Are folks here happy with Domoticz?
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I want to pick a controller, but I don't want to jump in feet first only to find out later that it's somehow seriously flawed. Domoticz, Openhab, and Vera appear to be the most popular based on number of topics and posts. I think I can rule out Vera based on prior negative experience with it. So, I guess that makes it Domoticz vs. OpenHAB. Any reasons to prefer one over the other? The built-in graphing in Domoticz looks very appealing.
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I want to pick a controller, but I don't want to jump in feet first only to find out later that it's somehow seriously flawed. Domoticz, Openhab, and Vera appear to be the most popular based on number of topics and posts. I think I can rule out Vera based on prior negative experience with it. So, I guess that makes it Domoticz vs. OpenHAB. Any reasons to prefer one over the other? The built-in graphing in Domoticz looks very appealing.
@NeverDie I'm happy with Domoticz. Easy to use but after a while I wish it was a bit more flexible.
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I want to pick a controller, but I don't want to jump in feet first only to find out later that it's somehow seriously flawed. Domoticz, Openhab, and Vera appear to be the most popular based on number of topics and posts. I think I can rule out Vera based on prior negative experience with it. So, I guess that makes it Domoticz vs. OpenHAB. Any reasons to prefer one over the other? The built-in graphing in Domoticz looks very appealing.
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I was using Domoticz before getting my Vera controller. It had some limitations, as most of them do, but overall I thought it was good. I think Domoticz has easier to use graphing than Vera. I am actually still trying to figure out data mining on the Vera.
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I want to pick a controller, but I don't want to jump in feet first only to find out later that it's somehow seriously flawed. Domoticz, Openhab, and Vera appear to be the most popular based on number of topics and posts. I think I can rule out Vera based on prior negative experience with it. So, I guess that makes it Domoticz vs. OpenHAB. Any reasons to prefer one over the other? The built-in graphing in Domoticz looks very appealing.
@NeverDie I have been toying with domoticz lately and openhab 1 in the past but found them all too limiting for my use cases.
I'm gradually moving towards node-red with its recent ui modules.
Probably more work to get things running than a regular controller but much more powerful in the end. -
I've tried Domoticz at the beginning and was amazed at how easy it is to setup.
As other mentioned before I missed the flexibility and started with OpenHAB.I really like the flexibility of my setup:
- MySensors Binding with three gateways attached (1x USB, 1x Ethernet RF24, 1x Ethernet RFM69)
- Sonos
- Influx / Grafana
- node-red (for rules) https://flows.nodered.org/node/node-red-contrib-openhab or MQTT
- Pushover
- EbusD (heating)
- Samsung TV
- upcoming: Neato Vac
- OpenHAB App
I'm trying to combine the best out of all worlds which is really easy with OpenHAB.
Examples:
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I've installed a (good looking) push button as a doorbell directly attached to the USB mysensors gateway and if the button is pressed a message is send via Pushover to our phones and the sonos in the livingroom is playing a sound while the sonos in the room of our baby girl is quite while she's sleeping.
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At (dawn - 120 minutes) the rollershutters (MySensors node) are closed, except the shutters of the doors to our terrace which will be delayed by 45 minutes. Additionally a light (433 MHz socket from hardware store) in the corridor and lights on the terrace (MySensors node) are switched on. Everything is switched off automatically at a given time. Rules are defined in node-red.
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Pressure of the heating system (Ebus) is below 1.3 bar --> send Pushover to phones
The controller strongly depends on what you're up to. What devices are you using?
If you're only using MySensors and maybe other devices that support Domoticz and don't need that much flexibility: stick with Domoticz. It's a good choice.
If you have different devices, look into OpenHAB, if there's a binding.
If you need the full flexibility go with node-red. There are many extensions available for node-red to support Pushover, Sonos .... so maybe that's the way to go.
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Interesting. My earlier thoughts were MQTT and maybe adafruit.io as the quickest/easiest solution to get up and running, but I wasn't sure where to go from there if I did that. I still like that idea, but then I thought that starting with a trail like Domoticz that had already been blazed might, in the end, be even easier and quicker to setup, as any unknown gotcha's would have already been solved.
