I have written many node red sequences for automations around the house and most of them rely on event state nodes testing the state of something. I am having trouble understanding when I should use the specific state that the device uses (such as on/off/open/closed/etc) versus a simple true and false. The confusing bit is that switching a motion sensor from on/off to true/false appears to work in some cases, but not all. What am I missing? I prefer true/false over the myriad of other string based states but it doesnât seem to always work.
Ok, I was hoping I could just stick with T/F but while some sequences were working, I am reverting them all back to using the strings. When I have time I will try to figure out why some were working and some not.
I changed it back to string on/off but am just trying to understand the innerworkingsâŚ
EDIT: There are 2 sets of counter lights. The left/middle/right lights are LIFX, while the ones I called âKitchen Counter Lightsâ are just 3 dimmable white LED flush mount lights. The goal here is for the automation not to turn on the regular counter lights when my LIFX lights are on. When those are off, the kitchen main light state determines how bright the kitchen counter lights will be if the home is in night mode otherwise 100% brightness. I added the failsafe when some other error was causing the lights to stay on all night⌠it may not be needed now other than in the unlikely case the counter lights get turned on remotely and with nobody around (so motion events canât start the timer to turn them back off)
Not sure about your exact issue but wanted to give some information about state type.
In the server config, thereâs a field State Boolean, Config Server | node-red-contrib-home-assistant-websocket. It takes a list of values that will translate an entity state when the State Type is set to Boolean from the original entity state to a true value if it exists in the State Boolean list. All other entity state values that donât exist in the State Boolean list will return a false value.
@Kermit - If I understand correctly, then what you are saying would confirm what I had observed. In other words, a state of on, or open was being translated to true, and given the list of strings it can convert to true is limited, I was having issues when I ran into such exceptions.
If my understanding is correct, then it all makes sense now! Thank you!
In essence, it is safer to stick with using the string, but in a subset of cases, one can opt for the Boolean approach as long as you are sure the strings get converted properly.
