Routines not Working Correctly

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN 
I have routines set up to go from arm home mode into standby mode between sunset and sunrise...here's what I have active on each routine...
ARM HOME - 2 Cameras, 1 Doorbell, NO lights
STANDBY - 4 Cameras, 1 Doorbell, 3 Lights
ARM AWAY - 7 Cameras, 1 Doorbell, 3 lights (everything active, recording and notifying)

Last night, hours after the system went into standby mode, I found that I had 1 camera and 1 light that were no longer sensing motion and after restarting the hub/base, both were now sensing motion.

This morning, after the system went from standby to arm home (and indicating so on the app), I found that all devices were still active as if they were still in standby mode (recordings, notifications, etc.) so I restarted the hub/base and nothing changed. After checking all routines and settings, I once again restarted the hub/base and this time the 2 cameras, that are included in standby but not in arm home, were no longer active in arm home (which is how they're supposed to be since they're not included in the arm home routine) but the 2 lights, which are NOT included in the arm home routine, continue to sense motion, send notifications and trigger the corresponding 2 cameras to record (the lights are set to trigger those 2 cameras when in standby but those lights and cameras are not included in the arm home mode).

So, what I now have is 2 lights that are sensing motion, sending annoying notifications and triggering recordings in corresponding cameras while in arm home mode when, in fact, those 2 lights are not even included in the arm home routine.

EDIT:
After posting this, I decided to unplug the hub/base for a few minutes and now everything is back to normal...other that trying to figure out just what happened in the first place and why I had to spend the morning messing with this, or if there is ever going to be a week that goes by when I don't have to spend hours trying to fix or figure out issues with this system? Very, very frustrating indeed!

[BrookeN]

Are you still seeing this behavior as resolved?

[KachinaShadow]

After unplugging the hub/base everything is back to normal and has remained so.

I just thought it was worth mentioning the whole ordeal since the changing behavior, upon restarting the hub/base multiple times, was really weird...especially things like the lights functioning, basically on their own, when not even included in the arm home routine 🤔

[BrookeN]

Thank you for letting me know. I did pass that information onto our team of what you were experiencing. If you see that behavior again, send me a dm and I will have someone look into it.  

[KachinaShadow]

👍

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN 
Unfortunately, this is not "solved"...the same thing happened this morning, not after it switched from standby to arm home at sunrise but after I restarted the VMB5000 hub, which I try to do weekly. I restarted the hub after finding the issue this morning and, like last time, that didn't solve the problem so I pulled the power to the hub for about three minutes and just like last time unplugging the hub fixed the issue, the lights no longer sense motion and send a notification when in arm home...remember, the lights are not even included in the arm home routine.

DM sent...

[KachinaShadow]

 @BrookeN 
Update to my last post...of my seven lights, the one that I checked after the reboot was not sending notifications but now, even after 2 reboots, the other six lights are still sensing motion and sending notifications when in arm home (none of those are included in the arm home routine!)
All seven lights are set up the same in both standby and arm away routines as follows...three are set to send notifications and four are not. Of the four that are not set to send notifications, three are on battery power only and one is powered full time (which is the only one that is not sending notifications). Of the three that are set to send notifications, two are on solar panels and one is on battery power only. 
I will continue to repower the hub, hoping that this resolves itself like last time because I can't have notifications for the lights being sent to me every time birds fly by and since none of the lights are included in arm home, there's no way to even turn off the notifications.

UPDATE: After unsuccessfully rebooting once more, I tried manually switching to standby and then back to arm home and that solved it. Besides the lights, there are 5 cameras that are not included in the arm home mode but, unlike the lights they did not mysteriously become active, so this issue is limited to just the lights.

Note that there was an issue, that began years ago, where the lights would send notifications whether or not notifications were selected (this began after an ongoing issue of the lights not sending any notifications, regardless of the setting, was resolved) and that the one powered light (with notifications turned off and was also the one that did not send notifications this morning) was the only light, then and now, that was able to turn notifications on or off when that issue came up years ago, and it's still the only light that is able to do so. Unfortunately, shortly after this issue began, the lights had reached EOL and even though the issue of being unable to turn off notifications had been created by the lights not sending notifications fix, it remained unresolved. Fortunately, three of my seven are just spare lights so it doesn't matter if notifications can't be turned off and, of the other four, the one where I need notifications to be off is the only one that's actually able to do so. The remaining three need to have notifications on even though with those three you have no choice as they always send notifications regardless.

