"So it's working. That's a good thing! Why it's working, I'm not 100% sure yet." --- This is so relatable🤣

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

The more layers of abstraction, the less likely you'll be able to deduce why something happens!

@Copter64

Жыл бұрын

​@@JeffGeerling like Ansible ;-)

@jacobmartin112

3 ай бұрын

My exact reaction when I set up pi vpn and it just worked.

I think the developers of Home Assistant should take this video to heart, as it perfectly demonstrates how new users interact with it, it is so not intuitive. I tried it several times, it just feels clumsy and instead I did everything in node-red where stuff is predictable, everything that you can control in HA is also possible in node-red.

@dougle03

2 жыл бұрын

Many people (Me included) use home assistant as the hub that brings together lots of different components, then use NodeRed as an automation engine.

@jtrevathan33

2 жыл бұрын

I think Home Assistant is an example of developers building something they want and not really listening to end users. I think it's great but I'm a developer and I often just write yaml files to do what I want. Not a very friendly solution to anyone that doesn't know the system. Now my SO just puts in feature requests 😂

@jean.luc.picard

2 жыл бұрын

Been using home assistant for years. It has come a LONG LONG way since the early years. More and more stuff is being brought into the GUI. I personally love the YAML style configuration but hey, I am a developer. It is really nice to be able to click through the GUI and only get into the YAML stuff when its required for advanced cases.

@mvadu

2 жыл бұрын

Same boat here.. Node-Red and mqtt are so flexible and easy to configure. I have bunch of wifi plugs and few 6 port extensions all configured just the way I want..

@klaernie

2 жыл бұрын

I'm using HA for quite a while now - and still frequently get stung by things like "what's that on/off value called again", or having to resort to templates to implement a missing brightness attribute of a lamp while the lamp is off. The YAML is nice and powerful - but the documentation makes learning it not easy. And somehow some actions got a lot of love - like the very magical service action, while others like setting lights directly are really cumbersome.

Pretty fun (and also a little nerve wracking and frustrating), to see you run through everything for the first time as a novice. I found myself saying "no, no, no, YES!" a lot. I honestly think a video like this is super important because once you get familiar with HA it's hard to remember what it was like to be a novice. Cheers and good luck on your HA journey.

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

I often try (but don't always succeed) to document the first time using anything - that's basically how I ended up writing Ansible for DevOps, it started as a series of my own notes to help myself... then I polished them a bit and a book popped out after a while!

@thierry3610

2 жыл бұрын

😆 I was doing the same Rob! Great to see you get on board Jeff, I feel you can add SO much value once you get your head around it. Thanks for your work!

@JB-fh1bb

2 жыл бұрын

I hope that the HA devs look at this video with the same eyes. It used to be a lot simpler for new people and I know it’s possible, I just think the devs have gotten too deep to remember what it’s like when you don’t already know how things work.

@anonymoususer6448

2 жыл бұрын

Oh YES ! this is a super useful video for the Home Assistant Usability team (assuming there is one). The video showed several occasions where a small change in the UI would provide great benefit for a (new) HA user. Excited to see Jeff, the RPI and YAML master, doing HA videos.... All the ingredients are here for super content in the future. Mark my words. @Paul Hibbert: take a look at this video. You will enjoy it as much as I do enjoy yours.... The HA, the HA, the HA... Oooh the HA

@jayare7750

2 жыл бұрын

I admire Jeff with all his knowledge, but I too was like... no!!!! I'm more of an MQTT guy, now I see why more people don't use it. zigbee seems pretty easy to set up.

An _occupancy sensor_ might be more useful here than just a simple motion sensor. Motion sensors rely on (relatively) large motion, like walking, whereas an occupancy sensor also uses heat and sound so that if you're in the room and not moving much (like when you're at a computer), it'll still keep the lights on.

@ChatGTA345

2 жыл бұрын

omg, this seems more like what Jeff started talking about at the beginning of the video, and why I decided to watch it, so it was a bit batey :P Could you give any examples/links on it? And @Jeff Geerling it would be amazing if you could get more into it please!

@fabriglas

2 жыл бұрын

A mechanical switch under his seat or floor mat if he is not moving much might be better but I understand his pain at work on pc you don't move much all lights go out..

@affieuk

2 жыл бұрын

some sort of pressure sensor on his chair, although it would be funny if he got off the chair and the light went out.

@4.0.4

2 жыл бұрын

Did not knew that was a thing so thanks.

@ChatGTA345

2 жыл бұрын

@@affieuk lol that would be fun :P but for real, there otta be a better/simpler way to do this. Incl. the same IR sensor but just measuring the amount of IR and sound in the room maybe.

