Saying Goodbye To Vera

Community Playground General Discussions
61

[quote=“ChrisK, post:60, topic:189772”]For those who are concerned that the learning curve is steep for Openhab, it is, but you don’t have to commit to it or do it in a day. You can just kind of slide it in over time like I did.

First I got Openhab up and running the demo code. Then started to build my configuration. I imported the information from my Vera using scripts written by guessed. The Vera was still running as before. I tried a simple rules to see if I could control my Vera.

As I felt more comfortable with Openhab I recreated my scenes and triggers from Vera into rules on Openhab. Today my Vera is just a Z-Wave controller. I can still control it using UI5, AltUI, or my favorite, OpenWave. Openhab has its own web interfaces, but I don’t use them for control much, yet.

Now, I do like my Vera, but I am in a very good position to drop it for a Z-Wave stick if I want to. I can move my installation from a RaspBerry Pi to a Mac or Windows. I am not dependent on any specific hardware platform. If a Vera Plus does come out and look appealing to me, I might buy one, but Openhab will control it.[/quote]

I definitely want to make the jump to OpenHAB but I run many plugins that are critical and some even connect to 3rd party devices and apps and have a ton of stuff in PLEG.

But the day that OpenHAB can support all of it cant come too fast!

62

Which plugins are missing in openhab?

I made the jump to OH about six months ago and have been pleasantly surprised to see the vast support all the OH bindings offer. I do think vera probably edges out openhab I little.

Moving from PLEG (which I love) was my biggest concern, but it didn’t turn out to be that bad actually. I also did it piece by piece.

I do feel the openhab + vera combo is the best method out there now for it’s versatility and reliability, and I’m saying that with a straight face! Haha

63

[quote=“silencery, post:62, topic:189772”]I do think vera probably edges out openhab I little.[/quote]Would you expand on why you feel this?

64

I’m not ready to jump ship quite yet, but I find myself thinking about it more and more every few days. You know, when I have to power cycle it because it just decides to quit working. I’m going to put a mechanical timer on it or something to do this “automatically”

Really helps my WAF ::slight_smile:

65

Sorry, should have clarified this. This is just based on my own gut reaction and broad generalization; I have not done any hard comparisons. I am only basing this statement on a simple estimate of quantity of vera plugins available. At last count, I remember openhab had somewhere around 100 bindings. I don’t know what the actual number of vera plugins available is, but it should be more than 100.

Of course, quantity doesn’t matter if the quality isn’t up to snuff. In terms of quality of expansion (bindings), I feel openhab wins out. Many equivalent plugins are better written in OpenHAB or expose a little bit more functionality. This isn’t a knock against the vera community, just an acknowledgement that OpenHAB was designed to be robust and extensible from the ground up.

Moreover, interoperability with most of the popular systems is already available. When I made the move to OpenHAB, I did not find myself missing any plugins (In fact, I was actually introduced to some awesome new expandability options through OH such as MQTT). For our specific environment, everything was covered. This includes DSC alarm, Harmony, Nest/Ecobee (Thanks Watou!), Weather, Sonos, Plex/Kodi, Hue, Occupancy. These seem to be the majors for most people, but of course everyone’s environment is different, so YMMV.

Vera’s huge draw over all other HA systems has always been high connectivity with other systems. Even if OpenHAB isn’t quite there just yet, it is VERY close and will probably match or beat vera soon.

Either way, what I love about the Vera + OH combination is how robust it is. In the rare case something you need does not exist in OH, you can always fall back to a vera plugin since the excellent MIOS OH binding will probably expose that device to OH.

66

do you know if there is a binding for the ELK alarm plugin in OpenHAB?

67

Sorry, I don’t know. However, if one doesn’t exist, you can still use the vera plugin and send the status of your M1 sensors to openhab to integrate into your rules processing.

