Update on the Z-Wave integration · Home Assistant dev docs

[mickeprag]

@Mutt

From what it says on the link, it does not yet support unsolicited reports which may be an issue for many users, so I’m at a bit of a loss as what this brings to the party (excuse my ignorance).

It is correct that this is an issue that must be solved. But it is certainly solvable! It “just” needs the listening dtls socket setup correctly. The rest of the logic for receiving the frames is already implemented.

@Mutt

I’m guessing from the name that you will be offering access to the zwave hub via an ip (network) port on the hosting machine

Yes, it could be setup like that. In many cases it will be the same machine.
What it brings to the table is that is does not use the reverse engineered OpenZWave for communication. Instead it uses the official implementation released by SiLabs. This has some benefits and mainly:

• It could support all latest Z-Wave functionality from day one. Since this uses the reference implementation from SiLabs, and no reverse engineering. The current code already supports both S2 and Smart Start.
• It’s the only allowed approach for implementing Z-Wave, if anyone wants the product certified by Z-Wave Alliance. This means that, theoretically, Home Assistant could be Z-Wave certified if using pyzwave.

@Mutt

Edit: the link page talks about the api being subject to nda’s as a proprietary standard. Where will this lead you when the standard is to be opened up later this year/early next

One of the drawbacks is the the Z-Wave USB adapter must be running a specific firmware version, so not all current adapters will work. That’s the comment about NDA. Because it is possible to make it work with any existing adapters but that will require work that I (and the company I work for) cannot release currently. If this may change when Z-Wave becomes fully open source then I will happily release it. And this “add-on” will require that S2 is implemented separately since the software from SiLabs will not be used at all. I hope this makes it clearer?

So:
Using compatible adapter => all bells and whistles will be available.
Using older adapter => all newer functionality must be implemented by the community.

[Mutt (Muttley)]

Thanks a lot clearer.

Would it be possible to provide a list of currently certified adapters ?

Given that you say ip access would be available over ip to a device with a certified adapter attached how would this device look ? Hardware, OS, any software layers, device integration layers ?
I assume costs for such would just be time of the Tinkerer (pun as one of our moderators is called that too)

Thanks in advance

[mickeprag]

@Mutt

Would it be possible to provide a list of currently certified adapters ?

I am not sure that exists currently. That’s up to the community to test, I guess. The firmware for the Z-Wave chip comes in different “flavors”. For Z/IP it needs the one called “Bridge Controller”. Some may have “Static Controller” that will not work (but could be reflashed).

Some more clarification.
Z/IP = Z-Wave over IP. This is a specification from SiLabs on how each Z-Wave node can be accessed over ip.
ZIPGateway = The software from SiLabs that implements Z/IP. This software exposes an API that is accessible over ip. This is what pyzwave connects to.

ZIPGateway could be running on the same machine as HA or it could be running on a separate. This is up to the user but I guess in most cases it will be the same.

ZIPGateway must be running on the same machine as the USB adapter is connected to. ZIPGateway will do the communication with the USB adapter.

I (and pyzwave) is not behind neither Z/IP nor ZIPGateway. Both is what SiLabs offer and the only allowed approach for implementing S2.

[Tinkerer (aka DubhAd on GitHub)]

I know that the zwave.me controllers support bridge mode, and even specify that they support Z/IP.

[marcelveldt (Marcel Van Der Veldt)]

Z-Wave is now implemented in hass by leveraging a python wrapper around OpenZwave, this leads to multiple issues, most important that the python wrapper can’t cope up with changes in the (O)ZW specs. And there’s also usability. The Z-wave mesh takes a little time to start as it needs to interview all nodes. Because OZW is the controller and it’s directly attached to Home Assistant, restarting Home Assistant leads to restarting the Z Wave mesh.

What we want to do is detach the OZW Controller/mesh from Hass and that’s where the OpenZwave Daemon jumps in. It’s maintained by the developers of OpenZwave itself so directly at the source. It “translates” the Z-wave mesh (serial API) to deliver it to connected clients (such as Home Assistant). It uses MQTT as the transport protocol because it’s well known and easy.

So the new Home Assistant implementation is just one of the clients for the OZW Daemon, there will also be a control panel etc. Or attach OZW Daemon directly to other platforms like Node Red.
So you can see this OpenZwave Daemon as an alternative to the Z/IP specification, living in the open source/community world.

Zwave2mqtt is a node wrapper around the OpenZwave library, translating the mesh and it’s devices into MQTT topics. It’s goal is to use MQTT to communicate with Z Wave devices while in the OZW Daemon approach (where we’re working on), MQTT is only used as transport between clients, no translation happened yet.

Z/IP is the closed source approach but would require special hardware/hubs or additional software licensing costs. See it as a proprietary hub and OZW as the opensource software hub. It can also be implemented into Hass, just like other hubs like Hue, vera and such.

To sum it all up:

Current Z-Wave component in Hass: openzwave 1.4, wrapper around ozw. Will most likely be phased out once new implementation(s) are better.

Zwave2mqtt: NodeJS wrapper around OZW libs, very actively maintained and provides full functionality. Translates Z-Wave mesh with all it’s devices to MQTT world, to be used by every platform that understands MQTT, including Home Assistant offcourse.

New Z-Wave component (as discussed in this post): Will be an official homeassistant component to replace the current Z-Wave component and translates Z-Wave mesh/devices into something HomeAssistant can understand. It’s talking to the Z-Wave mesh through the OpenZwave daemon using mqtt as the transport protocol.

