I finally updated to 0.88 and fixed all the things that broke with it. Now that Lovelace is the default, I’m at a point deciding which way to go. Wanted to see what most are doing in hopes to help me decide. To this point I’ve done very little with Lovelace. I started my own yaml file but just have a few things in it a couple months. Almost all of which are custom cards.
My lovelace yaml file has a lot of title graphics for easy scrolling as well as plenty of comments. The yaml HA creates has pretty much nothing as far a comments, etc…which is fine since you can edit most of everything in the UI itself. I’m not sure if its worth maintaining my own yaml file at this point if doing everything in the UI is quicker and easier. I’ve played around with the Editor for the cards a little so far.
What is everyone else doing? Also with going the UI route and letting HA handle it, how do you deal with custom cards that aren’t part of HA?
The one I started with was slightly fancy. Had some rounded corners and picture cards, but nothing I probably couldn’t do with clicking on Edit for the cards in the UI
If everything you have is in custom cards then I think that is the way to go. I’ve heard that others still have to maintain a separate yaml file for making raw config changes which to me eliminates the benefits of yaml mode. The benefits of yaml are comments, breaking up the config for easier readability using !include statements and just a general feeling of knowing exactly what is going on especially if something stops working correctly.
YAML, tried moving to the storage mode, but it rearranged, reformatted, removed comments and such and I prefer just making changes directly through the text file over samba using an application that supports YAML, then trying to use the inbuilt editor.
I like using the GUI editor to get immediate feedback and will then mimic those changes in a yaml file. I do major changes in the yaml file and then just copy/paste in total using the raw editor. So I can maintain comments (I don’t use includes)
Still using yaml file. Writing code is a skill that I do not want to lose and my perception is that I have a bit more control and customisation. Also, I was taught to always comment when writing code, which is now habit. The only thing I allow Hass to do through front-end is automations, as I had some big problems with that, as the automations kept becoming disabled after Lovelace became default (I never realised that there was a disbaled state, until 2 days ago!). However, I have now created an entity card to check my automations are enabled.
you can add something like this to the automation…
- id: '1507434167221'
alias: Coffee Maker Off
initial_state: 'true'
That will make sure it is always enabled. It does seem that when you make a new one that it is automatically disabled however it should remember the state across reboots. Sometimes if you restart home assistant too many times close together (easy to do when you are changing/trying stuff) HA thinks an automation might be causing an error and it will disable all automations. This initial state will make sure they come on/stay on.
Thanks for that. That’s the line I needed for initial state. Sometimes I had to reboot the RPi multiple times to get it to work. I’ve made an extra page called “System Status”, where I can monitor the system vitals and will add things such as internet speed etc, when I get round to it. Might make and entities card that shows what’s currently on.
See all of the other threads in which we’ve discussed literally the exact same topic. My opinion is still generally the same. If it makes it generally more complicated with more things to maintain and there’s no significant benefit I don’t see the point.
But that’s just me…if it works for you then carry on!
I want to be able to copy and paste things, to organise them into multiple files, to keep them under version control, to email them to friends, to generate lists of things with scripts and then paste them in, to know that I can edit things if the GUI isn’t working, and - especially - to add comments explaining what I’ve done.
Trying to keep an open mind but I can’t see myself using an all-GUI approach any time soon: you lose too much!
I do most editing in lovelace but I create my automations in yaml.
Too many things just don’t work very well in the UI config editor (automations-wise) and there hasn’t been any progress made in that area.
Does it mean that you don’t have lovelace mode: yaml in your config and just have an independent yaml file for your own records that HA does not use? Because I don’t think you can have yaml mode enabled AND being able to use GUI editor in the same time, it didn’t work for me on 0.88.2.
Therefore, I’m a bit confused how exactly you benefit from both options.
I haven’t tried it.
