Comment field

Configuration
1

It is very important to have a comment field separate from the names. In order to manage my system, I need stable names for binding to a bulb. The bulb may have various roles, but those roles are not in the names themselves. Having a comment field would be useful for humans managing the devices.

2

You can add as many custom attributes as you want to entities.

Customizing Entities: Manual Customization

In automations and scripts you can add aliases to triggers, conditions, and actions.

3

Thanks. I’ll look at it.

4

It worked though I had to a full reboot to get it to work – restarting YAML by itself didn’t seem to be enough.

My larger goal is to tie the database together. But the state file has an entity name that doesn’t show up when I look at the device list, and the friendly names for all Kaufman bulbs are, by default, the same.

There is the name shown as “kauf-bulb-b6359c” which corresponds to the DNS name, but it doesn’t show up in the state file. I have to guess that “light.kauf_bulb_5” is the same device. Adding

homeassistant:
  name: Frankston Home
  customize:
    light.kauf_bulb_5:
      friendly_name: ksink3

helps, but it only changes the name – not the names for the other aspects.

I have yet to find out how to get at the DNS name (and IP address) and automate tying all this information together.