Welcome to the world of Home Assistant. Great to have your analytical mind looking at it as I'm sure you have some great feedback for the dev group. Cheers, and enjoy the Home automation!

@AnthonyDiRuggiero

2 жыл бұрын

Glad it's not just me. ;)

@BestLittleStudio

2 жыл бұрын

Home assistant has literally saved the food in my fridge. It is so cold right now the fridge in my garage is not working, by putting a light in the fridge to warm it up (ironically so it will work better) and controlling that light based on time patterns I have kept my fridge at 32 and my freezer at -10. HA also reminds the family about chores via an integration with a custom discord bot, turns on my office lights after my morning alarm goes off and I have my phone off of charge for more than 60 seconds. Along with a whole slew of other useful things.

@asdkjh4370

2 жыл бұрын

The problem with HA is that is begining of the end of this platform unfortunetelly - pletny of boomers asking for more Google, Amazon integrations and that will turn HA (already turning) into another spying no privacy platform. I strongly suggesting to find alternative because way too many westerners got "involved" and crack in HA are already visible. Sad but true.

@peterbelanger4094

2 жыл бұрын

I really don't see the point in any of these technologies. Seems more like technology for technologies sake. But then again, I'm in my 50's. But don't call me a boomer. I was born in '70, gen-x and proud of it.

@AnthonyDiRuggiero

2 жыл бұрын

@@peterbelanger4094 I'm in my 50's and I don't have enough of this stuff

This is exactly what I have been waiting for after all home automation went cloud based and completely killed my desire to install these into my home. Have zero interest in granting massive companies unfettered access to my personal space. Looking forward to learning from your upcoming projects!

@stellviahohenheim

Жыл бұрын

Normal switches aren't dumb, they're doing their job 99% right after installation. You know what's dumb? Needing internet connection to turn on your light. Smh

@GlorifiedGremlin

Жыл бұрын

Me too I'm so hyped about this, I LOVE new tech and automation, but I will never willingly install listening devices and wireless cameras in my home lol anything that has an always on speaker MUST be local, or it's not an option. Ill finally be able to move beyond basic smart home crap

@GlorifiedGremlin

Жыл бұрын

@@stellviahohenheim You know being wifi enabled doesn't somehow disable the physical switches right? Lol it ADDS functionality, it doesn't take any away. Idk exactly what you were talking about tho cuz OP edited the comment lol

@SaItyStudios

Жыл бұрын

@@stellviahohenheim private and local is offline it runs off the servers you have in your house you can connect to internet but you can do what I do and have it only connected between my own servers so I have full surveillance of my 20 acres in my hands only and i can connect everything and make it all automated like some tony stark shit and it would be all offline all in my hands with a solar system array all off grid data transfer through all my servers photos videos movies anything you can think of in a digital format will go on a server.

As a security minded person I am always incredibly wary of home automation products that call back to unknown servers on the Internet. I think too many consumers are opening their homes up to nefarious and insecure device companies. Thank you for showcasing this. I will definitely be looking into Home Assistant.

@albertweber1617

Жыл бұрын

When forums started in the early internet, they were completely insecure. Any user could inject html. When Bitcoin wallets started, they just stored the key on the drive in a perfectly easy to find folder. When smartphones started, they didn't even have a password by default. Hell, https is *recent*. Security is never the first step of a new market

The thing that took me forever to figure out with Home Assistant is there's a big difference between "devices" and "entities". Devices contain entities, ideally one for each "thing" that it does or provides. So your motion sensor is a device, which contains entities for detecting motion, looks like it also does temperature, and probably an on/off status and battery level.

@bagorolin

2 жыл бұрын

Totally obvious. It's not like people use the term device completely different 😅

@tablatronix

2 жыл бұрын

Yeah I have had HA installed for a year now, and everytime I go into it I just give up after staring at it.. lol I just dont get it

@-Gadget-

2 жыл бұрын

Jeff got the hang of things Way too easily for my liking, took me far longer than I'd care to mention. The penny only dropped regarding Devices & Entities, when I built my automatic gate opener. That thing has more entities than a 747 cockpit after I was done with it (Slight exaggeration there..... Obviously). But the "Device" at the gate, now has an entity for sensing if the gate is open or closed, the entity for a trigger to open or close the gate, a link to the doorbell in the kitchen (which was an awesome addition... Loudest doorbell in the southern hemisphere I think), an entity for the beams when there is a vehicle obstructing the gate and a few other nicknacks like the gate lights etc. My current project is the solar array I have for the battery bank I use to keep myself and the rest of the family connected to the internet, local network and wifi. Let's just say it's been more of a headache after it was set up than what it was doing the actual installation, as now you have graphs and stats that give you endless sleepless nights, worrying if you have enough battery storage, and wondering if there are enough hours in the day to get solar batteries charged before sundown :/

@ooslum

2 жыл бұрын

@@-Gadget- Used to work with a guy who hankered after a '30s motorbike where you took the cap off to see how much gas you had and if your knees burnt the back wheel was about to stop, no HA for him😅, cheers.

