List devices being offline for too long (based on newly introduced last_reported state attribute)

[ToHi]

Good point…
I also have devices in my smart home which are not in use everytime. But I tend to deactivate those devices. But that is a decision of own.

[ToHi]

@x-ian

Looks like you are using last_changed and last_updated and my very first interpretation of their meanings was that these might not been always been updated and could lead to false positives (e.g. when an entity reports the same value like the previous one). Maybe that is a false conclusion?

Yes, I test against ‘last_changed’ and ‘last_updated’.
And your right, it can lead to false positives. In reality, I do not have.
My script checks every sensor or binary_sensor of a device. And most of the devices have several sensors. If only one sensor is updated, I assume the device is fine. With my devices, any of the sensors of a device always changes and that’s good enough for me.

@x-ian

And for the sensors/binary sensors I guess I don’t know enough to really talk about. Do things like physical buttons and lights also fall into that category? Cause I also care about them, despite them only responding to a physical interaction. E.g. it is rare that my outdoor lights triggered at night via motion sensors aren’t going on at least once per night. So if one bulb isn’t, then the likelihood for a problem is high and I want to know.

The thing is: Other entities than sensor or binary_sensor can be touched/changed by HA itself.
For instance a wall plug: It has a switch entity. This switch entity can be either changed by HA (by an automation for example) or directly on the physical device by pressing a button. The entity will be updated in any case, but can you be sure if this update really comes from the device?
But if this wall plug has a sensor for power measurement and this sensor entity gets updated than you know for sure, that this update was done by the device. Which means, it’s alive.

I believe, sensors and binary_sensors (of real physical devices) never gets updated by HA itself, only on behalf of the corresponding device. That’s why I only check sensors and binary_sensors.

[x-ian (christian)]

Ha. I didn’t even know that devices can be disabled. Makes a lot of sense. Thanks for pointing that out. But also: What a boringly simple solution …