I assume this is going to arrive at the solution of “Upgrade to Gemini-supported devices today!” Yeah, no thanks. I wish I could get Home Assistant working with my nest minis.
Google Assistant Is Basically on Life Support and Things Just Got Worse
Submitted 3 weeks ago by return2ozma@lemmy.world to technology@lemmy.world
Comments
nirodhaavidya@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
onslaught545@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
Get an ESP32, a temperature sensor, and 4x relay board and build your own with esphome!
If you pull the instructions for your thermostat, the wiring guide should tell you what each wire is for (because you can’t trust wire colors). From there it’s just wiring up the relays properly, getting the config built in esphome, and setting up a generic thermostat.
It sounds kinda daunting, but it’s really not super complex. The only gotchas too look out for are any of the relays that can’t be on when another relay is on. There’s a way to prevent that in esphome. I’m sure someone has made a guide on it by now.
sexual_tomato@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
No need for this. A Z-Wave or Zigbee thermostat does the same thing.
Wolf314159@startrek.website 3 weeks ago
The Google Nest Mini is a smart speaker, not the smart thermostat with a similar name.
ushmel@piefed.world 3 weeks ago
I know it's not the same, but my ecobee is fine and i think it avoids most mass surveillance stuff. They nuked the API but beetstat.io is cheap and nice.
null@lemmy.nullspace.lol 2 weeks ago
The Nest Mini is not a thermostat.
Archer@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
If you want just a temp sensor apolloautomation.com/products/temp-1
kayohtie@pawb.social 3 weeks ago
I ended up picking up two of the Home Assistant Voice PE devices and I’ve been fairly happy with them. I even extended their firmware so I have a clock display on each with one being my bedroom alarm clock even. But even out of the box functionality, as long as you can either run faster-whisper on Home Assistant (or another box), or don’t mind their lighter device-control-only route, is totally solid.
Plus music streaming to them (with an external speaker attached via the 3.5mm jack) is pretty good!
AtHeartEngineer@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
They do work pretty well, I’m phasing out the Google homes in my house trying to go completely local, and the voice PEs are pretty good for voice control.
PostaL@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
fmstrat@lemmy.nowsci.com 3 weeks ago
I have it set up fine?
kayohtie@pawb.social 3 weeks ago
I imagine more as in using them for local voice. Without that, it’s still dependent on connecting HA to Google Home. And outside of a fairly expensive hardware replacement module it ends up being cheaper to go other routes.
Jhex@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
So Google half baked a product, pushed it to the public whether they wanted it or not, and now it’s giving up on it replacing it with another half baked product nobody asked for…
Seems par for the course for Google
CeeBee_Eh@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
In all fairness, in the early days of Google Assistant it really was useful. It actually worked. Somehow in the last 5 years it plummeted. As in it stunningly and noticeably kept getting worse year after year.
Entertainmeonly@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
I have been saying for years my phone was so much smarter in 2015. I don’t know what happened. I could rename it talk to it and it was responsive and did what was asked. Crazy.
st3ph3n@midwest.social 3 weeks ago
Amazon Alexa has followed the same trajectory.
GreenCrunch@lemmy.today 3 weeks ago
I have a Google smart speaker that I got as a freebie. I used to use it (>3 years ago) for timers, alarms, etc. and had few problems, I just stopped when I moved and didn’t set it up. I put them back up a few months ago and it sure seems worse to me. Always triggering on random conversations, or to dialog on TV. Anyway they are permanent residents of the closet now. They suck.
100_kg_90_de_belin@feddit.it 2 weeks ago
I still miss Google Now
mic_check_one_two@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
Mine used to be fantastic for recipes. It was nice having a small screen in the kitchen dedicated to recipes and background music. You could ask it for a recipe, it would automatically search for one, trim the mandatory “story of my family eating this meal so I can copyright it as a creative work” intro, and compile the recipe in easy-to-follow steps. But now I ask it for a recipe, and it just goes “I didn’t understand, but here are the search results.” Which just opens a web browser, meaning all the biggest reasons to use it (not digging through search results, skipping the intro, compiling everything into a step-by-step list that you can follow along with, etc) are all gone.
Billy2600@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Don’t put extra internet connected microphones in your house.
czardestructo@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I work for an un-named company that makes stuff that has google assistant on them. Initially we out hardware mutes and pipes the microphones to physical hardware that monitored for wake up words and would then start piping the microphone data to the mother ship. Google told us to stop that, only way to certify the product as compatible with Google Assistant was to pipe the raw microphone data to the mother ship 24/7. That was 5 years ago and I removed all devices from my house.