68

PLEG is what many of us rely on for the bulk of the logic. It is a must to make a migration to openLUUP possible. And I have a lot of other device integration I would require (see below)
My system is split up far too much already I don’t want to run more separate things.
I already have…
ISY for Insteon (I have 30+ Insteon switches - too costly to change out and Insteon dimmers are WAY better than Zwave )
Wink for Zigbee
Amazon Echo
EVL3
Kodi
Harmony Hub
Ecobee
Onkyo
Denon
and a few others[/quote]

I’m also interested in this anwser, what plugins does it run?

PLEG
VERA Alerts
Vera Proximity
Sonos
Thinking Cleaner (roomba)
GE Caddx Alarm
MultiSwitch
MultiString
WeatherUnderground

Are the majors I use.

69

[quote=“integlikewhoa, post:68, topic:189772”]I’m also interested in this anwser, what plugins does it [openLuup] run?

PLEG
VERA Alerts
Vera Proximity
Sonos
Thinking Cleaner (roomba)
GE Caddx Alarm
MultiSwitch
MultiString
WeatherUnderground

Are the majors I use.[/quote]

PLEG is the biggest issue, perhaps, because it is licensed and encrypted. Richard was going to take a look at this - I don’t know what the status is. I hate to hassle, perhaps better if an actual PLEG user asked? Since openLuup relies on AltUI for its interface, there are many more easy options for triggering scenes than on Vera UI, because AltUI bases its triggers on device variable watches, as does PLEG. Of course, I fully understand that anyone would be loathe to lose the awesome functionality which is PLEG. It’s just that I have never needed to use it myself.

Sonos and MultiString I can vouch for, since I do use them. Also WeatherUnderground, but I’m running an old version - I think the latest one might be encrypted?

On one of the openLuup threads we’re (@CudaNet mostly) slowly working through a list. I’ll try and get a definitive list up, but it’s hard to check out plugins for hardware that you haven’t got, so we need to rely on others (that’s what a BB is for, right?)

70

Biggest regret I’ve had was jumping in without enough research and getting the incontrol HA software.

Vera is much better and more stable in my experience

71

Just wondering, anyone know of a Visonic Powermax Pro Alarm Plugin for Openhab? I haven’t been able to find one.

72

There are a bunch of openHAB Community threads on Powermax Bindings, from @lolodomo, like this one:

 https://community.openhab.org/t/powermax-binding/2824
73

Seems like you would get better answers if you asked the question on an OPENHAB forum, instead of on one of their competitors forums… Just saying.

Sent from my XT1585 using Tapatalk

74

I have to say, there was a time where I wanted to give the Vera Edge a shot with my waffle hammer. Slowly, I have begun to accept it and do see that the support people are trying. I’ve now ordered a “plus” and will set them up in Master / Slave, since my other building is 200 feet away and would rather have a herdwired ethernet connection, that I have, rather that rely on the “mesh network” for a backbone.
I am successfully running 5 of the new(er) Aeon Multisensors . a HAndful of Honeywell T-stats and a Aeon HEM.

Right now I have still have several issues, but used to have many more.

!: Ghosts keep popping up on one of the thermostat channels, They are clones of the Multisensors. If I reload the firmware, they go away

2: I cant get the graphical part to f the energy monitor to work.

But they are trying, give the poor Techs a chance!! It’s not easy to understand dozens of manufacturers API’s and lingos!

Joe

75

Patchski, how are you getting the Honeywell T-stats to work? Are they Wifi and you use the TCC plugin? Or, are you using z-wave T-stats?

76

[quote=“NickTheGreat, post:64, topic:189772”]I’m not ready to jump ship quite yet, but I find myself thinking about it more and more every few days. You know, when I have to power cycle it because it just decides to quit working. I’m going to put a mechanical timer on it or something to do this “automatically”

Really helps my WAF ::)[/quote]Happens to me every week or so. It seems like the Z-Wave section locks up in some way and the only thing that will fix it is a power cycle. Resetting the Z-Wave chip or doing a software reboot does not fix the problem.

