Alexa Routines
David Ludlow is so lazy that he even uses Amazon’s Alexa to turn off his fan heater. He’s probably never said thank you either
Regular readers may have gathered by now that I’m very lazy, and love finding ways to automate tasks I can’t avoid. One way I do this is through Alexa Routines, on Amazon’s Echo smart speakers.
You’ll find Routines in the Alexa app on your phone – tap More, select Routines, then click the Plus button. Routines work with a trigger (‘When this happens’, 1 in our screenshot below), which tells it to run, followed by an action 2 , which is what actually happens.
The most common trigger is your voice: type the word you want Alexa to listen for (if you choose ‘goodbye’, for example, saying ‘Alexa, goodbye’ would start the routine). You can then pick the actions, which can be controlling smart devices (such as turning off lights), getting a news update or traffic report and so on.
But it’s Alexa’s non-spoken triggers that I find most useful. One of the lesserknown is telling an internet-connected (smart) device in your home to start a routine by detecting motion.
To add smart devices, you need to add the relevant Skill (tap More, ‘Skills & Games’). Search these Skills by manufacturer (Ring, in my case) to find the right one. Go into the Alexa app again and click Devices, followed by ‘All devices’. Tap the device you want. If you see on-screen controls (such as an on/ off button), you can use routines with the device; if you just see an information page with no controls, you can’t. Only a year or so ago, most devices didn’t allow this level of control, but many now do.
One of my favourite routines is using my Ring alarm and Dyson Purifier Hot+cool Formaldehyde fan, which
I have installed in my office. I selected ‘When this happens’, chose the Smart Home option, then selected the Ring motion sensor in my office. This gave me a choice of two triggers for when motion is Not Detected or is Detected.
I opted for Not Detected ( 1 in our screenshot left), and then used the timer below to select 30 minutes 2 . This starts the routine if no motion is detected for half an hour. Then I tapped Next and chose whether the trigger is operational at all times or only at certain times.
The latter is useful when you want to detect motion to turn on a light, for example. I’d want this to happen in the evening only, not during the day. I then tapped ‘Add action’ to select what happens and, again, chose Smart Home. I selected All Devices, found my Dyson fan, then switched the Power slider to Off 3 . I clicked Next and saved the Routine.
The result is that when my office camera doesn’t detect motion for 30 minutes, it will automatically turn off my fan heater. Multiple actions can be added, so I can turn off my smart lights (Philips Hue) with the same trigger, for instance.
I can also reverse the trigger in a new routine: turn on the fan and set the target temperature when motion is detected again. There are numerous other combinations, so I recommend diving into the app and seeing which of your devices you can use.