Combine Schedule and Arrive/Leave Automations

[R1BennettX]

I need help programming automations. The new Arlo app automations isn't intuitive and the help topics don't help for real-world use cases that combine schedule and arrive/leave.

Context: I've used the three OotB modes: Arm Away, Arm Home, and Standby. My outside cameras are always active (including Standby mode). Therefore, Standby mode is used for when any phone is at home during the day. At night, when anyone is home, I use Arm Home mode to start recordings for both outside and inside cameras. Arm Away is used when everyone is outside the geofence regardless of day or night. In this mode, there are additional alerts for any inside activity.

Partial Solution: The following automations work together fine and as expected.

Schedule: I've set up schedule automations to define the times of day and night and switch modes accordingly. The Night at Home automation changes the mode to Arm Home and the Day at Home automation changes mode to Standby. Night at Home automation is enabled when in Standby mode only; Day at Home is enabled when in Arm Home mode only. This should mean that when Arm Away mode is active, the schedule changes should be ignored. 

Leave: When all phones leave the geofence, my Leave automation changes the mode to Arm Away. The Leave automation is enabled when in Standby or Arm Home mode, so it can Arm Away regardless of when we leave - day or night.

Problem: I'm not sure how to program the arrive use case. I have set up an Arrive automation for each person that may arrive home. That way any one person arriving should trigger the mode change. They are enabled only when in Arm Away mode, which should be obvious why. The issue I have is that I need an AND condition, or an IF...THEN logic, to distinguish whether it is day or night during the arrival and change the mode appropriately to Standby in the daytime and Arm Home in the night. I don't see a way to accomplish.

Any help welcome.

[jguerdat]

That isn't currently available. Geofencing and schedules can't be combined like they used to when using the old user interface that uses Library to view recordings. You can only change modes, not schedules. Hopefully this will be added down the road.

[R1BennettX]

That is disappointing news. Parity with old should be a foundational requirement for replacement of old with new function. It seems that a simple enhancement would be to include an action to run a schedule automation.

[StephenB]

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@R1BennettX wrote:

It seems that a simple enhancement would be to include an action to run a schedule automation.

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The problem here is that the new user experience doesn't really have the concept of a camera schedule.  Instead, you schedule an automation that will change the system mode when runs.  Not a good approach, since it is not grounded in how the user wants to manage their cameras.

I think to fix this they need to change the approach to have one or more camera schedules (similar to before), and then use Arrive and Leave automations to switch to one of those schedules.  Unfortunately not that simple a fix.

[KachinaShadow]

Pretty much the same issue here...

Since I use Sunrise/Sunset to activate a mode and at Sunset it changes from Arm Home (which has certain cameras disabled and others with different settings) to Arm Away (which basically has everything activated) and I then leave the house after sunset it remains in the Arm Away mode (since Leave activates Arm Away) but when I come back later the Arrive automation doesn't know that it's still after sunset so it activates the Arm Home mode and then I have to remember to change to Arm Away manually.

You're correct in stating that there needs to be an IF/THEN setting that you could make an exception for, in my case, whether you're in the Sunset or Sunrise period or by a specific time frame.

Paul

[StephenB]

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@KachinaShadow wrote:

You're correct in stating that there needs to be an IF/THEN setting that you could make an exception for, in my case, whether you're in the Sunset or Sunrise period or by a specific time of day.

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OR just have the system maintain two schedules - one when you are home, and a different schedule when you are away.  (Either schedule could just arm or disarm everything all the time).  Then have "Arrive" shift to the "Armed Home" Schedule,  and have "Leave" shift to "Armed Away" if everyone has left.  Also allow people to select either mode from the UI (As they can now), or from the home security hard buttons.

In other words, make "Home" and "Away" schedules, and not modes.  Then build in Armed and Disarmed (like before), and allow custom modes (like before).  

[KachinaShadow]

@ShayneS , @JamesC , @BrookeN 

Is there anywhere to submit suggestions to add needed features?

Paul

[BrookeN]

I have already added a feature request for custom modes. Is there another one that you have in mind?

[KachinaShadow]

Not yet...just the one we've been discussing in this thread.

Thanks

[TomoNZ]

Thanks for raising this feature request. I've found this thread out of my own frustrations in trying to setup geolocation with schedules. I really can't believe that Arlo have discarded this basic function during the app remodel!

