Features Roadmap

Feature development list / progress as below.

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Google Home Integration now complete, testing underway - if you want access contact me via node-red@cb-net.co.uk

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Release Plan

Release 0.3

• Initial beta test release, no state monitoring

Release 0.4

• [State] Show state in Alexa App
• [User] Show Device Count on My Device page
• [Device Admin] Add total device count
• [User Admin] Add Total User Count
• [User Admin] Add User Device Count
• [Analytics] Re-enable Google Analytics/ Integrate into new APIs, look to cover
  • Page view/ web site visits/ user journey flow
  • Event logging for
    • Command API
    • Discovery API
    • Get State API
  • Total API calls
  • Per-User Total API calls
  • Per-Device API calls

Release 0.5

• [Capability] Add support for Alexa.PercentageController
• [Capability] Break-out state data for colorBrightness and brightness
• [Capability] Add support for Alexa.Speaker
• [PlaybackController] Add support for FastForward, Next, Previous, Rewind, StartOver
• [Capability] Add support for Alexa.TemperatureSensor
• [Device] Create "dummy" state data on device creation, will make usability much easier
• [Alexa Skill] Availability in en-US, en-CA, en-IN, en-AU markets
• [Alexa Skill Marketplace] translations for:
  • Spanish es-ES
  • German de-DE
  • Japanese jp-JP
  • Italian it-IT
• [Lambda] Define function in East US 1 region
• [Lambda] Define function in Asia Pacific Tokyo region
• [API] Addition of API Rate Limiter
  • getstate Web API limiter
  • Lambda RATE_LIMIT_EXCEEDED event handler
• [Capability] Add support for Alexa.ChannelController
  • Lambda updates
  • Node-RED Contrib updates
  • Web Service updates
• [Branding] Rebrand website to "Node-RED Alexa Smart Home" in-line with node-red-contrib branding
• [Login] Display alert/ banner if account not linked with Amazon Account
• [User "My Account" Page] Create new user page to edit/ update details, change password and delete user account
• [Superuser] Change post-login behaviour to go to management interface, disable My Devices/ My Account
• [Capability]"<Device Name> doesn't support that" feedback now provided on unsupported command/ directive

Release 0.6

• [Web API] Deprecate rotating-file-system logs in favour of Winston logging to console / Docker logs (container-based architecture favours this)
• [Terms of Service] TOS updated/ links configured on login and register pages, modal code added for ease of consumption. Alexa Skill updated in each market with TOS link
• [Privacy Policy] Links configured on login and register pages, modal code added for ease of consumption
• [API] Define throttling on a per-router basis
  • getstate (in-place as of release 0.5)
  • login
  • newuser
  • devices
  • catch-all
• [Web UI] Add tooltips to each capability to help with user selection

Release 0.7

• [Branding] Website branding changed to Node-RED Smart Home
• [Branding] Logo created, updated across Alexa Skill and Google Home Skill
• [Branding] Change to red.cb-net.co.uk (inc SSL/ NGINX conf etc - leaving existing hostnames for Web API and MQTT in-play)
• [Google Assistant] Enable use of both Alexa and Google Home services - high-level plan:
  • MongoDB Schema Changes:
    • Google Home device data staging (available via /admin/update-schema):
      • Create new "attributes" element (mixed):
        • Create new attributes.colorModel element (string)
        • Create new element attributes.colorTemperatureRange : {temperatureMinK (number), temperatureMaxK (number)}
        • Move existing validRange values for colorTemperature
        • Create new element attributes.temperatureRange : {temperatureMin (number), temperatureMax (number)}
        • Create new element attributes.temperatureScale (string)
        • Create new element attributes.thermostatModes (array of strings)
        • Move existing validRange values for temperature
        • Modify getstate, setstate, device creation to use new elements
        • Create new element attributes.sceneReversible(boolean)
        • Add attribute element "translation" for Google Home and Alexa
  • API Add new routers for
    • SYNC
      • Add ReplaceCapability function to translate stored capabilities for Google Home:
        • PowerController >> action.devices.traits.OnOff
        • BrightnessController >> action.devices.traits.Brightness
        • ColorController & ColorTemperatureController >> action.devices.traits.ColorSetting
        • SceneController >> action.devices.traits.Scene
        • ThermostatController >> action.devices.traits.TemperatureSetting
      • Add gHomeReplaceType function to translate stored types for Google Home
        • ACTIVITY_TRIGGER >> action.devices.types.SCENE
        • LIGHT >> action.devices.types.LIGHT
        • SMARTPLUG >> action.devices.types.OUTLET
        • SWITCH >> action.devices.types.SWITCH
        • THERMOSTAT >> action.devices.types.THERMOSTAT
    • EXEC
    • QUERY
    • DISCONNECT

