"First Time" Rule

[rlkoshak (Rich Koshak)]

The two design patterns pointed to be lipp are applicable indeed. But 8 actually approach this from a different angle using

Design Pattern: Associated Items

Please see Design Pattern: What is a Design Pattern and How Do I Use Them for how to read and use DPs. Problem Statement Often one will have a number of separate Items which are all related to each other in some way. For example, one might have a Contact on a door and a DateTime to represent when the last time the door was opened. This is easy enough to keep track of if there are only one or two such Items, but if one has a lot of similar Items or is using a lot of generically coded rules where…

I create a Notified switch item that gets set to ON when the alert gets sent and OFF when the sense goes back to safe levels or at midnight. I check this flash before sending the alert.