Taleya@aussie.zone 3 weeks ago
I s2g i will set my house on fire before i allow a unmodded google device in it
Dorkyd68@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I just ditched my nest camera after 6ish years. Fuck the spys
Opisek@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I do wonder, is it possible to flash custom firmware onto the nest cameras? I don’t have any, but it would be a pity for alright hardware to go to waste.
sturger@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
My how things have changed over the years! Why, when I was a young girl, we didn’t have the internet. When we wanted to turn a light on, we had to write a letter to Ford Motor Co. (They were the tech of the day.) I’d write, “Dear Mr. Ford, please give us permission to turn on our light in the dining room.” Of course then we’d have to find a stamp, then walk the letter down to the nearest post office. (That was faster than waiting for the mailman to pick it up from the neighborhood mail box.) Sure enough, 6 weeks later we’d receive a reply saying, “Fine, turn on the light in the dining room.” The postman delivered mail in the morning, so we had to wait until dark to all gather around in the dining room and turn on the light with great ceremony.
We never understood why we needed to get permission from a company far away to turn on a light switch, but we were patriotic Americans, so we knew better than to question the process.
MOCVD@mander.xyz 3 weeks ago
Totally read that in Abe Simpsons voice
fodor@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
You got to love the author of that article. If you want the lights to turn off and on normally, maybe people should use light switches. Those aren’t going to break due to software downgrades, those don’t require Gemini or internet connections.
And I understand, there are rare situations when throwing the internet at your home appliances can make sense for solving niche problems. Those situations definitely exist, but for almost everyone almost all of the time, but it’s pretty fucking easy to turn lights off and on.
stealth_cookies@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
Lights are one of the areas where I think automation is genuinely useful, but my rule with anything “Smart” is that it has to be able to run 100% locally.
cynar@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
It also needs to fail gracefully. A smart switch needs to fail to a dumb switch, not “no switch”.
DJDarren@sopuli.xyz 3 weeks ago
I have a fan plugged into a smart switch that I’ve set to turn off when I fade up my mic while doing my radio show. It’s the most glorious use of throwing the internet at a home appliance I’ve yet come up with.
Taleya@aussie.zone 3 weeks ago
We have smart switches set to turn off floor sitting electricals if the leak sensor picks up a flood in the basement brewery. It also alerts us through HA there’s a beernami
sexual_tomato@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
I have three lights that were wired to one switch. With smart bulbs, I can individually turn them on and off or dim them. No “dumb” solution exists for homes that were wired in a stupid way.
Taleya@aussie.zone 3 weeks ago
We have leak sensors in the basement brewery and sockets that help the hubs ADHD and anxiety (did i forget to turn X off? I shall check my phone), all running through a HA server. A mate has literally programmed in migraine protocols.
Automation ain’t bad. Capitalism is what the haters are angry at. Wish they’d go shit on that instead of stupid commentary about laziness.
Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
You can get socket extensions where the bulb goes into it and then each extension is connected to a wall mount remote switch. No wifi needed and then you have a wall switch for each bulb.
Doesn’t fit into every light fixture though depends on the design.
Jakeroxs@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
Automated lighting based on day of week and weather is fun tho, then again I run it through home assistant lol
Squizzy@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
These just dont need to be online. 90% of the use I have seen is timers and lights, like a half step above hello world.
There is a market for voice assistants that are local.
cynar@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Home assistant is capable of it. Unfortunately it’s not yet overly user friendly about it, but it’s getting better rapidly.
Taleya@aussie.zone 3 weeks ago
Hell, win Vista used to support it. I built a very very stupid jarvis years ago on a bored weekend with win VR and some zigbees
interdimensionalmeme@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
I just leave everything on all the time.
shalafi@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I turn several lights on and off with a single command. The smart thermostat is the killer app for me though.
CidVicious@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
Long time google assistant user, but them putting Gemini in it is what I’m afraid of, not the solution.
This is yet another “google released a product, didn’t know what to do with it, and made zero updates over the last decade, so now they’re killing it.” I don’t think they’ve ever fixed the bugs that existed the first day I bought mine. The speaker is handy for casting to, but also cast is a shitty non-open protocol.
Kinda just agree with the “everything in this space sucks” unfortunately.
isVeryLoud@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
Is it easy to set up a smart speaker with Home Assistant? Last I heard, it was kind of a PITA.