Release 0.8

• [Web API] Change service to modular architecture, based on express.router to better divide up code. Single monolithic index.js is too difficult to maintain
• [Google Home] add 'roomHint' (string) attribute/ text box on device creation to populate
• [Command API] Moved response construction to NodeJS instance as opposed to Lambda
• [Google Home] Add support for Async State Updates
• [Alexa] Add support for Async state updates/ Alexa Authorization directive
• [Service Management] maintenance functions for:
  • AccessToken cleanup (handled via TTL index)
  • MongoDB Sessions (not needed)
• [Logging] Introduced Cloudwatch support for logs
• [Google Home] add support for mediaState trait (Alexa equiv. PlaybackController) / TV device type (experimental)
• [Google Home] add support for volume trait (Alexa equiv. Speaker)/ Speaker device type (experimental)
• [Google Home] add 2FA (PIN) check to Smart Lock device type (optional)

Release 0.9 [Development Branch]

• [Node-RED Contrib] Move Request Library to HTTPS due to ehcd curve errors
• [Capability] Add Alexa Contact Sensor capability
• [User] Add My Account option to remove OAuth tokens
• [API] Add State Update validation to API (was already built-in to Node-RED contrib, this is a fail-safe)
• [Node-RED Contrib] Added handler/ GUI-based warnings for unsupported commands
• [Node-RED Contrib] Add 'message/' topic / alerting capability in Node-RED interface for bad OOB state updates (those hosting their own must run the commands outlined here. (Work in Progress)
• [Alexa] Add support for ContactSensor
• [Alexa] Add support for MotionSensor
• [State API] Enable Change Reports/ status changes to GHome and Alexa for ContactSensor and MotionSensor

Release 0.10

• [Google Home] Fix multi-command/ partial success responses
• [Google Home] add Traits
  • Open/Close
  • FanSpeed
• [Google Home] add device types
  • Fan
  • Internal/ External Blinds
• [Alexa] add device types
  • Fan
  • Internal/ External Blinds
• [Alexa] add capability:
  • RangeController, customised for Blinds and general device types
• [Website] Translations for supported skill languages
• [Node-RED Nodes] multiple fixes:
  • Resolve state node being "first" to register causing MQTT connection failure
  • Removed the need/ requirement for payload.acknowledged to be set in state updates

Release 0.11 (current development branch)

• Re-structure service in preparation for further async/ event driven execution
  • Add .env file to reduce command complexity
  • Add .ghomejwt file to simplify env definitions
  • Introduce new async function to check for JWT/ kick off Home Graph API OAuth
• Streamlined passport authentication/ strategies code, consolidating into app.js (for now) and removing duplicate code from alexa, ghome, auth and default routes
• New MongoDB Indexes to improve Admin UI performance (aggregate query times significantly improved, changed table presentation to be on document load).
• Add email verification flow on account creation
• Add limitAttempts to passport-local-mongoose config to track lastLogin information
• Force all new user accounts to be lower case, lots of same-named accounts (for same email address!) with different case, clearly this was causing confusion!
• Add Dark Mode theme to UI via https://github.com/sandoche/Darkmode.js
• Change changePassword to use landing page, preventing token use by email scanning services that check URLs
• Add isVerified to Admin/ Users page
• Add functionality to enable/ disable users via /admin/users interface
• Bump all depends to vCurrent (at time of writing), including EJS which required changes on file includes within templates
• Add TOC / nav pane on /docs using https://github.com/afeld/bootstrap-toc
• Add sitemap using: https://www.npmjs.com/package/sitemap#example-of-using-sitemapjs-with-express
• Add robots.txt via https://www.npmjs.com/package/express-robots-txt
• Rewrite Alexa and Google functions to Async/ Await, consolidate functions to reduce code duplicate/ overlap
• Add support for branding/ brand name via .env file
• Add state reporting for fans, blinds (internal and external)
• Add support for mosquitto-auth-go plugin, replacing the now deprecated mosquitto-auth-plug
• Add require 2FA PIN on Smart Lock device for Google Home-enabled users when creating / editing a Smart Lock
• Add check for duplicate device name on create new device
• Ongoing

Backlog

• [Response/ State Node] Review possibility to merge
  • [State] ? move to conf node and offer checkbox/ auto-select if device.state.resportState == true
• [Device Admin] Edit
• [Device Admin] Disable Device
• [Device Admin] Reset Device State Element
• [User Admin] Reset Password
• [Node-RED Nodes] Translations for supported skill languages
• Alexa device types:
  • Camera - Alexa Show stream On TV or Echo Show
  • Door - Lock / Open + Confirm and Icon to display Locked/closed
  • Doorbell to pass notifications
  • Garage - Alexa is the Garage door locked / Alexa open / close
  • Network HW - Alexa to confirm status UP / Down etc