The other problem I’ve had is with Evolve devices. I have 7 LTM-5 switches I bought at the same time and of the 7 I’ve had 5 fail. Yes, they are out of warrantee but heck 5 out of 7 failures! That’s got to be either a bad batch or a serious design problem.

The other issue which neither Vera or Evolve will address, other than a little lip service, is the LRM-AS locking up. The only way to get them back is to cycle the air-gap switch. This always comes in bursts with multiple switches locking up at the same time. Evolve says it’s Vera’s fault and Vera’s says it’s Evolve’s fault. I’ve sent another message to Evolve about these issues so will see what they say. I’ll report back how they respond or if again I get no response.

This is just a few of the reasons I’m about to give them the boot. If a company doesn’t want to figure out why failures are happening then maybe they should get out of the business.

As it stands I really don’t know that I want to get a new Vera Plus to just toss the whole damn things.

77

I recently had my Vera Edge (RMA) by support and my local distributor Vesternet in the UK agreed to send me a Vera Plus (paid difference in cost)
I received my Vera Plus Monday 22nd February 2016.
at about 1600h GMT that day I plugged it in to my Home Broadband system (BT ISP with parental controls turned on More about this later).

The first problem was the Home.Getvera.com process failed to pick up my device automatically when I click the add device button on the dashboard.
I added it manually using the serial number and mac address printed on the label on the bottom of the device.
Some errors appeared on the screen saying update un-successful etc and the unit then could not be accessed via the dashboard.

I found the local ip address of the unit and connected my web-browser to it (both Internet explore and google chrome and CTRL F5 etc)

The unit after a long pause reported “Luup engine is taking longer to reload.”

I felt Doomed at this point because this was where it all started from with my Vera Edge which had been recovered by support twice since I got in in Aug-2015.

The unit wasn’t responding to anything.(normal eg Portal ,Apps and web Browser)
I was advised by Vesternet support to Hard Reset the unit.

I tried to hard reset the unit by holding in the Reset PIN for 30 seconds,
I then left it for 30 Mins.
It was still in the same state as before the hard reset.eg

Unable to log into the until via HTTP:\ (Luup engine is taking longer to reload.error message)
Unable to connect via the Portal http://home.getvera.com
Could Ping the Unit via
Was still able to SSH using putty to the unit.

At this point I thought I would try the reset via the SSH method.

Again run as per the application note vesternet sent me the link for APNT-121 - Vera Edge & Vera Plus Reset – Vesternet

This time I left it for an 45 Mins.
The status of the unit (with no power cycle)

Unable to log into the until via HTTP:\ (Luup engine is taking longer to reload.error message)
Unable to Ping the Unit via
Unable to connect to SSH using putty to the unit.

The power light had remained flashing for 45 mins and all other lights were on except the Bluetooth LED.

Tried setting my IP address to the special IP Address as per KB-97 - I can't access my VERA Edge on the local network, what should – Vesternet
so my special IP address for my Vera Plus is MAC=ee:66:66:22:22:e1 last 4 Characters convert to 192.168.22.51 (example only).
At this point status of unit was still

Unable to log into the until via HTTP:\ (Luup engine is taking longer to reload.error message)
Unable to Ping the Unit via
Unable to Ping the Unit via
Unable to connect to SSH using putty to the unit.

The power light had remained flashing and all other lights were on except the Bluetooth LED.

So decided to Power of unit.
Now the status of the unit is

Unable to log into the until via HTTP:\ (Luup engine is taking longer to reload.error message)
am able to Ping the Unit via
am able connect to SSH using putty to the unit.

Vesternet suggestion was that because my ISP was BT that the parental controls could be causing an issue.
See this KB-73 - Why isn't my VERA Edge working properly with my BT Internet se – Vesternet

So I took the unit to another location without the BT ISP issue and run the above again, with the same results.
except I was able to use the portal to register the unit, and it reported it was doing an update but ultimately the unit ended up in the same state again.

