My porch light sometimes gets left on and annoys my very nice neighbor. It’s on a schedule but sometimes someone turns it on after the scheduled off time and forgets to turn it off. Is there a way to give her access to that switch only? I am using Kasa wifi switches and Alexa in the rest of the house. Thanks.
Give you neighbor a scene switch connected to your Alexa that can control your light.
Tell it every half hour to turn off… except the times it is supposed to be on.
Simplest solution (which I have also used in the past) is to schedule a turn off event at say 4am and 6am.
If it’s already off, then there will no difference.
Don’t over engineer the solution, unless you really have to :)
If time between X:XX PM and Y:YY AM and light has been on for more than 15m —> turn light off.
my neighbors never complained but i had flood lights on all corners of the house, pendant lighting for the front and back porch, sconce lighting by the overhead garage doors.
pretty shitty with a lot of light pollution in every direction…
swapped everything to dimmable recessed lights. much much better.
“Also, if it’s bothering your neighbor, you may want to revisit the fixtures you’re using”
THIS - big time
light trespass is a major issue and illegal in most jurisdictions worldwide. In the UK it’s classified as a “statutory nuisance” and dealt with under the Environmental Protection Act 1990
OP needs to fix the throw of the light or risk his local authority (council) issuing an order which gets extremely expensive to ignore
Huh… wish I’d known that 5 years ago…
The neighbor could log in under your kasa account but would then have control over all devices in there. I wouldn’t have a problem with this. I share my account with my father. We randomly turn each others lights on and off. It’s fun
When we first got smart switches, I put one where my daughter Abby studies. I named it “piss abby” and when she was studying, I said “piss abby off” to shut the lights. She gave me a look and said “piss abby on” and kept studying.
I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist posting this here
If Reddit still had coins I would absolutely give you some kind of award.
Lol. Exactly what I’m trying to avoid.
I think you missed the point. You are overcomplicating something with a much easier solution.
You already have a “smart” switch. Make your programming smarter to avoid the problem instead of a using a complicated workaround.
Not to mention that telling your neighbor “you turn it off” is not exactly the courtesy that OP might think it is.
Microphone on porch that triggers on hey asehole, get another light!
Why is your light shining into his house anyway
lol I thought that link was going to be
Attach a shade on the side of the light which directly effects your neighbor. Large plant/statue/tree to reduce/eliminate problem. You can also add another schedule as others suggested to turn off after it’s been on for a specified amount of minutes. Still I would rather see if I can block the light to my neighbor so that I can use my smart light whenever and however I want :)
Giving access for your smart switch to your neighbor is no-no for me.
Unfortunately the light is mounted high up near the roof. It isn’t so much the light itself as the brightness reflecting off my white siding.
Use webhooks. In Alexa, add a webhook as a trigger and a routine to turn off the lamp, and your neighbor just needs to go to this specific url and turn off the light. Simple and fast.
https://trigger.esp8266-server.de/
https://www.amazon.com/Michael-Dworkin-Webhook-Routine-Trigger/dp/B09RGPYHLL
She doesn’t have curtains?
If your porch light is annoying your neighbour then you need to fix the LIGHT (ie: its throw) so it doesn’t shine (or reflect) into their windows before playing with any automation or remote controls
“Light Trespass” is a major issue and the kind of thing that local authorities (councils) tend to take seriously
A Google search on that term will underscore that message
ie: deal with the problem “at root cause” rather than trying to patch a poor setup by adding complexity
Agreed. Something as simple as changing the fixture to one that points down would benefit from unwanted light spill.
From your descriptions, I have the same Kasa switch set up (with bulbs that are three stories high thanks to a walkout basement). I have them set to go off 15 min after turning on so as to 1) not waste the bulb and 2) not cause issues for neighbors. So the dog can go outside and all is good without me having to worry.
This is a 30 second solution.
Under no circumstances would I give access to my smart devices to a neighbor.
I have my front outside on from sunset to sunrise, but at a low power setting. I want to say I keep it around 10-20% power.
You could also add a motion sensor outside that when triggerd could switch the lights to 100% for 5 minutes, resetting the timer as long as there is motion detected.
I am using Casetta light switches where ever I want diming.
Honestly you need to go low-tech here. Make it an IR bulb and give the neighbor a cheap IR remote to turn it off.
I also agree with /u/stoatwblr in make sure there’s a cut off for the light.
i use the same setup. create a guest account on kasa and share access to that specific switch with your neighbor. that way they can control just the porch light without affecting the rest of your setup.
Add an automation for Alexa to scream all over the house when left on outside the schedule. It’ll reeducate everyone to turn the lights off when done 😉
Now seriously: you could use another automation to turn it off after some time. Or improve it with presence/motion sensors to turn it off when no-one’s around.
Finally, if you really want to let her control the lights, I guess you could expose those to a “new virtual” house and invite her to that house. I’m not sure how it could be done in Alexa, though.
