Rather than reading this thread you might rather want to read the actual blog post. 
But I havenât actually checked the docs on that topic.
Auto detection only works reliably for users that meet the vendor expectations, which are usually just the ISP router with default config. I had a camera that was not able to be setup because the stupid app to configure it was not able to found the camera because it was doing a full ip scan on a /16 network, and it was timing out.
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That part of the article is talking about backups. Many of us like to have our config on a public git repository. Has many stated several times, .storsge is not git, or any other control system, friendly. It mixes config with temporary state, credentials, and changes so often that you will have to commit every 10 minutes, something you donât want to.
I will not be complaining that much about yaml if this situation that I described were better. But I didnât see anyone saying there are any plans to address this concerns either
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And backup was the exact question, no?
You have to differentiate between backup and shareable configuration and both is possible with the current system.
Shareable - you yaml files with your automations, scripts, scenes, lovelace dashboard, etc.
Backup - everything
You decide when to make a backup of your system and how often. It does not matter where you store that and git is perfectly fine IMO. No need to check in every tiny change to .storage, just whenever you think that a backup might be useful.
Sure, you might argue that the history of .storage might not provide much value beyond pure backup, but thatâs what they provide you with, the state of the system.
Yeah, is that etc part what Iâm missing. I also want to be able to share my devices.
In fact, I want to share everything except secrets. And that is not possible now. I think we both know what Iâm talking about, but you keep ignoring what I try to say and keep stating the same thing about backup. We just lost one HA feature, and there is no workaround or possible argument about that.
I appreciate your repeated efforts of explaining the backup process, but that is not the point almost all of us are trying to make here. If you donât see it itâs probably because you donât need it and are not able to put on someone elseâs shoes, which is not that bad, but you can not argue the backup thing again.
If you would instead of accusing me of ignorance and the inability to âput on someone elseâs shoesâ rather explain what exactly you are missing it might be easier to answer that question. And, no, I wont go back and read the other 331 comments in this thread.
Firstly I have to say that on the whole I think this (ahem) discussion has been pretty well mannered. Iâm glad it wasnât locked, I for one have enjoyed (ok, possibly not exactly the right word) hearing opinions from all sides.
To me though, whilst understandably in a thread generating 330+ comments in a couple of days, it seems to have begun to go slightly off the specific point.
Would it be true to say that there are broadly three camps here?
- Those who would rather everything stayed configurable in text files,
- Those who like the move to a UI based experience, and
- Those who (grudgingly maybe?) see some benefit in a UI based experience, especially perhaps for âone time setupsâ, like integrations, but are afraid that eventually everything will go down that route with no option for text based configuration.
I am probably in camp 1 but I recognise that isnât going to happen and I completely understand and to some extent sympathise with the reasons why that is. So that puts me squarely into camp 3. I resisted UI based integrations for a while but now I grudgingly ( ) embrace them. However, there is no way on earth I would use the Automation editor (for example). For a start it produces almost unreadable YAML (IMHO) with no comments. Why on earth it was released that way is a mystery to me. Maybe Iâm just an old dinosaur and things have moved on since I wrote programs for a living but certainly back in the day it was a rule of thumb where I came from that the number of lines of comments should at least approach the number of lines of code.
But I digress
I just think those of us in group 3 would like to hear a categoric answer (reassurance would be even better) to the simple question; will hand written YAML still be available to be used for what I would call the functional parts of HA e.g. Automations and Scripts?
I think most of the anger/resentment, call it what you will, is directed towards the perceived weasel words that donât feel like they project the truth. (Please note both sets of italics in that sentence.)
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Yes, as in the blog post mentioned. These will be even get extended support.
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I know this is repeated by some quite a few times with the goal of these comments is to keep that, however, that is not going to be the case. If you considered this a feature, yes, it will be lost in that case.
I think you hit the nail on the head.
I think a problem is this: with purely yaml setup, people got used to being able to use git as both a backup and as a community share of setups. Exclude the secrets file and I can share my whole (commented) setup and backup at the same time.
Now I canât do that - .storage has too many files that contain passwords and other private information to make it backupable to git with a simple one line exclusion.
Thereâs a few addons out there that backup snapshots to google drive and one that will back it up to a server over ssh. I use both for the UI aspects. The google drive one has a rolling 5 backups. The ssh one just dumps a single file without maintaining a rolling number. But on the server where the dumps are placed, I created an automation that only keeps 14 days worth. Took about 15 minutes to setup the google drive. About an hour to setup the ssh one.
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And here we go again.
Some people might want that info. Sorry to offend you.
Cool, fantastic, we are close to understand each other.
Is there a chance to make that obscure .storage folder a bit more human manageable? Like clearly separating state, personal information and actual configuration like someone else has already suggested? I mean, imagine the resources are available, no need to take the dev time into account. Would something like that be accepted? I know you are not the only one taking the decissions, but you can give your oppinion on that.
Doesnât offend me at all, but I think that point has been made several times already. I donât think anyone here complaining about loosing the ability to use GIT as an effective version control system for HA is missing one of the most famous, most mentioned, plugins of HA. Thatâs why I donât understand why so many people insist in bring that to the table over and over again.
Yes, I understand. I was simply replying to @nickrout with a manageable solution. Something that I use to get around this exact issue he brought up.
Ok, then I miss that context. My apologies.
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It are just JSON files, not sure how that is obscure. The last bit of your question is not an answer you are looking for, the human manageable part is the Home Assistant user interface.
(But, you already knew that, we are running around in circles).
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