Hi, i have been using smart lamps from aliexpress for awhile now. But these lamps force me to connect to an android app that phones-home to Beijing. Without the chinese yeelight app, i cannot change the color of the lamps. I find that kind of creepy.
Is there a good smart lamp system that is privacy respecting and hopefully opensource?
One that is locked to my local lan instead of a chinese trojan horse that spy’s on me 24/7.
I’m an arch linux user and i know some basic python scripting.
Buy a zigbee stick and use zigbee lamps; they are widely available (Ali, Ikea, Philips etc) and this solution doesn’t cost a fortune. It also prevent you from needing to throw the lamps away whenever the app stops working or the manufacturing company goes bankrupt.
I second zigbee. Fast, local control, with the added benefit of not clogging up your WiFi network.
Isn’t ZigBee just a standard? What makes it more private?
ZigBee is low-power radio (think Bluetooth but simpler), so there’s no Internet involved at all unless you connect it to an Internet-based device, and there you have many choices including open source or home-grown solutions.
Most Wifi bulbs work locally with home assistant for example. And you can stop their communication with the internet with some basic network administration. Otherwise, Zigbee bulbs do not communicate over the internet, they can’t. You will need a zigbee router, but there are open source solutions for that.
zigbee and/or zwave with a self hosted router like HA is the way. It even works if your internet is out snd nobody can just shut down the servers if they dont feel like paying for them anymore
Anything that is flashed with tasmota is fine. You can also buy them preflashed. https://tasmota.github.io/docs/
That or ESPHome.
Anything Zigbee or Z-Wave.
Shelly makes smart bulbs. They can be used only locally if you want or connect to homeassistant.
I have some Shelly plugs and they’re great. If I ever buy a house, I plan to populate it with Shelly devices. I do want to try out Zigbee, but I don’t have a need yet as I rent right now.
If you don’t mind “dumbing down,” the bulbs with an infrared or RF remote don’t require any apps. I prefer those for that reason
IME those can be unreliable though, and they’re barely cheaper than Zigbee bulbs
Eh you get what you pay for. I have a “kamija” branded one that I use on my nightstand daily for about 5 years now. Has an aluminum base and weighs a ton. Looks like they didn’t survive covid though, RIP
definitely would agree. the less things connected to the internet the better. same goes with using a timer unit in a heater instead of an app
Check out the IKEA ones, ZigBee - meaning there’s absolutely zero internet connectivity required.
A simple network sniffer is enough to figure out what sites the app is connecting to, then you can just block them on the router.
If you are using Android, you can do that easily right on your phone with PCAPdroid, it’s on the play store. No root required.
Why not just stick with dumb light bulbs? Why does everything need to be smart?