@khhnator

2 жыл бұрын

one gotta wonder why they don't just called it "activators" or something

Missing step - with a power tester, always check something that's live first! Otherwise your tester might be off/flat/broken and you wouldn't know.

@LabGecko

2 жыл бұрын

As an electrician's apprentice who has been (literally) shocked when the journeyman didn't check, your comment needs WAY more likes!

@memilanuk

2 жыл бұрын

@@LabGecko Live-dead-live testing is a *very* good idea. Check the tester on a known-live source - nearby extension cord, outlet, whatever. Check the circuit or device to be worked on is dead. Check the tester again on known-live source to ensure that the tester is still functioning correctly and didn't give you a bum read. That was the way it was taught to me years ago in the Navy, and it's kept me from getting lit up (too much) since then working with much higher voltage circuits.

Him asking "what's Home Assistant?", as I'm getting my own set up in my house brought me joy today.

FYI from a hopeless Home Assistant Fanboy: 1) Battery operated motion detectors typically have a several minute cool-down before they will detect motion again. 2) Aquara makes a no-neutral zigbee switch! They are relatively new.

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

Ooh nice! That's news to me.

@ArifKamaruzaman

2 жыл бұрын

@@JeffGeerling Probably Aqara. They make zigbee stuff. I never heard Aquara.

@jessepatterson8897

2 жыл бұрын

I have battery operated motion sensors, 6 of them, none of mine operate like that, and they are zigbee technically.

@Nuuki9

2 жыл бұрын

I have a few Hue motion sensors which are zigbee - just tested and once I stopped waving at it it was less than 10 seconds before it reset to "clear", after which it was able to detect motion again immediately. I believe different devices do have different capabilities and Hue seem well regarded, so worth doing some research as clearly this makes a big difference to how useful they'll be for a given use case.

@Morberis

2 жыл бұрын

Caseta makes great quality no neutral switches. But you need their hub. They will however last for years, wont void your insurance, and will be supported for years.

OMG Jeff, that $1 switch is a genius invention. With a pulley and some phishing lines, you could control the lights from your desk. 😂🤣👍🏻

@danielstellmon5330

2 жыл бұрын

Well..... As a kid before single board PCs were real......

@bufordmaddogtannen

2 жыл бұрын

@@danielstellmon5330 as a kid I could do automation with a C64 and accessory boards attached to the user port. 😁 Things got boring after the 8 bit era, reason why the raspberry pi came to be.

@eDoc2020

2 жыл бұрын

@@danielstellmon5330 When I was really little my parents had a commercial gadget on the light switch which is basically this. While I couldn't reach the switch itself, I could reach the handles hanging on the strings.

@tin2001

2 жыл бұрын

If only someone could invent a roof mounted switch with a string built in you can just pull to toggle.

@bufordmaddogtannen

2 жыл бұрын

@@tin2001 that would be like living in the future... 🤣 😂

I've labelled all my outlets and light faceplates too. Pro Tip, just mark the backside of them using a sharpie marker with the panel switch number. Sure you have to unscrew the faceplate to see the number, but if you need to know the number you are likely going to be taking off the faceplate anyway.

@Rn-pp9et

2 жыл бұрын

I've done exactly that and kept a spreadsheet ... my house only has a single switch and 1 or 2 power points per room :)

@missdee212

4 ай бұрын

This is a good idea

I recently got into Home Assistant and watching your raw reactions using it for the first time is hilarious. It’s also probably very informative for anyone working on the HA UX as your reactions matched almost exactly with mine when I was starting. If you get a chance, can you try to figure out and explain the zigbee clustering UI? It’s a mystery to me.

Thumbnail insisted me to LIKE the Video! 👍

13:06 The reason is that the state of the sensor is still "on", which in this case means "motion detected". Normally to change the to "off" it has to stay at least 1/2 minutes (but it depends on the sensor) without detecting motion. Having a sensor that sends Zigbee message every 5 seconds will drain it's battery faster!

Welcome to Home Assistant! Along with my NAS, and Raspberry Pi it has been responsible for some of my Linux journey in the last few years. I was wondering when you might venture into HA. I bought your Ansible book and am using it to automate all the things! Keep up the great content!

