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IFTTT and Model S

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Andyw2100

Well-Known Member
Oct 22, 2014
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2,448
Ithaca, NY
IFTTT seems to be gaining in popularity. I am brand new to it, though I've known about it for quite some time. There is current discussion in various threads about integrating IFTTT with the Tesla API.

These two threads discuss Tesla sites / apps that either already (the first) or may soon (the second) interface with IFTTT:

Project Cartesia - Launch, Updates and Support

TeslaLog.com - Your hosted Tesla Data Logger - Announcement / Support threads



I did a quick search for IFTTT recipes, using the search term "Tesla", just to see what was out there, and all that came up is shown below:

Tesla IFTTT Recipes.jpg



Only the last one is even in the ballpark of the kind of recipe I was hoping to find.

I'm thinking people here must be using IFTTT to do interesting things with their Model Ss, so I thought it would make sense to start this thread to discuss these things.

I actually thought of something I think I'd like to do, that I think should be doable, but having no experience with IFTTT, etc. I'm not certain.

I occasionally forget to take my cellphone with me when exiting the Model S. I thought the "If" could possibly be based on the phone sensing a disconnection from the car's bluetooth, in combination with a complete lack of motion. (One potential problem with that is I don't know how quickly the car drops the bluetooth connection with the phone when the car is turned off if there is no call in progress. Anyone know that?)

Assuming we could come up with an appropriate "If" trigger, I think some of the rest is easy, and some may be more difficult. The easy part would be to send e-mail or text messages saying, "Name left his phone in the car." In my case I'd probably send my wife a text, in case we were together, and myself an email, in case I had left my phone in the car and come in the house. What would be even better, but harder, would be if IFTTT could interface with the Tesla API, and make the car honk the horn. In fact, if the Tesla API is to be involved, the "If" trigger could probably be improved upon by also involving the car's doors becoming locked and the car being in park.

The above is just one recipe I think would be useful. I'm sure many of you are already doing lots of interesting things with IFTTT and your Teslas. So let's get this discussion going!
 
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Love it. I've used IFTTT a few times in the past, but never found much use out of it... I have a few ideas, if they were implementable, I'd start using IFTTT again...

If I drive more than 2 miles outside the radius of my house, set the Nest to Away (it'll do it automatically, but it'll take more time).

If my car is home for more than 30 minutes and not plugged in, send me a text.
 
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If I drive more than 2 miles outside the radius of my house, set the Nest to Away (it'll do it automatically, but it'll take more time).

Funny you should mention the Nest and away.

I happened to look at the Nest channel, not even thinking about incorporating anything there with the Model S, and from the recipes I saw, "Home" mode and "Away" mode were not things that were settable. (It could be that I just did not search exhaustively enough.) You could do things like set a temperature, set a temperature range, and turn the fan on, but I did not see any options to set either "Home" or "Away."
 
Funny you should mention the Nest and away.

I happened to look at the Nest channel, not even thinking about incorporating anything there with the Model S, and from the recipes I saw, "Home" mode and "Away" mode were not things that were settable. (It could be that I just did not search exhaustively enough.) You could do things like set a temperature, set a temperature range, and turn the fan on, but I did not see any options to set either "Home" or "Away."

lol, and that might be why I never got into IFTTT.... (not this specifically, but that there's a lot of features implemented in IFTTT, but if I'm using IFTTT I want IFTTT to let me control every aspect of my gadget, not just a subset)
 
lol, and that might be why I never got into IFTTT.... (not this specifically, but that there's a lot of features implemented in IFTTT, but if I'm using IFTTT I want IFTTT to let me control every aspect of my gadget, not just a subset)

I just did some more digging, and I am pretty sure there is no way to set Nest to Home or Away. I searched a bunch of recipes, and didn't see those options, and then I found this, which seems to be pretty conclusive. (The three actions in the right column are the only available actions.) :

Nest IFTT options.jpg



Of course that's just a limitation of what the Nest is allowing, not a limitation of IFTTT, right? I mean Nest could update their software tomorrow (I think it gets OTA software updates, doesn't it?--Edit - Answered my own question. It does. There was one released on January 11.), and then conceivably there could suddenly be new "Actions" available, right?

