The smart home has been often promised and typically half delivered, few products exist that deliver you “the package”, and to be honest that’s still the case today. However, with the right combination of pieces, you can get close, and with just a few more integrations I think the IOT/ home automation is close to delivering.
With Belkin’s recent announcement that their WeMo range will integrate with the Google Assistant, we thought it would be good to see what WeMo can do before and after the integration.
Today we’re focusing on one of Belkin’s more interesting WeMo home automation products the WeMo Maker. The Maker is a WiFi device that can both accept an input and control a simple device. While I had several projects in mind the Garage door just seemed the most awesome.
I bought a Reed switch (like a window sensor in a home alarm) and wired that to the Maker to sense when the Garage door is Closed. I then wired the Maker control output to the wired switch input on my Garage door opener, walla. We now have a garage door controllable by WiFi using the WeMo app, which is awesome in itself.
Enter Google Home / Pixel and IFTTT. Having configured the Wemo app to control the garage door, all you have to do is connect the WeMo app to your IFTTT account. Now, connect Google Assistant to your IFTTT account. Then program a new applet to accept a voice input and toggle your door.
Why the sensor you say? I’ve got a habit of leaving my garage door open all night, now I get a notification telling me it’s open before I go to bed. If it is, I simply ask Google – “Hey Google, activate garage door”.
What’s next? Perhaps a Geofence that opens my garage door as I arrive home, or perhaps I need to get a few more Makers to create my external lighting system I have planned. One thing’s for sure, I cant’ wait for official Google Assistant integration, I just hope it brings rich features!
Imagine Google Home saying at 9pm “Excuse me, the garage door is open, do you want to close it?” … now that’s the future.
