MyBMW Alexa Skill "Retired"? WTF
I tried to turn on the heat in my iX via Alexa and she tells me "the MyBMW skill has been retired. Please use the MyBMW mobile app". What's up with that?
Does anyone know of any other way to control the car via automation? I know this sound like the most first-worldish problem ever, but hear me out- I'm a volunteer firefighter. When we get an emergency dispatch in the middle of the night, I have a Flic button set up at my bedside- it turns on the bedroom light, and simultaneously starts the ventilation in the iX. That's really nice that in the 60-90 seconds it takes me to get dressed and get to the car it's already a little warm (or cool, but that's not nearly as needed). It's an emergency response, so I'm not going to stop and open my phone and authenticate, then open the myBMW app and then authenticate on THAT, and then press the button to turn on the heat. The one-button routine was PERFECT. I need to figure out another automation path now...
And this is not new-to-the-iX functionality for me, albeit a bit different. I've had this for 30 or so years with different vehicles using remote start. I built a relay box that was triggered by a "tone box" used in the fire service- that has a switched AC outlet that activates when we are dispatched (basically the real use case for that is a lamp). My relay box had a car remote built in and would send the proper button pushes on a remote control to remote start the vehicle. Granted the downsides to that were that the car would start EVERY time we had a call (even if I was not a home but my car was, or if I was unable to make the call).
So now I need to figure out another automation path...sigh.