I agree completely with you looking at the "describe what you want to do" box and going "uuurggghhhhh". In my opinion, you should type in there a phrase and it should search for that in the community blueprints section of the forum. I have NEVER managed to get that box to spit out anything useful as an automation for me. But the blueprint section on the forum usually has a couple examples lined up ready. That feature doesnt work and really drags the HA experience down, The blueprint function is MUCH better and people actually use it.

I don't think I have ever seen a better thumbnail.

Thank you for sharing your knowledge Jeff, love how calm you present your knowledge. God bless you and your family.

1:49 I feel you! Still don't know why so many people build a "cloud home" with a bunch of different apps and cloud servers involved. Connected over other cloud servers like IFTTT or Alexa. Feels strange to involve 3 different servers to switch the lights on 😅

@pravatiacharya5921

2 жыл бұрын

Because apparently you need a device in which you'll constantly run the HA server. In cloud servers you don't need to do that....

@szgege32

2 жыл бұрын

This is completly unneeded server. You can put your smart devices off cloud and use it http commands with more parameters. A pi server will make it more complicated and more errors to come up. There are presence sensors for the lighting and you can put it on a smart device input...

@ottermanuk

2 жыл бұрын

@@szgege32 Jeff made it clear the reasoning is security. Keeping everything internal to the house/network is perhaps a worthy trade off to running it on a pi rather than cloud etc

@szgege32

2 жыл бұрын

@@ottermanuk use a presence sensor, put it on directly input of the smart relay and you don't need to put it online and only you can reach it in ap mode near to the relay. It is much more easy to install and simple use and that sensor work better and longer than any iot movement sensor.(iot sensors are a bit bad in presence sensors items) Pi solution is over complicated. When you put more of these in the house, then you are in trouble, the simple solution is easier to fix..

Love that you show the learning process, and that just like us, you sometimes dive into something without a clue about how it works 😄

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

Yep, I think it's fun to see the learning process. We all try to get things fixed our own way and I've learned a lot over the years just 'watching over someone's shoulder'. The little tools they use, the way they get from point A to B, the way they search when they hit dead ends. I try to add some of that in my videos, but sadly I'm not always recording so I miss a lot :(

When you said "I'm not going to do this" after the light switch demonstration, and then proceeded to suggest a needlessly complex solution. I loved that.

Nice work Jeff! This is the Home Assistant / Device intro I was looking for to get started on my journey. Thanks!

Yes, the thing i dislike about existing home automation devices is i have to use their cloud service and i can't opt out. Glad to see more devices like this come out.

Configure your Red Shirt Jeff detector to talk to Home Assistant, them make the lights flash and you get a chat message when he walks into your office next. And if you use home assist to start and stop a recording, you can get a log of everything Red Shirt Jeff does in your office.

Your videos have such a clear presentation style -- your speaking voice, the editing, the lack of distractions (intros, outros, music, sponsors, etc.) -- that make me wish you would make videos on other topics (non-tech) that I'm interested in.

Thanks Jeff for this video. Yesterday I never heard of Home Assistant and now I'm addicted!

Loving your videos regarding anything Pi. Apparently my wife caught me often enough watching it and gave me a Pi4B as a present for Christmas. I don't yet know what to use it for (it's the traditional Pie, not a CM). Which is why your videos became even more interesting now. Thanks!

Glad to see you finally trying out Home Assistant! I fully expect a follow up video in a few weeks after you've succumbed to the urge to swap out another dozen light switches and install ZigBee sensors/buttons/etc everywhere 😅 I'm up to over 20 smart switches/dimmers, 4 scene switches, 4 ZigBee buttons, and a handful of other ZigBee sensors so far. My favorite automations so far have been turning off multiple lighting circuits with one switch (all off on the way out the door, etc).

Oh Jeff, your way of troubleshooting is the same as me! I don't feel alone in my thoughts. Thank you

Perfect timing! I was just getting an Home Assistant obsession in the past few weeks!

Was wondering when Home Assistant was coming to this channel! Definitely right that the automation UI needs some improvement. Until this video I hadn't realised that there's no indication if fields are required or optional (trigger id can be left blank). Still an awesome tool though. Being able to combine all of the different ecosystems is great. As is having it work without needing internet.

The Node-Red add-on makes automation deployment super rapid, and is more intuitive than Blueprint (IMO). You can use the ping command attached to a binary sensor to see if your computer is connected to the network, and make it so the lights won’t turn off while the computer is connected. This presupposes that you put your computer to sleep when you intend to vacate the room for long periods of time, and always log on the computer when you enter the room. If your NIC or network goes down, you’re also going to get notice in a fairly dramatic way. Migrating to the disk is as easy as booting linux off the SD, wget the HA OS image, and DD it to the attached disk. :D

@ClassicGOD

2 жыл бұрын

Yeap, Node-Red and VS Code add-on for configuration editing when needed.

