Answered

Google Assistant room assignment PROBLEMS


Userlevel 2
Badge +3

I have Google Assistant on all of my Sonos devices.  And for the past year everything has worked great, including my integration with my smart home devices.   I can say things like “Google turn off the light” and it knows what room I’m in and does the right thing.

 

Today I moved a single ONE to a different room.  Re-assigned the room in the Sonos app.  Then re-assigned the room in the Google Home app.  Total chaos followed.  Now NONE of my devices know what room they are in, and turn lights on in the wrong room, or for the entire house.   I unlinked Sonos from Google Home, started over.  Didn’t help.   Then I tried moving things around to different rooms, experimented with a few things.  Didn’t help.  Unlinked a second time.  Didn’t help.    Any ideas?   It seems like when I re-link my Sonos to Google, Google still has a memory of the bad set-up.  Is there a way to totally wipe the Sonos configuration from Google and start over?  Unlinking didn’t help.

icon

Best answer by Nevyn72 21 May 2020, 22:35

View original

This topic has been closed for further comments. You can use the search bar to find a similar topic, or create a new one by clicking Create Topic at the top of the page.

67 replies

Userlevel 1
Badge

I use Philips Hue bulbs and they are working here okay and they are set in the same named rooms in the Philips Hue App as they are in the Google Home App .. they appear like this (see screenshot attached)… the one thing I do not do, is give my bulbs the same name as the room itself .. So perhaps give them ‘unique’ names that do not ‘clash’ with any other smart-home device or room name ...and see if that resolves things.

Thank you very much for trying to help. But unfortunately my Lights and other devices already all have names different to the room name. So that should not be the issue.

Interesting finding:

  • I have 2 rooms with Google Home Mini devices. Let’s call them ROOM_A and ROOM_B. These rooms have no Sonos devices.
  • I have 5 rooms with Sonos devices. We call them ROOM_1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
  • The Google Home Mini devices work just fine.
  • All Sonos devices (ROOM_1 to 5) somehow react as if they were in ROOM_A. When I move that Google device to another room in the Google Home app, they follow. When I remove the Home Mini from ROOM_A completely, they instantly behave as if they were in ROOM_B. When I remove that Google Home Mini as well, they switch to ROOM_1… When I add the Home Mini in ROOM_A again, everything acts as if it were in ROOM_A.

One more weird thing:

Saying “Lights off” anywhere turns off the lights in ROOM_A and says so. But: Saying “Lights off in this room” behaves differently in every room (though it should do the same in my understanding):

  • ROOM_A → Turns off lights in ROOM_A and says so.
  • ROOM_B → Turns off lights in ROOM_B and says so.
  • ROOM_1 → Does nothing but says “Ok I’m turning off 8 lights” (correct number for ROOM_1).
  • ROOM_2 → Turns off lights in ROOM_2 (yay), but says “Ok I’m turning off 8 lights” which only corresponds to the numer of lights in ROOM_1. But in contrast to what it says neither the lights in ROOM_A nor ROOM_1 are turned off (?!)
  • ROOM_3 to ROOM_5 → Does nothing but says “Ok I’m turning off 8 lights” (number for ROOM_1).

This is weird as hell.

I did more testing and removed all rooms from Google Home and then set them up one by one again. In the progress, it seemed to fall back to the first room I created and then as soon as I set up ROOM_A again, it was back to the previous behaviour...

Badge

I’ll add my voice to the collective cry of frustration.

Everything worked perfectly, Sonos updated their software, now I have an annoyed wife as the Beam in the lounge turns on the lights in our bedroom.

Userlevel 1
Badge

I sent a link to this thread to the Sonos support (Germany) and just got a reply from them. They acknowledged the problem and said they are currently working with Google to get it fixed. Seems to be a problem on Googles side because they say it will be fixed with an upcoming update from Google. But they could not say when this will happen.

Badge

I tried contacting Sonos Support via Twitter. They had me send a Diagnostic, then unlink my Sonos account from Google Home, remove the Assistant from the Beam, and then add the Google Assistant back to the Beam.

Well, I’m happy to report that this time (this is probably the third time I’ve reset my home) the Beam decided that it was actually in the Lounge, and so far so good. I’ll update the thread after the weekend and let everyone know if it’s stable.

Userlevel 7
Badge +17

A Sonos employee mentioned this on the Dutch language forums too. 

Great news, it just magically working again after that it didn't work for 3 weeks! The rooms where you are, are known again.

At least it now works in our house, hope the glitch stays away now!

Userlevel 2
Badge +3

HOOORAY!!!!   Just tried it, and everything works as it should!   Thanks for the head’s up!!!!

Userlevel 7
Badge +17

Yes, problem seems to be solved👍

Working for me too!