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN 

Yesterday, I was just about to tell you that this problem hadn't reoccurred since the last time on 07/18. Unfortunately, that is not the case because this morning it started again.

In ARM HOME I have - 2 Cameras, 1 Doorbell, NO Lights, NO Notifications

THIS MORNING, in Arm Home (feed shows Arm Home Activated at 6:12AM - sunrise), I am getting the following...

DOORBELL - sending notifications while notifications in Arm Home are turned off for this device

SOUTH & NORTH CAMERAS - sending notifications and recording when neither are included in the Arm Home routine...these are not the two cameras that are included in the Arm Home routine
SOUTH & NORTH LIGHTS - sending notifications and cross triggering recordings on the South and North cameras, respectively, when neither are included in the Arm Home routine

AFTER restarting the VMB5000, here's what changed...

DOORBELL - no longer sending notifications (FIXED)
SOUTH & NORTH CAMERAS - no longer recording or sending notifications (FIXED)
SOUTH & NORTH LIGHTS - STILL sending notifications and cross triggering recordings on the South and North cameras (NOT FIXED)

AFTER 2nd VMB5000 restart...NO CHANGES from first restart

AFTER removing power from VMB5000 for 5 minutes...NO CHANGES from first restart

AFTER 2nd time removing power from VMB5000 for 5 minutes...NO CHANGES from first restart but while my VMB5000 was UNPLUGGED, I was still receiving notifications from the North & South lights 🤔 

AFTER 3rd time removing power from VMB5000...NO CHANGES from first restart but still receiving notifications from N & S cameras

I have been messing with this for almost two hours and I am certainly not going to listen to my phone notify me every time a bird fly's by so now my ONLY OPTION is to turn off ALL notifications in the app itself so now, I won't have any notifications at all in my Sunset activation of the Standby routine, which is pretty much what the Arm Home routine seems to be duplicating right now, with the exception of the N & S lights no longer recording or sending notifications after the first of the VMB5000.

While writing the above paragraph, it made me think that this behavior seems to be pretty much like a mix of the Standby and Arm Home routines, so I manually changed to Standby although when I switched it DID NOT show in Feed that I had changed to Standby...much like it was already in Standby when it actually showed being in Arm Home. I then manually switched to Arm Home, which did show on the feed, and now everything is FIXED and back to normal.

I guess that the two hours wasted on this wasn't in vain since I've pretty much found that there's sometimes a problem when automatically switching modes. I don't know if this is a Sunrise/Sunset activation thing since I did notice yesterday morning that, in Feed, it showed that it had switched to Arm Home twice at Sunrise. I will say that this whole time while acting like a combination of both modes and changing slightly after rebooting the VMB5000, needs to be checked out since it's now happened multiple times. 

[BrookeN]

Thank you for letting me know. I will pass this information on. 

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN 

Once again, the automated activation from "Standby" to "Arm Home" has failed...this morning, even though feed showed that "Arm Home" was activated at 6:19AM (sunrise), everything remained operating in "Standby" mode.

Fortunately, after messing with this for hours the last time it happened, I stumbled on to a fix that by manually switching to "Standby" and then back to "Arm Home", the system will actually go into "Arm Home" where it should have been after activating "Arm Home" at sunrise. Problem is that I don't need a "fix"...what needs to happen is for this to be "fixed".

[jguerdat]

Have you tried a specific time rather than sunrise/sunset?

[KachinaShadow]

@jguerdat 
Good thought, but I'm not sure if or when this would confirm that it was the sunrise/sunset setting actually causing it, and since it's so random it could take weeks, or longer, to confirm anything and who knows just how long to wait after changing to a set time, before changing back to sunrise/sunset to see if it's still doing it.
I've used the sunrise/sunset feature for almost two years without any issues, and this has only happened four times in the past month and a half and not even on a consistent timeline...7/5...7/18...8/11...8/20. So, who knows when or if it would do this again, regardless of if it was on sunrise/sunset or a set time.
I hate to have to deal with a set time since this is more of a light/dark thing that I'll be having to constantly adjust with the time variations of when the sun rises and sets. So, I guess I'll reluctantly (unless @BrookeN or the developers know a better way) try a set time for one month (???) to see if it still does it and then change back to sunrise/sunset and wait it out...might be the end of the year before knowing anything 🤔
Why is it always something 🙄

[KachinaShadow]

@BrookeN @jguerdat 

Found something interesting when I went to "Routines" to create a set time for "Arm Home" to replace the "Sunrise" automation.

