ESPHome device added, shows green in the dashboard, but devices now show unavailable

[Mikefila]

@Mikefila

Save the text of the sketch you use to compile, if that is lost there is no way to recover it from the esp. Disconnect the esp, remove the iteration in integrations, and then in the .storage folder of your HA installation there will be a copy of the esp config.

However it will not have the same name. You’ll have to open the text files and examine the contents to find it. Then delete it and restart HA and power up the node. If not you’re likely to wind up with copied entities with a _2 suffix.

follow this procedure I posted above.

[stevemann (Stephen Mann (YAML-challenged))]

@Mikefila

follow this procedure I posted above.

Still doesn’t say why it happens.
I have a device, a solar temperature sensor running ESPHome. I haven’t touched the code for weeks, but suddenly, yesterday, one of the entities was “unavailable”. I found that the entity was now _2. It only took me 30 seconds to edit the /config/ui-lovelace.yaml file and update the entity name.

It would be nice if we could force the entity name in the ESPHome code.

[tom_l]

@stevemann

I don’t set static IP on any of my devices, just my servers.

Guess which side of the ESP API acts as the server?

I’ll give you a hint. It’s not Home Assistant.

[stevemann (Stephen Mann (YAML-challenged))]

@tom_l

Guess which side of the ESP API acts as the server?

I’ll give you a hint. It’s not Home Assistant.

Smart-aleck. You know what I mean. NAS, Plex, MQTT Broker. Those have a permanent IP lease.

[tom_l]

I’m serious. Each ESPHome device acts like the server end of the API connection and benefits from having a static IP address just the same way larger servers do. In this case the Home Assistant ESPHome integration is the client.

[flyize]

Any chance you can explain why HA would be using (likely) the discovered IP, rather than the IP that MDNS resolves to?

[flyize]

That worked… but now they are unavailable again. I have to be doing something wrong. That seems crazy that I would have to set a static IP for all my ESPHome devices. FWIW, I have two others and they work fine.

[Mikefila]

Idk what to tell you it shows up 2x on the wifi configuration page, maybe just set static IPs.

[stevemann (Stephen Mann (YAML-challenged))]

@flyize

That worked…

What worked? Either say who you are replying to or quote something.

Mike-
“Dramatically” is a relative term. It only takes a couple of ms to look up the IP over MDNS. I wouldn’t call that “dramatic”.

As I said, I have dozens of ESP devices, mostly Sonoff running Tasmota, and a few that I have converted to ESPHome. None of them have a static IP.

[Mikefila]

Do you want a prize or something? This is written in the official docs from esphome. If you know better than the maintainers, maybe you should contribute to the project.

[flyize]

@stevemann

What worked? Either say who you are replying to or quote something.

To be honest, I’ve never actually quoted on Discourse. I didn’t really realize it was an option and usually just reply.

Either way, you can click the link of the person I was replying to and it will show you the post.

[stevemann (Stephen Mann (YAML-challenged))]

@Mikefila

This is written in the official docs from esphome.

"Generally speaking, disabling mDNS without setting a static IP address (or a static DHCP lease) is bound to cause problems. This is due to the fact that mDNS is used to find the IP address of each ESPHome nodes."

So, I read the docs that indicates that the developers expect the devices to use dynamic IP addresses.

Under “Troubleshooting”:
“Give your ESP a static IP.” is found right after “We are working on possible workarounds for the issue,”

[flyize]

I bet that I’ve found my issue. I’m guessing that HA Discovery grabs the IP address of the ESPHome node, and likely has no idea about its mDNS name. I deleted the device from the integration and manually added it using the mDNS name.

Does it seem that this could really be my issue?

[Mikefila]

@stevemann

We are working on possible workarounds for the issue

In other words use a static IP for now if you have connection problems.

@flyize idk all my nodes have been static from day one.

[stevemann (Stephen Mann (YAML-challenged))]

@flyize

Does it seem that this could really be my issue?

From the docs:

Frequently Asked Questions

“Online status detection in ESPHome’s dashboard by default uses mDNS…”

[flyize]

Well shit. There goes that idea.

edit: Wait, that says in ESPHome’s dashboard. I’m talking about HA Discovery when it finds a new device.