Is there anyway we [Arlo consumers] can 'up vote' or weigh-in on your submitted request?

[grahamam107]

I have been struggling with this issue for many months now.  I thought I had a solution that worked, but recently all automations stopped working, so I am not sure now.  Anyway, for what its worth here are my automations.

A.  Schedule 1.  Arm home at 10 pm.

B.   Schedule 2.  Standby at 8 am.

C.   Home (leave) - Arm away when two specific devices leave the geofencing circle, AND send a notification, AND disable schedule 1 AND disable schedule 2

D.  Home (arrive) - When either of two specific devices arrive, set to Standby AND enable Schedule 1 AND enable schedule 2.

Adding the disabling items to automation C did get over the problem of automation B triggering even though users were still away.

Adding the enabling items in D, is a partial solution of re-enabling the Schedules, but not totally, because if someone arrives after 10 pm, the system is left in Standby instead of Arm Home.

Unfortunately, soon after implementing the above plan, something else seemed to go crazy at Arlo in about mid August and now nothing works.  I would be interested to know if someone else has used the above plan, or could try it out if it suits their use case.

[Jeffi]

I noticed the same change when updating to version 5 of the app this weekend while away. Although the issue may have been there all along and I just didn’t test the specific scenario of everyone being away for more than 24 hours and the schedules taking priority over geofencing if away for more than 24 hours ie geofencing staying away doesn’t over ride the schedule if away for more than 24 hours. 

[KachinaShadow]

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@Jeffi wrote:

specific scenario of everyone being away for more than 24 hours and the schedules taking priority over geofencing if away for more than 24 hours ie geofencing staying away doesn’t over ride the schedule if away for more than 24 hours. 

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I was just away for 6 days and also found that geofencing worked great for day 1 but after that it reverted back to the regular schedules that were set in routines. When already in geofencing away mode, it should stay in that mode until geofencing return is triggered.

[StephenB]

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@KachinaShadow wrote:

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I was just away for 6 days and also found that geofencing worked great for day 1 but after that it reverted back to the regular schedules that were set in routines. When already in geofencing away mode, it should stay in that mode until geofencing return is triggered.

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Are the schedule automations enabled in "Arm Away" (or whatever mode you are using for "geofencing away")?

If they are, you need to disable them when you are in that mode.

There are two places to check - one is in the mode itself, the other is in the schedule automations. 

[KachinaShadow]

@StephenB 

Since I already have scheduled automations (sunset & sunrise) activated in Arm Away, which is currently the mode that I am using in Geofencing Away, then I would assume that it would be best for me to duplicate what I have in Arm Away to the Standby mode (without any automations activated) and to use it in Geofencing Away.

[StephenB]

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@KachinaShadow wrote:

Since I already have scheduled automations (sunset & sunrise) activated in Arm Away, which is currently the mode that I am using in Geofencing Away, 

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I am confused - what are these automations doing?  I thought your goal was to disable the schedule Arm Away???

[KachinaShadow]

@StephenB 

"Arm Away" mode has been my nighttime mode with pretty much everything activated and the automation set to enable it at sunset and go back to "Home" mode at sunrise but I had also included it in geofencing "Leave".

Since you had said to disable any automations for whatever mode that was used in geofencing "Leave" and since I already use the "Away" mode with the sunset/sunrise automations enabled, I basically recreated it in "Standby" without any automations to use it in geofencing "Leave" instead of "Arm Away".

It just seemed like the best thing to do since I wasn't using "Standby" for anything and could basically duplicate my "Arm Away" mode without any automations...hope that makes sense, somewhat.

[alex_loo]

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@grahamam107 wrote:

I have been struggling with this issue for many months now.  I thought I had a solution that worked, but recently all automations stopped working, so I am not sure now.  Anyway, for what its worth here are my automations.

A.  Schedule 1.  Arm home at 10 pm.

B.   Schedule 2.  Standby at 8 am.

C.   Home (leave) - Arm away when two specific devices leave the geofencing circle, AND send a notification, AND disable schedule 1 AND disable schedule 2

D.  Home (arrive) - When either of two specific devices arrive, set to Standby AND enable Schedule 1 AND enable schedule 2.

Adding the disabling items to automation C did get over the problem of automation B triggering even though users were still away.

