I would like to know what are the specific differences between a supervised + OS Agent installation and a full clean HAOS installation.
Especially what are the specific tasks you have to maintain by yourself with a supervised + OS Agent installation?
I would generally guess keeping the OS Agent up to date and firewall issues. But what else is not covered by OS Agent that is covered by HAOS? I.e. does the OS Agent kernel upgrades?
Thanks a lot in advance!
Maas
Edit: Of course we are talking about an environment that full fills the needed requirements.
Supported Operating System, System dependencies and versions
Docker CE (Community Edition) is the only supported containerization method for Home Assistant Supervised. We only support FHS 3.0 on the host file system.
Docker CE >= 20.10.17
Systemd >= 239
NetworkManager >= 1.14.6
udisks2 >= 2.8
AppArmor == 2.13.x (built into the kernel)
Debian Linux Debian 12 aka Bookworm (no derivatives)
This installation method can easily be broken if one manages the operating system incorrectly. Therefore, the following additional conditions apply:
The operating system is dedicated to running Home Assistant Supervised.
All system dependencies are installed according to the manual.
No additional software, outside of the Home Assistant ecosystem, is installed.
Docker needs to be correctly configured to use overlayfs2 storage, journald as the logging driver with Container name as Tag, and cgroup v1.
NetworkManager is installed and enabled in systemd.
Systemd journal gateway is enabled and mapped into supervisor as /run/systemd-journal-gatewayd.sock
In case any abnormality is detected that prevents Home Assistant from functioning, the Home Assistant Supervisor will report this to the user and block updates to prevent installations from breaking.
The big advantage of HAOS is “it just works” (to quote Paul Hibbert). If you’re concerned you can’t run anything else, just stick it in a VM. HAOS is by far the most common install, so therefore the one with the most community support.
HA supervised runs in a docker container and that one is updated automatically, but the Debian Linux that host the docker is not and have to be completely maintained by the user.
On top of that there will some severe restrictions on what can be done with the host system, because Supervisor will take control of many parts of the host system, so it will not just be a system free to do any and everything you wish.
You need to understand these limitations and you should also have a reason to actually choose this setup, because the administration will be a lot more messy.