Z/IP: Is not supported yet by Home Assistant but in theory the new Home Assistant component should be able to also talk to Z/IP gateways instead of/in addition to the OZW “gateway”.

[Mutt (Muttley)]

@marcelveldt Thanks, that’s very informative.
So I was wrong when I told @zacs 'there was no mqtt in the “HA New Z-wave Implementation” ’
To be honest I’m not sure why it’s there as the MQTT structure doesn’t extend into the mesh (but then it’s a closed proprietary system, so maybe it does ! ) and I suppose any wrapper needs “A” protocol. and mqtt is a common open standard.
Given this, it sounds like the “HA New Z-wave Implementation” will be the one containing the extra layer and the Z-wave2MQTT one ‘more native’ - that is unless mqtt itself is a layer on HA itself so mqtt translated in, processed, and then translated out again.

This is all quite confusing

Given that I generally run “as vanilla as possible” and as the statement by Fishwaldo and others that future ozw upgrades will be modular and transparent, I think I’ll stick with that.
Further, when the standards are ‘opened up’ then there will be ‘something’ put in the ozw slot so it will probably be rewritten as needed or as an ‘official core’ dropped in (with suitable modifications around it to accommodate it).

@Tinkerer given the current explanation of Z/IP, the avoidance of discussing cost and (to be honest) my conceptual usage scenarios … I don’t see what benefits Z/IP would bring me. So again I’ll be taking the vanilla route.

Thanks to all for educating me and the time (and patience) required to do it

[rct]

@marcelveldt - Thank you. This is a very helpful summary (and overview of the alternatives). I think it would be useful if this (or something like it) made it into the HA Z-wave docs at some point.

I have a question about topology:

For the new Home Assistant Z-wave component that uses MQTT as the transport to talk to the OpenZwave Daemon, is an MQTT broker required in the middle between the OpenZwave daemon and HomeAssistant?

(Or will the OpenZwave daemon essentially be it’s own broker to simplify deployment?)

[Tweak3D (Justin Hoover)]

I didn’t see an answer above, but perhaps I just overlooked it. Would there be a possibility of migrating our existing zwave devices to this new configuration or will this require rebuilding our zwave network? I like this idea as this is a common pain for me to deal with, but I also don’t want to rebuild my network again as its always such a PITA to redo everything.

[Molodax (Alex)]

@Mutt

I don’t see what benefits Z/IP would bring me. So again I’ll be taking the vanilla route.

Hopefully, other options will be taken into account too. I see a benefit that Z/IP would bring to me, such as the latest functionality not relying on “reversed engineering” and, also, implementing S2.

[Tinkerer (aka DubhAd on GitHub)]

@rct

is an MQTT broker required in the middle between the OpenZwave daemon and HomeAssistant?

Yes, you’ll need an MQTT broker you run. If you use Hass.io Home Assistant you’ll be able to install the Mosquitto add-on. If you use another install method just install Mosquitto.

[Tinkerer (aka DubhAd on GitHub)]

@Tweak3D

I didn’t see an answer above, but perhaps I just overlooked it. Would there be a possibility of migrating our existing zwave devices to this new configuration or will this require rebuilding our zwave network? I like this idea as this is a common pain for me to deal with, but I also don’t want to rebuild my network again as its always such a PITA to redo everything.

The inclusions are stored on the stick, so as long as you use the same stick there’s no issues. I know the dev is looking at what they can do to migrate all the existing entity_ids so that you don’t have to change anything, but I don’t know what the state of that is.

Worst case, you’ll have to rename some things.

[Tweak3D (Justin Hoover)]

Thats totally tolerable and easy to get a backup of if needed. Thanks for the confirmation.

[teachingbirds (Isabella Gross Alström)]

Anyone have tried and managed to use the set_config_parameter service call? I can’t seem to format it the right way.
Edit: I tried to do something else than what I thought

[marcelveldt (Marcel Van Der Veldt)]

At this time you need to have a MQTT broker already setup but when we move towards official inclusion we will take care of that in some automagic way

[marcelveldt (Marcel Van Der Veldt)]

I think it’s only a matter of time until Z/IP will also be supported. In an ideal world you will have just one Z-Wave component in HomeAssistant and it will take of handling the correct “route” for your situation. Our current route with detaching the hass component from the actual controller is preparation for that…

[JuP]

I am actually glad you guys are working on this and cannot wait to see it released in HA stable. Well done and thank you!

[MYeager1967 (Michael Yeager)]

Is there any chance whatsoever that this will finally support the Enewrwave zwn-sc7 seven button scene controller? It has been supported by Vera for years and it is the only holdout I have for keeping the old Vera Plus running. I would love to finally get everything all under one roof…

[nickrout]

That seems to be up to the openzwave developers. Ask them.

EDIT: which I see you have already done.

[FreelancerJ]

Forgive me if it’s been answered, but I didn’t see as I scrolled through.

Will this new and improved Z-Wave system (working with OpenZWave Daemon), allow us to have the Z-Wave controller on a physically different computer?

I have a Razberry GPIO module set up on a Raspberry Pi 3 in one part of my home, but am running HomeAssistant on a Raspberry Pi 4 in a different area. The Pi 4 has a case on it for cooling and mounting, but while it has a GPIO extender built in to get around the fan and heatsink positioning, I’d rather not have the card poking out into the open, especially with 2 curious cats around

[Tinkerer (aka DubhAd on GitHub)]

Yes.

It communicates over MQTT. The Z-Wave controller can be anywhere on the planet (or off of it, if you have access to a handy space ship) that you have connectivity to.