Review: Stringify Flows + Amazon Echo + Wink Hub + IFTTT for DIY Home Automation

Today we are going to review Stringify, which is one powerful option that will take your automation robots and routines to a new level. For those of you that aren’t familiar with Stringify, it’s a cloud based logic system that has the capability to connect to other cloud-aware smart devices and services like the Amazon Echo, Wink Hub, SmartThings, IFTTT and many others. You use these connections to create advanced logic flows that can respond to triggers and make one or more things happen. Stringify Website: https://www.stringify.com/ Where I Buy My Domain Names and Web Hosting Stoco.net Domains and Hosting: http://bit.ly/2m7zuEd Wink Hub 2: http://amzn.to/2dzJPKf SmartThings Hub: http://amzn.to/2ltHdzF Other Videos: Adding GE Smart Switches to the Wink Hub: https://youtu.be/Gk0h3j2tUDY Install GE Non-Dimming Wall Switch: https://youtu.be/IwdBC90_QBE Setting Up a Wink Hub Gen 2: https://youtu.be/D-zSbAT-eus Connect Wink Hub to Amazon Echo: https://youtu.be/1c4psqOhr3M Troubleshooting Wink Hub Pairing: https://youtu.be/3An22VqWdV0 At the time I recorded this video, Stringify is only available for iOS and Android devices. Just like any other app, you’ll need to create an account with Stringify to get up and running. Now, it’s important to understand that Stringify is a cloud service. This means that if your internet goes down, anything you have left up to Stringify won’t work during that period of time. We’ll start with an Echo Dot and a Wink Hub in our little house. Any time you give an instruction to Alexa, she takes that request up to the Amazon servers. If the command was related to your smart home, Amazon sends the instruction set over to the Wink servers, still out there in the cloud. The Wink service takes that command and sends it down to the Wink Hub inside your home, which in turn sends the command over to the light, and viola, the light turns on. If you have an Echo, you will probably already have noticed that when the internet is down, Alexa is pretty useless. Stringify sits out on a server and when it fires one of it’s flows, it will send that information over to the Wink Hub. If Stringify detects an event that is contained in a flow, it starts that process all over again. And, since you can connect Stringify to your Amazon Alexa, you can give voice commands to the Echo, which in turn fire Stringify Flows, which does even more cool stuff. Now, stringify isn’t limited to the Amazon Echo and smart home hubs, it connects to a whole host of cloud services, including IFTTT. And if your wondering if you can do the same things with IFTTT, the answer is no. IFTTT is limited to a single trigger and responding action. This means that you can add in AND and OR conditions to your flows for a more powerful experience. And using our Stringify flow, we will say that if there is doorbell motion, OR is nighttime, turn on the light. So to accomplish this, we will modify this flow. DIY Smart Home Guy Websites: Website: http://azhb.com Facebook: http://facebook.com/diysmarthomeguy Twitter: http://twitter.com/diysmarthomeguy Copyright 2017 John Stone, all rights reserved DIY Smart Home Guy is a Trademark of John Stone and AZHB.com