Offline causes chaos

BrianGGG · May 18, 2024, 7:01pm

Hello. I have recently had two issues related to devices becoming unexpectedly offline.

My problem is: In both cases, it was not obvious that these devices went offline even though they prevented an important automation from working correctly.

In one case, I have 4 smart lights that turn on when I detect motion with a camera. One of the devices (a light) went offline. Instead of there being any kind of error or obvious sign of trouble, the automation just stopped working for all four lights.

More disturbingly, one of my cameras went offline, and so a script that includes all of my cameras no longer functions (without any obvious signs of trouble).

My question is this: Does anyone have any ideas on either:

A way for me to program around this and say “only run this code if a device is online, skip it if not”

or

A way to write a “device checker” that can alert me if a key entity or device is offline without invalidating the device checking script.

Any ideas?

bkbartk · May 18, 2024, 7:10pm

you can adde continue on error in steps of your automation

Script Syntax - Home Assistant.

you an create an automation checking state, unknows/unavavailble.

MaxK · May 18, 2024, 7:46pm

github.com

jazzyisj/unavailable-entities-sensor/blob/main/README.md

## What does this template sensor do?
This sensor iterates the state object and returns entities that have a state of unknown or unavailable.

The sensor state is a count of unavailable entities and the entity_id attribute is a list of those entity id's.

## Requirements ##
To use this template as is you must be running at least Home Assistant v2022.5.

## How do I use this sensor?
### Install As Package
The easiest way to use this sensor is to install it as a [package](https://www.home-assistant.io/docs/configuration/packages/).

If you already have packages enabled in your configuration, download [`package_unavailable_entities.yaml`](https://github.com/jazzyisj/unavailable-entities-sensor/blob/main/package_unavailable_entities.yaml) to your packages directory.

To enable packages in your configuation, create a folder in your config directory named `packages` and add the following line to your `configuration.yaml` file.

    homeassistant:
      packages: !include_dir_named packages
### Install Without Packages
To create this sensor without using packages simply copy the relevant template code to an appropriate place in your configuration.yaml file. The ignored entities group and example automation are optional.

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BrianGGG · May 19, 2024, 1:25pm

Thanks to all. I’m going to take both of the solutions above: Error handling and regularly checking the state of key devices.