Userlevel 1

Yes! I can confirm this is working for me now too. 

Badge

Unfortunately everyone in my house has already learned all the commands.  Everyone has a ceiling fan and light in the bedroom they control with “Hey Google, turn on the fan” or “turn off the light” etc.   It’s going to be a while to train everyone to say “Hey Google, turn on the fan in the mater bedroom” etc. That’s lousy.   Really takes away from the out-of-the-box functionality GA/GH provide.

What ceiling fans do you have?

Yay, it works for me too! 

Userlevel 2
Badge +3

What ceiling fans do you have?

 

I have regular Hunter brand fans that include a light fixture.  But here’s the good part:

  • In my home there were two wall switches up to the fan junction box (i.e. “2-wire setup”).  One switch for the light, one for the fan.  
  • I did not install the remote that came with the fan. 
  • I “hard-wired” the fan to the existing electrical wires in the junction box.
  • At this point one switch controls the light, the other will turn on/off the fan (but not control the speed)
  • My fan did not have pull-chains, but if it did, the fan pull chain should be in the position for “high”
  • Then I replaced the wall switch for the fan with this:  https://www.amazon.com/GE-Enbrighten-Required-SmartThings-14287/dp/B06XTKQTTV
  • I have a SmartThings hub which will control switch which is the fan speed. 
  • I linked my SmartThing hub to Google Assistant/Home and can control the fan with my voice:
    • “Turn the fan on”
    • “Turn the fan off”
    • Note that Google doesn’t recognize the fan speeds “high/medium/low” so you have to use voice controls like it’s a dimmer.  “Turn the fan to 30%” etc.   0-30% results in low speed, etc.

Love it!

If you don’t have that kind of set-up Hunter also makes fans with Smart capabilities built-in that directly integrate with Google Assistant, Alexa, Apple Home Kit, etc.

I took this approach because I wanted to purchase a particular fan and take advantage of my existing 2-wire / 2-switch set-up.  I still wanted someone to be able to walk into a room and control the light and/or fan with the wall switch and not have to use voice commands.

Good luck!

Badge

What ceiling fans do you have?

 

I have regular Hunter brand fans that include a light fixture.  But here’s the good part:

  • In my home there were two wall switches up to the fan junction box (i.e. “2-wire setup”).  One switch for the light, one for the fan.  
  • I did not install the remote that came with the fan. 
  • I “hard-wired” the fan to the existing electrical wires in the junction box.
  • At this point one switch controls the light, the other will turn on/off the fan (but not control the speed)
  • My fan did not have pull-chains, but if it did, the fan pull chain should be in the position for “high”
  • Then I replaced the wall switch for the fan with this:  https://www.amazon.com/GE-Enbrighten-Required-SmartThings-14287/dp/B06XTKQTTV
  • I have a SmartThings hub which will control the fan speed. 
  • I linked my SmartThing hub to Google Assistant/Home and can control the fan with my voice:
    • “Turn the fan on”
    • “Turn the fan off”
    • Note that Google doesn’t recognize the fan speeds “high/medium/low” so you have to use voice controls like it’s a dimmer.  “Turn the fan to 30%” etc.   0-30% results in low speed, etc.

Love it!

If you don’t have that kind of set-up Hunter also makes fans with Smart capabilities built-in that directly integrate with Google Assistant, Alexa, Apple Home Kit, etc.

Good luck!

 

I have the Hunter Romulus, but the smart home integration is terrible. Honestly, I feel like I was lied to through advertising. To talk with the fan you have to say like “Hey Google connect to simple connect app” and then eventually you can tell it to adjust the speed or light, but it's extremely tedious and I never use it.

Terrible!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Userlevel 2
Badge +3

I have the Hunter Romulus, but the smart home integration is terrible. Honestly, I feel like I was lied to through advertising. To talk with the fan you have to say like “Hey Google connect to simple connect app” and then eventually you can tell it to adjust the speed or light, but it's extremely tedious and I never use it.

 

Oh my!  My set-up is direct: “Hey Google, turn on the fan.”   It’s named “ceiling fan” in the apps but it figures it out.  Also the switch remembers the last speed and will stay at that speed every time you turn on the fan, until you change the speed.

I have fans like this in all the bedroom, and then can setup macro commands in Google Assistant: “Hey Google, turn on all the fans” etc.   Love it.

Userlevel 1
Badge

Rooms are working (mostly) for me as well again :-)

As long as I say “Turn on the lights” it works as intended. When I say “Turn on the lights in this room” in any room it still responds with “ok, I’m turning on 8 lights (=living room)), but does nothing.

But since I never say “… in this room” I guess it’s fine.

Userlevel 2
Badge +3

Try “Turn on the room lights.”