On the WEB PORTAL the Routines / Automations, showed the "Standby - Sunset" and the "Arm Home - Sunrise" both ACTIVE
Yet, in the APP the Routines / Automations, showed the "Standby - Sunset" but the "Arm Home - DISABLED"

So this allowed, in the "Standby Mode" on the web portal, for "Arm Home - Sunrise" to be selected but in the "Standby Mode" on the app, "Arm Home - Sunrise" was shown as "DISABLED" and was grayed out, not allowing it to be selected.

Since the settings in "Routines" affect the entire system, how is it possible to have two different selections, between the web portal and app, and how was the web portal setting able to take priority and function (other than the four times in the past week and a half, when it did not switch back to Arm Home) while the app was showing "DISABLED"...and why did everything function for years without issue...and why did this start happening in just the past week and a half...and why did this obviously change.

Now that I've now enabled the automation in the app, which now matches the web portal, I'm going to leave it like that and see if I have any more issues.

Maybe someone should take a look at why the system would allow there to be two different settings for the same automation.

[jguerdat]

@KachinaShadow I thought it used to be that, at least on Android, you could go to Routines, Automations and click on the "clock" icon next the schedule Automations to enable/disable that one. Right now, the icon rotates but that's it. For GF, it enables/disables as I expected. You might want or to check this to verify the various Automations are enabled.

@BrookeN can you check into whether what I'm seeing is expected and what the utility of those is supposed to be for?

EDIT: for whatever reason, attempting to disable a schedule using the Android app on my phone just shows the rotating "clock" icon. When I try the same thing on my Chromebook, also using the Android app, the automation disables/enables as expected. It's almost like the phone somehow does a double trigger (disables and then enables) but it's very repeatable. The web client also works properly.

[KachinaShadow]

@jguerdat @BrookeN 

This morning, after yesterday enabling the supposedly disabled "Arm Home" automation in the app, there was no issue with the system going into the "Arm Home" mode (pretty much like 90% of the time in the past month and a half).

Although today, when I went into automations in the app, I found that the "Arm Home" schedule was once again grayed out and showing "DISABLED" so, like yesterday, I clicked on the "clock" icon and "Arm Home" was no longer gray and was now showing "sunrise"...not sure why it changed back overnight so I'll check it again tomorrow morning.

@jguerdat You mentioned that, in the app, your "clock" icon rotates but that's it. My clock icon, when clicked, immediately enables with no rotation...although clicking on it is how I theoretically enabled it yesterday.

Strangely enough, after enabling it, clicking on the "clock" icon WILL NOT disable the automation (nor does it spin), instead it's just like clicking on the right arrow (>) which opens the next screen where you can make changes to the automation but that's it. Although in the web portal, when you click the clock icon, the "Armed Home - Sunrise", clock icon spins and then disables the automation, turning the text gray which also disables it in the app. With the "Arm Home" automation disabled in the web portal, clicking on the clock icon enables it while also enabling it in the app... thus working as expected.

So, the problem seems to be the enable/disable "clock" icon function in Automations/Schedules in the app. I'm still not sure if this has anything to do with my issue of the four times of not enabling "Arm Home" at sunrise, while actually showing it's enabled, but this certainly needs to be fixed before even being able to determine if it has anything to do with my issue.

[jguerdat]

Well, today there's no spinning clock - it just enables or disables. Hmmm...

I have found that hitting the clock can be difficult, leading me to cause the app to go into the automation editing screen. A little more separation could be useful.

@KachinaShadow while I don't think it would affect a global setting (using the clock to disable) have you checked to see if your GF automations not only set a mode (or whatever) as well as having an Action that disables a schedule?

[KachinaShadow]

@jguerdat 
GF settings are as follows...
Leave (Everyone Leaves) - change mode to Arm Away
Arrive (Anyone Arrives) - change mode to Standby

Only GF actions are to change modes...no action to disable any schedule. GF has always been using these settings and has always functioned perfectly.
Only thing I have to do after "arriving" is to manually set the mode to either "Arm Home" or "Standby" depending on what mode it should be in depending on if it's after sunset or after sunrise. It would be nice to be able to set actions, in "arrive", that would change it to the correct mode dependent on sunrise/sunset but I haven't spent much time thinking how to do that or if it's even possible.