Imho HA is working towards all this (or almost all). The only thing HA really fails is rules. And in particular the creation of rules aka automations. It’s all covered from a programming perspective. But imho it should be from a business rule like perspective. And made easier to create and manage for a simple non programmer.
I think only having a phone as a remote control for lights is not optimal — opening an app or even just accessing and running a shortcut, or asking an assistant (Siri, etc.) is just so much slower. I try to keep physical switches on lights besides automatically turning them on and off. While a dashboard is nice, I think what the post is saying that it shouldn’t be the goal. Expanding your example, there is probably many ways you van automate that use case, e.g. getting a notification to tell you its getting late for the kids and an action to turn off the lights, or if there hasn’t been movement in the room. Some people even have bed sensors. Etc.
Still there are better solutions. Get HA to notify you when the light has been on for X time in an empty room.
If you have no way of knowing whether the room is empty, you could always ask your voice assistant “kid’s room lights” to know the light’s state.
Then you can either turn it off by voice command or actionable notification.
You don’t need the app 
.
The only app I use is the HA dashboard and I really barely use it except when there’s absolutely no other way.
I wasn’t talking about only having an app. I use voice control, presence detection, physical switches, and the phone app. They are all useful.
To me, the best place to receive actionable notifications is in the phone app. I can see my whole house status at a glance (auto-entities), and I can easily control when I want to receive notifications or ignore them.
The only form of HA control that doesn’t make sense to me is the wall display.
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My wife doesn’t even notice the most things I switched to smart stuff, everything works as before. I only extend to existing functionality, never replace it by something else. We just get more lazy without her really knowing.
The only place I break this rule is my own office because I use it as a lab to test stuff before implementing it in the rest of the house.
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I have a similar set up where there are devices my family use and there are some only I use.
Example of family-uses are Z-Wave light switches that I installed in-wall (Aeotec Nano switches). These use the existing light switch to control the Z-Wave switch instead of the actual A/C circuit, and they behave the same (except the toggle state can change – but no one really notices or cares).
EDIT: and of course the Z-Wave thermostat which is easily overridden by my family (I can detect that it was changed at the device and back off automation for a period).
For my own devices, these are things like being able to remotely toggle a Raspberry Pi – my wife and kids don’t really even know they exist.
And then of course my lab also full of things I experiment with.
Excellent article!
Can I translate it to PT-BR in our Brazilian forum?
I will include a link to here on that
The licence is here
Yes because it was written in 2016. It doesnt really make sense to update it in my opinion, since it is a blog post.
If I remember it correctly it’s being linked from the installation guide or similar. So it’s a common read text that should be fresh with the latest ideas of what a perfect home automation is, today.
It doesn’t need to be a blog post. And the link can also be changed to a new blog post etc.
No. The original post in this thread is a blog post, from years ago. It should stay as historic. People can clearly see that based on the date it was posted. The link you are referring to in that blog post goes to an (also very old) news article.
Not sure why you are getting so bothered about an old post…
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It is dated, so you can work out when 'January‘ was.
Should we go back to newspapers from April 1912 and change the archives to clarify that the Titanic didn’t sink this month? No, of course not
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A link to this blog post was definitely a part of the introduction or installation guide. I think it might be part of a “you’re done, we’re installing some things, please read this text” state. But it might also been removed since i wrote the comment.
This has been my philosophy from the start, which is why I’ve always focused on automating conveniences. If it ain’t convenient, it ain’t automated. Which is why the light on my nightstand is automated, my wife’s isn’t.
Ideally, I’d like to be able to just create an automation by saying to my system, “If it’s dark when I get home, turn on the light on the basement landing,” and have it configure a rule.
Hello all
interesting thread. I agree with @DarthBob automating for the sake of automation is expensive and useless. I am not an IT guy, I’m a pensioner with too much time an his hands and i have become extremely lazy in my old age. For me automating my coffee maker (an espresso machine) or the fridge tells me what i need to buy is of little use and value. However if this floats you boat power to you all
I also agree with @devastator that we should avoid at all means the cloud.
I’m lazy to the point i do not want to use my phone or a voice assistant like google siri or alexa (i use almond). I try to have automation start based on time of day, date, sensors or the presence of my phone connected to my router. (my next development is to install a WIFI repeater .at the beginning of my lane (30 meters) so when i arrive in range my house will turn on. Yes when all goes pear shape you will still need to use the switch
IMHO home automation should more and more drive to be intelligent home. Home assistant is great basis to start this. only issue is me and my lack of knowledge
However thanks to the HA community and youtube videos (sometime great ideas but incomplete and sometimes contradictory) i manage to continue to develop my environment.
I can only say thank you all for a great contribution to the development of this platform and your teachings
Perfect philosophy, tech should not get in the way of humans doing things, but should help human do things better.
Switching on lights through the phone is an example of the former, not of the latter: you better switch on your lights using the electromechanical switch in your house, otherwise you do not own tech, you are owned by it.
Automation should be used to do useful things, for example automatically lowering the heating (or AC) when there is nobody at home, therefore saving energy without decreasing comfort (provided you have a good way to sense the inhabitants, which is all the question).
The non-geek inhabitants of the house are your first clients. Piss them off, and you’ll see.
I’m agree with you
but I know a valid use case for being able to control lights from my phone:
I’m quadriplegic and it’s very useful to control my house from my bed! 
Best Regards
olf24
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In your post, you mention fail-safe operation, but a topic i rarely hear about is ‘closed-loop’ control.
Many ‘dinky’ brand actuators and switches don’t reliably or regularly report their current state. One example is IR senders without a back channel.
…
There should be some indication if the device being queried, or reporting its present state…. e.g a light switch is ‘on’ but doesn’t show ‘on’ until the next off-on cycle.
A door is open, but the status says’closed.’ until it’s cycled by HA.
A list of certified actuators or switches would be helpful