Controlicz - Easy Domoticz to Alexa Integration Topic is solved

[Madgeni]

Hi - just wanted to let you know that the native Alexa smart home skill is now live
This allows you to control on/off/dim lights, on/off devices, set/get temperatures and requires no installation or configuration on your Domoticz, other than adding devices to room plans (for the devices you want Alexa to control).

Simply register at www.controlicz.com then enable the Controlicz skill on Alexa

[blacksn0w]

Hi - just wanted to let you know that the native Alexa smart home skill is now live
This allows you to control on/off/dim lights, on/off devices, set/get temperatures and requires no installation or configuration on your Domoticz, other than adding devices to room plans (for the devices you want Alexa to control).

Simply register at http://www.controlicz.com then enable the Controlicz skill on Alexa

And you are saving this credentials and in case of a leak someone could control all saved domoticz instances? Or is there some kind of protection?

[Madgeni]

all your data is encrypted, the site uses a public SSL cert and your password for the site is hashed

[remb0]

Great work!
I registered an account.
I setup my external https address and discover.
but nothing found.

so I want to check my details but can't login, tried multiple times, am I blocked?
there is no option to reset account, no confirmation mail etc.
maybe you can help me?

Because this is very very nice if it works

[diepatchworke]

There are a few working methods already for integrating Domoticz and Alexa. The simplest I had found was using HA-Bridge https://github.com/bwssytems/ha-bridge. The nice thing about it, is that it simulates a Phillips Hue so Alexa can discover your devices locally without any cloud service. There are some limitations. You basically only have access to On, Off and Dim requests. You're not able to query the status or temperature of any device. To get some of the extra bells and whistles you can setup the Domoticz Alexa Skill viewtopic.php?f=38&t=9446&hilit=alexa#p65767, but that gets a lot more involved.

I've been satisfied with HA-Bridge for a while, but I would like it to be even simpler. I'm also not a java developer and I would really like to make tweaks. So I searched for alternative Hue simulators. I wanted one that would automatically look at my Domoticz devices and make them available to Alexa. I then found hueAndMe https://github.com/johnray/hueAndMe, a python based Hue simulator. It did exactly what I wanted but for Indigo instead of Domoticz. Duplicating what it was doing for Indigo to Domoticz was pretty straight forward. I have a pending pull request to add the Domoticz integration, but the code is available on my fork in a Domoticz branch https://github.com/getSurreal/hueAndMe/tree/domoticz.

Hello,
i have to tries this second workaround : https://github.com/getSurreal/hueAndMe/tree/domoticz but my alexa diddnt find anything of my domoticz items.. alexa found nothing.

please can you tell me a step by step manual for me? i think i made a mistake in the config? and sorry for my english.

[michaldobrotka]

Hi,
same by me. I am registered, skill enabled but after discovery noting was found. Is with IP meant my LAN IP ?

[Madgeni]

Hi - a silly Q, but are your devices in Room Plans in Domoticz?

[michaldobrotka]

Yes Madgeni,
I have 7 rooms, each with 2-7 devices. (I noticed that this is a term in your skill description).

[Madgeni]

Your Domoticz needs to be accessible via the internet - i would suggest implementing ssl https://www.domoticz.com/wiki/Native_HT ... SL_support

Then in the Controlicz site you just need to provide:

domoticz IP/dns name
port no:
domoticz Username
domoticz password

[freijn]

I have an other silly question. Living in the Netherlands its impossible to order an Echo dot.
What's the trick to get one?

Apologies for hijacking your post

Frank

[Madgeni]

hah, ebay?

[michaldobrotka]

I have an other silly question. Living in the Netherlands its impossible to order an Echo dot.
What's the trick to get one?

Apologies for hijacking your post

Frank

Or even better amazon.de (maybe you'll need to make a request for order) and they send you bid. But from NL shouldn't be any problem to order it directly. And I registered a sale going on amazon right now.

[Madgeni]

I've increased the timeout on the lambda, to see if that resolves it - can people retest, also ensuring you use https - i don't want to drop down to http connections for your homes - i don't think anyone would thank me

[blacksn0w]

I've increased the timeout on the lambda, to see if that resolves it - can people retest, also ensuring you use https - i don't want to drop down to http connections for your homes - i don't think anyone would thank me

Maybe you should open a new thread for the whole "Controlicz" thing, currently there are two which are used for the same purpose
And another question: What about allowing only the Controlicz IP to connect to the Domoticz Instance from the outside?
There should be some ways with firwall rules and/or iptables, what do you think?

[Madgeni]

fair point on multiple threads
In terms of FW rules, that would be client side, and therefore dependent on what kit each person has

[danpep]

@madgeni,

I have now forwarded my external port to my Domoiticz SSL port and tested that this is working from outside my LAN. I am still not getting any devices in Alexa and now I don't even see the controlicz IP appearing in my domoticz log. Could it be because I don't have a SSL certificate? In a browser I can ignore this but I don't know if this will trip up your interface.

Perhaps an error message could be shown on controlicz.com to help with troubleshooting in future.

Thanks again for any help. Beers and a review coming your way if I get this working.

[Madgeni]

Hi - have you had any luck? Been trawling through the various logs, i can see some control & discovery requests

[danpep]

@madgeni,

I went back to the alexa web and my devices have appeared and are working via the echo. Thanks for your help! $10 in yor PayPal as promised.

[Madgeni]

Thanks Danpep, that's very good of you - really pleased it's working - i think i need to be *much* clearer on the documentation on pre-req of https

[remb0]

@magdeni

I use: https://domain.nl
port 443
username and pass

my devices are in roomplans, also the domain is working in and outside of my home.
And On my dns server (pi-hole) I see connections with status oke from lamya amazon while discovering.
But no more devices then my hue and ha-bridge.