One of the common uses of the motion detector is to turn on a light when someone comes into a room. But whether to do that or not should often depend on how much light is already available. And the LZW60 can measure that too! But I’d like the illuminance measure to be available as of the time the motion is detected.
If I walk into a dark room, the light should come on. If I turn on a different light in the same room, or even the same light that the motion is controlling before the motion is detected then the motion routine shouldn’t run.
Possible? Useful?
Absolutely. The LZW60 exposes both motion and illuminance. It depends on what you use for your automations, but in essence predicate the light turning turning on on both.
For example . . . IF there is motion AND illuminance is less than X, THEN turn the light on.
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Hi @Bry,
That’s exactly what I’m doing. The problem is when that illuminance was measured - I’ve got mine reporting every 15 minutes (default is 2 hours). But it’s periodic, so the automation is working with old data (in my case up to 15 minutes ago). What I was suggesting is the option to send the illuminance measure at the same time as the motion.
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OK, I understand now. I have no idea if that’s possible. If you are just using this for low level illuminance detection, then lower the reporting interval AND the reporting threshold to insure you are not reporting too often. Not perfect, but closer to what you want.
Is this natural light detection, or something else? Does the light level change that much in 15 minutes?
Hi @Bry,
We’re in the ‘suggestions & wishlist’ section, so I was thinking of this a a feature for a new firmware.
I’m really thinking of some other light - natural light we can probably get close with sunrise/sunset & an offset.
What I’m trying to design/optimize is turning a light on to help me fumbling around in the dark at night. So I going through the full/ideal specs I’m thinking of…
- Turn light on low when there’s motion. Save previous light level.
- When motion stops, turn light off and reset to saved level (when the light is manually turned on the next morning, it goes to a normal level)
- If there’s enough light to see anyway, don’t do anything
The ‘exception’ cases I was trying to trap…
If I turn the lights off & head for bed, then fairly immediately, remember something & come back - the periodic illuminance measure is probably from before the lights were turned off, so no night light
And the other way round, before coming into the room, I turn on some other (or the same) light, no need for a motion response.