Homebridge Motion Sensor Web

This is a Homebridge plugin that allows you to create motion sensor accessories in HomeKit for devices that can fire a web request when motion starts and ends.

I built this for my Ubiquiti UniFi Video cameras. They have motion detection built in and they write to a log file (/var/log/unifi-video/motion.log) when they detect motion. I have built a bash script that you can install as a service to send web requests when logs are written to that file. You can find this in the project /UniFi Video Service/unifi-video-motion-logwatch.sh. I've used systemd to run it as a daemon on my Ubuntu UniFi Video NVR machine. I understand that the official Ubiquiti NVR may run Debian 7 (Wheezy) so systemd may not be available. You will have to use initd. You will also need to change the permission on /var/log/unifi-video/motion.log so that anyone can read the file (chmod a+r /var/log/unifi-video/motion.log).

Installation

You must have Homebridge already installed, then just install the plugin by running npm install -g homebridge-motionsensor-web

How It Works

This Homebridge plugin listens for web requests (on the configured port) with two different pathnames, /start and /stop. It also requires a search parameter on the end that specifies the configured sensorName.

Example Start

http://{IP_OF_HOMEBRIDGE_SERVER}:{CONFIGURED_PORT}/start?sensorName=MyConfiguredSensorName

Example Stop

http://{IP_OF_HOMEBRIDGE_SERVER}:{CONFIGURED_PORT}/stop?sensorName=MyConfiguredSensorName

Configuration

I have included an example config of the platform in example.config.json.

Required Platform Option

• httpPort - You must provide the port that the plugin will bind to, to listen to web requests

Required Sensor Options

• name - Friendly name for the sensor
• sensorName - The parameter value for parameter sensorName in the web request
• manufacturer - Manufacturer
• model - Model

Optional Sensor Option

• serial - Serial
• stopDelayMs - Set this to the millisecond value you want to delay the stop event from firing after it has fired. (Now that I look at this, I don't really use this, probably can take it out.) DEFAULT: 1500
• startAfterStopFuseMs - Set this to a millisecond value. This will prevent any new start motion events from firing (for the given time) after the last start motion event. I created this as my cameras would trigger a motion start, then I will turn on a light, and then leave them on for 5 minutes, and then turn off the light. When the light turns off it triggers another motion start event, so would get stuck in a loop. I resolved it by using this and setting it to 5 minutes plus 10 seconds. DEFAULT: 750