Binary_sensor as person

Configuration
1

Hi experts,

I want to add my cats like person-badges to my HA-Lovelace.
The CatFlap gives me binary signals to tell me if they are at home or not.
Unfortunately I can only add device_tracker as persons.

Is there a workaround available?

2

You can use “device_tracker.see” in order to create a device_tracker entity in an automation.

Or you could use a MQTT device_tracker:

3

Just landed here looking to do the same with my Sure Petcare flap - would like to have the cats show as person badges (showing home / away as relevant)

Did you find a way to do it?

4

Both version above still work for creating a device_tracker of a binary_sensor.
There is a third one, composite device tracker:

(you can use it with a single binary_sensor also)

In advance to device_tracker.see it survives a restart of homeassistant.

5

Not sure if you found the solution (it’s been almost 3 years) but here is what I did for my cat Zorro (it is in a file called cats.yaml in the automations directory in the configuration folder):

---
- alias: "20102 - Update device tracker for Zorro"
  mode: queued
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: binary_sensor.zorro
      from: "off"
      to: "on"
    - platform: state
      entity_id: binary_sensor.zorro
      from: "on"
      to: "off"
  condition: []
  action:
    - service: device_tracker.see
      data:
        dev_id: "zorro"
        location_name: "{{ 'home' if is_state(trigger.entity_id, 'on') else 'not_home' }}"
        source_type: "router"
6

Recently I added the following trigger because at HA startup, the deice_tracker would only be created when the binary_sensor would toggle:

    - platform: homeassistant
      event: start

(and yes, I know the line condition: [] can be omitted)