My nightstand lights are connected to a surge protector plugged into a Zigbee smart plug plugged into a dumb wall outlet controlled by a single dumb wall switch.
I have the smart plug set to default=On, so the wall switch works fine, and I can also turn the lights off from my phone or via an automation. All good so far.
What I WANT is to be able to turn the lights ON without getting out of bed, and irrespective of the position of the switch.
I tried putting a second smart plug in the switch-controlled outlet and making an automation to toggle the surge protector’s smart plug when the switch’s empty smart plug powers off/on via the wall switch, but it looks like it’s not simple to detect a Zigbee device “disappearing”. I found some integrations that detect zigbee devices disappearing, but those seemed more for running health checks to detect and repair moved devices than for live detection.
Any suggestions?
You may have better luck with a smart zigbee switch to replace the switch. Be careful that it complies with your local regulations etc.
If you want the aesthetic of the current switch, you can alternatively get relay modules which would sit in the box behind the switch and connect both to the switch and the socket.
If you don’t want to mess with the in wall wiring, you can get covers that sit over a wall switch and contain/mount a battery smart switch.
If none of that suits, sounds like you’re on the right track with powering the light from a non switched socket and using the presence/absence of a second device to identify the switch position. But I don’t have advice on the fine details.
I like the relay idea better, thank you. I’ve done outlet and switch wiring before, but never for HA and not yet in this house.
Detecting the missing device seemed like it would be the easiest way as it wouldn’t require wiring, but it seems that that’s actually the more complicated option!