Hey everyone, I’ve been exploring ways to enhance my SmartThings setup, and I came across an interesting challenge that I thought I’d share with the community. I’ve got several flows set up to automate different aspects of my home, but there’s one feature I’ve been wanting to tweak—extending the runtime of a flow during specific events, like parties or when guests are over. Let me walk you through my experience and see if anyone has some insights or solutions!
So, here’s the situation: I’ve got a flow that’s designed to run on a preset schedule, ending at 11:45 PM. While this works perfectly for my regular routine, it can be a bit of a buzzkill during parties or when I have visitors. Imagine the music or lights automatically turning off at 11:45 PM when everyone’s still having a great time! It’s not ideal, to say the least.
I’ve been thinking about how to manually extend this flow’s runtime using something like a pushbutton on my phone. The idea is that during a party, I could easily press a button to add more time to the flow without having to manually adjust everything. But I’m not entirely sure how to implement this. Is there a way to integrate a pushbutton into my existing setup? Or perhaps automate this extension using some sort of conditional trigger?
I’ve looked into some of the posts here and seen that others have tackled similar issues. For example, one user mentioned using a combination of SmartThings routines and IFTTT to extend their lighting schedules during gatherings. Another suggestion was leveraging the Alexa app to manually adjust the flow’s end time through voice commands. While these ideas are helpful, I’m still not entirely clear on the best approach for my setup.
I’d love to hear from anyone who has successfully implemented a similar feature. Whether it’s through custom automation scripts, integrating third-party services, or even using a simple workaround, I’m all ears! Let’s brainstorm together and see if we can come up with a solution that works seamlessly with SmartThings.
In the meantime, I’ll keep experimenting with different approaches and share any progress I make. It’s a bit frustrating not having this feature, but it’s also a great opportunity to learn more about the capabilities of SmartThings and how to customize it to fit my needs.
Thanks in advance for your thoughts and suggestions! I look forward to hearing from you all.