There is no connection between the Action tool and the Template editor tool. You need to use the “Copy to Clipboard(Template)” button to copy the data and then paste it into the Template editor tool, otherwise the variable value doesn’t contain anything in the Template editor.
When you paste the copied data into the Template editor to test the template for your sensor, it will be pasted in as a set statement using whatever variable ID you assigned the response_variable in the action.
Trigger-based sensors are not supported in Template Helpers, they must be added to your configuration.yaml file (or a properly merged file that has template as the top-level key). Other “advanced” functions like delay_on, availability, and attributes are also only available when configured in YAML.
Over the past year, I have been trying to reduce my configuration.yaml and use more of the new configuration features like Helpers and Templates in HA.
I’ve been searching for a function that does this for months. That said, your Result panel arrangement looks different than mine. Mine is a concatenated string, comma delimited without line breaks between attributes.
I’ve just finished updating the main guide at the top of this thread. It now includes the latest code, as well as new examples for using these sensors on a dashboard and in automations.
You can jump back to the main post by clicking this link:
