Remote control for interacting with smart home iot devices and web services

A method comprising:

• receiving routine configuration data of a routine from an external configuration application comprising data required for triggering an action on a 3rd party device or service, the routine configuration data including information about one or more custom parameters comprising a name, a data type, and allowed values;
• associating the one or more custom parameters with one or more available options for the 3rd party device or service;
• transmitting to a remote control device routine data comprising data of the routine and the one or more custom parameters associated with the routine;
• receiving a selection of the routine on the remote control device;
• and
• prompting for values to be entered for the parameters associated with the selected routine, which after being provided by the user, will execute the routine to trigger a network request for the routine, including the provided parameter values, which will then be used to execute the associated action on the 3rd party device or service using the values of these custom parameters to specify the behavior of the 3rd party device or service.

An apparatus for triggering user configured Internet requests to 3rd party devices or services from a configurable hardware remote control device, with custom user defined parameters, where the entire system comprises of:

• a hardware remote control device, with at least one processor, at least one radio wave based communication system, a graphical display, user interface for navigating routines and their parameters, memory to store routine data, and at least one battery as a primary source of power to the electronics, so as to be typically portable without wires;
• software running on the remote control device, where the primary function is to select and trigger the user's preconfigured routines with their custom parameters, where this functionality is available by default without the user having to install 3rd apps, and which allows a user to select a routine, and then to enter values for the routine's user configured parameters, as defined by the user for each routine, which when triggered will make a network request with the selected routine data and parameters, where a 3rd party device or web service associated with that routine will perform an action with the supplied parameters;
• an external configuration application, to be run from an external computer or mobile or tablet device, which will allow the each user to configure the routines, including creating a name for each routine, and each routines' optional parameters as defined by the user, with user entered parameter name and user selected data types and allowed values, and where the user can connect the routine to an available 3rd party device or web service to be triggered when the routine executes;
• and
• at least one central API server, which will store data on which devices belonging to each user, and allow users via the external configuration application to add/edit/remove routines and parameters for each device, and which will then load those routines and parameters onto the remote control device, which can then be executed by the remote control device to trigger the 3rd party device or web service.

An apparatus for triggering user configured http/https requests to 3rd party API from a configurable hardware remote control device, where the request data provided by the user while configuring a routine includes the request method, a user provided destination url for the 3rd party API, optional query string parameters, and an optional content body payload, where the parameters can be entered or selected on the device before triggering on the routine, where the entire system comprises:

• a hardware remote control device, with at least one processor, at least one radio wave based communication system, a graphical display, user interface for navigating routines and their parameters, memory to store routine data, and at least one battery to power to the electronics, so as to be typically portable without wires;
• software running on the apparatus, where the primary function is to select and trigger the user's preconfigured routines with their custom parameters, where this functionality is available by default without the user having to install 3rd apps, to optionally enter values for to be included in each routine's user configured query string or body content values, which when triggered will make a network request to the routine's specified URL, with any optional user provided query string parameters and/or body content, where a 3rd party API can then perform some action based on that triggering event and the query string and/or body content data;
• an external configuration application configured to be run from an external computer or mobile or tablet device, which will allow a user to configure the routines, including creating a name for each routine, specifying their destination URLs, and each routines' optional query string parameters and/or body content, to be loaded onto the user's remote control devices.

An apparatus for triggering user configured Internet requests to 3rd party web services or APIs with parameters, acting as a remote control device, the apparatus comprising:

• a hardware remote control device, with at least one processor, at least one radio wave based communication system, a graphical display, memory to store routine data, and at least one as a primary source of power to the electronics, so as to be typically portable without;
• a hardware user interface, consisting of at least one rotary knob or wheel, and one or more buttons, where the knob or wheel may physically rotate or including a capacitive touch sensor, sensing the position of the users touch, which is used for navigating routines and their parameters;
• software running on the apparatus, where the primary function is to select and trigger the user's preconfigured routines with their custom parameters, where this functionality comes available to be configured without requiring the installation of additional 3rd party applications, where those routines are first browsed with the rotary knob or wheel, allowing the user to select from one of their saved routines, and to enter values for the routine's user configured parameters with the rotary knob or wheel, which when triggered will make a network request with the selected routine data and any parameters for that routine, where a 3rd party web service associated with that routine during the user's configuration will perform an action with the supplied parameters.