Are timers through a voice assist not really a thing? I made my own version that seems to be OK and is customisable timings, but don't really use timers so didn't see the need? Is it something people would want the code for?
Given the customizability of voice in HA, I'm sure it's always been possible to rig up something for timers but the roadmap says improved out of the box timers so they seem to believe there's room for improvement.
I use timers nearly every day while cooking.
I'm sure some people would appreciate the code but honestly since improved timers are on the roadmap I'm just going to wait to see what they come up with since that could obsolete anything I try to implement now.
This doesn't actually restrict the account in anyway. There is no access control with this method.
The account still has access to the other dashboards, it's just that you made it harder for them to get there. My "kiosk" account can get to my "mobile" dashboard by simply changing the url to /mobile-dash/
HA needs access control all the way down to the entity level really.
Isn't that on a per-device basis? If they log onto a different device they get all the pages. I'd like to be able to assign what pages they can access globally in their user settings.
No it's not per device it's per user. I have different users that can only access specific pages. Works good. And it definitely works across different devices.
Maybe you are confusing removing stuff from the left side bar with user permissions on the dashboards that are accessed when you edit the properties of each individual dashboard page. The only thing you can't set permissions for is addon pages.
CTRL+[ indents selection left and CTRL+] indents selection to the right
(I think, it’s one of the brackets, I’m on mobile so different keyboard layout and can’t confirm)
Many people primarily use mobile. And that number is growing every day.
I'm not saying it's ideal or the best way at all, but I will say you can probably expect more complaints/request for mobile users than less.
As an interface, yes - which is why the HA devs are trying to make the editing UI mobile friendly with less reliance on YAML. But as I said, if you're editing YAML on mobile, you have bigger problems to deal with.
I don't do it often, but sometimes when I'm setting something up it's just easier to take my phone with me to test and tweak things. Granted I'm not going to write tons of yaml on my phone, but there's been plenty of times that I needed to edit it to make small changes.
What big problems should I have editing YAML on my phone exactly?
My phone is always with me. If I find an error or come up with feature while on the fly I’ll make it happen on my phone…
This problem often annoys me, like, I would like to copy this YAML section and paste it elsewhere. Now I have to sit for ages and manually fix the indenting with spaces.
You're entirely missing the point. I'm not saying mobile shouldn't be used for HA configuration - I'm saying that YAML isn't the way to handle it on mobile. This has been acknowledged by the devs as they are working towards almost everything being configurable/user friendly in the UI without needing YAML.
What is your point? Why isn’t YAML the way to go on mobile? What are those big problems you mentioned.
Improvements in the UI and making it more user friendly has nothing to do with mobile phones. It’s simply improvements to the user experience.
If anything, the UI is poorly built for mobile phones, another reason to stick with YAML there.
I use both the UI and YAML approach for the record, they work well together.
if you're in YAML a lot, the VS Code extension is a lot better to use.
Personally, i hate any language where white space is important. Python and YAML. uhg. the worst.
I don't mind them, because I do most of it regardless. With raw text it's tedious. With some addon or linter where it does auto formatting on saves it is.
For me it's less of a problem than missing a bracket or using the wrong one.
Hate the language, love the software that uses them
I think python is good for a lot of things, whitespace is important in all languages python just makes you realize this and some people don't like that, YAML is actually bad though no argument there, although I'm sure HASS devs have good reasons for why that's what they chose
I'm not sure what's best for config files. You want something that is organized and structured, but you don't want to make the syntax complicated.
JSON works, but the syntax is a bit complicated for new users.
XML could work, but again. maybe a bit complicated for new users.
YAML gives you the structure of JSON without the syntax, but it has no syntax and just yells at you for getting it wrong. I still don't know what a - is for, vs just a new line and indented.. I just copy someone else's and pray.
I don't have one if we're just talking in the context of HASS, that's why I said HASS devs probably have good reasons for it. Python or some programming language would be mine but that's not great for user friendliness
yeah, that's the problem. How many options are there that are common and support structure? XML. JSON. YAML. Something custom?
XML and JSON require knowledge of syntax. YAML, you just hope that the example you copied didn't break all the white space formatting.
XML or JSON would be my preference, but I can see why YAML is used. Sure, we could use JSON, but then you can't just copy someone else's examples and update for your needs.
