How to keep your recorder database size under control

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284

A fault is too strong a word in my view, but the burden is on you to provide accurate information in order to get accurate answers. Being upset about this will not lead to more or better help.

Sure, that’s just true for you, but usually when people speak about the state class, it will be on the HA side (as the common denominator), because there’s a variety of devices and integrations people can use. With non-ESPHome devices, people have less control over this, which is why it then gets overridden on the HA side.

Inaccurate. ESPHome is a project in its own right and can be used independent of HA. Both are merely under the Open Home Foundation.

Inaccurate. Integrations would typically set it, and only for select entities. In the case of ESPHome it is not the integration. I’ve never seen this done automatically for any of my ESPHome devices.

Back to my question though:

If you set it before (i.e. even setting it to '') you now have a state class (from HA’s point of view), even if you remove it from config now. That said, your repairs dashboard should pick up this discrepancy (you had it before, and you have none now). Do you not see a repair?

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  • ESPHome may be standalone, and I use that often, but the storing of data is done by HA.

  • You obviously know my system and code but I repeat that I had never set any state_class for my sensors. All data is ending up in LTS because a state_class was being assigned. I only went down this path because I wanted to stop saving useless data for all time.

Code for a temp sensor;

  - platform: dallas_temp
    address: 0x4000080104f4eb10
    name: "Outside Temperature"
    accuracy_decimals: 1
    update_interval: 60s

From Developer Tools\States

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To prevent state_class being assigned;

  - platform: internal_temperature
    name: "Internal Temperature"
    state_class: ''

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Once this is done I then get an option to remove data from Developer Tools\Statistics.

286

It does seem that the platform you are choosing in esphome is perhaps dictating the state class in home assistant.

I do not know esphome well at all, but I do know that you can use customize on the resulting home assistant entities in order to remove the state class.

287

I tried to tone down your previous message, but you keep trying to provoke for some reason. I never said you set it for a fact. I merely stated that if you did, then there is a certain way out of that situation. It’s because I have done this before where I did passing a state class, but then later changed my mind.

This is new information. Previously, it was the WiFi signal sensor. I don’t see that for either platform a state class is set by default. All I can say is that the core (base) sensor config won’t do that. As the docs state, the state class is optional. Perhaps you found a bug in these platforms or something that is undocumented. You should search the ESPHome issues on GitHub or log a new issue. I cannot say whether this behaviour is intentional.

As I said, you’d get a repair message.

288

It appears that any sensor that returns a numerical value is assigned a state_class. I do have an Android device which shows this. I do use Customize to correct state_class for some energy sensors.

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289

I guess I need to do some homework. It’s not clear to me what functionality I lose if I null out state_class on all my entities. It’s not clear to me where this setting is established across all the different platforms and integrations, or how it’s used for anything besides LTS.

A targeted search turned up lots of very specific errors, problems and complaints, but not much general information about what state_class really is and how it works.

Is there a quick reference somewhere?

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291

Hey friends,
seems like I found the right thread. Any advice how I can purge all history from an sqlite database? My disk is 99% full and recorder.purge seems to not like that.

I am running a HAOS setup and can’t easily stop home assistant and manipulate the database file on disk (would need to connect the eMMC card to a different PC and I’m not physically there).
Any ideas?

292

Got this resolved by recklessly deleting the database file while HA was running. The details are in the linked ticket for those interested :slight_smile:

293

Actually, it’s not reckless (unless you didn’t make a backup in case you realised you needed something), as your HA config isn’t stored in the DB. Only your sensor and other data. Since the DB usually only stores recent data (the default recorder setting is 10 days), people with corrupt DBs will often delete it. You’d lose your LTS too though, so that’s something to remember. The yanking you referred to in the linked topic on a running instance: Well, now that might be frowned upon. :smiley:

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294

That statement is true and false at the same time. Well, after a repack followed by a purge I notice significant lower system load for some time (until the DB starts to grow again). So buying that faster system response during the day (when HA is needed) for a precisely planned load situation during the night (when HA is not needed that much) is a rather great deal for me.

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295

I can’t find an entry in the recorder manual that the vaccum is only done monthly.
can you please show me the entry? Thank you!

296

Thanks to some help from this thread, I was able to prevent my entities from recording LTS data, and clearing these data from the database. It made a huge difference. My database is 35% of the size it was before I started this effort.

I posted more info on another thread, here.