iOS 10 Issues setting up multiple devices on Home App (HomeKit) for use with HUE Hub.

Question

Level 1

7 points

iOS 10 Issues setting up multiple devices on Home App (HomeKit) for use with HUE Hub.

I can connect one iPhone, but am unable to allow a guest or second iPhone to control lights. Once I am setup on one iPhone, the second iPhone won't see the HUE Hub with their Home App. When I send a guest invite and they accept, they see my Home Setup I created, but they get an error saying "accessories not responding".

I have rest iphones and HUE Hub multiple times as well as HUE and Home App settings. I am always able to setup either one of the two iPhones initially. The problem comes in when trying to grant controls to the second iPhone. I have even tried deleting the HUE Apps to make sure they are not interfering somehow. Both devices are able to use the HUE App just fine to control the lights, but we would both like the convience of controlling the HUE lights with the iPhone Control Center.

Anyone have any success stories with connecting multiple devices using the HUE Hub and Apple Home App since iOS 10 release?

Both devices are iPhone 6 Plus running iOS 10. I do have a iPad Pro available, but it's not setup for iOS 10 yet nor being used for light control. The HUE Hub is the latest square model.

Thanks!

iPhone 6 Plus, iOS 10, Home App (HomeKit)

Posted on Sep 14, 2016 9:14 AM

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Answer 1

adiasbr

Level 1

4 points

Feb 6, 2017 6:02 AM in response to rgrif13

The main hub in your home, whether iPad or Apple TV, has to be in close proximity to the accessories, without many walls, because a bluetooth connection is required. After each event, the information is sent to the hub and then the notification is sent to the remote device, but not to the guests.

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Answer 2

Jibers

Level 1

9 points

Sep 15, 2016 9:16 AM in response to rgrif13

I have the exact same issue. My iPhone 6S+ works great. My kids and wife iPads, iPods and phones running iOS10 do not. They can see the home app screen and all the setup devices. But, each device says 'no response' and at the top of the page its says 'No accessories responding'.

In addition, they can all use the Hue app and control the lights fine. However, not with Siri, but thats another matter. Again my siri commands work fine.

My guess is, its a bug.

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Answer 3

rgrif13 Author

Level 1

7 points

Sep 15, 2016 9:56 AM in response to Jibers

Hey Jibers,

I was able to fix my issue yesterday. I have 3 devices in my home, 2 iPhone 6 Plus and 1 iPad Pro. My wife's iPhone and iPad Pro share the same iCloud username. I originally setup my Home App on my iPhone 6 Plus, which worked flawlessly. I sent an invite to my wife's iPhone and she accepted but got the "No accessories responding" even though she could see all my settings for lights. Her iPad was not upgraded to iOS 10 yet which has the same iCloud username as her iPhone. I believe this is what was messing us up. I first reset and deleted all the settings on the home app. Then I reset the HUE Hub in the Siri tab on the HUE app. I then upgraded her iPad to iOS 10 and instantly saw an invite that was hung up in the Home App and so I deleted it. I then did the setup of the Home App from her iPad and sent me an invite which solved our issues. We are now able to use the Home App on all 3 devices.

I suggest trying to delete all settings on everyone's Home App (delete all homes created and invites) and reset the HUE Hub from the siri tab on the HUE App. Make sure that all devices have iOS 10, otherwise turn them off while setting up your devices. Also might be good to turn off secondary devices that use the same iCloud username as people's primary device. Make your profile again on your primary device in the Home App, then send an invite to one person and see if it works. If that works, then continue sending it to the rest of your people in your house making sure they are connected one by one.

The invites seem to mess up when you send it to someone that has multiple devices with different iOS versions with the same iCloud username. At least that is what caused my headache.

hope this helps you, you seem to have way more devices than I do.

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Answer 4

Erik.vk

Level 1

4 points

Sep 15, 2016 11:45 AM in response to rgrif13

I too have the same issue. One solution for me was to setup an ipad as a "home hub" and then share the home, then the other phone could connect to my hue system. But it was slow and unreliable. Waiting for an update from apple and/or philips.

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Answer 5

Jibers

Level 1

9 points

Sep 15, 2016 11:49 AM in response to Jibers

Great thanks, I shall try that.

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Answer 6

Jibers

Level 1

9 points

Sep 16, 2016 3:26 AM in response to Jibers

Unfortunately this did not work for me.

At the moment i guess this is a work around for some, but a bit flaky too.

I'm sure there will be an imminent update, as having to go about it this way is not user friendly.

Thanks for trying to help.

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Answer 7

tjo04

Level 1

4 points

Sep 18, 2016 4:30 PM in response to Erik.vk

I have had similar issues with the Hue system including not being able to remotely control bulbs via Apple TV 3. Like your case, setting up an iPad as a Home Hub alleviated the issue. Also hoping/waiting for a fix.

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Answer 8

lowe493

Level 1

4 points

Sep 19, 2016 11:54 AM in response to Jibers

Same issue here with 2 devices that are on the same version different icloud accounts tried everything, hopefully they will find a fix soon

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Answer 9

lowe493

Level 1

4 points

Sep 21, 2016 11:17 AM in response to rgrif13

So i decided to report this as a bug to apple via the Developer channels, and i've managed to get the hue to work with a shared user.

So the issue is the firmware on the hue, you will need to update your hue to the newest version, mine was not automatically updating to the newest firmware. To force a firmware update its pretty easy if you have a basic technical understanding of computers.

So first off you will need to have a user in the Hue's API if you dont you can create one by reading the following from hue, you will need to create an account to view the info

http://www.developers.meethue.com/documentation/configuration-api#71_create_user

So when you have a user in the api you will need to follow the following http://blog.tomgillett.me/philips-hue-forcing-a-firmware-update/

(from step 3)

After this once you have rebooted your hub and once you reopen the app the hub should popup for an update.

Once this finishes you should be able to setup the siri voice control which will setup your Home automatically so it maybe a good idea to remove your current home. Then you can share the home which will work 😀

I do not own any of the information provided credits to the authors of the guides above.

thanks

steve

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Answer 10

Erik.vk

Level 1

4 points

Sep 21, 2016 11:25 AM in response to lowe493

Just updating the hue app and the bridge today (a new version came out earlier today) worked for me. It was obviously a Philips issue, and Philips fixed it.

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Answer 11

Oct 5, 2016 4:07 PM in response to lowe493

Welp, don't know what I actually did. I followed the instructions to force an update, and all went as described except for the end when you "put" the last message through. Got an "error 400". Some of what I did actually rebooted the bridge, but that's it. The Hue app was already on the latest version, and when I launched it, there was no notification for an update (for the bridge). So, no update occurred. Aside from that I disconnected and connected the Apple TV from Home, and I downloaded the ($2.99) Hue app for the TV. Between the low level stuff I did on the bridge and what I did on the TV, it all started working, including being able to control the lights via Siri via the TV. So far, it's gone a full day without breaking, so I'm optimistic it'll continue to operate as intended, without the dreaded "no response" messages from the Home App. Interestingly, because the Hue app always worked, and people reporting iOS 10 was breaking it, I figured it was a bug in the Home App rather than the Hue side, and I'm still not 100 percent either way, but in any case... fingers crossed.

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