discussion General Home Automation / Home Assistant thread

[JD]

I believe the BLE bulbs need a hub that supports them. Like an Amazon Echo. The Echo itself controls them.

That would make sense so it's not tied to a single phone then. The Hue site isn't very clear though.

If buying an Echo though, might as well just get the Amazon bulbs that come pre-paired to your account if @Marzipan is looking for "easy".

 

[Izerous]

Most of my stuff is on schedules. Christmas lights, night lights for the little ones, dashboard needs to be fixed (lost account sunc) but it used to turn on and off automatically too. Turn on in the morning while everyone was getting ready, turn off by the time everyone would have left. Turn back on when everyone would be home getting ready for the next day.

The nightlight automatically tun off when the kids should be out of bed, even delayed based on time of dusk so they are not on at bedtime if it is still kinda light out.

 

[lowfat]

Haven't used any automations in 2+ years except for 1 that automatically turns on my dust extractor when I turn on my saws.

But last night I finally get around to unboxing my ol' LG C9 OLED and putting it in the living room. Sat in the box for the last 2 years. Previously I was able to create automations to turn off the display (leave TV itself on) and could control it via Harmony remote. Nothing was working as Home Assistant has changed so much in 2 years. But I did manage to get that working. BUT I was also able to toggle through various brightness values w/ the Harmony as well. I see mention of it in my old Node Red settings but can't find anything in HA. Finally decide to check this thread if I posted what I did. Seems I did. Although not in much detail.

On my gaming PC I use ColorControl to control my LG OLED. I've been able to setup keyboard shortcuts to adjust brightness. Seems I did the same thing for the living room PC. Although I ran a Windows VM and ran a HA client app in the VM that could accept keyboard commands.

I was going to add a Lenovo thin client to the living room to act as a Tidal client anyways, so I guess I could add ColorControl it as well. My googling hasn't been able to find a lot of success with other people controlling picture settings remotely, even after all this time.

 

[lowfat]

I've been on a quest to have a better way to listen to Tidal in my living room. Prefablably Tidal Connect, where I could change songs with my phone. Almost nothing supports it.

Was about to buy a $350 WiiM player but during my googling I found out about Music Assistant. Integrates in to HA. It can play on any Chromecast / or media player that can connect to HA. And Tidal is one of the things it supports.

Tested with the Yamaha RX-V6A in my office. Worked good. AVR in living room doesn't have wifi. But the Yamaha AVR I got for free a couple months ago does. Swap it out and got Tidal playing full quality.

Only downside is there is no android app. I have to go through the Home Assistant app, so Android media controls don't work. Literally the only way I seem to be able to change tracks is within the music assistant tab in HA. And doesn't seem to pass through any entities to HA, so I can't even bind controls to my Harmony remote.

It does have a Windows AND OSX app. But no mobile yet.





Edit: got it working. The instructions on their site is for a version of Home Assistant that isn't even out yet. So I did the old setup and got it working. Able to do basic controls with the Harmony remote.


Probably the most powerful whole home audio service there is. I could play via Google, Alexa, Sonos, PC, and AVRs all at the same time if I so desire.

Edit2: it doesn't sound good. Not sure if it is my AVRs or what is the cause.

 

[Marzipan]

some smart home brands have sensors and I'm wondering if any of them allow for somethings like this:
- can detect a phone and knows how to turn a light up brighter and then drop it down when the phone goes away?

my FiL has light sensitivites, so a lot of the house is dim...but, he's almost 92 so spends a lot of time napping, so would love it if some of the lighting could be automated to get brighter. I know I can do it manually, but that would be a lil onerous in the long run.

 

[Izerous]

some smart home brands have sensors and I'm wondering if any of them allow for somethings like this:
- can detect a phone and knows how to turn a light up brighter and then drop it down when the phone goes away?

my FiL has light sensitivites, so a lot of the house is dim...but, he's almost 92 so spends a lot of time napping, so would love it if some of the lighting could be automated to get brighter. I know I can do it manually, but that would be a lil onerous in the long run.

I do know there are sensors that can detect if a phone is at home or not. Things like even my nest thermostat (which is an older model) can manage that home & away functionality but that is also based on a wifi connection being present or not I believe. I think if the goal is something like is Phone X in Room B use brighter lights... I think you would need custom routine logic and probably BT reliance instead of WiFi to be more accurate.

In the mean time a lot of smart dimmers can change brightness based on time of day. If he is always in bed by 7pm could set the lights to be brighter by 7:15pm for example which would at least help some

 

[Marzipan]

I do know there are sensors that can detect if a phone is at home or not. Things like even my nest thermostat (which is an older model) can manage that home & away functionality but that is also based on a wifi connection being present or not I believe. I think if the goal is something like is Phone X in Room B use brighter lights... I think you would need custom routine logic and probably BT reliance instead of WiFi to be more accurate.

In the mean time a lot of smart dimmers can change brightness based on time of day. If he is always in bed by 7pm could set the lights to be brighter by 7:15pm for example which would at least help some

my FiL is an analog guy, so we can't change things like that. I guess I will just do it where needed when needed. perhaps the sensors can be installed so that after no movement has been detected for a bit, will dim the lights and keep them dimmed until told to brighten. is that something doable? I'm thinking if a sensor dims after no movement detected it would also be mandatory to brighten when it detects movement.

 

[JD]

my FiL is an analog guy

It would likely be easier to put a button where he sits or however he enters a room typically to trigger the automation instead? When he presses it, all lights in the room could dim to 50% or whatever is comfortable.

The rest of you could use your phones or voice or whatever else to increase the brightness as needed.

 

[Marzipan]

It would likely be easier to put a button where he sits or however he enters a room typically to trigger the automation instead? When he presses it, all lights in the room could dim to 50% or whatever is comfortable.

The rest of you could use your phones or voice or whatever else to increase the brightness as needed.

interesting. but no, he won't understand or approve of any changes that he won't see reason for. if it makes anything more difficult for him, he has a fit. as an example, we had to install a gate to keep Nana out of the kitchen except when it's time to eat. oh, he had temper tantrums, kicked the gate, smashed the gate with his walker, swore at it, cursed it, demanded it to be removed. it's been 3 months now and he still grumbles at the inconveniences it's introduced. so yeh...everything we have to do needs to be on the sly and without any apparent changes to what he's used to.

 

[sswilson]

If you're looking for something that's going to trigger an action on sound or movement, maybe look into devices for hearing impaired. Wayyyy back in the day they had devices which flashed lights when the phone rang or somebody rang the doorbell. I'd imagine they've got some pretty high tech stuff these days.