First thing I do when I get a smart appliance is scan it with nmap. This has revealed some interesting Easter eggs, like my Davis instruments air quality sensors having a local REST API.
Doing the usual scan against my GE washer and dryer shows that port 53 is listening. What could that be for? Is there a way I can at least query their status locally or something?
When I got the washer and dryer I was excited about the smart home features because getting an alert when my laundry is done or starting the washer remotely so the clothes are done when I get home are genuinely useful features. However, last time I checked the app none of that was available, so I just have these Trojan horses in my home spying on me with no benefit in exchange. Their app wanted my freaking mailing address when I signed up for their mandatory account, so the features mentioned above are the least they could offer in exchange for my digital soul. But I digress.
My fridge is in a similar situation. It commits the additional cardinal sin of ONLY being controllable via the app, with no on-board temp or filter status indicators whatsoever.
Home brewers are looking at you very oddly right now.
Yep my beer fridge is exactly this :)
Home brewers just set the fridge thermostat as cold as it goes and set the temp externally by turning the power off when it’s cold enough.
Not sure i’d drill a hole into my nice-looking kitchen fridge though. Probably rather than connect it to WiFi, but… I don’t currently see a need to connect it to wifi anyway?
@southernbrewer
I‘m not a Home brewer but three of our fridges get the same treatment as their primitive „thermostats„ are so crappy. Two simply were either too cold or not cold enough with a ridiculous amount of variation while the third one, an outdoor fridge-freezer combo has the thermostat in the fridge compartment and during cool nights sees no need to cool while the freezer compartment gets close to thawing.
We use a kegerator so the probes just run through the pre-drilled hole for the gas. But really the cables are so thin a standard door seal would close over them
I can see where a temp would be useful to detect failure , but a power draw monitor would do the same