Hands-On Tech 222 Transcript

Please be advised that this transcript is AI-generated and may not be word-for-word. Time codes refer to the approximate times in the ad-supported version of the show.

0:00:00 - Mikah Sargent
Coming up on Hands-On Tech. Let's take a look at gaining access to a fan via our Apple Watch. Stay tuned.

Hello and welcome to Hands-On Tech. This is the show where I, Mikah Sargent, take your tech questions and answer them. Yeah, it's that easy. You write in at hot@twit.tv and I answer your question. I love it and you love it and that's why you're here, right, all right. So this week we got a question in from Dave who writes. Dave who writes I have an Ozeri tower fan that's spelled O-Z-E-R-I tower fan that I can control from the top of the fan or its infrared remote.

I also have the Ozeri app on an iPhone that I can control the fan using Wi-Fi. Is there a way to control the fan from my Apple Watch? I wish there was an Ozeri app for the Apple Watch, dave. So here's the thing I looked into this issue. I downloaded the Ozeri app on my device and one of the ways that you can see if you are able to sort of set up a way to pull off this automation is by launching the shortcuts app and tapping to create a new shortcut by hitting the plus icon in the top right corner and then simply scrolling down in the actions pane and looking for the name of the app so in this case Ozeri and it did not show up, which tells me, okay, Ozeri is not an app that has any shortcuts, actions and, honestly, one way that you can also tell is just by launching the app. And if you look at the Ozeri app, it's scaled poorly, so you know that the app really hasn't had many updates in a long time. So that's the other way that you can kind of tell okay, this probably doesn't have any integrations for automation. So I said, hmm, if I can't get it to work that way, is it possible that Dave may have just missed that there was an Apple Watch app? So the next thing I did was I went into the Watch app on my phone, because that is where you can go to install apps and you scroll down until you get to the section that says Available Apps. And I scrolled through and I looked for for Ozeri and I didn't see it there either. And then I said, okay, sometimes it does take a sort of cash refresh to make that happen, to have it appear. So I launched the Ozeri app. I force quit the Ozeri app. I launched the Apple Watch or the Watch app on my iPhone and quit, the Watch app on my iPhone, restarted both of them, looked through again. No, now I can confirm absolutely. There's no Ozeri app and there's no Ozeri shortcuts integration.

So what do we do in this instance? How do we fix this problem? How can we make it possible for our dear friend Dave to be able to control the tower fan from an Apple Watch? Well then, I said, you know, not too long ago I had an episode of Hands-On Tech where someone was asking about changing the media buttons on their TV remote and I suggested that they get an IR blaster that they could use to control the TV in a different way from what they were doing before. And I also have one of these devices. It's a Broadlink RM4 Mini. So I looked at the Broadlink RM4 Mini app it's just the Broadlink app and I launched the Watch app and I launched the Shortcuts app and also none of them supported the Broadlink. So I knew, okay, that's not going to work either. Ported the Broadlink. So I knew, okay, that's not going to work either. Well, dear Dave, I believe I found your answer.

There's a company called Tuya T-U-Y-A, and Tuya makes what's a. Tuya Makes an IR blaster that's available for $27 on Amazon's website, and this IR blaster it does have. Oh and, by the way, there's a sale, there's a $3 coupon, so you can actually save a little bit of money. This does give you the ability to control via IR, but, more importantly, it has two things it has an Apple Watch app itself, and it also has shortcuts integration, has shortcuts integration. So what you will do, dear Dave, is you will, if you choose to do this, you'll get the Tuya smart IR controller and you will set it up with your tower fan. There are a bunch of ways to do this. It's got like a library, but it can also learn what the command is, and, of course, it needs to be in the same room with the fan. And then from there, on your Apple Watch, you can install the Tuya smart app and set up the device that way, or you could use a shortcut, and so you can run that shortcut from your Apple Watch. But in either case, and so you can run that shortcut from your Apple Watch, but in either case, you would then be able to use the Apple Watch to actually make this control.

It's kind of wild how often the problems that people have with automation can be solved with an IR blaster. They're pretty powerful tools. There's one other suggestion that I have for you that I don't think is as elegant a solution, but the company Switchbot is a company that's been around for a long time and it makes all sorts of little devices, including what's called the SwitchBot Bot. And the SwitchBot Bot is a tiny little device that you can attach to the side of a tower fan, for example, or a humidifier or whatever device it happens to be, and all it is. All it amounts to is being a button. It presses things, and it has two options. There's the rocker switch mode, which can switch on and off lights or other rocker switches, and then just the button mode, which will press a button, and so you could stick this to your tower fan and have it press the button that way, again controllable via your Apple Watch. So either of these solutions will work for you.

I personally find that the IR Blaster is a much more elegant solution, because I'm going to share in the Discord an image of something that you would never catch me doing, but they do offer it as an option, and that is using that SwitchBot button to turn on an espresso machine in the morning. But you have to stick the honking wall wart thing onto the espresso machine and it looks so goofy. Maybe John will be able to add this in post. But essentially, if you can imagine a small little rectangular prism just glued to sort of awkwardly glued to the side of an espresso machine, sticking out all over the place, no, there's no way, not in my lifetime, but it is. You know, if you've got no other solution and you want to make something automated, that's a way to do it. Ultimately, I think the IR blaster is your better choice, and we know now that Tuya makes an app for the Apple Watch and also an app for shortcuts integrations. I should mention that SwitchBot is also supported by the Apple Watch, so if you decide to go with that option, you can use that directly. But I have to say I'm very glad that I can now delete the Ozeri app from my iPhone, that we've done that research to determine what's possible. I should mention too, tower fans are not the only thing that IR blasters are good for, although it seems to be the modern choice.

There are lots of IR-controlled devices. You might have a humidifier that has an IR option. You might have a space heater that has an IR option. You, of course, have televisions that have IR options Almost all of them do and the cool thing about IR blasters is they don't have to be single purpose devices, so you can use them in a room that has a tower fan, that has an overhead fan, that has a remote, perhaps that has a humidifier, that has a television, and when it comes to the television, different buttons send out different codes. So you can use that IR blaster to send out different codes, so you could have it, for example, switch modes automatically and turn off the fan because you're trying to watch something on television. And then, of course, you're starting to be able to get things set up so you can say this has a humidity sensor and if the humidity raises above 56%, then please, ir blast to turn on the humidifier in the space. That's one example of a way to use it. So, yeah, this can become really powerful pretty quickly if you are looking to do that. So, Dave, that is my suggestion for you and, as always, I'd love to hear what solution you end up taking. That's my favorite thing is hearing back and knowing that the option that you chose to take and how it worked for you.

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0:12:38 - Leo Laporte
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