eedomus: compatibility with the Google Home voice assistant
We had done some teasing this summer on social networks by showing the possibility of using the Google Home voice assistant to control its eedomus home automation box.
However, this possibility was still not available at the time of the last update. Not the fault of Connected Object, which had done this development very quickly, but that of Google, which took a while to validate the compatibility. Good news, the eedomus home automation box is now officially compatible with Google Home! It thus becomes possible to pilot your whole house by voice, and in French! Because if the eedomus box was already compatible with the Amazon Alexa vocal assistant, it was done in English, then Alexa is still not available in France, to our greatest dismay: / The Google Home has been available in France since early August, and works really well, it must be admitted.
If Google Home is very practical to ask for the weather, to know the latest news, to have the schedule of your day, to know the cinema screenings, or even to tell jokes, the fact of driving your house by voice is now a feature that adds a real plus, for example to control the heating, to ask for the opening of the shutters, to have an energy consumption report, etc....
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To use this feature, go to the configuration of the eedomus box, then click on the wrench next to "Google Home":
You then access a screen that allows you to select the devices and scenarios you want to make available on Google Home. The controllable devices are: switches, relays, dimmers, thermostats and eedomus scenes. The fact of being able to precisely select the devices to display in Google Home thus avoids getting polluted with many devices that you do not want to have on Google Home. It is also possible to rename them if you wish, so that they are clearer and more understandable on the voice assistant.
Once this is done, all you have to do is go to the Google Home application on your smartphone or tablet. We ask to add a device in the "control your home" section, and we select eedomus. A screen then asks us for our eedomus box IDs:Finally, the application is informed in which room the different devices that have been brought up from the eedomus box are located:This makes it possible to control several devices simultaneously: "Ok Google, turn off all the lamps", or "Ok Google, turn off the lamps in the living room". Google Home will then know which lamps are in which room.
From there, many orders are possible:- It is possible to query the status of his lamps: "Ok Google, the lamps are on"?
- The color of the RGB lamps can be controlled, for example "Ok Google, turn on the kitchen lamp in red"
- The thermostat set point can be changed with this type of order "Ok Google, change the thermostat to 20°"- The temperature measured by the thermostat can be queried: "Ok Google, what temperature does it make in the house?"
- A scene can be activated by asking: "Ok Google, activate Television", or "activate the television set".
- Note that it is also possible to create "voice" shortcuts from the Google Home app to control eedomus devices. Ex: "Ok Google, go to bed" could activate one of your bedtime scenes:)
Voice orders via Google Home work really well, and make it easier to manage your home! A compatible WAF system, validated by Mrs: D