It is ironic that quite literally the very first thing I looked at was not, at least for now, possible!
 
I occasionally forget to take my cellphone with me when exiting the Model S. I thought the "If" could possibly be based on the phone sensing a disconnection from the car's bluetooth, in combination with a complete lack of motion. (One potential problem with that is I don't know how quickly the car drops the bluetooth connection with the phone when the car is turned off if there is no call in progress. Anyone know that?)
Right off the bat you're hitting on the major limitation of IFTTT as it currently stands: only one IF trigger is permitted per recipe. People are starting to use the dedicated Maker channel and a web server to enable multiple IF triggers, but it's complex and, of course, you need a web server to interact with and the know-how to code handlers for the requests. Worse, in your case, is that the accelerometer isn't accessible through IFTTT, even on Android.

Location triggers in IFTTT are currently when the Channel's data source, whatever that is, enters or leaves an area. You can't check if the location of the Android Channel and the location of the Tesla Channel match each other.

So both the complexity of what you're trying to automate, and the lack of appropriate channels/triggers is going to be a major limitation, unfortunately.
 
Of course that's just a limitation of what the Nest is allowing, not a limitation of IFTTT, right?

It's not a limitation of the Nest, as I can do this with my home automation software (using a 3rd plugin that uses the Nest API).

Screen Shot 2016-01-21 at 2.10.29 PM.png


Can also do it with the Nest app. If you're really bored, here's the topic of "Away" on the Nest developer's site. Nest Developers
"The Nest cloud API provides the ability to directly set Home and Away, as well as listen for changes to these states."
 
It is my understanding that Nest explicitlt forbids setting your Nest to Home or Away programmatically in their UI Guidelines. If you violate this rule, you cannot obtain the "works with Nest" cert. It is a really stupid rule that I think should be ignored.
"The Nest API provides the ability to directly set Home and Away, as well as listen for changes to these states. When setting Home/Away, it should be done as the Nest app does it: as the result of an explicit user request. Trying to algorithmically set this state runs the risk of creating a confusing user experience and is forbidden by our UI & Marketing Guidelines."
 
Right off the bat you're hitting on the major limitation of IFTTT as it currently stands: only one IF trigger is permitted per recipe.

That's really interesting. I had no idea that limitation existed. As a complete newbie to IFTTT, it just seemed intuitive that you'd want to be able to set up multiple "If" conditions. I guess I hadn't thought enough about it. If I had, I would have realized that if what I wanted to do was possible, the app would have had to have been called IFTAIFTTT or better yet IFTAIFTAIFTTT.

Perhaps the functionality, if not the app name change, may come in the future?
 
It's long been theorized that a Premium IFTTT account will be made eventually that permits multiple IFs and Boolean logic combinations. Most users think that's how they'll eventually monetize the service.

That said, it's been a rumor for as long as I've been using the service, which is several years now.

I think it'll come eventually, but there's no promised or expected timeline for it, unfortunately.
 
I've thought about trying to use IFTTT in combination with data from my utilities hourly pricing program and the Tesla API to try and optimize charging times throughout the day/night but I haven't taken the time to really dive into it. If anyone has other suggestion on how to do this I'd love to hear it.
 
Love it. I've used IFTTT a few times in the past, but never found much use out of it... I have a few ideas, if they were implementable, I'd start using IFTTT again...

If I drive more than 2 miles outside the radius of my house, set the Nest to Away (it'll do it automatically, but it'll take more time).

If my car is home for more than 30 minutes and not plugged in, send me a text.
Most home automation tools utilize your cell phone location as a "Home" or "Away" trigger.
 
