Create dynamic entities when one entity has multiple attributes

Hi all,

I’m on Home Assistant 103, and I installed the ESXi Stats custom component. It works great, but I’m having a hard time with the different attributes contained in the entities created by the component. Here’s a screenshot:

I’ve seem that I have to create sensors using the template function, but is there a more dynamic way to instantly show one of the attributes of the entity, without creating a template sensor ?

Something like sensor.esxi_datastore_datastore1_attributename ? I tried tollok at the documentation, but I’m a bit lost right now. Does anyone have this problem ? Do you have to create a template sensor for each attribute (like I did for free_space_gb and total_space_gb) ?

Thanks in advance for your answer !

Yes you have to do it like this. The reasoning behind this is probably that most of the time you will only need one or two attributes and if it would automatically create a sensor for each attribute this would clutter the system massively and leave you with lots of unused entities.

but is there a more dynamic way to instantly show one of the attributes of the entity, without creating a template sensor ?

When you say ‘show’, do you mean for lovelace only? There is a custom card that will show you attributes at a glance if you don’t want to create a sensor out of it.

But, Burningstone is correct here. The best way is to create a template sensor for the attributes you want to track, and is highly recommended if you plan on doing any sort of triggers based on these attributes.

Thank you both for your answers !

I gues I’ll do some template sensors then :slight_smile:

Thanks again !