I as at my local Home Depot and saw a display of Quirky products. The Nimbus caught my eye. I went home and did some research on the product and found out that they are going to release an api for the products very soon. I just got in on the api and looking at it as we speak. I plan on using the Nimbus to show my weather station data in my living room. I may pick up more of them to have around the house.
For those of you who do not know what the Nimbus is, it is a device with 4 dials on it. Each dial contains a digital display to display text and a digital dial to show in analog form the content you want to display. It is pretty slick.
Lol, now that I think about it you are right it is almost like Brookstone. However, I do see some potential with the Nimbus. And I got it at HomeDepot for 89 bucks.
Just caught this thread & showed my wife the product web page for the egg tray. In my most serious voice I asked, if she could really use something like this? She looked at me like I was an alien.
[quote=“Z-Waver, post:2, topic:178534”]OMG! Quirky is like Brookstone, only worse! More expensive and even more tempting.
I could easily do much more than Nimbus with a much cheaper Android tablet[/quote]
My thoughts exactly.
Don’t get me wrong, I actually appreciate analog displays more than digital, but this thing is just overpriced. I’m researching an elegant way to mount and power tablets around my house for the HA and other info family members might want.
[quote=“TC1, post:5, topic:178534”][quote=“Z-Waver, post:2, topic:178534”]OMG! Quirky is like Brookstone, only worse! More expensive and even more tempting.
I could easily do much more than Nimbus with a much cheaper Android tablet[/quote]
My thoughts exactly.
Don’t get me wrong, I actually appreciate analog displays more than digital, but this thing is just overpriced. I’m researching an elegant way to mount and power tablets around my house for the HA and other info family members might want.[/quote]
Agreed. Further, since I began my escapade last week to use an Android tablet for vocalizing things I’ve begun to replace some of the automation in Vera with Tasker logic. Eventually the Vera will just be sending events (via Vera Alerts notifications) to the tablet and Tasker will control the corresponding activity. I’ve moved about 10 scenes to this model so far and it works very well. Using AuthomationHD to control the Vera from Tasker works nicely, and having all of the logic for scenes consolidated in one place is convenient.
For example, if Vera detects motion in the basement it raises the event to Tasker. Tasker turns on the basement lights and redirects my TV’s to show the IPCam monitor app on the TV (via AutoRemote and Google TV, which I’ve got on all my sets). It can also optionally read all alerts through the TV’s, muting them before speaking. If I’m not present in the house, Tasker will send my cell phone an alert, which will also call up the IPCam app there. Since my primary Vera install is at a weekend house I can have it redirect all my alerts to my home TV’s too.
Emails and logging and all are much more easily handled in Tasker.
Eventually, I’ll package the scenes as widgets to use on multiple cheap tablets around the house. Only one will be the head node responsible for the automation, but any others can be used to trigger scenes manually. A lot of nerdy goodness.
[quote=“garrettwp, post:1, topic:178534”]I as at my local Home Depot and saw a display of Quirky products. The Nimbus caught my eye. I went home and did some research on the product and found out that they are going to release an api for the products very soon. I just got in on the api and looking at it as we speak. I plan on using the Nimbus to show my weather station data in my living room. I may pick up more of them to have around the house.
For those of you who do not know what the Nimbus is, it is a device with 4 dials on it. Each dial contains a digital display to display text and a digital dial to show in analog form the content you want to display. It is pretty slick.
I ended up picking up a Quirky Nimbus at Homegoods for $29 last week. As many reviews mention it doesn’t work very well with the Wink app, but you can use it with IFTTT so it becomes much more useful.
Garrettwp, did you end up doing anything with yours? I was hoping to show the status of my Garage Door Status from the Vera to one of the dials. Do you happen to have any suggestions as to the best way to accomplish this? Thanks
I got one for cheap a while back. I’m using the Maker Channel on IFTTT along with a few Tasker Plugins (the AutoApps) on my Android phone. Here’s what my Nimbus is doing. All are using AutoRemote (via Maker Channel on IFTTT) to make this happen.