@CMDRSloma

2 жыл бұрын

Yep, Node-Red is more powerful and more intuitive.

@EsotericArctos

2 жыл бұрын

Node Red is great, if you know how to use it. The less technical people will probably just use automations from the GUI. It depends what you are use to using. I use all HA automations and don't use Node Red. I just never found Node Red that intuitive and the learning curve to both install Node Red and get it working is higher than reading the documentation and learning how to use the inbuilt automation. It all depends what you are use to using, and how much you want to tinker. Also depends if you are the average end user looking for something out of the box, or if you are putting hours into the tinkering to get it to work right.

@CMDRSloma

2 жыл бұрын

@@EsotericArctos I find this exactly the opposite. I am a visual learner and I find built in automations very confusing and cumbersome. When I installed Node Red, I quickly understood the concept, Node Red works just like Lego in my mind. The only thing you need to understand is the concept of a payload and use debug node to see how a particular message is constructed, then it is easy to manipulate that. It is definitely more powerful, not only you can build automations but also the UI if you wish. I understand some people prefer HA automations, but I don't find them to be easy.

@coolelectronics1759

Жыл бұрын

that is dope I didn't realize it could be further integrated like this

Another great video Jeff! I remember the days when we had to use "smart devices" that communicated with each other via the electrical lines in your house... late '90s being the timeline for that. So glad to be well past those days and into the this time where granular control is fainlly dooable at a very low cost.

Welcome to the wonderfull rabbit hole that is home assistant. Been using it for 3 years and love it 👍

You may have already figured it out, but the naming of the motion sensor was different because a "device" can have multiple "entities." A lot of little things like that or searching existing vs new integrations tripped me up as well, and I'm still finding bits that aren't very user friendly. It's super powerful, but I think your experience matches what we've all gone through when starting out. It seems like when projects end up with hardcore long time users it can be easy to overlook the onboarding experience.

Home Assistant is amazing! I started down the rabbit hole when we had an elderly house / dog sitter and she couldn't figure out how to watch our TV (surround sound, inputs, android tv box). The next time she visited Home assistant did everything for her, all she had to do is use the remote to turn on the surround sound.

@TH-wr1dv

2 жыл бұрын

And after you test node-red you start thinking where you even need HA and why to waste time with mashing head to wall with it ;)

Oh my! I sat today to do a quick research on home automation solutions and here you are! Just in time mate! Thanks a lot for that

I’m happy that you are Jeff Gerling even between your videos. Even more happy that you started using Home Assistant.

Another homerun, Jeff! Love the Chapters listed too. Really helps rolling back and forth through the video. HA looks like a great program for my use; Trying to figure out how to make it run in two VMs with hot/standby setup so if the primary dies....

@PBRichfield

2 жыл бұрын

Look at the container install option or use esxi and HA/failover; however, the latter would leave you with a nested AND emulated setup with the core (their own home rolled kernel). This is a perfect use for the esxi arm fling but mileage may vary due to it not being a supportable product. I'm not dissing on it bc I have a mutli-ISA cluster in my home lab. I just noticed qemu underneath the other day on my soon-to-be trashed x86/64 Home Assistant. I'm probably going to get flamed but I'm giving up the home assistant due to too much time to build and maintain. Just to levelset, my smart device collection covers everything but 433mhz. I also have a very nice collection of debuggers, mcus, and sdrs with various limiting factors. Its been fun but the last update that killed both zigbee and zwave was the last nail in the hass coffin. Now I'm into custom ethernet gateways which as a person that reads assembly while on the toilet, fits me better.

@Doesntcompute2k

2 жыл бұрын

@@PBRichfield I have two frames running ESX but I'm trying to NOT use that for these "home production" VMs/containers. I think I'll soon be turning them off 24/7 and only booting when needing the 64cores. I'd rather Proxmox it. I'm going to see how well HA works in my home, but from what I have seen, at least I can hack it to do just about anything. I do want ZigBee and Zwave running and stable. I have a lot of IOT objects. We'll see. I'll put out the final (working) design on r/homelab and perhaps r/homeautomation. Thanks for your input. Helps to have others who have been through the grind.