Its seems to me the unit is corrupted and cant be hard reset to solve the problem.

so using info from

I have a copy of all the logs I could get off the unit. (I have raised a support Ticket with Vera)
It is connect to Internet connection with no firewall or parental controls.

i am Unable to log into the until via HTTP:\ (Luup engine is taking longer to reload.error message)
am able to Ping the Unit via
am able connect to SSH using putty to the unit.
The unit is still removed from my home.getvera.com account after the last failed Hard reset which must have worked partly as this Unit has been removed from my dashboard.
No lights are changing and a continuous ping to the unit shows no loss of connectivity during this cycle.
Remote assistance is enabled it says.

I am seriously thinking about saying good Bye Been on this Since Vera Lite days.
I am an Industry Automation Engineer/Manager, over 25 Years been working on Technology at all levels.
Have extensive Knowledge of how this stuff works under the hood but am disappointed by this and don’t want to give up but really cant see a way forward.
I haven’t even tackled the task of getting my 70 Plus zwave devices working again with a new box, Without the old unit to move the Zwave settings from.

78

Sadly my 8 month experience with a Vera Edge echoes many of the problems stated here. I agree that this forum is well attended and helpful but unfortunately the device itself seems flaky and not fit for much more than timing lights on and off. My Edge was stable for the first 6 months but it has always been very difficult to pair new devices (requiring multiple attempts and often trailing leads to get the controller next to the device). I find it odd that there are postings on this forum from people reporting that they have never had any problem pairing devices and have never had to move a device closer to the controller and yet of the 10 or so devices I have in my system not one has taken less than about a half hour of fiddling with to get it to pair. Why the huge discrepancy in user experience? I have tried to document my own user guides (those published by Vera are either outdated, innacurate or misleading) but I’ve often found that what worked last time no longer works so its a fruitless task to try and document anything in detail). Several weeks ago I started trying to add more functionality using plugins like PLEG. For a time this seemed to be the answer to getting a home automation system that was more than just a light timer but now I am getting LUUA engine taking too long to start and despite trying all the advice offered on this forum (including, to date, 4 hard re-sets) it crashed again last night (just the power light flashing this morning) and although a further re-set and backup today has got it halfway back to where it was I am not confident it will stay that way. I am a long time Linux user and comfortable to tinker under the bonnet but I didn’t buy this box to have to keep re-building it. I am extremely reluctant to give up but I am now close to declaring this device ‘not fit for purpose’ and looking for alternatives.

79

I am one to give Vera the boot and moved 2 of the 3 houses to Homeseer. So I have had problems is what I’m trying to say but adding devices was NOT one of them. I did have trouble adding VRCS2-MRZ on Vera but I ran into the same problems on Homeseer also.

I use alot of GE switches and those have been super easy on both systems. I don’t believe in battery devices and those seem to have including problems also since they need to wake up, have a force wakeup or other tricks, but again I would suspect those are the same on any system do the nature of batteries and conserving batteries.

So my point is I think your problems with adding devices are different due to the type of devices and maybe even how far they are from your controller. But known devices that have trouble seem to have the same trouble on other systems is my experience. One think that is a VERA issue is the random disconnect or red unhappy face when a device looses connection.

80

you may be right. To be honest I could live with a few hassles pairing the devices (and obviously MCV don’t have the same level of control over peripherals as the likes of MS or Apple) but the lack of attention to detail is reflected all over the Vera UI and no doubt is in the core code as well. The Vera boxes are cheap, I’m sure that many would happily pay twice as much if it meant that MCV put more effort into the product. As it is, I don’t want to keep trying new products and finding each brings along a new set of problems but nor do I want a ‘science project’ so I for one am hoping that MCV can turn this into a stable product some time soon.