Overspark@feddit.nl 3 weeks ago
Depends on which one you have. If you but their own smart speaker (Voice PE), which is designed to stay entirely local if you have the right hardware and software locally, and even has a hardware switch to temporarily disable the microphone, it’s pretty easy. And of you don’t have all that locally you need a paid subscription to use their cloud a little bit, but they won’t store anything. So still pretty easy.
isVeryLoud@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
I want to run my own voice processing service, ideally. Something that runs off of my home assistant server, would be cool if it made use of a Coral AI or similar.
avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
Buy this. You can use your own voice processing on another machine on your network. You could even hook it up to your Ollama.
Sprocketfree@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
How is the speaker in that? I have some atoms and the speaker sucks. Thinking about buying a bunch of these Google devices and replacing the PCB but I’d rather save the time if something like this actually has good sound.
ch00f@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I’m curious about this as well. I think all the components are available, but nobody’s clicked them together yet.
isVeryLoud@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
My understanding is the software is the problem, I don’t understand why though.
interdimensionalmeme@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
Probably 200$ of raspberry pi gear plus a few weekends messing around should net you something awesome that only catastrophically fails sometimes.
stealth_cookies@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
XD, I totally did this to make a smart alarm clock a couple years ago. That said it is completely stable, don’t think it has ever crashed or locked up on me, unlike the echo show it replaced that did so frequently (not to mention it occasionally updating in the middle of the night and waking me up at full brightness)
TheOrionArm@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
George Orwell was wrong. We didn’t need the government to bug our houses, we did it ourselves. 🤦♂️
Patches@ttrpg.network 2 weeks ago
Whatchu mean we?
I got dumb troglodyte everything.
tehWrapper@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I don’t use Google assistant to control any other devices but the amount of stuff I ask 'hey Google’s to do over the last few years has gotten worse than when it first started. More often now I just play music to it via Bluetooth connection.
goferking0@lemmy.sdf.org 3 weeks ago
It’s also how randomly terrible it will be. There are days it couldn’t set timers only to work the next day. Or worse telling it stop timer would stop what was playing on a completely different device.
Cocopanda@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
If they kill Home. I’m done with Google products. I’m heavily integrated into nest and Google home. If they kill it further. I’m out.
Modern_medicine_isnt@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
If you really do swear them off, you will have dodged the next many bullets. They have made a solid pattern of killing off things we want. Generally, things we want don’t make them enough money.
Cocopanda@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I used to support the Home team. I saw them grow from nothing when I worked there. It’s pathetic what they are doing to everything.
winkerjadams@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
sturger@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
5 years ago voice assistants were being promoted with all the breathless excitement that “AI” is receiving today. I imagine in 5 year’s more time Google will be giving the same listless attention to their AI products that they are giving to their voice assistants now. Well, actually to just about every product they’ve ever made, except maybe for Google Mail.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
It can’t even properly schedule reminders anymore, the one fucking thing I used to for.
MilitantAtheist@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Give me a good non-cloud voice control system that works and I’ll switch in a second. And on another note: The “Hey Google” command is so fucking annoying.
Lee@retrolemmy.com 2 weeks ago
Idk if this covers your needs, but Home Assistant is non-cloud and supports voice commands. They’re selling a voice hardware now (preview edition):
www.home-assistant.io/voice-pe/
While I’ve used HA for years, I’ve never tried any of the voice command methods, so can’t really comment on it. I had just recently came across their voice hardware and am probably going to give it a try.
Nalivai@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I don’t use Google Wiretap, but I use google assistant on my watch to control the smarthome, and I would be very, very disappointed if it was dead
ArsonButCute@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
Wearing Google wiretap instead of putting it in your home isn’t much better. Honestly it’s probably worse.
solrize@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
Buh bye
cupcakezealot@piefed.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
so glad i use google home as a sirius speaker and speaking to it is the only way i can control it /s
Jimmycakes@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Found the one in the picture in my office while I was cleaning. I just threw it away
baggachipz@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
I am shocked…shocked! that Google would let a product die on the vine and cease supporting it. Google assistant is dead, long live Gemini assistant!
Pistcow@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Its about generating investor buzzwords and killing off beloved apps every 3-6 months.
GissaMittJobb@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
As I understand it, Google mostly ships new stuff that they let die because it’s one of the only ways to get a promotion at Google - to ship a product.
Once shipped, the newly promoted staff moves on to something else, and the business people take a look and see if the product actually makes any sense from a financial perspective, which is rarely the case.
UltraMagnus0001@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I Still get their apps confused because of the stupid icon updates…or maybe I stupid and can’t learn new things.
CookieOfFortune@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Their new icons are so dumb. I think they thought people would get used to them but no, they’re still bad after several years.
Lemminary@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
It does take me several seconds to realize which one is which, so I sometimes go by their arrangement on my home screen. Avant-garde design, I guess.
BackgrndNoize@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Same, never had that issue with the old logos