@PBRichfield

2 жыл бұрын

@@Doesntcompute2k my pleasure. I found out this morning while applying to be officially sanctioned/ordained as a VMware evangelist that there is a non 4 letter word for people like me. Am I terrible to even go as far as filling out the form just for the off-chance the 'prize' if I even get nominated is the Arm fling API? That's all I want. Well that and this remote and it's all I'll ever need. Oh and this chair... This apj, remote, and chair. Yep, that's all - bastardized dialog from Steve Martin in The Jerk. Fun fact: I regret not getting the e3 127/8x v3 for my 2u shorty x86/64 host instead of that 4970k... But then I wouldn't ever had to opportunity to run my azure ad connected server 2022 headless dc on water-cooled 10yo silicon! Thats where the HA is spending it's twilight years too. If you need a fully updated 700 series coordinator, let me know. I might have one for sale cheap.

@Doesntcompute2k

2 жыл бұрын

@@PBRichfield I was going to put the stack of 1u Dell 1650s and Dell 1750s "into MAAS service," then I sat there and couldn't figure out WHY. DDR2. Seriously. And the power they take. :( They're going to the recycler with all of the old Cisco 10/100Mbps switches. I'm trying to get rid of all Xeon 5Ks, keeping the Xeon 2600s where the cores make sense. I have full VMWare enterprise, XCP-ng, and Proxmox. Liking Proxmox a lot. I'm pretty sure I still have a (huge Sony WXP) laptop downstairs with an Intel Quad Q9600/9650. So I get your 4970.

Welcome to Home Assistant and goodbye to any free time you had. This was really interesting after two years with HA I didn’t realise how it must be for a newbie. I can’t wait for you to use this more as I have no doubt you will be doing great stuff with it.

@LeGridStudios

2 жыл бұрын

lol yeah! I have had so many years of total fun mastering every kind of control system there is. no you don't want to be on line with any of this! But if you pull power from the grid you are owned. I just got a screen capture for typing this comment. know there is more then just cat6, wifi, and blue tooth at work in your PC. Hello 5G 😂 there is nothing we can do to change it.

I liked that you went through the process for the video, rather than having everything worked out ahead of time. And your "narration" as to what you were thinking as you did the various steps can be beneficial to people watching. Thanks!

Excellent! I've seen some of my friends Home assistant add-ons for their smartphone which turn it into a control dashboard with notifications and other types of alerts. So you won't even need additional hardware to control the lights on command.

Nice, it's like I just discovered a star wars/marval cross-over. Welcome to the awesomeness that is being able to use a motion detector to trigger a suction fan in one room and an IR blaster that turns on oil diffuser in another, every time my cat takes a s#it.

@UNSCPILOT

2 жыл бұрын

Well, add a counter and send a notification when the cat's taken too many trips and you can stay on top of keeping things clean

@mosth8ed

2 жыл бұрын

@@UNSCPILOT What gives you the impression that I do not keep it clean?

@UNSCPILOT

2 жыл бұрын

@@mosth8ed wasn't saying you didn't, just considering what else I would add to keep myself organized. Or TL;DR: I was thinking out loud in a comment like a goofball

You gotta love the time in seconds 😂 That's a complete programmer move

@ilovefunnyamv2nd

2 жыл бұрын

nah, it should be in milliseconds. let me decide if I want to wait 60000ms or 1!

Really excited to see you getting into Home Assistant!

Welcome to Home Assistant, Jeff. Keep it local; no lag and better security.

Jeff, you could also install the Home Assistant app on your Mac. This will provide you with an sensor that can tell if your computer is in sleep mode. So the lights won’t turn off when your working at your desk.

LMAO the thumbnail 🤣🤣🤣

This is a great video! I’m glad I found your channel. Thanks for sharing such great content!

Thanks for this video... I've been looking for a home automation system that doesn't connect to the cloud. I appreciate the detail you went into and the editing to remove the boring bits.

Interesting that you make this and put it out now, because I've been using home assistant on one of mi pi's for only a few days now. I've had some of the same reactions that you have had to its setup and knowing some things require certain parameters and that underscore used in the identifier name!!! You know a seasoned programmer when they automatically know that's probably a better way to go. Even on systems that allow all sorts of weird characters and spaces in filenames, I still find myself going with something that is easier to manage in scripts and programming languages.

I can't wait to see the effect on Home Automation software in of itself, the influx of new users using cheap single board computer will probably lead to new development

So awesome to find someone taking personal data privacy seriously. IoT & home automation is great, but I don't want my home talking to ANYTHING outside my network. I don't care what country it is.

Nice video as always Jeff! I've never used Home Assistant either, but now I can't wait to try it out.

You'll need more than a scarf in -17. Canadians: "-17, that's nothing!"

