In a rush to get setup with Home Assistant when Insteon pulled the plug, I went with the Windows portable/stand along version without realizing that this was not an official HA release, and that some features wouldn’t be available, and so on.
Everything is up and running with the portable version, I created an HA account, signed into my Insteon hub, added all my Insteon devices and recreated all my scenes, and added the Nabu Casa option, so everything is now fully connected with Alexa (voice commands). I am also able to access my HA Account and setup via the macOS and iOS apps with ease and without issues.
Even though everything is running smoothly with the portable version, I am thinking it would be best to migrate to the official HA release using VM. I already created the Linux VM on my ThinkPad per the ‘getting started’ instructions, and I am at the point where it’s asking me to logon to HA - so this is where I stopped.
Does anyone have a guide on how to migrate to the official HA release from the portable version? I need to backup my settings from the portable version and bring them into the official release install, but can’t seem to find a definitive and clear way of doing this.
I also have questions about my HA and Nabu Casa accounts.
Do I sign into the official HA release using the same HA username and password that I used for the portable version? Or create a new one?
Do I use the same logon for the Nabu Casa account? Or will I need a new one? I am assuming I am going to need a new local address from my Nabu Casa account?
I really wish I would have started this process using the official HA release/method, but rushed into things not realizing the portable version was not official, and can be limiting (and a pain to update).
Sadly HassWP uses an outdated version of HA, so this is going to be a little more work than it’d be if the developer would keep it updated.
Configure your new HA install, and add and configure the Samba and SSH/terminal add-ons
SSH to your new install and use the ha core stop command to stop Home Assistant - you’ll lose the UI here, which is why you have to use SSH
Copy your configuration folder over to the config/ share - including all the hidden files and folders. If you miss the hidden files/folders you won’t have a working HA.
Use ha core start to start the new HA install
If it all went right then you’ll find that the new install is just like the old one - same user, everything.
Thank you, I appreciate the help. Everything seems to be working fine with the portable version, but I don’t like the idea of relying on an unofficial 3rd party for updates, missing out on features and perhaps stability issues down the road.
My only issue is that scenes turn on and off in a clunky, staggered, delayed, way. Each device, one by one, slowly turns on/off, versus the smooth, quick, ramping in an out (with all devices in unison) as it was with the Insteon hub setup (before they jumped ship). So I am not sure if this is due to using the portable version, or if this is normal with HA and I am just not used to it?
Also, I am wondering if the developer of HassWP incorporates the backup feature in the next release, if I could just backup my portable configuration, then restore it once I migrate over to the legit setup…
If/when they upgrade HassWP to HA 2022.4 then that’ll be available. Sadly there’s a history of it not being updated reliably.
I’d expect that things wouldn’t be quite in unison. HA will send the commands to the bulbs one after the other. The transitions are handled by the bulbs though, so it should behave relatively smoothly.
You could try using the “Home Assistant Google Drive Backup” Supervisor addon, and backup to Google from the old, then install it on the new and restore.