Boolean State Follower

Blueprints Exchange
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1

It is often useful to set the state of one entity based on another. Maybe one light should be turned on when another light is on. Or a template helper computes the desired state of a switch.

Unlike the example in the blueprint tutorial, the Boolean Follower only requires its input to have a state which can be ‘on’ or ‘off’, and the entity which is supposed to match that state must have a ‘turn_on’ or ‘turn_off’ service.

If the input state is other than on or off, the automation will fail, which I think is the desired behavior.

Open your Home Assistant instance and show the blueprint import dialog with a specific blueprint pre-filled.

blueprint:
  name: Boolean Follower
  description: An entity with turn_on and turn_off follows the state of another entity with on or off states.
  domain: automation
  input:
    to_follow:
        name: Entity to Follow State
        description: The entity with the desired state.
        selector:
            entity:
 
    target_entity:
      name: followed
      description: The entity that should bept in sync with the entity to Follow State
      selector:
            entity:

mode: restart
triggers:
  - trigger: state
    entity_id: !input to_follow

actions:
  - action: homeassistant.turn_{{ states(trigger.entity_id) }}
    metadata: {}
    data: {}
    target:
      entity_id: !input target_entity
2

As an example of a way I use this, I have a complicated set of circumstances in which I want my holiday lights on.

If it is dark out any any of this are true:

  • time between 6AM and 10:30PM
  • person detected by frigate
  • someone is arriving home

or my outdoor light switch for another set of lights is on (mainly to force the lights on during day for testing).

I compute that with a template helper, and turn on a group of lights with the blueprint (I have two switches that need to be operated).

3

@dougransom Hi Doug, I found this while looking for a way to sync my a lock entity (locked or unlocked) with a binary_sensor entity (on or off)

Any chance you can mod the blueprint to work in this situation?

thx!

4

I’ve recently started getting errors with this Blueprint. Not sure what can be done about it but I thought I would share:

onn Google Media Player bool tracker uses an unknown actionError · Reported by Automation

The automation “onn Google Media Player bool tracker” (automation.onn_google_media_player_bool_tracker) has an unknown action: homeassistant.turn_unavailable.

This error prevents the automation from running correctly. Maybe this action is no longer available, or perhaps a typo caused it.

To fix this error, edit the automation and remove this action.

Select Submit below to confirm you have fixed this automation.

5

I switched to using the blueprint Linked Entities , you might want to try that.

6

Edit the blueprint & add in a condition that the trigger state is not unavailable.

7

Sugestion:

The turn_{{ states(trigger.entity_id) }} error occurs in Home Assistant Community because you are likely trying to use trigger.entity_id directly within a service call, but you should instead use trigger.to_state.state to get the new state of the entity. The error message turn_unavailable or turn_unknown indicates that the automation is trying to call an invalid service because the trigger.entity_id is being rendered as part of the service name, which is incorrect syntax.

Correct Syntax

To fix this, use trigger.to_state.state in your template to correctly identify the new state of the triggered entity.

For example, instead of:

Code

action:  service: input_boolean.turn_{{ states(trigger.entity_id) }}

Use:

Code

action:  service: input_boolean.turn_{{ trigger.to_state.state }}
8

Stop blindly posting what AI tells you and read my previous comment above.

Using trigger.to_state.state won’t solve the issue since it will render as unavailable if the trigger state goes to unavailable.

The only way to fix this is to either use not_to / not_from unknown/unavailable in the trigger, or else by excluding those states in a condition.

9

Because this one was accepted by home assistant as a repair and the other one not