Jimmy Westenberg / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Google recently ended its support for early Nest Learning Thermostat models, highly limiting their functionality.
- Last week we learned of a project to extend online support for these models, through alternate firmware.
- Those downloads are now available for anyone interested in trying them.
Nothing lasts forever, and that’s especially true when we’re talking about smart electronics whose “brains” require them to be talking to some distant cloud server. Right now, early adopters of smart thermostats are acutely learning this lesson, with Google mothballing first- and second-gen Nest models last month. When the deadline arrived, we looked at what limited functionality remained for those Nest Learning Thermostat models, with the tease that a third-party project was trying to restore some of the remote app control Google had killed off. And now it’s time for us to get our first taste.
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Last week, we saw that developer Cody Kociemba was well on his way towards introducing replacement firmware for these thermostats, and all this interest has prompted him to hurry up and share his solution. He’s since launched his No Longer Evil webpage for the project and shared the firmware and setup instructions on GitHub. Source code should be arriving to complement those binary downloads sometime in the next couple weeks.
Basically, No Longer Evil offers a web-based dashboard for controlling converted Nest Learning Thermostats. You flash your old hardware with a custom bootloader and kernel, which tells it to talk to the No Longer Evil server instead of Google’s. Kociemba has implemented a reverse-engineered version of the Nest API, so as far as the thermostat knows, it’s working just like it used to — it thinks it’s communicating with Google, as intended. All you need to do is create a No Longer Evil account and link up your newly flashed hardware.
Up next, we can look forward to the source code being released for not just the modified thermostat firmware, but also the backend that runs on No Longer Evil to emulate the API. There’s also the possibiltiy of a mobile app down the road.
If you’re curious to give this a try, be aware that Kociemba strongly warns that this is all still in testing, and you shouldn’t blindly use it in a situation where you or others are relying on it to keep you warm and safe. But if you’re happy to put up with a few speed bumps, and are willing to keep a close eye on things, it just might be worth your effort. Come visit us down in the comments if you install it on your thermostat and share how it went!
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