Unreliable InfluxDB size sensor

[tom_l]

That’s an excellent idea Eric! Works perfectly. Hopefully it will solve this issue too:

Unreliable InfluxDB size sensor

I am seeing this error occasionally: Logger: homeassistant.components.file.sensor Source: components/file/sensor.py:85 Integration: file (documentation, issues) First occurred: 17 February 2021, 13:42:25 (2 occurrences) Last logged: 17 February 2021, 13:57:26 File or data not present at the moment: ha_influx_db_size.txt Possibly because the file is being written to when home assistant is trying to access it. As an alternative I’m looking to push the update directly from the command using the…

The only addition I’ve made is to add the retained flag so that the sensor restores after a Home Assistant restart and to change the topic to match the structure I use:

init_commands:
  - >-
    while [ 1 = 1 ]; do docker exec addon_a0d7b954_influxdb du -s
    /data/influxdb/data/homeassistant | mosquitto_pub -t
    home-assistant/sensor/dbsize -r -u <user> -P <password> -l && sleep
    300; done &

Mqtt sensor:

- name: InfluxDB DB Size
  unit_of_measurement: 'MB'
  icon: hass:chart-line
  state_topic: "home-assistant/sensor/dbsize"
  value_template: "{{ (value.split('\t')[0]|int(0)/1000)|round(3) }}" 

[sender]

Hi, may I please have some advise. I have don all of the above and get the following:

My config in the addon seems correct and I can use the user creds to login to homeassistant…

[tom_l]

@sender

and I can use the user creds to login to homeassistant…

Those credentials are for your mqtt broker.

[sender]

I use the addon broker and that user homeassistant users, right?

[tom_l]

No you can’t use the homeassistant user. Use the credentials your devices use to connect to the broker.

[sender]

Sorry, I am not sure if I understand… I use a home assistant user to connect to mosquitto.

Do I need to make like above? Why?

And in the addon docs:
Option: logins (optional)
A list of local users that will be created with username and password. You don’t need to do this because you can use Home Assistant users too, without any configuration. If a local user is specifically desired:

logins:

• username: user
  password: passwd

What am I mssing?

[tom_l]

@sender

you can use Home Assistant users too, without any configuration.

Yes you can but you specifically can not use the username “homeassistant”.

https://github.com/home-assistant/addons/blob/5d21f08245dd0fac4183169fe43848c05547c401/mosquitto/DOCS.md

[erkr (Eric)]

@tom_l

The only addition I’ve made is to add the retained flag so that the sensor restores after a Home Assistant restart and to change the topic to match the structure I use

Thanks for the retain flag suggestion (adding -r flag)

[sender]

I did not use that username…

[chrisdev524]

Hi!
I can’t make the Terminal&SSH work. I have tried the file creation mode and the mqtt, but it seems, that nothing happened.
I don’t have an option to turn off Protection mode

config:

log

Thank you for your help!

[tom_l]

Turn on advanced mode in your profile.

[HeedfulCrayon]

That add-on won’t work. In the documentation it says

Known issues and limitations

• This add-on will not enable you to install packages or do anything as root. This is not working with Home Assistant.

Use the SSH & Web Terminal add-on found here GitHub - hassio-addons/addon-ssh: SSH & Web Terminal - Home Assistant Community Add-ons

BTW, @tom_l and @erkr thank you for the tips for running the MQTT publish as part of the ssh add-on, works great!

[tom_l]

@HeedfulCrayon

Use the SSH & Web Terminal

Doh. Good catch. I missed that they were not using the Web terminal SSH add-on version.

[erkr (Eric)]

Hi,
Previously in this thread I proposed to publish the InfluxDB size via MQTT. I just want to update how to publish it via a command line sensor, for those that don’t want to run a MQTT server. Please note this procedure is more advanced.

• The SSH & Web Terminal is still needed (with protection mode off)
• We now don’t create the init command in that add-on!
• You first need to create authorization keys to enable password less SSH access. This is explained in: SSH'ing from a command line sensor or shell command
• the procedure doesn’t mention you have to also have add the public key to the authorization_keys in the SSH & Web terminal config!
• If SSH logon works without a password, you can create a command line sensor to read the InfluxDB size like this:

  - platform: command_line
    name: InfluxDB Size
    unique_id: influxdb_size
    command: ssh <user>@192.168.178.47 -i /config/.ssh/id_rsa 'sudo docker exec addon_a0d7b954_influxdb du -s /data/influxdb/data/homeassistant'
    value_template: "{{ (value.split('\t')[0]|int(0)/1000)|round(1) }}" 
    unit_of_measurement: 'MB'
    scan_interval: 300  

Check the log of your SSH & Web terminal add-on if there are issues

[CentralCommand (Mike)]

Each addon has a hostname which is shown on the info tab of the config panel for that addon which can be used to talk to it from HA and other addons. You don’t have to expose the ssh on the host and go out over your LAN to talk to it from HA. Just use this instead and talk to it directly without leaving the docker network:

ssh <user>@a0d7b954-ssh ...

Plus then your yaml can simply be copied and pasted by other users that want to do the same since the hostname of an addon is the same on all systems. Whereas everyone’s LAN subnet and chosen IP for HA is different.

[erkr (Eric)]

@CentralCommand Thanks for the tip, didn’t realize that, but it indeed works fine. Changed it into:

command: ssh <user>@homeassistant -i /config/.ssh/id_rsa 'sudo docker exec addon_a0d7b954_influxdb du -s /data/influxdb/data/homeassistant'

[beylie]

I found this thread very helpful in setting up my DB size sensor.

