After installing HA for the first time, I was able to add my Ring StickUp Cams using the standard Ring integration. This added my Ring cameras as a variety of entities. From what I’ve read, there’s also a Ring MQTT intgration, but I haven’t used it yet. I have no idea what MQTT is supposed to be. When I look at the current available entities, there are live views and a kind of still image of the latest events.
My idea was to create a dashboard that displays the most recent still image, and when I click on that image, the live view opens. If I’m right, this shouldn’t drain the Ring cameras’ batteries as much, as if I used the live view directly in the dashboard. It should look and work similar to what the original Ring app shows me.
I have absolutely no idea about smart home systems, and Home Assistant in particular. All these protocols are completely foreign to me. I have no idea what I need and what I don’t. I don’t expect a step-by-step guide for beginners from you, but I’d appreciate a link to one. I assume this is a fairly common setup, but I don’t know what terms to search for to find the right one.
If you add the live-view camera as the entity in a picture-entity card, it will automatically use the last snapshot as the cover image and when clicked, will pop-up the live view.
The Ring-MQTT integration is essential if you want to track other Ring hardware other than cameras, like contact sensors, motion sensors, and keypads. You will need to install and setup an MQTT broker first; Mosquitto Broker App is the go-to standard for most users. All MQTT is is a lightweight messaging protocol. It allows devices to “talk to each other” so-to-speak. In this case, it will allow your Ring devices on Ring’s servers to talk to your HA machine, providing details about the devices, like whether a contact sensor is open or closed, etc.
If you go to Settings > Apps > Click on install Apps at the bottom and look through the Official Apps, you’ll see Mosquitto Broker. Click on it. Then Click on the documentation tab. It gives detailed instructions on setting up the broker.
To install Ring-MQTT, you’ll need to add a custom repository to the Apps Install page. At the top on the right, click the 3-dot icon and select Repositories. Go here, copy the URL, and add it as a repository. Then refresh the browser. The Ring-MQTT App (formerly called Add-on) will appear on the App Install page. Instructions on setting it up are in it’s wiki.