Every night when I go to bed, I want to turn off all my lights…except the bedroom light. I want to turn on this light before bed. Using Stringify, I can finally create one voice command that turns off some lights and others.
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Philips Hue can turn multiple lights on or off with Alexa, but it can’t do both with a single voice action. That’s where Stringify comes in. Stringify is a very powerful automation tool that allows you to link all your smart gadgets and online services. If you’ve never used it before, check out our tutorial on the subject here, and then come back here to create a Thread.
For this Stringify Flow, we are going to change multiple lights at the same time to create a scene. Stringify can turn multiple lights on or off, change their brightness, or change the color of a light with a single command. Depending on how many smart lights you have and what your daily routines are, you can use the same principle to create a set of different types of commands. For example:
- Turn off the lights at home before bed. A bedtime flush can turn off all the lights in your living room and turn on the lights in your bedroom.
- Activate theater-style lighting for the duration of the movie. You can use Flow to turn off your living room lights and turn on your TV backlight to get ready for a movie.
- Dim the lights for cozy reading. With one command, you can turn off the overhead light in the living room, but set one light next to the sofa to low light so you can read.
The process for creating all these types of scenes (and many more) is basically the same, but we’ll demonstrate it with a simple bedtime routine. To do this, you’ll need to add your smart lights and voice assistant to Stringify Things (we’ll be using Philips Hue and Alexa for the demo). To get started, open the Stringify app on your phone. Click the round plus button at the bottom and click «Create New Thread».
At the top of the screen, click «Name your stream» and give it a name.
Click the big plus button at the bottom of the screen to add your items.
From the list of your things, add Alexa and any lights you want to change. You can also use Google Assistant instead of Alexa to do the same if you have a Google Home or want to activate this stream from your phone.