Deactivate device vs Delete device

Product Wishlist
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Continuing the discussion from Mark a device no longer used:

The above thread is locked, so I am creating a new topic because I feel that I have something new and worthwhile to contribute. I have searched the forums for “deactivate” and didn’t find any instances that apply to the following.

Rather than Deleting a device, I would like to Deactivate a device. Here’s some reasons why.

  1. If a device breaks beyond repair, and I remove it from my home, I would prefer to deactivate it to ensure that a replacement device does not get absorbed into a model that really is not it’s own.

  2. If a device model gets broken and is only detecting a fraction of it’s true load/consumption, or more than it’s true load, I would prefer to deactivate that device so that a new detection will occur for usage going forward, and to preserve the past usage, imperfect though it is.

  3. Seasonal devices, two examples:
    A. I have a whole house fan that will only get used from May or June to about September. I would like to deactivate the device during seasons that it is totally not used. (Although, it does have a simple control computer that is on year-round. I am planning to put a HS110 smart plug on this device because it has 7 fan speed settings, resulting in a complex load model.)
    B. Window-mount AC’s are typically only installed, or at least only used, in the Summer season, and maybe some Spring and Fall in the lower latitudes. It would be useful to ensure that no other device load could be mistaken as that AC when the AC is not installed for the Winter season.

So, for examples 1 and 2, the vision for Deactivate is that is permanent, like Delete is. For example 3, this is more of a toggle setting used on a seasonal basis. I am not sure how Sense should, perhaps, remind a user to Reactivate a device as appropriate. Maybe the Data Science team would have some ideas about that.

4 Likes
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I like it. We’d also need an “Activate” device to return it to active again I guess. I can think about other things such as Christmas trees, Christmas lights and the like.

3 Likes
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Agreed, this would be an excellent enhancement.

However, since this may not be made soon: here’s a workaround that I use to get “obsolete” or inactive devices out of the way… I put an emoji (like: :no_entry_sign:) as the first character of the device name.
This typically will cause the device to sort to the bottom of the list (as well as a visual reminder to me if it happens to turn on).

This isn’t a holistic “solution”, but it is an immediately-available workaround to provide some of the behaviors you desire.