Description field for devices

Configuration Zigbee
1

As I have more and more Zigbee devices added to my HA environment, I feel a need to save additional information to a description field. For example, I have 3 motion sensors which are detected as exactly the same model. But 1 of them is a little different and has in fact a different retail model name. I would like to store that information in a description or label field. As there is currently no description field available and I don’t want to put all info in the device name field, what would other options be?

And what do you think about the suggestion to add a description field to a device so you can store additional information about the device besides a name and the area?

2

You can add custom attributes to any entity.

As long as they share a common entity id pattern you can use customize_glob to add the attribute to all the entities from a particular device by using wildcards (*) for the domain and end of the id.

homeassistant:
  customize_glob:
    "*.kitchen_echo_dot*":
      generation: 3
3

Thank you. So if I want to add a description to every device, I could add a customization to the device class? I only want to add an attribute, not a value, because every device object instantiated from the device class can have a different value for the description.

4

I would like to see this added in the GUI. For each entity, I can add some additional information about what the entity is about. The description should be 255 characters. Any AI added to HA would be able to read the description for added context as to what that sensor or entity is for. Like, if I have a timer entity called Ibuprofen set to Idle eight hours of last use, I like to add context stating that I should not take Ibuprofen within the timer Active state. ChatGPT or any other AI services would know why that timer exist. Second, for personal reasons. I have a five lamp fixture, each with a smart bulb. The name of the bulb, of course, would be “living_room_bulb_1” and so forth. If I have bulb_4 pointing down, I can state that in the description, so I know which one is actually pointing down. I wouldn’t have a description for every single entity, but I think it would be nice if it did. If the description field is null, no need to add extra DB storage, just remove the description from the entity. If it does have something in it, then it is my choice to add something in it.

In the entity, “>” can be used to add a description. This will add more data to that entity DB. Expose the description to the AI services as well. If I remove it, “null”, then it will delete that entry in the DB.

I hope I am describing this correctly. Thank you everyone!!!

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