I have been reading this with interest. I am pleased for you, but I still totally do not get it. A big part of the problem is the weird language. When it says “ESPHome node” does it mean the device I am trying to add? (O/T: If so why doesn’t it just plug and play anyway? Not explained). I put in its IP address as determined by looking at my network, and like innumerable other people I get the “Can’t connect to ESP. Please make sure your YAML file contains an ‘api:’ line.” message. When it says “your YAML file” which one does it mean? My personal file? Do I even have one? Must mean the configuration.yaml then, yes? Apparently not. It’s the yaml file for the device. And - again, like innumerable others - it does indeed have an “api:” entry. So, then what? Nothing I can find explains what to do next … hence these despairing forum posts. Bear in mind that, to new users of HA like myself, saying “The ESPHome Dashboard is completely independent from the esphome node(s) that you want to integrate into HA.” simply makes no sense, given that you use the ESPHome thingy in HA to try to add the device aka “node”. By the way, the “Please enter connection settings…” dialogue box defaults to Port 6053 on mine. What is that? Is it correct? How can I tell? I can’t find anything in the installation instructions for my device or the wider ESPHome documentation that even explains what that is.
Note I’m not and advanced nor expert on ESPHome, and have only one ESPHome device.
When it says “ESPHome node” does it mean the device I am trying to add? (O/T: If so why doesn’t it just plug When it says “your YAML file” which one does it mean? My personal file? Do I even have one? Must mean the configuration.yaml then, yes?
“node” is your ESPHome device - enter its IP address or hostname.
AFAIK if it can’t properly communicate with your device, you’ll get this failure and message.
I got this for my device when I first enabled it and it was already automatically found and in use by HA, but I don’t see this anymore - it actually says the device is already configured, not sure if HA changed or what. This made it super confusing for me.
So,make sure you can ping / access the device from your HA system. If so, I don’t know what’s broken for your setup nor what logs / details you need to get further.
For the yaml part: it means the EPSHome yaml file that you’d use to modify the firmware of your device, and that file is used with ESPHome Dashboard - I assume the note about the YAML is just always output, because the HA ESPHome integration will hit this same code if it can’t connect or if it connected and the device yaml did not have the api line for home assistant.
Bear in mind that, to new users of HA like myself, saying “The ESPHome Dashboard is completely independent from the esphome node(s) that you want to integrate into HA.” simply makes no sense, given that you use the ESPHome thingy in HA to try to add the device aka “node”.
ESPHome Dashboard is software that you run separately - it can be on a different system from HA - and it’s used to flash / update firmware on your ESPHome device(s).
There’s an HA add-on (not an HA integration!) for it that can show up in the HA sidebar (HA left column). HAAS can set that up, but I’m not using HAAS and couldn’t figure out how to add it (not asking for help with that). But you can run it in docker or elsewhere (though it has its own problems if mDNS is not setup / working on your network), and you only need it to flash or update your devices firmware - if it’s working fine (and yours is not at this point), no need to get the Dashboard working.
By the way, the “Please enter connection settings…” dialogue box defaults to Port 6053 on mine. What is that? Is it correct? How can I tell? I can’t find anything in the installation instructions for my device or the wider ESPHome documentation that even explains what that is.
Based on tcpdump output, ESPHome uses port 6053 to communicate with ESPHome devices in HA - I assume you can change that in the ESPHome devices yaml and use a different port on your device if you wanted.
Sorry just catching up. Thanks Patrick. In the end the fundamental issue was the way my home network was (mis)configured. I’ve spent a few days thinking about it and reading up, then took the plunge this morning and reconfigured everything. Touch wood, so far so good. Cheers.