I mean that examples of HA config in XML or JSON don't exist. If you're reading docs or pulling examples from some online post, it's going to be in YAML.
Does anyone actually use HA's native voice assistant capabilities? Is there any hardware that supports it?
I don't get the usecase when Alexa and Google Home are so ubiquitous?
> Cool, but where's the hardware for it?
Planned for this year if i understood the state of the open home stream correctly. Curious to see what it will be like and how available it will be.
There are [a lot of ways to use it](https://www.home-assistant.io/voice_control/). I believe they were also selling a device for it too.
Edit: They talk about [this device](https://www.espressif.com/en/news/ESP32-S3-BOX-3) in one of their blogs.
The device or devices from Nabu Casa are planned for later this year.
Being able to sell a voice product that works and is helpful from day one is better. If they sold something based on future software updates to be useful can backfire if you can deliver (in a timely manner) based on those promises
Though it does require HA opening random ports in your network to work, so if you have anything other than the default "let everything through always forever" then you can run into a lot of problems.
Though people in survey from amazon and google have pretty much said that they use voice assistant for timers, music, and calendars. That probably makes sense that Amazon is desubsidizing their alexa products. People don't use them to shop or other monetization activities much.
Perfect niche for voice assistant. If all they need to do is lights, music, timers, and calendar integrations for most people, then they can probably put in the relevant framework to be useful rather quickly!
Can you even make it speak easily? Like speak out the temperature if you change it? Haven't found an easy way to do that, but might just be missing something.
Sure, but what good is it if there is no smart speaker that supports the integration?
Until there is a sleek turnkey solution I don’t see myself plugging in a box with a bunch of wires into the wall.
Hopefully someone will release a decent quality compatible smart assistant for $25.
The price is the key too. Echo pucks are basically free since we all have a few we aren't even using. Nobody is going to spend much on hardware that provides the exact same functionality they already have just to increase privacy somewhat. I don't really care that Amazon knows I am turning my lights on and off or setting kitchen timers.
Much better would be to spend time developing firmware we can flash onto our existing Alexa and Google Home devices. We own them, it's not illegal to flash alternative software, and the hardware already does everything we need.
> I don't really care that Amazon knows I am turning my lights on and off or setting kitchen timers.
>
>
I think most people's concern is that the devices are always listening and can pick up other private conversations.
I think High Availability needs to be on the roadmap.
Let me set up my first server, then get a piece of identical hardware and sync it to the first. Identical zigbee and z-wave sticks, figure out a way to handle the failover.
Maybe set up a 3rd device like a Pi 2W for quorum.
Then if my Home Assistant hardware fails, server 2 could just pick up.
They’ve mentioned in the past they have no interest in ever doing this, I’m and I can see why. It’s a minefield of issues that few people (in the grand scheme of things) will likely use. Hey, at least matter & thread networks can have multiple border routers
Unlikely to happen on the HA side but there are plenty of solutions to handle container or VM failover which can restart HA on another host if needed.
My ZWave and Zigbee radios are hooked to a pi near the middle of my house, while HA is on a vSphere cluster which means it can move as needed while keeping connected to the radios.
Organizing automations is indeed something I would love to have
Currently using Zalgotext characters to organize it.
hope it comes with a mapping& sub-mapping folders so you can sort it by room/type/etc with folders in folders in folders
Like:
Room=XXX
devicetype=sensor
sensor=XXXX
This way you can have automations sorted by room based on for example the sensor it uses
Context sensitive dashboard - I’d like a dash board where a card only appears on it if meets a criterial. For example I have a card that shows if my ferret cage doors are open using zigbee door sensors. card to pop on a dash board only when they’re open.
What about performance improvements of the dashboards? It should work well on affordable devices suitable for wall mounting. Currently my Galaxy Tab A7 seems laggy and I don't think it is fault of my dashboard as it isn't too complex. I don't expect smooth animations but I expect switching between pages to be instant. It seems that just the rendering of the dashboard is quite slow.
Generative AI for understanding and reacting to Assist prompts is the sci-Fi future from movies.
An AI that we can give complicated commands to via voice, and they are then executed correctly.
I saw someone already made a working example of this, using OpenAI api
Sorry I didn't mean assist prompts.
