sequence: swipe left to + add tiles/ hit plus/swipe left to “Template” with HA symbol at top (forgot that picture)/hit that and “Set Template on phone” appears/ long-press and “Edit” comes up along with a plus or minus (minus deletes the tile and plus wants to add an additional tile)/ hit edit "template tile - refresh interval etc screen/ scroll down to "change template in phone settings - no template 1 which is setup in companion app on phone
does the phone app still show 3 template tiles like your last screenshot? if yes please add some random text in the others and check the tile again please
phone app has 3 template tiles still. Don’t know how to delete them. Added a word to template tile 2 and it appears under the first way I showed - through apps/ home assistant/ settings/template tiles/ template tile #2. The problem is it says other crap I don’t want “change template in phone settings BS”. Template tile #1 has the formula/ code and the BS. ChatGPT said to delete the app on the watch (which I just added as I only just purchased the watch) and “use the Beta version of the companion app”
please update all 3 template tiles its quite possible you added 3 and didnt realize it
you delete a tile like you do with any with any other tile by swiping it up to go away, I think your samsung companion app should also let you remove tiles
tahts probably due to the actual tile not having any data and thus a real error.
any reason why you didnt add text to template 3 to test that either?
the beta has no differences in the code with respect to template tile
Added text to tile 2 and it comes up under HA app but not in the add tile. I’ve added and deleted tiles so many times now it isn’t funny. I now have zero tiles on the watch relating to this - deleted them all - but there are TWO template tiles in the companion app on the phone. If I add a template tile by swipe/add/edit/etc it still comes up blank. Here’s the pic on the watch under HA app/settings/template tiles/template tile #2
ok remove all the HA tiles from the watch, then clear data for the HA Wear OS app and force stop the HA phone app. Next login to the app on the watch which will have you use teh phone app, once logged in check to see what template tiles the phone app shows. Maybe something got stuck and needed to be cleared out, the restarts shoudlve fixed it but maybe some data is lingering.
The Wear app depends on the OS to notify us when tiles are added and removed so its possible the IDs got mixed up and needed to be completely reset to be back in sync.
The text underneath the code is generated by the code and will appear on the watch. Mine has two sensor states plus a heading ‘Reservoir’ that I needed to type into the grey box. No need to ‘save’ anything, whatever you put in the code will appear on the tile. If you want more text you need to write it in yourself. It’s pretty basic, no scope for anything interactive AFAIK, all you have are CSS style font and formatting.
Okay - so I broke down and uninstalled Home Assistant from the watch which of course made it lose contact with the companion app on the phone. It still had the server listed even though I cleared cache. Now that I’ve reinstalled it I have access to favorite entities and Template tiles under the server on the companion app (phone). Template tiles says to add a tile on the watch which I did. As expected, if I go to edit there is no data - says the trusty old “change template in phone settings”. I waited awhile and then restarted Home Assistant on the phone and have “Template tile #1” again. I enter “Testing again” (no quotes) and wait awhile. Go back to the tile on the watch and long-press then edit. It says “Template tile”; “Refresh interval: manual”; “Template tile content”; Change template in phone settings"; Testing again (in lighter letters than the rest - what I call “greyed out”)
I don’t know what I can do any differently. It’s misleading saying change the settings on the phone - if they mean change the template code. There are no settings under the companion app and definitely aren’t any for the watch server - only favorite entities and template tiles. Template tiles has nothing except the grey box to enter text or code. It would be so much simpler if I could choose a sensor as a favorite.
I’d still like to know what’s preventing me from doing something that apparently should be much easier, but while messing with the watch face I found out I can use sensor state in a complication. I chose my alarm panel and it shows current state which is what I’ve been trying to do all along just in a tile and preferably along with other entities in the template. Thanks to both of you for the help; I’m accustomed to things that work for other people not working for me. Cursed I guess.
But those are the settings. You have entered “Testing again” as text in the companion app and it’s shown up on the watch (in grey - it will be white on the tile itself). If you want a sensor value it needs to be in Jinja code. If you want to be able to press something on the watch it needs to be on the favourites tile as an icon.
template tile is what you want. How is that misleading? You added a template tile and so you configure it on the phone. The reason for the phone requirement is simply the watch keyboard lacks required keys for templates like: {
Step 1: Add template tile to watchface
Step 2: Open phone app and template Settings > companion app > wear os > template tile > Add to desired template
Step 3: profit
It would be less misleading if it just said “change on phone” or change template in phone" without saying “settings”. You think " (in grey - it will be white on the tile itself)". Here’s a picture I posted of the tile on the watch:
This is what it looked like when everything was done on the phone and the tile was on the watch. It remained that way until I updated the OS on the watch (which I just purchased). I tried updating when I first got it but found there is a trick to the Samsung watch update. You have to disconnect from the phone and turn off Bluetooth and turn on wifi. After I updated I swiped to the tile and the “settings…” messages were gone. I went back to the template tiles on the phone and changed to the states code but when I went back to the watch tile it just had the code, not the rendering. I deleted the tile and re-added - went back to the phone and the original tile was blank - re-entered the code - went to the watch tile and it showed the expected output. Restarting watch and companion app (many times) didn’t do this yesterday. So something in the old OS version wasn’t allowing the correct template tile transfer (?)
In any case, it’s working now exactly as you described originally and I expected to work the way I followed what you said. Thanks for your help and patience.
First of all thank you for help and patience. It turned out my “new” watch needed an OS update - or possibly had something wrong in the old OS that was repaired when I updated it. Not sure if you can see my response to gda1 that explains it in more detail. I see your point about the sensors - they are a majority of my Home Assistant entities too.
The tile is now working as expected; I didn’t do anything different - updating OS changed what the tile said (eliminated the “settings…” prompt.
ah yes thats an old trick from Wear OS first started, still works on the pixel watches too.
The app depends on Google services to communicate between phone and app, i think its reasonable to expect all things to be updated for feature to work properly.
I’m still learning. It took a day before I Googled to find out about the update “issue”. I had tried updating a dozen times and got a “couldn’t copy the software update to your watch”. Seems there was a lot of people with this “problem” - not just me for a change LOL. It took hours to do all the updates since I have the Watch 4; not sure what it had when I got it but it’s on OS 5 now. I’ll check for updates again in awhile. OS 5 changed the watch face I used slightly - don’t like it. Overall I’m impressed with the Home Assistant app on the watch - especially now that the Template tiles are working correctly. It would have been enough to have access to entities and narrow it to favorites. I can save the monotonous task of taking my phone out of my pocket, unlocking it, opening the HA companion app, and pressing a button to do something. Now I can tap my watch, tap HA complication and tap a favorite. Saves a second or two LOL.
Last update has One UI 6.0 and Wear OS 5.0 so miles ahead of what it started with. I’m happy so far. But I’m back with another question. I looked in the companion app / Wear OS docs. It covers the template tiles (which is working for me now) and honestly beside the “settings” terminology was easy. If I had updated the watch I probably wouldn’t have even been here asking about them. Now it works just like I thought: add tile x on watch - template tile #x appears under companion app/ template tiles - modify code there - magically appears on watch tile x.
I was expecting the shortcuts tile to do something similar. I added a shotcuts tile to the watch but don’t know what to do (where it’s at) on the phone. I only have favorite entities and template tiles under the Wear OS settings on the phone - WOW it DOES say “settings”. I know there are shortcuts in the main companion app interface and I have some but I know that’s different.
I saw your answer to my “problem” in a GitHub thread just now. I had the shortcut tile on the watch but also had “show only favorites” selected in settings. Adding shortcuts now - thanks again
