Anyone seen this (Find internal positioning)?

Feature Requests
61

I just managed to configure it.

First I checked what was being sent via MQTT (wtih MQTTspy):
Topic: crows/location/RogueCrow
Sample JSON: {“location”:“living room”,“time”:1515000293638441250,“bayes”:{“living room”:1},“svm”:{“living room”:0}}

Sensor configuration:

- platform: mqtt
  name: "RogueCrow room"
  state_topic: "crows/location/RogueCrow"
  value_template: '{{ value_json.location }}'
2 Likes
62

Hey!

Thanks very much for this! I’ve just tried the same setup but can’t seem to get it to work?

I have

device_tracker:  
  - platform: mqtt
    name: "my name"
    state_topic: 'mygroupe/location/myname'
    value_template: '{{ value_json.location }}'

but I get "Invalid config for [device_tracker.mqtt]: required key not provided @ data[‘devices’]. " in the log?

Any Ideas?

EDIT:
Ah just spotted you’re using a sensor and not a device tracker? I was hoping to get away from a sensor and use a device tracker.

63

Yes - I opted to use this as a sensor, since it was smpler and I have a device tracker already which works perfectly.

I am not sure if this can be used straightforward as a device tracker. Checking the documentation:


-> FIND won’t provide what these components are expecting I think.
Not sure if device tracker can be configured as a template or similar…

64

Yeah, thats the conclusion I came too. Shame really as I’d like them setup as device_trackers but as you say, if find isn’t supplying the relevant data then I don’t think it’s going to happen. I was hoping we might be able to use templates but it seems not.

Thanks for the input tho! :slight_smile:

65

You should be able to write an automation which does this tho…With an mqtt trigger and posting the data in the correct form to the mqtt…

~Cheers

66

I have node-RED listen for the MQTT topic and then extract the data and use the service device_tracker.see to have my device show up in HA as a device_tracker entity.

You should be able to do something similar with HA automatons by triggering on the mqtt sensor and then calling device_tracker.see.

67

Here is challenge.

How about using the disturbances on the wifi signal field in order to track people. No need to carry your phone e everywhere to be tracked. This would be the ultimate HA sensor.

Here is a paper that describes the method and some test results: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4813882/

MIT is working on a more advanced system but it requires special RF antenna.

68

This looks awesome! The Room+ app doesn’t seem to be showing up in the Play Store in the UK - is this US only?

Also which app is recommended now? FIND3, Room+ or Zanzanito? Thanks :slight_smile:

69

@schollz Now that we can (or should soon be able to) use Google Home to track bluetooth devices, is it possible to provide the rssi information from HA instead of using the app. This will allow tracking not just iOS devices, but any bluetooth device.

70

I just tried FIND3 this afternoon and was amazed by its magic. Is anyone in this thread still using it? I would be very keen to hear some long term experiences and use cases.

71

@schollz curious if you had a chance to consider arsaboo’s question above! Are you still actively developing / integrating with Home Assistant?

72

Curious about the Google Assistant thing as well. Is it still possible with Home Assistant now?
Does anyone know any good tutorials to install Find and integrate it to HA ? I am struggling with Indoor Positioning sensors.

73

No Google blocked this.

74

@firstof9
Thanks for that. I suspected so when I couldn’t find anything.

I am going to have a look at FIND. I tried Room Assistant recently but found it really hammered the MQTT and it wasn’t as accurate as I hoped for.

75

FIND also uses MQTT

76

@firstof9
How do you find the MQTT traffic? I was get quite a lot with Room Assistant. I had 3 pis setup and it was like 20 messages a second from each one.

77

I wasn’t watching it, why are you worried about MQTT traffic?

78

I found with Room Assistant that it really slowed everything down. I am running on a Raspberry Pi 3B with the Mosquitto plugin. It’s not a huge install so it works fine normally, but with so many MQTT messages hammering Mosquitto at the same time it caused lag. Once I killed RA, the lag was gone.

79

Might need to put the MQTT server on a bigger machine for room positioning, there’s docker containers to run FIND with I just didn’t find it useful enough (room presence).

80

Anyone tried using the wifi sensor from the hassio app? It sends signal strenght, but not frequently…