Andyw2100 -- It is hard to find Tesla apps in the IFTTT search box because they arent tagged by the "Tesla" name. I just found this one, which is marked under "Numerous".
If the battery charge on my Tesla Model S goes below 25%, turn the lights in my garage red by numerous - IFTTT
I havent reached out to Numerous yet, but it stands to reason that if he can have the red light turn on in his garage when he is below 25%, then he can do anything else that hooks into the tesla api (like turn heat on etc). And as you and i discovered from another chat, that would allow me to turn the heat on with my voice-activated Amazon echo, which works with IFTTT! It still doesnt solve my need for a timer to turn on the heat everyday at 830 am, though.

IFTTT seems to be gaining in popularity. I am brand new to it, though I've known about it for quite some time. There is current discussion in various threads about integrating IFTTT with the Tesla API.

These two threads discuss Tesla sites / apps that either already (the first) or may soon (the second) interface with IFTTT:

Project Cartesia - Launch, Updates and Support

TeslaLog.com - Your hosted Tesla Data Logger - Announcement / Support threads



I did a quick search for IFTTT recipes, using the search term "Tesla", just to see what was out there, and all that came up is shown below:

View attachment 108865


Only the last one is even in the ballpark of the kind of recipe I was hoping to find.

I'm thinking people here must be using IFTTT to do interesting things with their Model Ss, so I thought it would make sense to start this thread to discuss these things.

I actually thought of something I think I'd like to do, that I think should be doable, but having no experience with IFTTT, etc. I'm not certain.

I occasionally forget to take my cellphone with me when exiting the Model S. I thought the "If" could possibly be based on the phone sensing a disconnection from the car's bluetooth, in combination with a complete lack of motion. (One potential problem with that is I don't know how quickly the car drops the bluetooth connection with the phone when the car is turned off if there is no call in progress. Anyone know that?)

Assuming we could come up with an appropriate "If" trigger, I think some of the rest is easy, and some may be more difficult. The easy part would be to send e-mail or text messages saying, "Name left his phone in the car." In my case I'd probably send my wife a text, in case we were together, and myself an email, in case I had left my phone in the car and come in the house. What would be even better, but harder, would be if IFTTT could interface with the Tesla API, and make the car honk the horn. In fact, if the Tesla API is to be involved, the "If" trigger could probably be improved upon by also involving the car's doors becoming locked and the car being in park.

The above is just one recipe I think would be useful. I'm sure many of you are already doing lots of interesting things with IFTTT and your Teslas. So let's get this discussion going!
 
Another application. My nest is programmed to my schedule... umn how about instead of "Smart preconditioning" IFTTT would let me use "Nest preconditioning". I don't have a need for the Tesla to turn lights on/off (I'm not always first, and very few of my lights are smart), I don't need it to change colors, I don't need it to integrate with my home theater or anything else that I can control with a phone.

I just want it to text me if I'm home and not charging, precondition normally, and change my nest to away when I leave.


An even better one would to be to have the Nest go from away to home when I'm more than 120 miles from home and traveling towards home (if I leave for a weekend going north, I need to remind myself to turn the nest back on at the DE supercharger)


Lots of potential, I wont hold my breath though.
 
I figured out how the Numerous channel works in IFTTT. In short, it won't achieve what I need. Here we go: Numerous is an Iphone app that basically consolidates statistics from varoiius apps and shows you all of them in one screen on a bunch of tiles. It looks like something that some venture capitalist thought up as the next big thing -- getting all your data in one place, transformative, figure out how ot make money off of you later, or maybe selling real estate on your screen to data providers, etc. Anyway, for Tesla it tracks data like charging or not, when you are done charging, how much charge you have. With that data, you can create an ifttt channel. So the problem is it will NOT turn on my heat for me in my tesla per a schedule, because it doesn't touch the heat function.
Another wasted lunchtime obsessing over my P85.... Gee, it would be nice if Tesla did some of this work for me....

