I think the key to successful adoption of home automation is to make the complicated easier and what’s already easy, invisible.
In other words, if you turn a light which previously was as simple as turning on a switch into an app or a different button or something, it’s not going to work.
In our basement (old 1920s house) we had a bunch of independent string lights, so you’d have to run around and turn on 5 different lights separately.
I made the only switch into the room a smart switch (it’s not even connected to a light anymore) and it now triggers the five different lights automatically.
So while there is the odd chance of not being able to turn on the lights in the event of a failure (don’t do this type of solution in important locations) the overall ease/improvement outweighs the inconvenience should it go down.
The only time I have issues with my installation is when I try to “fix” what was already working perfectly fine.
I’ve definitely learned to resist the urge to update software when I’m not home / traveling :)
This is it !
I think the key to successful adoption of home automation is to make the complicated easier and what’s already easy, invisible.
In other words, if you turn a light which previously was as simple as turning on a switch into an app or a different button or something, it’s not going to work.
In our basement (old 1920s house) we had a bunch of independent string lights, so you’d have to run around and turn on 5 different lights separately. I made the only switch into the room a smart switch (it’s not even connected to a light anymore) and it now triggers the five different lights automatically. So while there is the odd chance of not being able to turn on the lights in the event of a failure (don’t do this type of solution in important locations) the overall ease/improvement outweighs the inconvenience should it go down.
The only time I have issues with my installation is when I try to “fix” what was already working perfectly fine. I’ve definitely learned to resist the urge to update software when I’m not home / traveling :)