The only place I use a control system for the C-Bus is in the theatre. Everywhere else it's the normal C-Bus hardware. My C-Bus is about 12 years old and I believe they now have better smart interfaces available (Wiser ??).

I just have a C-Bus serial interface in the theatre rack and use a Global Cache IP2SL and the Demopad control app.

I reverse engineered the C-Bus commands and feedback, over a very long period that involved way more of my time than it deserved, but I really wanted to crack the challenge.