@joeltyler3427

2 жыл бұрын

As a Australian. What's that's. Here it's boiling hot to just cold. Unless you're in the Australian Alps.

A warning in reaction to the "local" part: some Tuya-compatible devices are apparently integrated using the Tuya cloud API. In that case, the "local control" is somewhat of an illusion.. I installed some Wiz Connect smart bulbs (horrible configuration experience) and TP-Link's Kasa switches (a breeze to configure). Both provide a UDP-based local protocol that has been reverse-engineered. (I do not use Home Assistant: I preferred writing my own apps, for the fun of it, and to experiment with a sorta micro-server architecture, and not because of any issue with Home Assistant. After watching your video I tried setting up a device name with a space and spent an evening fixing a handful of bugs, including HTTP character encoding misshapes. Thank you! 😂)

@ClintonJudy

2 жыл бұрын

FWIW, the integration page for any given device on the Home Assistant website will list whether the integration requires internet access for it to work, or whether it’s local only. Since discovering that myself, I’ve been slowly replacing the IoT devices in my house with things that work locally and don’t require access to the internet. Everything is becoming more reliable as a result!

@Chimel31

Жыл бұрын

Now you just need to check if your devices support names with left-to-right Arabic script. 😁

@jeremybensoussan9906

10 ай бұрын

@ClintonJudy I couldnt find the information on the home assistant integrations page. Is it still there? It s hard to know which device can be conpletely setup offline...

I really appreciate that there's a pretty sophisticated effort to decouple "home automation" and "cloud-based providers". I know I'm not "leveraging the power of Amazon's AWS computing options", but maybe I don't want to, maybe I'm totally content with having a raspberry pi switch a smart plug on my kettle when I scream "tea, earl gray, hot!" in my kitchen, even if it takes a couple seconds to parse the command.

Love that you filmed the process of automating even though you haven't previously learned it. 👍

Different smart motion sensors have different interal cooldown for them. some have minutes while other seconds.

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

This is good to know! Didn't even know that was a thing, but now I do.

@lmamakos

2 жыл бұрын

@@JeffGeerling I think it's mostly a power-saving thing so it's not turning on the ZigBee transmitter every time that you twitch. My el-cheapo 433MHz wireless sensors do the same thing; I think with a 5 minute cool-down time. I use those, hard-wired PIRs on my Elk alarm system, a couple of Z-Wave sensors and some PIR sensors on ESP32 sensors around the house to sense motion/occupancy. That's ultimately the real power of Home Assistant, as it abstracts all the different technologies used to integrate the sensors into those abstract entities, making it effortless to work across different technologies. You don't have to pick and join a single technology/religion for the stuff in your home.

You've just begun! Now create something for 200,000 square feet of 277 volt lighting ;) All centrally managed and scheduled for over 50 employees. I actually find it odd that this stuff is ONLY NOW getting into to hands of home DIYers. Been doing this stuff for over 20 years. It's about dang time.

I totally agree with you and that first section that tries to guess what you want to do. It has never worked for me so I just immediately go into manual mode now.

So interesting watching people figure out HA after being deep in the rabbit whole for a while. It's a great platform and a great community! Enjoy!

Homeassistant has a dashboard where you can place buttons and widgets, also they have a mobile app. Its very good and I like that HA isnt so polished, in order to polish it up to make it more friendly to first time users you'd have to lose some of the flexibility, and that's not what the project is about

@KiraSlith

2 жыл бұрын

This all or nothing attitude towards user friendlines and power user features is little more than logical fallacy, you can always have both, the alternative is death by obscurity. In this case it just requires a public library of Blueprints, which looks like the direction they're already going anyway.

When I can watch a video of someone explaining something I already know and be entertained I know is a good content creator. I'm sure Jeff will find the configuration.yaml file and never use the UI again jejejeje

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

Wait I can use YAML for all the things???

@markmaverick1437

2 жыл бұрын

@@JeffGeerling For everything

@jantoniotorre

2 жыл бұрын

@@JeffGeerling indeed, not the way a non-programmer mortal like me runs it but I'm sure you'll enjoy. Looking forward for the projects you'll be able to pull off

@RuiFungYip

2 жыл бұрын

@@JeffGeerling Not sure if you can use it for *all* the things. I think I remember some integrations having their YAML config being deprecated in favor of the UI config flow setup. (While some still only has YAML config because nobody has gotten around to them.)

@PBRichfield

2 жыл бұрын

Jeff also has a 3d printer so I expect a custom wall panel (cm-based, of course) before Christmas!

More great content. Thank you, Jeff.

I been looking for this for so long, It's a good Thursday.

