I’d like to use my dahua cams with HA and use GitHub - rroller/dahua: Dahua Camera and Doorbell Home Assistant Integration to see if I can get an alarm event in HA, but I’m too confused by what “HACS” is
It’s my first foray into HA after a number of years leaving it alone as I didn’t agree with all the complication of “hassio” and different versions
Now I hear about HACS in wondering if some one can explain it for me please?
I’ve currently got the HA docker on my unraid server
HACS is the Home Assistant Community Store, a nice way to add integrations from the community to Home Assistant that are not core integrations. HACS allows you to add things without much fuss, and get notified of updates.
You do not need it. You can also add these integrations manually. But if you do use quite a few community integrations, as most of us do, you would probably not want to do without HACS.
But then again, if you think hassio (currently named HAOS) is a complication, then HACS is maybe also a complication? HAOS + HACS is for almost all of us the opposite of complication. But if you want to be in full control and do everything yourself, then you should probably pick manual install for all integrations instead of using HACS to do it for you.
Thanks for the calm explanation
Assumed HACS was a complication but above described it as a “App Store” it sounds the opposite of a complication 
However I still don’t get the haos thing. Am I on haos having HA in a Docker container?
Also, can I assume HACS isn’t available for Docker?
No, HAOS is a complete (stripped) Operating System (OS) with Home Assistant installed inside it (using containers, but also hidden inside). If too is a convenience so users do not have to worry about updating and maintaining the OS, making sure all required software is installed and updated, … It is a complete maintenance free system. Most users use it nowadays.
You can run it from a docker install, but it is installed inside the docker using a script. See the link I posted if you push the button Start using hacs, which takes you to the page below, where you choose the tab named “container” (which is what you have):
Thanks that’s really helpful . Have a great rest of the weekend sir 