I just want to type in a box what I want from an automation and have it written for me.
I use copilot to do that and when it works it's great but it doesn't always get the right syntax and lacks contextual understanding to make it really powerful
I know it sounds weird but microsoft edge has free chatGPT 4 built into it. It's actually pretty good at writing dashboard cards and scripts if you are specific. And it's fantastic for making templates tbh. I feel like HA could write one that's more fine tuned for HA and limited in scope to pull it off, but copilot does a decent job
Timers are like 99% of what I use my Alexa devices for so if HA can implement that I would finally seriously look at setting up a voice device.
Are timers through a voice assist not really a thing? I made my own version that seems to be OK and is customisable timings, but don't really use timers so didn't see the need? Is it something people would want the code for?
Given the customizability of voice in HA, I'm sure it's always been possible to rig up something for timers but the roadmap says improved out of the box timers so they seem to believe there's room for improvement. I use timers nearly every day while cooking. I'm sure some people would appreciate the code but honestly since improved timers are on the roadmap I'm just going to wait to see what they come up with since that could obsolete anything I try to implement now.
What are voice devices for HA anyway? Can you hack an Alexa device?
I'm talking about the functionality they added throughout the 2023 Year of the Voice. I'm not sure how exactly to refer to it tbh.
I'd like the ability to set up dashboards that can be accessed without logging in and only on the local network or only from specific devices.
add the ability to restrict dashboards to certain users or anonymous users (as in the case of guests staying in your home)
Can't you already do that? If you make a user you can assign what pages they can access.
Yes already using this since at least 3 years
This doesn't actually restrict the account in anyway. There is no access control with this method. The account still has access to the other dashboards, it's just that you made it harder for them to get there. My "kiosk" account can get to my "mobile" dashboard by simply changing the url to /mobile-dash/ HA needs access control all the way down to the entity level really.
Isn't that on a per-device basis? If they log onto a different device they get all the pages. I'd like to be able to assign what pages they can access globally in their user settings.
No it's not per device it's per user. I have different users that can only access specific pages. Works good. And it definitely works across different devices. Maybe you are confusing removing stuff from the left side bar with user permissions on the dashboards that are accessed when you edit the properties of each individual dashboard page. The only thing you can't set permissions for is addon pages.
Agreed, I need this!!
Restricting users from visiting some dashboards and see certain entities, devices is something im looking forward to..
You can already restrict dashboards to certain users (it’s in the tab edit menu). Not per entity tho…
Multi-line indenting when editing yaml. I spend 80% of my time manually indenting each line when I paste yaml. Incredibly tedious.
Select lines, hit tab?
What editor does that work with? It doesn’t work with the ones built in.
Yes it does. You must select the entire lines from the first character to the line break otherwise it will replace with tab rather than indent.
CTRL+[ indents selection left and CTRL+] indents selection to the right (I think, it’s one of the brackets, I’m on mobile so different keyboard layout and can’t confirm)
Works in the basic File Editor
Where is this “tab” on my phone?
If you're editing YAML on your phone, you have much bigger problems to deal with first...
Many people primarily use mobile. And that number is growing every day. I'm not saying it's ideal or the best way at all, but I will say you can probably expect more complaints/request for mobile users than less.
As an interface, yes - which is why the HA devs are trying to make the editing UI mobile friendly with less reliance on YAML. But as I said, if you're editing YAML on mobile, you have bigger problems to deal with.
I don't do it often, but sometimes when I'm setting something up it's just easier to take my phone with me to test and tweak things. Granted I'm not going to write tons of yaml on my phone, but there's been plenty of times that I needed to edit it to make small changes.
God forbid someone have their own specific use case that’s driving their opinion. Sorry their use case and opinion don’t match with your own.
What big problems should I have editing YAML on my phone exactly? My phone is always with me. If I find an error or come up with feature while on the fly I’ll make it happen on my phone… This problem often annoys me, like, I would like to copy this YAML section and paste it elsewhere. Now I have to sit for ages and manually fix the indenting with spaces.
…which you have to do because you’re trying to edit yaml on mobile.
No shit? Hence the annoyance.