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I'm using FHEM as controller.
Pro's:- Open to a huge variety of hardware interfaces
- brings a lot of modules, also to implement standard logic tasks
- is written in perl, so if you know programming (especially in perl), it is pretty easy to implement extensive own logics
Con's:
- Forum is mostly in german, but all documentation is available in english (but sometimes may be hard to understand)
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Just to clarify I think Domoticz is very versatile and flexible when it comes to hardware but when it comes to GUI and how to visually show everything it's very nice but not configurable.
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Domoticz is very simple to get it running and if you don't need fancy functions it's OK. Of course there are more powerful solutions but you need to learn more an extra language (either for scripts or programs). I was looking at node-red too, but I don't have time right now to start learning Javascript and same for Openhab you still need to learn the code.
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To clarify things wrt. to FHEM:
It is pretty easy to set up and getting devices virtualised and browser-usable is also not a big issue, but without additional work not very nice-looking as a GUI (but nevertheless functional).
But as soon as you want to implement logics, it is relatively easy possible within this environment. -
I think I'll first give Pi Dome a try, since that allegedly has an actual MQTT broker built into it, and it's already on the list of mysensors controllers. If there are any other controllers also built around MQTT, I'd be interested to hear which ones.
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I've been using Domoticz for a while, because it was the most obvious system to use with my RFXTRX433 and my 433MHz modules.
I agree with what has been said: very easy to setup, nice graphs/history but limitations in UI are very frustrating. There's a nice API too, but I'm not feeling like reprogramming the full UI to have something that I enjoy.
I'm getting frustrated with the programming of events too, for very basic scenarios it's fine, but the way it works can quickly make it a mess. For example if you switch a light in a script it will re-trigger scripts based on light switching and you have no way to know if it was triggered by user action or by script, so you you have to start using global variables (declared in another part of the UI) to keep that information etc etcSo, I'll start my controller shopping season too relatively soon I think :)
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I would like to use Domoticz because of its popularity here in the MyS community, but I've given up every time this far. Lately because there seems to be an issue with Eth-Gws for other MyS-systems on the same network(?). And I've also noticed an annoying 2-3s delay from sensor reading to registration. And the UI doesn't feel flexible, lightweight and reliable. Too much like the Vera I used before. Not to mention other controllers "responsive huge white spaces UI style".
So, I'll continue with Fhem. A pain to master as non-German (nor Perl) speaking, but with a good feeling of old proven quality under the hood.
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I think I'll first give Pi Dome a try, since that allegedly has an actual MQTT broker built into it, and it's already on the list of mysensors controllers. If there are any other controllers also built around MQTT, I'd be interested to hear which ones.
@NeverDie said in Are folks here happy with Domoticz?:
I think I'll first give Pi Dome a try, since that allegedly has an actual MQTT broker built into it, and it's already on the list of mysensors controllers. If there are any other controllers also built around MQTT, I'd be interested to hear which ones.
Actually, I think I'll start with Domoticz. Except for the last comment above, it seems to at least "work" at some level for most people, whereas I'm not sure if the same can be said for PiDome.
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I am actually happy with domoticz. I have used it for about a year and its main advantage for was that it's very easy to learn and to use. Recently I discovered dzVents (which is now integrated in the domoticz beta) that allows for easier and more complex scripts. For now I was able to do anything I wanted in domoticz.
The UI isn't perfect (although openhaps is way worse imho) but it gets the job done.I also tried to use openhab (2) earlier but thats a totally different beast. You can do awesome stuff but it's REALLY hard to get started. The new ui in openhab 2 looks great but its still a weird mix of using text files and the ui.
HA also looks great but I haven't tried it yet.So overall I would start with domoticz and switch later if you are missing any features.
PS also domoticz updates (at least for features related to mysensors) seem to be implemented pretty slow. I have opened several tickets in their git where the answer was mostly: implemented on you own ;) Which is fine (I dont pay them afterall) but other systems seem to be way more active.
