Evohome - Boost option?

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  • Hoppy
    Automated Home Lurker
    • Nov 2017
    • 8

    Evohome - Boost option?

    Hi, I've previously used this forum for info and help, but only just joined.
    I bought Evohome in March, it's working well, certainly very happy with it, it does what I wanted and expected. Researched it last year and it ticked all the boxes of my requirements. I got the impression that the app was a bit clunky and that did turn out to be the case, but seems to be much more stable now tho. If I'm honest and especially after buying some Philips Hue lights, the app user interface still looks a bit 'engineer' rather than end user pretty, and the connection to servers and/or my controller is still quite slow (when compared to Philips Hue UI presentation and connection).

    Anyhow, I'm just wondering if I'm missing something (sorry if this has been done to death before). There appear to be lots of options to very simply turn the whole heating down or off, away, heating off, economy. Where's the option for when Great Aunt Doris visit's?. At the moment I've tried a fuddle with the 'away' function by turning it up as high as it'll go, which is only 20C. Anyone got a get around or any ideas?, I'm aware of a 3rd party app which does exactly the function I'd want, but would rather stick with Evohome app. A 'boost' button would be nice +3C throughout the house for 2 hours, type stuff.
    Cheers
    Last edited by Hoppy; 21 November 2017, 10:12 PM.
  • roydonaldson
    Automated Home Guru
    • Jan 2013
    • 205

    #2
    Just use the Custom setting and build one yourself. I've got my Custom setting to turn all of the downstairs rooms on to 21. You can hit it once to enable it, or hold it down to turn it on for a number of hours only.

    Comment

    • chippie
      Automated Home Lurker
      • Dec 2015
      • 5

      #3
      I've just implemented a boost button system using amazon dash buttons, a raspberry pi and IFTTT. Got a few buttons in different rooms. Press the button and it changes the set point for that room to a particular temperature for an hour. Or whatever temp you want for however long you want.


      While I appreciate it's not a straightforward thing to set up, once it's running it just works.

      Happy to post further details if anyone is interested

      Comment

      • paulockenden
        Automated Home Legend
        • Apr 2015
        • 1719

        #4
        Please share. Always fun to look at things like this.

        Comment

        • chippie
          Automated Home Lurker
          • Dec 2015
          • 5

          #5
          First, I ordered some Amazon Dash buttons - they are usually £4.99 each, but I got them for £1.99 each when they were on offer a week or 2 ago. I got ones for things I might want, as if you actually use the button, you get £4.99 off your first order, so the button pays for itself.

          I then set up dasher on my pi - see https://github.com/maddox/dasher

          I did have some problems with it not working, due to the version of node.js, but after some fiddling around, found a version that worked (sorry, can't remember which one!! I'll see if I can find out)

          Once that is up and running, you have to part register the button with the amazon app on your phone, but don't complete the setup - this adds your wifi settings to the button. Then when you press a dash button it broadcasts a UDP and ARP broadcast packet to the network, and dasher on the pi is listening out for this (you have to get the MAC address of the button and add that to the dasher config).

          Then I set up a webhook on IFTTT, and dasher calls that when the button is pressed. That in turn uses the evohome scripts on IFTTT to do whatever you want. In my case, for a boost, the button in my lounge changes the lounge set point to 24 degrees for 1 hour.

          I bought 10 of the buttons to play with - the idea of a boost button for a specific room was the main reason, as I just find it a faff using the app or controller to set a manual 1 hour boost for an individual room, nut they were cheap, so I got loads - need to think of some other things to use them for.

          Comment

          • G4RHL
            Automated Home Legend
            • Jan 2015
            • 1580

            #6
            The simplest is use the Custom Menu. I used to have it set as a boost for some zones to a higher temperature but then found I rarely used it.

            I agree wholeheartedly with Hoppy’s comments about the app. It is missing so much, apart from a decent appearance, but what is missing is surely very easy for an app programme writer to do. I rarely use the Control Panel for anything now, it’s a sluggish pain to plough through and as I have it all set as I want I make do with the app. But that app needs a lot more functionality that ought to have been there long ago.

            Comment

            • philchillbill
              Automated Home Legend
              • Jan 2017
              • 591

              #7
              Rather late response, but I implemented this via a perl script kicked off by Alexa.

              Comment

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