Smart Life / Alexa *Migration Strategy* tips please

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The HA documentation and the many YouTube videos on HA are very good at telling us how to start an installation from scratch, but I want to migrate an existing ‘live’ system to HA that currently runs on dozens of Smart Life scenes and Alex routines, and I want to do it step by step without breaking the present system, spending the minimum of time at the installation site (which is not my home). Can anyone advise on the best strategy?

I am a former software engineer, so will program if necessary, but I prefer taking the simplest / quickest approach first, then upgrading later, a step as a time. I have no pressing cloud security or lag concerns. I am adopting HA for more sophisticated logic and as a more flexible Zigbee hub for future projects (door security and smart heating).

  1. The existing system, started about three years ago, operates mainly with WiFi devices connected to Smart Life (one or two exceptions under eWeLink, Flic and Gosund). They comprise an IR universal remote with sub-devices for TV, Firestick, Sky+HD box, and a Sony DVD player; ten 1- to 3-gang light switches; four smart plugs; and a curtain rail. There are 6 Alexa Echo devices. I have a couple of Zigbee closure sensors connected via an Echo 4th Generation, but am happy to reconnect those to the new hub and start again.

  2. I have already set up a the new HA hub in my own workshop, which is not the house where it is going to be installed. I installed HA native on a Dell Optiplex 3050 MFF, with which I am very happy.

  3. I have a Nabu Casa account for the target user (separate from my own), with remote access set up and tested. Nabu Casa Alexa integration is installed but not yet in use.

  4. I have the standard Tuya Smart Life cloud integration installed. I can see all the Smart Life scenes in HA, each with an ‘ACTIVATE’ link that I have not yet pressed.

  5. I have Tuya Local installed, and would like to migrate to that in the end, but am happy to keep that as a later step.

I DO NOT WANT TO MESS with the current live system until I am on site to catch any errors. Even then I would like to migrate scenes / routines / automations step by step so that the operation of the existing system is not disturbed for more than a few minutes at a time, and can be left in a part-migrated operational state if I run out of time.

MY QUESTIONS – to anyone who has done something similar before – are not so much ‘how’ questions as ‘which is the most appropriate strategy’ questions …

A. Presumably, if I ‘activate’ scenes in HA they will become exposed to Alexa. Will Alexa (a) switch from the old Smart Life scenes to the new ones; (b) stay with the Smart Life versions; or (c) just get confused?

B. Presumably, I will ultimately turn off the Smart Life skill in Alexa, so that Alexa always goes to HA – but I would retain the Smart Life account as a means of onboarding new WiFi devices? That would however be a rash step if Alexa does not automatically recognise them in HA, so should presumably be my last step?

C. Ultimately I will want all the Smart Life scenes inside HA. Can I just write an HA scene with the same name and expose it to Alexa, at the same time deactivating (or deleting) the equivalent Smart Life scene, or will I need to write a scene with a different name and then update the Alexa routines that use it?

D. Ultimately, I will want as many Alexa routines as possible inside HA as automations. Some are scheduled; most are simply to links to scenes anyway. I guess Alexa will have to keep the latter when it involves multiple trigger phrases, but HA could take over scheduled actions, using TTS instead of ‘Alexa says’ for spoken reminders, and those where one device (such as a doorbell) triggers an action.

E. Ultimately, I will want to migrate all the Smart Life devices to Local Tuya, but I am assuming it is best to hold that as a subsequent step until after I have migrated all of Smart Life cloud to HA? If I migrate a device to Local Tuya will scenes and automations using it still work, or will I have to update them all again too? And if that is the case, perhaps I should go straight to local Tuya and not go via the Tuya cloud integration at all??

As you can see there are a number of dilemmas that could be resolved by trial and error, but that could cause me to spend a lot of time and disrupt the existing system. Therefore any advice on how to migrate while minimising both disruption and my time on site would be very much appreciated!

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If you’re using the default Amazon integration with Nabu Casa - the Alexa Integration supports filtering entities from Amazon:
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Click Manage Entities and it will take you to a spot where you can filter entities by domain or even individual entities. (Basically shut it all off until you’re ready, then enable what you want)

Wont matter first or last, just matters if there are ‘duplicate (named) devices.’ You can disable the appropriate devices in Alexa, or filter them from HA or kill one of the skills - your choice. Don’t overthink it.

The biggest hole here in your strategy is: ‘im not touching anything until I’m onsite.’

Why?

Just turn on the HA integration to Alexa and filter everything out so nothing is sent to Alexa except for the entities you choose (for testing) Then you can see how this works and looking at the questions you’re asking, you’ll quickly figure out your order of operations and what problems you need to solve along the way.

The reason I suggest that - to convert those Tuya devices to local AFAIK you’re going to have to flash them. Then re-onboard them to local Tuya or ESPHome. Either way its a time suck and it kills access to the device until you’re on the other network. It’s a much better experience for the end user (sounds like you’re doing this for someone else) and a lot less stressful for the installer if you can do one, test it and see if it works without hosing everything else in the process.

I get you’re going to have to be there to flash the devices so why not do them all at once… IMHO I’ve never had a project go perfectly as planned. If you take everything offline from Smart Life at once and try to move it at once, invariably something is gonna hit a snag and delay the whole operation. If you instead get HA setup to AMZ first, then kill devices / entities one by one as you migrate each, and expose only what you need back to AMZ, you can do the whole thing without the end user ever knowing anything changed except the ‘cloud lag’ starts to go away as you move devices. Pull device from SmartLife and any scenes it was in. Flash device, onbopard to Local Tuya or EspHome, rename device to old name, recreate scenes, expose device(s) / Scene(s) to AMazon, wash rinse repeat and the system stays up while you do it. If one device mucks up the works you can either skip it and come back to it or stop and fix it - either way your end user is still up.

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I mean I am not going to do anything that might upset the system currently running when I am not there to fix it if it goes wrong. I don’t think that is a ‘hole’, just a constraint. I have set up the HA computer in advance and can see all the Smart Life devices and scenes already.

For the rest I think you are right. On HA it is probably safest to hide all existing Smart Life (WiFi) devices and scenes initially from Alexa, then migrate them one at a time. It does mean I will have a hybrid system where Zigbee devices will operate through HA and WiFi devices through Smart Life, but I guess that is not a problem? Actually there is no need to migrate WiFi devices at all until I go ‘local’ because it only makes the path from Alexa to the device longer (it presently goes from Alex to Smart Life; going from Alexa to HA to Smart Life is probably not going to be quicker?). I was not planning to flash anything; there are ways of using local Tuya after initially registering with Smart Life.