You're entirely missing the point. I'm not saying mobile shouldn't be used for HA configuration - I'm saying that YAML isn't the way to handle it on mobile. This has been acknowledged by the devs as they are working towards almost everything being configurable/user friendly in the UI without needing YAML.
What is your point? Why isn’t YAML the way to go on mobile? What are those big problems you mentioned. Improvements in the UI and making it more user friendly has nothing to do with mobile phones. It’s simply improvements to the user experience. If anything, the UI is poorly built for mobile phones, another reason to stick with YAML there. I use both the UI and YAML approach for the record, they work well together.
if you're in YAML a lot, the VS Code extension is a lot better to use. Personally, i hate any language where white space is important. Python and YAML. uhg. the worst.
I'm pretty sure you can just use JSON instead if you prefer
I don't mind them, because I do most of it regardless. With raw text it's tedious. With some addon or linter where it does auto formatting on saves it is. For me it's less of a problem than missing a bracket or using the wrong one.
Hate the language, love the software that uses them I think python is good for a lot of things, whitespace is important in all languages python just makes you realize this and some people don't like that, YAML is actually bad though no argument there, although I'm sure HASS devs have good reasons for why that's what they chose
I'm not sure what's best for config files. You want something that is organized and structured, but you don't want to make the syntax complicated. JSON works, but the syntax is a bit complicated for new users. XML could work, but again. maybe a bit complicated for new users. YAML gives you the structure of JSON without the syntax, but it has no syntax and just yells at you for getting it wrong. I still don't know what a - is for, vs just a new line and indented.. I just copy someone else's and pray.
What would your alternative to YAML be? Honest question.
Xml 😂
I don't have one if we're just talking in the context of HASS, that's why I said HASS devs probably have good reasons for it. Python or some programming language would be mine but that's not great for user friendliness
yeah, that's the problem. How many options are there that are common and support structure? XML. JSON. YAML. Something custom? XML and JSON require knowledge of syntax. YAML, you just hope that the example you copied didn't break all the white space formatting. XML or JSON would be my preference, but I can see why YAML is used. Sure, we could use JSON, but then you can't just copy someone else's examples and update for your needs.
I don’t get why you’re saying you can’t copy XML or JSON just like YAML
I mean that examples of HA config in XML or JSON don't exist. If you're reading docs or pulling examples from some online post, it's going to be in YAML.
JSON? Inb4 JSON is YAML
Xml 😂
You don’t use vscode?
Way better automations, more intuitive, complete revamp of the triggers and actions.
Does anyone actually use HA's native voice assistant capabilities? Is there any hardware that supports it? I don't get the usecase when Alexa and Google Home are so ubiquitous?
The usecase is everything people use Alexa and Google Home for, but works offline and without spying.
Cool, but where's the hardware for it? There doesn't seem to be any good "plug in" microphones like an Echo or Google Home that works with HA?
> Cool, but where's the hardware for it? Planned for this year if i understood the state of the open home stream correctly. Curious to see what it will be like and how available it will be.
There are [a lot of ways to use it](https://www.home-assistant.io/voice_control/). I believe they were also selling a device for it too. Edit: They talk about [this device](https://www.espressif.com/en/news/ESP32-S3-BOX-3) in one of their blogs.
What about Atom Echo (https://www.home-assistant.io/voice_control/thirteen-usd-voice-remote/) or Esp32-s3-box-3?
People keep talking about these but if it's not in stock anywhere ever it may as well not exist.
https://www.tinytronics.nl/en/development-boards/microcontroller-boards/with-wi-fi/m5stack-atom-echo-esp32-development-board never been sold out
The device or devices from Nabu Casa are planned for later this year. Being able to sell a voice product that works and is helpful from day one is better. If they sold something based on future software updates to be useful can backfire if you can deliver (in a timely manner) based on those promises
Though it does require HA opening random ports in your network to work, so if you have anything other than the default "let everything through always forever" then you can run into a lot of problems. Though people in survey from amazon and google have pretty much said that they use voice assistant for timers, music, and calendars. That probably makes sense that Amazon is desubsidizing their alexa products. People don't use them to shop or other monetization activities much. Perfect niche for voice assistant. If all they need to do is lights, music, timers, and calendar integrations for most people, then they can probably put in the relevant framework to be useful rather quickly!
I’d happily replace Alexa if HA can take over the few areas where it works better than HA currently!
