Going back to Domoticz

Hi All,

This is my first post on these forums - as you can see from the subject, I am giving up on HA.
I will try to explain my reasoning in a non-biased way, I am not trying to annoy anyone, just give a POV.

I have been using Domoticz for 3+ years, but started to feel it was getting stale, not much changing, I read lots of good reviews about HA so when the SD card in my RPI4 failed, I decided to try HA.

This is when my problems started - I really struggled to install HA, I tried the RPI imager version, and the recommended image from the HA user guide via Balena. Both had the same issue - the installation just froze and after waiting for 2+ hours, I gave up. I tried this with new SD cards, different USB 3 sticks, and
finally I purchased a USB3 SSD, this worked much better, and I was able to progress.
Very frustrating that SSH / telnet is not possible during installation, so a headless install is almost impossible to troubleshoot.

Once I installed HA, I started the setup of devices.
Here is a list of my setup:
RPI4 8gb
RfxTrx433XL
lots of devices working ok
Owl intuition CM180i energy monitor
ESP8266 Milight hub (via MQTT)
A few miLight RF hubs (FUT 037 I think)
Aeotech Z-Stick 5 (via USB hub) (via z-Wave JS)
Lots of Z-Wave deivces working ok
4x Philio PST02A multi sensors
128gb external SSD USB3 drive

Most of the setup of devices went well, but I had some real problems:
Philio PST02A’s
Motion detection & door opening, I had to use various workarounds I found on these forums, and the end result is not great.
Owl Intution
Energy monitoring seems to think I am using billions of kWHs, then 0, then billions again, the figures are all over the place. changing the UOM to Wh did not help.
3 phase electricity supply charts just look abysmal, no history, no overlaid charts
Just a really poor implementation

No way to visualise Z-Wave connectivity, which devices are working as a hub?

Now I have SSH enabled, I am really struggling to view or change anything in the filesystem. I think this is linked to the docker image thing. I get filesystem locked type errors.

Trying to google for help always ends up pointing to stuff telling me to add entries into configuration.yaml which I believe is deprecated (but who knows)
I still have no idea if I am running Hassio, HA, Docker, or whatever, why so complex?

I tried some automation / scenes stuff, but basically most of it does not work as expected, none of my dimmable Mi-lights could be controlled preciseley, I could automate “reduce dim level” but not set dim to 20% - no idea why?

Honestly, the list goes on, I have been struggling with this for 2 weeks, and I have decided to give up.

Domoticz is far from perfect - but I never had any of the stupid configuration issues I have with HA.
Domoticz is old school - The documentation is reliable, SSH in and set up a cron job - job done. Same for scripting, I did not find any good scripting examples in HA, lots of blueprints etc, but nothing with just a simple script sample that I could leverage.

I guess I am showing my age, but this kind of feels like trying to work on an old V8 vs a Tesla.
Sure, the Tesla is great - but if stuff goes wrong, you have no chance to fix it yourself.

/end rant

Sorry HA, I gave it my best - but I give up.

o/

Hi, 2 weeks is really not enough to get the hang of HA.
It’s a pity that you didn’t ask for any help here on the forum because many of your issues would have been addressed/solved and instead end up with this ‘POV’.

Because of the strength of HA, being able to knot ‘everything’ together, this can also be the downside for new users.
Many of us have gone through this faze and by being determined, we have a system that can jump through hoops and being rocksolid.

Happy automating!

I moved from Domoticz to HA… Was frustrated because I didn’t u feestband HA at all.

Moved back but on different RPI I was playing around with HA… At certain moment I saw the light and found out how it worked.

Now these days., never go back to Domoticz… It’s a good tool but nog that smart and solid as HA.

Give it more time and you will understand how it work.

I’m also originally from Domoticz. Moved over to HA about 3 years ago, when I felt the development of Domoticz was stalled and it didn’t really fit my needs anymore. I’m quite happy with the move, although there are many things in HA that annoy me. But in the end, unless you develop everything yourself from scratch, it’s always a compromise. HA is a lot more flexible than Domoticz. The extension, scripting and customization possibilities are lightyears ahead of Domoticz.

All the problems you listed are minor starting stumbling blocks. There’s nothing major and nothing that can’t be solved. There is a learning curve and you’re right on it. Why don’t you ask people around here for help with your problems rather than giving up before even really starting ?

I have tried majordomo and domoticz for several years. I tested with a bunch of devices and used different automations. But when I tried Home Assistant, I realized that I had lost a lot of time on other systems. In order for everything to work and for you to understand, use a good computer. Everything is easy to install and configure.

That’s fine, there’s space in the world for more than one system - variety is wonderful!

I started with Domoticz and found it very easy to get up and running. I particularly liked the blocks way of building automations - that was unique and very friendly.

But like you I found it confining and also there were a lot of things I couldn’t do with it. I tried HA some four years ago and didn’t love it right away. But I persisted and now I do. I have a very large HA system that has kept me entertained and interested all the time.

HA is a great system, and there is a reason it’s the biggest and most popular HA solution out there. But you’re right too, and there’s no one perfect solution that fits everyone. No shame in trying something and deciding it’s not for you.