As I understand it, Thread can transparently extend its mesh over regular IPv6 (Ethernet, Wi-Fi, etc), whereas extending a Zigbee (or Z-Wave) mesh beyond useful mesh range is a mess. I have a Z-Wave network that uses two controllers, and it sucks. It’s utterly obnoxious to maintain, the whole concept of multiple controllers is barely supported by zwave-js-ui, it is far to dumb to recover quickly on its own if it transiently loses connectivity to a node, and roaming between controllers is a complete non-starter.
I haven’t tried Thread yet, but I’m delighted by the concept of having a couple of easy-to-maintain base stations (routers or whatever they’re called) connected to the local network and having devices automatically roam between them.
I am not delighted by the fact that an Apple Home Thread network, a Google Home thread network, and a Home Assistant native thread network appear to be different things that are not entirely compatible with each other.
I believe this is what thread v1.4 is attempting to solve. Apple has already updated their Thread border routers to v1.4, and Google, Amazon, and Samsung have all promised to update their border routers too.
Yes this is indeed a problem. You can get around this by piping the Z-Wave or Zigbee information into a MQTT server and basically run them as separate networks, with Home Assistant and MQTT tying it all together. But you will need some type of Zigbee to Ethernet adapter (Sonoff makes one, Raspberry Pi, etc.) or Z-wave to ethernet adapter (again Raspberry Pi). It's definitely clunky. But doable.
I am running multiple Zigbee networks near each other (in a house and in a detached garage) with Home Assistant, MQTT server and a Sonoff Zigbee bridge, with Tasmota.
> I am not delighted by the fact that an Apple Home Thread network, a Google Home thread network, and a Home Assistant native thread network appear to be different things that are not entirely compatible with each other.
Hmm, in what way? The Matter standard does demand that devices support at least 5 of such "fabrics" at once. Where is the issue in practice?
Maybe there isn’t one. Can I “pair” a Thread device with, say, an Apple TV and have it talk to the Apple TV via radio to an IKEA Dirigera hub and then IPv6 over Ethernet from the Dirigera to the Apple TV?
I haven’t tried Thread yet, but I’m delighted by the concept of having a couple of easy-to-maintain base stations (routers or whatever they’re called) connected to the local network and having devices automatically roam between them.
I am not delighted by the fact that an Apple Home Thread network, a Google Home thread network, and a Home Assistant native thread network appear to be different things that are not entirely compatible with each other.