I havent watched your video yet.. but damn.. your thumbnail made me cry from laughing :)

Hey Jeff, I think you should keep the timeout to a minute or so but write a script that runs on your PC that detects that you are using it (e.g keystroke, mouse, media is playing) which then feeds as a motion sensor to the HA.

Best. Thumbnail. Ever.

Given that you have yml code for the blueprints, I'm curious if this can be deployed with an Ansible playbook and make automating large spaces/businesses easier to do.

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

I believe some people have already been doing it. And I should probably follow suit (see github.com/mpataki/ansible-homeassistant for example!).

@PBRichfield

2 жыл бұрын

Yes and probably a great idea after you get your version control and CI/CD pipeline setup.

@PBRichfield

2 жыл бұрын

Look at terraform also for your ipmi enabled boxes but i'm curious if you could jumpstart a Pi with an SSD to be used as a stand in ipmi to provision the others. Once all the clients check in, it runs a script to kick start itself into an NFS target for your vms?

@PBRichfield

2 жыл бұрын

Along with it's cert from the domain CA

There are actual human prescence detectors you can buy. Adafruit has one with steamma qt even. They recognize human prescence even if still, sleeping or whatever using radar. Thats what i would use :)

@AnthonyDiRuggiero

2 жыл бұрын

not sure I like being irradiated 24/7, but I guess a wifi camera would hit you with similar exposure.

Finally!! About time you got into HA being such a big open-source supporter. Also the trigger id is what you can use for complex automations. It's a optional field though.

Welcome to the awesome world of Home Assistant. Can't wait to see what you can come up with. On your comments on the Automation setup, I think they were listening to you. The 'New Automation' dialog in the recent 2022.2 release has dropped the 'what do you want to do' option & now just asks 'Blueprint or Blank Automation'.

"The office" moment when you start waving your arms haha

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

It was getting so annoying. In the 5 days since setting up Home Assistant, I haven't had to wave my arms once. Win!

Yeah! Ansible! wait....that's not what the title says.... It's not ansible?

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

It's still YAML!

Jeff, you have entered the rabbit hole, good luck! Welcome to the HA community!

I can't even tell anymore how many Videos from you i actually watched, ....But thanks @ KZread for recommending them over the last months. This time i subed...just to make sure i don't miss any of them ever again. You're my Favorite Pi-Guy on KZread ;)

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

You're my favorite commenter on this video :)

Yaaa Jeff is using home assistant!!!!!! I am excited to see what you come up with Jeff.

I went a rather complicated way with this a few years back. Using the touch input on a teensy, some aluminium foil and a couple of resistors, I made a switch that could sense me from around 30cm away. I put one on each side of my doorway and wrote a program that looked at both sensors to determine if I was entering for leaving the room. It was messy but it did the job.

OMG the idea of putting numbers on my outlets and switches is amazing and I don't know why I never thought of doing that

Very nice and useful video, thanks, Jeff!

jeff i love the thumb you used for this , dude you are awesome. My name is Billy and i been following you recently , thanks for your help

Home assistant has come a long way

Going through the process is more interesting then teaching it. Thanks.

first time user and immediately spotted the biggest problem with HA: kinda user friendly. But very friendly to the programmers ;-)

That HomeAssistant casing is so cool!

I started with HA and zigbee a few weeks ago and have been having a blast. Looking forward to what you get up to!

Yet again a great video! Thank you!

Thank you so much for making this such an honest video

I love the artwork above the lightswitch

@JeffGeerling

2 жыл бұрын

Thank my daughter-and also ask her to help interpret it :D

ooooh! cool! more people running into HA! automating my home was my pet project at the start of the pandemics, during the lockdown! and i'm loving Home Assistant! :D

Great project 👍 Big problem, big solution. Thanks for sharing your experience with all of us 👍😀

"It's working, that's a good thing" "Why it works, I'm not 100% sure" Just amazing quote

Excellent video that details all of my interactions with HA. I would love to use it but I've spent days trying to get my stuff working only to dump it and go back to what I have. I may give it another try after this.

Thank you - was nice to see you stepping arround in HA - what I missed was the reload of AUtomations which is typically necessary after you changed or established an automation.

@Cory182

2 жыл бұрын

Reloading was only necessary when editing yaml files to define automations. When using the web UI, you only need to click on the save button for it to take effect.

Nice to see that you are getting in Home Assistant… when you start, you’ll never stop and start automating everything. You’ll drive red shirt Jeff crazy with it.

Looks like a great system in the minds of the designers! Not running out and buying one of these!

I'm so glad I'm not the only one that struggles to find things in the homeassistant ui's dance of configurations and addons. :)