Adding the enabling items in D, is a partial solution of re-enabling the Schedules, but not totally, because if someone arrives after 10 pm, the system is left in Standby instead of Arm Home.

Unfortunately, soon after implementing the above plan, something else seemed to go crazy at Arlo in about mid August and now nothing works.  I would be interested to know if someone else has used the above plan, or could try it out if it suits their use case.

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hi @grahamam107 , in case you manually switch to ARM AWAY from Dashboard, schedule 1 and schedule 2 would NOT be disabled (vs what's done by C for you).  So I'd suggest removing "disable schedule 1 AND disable schedule 2" from C, and instead doing "disable schedule 1 AND disable schedule 2" under Routines > Modes > Arm Away.

And similar, for the geofencing switch to Standby.

Alex

[grahamam107]

@alex_loo Thanks for that suggestion.  I will can see the logic of what you suggest, and I have implemented it.

In the meantime other bugs have emerged.  For a while no automations worked, which was partially fixed (the  schedules) by deleting all aotomations and modes and reprogramming from scratch.  However, I can only get the leave automation to work with one device, not two.

More strangely, in the past week, when the schedule to activate Arm Home triggers, one of my 5 cameras (Essential Outdoor) fires always with the same time stamp as the automation, but I observe no movement in the recording.  Weird.  Obviously another bug introduced in Arlo’s feeble attempts to remove others.

[alex_loo]

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@grahamam107 wrote:

However, I can only get the leave automation to work with one device, not two.

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hi @grahamam107 , (and assuming your app is showing "feed", not "library")

Interestingly, I can at get my leave automation working --- though not always.  My case is 1 Android + 1 iPhone, and no subscription, and both devices logging in the same account.

Such "not always" behaviour also happens to my arrive automation.

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@grahamam107 wrote:

More strangely, in the past week, when the schedule to activate Arm Home triggers, one of my 5 cameras (Essential Outdoor) fires always with the same time stamp as the automation, but I observe no movement in the recording.  Weird.  Obviously another bug introduced in Arlo’s feeble attempts to remove others.

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This is another interesting thing.  Cameras are enabled/disabled under various modes, and so far for my 3x ultra 2 cameras, they have been behaving perfectly well, according to the mode they are assigned to.  Do you think if this weird camera of yours misbehaving only in a certain mode, or randomly?

Alex

[StephenB]

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@KachinaShadow wrote:

@StephenB 

"Arm Away" mode has been my nighttime mode with pretty much everything activated and the automation set to enable it at sunset and go back to "Home" mode at sunrise but I had also included it in geofencing "Leave".

Since you had said to disable any automations for whatever mode that was used in geofencing "Leave" and since I already use the "Away" mode with the sunset/sunrise automations enabled, I basically recreated it in "Standby" without any automations to use it in geofencing "Leave" instead of "Arm Away".

It just seemed like the best thing to do since I wasn't using "Standby" for anything and could basically duplicate my "Arm Away" mode without any automations...hope that makes sense, somewhat

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 Ok.  Generally if "Arm Away" is being used for Geofencing, then you do want the schedule to switch between "Arm Home" and "Standby".  Then the schedule won't kick in when you are away for multiple days.  Maybe check the reply here (marked as the solution):

• https://community.arlo.com/t5/Arlo-Secure/ARLO-Po-model-VMC-4030/m-p/2423038

It might be useful in clarifying how the automations work.

[KachinaShadow]

@StephenB 

Thanks for the info. It really helped to understand why the geofencing "Leave" wasn't staying active beginning the next day of a multiple day trip away from home...because I was using my "Arm Away" which still had the sunset/sunrise automations.

Since we're both retired and are either home most of the time, gone for short trips to the store or leave on the occasional vacation every couple of months our Arlo setup is pretty simple and really only needs two scenarios (basically home (day) with a couple of front cameras activated & away (night) with all devices activated).

With "Arm Away" (all devices activated) being used between sunset and sunrise (that sunset/sunrise feature is great by the way) it was certainly the best choice for the geofencing "Leave", but it never dawned on me to not have any automations included that would change it back to "Home" at sunrise and "Away" at sunset so by basically duplicating the "Arm Away" mode, without the automations, in "Standby" and using that for the geofencing "Leave" it should solve the problem.

Now all I have to do is plan another multiple day trip 😁