I’ve always been proud to fly the American flag outside my home, but manually raising and lowering it every day was getting tedious. That’s why I decided to automate it using my Hubitat system! 
Here’s how I did it:
First, I set up a Generic Z-Wave Garage Door Opener to control the flagpole. It works perfectly—the device reports as “closed” when the flag is up and “open” when it’s lowered. I added a button to my Hubitat dashboard for manual control, which is super handy.
Next, I integrated Google Calendar using the Hubitat Gcal Search app. I created two virtual switches: one for lowering the flag to half-staff and another for raising it back up. These switches trigger based on specific calendar events I set up, like “Flag Half Staff” or “Flag Back Up.”
Now, I need some help figuring out how to connect these virtual switches to actually trigger the flagpole device. Once I get this working, it’ll be fully automated! 
If anyone has experience with this setup or can offer tips, I’d greatly appreciate it. Let’s make this patriotic project a reality! 