Starting again, looking for advise and guidance

Configuration
1

Im looking for advise and guidance, as i seem to be overwhelmed by everything. Ive been reading and watching youtube videos for about a month, ive got some things up and running, but not really able to make use of anything.

My aim is to have everything i currently have, linked into HA. At the moment, i have the following

Alexas, a few dots, and a show5, setup with a few routines controlling sockets and lights
Sonoff zigbee bridge, with a few door sensors (again, linked to alexa to notify when doors open), a few temp sensors and a motion sensor, controlled via ewelink app
numerous RGBWC bulbs, controlled via Lepro LampUX app
some WiFi sockets, controlled via eFamily Cloud app
a swann security CCTV system
a Tapo wifi camera
my android phone, with life360 installed
an android tablet, which im hoping to wall mount

i have HA installed on a Raspberry Pi4 4G model, details as follows

System Health

Home Assistant Core Integration

version: 0.118.0
installation_type: Home Assistant OS
dev: false
hassio: true
docker: true
virtualenv: false
python_version: 3.8.6
os_name: Linux
os_version: 4.19.127-v7l
arch: armv7l
timezone: Europe/London

Home Assistant Cloud

logged_in: true
subscription_expiration: December 18, 2020, 12:00 AM
relayer_connected: true
remote_enabled: false
remote_connected: false
alexa_enabled: true
google_enabled: true
can_reach_cert_server: ok
can_reach_cloud_auth: ok
can_reach_cloud: ok

Hass.io

host_os: HassOS 4.17
update_channel: stable
supervisor_version: 2020.11.0
docker_version: 19.03.12
disk_total: 56.7 GB
disk_used: 2.8 GB
healthy: true
supported: true
board: rpi4
supervisor_api: ok
version_api: ok
installed_addons: File editor (5.2.0), Samba share (9.3.0), FTP (3.5.0), Duck DNS (1.12.4)

Lovelace

dashboards: 1
mode: storage
views: 4
resources: 3

Ive got my sonoff stuff showing in HA by using SonofLAN, ive created a dashboard page with my cameras on, and another page with travel info and showing my location on a map

Ive signed up for nabu casa, but cant work out how to get anything output to the dots or show

so im thinking of starting from scratch, to try and get my lights, sockets, everything all into HA, then get things linked to alexa, then start building automations etc

Any help or guidance would be great, as i think ive read and watched so much, that im looking past how simple it should be

tia

dd

2

I’m assuming you followed the directions here ??

  • Activated the Home Assistant Smart Home skill via the Alexa app: From the Alexa App on your phone, go to Skills, add, find “Home Assistant Smart Home” and add it. You will be prompted to link to your Nabu Casa account.

With Nabu Casa, they really made it simple to get this working.

However, if you don’t have any of the devices listed in the ‘Available Domains’ section, nothing will show up yet.

Ive got my sonoff stuff showing in HA by using SonofLAN, ive created a dashboard page with my cameras on, and another page with travel info and showing my location on a map

None of these things you say are supported via alexa.

I don’t think there is any need to start over. I would try adding a single light or socket to home assistant. See if you can get that working.

Then, open your alexa app, then click “scan for devices”. It will send a new discovery message to your home assistant in which case, this new light or switch should be discovered. That would be a great first test before trying to add everything!

3

thanks for the reply

i followed the steps for nabu casa, and i do have a lot of different alexas showing in HA as entities, different rooms, followed by media player, standby, do not disturb, allsorts, but i simply cannot figure out how anything is actually done with them, and ive read the entire alexa thread

all of my sonof gear is integrated into HA via SonofLAN, i can see my sensors, ive setup history graphs for tempreature and humidity, and i can see the door sensors, and see if doors are open or closed. The door sensors are also available with alexa, who speaks ‘Front door opened’ or ‘back door opened’

For travel ive got waze travel time sensors set up, 2 iframes for areas of interest, as well as life360 tracking my phone, which creates a URL with my GPS location, and puts that into an iframe

for my cameras, i created URLs for the streams direct from the cameras, and theyre called in a picture entity card, and when clicked, loads the live stream

the travel and cctv stuff are mainly for use on a tablet, within HA, not for use with alexa, but, i do have access to my camera feeds via my echo show, by simply asking ‘alexa, show me xxx camera’

so, as you can see, im not scared to dig in and play with things, im just at a loss as to how to get my sockets and lights integrated, and get things to work with alexa, so thought starting over may be easier

4

Nope. Light and sockets have nothing to do with alexa.

