Hour and minute in a rule

Setup, Configuration and Use Beginners
1

I use this rule(example) to do certain things like automating lights only at certain hours…

rule "example"
when
Item motion changed to ON
then
val Integer currentHour = now.getHour()
if ((8..19).contains(currentHour)){
bedroom.sendCommand(ON)
 }
end

so i turn on the light only between 8am and 8 pm,but what if i want to turn it on between 8:30am and 8:45pm ?Can anyone give me an example to work with?

2

Add a virtual item and a rule with cron triggers to turn the virtual item on or off. Then your rule above just needs to check if the virtual item is on/off before firing the command.

It’s a little more indirect, but gives you more flexibility, since you can have multiple periods (e.g. 8:30am-10am and 7pm-8:45pm) and other triggers that aren’t based on time.

3

or instead of using time you could use the astro binding to have the light on only when it is dark.

To add to @rpwong Create a new switch item named like enable_lights

Then you can have a rule that runs on a cron trigger Time cron "0 30 8 ? * * *" 8:30am

rule "Enable Lights"
when
  Time cron "0 30 8 ? * * *"  or astro binding trigger
then
  enable_lights.sendCommand(ON)
end

rule "Disable Lights"
when
Cron trigger or astro binding trigger
then
  enable_lights.sendCommand(OFF)
end


rule "Motion detected turn light on if lights enabled "
when
Item motion changed to ON
then

if (enable_lights.state == ON){
bedroom.sendCommand(ON)
 }
end
4

i already use astro and iluminance readings from my aqara motion sensors to determin darkness night time for a more generic trigger.I just want to find out if there is a way to get hour and minutes in 2 values and use them for more detailed periods of time within the day…

5

You can. Work in minutes instead of hours. Set a variable to now and get the minutes and hours, multiply the hours by 60 and add to the minutes. Then do your compare in minutes.

6

Many people use datetime objects within their rules, allowing use of isAfter and isBefore methods.
See “Time of day” postings.

1 Like
7

In JRuby:

rule 'example' do
  changed MotionItem, to: ON
  between '8:30am'..'8:45pm'
  run { BedRoomItem.on }
end
1 Like