Perhaps just a few notes on what I had to do to get it working as a noob:

In the SSH & Web Terminal addon, you have to put the init_commands into the init_commands field. You don’t use the ‘- >-’ part if doing it like this:

    while [ 1 = 1 ]; do docker exec addon_a0d7b954_influxdb du -s
    /data/influxdb/data/homeassistant | mosquitto_pub -t
    home-assistant/sensor/dbsize -r -u <user> -P <password> -l && sleep
    300; done &

Remember to change the username and password with your MQTT broker username and password. Also make sure the db name matches what you have in the command. In my case the db was called home_assistant not homeassistant.

The whole entry that goes into configuration.yaml looks like this:

mqtt:
  sensor:
    - name: InfluxDB DB Size
      unit_of_measurement: "MB"
      icon: hass:chart-line
      state_topic: "home-assistant/sensor/dbsize"
      value_template: "{{ (value.split('\t')[0]|int(0)/1000)|round(3) }}"

That worked for me.

[e-raser]

So are you actually SSH-ing from your HA back into your HA? Why ist that necessary if everything is local already?

I had this which never worked, now finally following up and trying to keep the CL sensor path instead of writing things to a file or MQTT (keep it as simple as possible!):

sensor:
  - platform: command_line
    name: InfluxDB size (homeassistant)
    unique_id: xxx-xxx
    scan_interval: 3600
    command_timeout: 30
    command: "docker exec addon_a0d7b954_influxdb du -shm /data/influxdb/data/homeassistant | cut -f1"
    unit_of_measurement: MB
    value_template: "{{ value }}"

Sensor output is: (empty/nothing)

Running the command manually in the SSH addon with protection mode off gives:
5621.

Makes sense, as the CL sensor is run in the HA container - which does not see the folder (same for /backup which is not accessible for HA).

So how to make this work?

• …without SSH-ing into localhost (giving HA access to the whole system without authentication still does not feel like a good idea from a security perspective - this way it can “break out of its jail”).
• …without using ✔️🏃Run On Startup.d
• …without constantly running a cron which stores the output of the du -sh command to a file which is then read by HA.

All of that is way to complicated. Sounds like there is one pill I have to swallow - unless there’s another way. Maybe?

[e-raser]

As soon as I use the init_commands, after restarting the addon I get constant and plenty of these:

Error: The connection was refused.
Connection error: Connection Refused: not authorised.
Error: The connection was refused.
Connection error: Connection Refused: not authorised.
Error: The connection was refused.
Connection error: Connection Refused: not authorised.
Error: The connection was refused.
Connection error: Connection Refused: not authorised.
Error: The connection was refused.
Connection error: Connection Refused: not authorised.
Error: The connection was refused.
Connection error: Connection Refused: not authorised.
Error: The connection was refused.
Connection error: Connection Refused: not authorised.
Error: The connection was refused.
Connection error: Connection Refused: not authorised.
Error: The connection was refused.
Connection error: Connection Refused: not authorised.

@sender I saw in Unreliable InfluxDB size sensor - #39 by sender you ran into the same issue. How did you fix this?

@erkr might have an idea too I guess.

UPDATE:
Found the error. I can strongly recommend to put and for MQTT in ', so make sure to use ...-u '<username>' -P '<password>'...

---

What would the SSH & Web Terminal addon insert need to look like if I want to to it other stuff too (by always also sending the output to MQTT)?

Like:

• du for /data/influxdb/data/_internal (also in InfluxDB addon)
• a simple du -shm /backup (for getting the size of the backup folder - not related to InfluxDB at all)?

Is this supposed to work?

while [ 1 = 1 ]; do du -shm /backup | cut -f1 | mosquitto_pub -t homeassistant/sensor/System/foldersize/backup -r -u <username> -P <password> -l && docker exec addon_a0d7b954_influxdb du -shm /data/influxdb/data/homeassistant | cut -f1 | mosquitto_pub -t homeassistant/sensor/InfluxDB/dbsize/homeassistant -r -u <username> -P <password> -l && docker exec addon_a0d7b954_influxdb du -shm /data/influxdb/data/_internal | cut -f1 | mosquitto_pub -t homeassistant/sensor/InfluxDB/dbsize/_internal -r -u <username> -P <password> -l && docker exec addon_a0d7b954_influxdb du -shm /data/influxdb/data/chronograf | cut -f1 | mosquitto_pub -t homeassistant/sensor/InfluxDB/dbsize/chronograf -r -u <username> -P <password> -l && sleep 900; done &

Because: not sure

• if multiple commands are working
• what the -l does

Update:
I managed to realize this too. It’s possible to set multiple init_commands (using the UI or the YAML editor). I decided to set 4 individual ones (3 for InfluxDB sizes and 1 for /backup (another use-case)). Will need to monitor system utilization but based on @tom_l 's intensive testing back then I guess it should be fine.

[sender]

Hi all, after updating a lot of addons last evening (mqtt, ssh, etc.) I found this morning my entire entity (mqtt) was missing from configuaration.yaml.

This was totally gone:

mqtt:
  sensor:
    - name: InfluxDB DB Size
      unit_of_measurement: "MB"
      icon: hass:chart-line
      state_topic: "home-assistant/sensor/dbsize"
      value_template: "{{ (value.split('\t')[0]|int(0)/1000)|round(3) }}"

Someone knows how or why this could have happened?!