Netatmo radiator valves integration - local or cloud?

Hello everybody :slight_smile: ,

nice to be a part of HASS community. After trying HASS in virtualbox on PC, I have decided to give it a go and went for rpi4 hass os setup. I have a very noob question though, which I am trying to properly understand to grasp the concept. So:

When I setup the HassOS on virtualbox, hass offered me initial integrations available, if I understand correctly based on some network search, it found a few, like ikea, google cast and netatmo for example. (this actually convinced me to go for hass)

After setting up the rpi though, I was not offered netatmo integration any more. I can search for it and It wants me to login to netatmo account, but I would swear that I did not have to login to netatmo account on virtual box, and I was able to control my radiator valves. I now do not understand. Did I have some kind of local control over netatmo if it was recognized automatically without cloud? I would definitely prefer this local control to cloud. If that is the case, can I anyhow force the initial network search again? Was there a reason it did not show up by itself?

Thank you for any clarification!

BR,
D

I almost forgot to mention : on virtualbox I ran HASSOS 4.16 and on rpi I have 5.5. Also, I have noticed now, that I cant even open netatmo cloud login page upon integrating, it just says “aborted”…

Update 3. :roll_eyes:

Ok, starting to feel real noob now. I just rebooted and login page showed again. That’s one thing sorted.

But, now I tried to login, and after seeing Nabu Casa logo and the thermostats having more sophisticated and precise controls, I am definitely positive that the integration I was seeing before was local? I have subscribed in the meantime to trial cloud, but I did not realize that will force my Netatmo valves into cloud control…

Can this behaviour be overriden? Please take this as a general question not just Netatmo, as I am not sure how many integrations could be amended by having Nabu casa…

HA will try to detect devices on your network, this is correct and true for Netatmo specifically. You also have to log in to your Netatmo account to actually use it to grant HA access to your Netatmo account regardless whether you add the integration manually or when it was auto discovered. There is no local control for Netatmo, it is all done via their cloud API. (You may be able to use them via HomeKit, not I have no experience with that)

Hello Tobi, thank you for your answer. It however sounds even more weird now, as I am absolutely positive that on my Virtualbox, where the integration was automatically offered to me by HASS, I did not log in to the Netatmo cloud and I have had access to the valves. I actually have proof of this as when I logged in through Rpi, I got email from Netatmo notifying me that someone logged in. It did not happen on the Virtual box (version 4.16., about a week ago). Access to valves was limited though, not as detailed as I have now through cloud. I was definitely able to read temps and change setpoints. On rpi, I also was not offered the integration automatically (version 5.5) did something change on hassos or Netatmo side?

Thank you

If the thermostat was working without you granting access to your Netatmo account you probably have used the HomeKit integration for interacting with your devices. As I said, I have no experience with that and as you describe the control more limited than with via the Netatmo integration this is another indicator.

The email about someone logging into your account also has nothing to do with HA. This stems from the fact that you had to log in in order to grant access.

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If you mean Apple homekit I have never had any apple product except my company’s phone.

I only mentioned this to emphasise that I had definitely not logged into Netatmo cloud in the first case.

I brought this thread up mainly to better understand hass ecosystem and integrations, as it seemed to me that there are more official ways to integrate something, based on this experience, but can’t find any relevant documentation for this behaviour…

Is it possible to force hass to search for integrations on the network after initial setup? as in the second case I had Netatmo gateway on the same network but the integration was not offered.

HA will scan for devices periodically. But if the device does not show up on its own manually adding the integration is just the same. Only manually. :wink:

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You need to reset the relay/gateway for the thermostats. I had the same problem yesterday and reseting the relay solved it.

https://helpcenter.netatmo.com/en-us/smart-radiator-valve/connection-wi-fi-radio/how-do-i-reset-my-relay

Then you need to set up the wifi connection in the app again.

I think it’s because the relay is already connected to “homekit” on your old home assistant instance and it can only handle one instance at the time.

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Wow thanks, this makes sense. I will give it a go. Still not sure though why everyone talks “homekit”, I never had one. Is that just some kind of possible local API integration?

By the way, how is this local integration working for you? Can you issue commands to valves and get status?

Thanks!

My question is a little bit offtopic, but can someone tell me that is the valve position (percentage) available in HA for Netatmo radiator valves?

Hi!

I know, it’s January already and the question was off-topoc…but I found it via “google” and wanted to add some more information…

But I created a separate topic here: