I primarily use the dimmer switch via zigbee bindings to smart bulbs in lamps in my rooms. Most of these rooms have one overhead light that the regular switched used to serve. I rarely use that light but currently its just disconnected so i can have the switch plugged in and not have to add a gang to my box. Id like to see a firmware feature where the relay/dimmer was separate from the “virtual” state of the switch and could be toggled by the config button. Then i can use the paddle for the lamps like normal. But can still use the config button to turn the overhead on when i need it.
Another use case is for the on/off switch. I have mine controlling power to a fan. Id like to be able to control this on and off by the config button and bind the paddle to the lights again via zigbee bindings.
It would a parameter “config controls load” and just separates the load control from the virtual dimmer.
It wouldn’t be quite as elegant or fast, but maybe you could manage this with some sort of automation and combination of settings.
Perhaps you could not put it into smart bulb mode, but enable local protection and leave remote protection disabled. Assuming it still sends zigbee commands in this mode, then your automations and bindings could still work and you could turn the load off via the config button. Then you could also do something like change the led color for when the load is on/off.
You’d have to be careful dealing with remotely and probably create some virtual switches to separately handle the load part vs the smart bulb part to make it easier.
I think someone did something like that here:
I kind of like your idea for my bathroom on/off switches as the fans are only on/off, no speeds involved, so it would let me potentially consolidate a 2-1 and a on/off into one switch and let config control manual on/off of the fan.
I’m pretty sure local protection will prevent the binding commands. But you shouldn’t need it. See if an automation to toggle the smart fan mode w/the config button will accomplish what you’re looking for. The smart fan mode will keep paddle presses from affecting the wired load, but I’m not sure of that settings effect on binding commands.
Ah, right, I did know that local protection would disable the binding commands as I use that feature elsewhere (to intentionally disable them). I guess it still sends out zigbee actions that can be used in an automation, but the events are not sent to any bound devices.
I think the issue here is ultimately that there doesn’t seem like there’d be a way to prevent the binding command from being triggered when you turn on/off the load of the switch, right?
There are a couple parameters in the new on/off that seem undocumented , like “Alternate Smart Load Control Mode”, but I assume none of those are related.
My thinking is that if the config button isn’t bound then pressing it won’t send a binding command in and of itself. I would not think that a switch turning order off via an automation would either, but this is edge case stuff and you won’t know until you try it.
I think the issue was that OP wanted the up down paddles to be bound to lights and the config button to turn on and off the load. I think any automation that sent a command to the switch to turn on or off the load would trigger whatever binding is on the switch to the lights.
Maybe a better way to think about it is that the load should be its own switch. And there could be a setting to bind that to the config button as a toggle or to the “virtual dimmer” light entity.