https://nanoleaf.me/en-GB/integration-hub/thread
thread is really cool. it does what it says it’s gonna do, it actually just works. well, actually no it doesn’t just work, it requires a little bit of admin on the routing kind of things. You really need to isolate your IoT stuff away from the rest of the network.
the kit is still not up to date when it comes to WPA3 and also needs peer to peer to work so you can’t isolate clients which tbh, you should be doing on your local network especially if you have guest access to it for regulars (like airbnb users etc)
that being said, as long as you know what your doing it’s pretty simple to setup and you don’t really need to do much, i think the devices just use the best route it can, i’ve not had them drop out like i did before on bluetooth or wifi, i’m using a combination of the apple home app and their third party apps to get the colours and such like right on the lights.
i’ve yet to go down the rabbit hole of full home automation but being able to turn lights on and off, set alarms, turning things off when i leave, it’s pretty sweet.
I’m struggling a little bit with power sockets working the same way, i don’t think the one i have has thread support even thou i know they do make them, it doesn’t say on the website if the one i was sent has it or not even thou the description on the site says it does, mine looks square and not flat and rectangle.
Photo by Howard Bouchevereau on Unsplash
at some point i’m going to have to approach the wiring setup so that it works with the independent power relay as well (if mains house power goes out) but so far i just wanted to get over the initial hurdles of setup, next i’ll be looking at ifttt commands and general actually “if that, then this” kinda setup — take some of the weight out of the house daily activities.
so far i’ve only really used it to play chilled night time music sounds and to switch lights on and off, the smart lights remember the last setting they were on, i’ve not really dug into more automation yet, especially on the siri side but you can do stuff like geo location arrival and departure which is pretty cool.
I’m certain that “thread” and anything else that does a mesh network setup (remember the HomePod mini has a thread router in it) it’s incredibly low latency, you can just notice it between having bluetooth on and off, i’m guessing if you had a lot of bluetooth devices around and activated it would be quite congested — the integration of home devices on iPhone is nice too.
I’m looking forward to extending the lighting setup so i’ve got wired bulbs and lighting in other areas too, i want it to be pretty transferrable too. It’s more of a bit by bit thing for maximum chillness rather than use it for “stage” and “setup” for recordings/streaming.
Extending the system out should be relatively straight forward from here, sensors, locks, water and air quality and switching fans on and off based on temp (fixed positions) all over thread — i’ve not looked at bandwidth issues or limitations and really it would be nice to have a backup thread router on the “network” too instead of relying on the one thing.
certainly feels like IoT is maturing finally in 2022 and the move away from having shitty wifi settings and things that operate over bluetooth is over — low latency and mesh networked devices all the way!
humble x