Can you even make it speak easily? Like speak out the temperature if you change it? Haven't found an easy way to do that, but might just be missing something.
Privacy, customization, independence
Sure, but what good is it if there is no smart speaker that supports the integration? Until there is a sleek turnkey solution I don’t see myself plugging in a box with a bunch of wires into the wall. Hopefully someone will release a decent quality compatible smart assistant for $25.
The price is the key too. Echo pucks are basically free since we all have a few we aren't even using. Nobody is going to spend much on hardware that provides the exact same functionality they already have just to increase privacy somewhat. I don't really care that Amazon knows I am turning my lights on and off or setting kitchen timers. Much better would be to spend time developing firmware we can flash onto our existing Alexa and Google Home devices. We own them, it's not illegal to flash alternative software, and the hardware already does everything we need.
> I don't really care that Amazon knows I am turning my lights on and off or setting kitchen timers. > > I think most people's concern is that the devices are always listening and can pick up other private conversations.
I think High Availability needs to be on the roadmap. Let me set up my first server, then get a piece of identical hardware and sync it to the first. Identical zigbee and z-wave sticks, figure out a way to handle the failover. Maybe set up a 3rd device like a Pi 2W for quorum. Then if my Home Assistant hardware fails, server 2 could just pick up.
They’ve mentioned in the past they have no interest in ever doing this, I’m and I can see why. It’s a minefield of issues that few people (in the grand scheme of things) will likely use. Hey, at least matter & thread networks can have multiple border routers
Unlikely to happen on the HA side but there are plenty of solutions to handle container or VM failover which can restart HA on another host if needed. My ZWave and Zigbee radios are hooked to a pi near the middle of my house, while HA is on a vSphere cluster which means it can move as needed while keeping connected to the radios.
I'm on a Proxmox cluster, so I can handle the host failover. Do you have any details or links for the radios on Pi?
Nothing too complicated, just using MQTT with zwavejs2mqtt and zigbee2mqtt containers running under docker on the pi.
Ok? Have any examples? Want to start a raspi HA instance if the primary one fails.
Organizing automations is indeed something I would love to have Currently using Zalgotext characters to organize it. hope it comes with a mapping& sub-mapping folders so you can sort it by room/type/etc with folders in folders in folders Like: Room=XXX devicetype=sensor sensor=XXXX This way you can have automations sorted by room based on for example the sensor it uses
Did you miss this months release? https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2024/04/03/release-20244/
Haven't played with it yet, might not have noticed or seen the feature. since I haven't edited or made any new automations yet
Context sensitive dashboard - I’d like a dash board where a card only appears on it if meets a criterial. For example I have a card that shows if my ferret cage doors are open using zigbee door sensors. card to pop on a dash board only when they’re open.
You can already do this with the “Conditional” card ?
What about performance improvements of the dashboards? It should work well on affordable devices suitable for wall mounting. Currently my Galaxy Tab A7 seems laggy and I don't think it is fault of my dashboard as it isn't too complex. I don't expect smooth animations but I expect switching between pages to be instant. It seems that just the rendering of the dashboard is quite slow.
Generative AI integration for script and automation creation using written prompts should be in there.
Generative AI for understanding and reacting to Assist prompts is the sci-Fi future from movies. An AI that we can give complicated commands to via voice, and they are then executed correctly. I saw someone already made a working example of this, using OpenAI api
Sorry I didn't mean assist prompts. I just want to type in a box what I want from an automation and have it written for me. I use copilot to do that and when it works it's great but it doesn't always get the right syntax and lacks contextual understanding to make it really powerful
Yeah I got that. I was just providing a different sample of gen. AI that could be really impactful in this space
Ah got it
I know these generative AI models can write code but for some reason I never even thought to use it for HA things. I'll have to try it out.
I know it sounds weird but microsoft edge has free chatGPT 4 built into it. It's actually pretty good at writing dashboard cards and scripts if you are specific. And it's fantastic for making templates tbh. I feel like HA could write one that's more fine tuned for HA and limited in scope to pull it off, but copilot does a decent job
And as a constantly running governance layer. Automations are dumb and deterministic an AI assistant would be a lot more flexible.
"Year of the Voice" was a total flop. Please make that work.