OH2 with HomeMatic and Alexa via openHAB Cloud

[Itzamna (Mario Fliegner)]

Hi there,

I’m running OH2.2.0-1 on openHABian on my RPi3 and I’m trying to control my Homematic Thermostats by voice with Amazon Alexa. I messed around already a couple of hours with connecting it but without success. All is working fine up the last step. If I search (“Discover”) for devices in Alexa nothing shows up. Maybe I’ve missed something in general before… I would appreciate any input.

Here the steps I’ve done so far:

1. Added the Homematic + openHAB Cloud binding + Homekit Integration in Paper UI
2. Searched for Things and added+configured it all, so all my Homematic devices are available.
3. Created a heizung.items file in /etc/openhab2/items with the following content (currently 1 device) based on the Homekit documentation (http://docs.openhab.org/addons/ios/homekit/readme.html).

Group gruppeWohnzimmer "Wohnzimmer Thermostat" ["Thermostat"]
Number WohnzimmerAktuelleTemperatur "Wohnzimmer Thermostat Aktuelle Temperatur" (gruppeWohnzimmer) [ "CurrentTemperature" ] {channel="homematic:HM-CC-RT-DN:ce242794:NEQ1231073:4#ACTUAL_TEMPERATURE"}
Number WohnzimmerSollTemperatur "Wohnzimmer Thermostat Soll Temperatur" (gruppeWohnzimmer) [ "TargetTemperature" ] {channel="homematic:HM-CC-RT-DN:ce242794:NEQ1231073:4#SET_TEMPERATURE"}
String WohnzimmerHeatingCoolingMode "Wohnzimmer Thermostat Heating/Cooling Mode" (gruppeWohnzimmer) [ "homekit:HeatingCoolingMode" ] { channel="homematic:HM-CC-RT-DN:ce242794:NEQ1231073:4#CONTROL_MODE" }

4. Configured the Homekit integration, set Network Interface to the IP of my OH2 RPi3 (??) - leave rest with their defaults.
5. Configured the openHAB Cloud service and selected the 3 options (WohnzimmerAktuelleTemperatur, WohnzimmerSollTemperatur and WohnzimmerHeatingCoolingMode)
6. Configured the myopenhab.org connection. It’s working so far (except the myopenhab server is down )
7. All 3 selected options from 5) appear in the clouds Item list:
   
   
8. At the Amazon Alexa website I’ve added the openHAB skill and linked the account:
   
   
9. But if I then goto “Settings” -> Manage Smart-Home Devices, nothing happens. If I click on “Devices” -> “Discover” nothing shows up from the Homematic stuff. But that’s what I’m expecting!?

Is this the correct approach at all (via Homekit integration)? What I’m missing in the configuration? Maybe I still have a comprehension issue on how do I map the Item in openHAB Cloud to Devices in Alexa?

BR,
Mario

[hmerk (Hans-Jörg Merk)]

Did you read and follow this link
http://docs.openhab.org/addons/ios/alexa-skill/readme.html
You don’t need to expose any item to myopenHAB and you don’t need to install HomeKit binding.
Looking at your myopenhab screenshot, your Thermostat returns a value, Alexa does not support : AUTO-MODE
A reference to accepted modes can be found here
https://developer.amazon.com/de/docs/device-apis/alexa-property-schemas.html#thermostatmode

To check if Alexa is properly connected, try tagging a simple Switch item and do a discovery after a couple of minutes.
Check then, if Alexa found your switch.

[Itzamna (Mario Fliegner)]

Thanks for the answer. Yes, I found the readme for the alexa-skill before. Unfortunately it didnt’ work either, so I tried with the HomeKit because I thought I missed this. However, not I’ve removed the HomeKit again and tried the connection with a Switch item and even with a Color and Number item (not the Thermostat). The result is the same as before. It shows up in myopenHAB but if I “Discover” the Alexa devices nothing appears (also not after 5+ minutes). This leads me in the direction that I’m doing something wrong. But up to now I did not find the issue. At least a simple switch should work (with a simple network device)? Is my tagging still wrong?

Here is my latest test with an .item file (yes, I even tried with just one item):

Group gBeleuchtung "Beleuchtung" ["Lighting"]
Color Licht_Decke_Wohnzimmer "Meine Deckenbeleuchtung Wohnzimmer" (gBeleuchtung) ["Lighting"] { channel="hue:0210:00178861c975:3:color" }

Group gGarten "Garten" ["CurrentTemperature"]
Number AktuelleTemperaturAussen "Meine Aussentemperatur" (gGarten) ["CurrentTemperature"] { channel="homematic:HM-WDS10-TH-O:ce242794:OEQ0087107:1#TEMPERATURE" }

Group gSound "Sound" ["Switchable"]
Switch Bose_Soundtouch "Mein Bose Sound" (gSound) ["Switchable"] { channel="bosesoundtouch:device:506583630E91:power" }

Group gKamera "Kamera" ["Switchable"]
Switch IP_Camera "Meine IP Kamera" (gKamera) ["Switchable"] { channel="network:device:192_168_178_35:online" }

Here are the screenshots of the channels for the items, just to proof that I use the correct item types:

Then I’ve added the items in the Paper UI configuration of the openHAB Cloud service:

And it shows up in the cloud:

Thanks for any further insights on what can be wrong.

[Septem (Toby)]

Hay Itzamna, I have the same problem.

I did a brandnew installation of Openhab 2.4, set up one of my thermostats from Homatic and connected it to the myopenhab cloud service (with and without exposure).

But the Alexa-App didn’t find anything so far.

Here is my home.item file

Group HEIZ_THERMO_Esszimmer "Esszimmer Thermostat"
Number HEIZ_SET_Esszimmer "Esszimmer Heizung" [ "TargetTemperature" ] {channel="homematic:HM-CC-RT-DN:OEQ0410646:OEQ1712142:4#SET_TEMPERATURE"}
Number HEIZ_TEMP_Esszimmer "Esszimmer Temperatur" [ "CurrentTemperature" ] {channel="homematic:HM-CC-RT-DN:OEQ0410646:OEQ1712142:4#ACTUAL_TEMPERATURE"}

Do we miss something? There has to be people out there with alexa, OH2 and Homatic thermostats running.

[Septem (Toby)]

Well, I made some progress.

With this configuration, I can finde two devices with Alexa.

Number HEIZ_TEMP_Esszimmer "Esszimmer Temperatur" ["CurrentTemperature"] {channel="homematic:HM-CC-RT-DN:OEQ0410646:OEQ1712142:4#ACTUAL_TEMPERATURE"}

Group HEIZ_THERMO_Esszimmer "Esszimmer Thermostat" ["Thermostat"]
Number HEIZ_SET_Esszimmer "Esszimmer Heizung" (HEIZ_THERMO_Esszimmer) ["TargetTemperature"] {channel="homematic:HM-CC-RT-DN:OEQ0410646:OEQ1712142:4#SET_TEMPERATURE"}

Here they are.

With that, it does work