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Luke Liukonen
Luke Liukonen

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It was great while it lasted

As of today, I have 13 days to either disable or somehow move a number of bindings I have on "If This Then That" (IFTTT). They have changed there policies to have unlimited amounts of bindings as a paid user, but limit the total number of bindings to only 3 bindings for a free account. And while the price is right (you can set your own now, and "pay forever" that price) I am a developer... which means I like to work around problems if I can. I may purchase it... they have been a great service for as long as I've used them. That said, I've decided to start giving Node Red a try. Per Wikipedia "Node-RED is a flow-based development tool for visual programming developed originally by IBM for wiring together hardware devices, APIs and online services as part of the Internet of Things". What that translates to for me is, Node Red is a more complicated, powerful version of IFTTT that can be hosted locally. I've personally spun up a docker container on my 24/7 low powered linux machine, and set up a flow for doing speed tests. While it's not as nice as my original script (that would save to google docs) having a version that is actually working (my cron job was removed on a re-image of the machine, and I never put it back). We'll see how it goes. Most of the bindings I've used on IFTTT have been Web-Hooks that send emails or messages. Node Red appears to have this functionality baked in. Now it's a matter of getting these services written in Node red, and changing the bindings on my apps, wish me luck!

Top comments (2)

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yellow1912 profile image
yellow1912

Nice. As I grow older, I start to value the time I have. It's a business decision (to spend more time on core features) and a personal decision (to spend more time with loved ones). For that I normally opt for paid solutions because they spent the time so I don't have to, and also because I think it's fair someone needs to earn a living too.

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psiho profile image
Mirko Vukušić

I haven't even used IFTT after trying NodeRed. I simply love it. Well, part of the reason was privacy/security and not wanting to be pulled in any of the home automation ecosystems. So I flashed all my devices with Tasmota firmware and moved to Homeassistant self hosted solution. I had an Unraid server already so it was a perfect place to run those on, as Docker containers.
Out of all those tools and software, NodeRed most impresses me. There is no limit in what you can do with it, it's free and easily hosted localy or remotely using a docker container.