Welcome to BroadLink Tech Park.
What’s the difference between smart home and connected home? Definitely the difference
is "SMART".
ON/OFF control, remote control, voice control... these functions are very common now. It's
not smart if every time I still need to use the phone or say something to let the device
act as what I want. What customers' real need is automations without attendance. For example:
Turn on lights automatically at sunset. Turn on air conditioner in cooling mode at
76℉ when it's getting hot. Notify me if the smart plug is offline.
This is the real magic of smart home and this is "Routines" in BroadLink app.
The function of routines is designed to enable automations of multiple devices and even interact
with external data. This can be called Routines, Automations, Triggers or Connections... depends
on which app you are using. Alexa, Google Home, SmartThings and IFTTT all have Routines
function.
Like the name, usually people set routines for daily or frequently used tasks and these
tasks can be performed fully automatically.
In BroadLink app, a routine consists of 3 parts: Triggers, Actions and Conditions. So,
you can set up a routine like "When A is triggered under condition B, do action C". Here the
trigger and action are mandatory, and condition is optional. You can also make it as "When
A is triggered, do action C". You can also add multiple triggers, actions or conditions,
like "When A1+A2 are triggered under condition B1+B2, do actions C1 and C2". It is very flexible
and easy to use.
To set routines, open BroadLink app and tap "Routines" at the bottom to switch to the
setting page. Then tap "Add" button to create a new routine.
First let's tap "When event triggers from". You'll see five options:
At specified time: Triggers the routine at a specific time on specific days, also, you
can customize a time you need. Weather changes: Set the weather, temperature,
or humidity at your local city as the trigger. Weather keeps in certain state: Similar to
the "Weather changes", but you can set the duration of
the state. Device operated: In this option, you can select
and set the device state in your device list as the trigger.
Device kept in certain state: Similar to the "Device operated", but you can set the duration
of the state.
Please pay attention when you set the change of state, you need to make sure the current
state does not reach the threshold so the system can detect the change. For example,
if you set the trigger as "When temperature rise to 86℉and keep for 1min", you need
to make sure the current temperature is below 86℉, otherwise the it will not be triggered.
After you've set up a trigger, you can start selecting actions to go with it by hitting
the "Do actions" button, which also brings up several options:
Control certain device: You can choose a device and specify an action. It supports any controllable
state of the device. Activate a scene: If you want to do more than
one action, definitely you can add all actions. But another better way is to add actions in
a scene and choose the scene here. Push notification on phone: You can get a
notification on phone when the event is triggered.
At last, you have optional condition can be set for the routine. We can see in the first
part, you can set more than one event as the triggers, but these events may not happen
at the same time (or we say they are connected by "or"). The relationship between "When event
triggers from" and "Under conditions" is more like "and", means if you set the conditions,
the routine will be only triggered when both are activated.
One more thing important, if you are living in a country with daylight saving time or
commonly called "winter and summer time", you need to enable the DST in routine setting,
otherwise the time set in triggers will have 1 hour difference.
Case 1
Some customers are wondering where is Sunrise & Sunset anymore in timer, actually we've
moved it into routines. Here we will take Sunrise & Sunset mode as an example to show
how routine works.
Create a routine, firstly we enter a routine name, then, tap "When event triggers from"
to add a trigger; here we can see sunrise and sunset mode are set in the option "At
specified time". We need to choose the current city and tap "OK" to save.
Then we set an action, when sunrises, open my curtain. Time to get up!
Tap save, OK done. we have created a simple routine.
Case 2
Some customers have not used the notification feature, here we also show you a case. We
set "when temperature rise to 86℉ and keep for 1min", turn on the AC and push me a notification.
Case 3
If you just want to get alert of device state change, another way is to set it in device
property. Enter device control page, tap the top right button and choose "Property". Then
tap "Notification setting". This is same as what you can do in Routines.
All routine results are saved in your account. To check your routine results, go to "Me"
page and tap "Notification center".
Here we also want to introduce our special pack – RM4 mini or RM4 pro with sensor cable.
With the sensor cable, not only you can easily check the temperature & humidity in last 24
hours, but also you can set the temperature & humidity as a trigger without using extra
sensors.
Buy one and try the powerful routines feature now! Create your innovative ideas and have
fun with your family! If you feel this feature is useful, please share this video with your
friends and tell us your experience on Facebook or Twitter. Your support is our passion!