I am new here and am evaluating home automation software such as openhab and home assistant (any other major contenders out there?)
I am currently just wondering what use this kind of software has?
The reason I am asking is that we all have smart devices, majorly the commercial ones such as logitech remote, philips hue lights, wemo switches etc and they all come with their own software/ apps for managing them.
So, what is the point of home automation software such as home assistant?
Is it just the potential of consolidating the management software for each device into one dashboard?
What I like in particular about HASS is the ability to combine multiple platforms of smart devices. I use a combination of X10, Cree, Z-wave, and Zigbee devices as well as cameras, servers, media players, and remotes. There may be other platforms out there that I have not come across but HASS so far has incorporated everything I have/need. I can purchase devices based on features & price and know that I can use it with HASS.
But, an additional thought: I see a lot of people in this forum that are working hard to get things to look the way they want them to in the HASS UI. I feel like if I need to touch the UI, I’ve kinda failed. I focus on home automation, not remote control. Lights adjust based on sunrise/sunset and presence detection. Or based on motion (lights come on dim if I go downstairs at night and all the lights are turned off). Or based on other things that can be detected (don’t assume I’ve gone to bed and turn off all of the lights if you can ping the TV - that means I’m up late watching TV). That kind of stuff. If I do need remote control (turn on the TV or a specific light), I might fall back to Alexa voice commands or just make it so that someone can use a switch (rather than a button on their phone).
Home Assistant lets me build rules that act as the glue to talk to and respond to all of the “smart” items in my house.
I use a combination in my home. I have multiple Echo devices throughout the house for easy voice control but then have a couple of tablets mounted with the HASS interface for direct interaction and various other read-outs (weather, presence, device statuses).
I only have a half-dozen or so true automations at this time but they are building slowly.
I envy you guys for being able to dig so deep into home automation.
I am jsut renting apartments and the freedom available to change stuff into “smart” is very limited.
I’d love to have sensors in place for light switching but the light sockets do not allow me to use standard e27 sockets.
I’d love to use a smart thermostat but my landlords thermostat is not compatible with nest or others
I’d love to use a ip camera but i already have an alarm system for the apartment
I’d love to have a smart lock by my landlord would not change the locks because of that.
so much cool stuff for “smartifying” the phone but not available for me to use…
So I end up having smart light for night stands and the TV and power switches of devices that actually are able to be switched by power on and off (most lamps only have a trigger button instead of a on/off switch)
making a switch is nice.
but i find it a lot nicer to be able to turn on and off all kind off lights, heating, motion detectors, and other stuff from 1 point in the room (tablet besides the door) or a mobile then running around the house to let it do what i want.
its nice to have a nightswitch what turns off everything. i can make a switch for that in my bedroom. even 2 which can be reached from both my wife and me, but what if i want to sleep on the coach. or when i have guests who want to stay awake and i are going to sleep?
Yep, you are in a tough spot there. I guess it’s one of the benefits that comes with that 30 year mortgage . My goal is to have my house think for me. One example I gave earlier was to have my indoor and outdoor Christmas lights turn on at sunset. But if it’s raining, I want my outdoor lights to turn off. Something about electricity and water I really don’t like. It takes input from a “sun tracking” component that comes with HA, my z-wave components that control my sockets, and the weather underground component to tell me if it’s raining currently (rain fall in last hour) to do this. Last night one of my kids decided to print out his English paper on my wife’s printer which is in our bedroom, at 12:30 in the morning. I got up and took it upstairs to him. As we were walking down, he turned on the stairway lights and we were greeted by a nice warm red glow. Because it was after 22:30 (I think) and before 5:00 AM, the lights came on red instead of white. I didn’t even think about it when he turned on, in fact I had forgotten all about it and was bracing myself for a blinding flash of white light. That’s the kind of benefit I see from it right now.
Rene Tode, That’s very true. I’m going to be seeing how the “guest” thing works the Christmas when my son comes home and has to deal with his room that I have been using as an experiment room for the past couple of months. It might be funny to watch.
When I started with HA, this was my initial take on it - a cool interface.
But as I really thought about it and started to get better at combining devices and writing automations, I took your route. To me, triggering things is great for showing off to visitors. But to make the home truly “smart”, it’s all about the automation. Making the home predictive and reactive to conditions rather than just responsive.
HomeAssistant makes this possible not only by providing a uniform interface to dissimilar devices and platforms but also through it’s framework, templating structure and API. With it, most of what I can realize can be accomplished.
But I also need to make the comment that without this community, nothing would be possible. Out of all of the open source projects I’ve ever been part of, this is the most active, friendly and helpful community and one of the reasons I spend so much time trying to give back.
for me yes. And is not “just” … its a huge thing to have, very powerful.
It makes you free from single manufacturer: for example you can control with a switch from Xiaomi a lightbulb from philips, a doorlock from august, a chromecast from google, a tv from samsung … and so on … and in any combination you want
And everything (thanks to home assistant) you can control from Alexa or Google Home with voice.
Unfortunately many of the vendors have in my opinion over utilized the cloud. It’s today’s buzz word and everyone wants to jump on board. As a result much of the logic around the devices is stored in the cloud. Wink seems to have gotten the message and moved “some” of their processing back down into the hub, others have not. Home Assistant with a Z-Stick allows you to replace much of what wink does for you. But, while Home Assistant is a wonderful product and I could not imagine doing what I am with home automation without it, it is a work in progress. Integrating devices into it is not as easy as it is with wink and is subject to the occasional burp when a new release comes out. For that reason I continue to utilize wink as my primary “hub” even though this means that at times, things may not work because of internet failure. I use Home Assistant and AppDaemon as my automation engine, and will be using the HADashboard as my primary user interface for my family as soon as I get time to figure out some nagging issues on my side.
(or they are like hass 
)
It might be funny to watch.