Starting with both Hue and Ikea Tradfri, one of the first things that I wanted to cover was a centralized way to control the lights for myself and my household. Some apps allow to control both systems but I didn’t like their user experience. Also picking up a phone and open the app was a threshold. I then found out about all those cool wallmount projects people made and decided I needed one. This was the reason for me to enter into Home Assistant and take control. I finished my HA powered dashboard that me and my family use daily now. As a way to help or inspire others that have come in with similar ambitions, I’m sharing my project here with you.
Here’s what I’ve used:
- Lenovo Tab M10 FHD Plus (2nd generation)
- 70mm aluminium discs as wall mounts — with 60mm self-made wooden spacers, to create more space between the tablet and the wall, necessary for a power socket behind the tablet (see below)
- 60mm magnetic discs — attached to both the tablet as well as the aluminium wall mounts (I had 4 similar sets already, left over from something else)
- Special two sided spacer screws to mount the aluminum mounts – You need to find proper ones that match the mounts of your choice.
- JUNG USB charger — mounted inside one of my walls, where I altready had 220v electricity to connect with.
- USB flat ribbon cable with 90 degrees connector — still underway. I preferred the 90 degrees USB type C male on both ends, but couldn’t find it.
- Home Habit — licensed version. It’s cheap and worthwhile, both for you as well as on behalf of the creator’s effort.
Home Habit
I have been a Home Habit user for a year now. On a tablet, it looks clean, consistent, large tiles and works perfectly well with Home Assistant. The app can be enabled as Launcher, which means a tablet can use the app as home screen when powered on or when the home button is pressed. That’s a fool proof way to monitor and control your house.
About me
When I found out about all those other integrations HA supports and the flexible way to change things, I have been using it every day for a year now and I have become a big fan of HA. The community is friendly and open, which is great to get started, especially for people not technically proficient and code savvy. The platform itself is great as it’s quite easy to get into with even a modest technical background and brings cool new things to people’s lives and households. Being involved in the Drupal community for almost 15 years, it’s great to see the evolving parallels between both communities.
