we'll be using SmartThings, "Smart Lighting" SmartApp, which is built into the SmartThings App. More on that below in the setup instructions.

Setting Up Your Scene

Again, prior to setting everything up, please install the correct device handlers. This is essential to make this automation work. Also a reminder, what we're planning on doing with this scene/automation is that when motion is detected (ie: Trick-or-Treaters are detected), your switch notifications will pulse orange and then revert back once motion has stopped. Again, feel free to substitute colors and/or animations per the holiday/event.

Step 1 - Preparing Notifications

First, we have to setup what you want the notification you'd like. There are so many options and to better explain how they work, we'll break it down into a couple sections: Notification Components and Selecting your Notification.

Notification Components

There are four (4) different components to every single notification:
  1. LED Effect Color: This is the color you want your notification to be
  2. LED Effect Level: This is the dim level you want your notification to be
  3. LED Effect Duration: This is how long you want your notification to last
  4. LED Effect Type: This is the animation you want your notification to be
To get a better visual of what the LED bar would look like, please click on this link (special thank you to Nathan Fiscus from our community for building this):  https://nathanfiscus.github.io/inovelli-notification-calc/

Inovelli Notification Color Recommendation Chart

Below you'll find our recommended notification colors for various holidays and events. We'll leave the Level, Duration and Animation/Type for you to decide.

Holiday / Event
Recommended Color / Value
Birthday Party
Blue or Pink
Canada Day
Red or White*
Christmas
Red or Green
Easter
Cyan, Pink or White*
Independence Day (USA)
Red, White* or Blue
Kwanzaa
Red or Green
Labor Day (USA)
Red, White* or Blue
Labour Day (Canada)
Red or White*
Memorial Day
Red, White* or Blue
New Years Eve / Day
Yellow or White*
Passover
Cyan or White*
Rosh Hashanah
White*
Thanksgiving (USA & Canada)
Orange or Red
Veteran's Day
Red, White* or Blue
Yom Kippur
White*

* White is only available on the Fan/Light Switch. For Dimmers, you must have firmware 1.45 or higher and for On/Off, you must have 1.19 or higher.

NOTE: For an On/Off or Dimmer Switch, you can clear your notification manually from the switch by tapping 2x on the configuration button. Whereas on the Fan/Light switch, you have two separate LED bars for notifications and if you want to clear a Light LED bar notification, you'd hold down on the top of the Light Rocker and while holding it, press the Light Button 2x. Similarly, for the Fan LED Bar notification, you'd hold down on the top of the Fan Rocker and while holding it, press the Fan Button 2x.

Selecting Your Notification

Once you've determined what you'd like your notification to look like, it's time to select it from within the app. Again, please remember to have installed the child handler otherwise this will not work.
  1. Open up your SmartThings App
  2. Select your Inovelli Red Series Switch
  3. Click the three dots at the top right and select, "Settings"
  4. Scroll down to the, "LED Notifications" section
  5. Select your, "Effect Color" - In this case, "orange"
  6. Select your, "Effect Level" - In this case, "100"
  7. Select your, "Effect Duration" - In this case, "Indefinitely"
  8. Select your, "Effect Type" - In this case, "Pulse"
  9. Go back to the home screen (where it lists out your rooms)
NOTE: Remember the Fan/Light switch has two different areas to setup notification effects (Fan and Light).

If you want more than one light switch to show the notification, please repeat the step above for each switch you want to show the notification

Step 2 - Setting Up Your Automation (To Turn on Notifications) 

After we've prepared the notification, it's time to setup the automation using the Smart Lighting SmartApp to turn this notification (pulsing orange) on when motion is detected and off when motion is no longer there:

Smart Lighting Automation: LED Bar Lights to Pulse Orange

  1. Click on the three lines at the top left of the screen (to access the menu)
  2. Click on, "SmartApps"
  3. Click on the, (+) sign at the top right to add a SmartApp
  4. Scroll down and select, "Smart Lighting" and select it
  5. Click on, "New Lighting Automation"
  6. Click on, "Which devices do you want to control", and select the following devices:
    1. Red Series Notification Devices: "Whatever you named your Inovelli Red Series Switch (Notification 1)" and click, "Done" (NOTE: Look for whatever you named your Red Series Switch and then it should say, "(Notification 1)" next to it. The Fan/Light switch will say, "Fan" or, "Light" before Notification 1)
    2. You can select multiple devices that have notifications setup (ie: select, "Switch #1 (Notification 1)", "Switch #2 (Notification 1)", "Switch #3 (Notification 1)", etc)
  7. Change, "What do you want to do?" to, "Turn On" (ST App says, "Colour")
  8. Click on, "Select Trigger", select, "Motion" and press, "Done"
  9. Click on, "Which motion sensors?", select your sensor and press, "Done"
  10. Click on, "Turn on", select, "Motion Starts" and press, "Done"
  11. Toggle where it says, "Turn off after motion stops" to on
  12. Press, "Next", followed by, "Next" again, and then, "Done"
Now, whenever motion is detected, your LED bar notifications should turn on to orange and pulse. Remember to turn this automation off after Halloween (or your other event/holiday).