Now that I got the IR/RF smart remote from the previous post, I wanted it to control my patio lights. Now the challenge was that these lights were not smart, and adding my indoor smart switch was not great for the outdoors. So I need to investigate.

Luckily all-mighty amazon came to the rescue and I found the following outdoor switch. This one was fancy – it came with a remote that allowed for the usual on/off as well as for timers for 2h/4h/8h and the best part a dusk to dawn sensor.

Now the dusk to dawn would have worked perfectly, however, I wanted sunset to around 1 AM, as I’m sure I would have passed out by then, being the old fart that I am. So coded in the on/off command in the IR/RF smart remote. Then connected the smart remote to IFTTT and coded in the following routines:

At sunset turn on the lights
At 1am turn the lights off

Using this method, I was able to code in my patio lights to turn on and off automatically and I did not have to worry about turning them off when I am going to bed. Laziness for the WIN!