Node-Red to Androind Notification w/picture

Third party integrations Node-RED
1

I am trying to send a picture to the Android notification from Node Red.
The notification works in general, but any content I want to add in the message does not get sent. the message title and data string is sent, just not the picture or live camera entity.
Is there a setting I am missing?
This is my simple test flow:

[{"id":"40cdf0ec47c1c102","type":"tab","label":"Flow 2","disabled":false,"info":"","env":[]},{"id":"5d60bd1f594cf88e","type":"inject","z":"40cdf0ec47c1c102","name":"","props":[{"p":"payload"},{"p":"topic","vt":"str"}],"repeat":"","crontab":"","once":false,"onceDelay":"0.1","topic":"","payload":"","payloadType":"date","x":260,"y":220,"wires":[["6b930711fde1d794","edc68da62dbbc0f5"]]},{"id":"edc68da62dbbc0f5","type":"api-call-service","z":"40cdf0ec47c1c102","name":"Notify Phone","server":"6119efaf.04ac5","version":5,"debugenabled":false,"domain":"notify","service":"mobile_app_haz_galaxy_fold_3","areaId":[],"deviceId":[],"entityId":[],"data":"{\"title\":\"Car\",\"message\":\"Car Detected\",\"data\":{\"entity_id\":\"camera.camera_back_patio_house\"}}","dataType":"json","mergeContext":"","mustacheAltTags":false,"outputProperties":[],"queue":"none","x":570,"y":240,"wires":[[]]},{"id":"6b930711fde1d794","type":"api-call-service","z":"40cdf0ec47c1c102","name":"Notify Phone","server":"6119efaf.04ac5","version":5,"debugenabled":false,"domain":"notify","service":"mobile_app_haz_galaxy_fold_3","areaId":[],"deviceId":[],"entityId":[],"data":"{\"title\":\"Car\",\"message\":\"Car Detected\",\"data\":{\"image\":\"/media/local/car_cropped.jpg\"}}","dataType":"json","mergeContext":"","mustacheAltTags":false,"outputProperties":[],"queue":"none","x":570,"y":300,"wires":[[]]},{"id":"6119efaf.04ac5","type":"server","name":"Home Assistant","version":5,"addon":true,"rejectUnauthorizedCerts":true,"ha_boolean":"y|yes|true|on|home|open","connectionDelay":true,"cacheJson":true,"heartbeat":false,"heartbeatInterval":30,"areaSelector":"friendlyName","deviceSelector":"friendlyName","entitySelector":"friendlyName","statusSeparator":"at: ","statusYear":"hidden","statusMonth":"short","statusDay":"numeric","statusHourCycle":"h23","statusTimeFormat":"h:m","enableGlobalContextStore":true}]

I get a notification on my phone saying Car and a Car Detected. Nothing else. No picture or live feed.
I have access to the media folder where the picture is saved. I created the picture from Node Red. The picture exists. The camera is also accessed through Node Red in a different flow.

So from what I can tell, it should work. Any thoughts?

2

I don’t know if this is true anymore, but this is how I am still using it, and it works fine.

AFAIK the Notifications are never sending an image but only the link to the image. Meaning the image will need to be publicly available. Therefore, you could use the

www (“config/www/”)

folder within in your main Homeassistant config folder.

When referencing to your picture you would then use your public ip or dns entry like this:

https://XXX.duckdns.org/local/snapshot_roborock.jpg

The part saying …/local/… is important as that is how the www folder is published.
I believe you might also need to add the path to your config like this:

allowlist_external_dirs:
- ‘/config/www’

You can probably also use other folders in the same way.

3

I have the media folder under the allowed list. HA can access the picture from it, and save to it.
But I did not know that it will only work with a public domain. I do not have my HA exposed externally.
If I understood you correctly that is.
I use it locally only, and have the HA Cloud for remote access. But the environment is only local, no access from a public website. Could that be it?

4

Yes I think that will be the reason. Because the Phone cannot access the URL you are sending it.

5

Based on some of the reading I have done, I guess I will stick with the text notifications only.
I am not savvy enough to expose my server to the world and securing it properly.
Thanks for the help. Saves me a lot of debugging time trying to figure it out.

6

Came across needing to do this again. Everywhere I read still says you need the DuckDNS which is not for me still. I am surprised that the cloud access of HomeAssistant with the monthly subscription does not allow this via the app notification, but a free service like DuckDNS would. I know it is only about exposing the server to the internet to get local files, but if I am operating from within the companion app, should be a service provided.
Is this not a desired feature? Or is there a technical issue that makes it impossible to implement in the app? I see a lot of ppl wanting to send images and short videos, etc.

Doesn’t hurt to ask I guess!