If you want that, take a look at swidget (https://www.swidget.com). They used to have z-wave, and a recertifing with the new 800 series chipset.
I’m planning to use their outlets with some sensors for A/C powered air quality.
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FP2 is pretty cool, but let’s not over-index on the new hotness.
FP2 is USB only, not UL certified, not able to build in, requires wifi and proprietary app to configure. Also, costs more than a Project Linus without any of the other features of a 2-1 dimmer.
To keep Zigbee or Z-Wave combat, Project Linus is going to be a bit more limited than FP2. It would be difficult for a zigbee device to create new “zones” in your smart home based on a config update, the protocol likely does not allow for it to generate arbitrary new devices. However, if you move some of the smarts to Home Assistant or similar, we could ask that Project Linus not just detect motion, but give the grid zone and distance info in the response, so that you could take action on that, and pull off a lot of what FP2 can do.
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@simnick I had looked at Swidget a while ago when they were having stock issues and thought they would be neat. However, their basic sensors (temp, humidity, PIR) didn’t make sense to have embedded in a receptacle since battery powered ones were cheaper and easier to place.
I would only think about switch based sensors that can’t really run on battery. MMWave being a great example.
On that note, my FP2 arrived while typing this. Looking forward to testing even though I agree with your assessment of the shortcomings.
I wonder how long it will take Linus to forget all about this and light up his home up with FP2s.
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And have wires hanging down the walls all over the house? No thanks.
Even on a desk, the Aqara logo ends up flipped upside down and the cable plugs into the top so you can see it sticking out.
A bit of a design flaw on their part IMO
The term is sexist, but the concept is valid. WAF (wife acceptance factor) matters. I think we could call it IDAF (Interior Designer Acceptance Factor). USB cords running all over the place is not the vibe I’m going for in my house. I want clean, screwless Decora wall plates, with everything hidden inside them, with minimal things stuck to my ceiling (can’t someone please make a decent looking smoke detector!).
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I actually prefer the look of the Nest Protect over pretty much any smoke detector. They look like speakers and have built-in night lights. The motion sensors in them are now exposed to home assistant as well. Google dropped the ball by not having them act as Google Home devices though, especially since they already have all the components except the mic!
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What about IDGAF (Interior Designer General Acceptance Factor)? But then I guess that kinda means the opposite…?
How is WAF sexist? My wife’s approval of the design and appearance of the things I change in our home is very important to me, since you know, my wife lives here too. I don’t understand how “sexist” made its way into this conversation.
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Because it assumes everyone building smart homes are married straight males, and that their wives are only involved as far as appearance is concerned.
Sadly, the stereotype may be statistically true, but that makes it worse for any women who want to get involved in these communities. Or men who have husbands. Or folks with roommates or other living situations.
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“Building The Open Home” by the Home Assistant folks has a good piece on this.
They propose the term “Home Approval Factor”
Open Home Approval Factor
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I disagree. When I use that term I make no assumptions of gender and while appearance is certainly important, speed, function, the intuitive nature of controls, the quality of the experience, etc are all things on which my wife’s opinions and desires are equally as important as mine. If the “wife” portion of the term doesn’t apply to someone in particular, then that person should use a more fitting term of course if they wish, but to say that anyone using the term is doing so in a sexist manner because it may not precisely fit someone else’s particular situation… is much more troubling than the original “problem” stated here. I do agree that the “smart home community” should be as open as possible, which includes calling out sexism where present, but it also includes not labeling things as sexist when it isn’t. With that said, I don’t want to derail this thread or get into a long-winded discussion about it. This is probably not the place for that. My apologies for the distraction to this point and I’ll leave the matter be.
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Valid concerns or cognitive dissonance? Seems to me these can be placed inconspicuously and still provide full coverage of the room.
This is honestly something I’ve never considered but I think the WAF term being considered sexist depends on how it’s used.
For example, if I am speaking of WAF in terms of my own setup then it would not be sexist at all since I am literally speaking of my wife. However, for me to suggest to somebody else they should worry about WAF would be making many assumptions that we may not be knowledgeable about. Maybe sexist isn’t the right term but moreso non-inclusive maybe? We could have HAF (husband), PAF (partner/person/parents), RAF (roommate).
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Yeah this something we’re talking about internally about what can/cannot be done. I agree, something to strive for if we can. The challenge is that Aqara has their own hub which makes it much easier for them to control the user experience, whereas we have to account for multiple different hubs and the limitations within.
Exactly, this is the challenge that we have to account for. I’m hoping we can work closely with Home Assistant, Hubitat, (not sure SmartThings will play ball, but we can try) to try to figure this out as I also think it would be a huge selling point for their platform. I’m sure Home Assistant has something close already as I’ve seen the rumblings about integrating the FP1/FP2 into the platform and what’s exposed, etc – but I haven’t looked much deeper.
Yeah we’ve talked about this internally and it’s on the list to explore further for sure. There are a couple of challenges with this approach:
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Multi-Gang Design - I suppose you could have some sort of clip-on mechanism, but still a challenge from both a feasibility standpoint and also a design standpoint
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Cost/Appearance - I’m assuming these wouldn’t be used everywhere in the house due to cost being probably around $15-20/unit, so we’d have to make a non-smart version (which is where we similarly stand with multiple SKU’s on the mmWave front) and from an appearance standpoint, I personally wouldn’t want it to be some beefy faceplate (that’s just me though, idk what everyone else thinks).
I definitely think it has legs, don’t get me wrong and think you can put a lot into a faceplate as you suggested. It’s just a little bit out of our comfort zone right now.
Yeah they have a really cool product – I’ve always thought it was fascinating – I just couldn’t get over the cost and also not sure on the future-proofing/cost benefit ratio. But, they have some pretty cool combinations.
This is a great point and one that I have to keep in mind too. I’m more of the, “let’s do everything and make this the best there ever is” (I’m like that on all projects), but I have to go back to how this project started and what the need was. The need was to have something that is superior to a PIR switch – something that solved for the, “sitting still and the lights go off” and that’s where mmWave came in.
I have to keep myself grounded sometimes when comparing to the FP2 as it is an intimidating engineering feat and also solves for a different (similar) problem as you mention. While both solve for presence detection, they are different in that you can inherently do different things with a sensor than a switch and each have their pro/cons.
Sensors are great in that they can be positioned everywhere making them a better solution all-around, they can pick up a ton of data (temp, lux, etc), but they can be an eye-sore to some people (me included) and they can give off the feeling that you’re being spied on (if you don’t know what it is). Whereas a light switch can blend in to your aesthetics, seem less intrusive, etc – but where it falls short is that you can’t put it anywhere and, in some cases, you can’t pick up the full field of view. But this is true for any motion switch, not just mmWave.
Exactly, you hit the nail on the head for what we’re trying to accomplish. I agree, it would be amazing to have all these zones and I agree that it just may not be possible and some may have to move to the hub for processing.
This is what we’re working through right now with a couple of the manufacturers. What can be processed locally to accomplish zones, and what has to be done on the hub?
The last difference between the FP2 and us, is that unfortunately (fortunately for the entire market, but unfortunately for us going up against them) they have a multi-million dollar R&D department who’d likely been working on this for a while and a lot is proprietary. In addition to that, as I mentioned above, they have the ability to control the user experience via their hub whereas we do not have that luxury at this time.
What I can promise is that we’ll try our best to get as close as we can and we will work with you guys to come up with some alternative solutions if we can’t do it with Zigbee. But I will explain as best as I can the challenges so that we can all work together to make something we feel comfortable with.
This project is going to rely heavily on the community as this is new territory for everyone, but I’m confident between the thousands of us, we will deliver an amazing product.
I’ve personally never been more excited about a project and neither has the other Eric.
Lol, man c’mon 
I thought I was going to have to join a support group as being the only one who thought this way. Glad to hear someone else shares the same feelings haha. I absolutely love the Nest Protects. The pathway light feature is awesome at night when walking down the hall.
I agree though, they need to get them in the Google Home app. Really annoying to have to switch back/forth from Nest to Google. I have the same issue with my Google Doorbell. I can see it in Google Home, but if I click on it, it opens the Nest app.
Lol
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I am curious about that map we see in the FP2 marketing literature - is that a grid drawn from the point of view of the device? So, it would be a room map as shown ONLY if the device is mounted on the ceiling, looking down?
Pure curiosity question here so please don’t take offense. When I see this being pushed as a big feature of the fp2, I’ve been struggling to figure out the hype behind it. So my question is, what use-case is there for multi-person detection?
I can honestly only think of 2 useful cases. 1 would be lowering temps based on # of people in a room, but I doubt people are getting down to that level with their heating automations. The other would be to catch the wife with the mailman while I’m out of town on business.
Are there any specific automations you’d run based on multiple people in a room?
Another would be to brighten the room up as the bodies fill in.
But can’t it only detect up to 3 people? If it could detect a party I’d get it. But 3 people doesn’t give you much.
Maybe it’s a bathroom?