Just add them to Home Assistant following their own directions. Just forget alexa exists at all for now. Open the Home Assistant app and see if your lights show up there.

Once they show up there, they will automatically show up in Alexa.

5

i think this is what im having the main issues with.

all of my lights and sockets work with alexa fine, as their apps are linked using the available alexa skills, but, i cannot find anything to link them to HA (thats why i listed the apps that i use)

EDIT to add: i had the alexas for a while before finding out about HA

I did try to link them up to tuya, which i have linked to HA, but it wasnt finding the sockets or lights, not too sure if its because theyre linked to lampux and efmaily apps, and didnt really want to reset everything (hardware wise) as they already work fine with all my alexa routines and voice commands, BUT, if this is the best (or only) way to get them into HA, then i guess thats what ill have to do

once again, thank you for the reply :slight_smile:

6

OK, so i reset one of my sockets and one of my bulbs, and then paired them up with the tuya app, and reloaded tuya in HA, and these 2 devices are now available to turn on and off within HA (i have no colour control over the bulb, but ill look into that later)

They also now show up twice in my alexa devices, once as a bulb and socket, and again as a switch, i also had ro re-add them to my routines on alexa

so, it looks like i need to spend a while resetting my sockets and bulbs to get any further

7

Yes. That will happen with devices already paired with alexa.

Alexa sent a request to Tuya saying “Give me a list of all devices this user has”

Alexa sent a request to your Home Assistant asking the same thing.

It doesn’t know these are the same devices. Thus, they will both show up.

Here is where you can add the exclude options.

https://www.nabucasa.com/config/amazon_alexa/

For cloud devices, such as the Tuya devices, it’s up to you if you’d rather have just Tuya skill control them or not.

So, for any devices you don’t want to remove from alexa, you should probably add them to the exclude list so Home Assistant wont advertise them to Alexa. It’s up to you really.

The major benefit will come when you start adding devices that don’t have an alexa skill. Now you can control them via alexa!

1 Like
8

The majority of what i have, is already alexa controlled. why i started looking into HA was to implement things that alexa cannot control,

for example, i have a routine set up, which turns on my bedside lamp 1 minute before my alarm goes off in the mornings, the bulb is set to a slight off blue colour, with 1% brightness, just bright enough for me to see, but not bright enough to wake the wife. sometimes when my alarm goes off, i get up straight away, sometimes i press snooze a few times. The light goes off after 15 minutes, either way.

Id like the light to stay on, untill my sonof zigbee motion sensor detects movement on the landing, meaning im out of the bedroom, and no longer need the light, alexa doesnt recognise the motion sensor, so i cannot do this

The wife also likes to mess about with the switch on this light, to get the bulb reset and full brightness, so, i also have a sonof zigbee switch, which can recognise a press, double press, and long press, so, a single press would turn the light on on her setting, a double press for my dim setting, and a long press to turn it off, alexa doesnt recognise the switch, so i cannot do this

Another thing, mainly using alexa, is some sort of geo fencing notification. I have HA setup so my phone is tracked on a map, and im sure itd be possible to have an alert pop up on HA when im 15 minutes away from home. Id like this alert to come out of the alexas as a voice notification (this is the sort of thing i thought nabu casa would be able to do)

So the end result isnt really for being able to use alexa to control things that dont have an alexa skill, but more being able to use alexa to notify of things that HA is aware of by things that are being triggered