Another application. My nest is programmed to my schedule... umn how about instead of "Smart preconditioning" IFTTT would let me use "Nest preconditioning". I don't have a need for the Tesla to turn lights on/off (I'm not always first, and very few of my lights are smart), I don't need it to change colors, I don't need it to integrate with my home theater or anything else that I can control with a phone.

I just want it to text me if I'm home and not charging, precondition normally, and change my nest to away when I leave.


An even better one would to be to have the Nest go from away to home when I'm more than 120 miles from home and traveling towards home (if I leave for a weekend going north, I need to remind myself to turn the nest back on at the DE supercharger)


Lots of potential, I wont hold my breath though.
 
I looked into IFTTT some time ago and was going to use the fact that Visual Tesla can send an email to IFTTT to trigger opening my garage door. That's a moot point now, but could be what some of you are looking for.

John
 
Andyw2100 -- It is hard to find Tesla apps in the IFTTT search box because they arent tagged by the "Tesla" name. I just found this one, which is marked under "Numerous".
If the battery charge on my Tesla Model S goes below 25%, turn the lights in my garage red by numerous - IFTTT

Yes, that one was pictured in my opening post, and was the one I referred to as the only one in the ballpark.

- - - Updated - - -

I looked into IFTTT some time ago and was going to use the fact that Visual Tesla can send an email to IFTTT to trigger opening my garage door. That's a moot point now, but could be what some of you are looking for.

I think VT sending email messages to IFTTT could definitely work for some things. Being brand new to IFTTT I didn't realize that was an option. I'll have to look into that, as I already do run VT 24 X 7.

Thanks!
 
That's really interesting. I had no idea that limitation existed. As a complete newbie to IFTTT, it just seemed intuitive that you'd want to be able to set up multiple "If" conditions. I guess I hadn't thought enough about it. If I had, I would have realized that if what I wanted to do was possible, the app would have had to have been called IFTAIFTTT or better yet IFTAIFTAIFTTT.

Perhaps the functionality, if not the app name change, may come in the future?

I figured out how the Numerous channel works in IFTTT. In short, it won't achieve what I need. Here we go: Numerous is an Iphone app that basically consolidates statistics from varoiius apps and shows you all of them in one screen on a bunch of tiles. It looks like something that some venture capitalist thought up as the next big thing -- getting all your data in one place, transformative, figure out how ot make money off of you later, or maybe selling real estate on your screen to data providers, etc. Anyway, for Tesla it tracks data like charging or not, when you are done charging, how much charge you have. With that data, you can create an ifttt channel. So the problem is it will NOT turn on my heat for me in my tesla per a schedule, because it doesn't touch the heat function.
Another wasted lunchtime obsessing over my P85.... Gee, it would be nice if Tesla did some of this work for me....

EVmote makes this particular recipe really easy. Turn on my heat to 80 at 7:30 am or whenever you want.
 
@cryptyk
I just bought evmote premium and set up my first IFTTT formula per your website's directions, to trigger the tesla climate control, with the "on" or "off" body of commands as indicated on your website. Weirdest thing -- I tell my Amazon echo to "Trigger Tesla Climate Control" when the climate control is already on, and that IFTTT command will successfully turn off the climate control, as indicated on my tesla app, and my IFTTT app shows the command was sent. However, when the climate control is off in the car (as shown on my tesla app) and I tell my echo to turn the climate control on, the IFTTT app shows that I correctly gave the command, but the tesla app doesn't show anything happening, and I get no heat. I double-checked that the body of my Maker action was right ("on" or "off") and it was. Do you have a clue what is going on here? Something in my car? Last winter when my Visible tesla used to work, it would turn my heat on automatically with the timer function just fine, so I don't know what could be going on. Obviously getting heat is more important to me right now than turning it off! thanks.

EVmote makes this particular recipe really easy. Turn on my heat to 80 at 7:30 am or whenever you want.