-Via AutoXBMC, Dial 1 is showing the band playing on my HTPC.
-Via AutoWeather, Dial 2 is showing me the high & low temp. I have it updated every hour.
-Via AutoWeather, Dial 3 is showing current temp - updated every 30min
-Via AutoWeather, Dial 3 is showing current conditions - updated every 30min
Not very exciting, but I’m planning on doing more later. The Nimbus is limited. At it’s original price, it is ridiculous, but for the sale price, it is almost worth it.
To get it to show your garage door, you should use AutoRemote, Maker Channel, and AutoVera…It should work, but you do need an Android device & Tasker
[quote=“toddst, post:8, topic:178534”]I got one for cheap a while back. I’m using the Maker Channel on IFTTT along with a few Tasker Plugins (the AutoApps) on my Android phone. Here’s what my Nimbus is doing. All are using AutoRemote (via Maker Channel on IFTTT) to make this happen.
-Via AutoXBMC, Dial 1 is showing the band playing on my HTPC.
-Via AutoWeather, Dial 2 is showing me the high & low temp. I have it updated every hour.
-Via AutoWeather, Dial 3 is showing current temp - updated every 30min
-Via AutoWeather, Dial 3 is showing current conditions - updated every 30min
Not very exciting, but I’m planning on doing more later. The Nimbus is limited. At it’s original price, it is ridiculous, but for the sale price, it is almost worth it.
To get it to show your garage door, you should use AutoRemote, Maker Channel, and AutoVera…It should work, but you do need an Android device & Tasker[/quote]
Ideally, I’m looking for away to handle this via LUA. I want to use the garage door as a trigger and just execute a LUA command to update the Nimbus Dial to say Open or Close for the garage door. Planning to try to dig into the API and figure out if there is away to set the dial directly via LUA.
The solution you have sounds interesting as well. So how does the flow work on your setup?
Android phone–>AutoVera–>AutoRemote (Tasker Plugin)–>Makers Channel on IFTTT–>Nimbus Dial Updated
[quote=“kenray536, post:9, topic:178534”]The solution you have sounds interesting as well. So how does the flow work on your setup?
Android phone–>AutoVera–>AutoRemote (Tasker Plugin)–>Makers Channel on IFTTT–>Nimbus Dial Updated[/quote]
Yep, that’s exactly how I do it. Both AutoVera & AutoRemote are Tasker Plugins.
With the updates to his plug my Nimbus has now become my Vera status station. I am able to trigger to update based on anything I want and I can write the status of any device(s) I want to the gauges. I’m currently using it to show the status of my garage door but I plan to expand on this. I have it sitting next to my bed so it’s nice to be able to see what’s going on with a quick glance.
With the updates to his plug my Nimbus has now become my Vera status station. I am able to trigger to update based on anything I want and I can write the status of any device(s) I want to the gauges. I’m currently using it to show the status of my garage door but I plan to expand on this. I have it sitting next to my bed so it’s nice to be able to see what’s going on with a quick glance.[/quote]
This is so awesome! Thanks for posting this. Time to update the Wink app on my Vera.
With the updates to his plug my Nimbus has now become my Vera status station. I am able to trigger to update based on anything I want and I can write the status of any device(s) I want to the gauges. I’m currently using it to show the status of my garage door but I plan to expand on this. I have it sitting next to my bed so it’s nice to be able to see what’s going on with a quick glance.[/quote]
This is so awesome! Thanks for posting this. Time to update the Wink app on my Vera.[/quote]
You’re welcome, this change opens up a lot of possibilities. Props to Cybrmage who did the work. Enjoy!
FYI, you can set both labels on the Nimbus. The first and the second. (To access the 2nd label you just press down on the Nimbus dials. There are buttons underneath on both sides). You can also set the brightness on the Nimbus using these buttons. I didn’t know this because my Nimbus didn’t come with a Manual but I discovered it while poking around in the Wink API.
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